Do the Scots REALLY want Independance?

[DaveinGermany]

In response to "Guinness" Yep, the English do have a very chequered past but then again so do many other European Nations, Belgian Congo, Dutch East Indies, Spanish conquest of South America, French & Germans in Africa the list goes on & back into the 15/1600's up to present day.

"Slave Labour" would've been used as that was the easiest option(not only by us), instead of carting Navvies & Artisans all over the globe they used what was available & despite what you maintain I don't believe all were treated with disrespect & an iron rod of discipline.

Your points are valid but at the time of conquest & Empire that was the way of the world. We apparently live now in an "enlightened society" so how can you justify the continuance in certain areas of the world today this behaviour continuing ? Not by us but those who argued & fought for their independence from the likes of us & the other great Nations ?

What we left behind in most cases was a functioning & organized society which in some lands have gone to the wall, so what does that tell you about the bogeymen & who they are ? If we are no longer there how may we be held accountable ? I see by your Avatar & site name you display symbols that represent Ireland, is this in part the reason for your view on the matter ?

British Troops have to all intents & purposes been drawn away from Ireland & everything that their presence entailed, yet as recently as last week we saw a return to the dark days of the 70's-90's, This one you can't blame on us, so who are the bad guys ?

[Gordon Booth]

Guinness,however you measure it we were the most benign colonists of that age or any earlier one.Of course we put in the systems for our benefit but they didn't have them before and they had when we left!
We DIDN'T use slave labour-we were the first nation to abolish it in 1834.They weren't well paid by modern standards but they WERE paid and a lot of them are worse paid now,after 'freedom'.
Of course we sided with the stronger tribes,we weren't idiots, we were there to win.And we NEVER practised ethnic extermination(possibly because it didn't make good economic sense?)
In 1904 the general over the German army in Namibia instructed his army'Any Herero found within these German borders will be shot.No prisoners will be taken.That is my decision'.This was official government policy and it included women and children.Those they couldn't shoot they drove into the Kalahari desert to die,having first poisoned the few wells there were.About 22,000 died out there.His aim was to clear the land for the German people.Ring a bell?Any they missed killing were put concentration cams and WORKED and starved to death.Oh yes, and they had a German geneticist experimenting on them to prove Aryan supremacy-a lot of their skulls were still in Germany till quite recently.Ring another bell?
We established the concentration camps in the Boer War to contain them,not to eliminate them.Yes,they were badly and cruelly run and many died but at least there was a massive outcry from the British at home and things were changed.
The Africaaners-we let them run the country,the Irish were given independance(after a slight argument) and the treatment of the American Indians was carried out by an American government long after we had gone.The aborigines-I'll have to think about that,but we didn't exterminate them.
As for the David Niven film-made by American studios who are still spouting anti-British drivel-see the Mel Gibson films.According to their films it was 'our American boys' who bombed the Ruhr ??And John Wayne won the war,we didn't have anything to do with it.

Many things we did were wrong by modern standards but NOT by the standards of the day. As empires go we didn't do too badly and no PC crawling should be allowed to give the lie to that.

[Gordon Booth]

DaveinGermany, I've just spent ages one finger typing that lot and find you beat me to it on almost every point.Sorry about that,I'll rest my finger for a bit.

[Guinness]

You got me wrong guys, I was simply pointing out the errors in historical fact that Gordon had posted.

Like I said..history is history, the fact that I'm Irish (and proud of it) does not mean I bear a grudge, why would I, England has done nothing to me, it provides me with a job, a wife (hmmm...questionable), and a good quality of life.

Yes of course other colonising countries used the same methods, I totally agree. You only have to read up on what Pizarro and Cortez did.

And yes, William Wilberforce was a major player in aboloshing slavery, that doesn't preclude the fact that slavery was supported and encouraged by the British Empire for a number of years.

Regarding the Afrikaan concentration camps, again I was pointing out an inaccuracy about the British Empire 'NEVER' participating in ethnic cleansing. I agree with Gordon that they cleaned up their act when the British public found out, my point is they did it first! I agree they were set up to contain the Boers, but that does not excuse the fact that women and children were incarcerated and forgotten about until they died. Ask any German (and I'm sure Dave has) how they feel about concentration camps and I'm sure they would be as disgusted now as the British public were then. All I'm clumsily trying to say is that the British Empire, although necessary for the age, was not such a wonderful thing, and should not be looked at through rose tinted spectacles.

I dont dispute Namibia or the atrocities, or the 'no prisoners' by the german General, but then again T.E.Lawrence in his book Seven Pillars of Wisdom relates of an event when he did exactly the same thing. As for the inhuman experiments carried out there, who can say what would have happened in those Boer camps had the technology, idealism and knowledge been available.

And the film was written and directed by two Englishmen.

