Wrongthink

When you hear someone talking about Westminster not granting a referendum you know you're not listening to someone who is serious about restoring Scotland's independence. Those who are serious about Scotland's cause know that Westminster has no legitimate role in the process by which our independence will be restored. People who are serious about the constitutional issue regard as irrelevant what Westminster will or will not grant. We know that independence has to be taken regardless of the preferences of the coloniser.

After nearly eleven years in which Scotland's cause has made no progress whatever, it is surely clear to all bar mindless party loyalists that the nominally pro-independence parties are failing to do what is required. But this needs to be explained. Why are these politicians and parties failing to progress Scotland's cause? Why are they not doing what is required? How can they fail to recognise their own failure when it is so plainly evident to everyone else? Except those mindless party loyalists, of course.

How can these politicians and parties remain convinced that their approach to the constitutional issue is the right one when that approach has achieved absolutely nothing since 2014?

It can only be that they are thinking about the issue wrongly. If you misidentify the problem or misapprehend the situation that provides the context for that problem. then your solutions are unlikely to be effective and might even be harmful. If you think about the matter wrongly, it is surely inevitable that your approach to addressing the matter will be wrong.

It can hardly be disputed (except by, you know who) that the approach to the constitutional issue taken by the nominally pro-independence parties is ineffective. Which strongly suggests that their thinking on the issue is all wrong. The issue they are addressing is not the issue that confronts us. They are attempting to deal with a different problem in a different set of circumstance. It is hardly surprising, therefor, that their attitude appears odd and inexplicable to the increasing number of people who have engaged with the new thinking on the independence issue. As more and more people come to recognise Scotland's true situation as the annexed territory of England-Britain, the nominally pro-independence parties and politicians are bound to seem more and more out of step - not only with the independence movement, but with reality.

I can suggest two reasons for this 'wrongthink' on the part of the likes of John Swinney (above left), Neale Hanvey (above right), and Kenny MacAskill. The first is - to the surprise of nobody - the colonised condition of their minds. The colonised mind has internalised an attitude of cultural inferiority - a belief that the values, attitudes, and priorities of the coloniser are inherently superior.

The colonised mind comes to rationalise its colonisation. To accept that the reality imposed or inculcated by the coloniser is normality. To embrace it as the reality that must be subscribed to. To adopt it as the standard to which everything must conform.

The colonised mind ls persuaded that however unsatisfactory its condition may be, that condition is a fact of life with which lt must cope - or be deemed to have failed. It simply does not occur to the colonised mind that things might be changed absent the consent and cooperation of the coloniser. Acting without that consent and cooperation is quite literally, unthinkable.

All our minds are colonised to a greater or lesser degree. It is impossible to be born and raised in Scotland without your mind being colonised. After more than three centuries of annexation, colonisation of the mind just happens. It is no longer an overt process. All the machinery of colonisation - particularly education and media - are deeply embedded in our society. We are participants and perpetrators in our own colonisation. The colonised mind condition is contagious. A mind very thoroughly colonised contaminates every mind with which it has contact. Colonised minds contribute to the process of colonising minds.

Which all sounds as if there is no escape from this condition. There is. People begin to decolonise their minds when they start to question the superiority of the values, attitudes, and priorities of the coloniser that have been inculcated into their minds. The colonised mind defers to Westminster, for example. The mind in the process of decolonisation asks why we defer to Westminster. The decolonised mind regards deference to Westminster as something almost obscene.

The nominally pro-independence parties are led by people whose minds remain completely and stubbornly colonised - as evidenced by their deference to Westminster. Whether people in this condition are particularly drawn to a career in politics, or whether being a career politician 'solidifies' the colonisation of the mind and makes decolonisation more difficult, I cannot say. Probably a bit of both. People attracted to the idea of political power are likely to be very self-confident and egotistical. The very kind of people who are not given to admitting mistakes. People who don't change their minds easily or often. Decolonisation of the mind is more problematic in cases where the individual is disinclined to question their own assumptions and preconception. They may even be highly averse to doing so. Without this initial questioning, the decolonisation process cannot begin.

Also, these nominally pro-independence politicians and parties are thoroughly captured by the British political system. a system which actively discourages admissions of error and changes of mind for any reason other than political expediency. See the reaction when backbenchers rebel against their leaders on a matter of principle or a question of conscience. They are treated like heretics by other politicians. Especially those in their own party.