[Gordon Booth]

Actually,Guinness, if you check back you'll find the British DIDN'T do it first.The term 'concentration camp' meant just that- to concentrate the Boers in controlled areas. The results were wrong until civilian control was installed at the insistance of the British government, when the death rate dropped to about 2%,not bad even for the population of London in those days.They were NEVER extermination camps!
The Americans, those pillars of freedom and democracy,beat us to it by about 66 years when they imprisoned the Indian tribes(I think it was the Cherokee) in camps,murdered and raped many of them and intentionally let many starve to death.They did the same in the Philippine war of independance in 1899,same results.Other did the same.

As for the film,whoever wrote and directed it,where was it made?

[Gordon Booth]

You're right, Guinniss, the film WAS British,made to improve British opinion and sympathy towards American personnel here during the war.
But wern't the hostile comments about the British Empire actually made by the American prosecutor, who hated the British because he was killed by them during the American Revolution?
We've wandered a bit again from the thread,still it's fun.

[Guinness]

Totally agree, the camps set up in the Transvaal were simply concentration camps (before the term was bastardised by the nazis), however the camps were also used to house, believe it or not, jews in the area. My original point was to debate that Hitler got his ideas of concentrating his enemies into one area from the British and not from what happened in Namibia.

As an aside, I read a book written by an Auschwitz survivor, (been wracking my brains for the last 20 minutes but I cant recall the title), a few years ago, he described building the ovens after he arrived, apparently Hitler only thought of 'the final solution' as an afterthought (chilling when you think about it), so even Auschwitz wasn't an 'extermination' camp' per se either

And as for rape, pillage and murder, Pizarro and Cortez have the yanks beat hands down by a number of years.

I believe you are right about the prosecutor, he was someone who was killed in the American war of indepence if I recall correctly. Cant see how it was a pro-US film though, I know the female lead was a Yank but cant recall ay other Americans in it apart from the prosecutor

[Gordon Booth]

Pizzaro and Cortes didn't have to exterminate the Indians-European diseases,smallpox mainly, did it for them.They died like flies. I still put the Yanks among the first to actually organise it in an age when we were suppost to be becoming more civilised.

[Mancie]

Just had a quick read of the posts and is obvious is it's more like us english wanting to get rid of the Scots because they apparently take more dosh than they put in.
Scotland joined the union because they were skint.. nowt to do with wars.. they joined and accepted Westminster as the hub of power because they agreed to a hefty financial package way back in the 18th century....if I was a Scot I'd vote to leave England to it's demise.. England is about to be destroyed by this Government and if the Scots are "canny" as they make, out the time to leave the Union is now .

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by Mancie

Just had a quick read of the posts and is obvious is it's more like us english wanting to get rid of the Scots because they apparently take more dosh than they put in.
Scotland joined the union because they were skint.. nowt to do with wars.. they joined and accepted Westminster as the hub of power because they agreed to a hefty financial package way back in the 18th century....if I was a Scot I'd vote to leave England to it's demise.. England is about to be destroyed by this Government and if the Scots are "canny" as they make, out the time to leave the Union is now .

No Mancie this country has already been destroyed over the last 13 yeas but sadly your the only one who can't see it

[cashman]

Originally Posted by Mancie

. England is about to be destroyed by this Government and if the Scots are "canny" as they make, out the time to leave the Union is now .

Mancie.....wake up, England was knackered before "This Lot" were elected, granted i don't think they will improve things much if any, but wake up n smell the coffee, it was already destroyed.

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by cashman

Mancie.....wake up, England was knackered before "This Lot" were elected, granted i don't think they will improve things much if any, but wake up n smell the coffee, it was already destroyed.

The Far Left and the Far Right speaking in unison

[Guinness]

And the Scots come up with a health brainwave...lets tax supermarkets for selling fags...we'll make £110 million in 4 years...

BBC News - Six Scottish Sainsbury's supermarkets end cigarette sales

result..supermarkets stop selling fags...government get zilch...job losses ensue (wholesalers, distributors and even the guys on the kiosks)...meanwhile your average Rob Roy continues smoking his roll ups bought in the corner shop or more likely from a mate who's just got back from Benidorm.

Many others can even skip across the border and buy from an English supermaket.

Please hurry up and devolve, this kind of inane nanny state politics is contagious

[Neil]

Have they set up border checks to make sure no is smuggling English supermarket fags across the border?

[gynn]

If you take away Alex Salmond, who else can you think of who is keeping the Scottish Independence issue on the boil? Anyone name another SNP member off the top of their heads? Anyone name a Member of the Scottish Parliament speaking against Independence?

Strikes me that if you take away Salmond, you take away the Scottish Independence debate. His personality has secured Westminster's agreement to a referendum.

Seems a daft basis on which to base the future prosperity of a nation.