The nominally pro-independence parties having been captured by the British political system is the second explanation for the 'wrongthink' on the constitutional issue.

Party politics is ideally a battle of ideas and principles. The British political system abandoned any pretence of striving for this ideal half a century ago or more. It is now solely about the numbers. Number of members. Number of votes. Number of seats. Number of pounds in the bank. Politicians are puppets to the numbers. They are either striving to get the numbers up or dreading the numbers going down. They will say and do whatever they are told they must say and do in order to increase the numbers. They have nightmares about being blamed for the numbers going down. They lie and make false promises to boost the numbers, then they prevaricate, procrastinate, and obfuscate rather than risk doing anything that might tip the numbers the other way.

This is the mindset towards which all politicians will gravitate when captured by the British political system. However strongly committed to causes and principles they may be initially, in time their thinking comes to be dominated by consideration of numbers. It's not that the individual ceases to believe in the cause or adhere to the principle. It's just that these things are superseded by what is considered politically expedient.

When cause and principle are deprioritised, it becomes easier for partisan advantage and personal ambition to influence thinking. Cause and principle are the flukes of the anchor. When the anchor chain is broken, the politician is adrift and susceptible to all the eddies and currents of the political sea.

We see this all too clearly when we look at John Swinney. He is not alone, of course. But he is First Minister of Scotland and leader of the supposed 'party of independence'. He is the de facto head of the independence movement. More than any other individual, Swinney is the embodiment of the independence cause and the personification of the principles which underpin that cause. It follows that the way he thinks about the constitutional issue matters a great deal. The way he thinks directly impacts Scotland's cause because the way he thinks informs the way he acts. It determines what he supposes is an appropriate approach to fighting for that cause. If his thinking is wrong, so is the approach he adopts.

The SNP being the dominant (nominally) pro-independence party, the 'wrongthink' of its leadership inevitably infects a large part of the independence movement. To a considerable extent, the way the leadership thinks about the constitutional issue becomes the way the movement thinks. To an even greater extent, the approach - the strategy and tactics - approved by the SNP leadership becomes the approach adopted by the movement. This necessarily leads to conflict between those who toe the 'official' line and those who dissent because they have begun the process of decolonising their minds and see the 'wrongthink' of the party leadership.

I stress yet again that this doesn't just apply to the SNP. The other nominally pro-independence parties are just as bad. Scotland's entire political elite is afflicted with the same 'wrongthink'. These parties - particularly Alba - try very hard to present themselves as different from and as an 'alternative' to the SNP. But the differences are superficial at best and their approach to the constitutional issue is blighted by the same 'wrongthink' as has taken the SNP so far adrift from the route to independence.

I was considering how to end this article without getting into an exploration of this 'wrongthink' which would make it overlong. Then I recalled an exchange I came across on Facebook this morning. It very clearly demonstrates the clash between a mind well on its way to decolonisation and one which has yet to take the first step on that journey. I'll end with a screenshot of that exchange followed by my own response.

The notion that we should not begin the fight unless it is already won is just as daft as it sounds when you say it out loud. Mindless SNP loyalists would have us all be as timorous and hyper-cautious as their dear leader.

It doesn't occur to these fools that the reason their party has failed so abysmally to progress Scotland's cause for nearly eleven fucking years is that they are not talking the language that people need to hear. People need to be enthused. They need to be inspired. They need to be provoked. They need to hear determination, net hesitation. They need to hear confidence, not caution. They need to hear anger, not appeasement.

The needle will start to move on the Yes-meter when we push it, not before. People will come to the independence movement when we look as if we mean it. They will back independence when they are given a reason to believe it can and will be done.

Alison is right. Westminster has no role in the exercise by the people of Scotland of our right of self-determination. The 'self' in 'self-determination' refers only to the people of Scotland. That our political leaders not only give Westminster a role but a veto on our human right of self-determination is an act of treachery.

Don't you dare pour cold water on that fire! You kill that fire, you kill Scotland's cause. Dumb party loyalists have done too much harm already by enabling the self-serving cowards who are betraying the independence movement and the people of Scotland. We need more fire and far fewer people putting party and personality before cause and country.