Why did Scotland mostly vote Remain?

Your arse. That statement tells us quite the opposite, and indeed it's a rational expectation: groups don't tend to get poorer in isolation, societies do. It's a luxury of the comfortable and the mobile that they can sit and talk about how lovely something would be, without worrying too much about the consequences.

"Scotland" will never be able to make decisions, only individuals within it in a democracy. Just like we have now.

I know enough about the sort of people who come out with that sort of thoughtless nonsense.

Like I said, in the last 15 years, Scotland's deficit has been proportionately smaller than the UK's in two or three years based on how you measure it.

Scotland did well throughout much of the 1980s. So, incidentally, did the rest of the UK. But I don't think positions from three decades ago are particularly helpful in informing a view of Scotland's fiscal balance now and in the future.

You do seem to accept my position - hell, I'm doing little more than quoting the GERS figures that you have quoted back at me. That's at least some common ground.



Erm, you've just linked me to two reports. GERS 2010-11 and GERS 2011-12. They say

2010-11: Total revenue (geographic North Sea): £53,128 million.Total expenditure: £63,807 million.

GERS 2011-12: Total revenue (geographic North Sea): £56,871 million.Total expenditure: £64,457 million.

That's literally the opposite of what you said they say.



I suppose this is the distinction: nationalism. You don't seem to have any problem with political variation, except when it is attached to being a "country". You might as well have just said "I think Scotland should be independent because it is a country" from the outset.

You attach all-important significance to your belief that Scotland is a "country" and therefore not only can be but must be politically recognised. I do not believe that what are essentially cultural entities have significance in politics, just as I believe politics should be distanced from questions of religion, ethnicity or any other of the plethora of what comes under the banner of "identity politics".

I won't agree with you that democracy is tied to that. You may as well argue that political decisions are illegitimate unless agreed by every racial group in a political entity, or every faith, or people of both genders. Democracy is fairly straightforward though: the people rule, one person one vote. Collections of people do not have views, individuals do, and that is how they should be represented.

I don't claim the UK is undemocratic, merely that the current system of democracy consistently ignores the will of the Scottish people to the extent that I, and many others, believe Scotland needs to be independent to give its people a reasonable democratic level of control of their own futures.

I'm sure Scotland will be pleased to know what it must share viewpoints between the Lothians and the Kingdom of Strathclyde then. Or that the US should collapse if the California Republic votes a different way from the Republic of Texas.

It's political viewpoints that the issue here is really with. In terms of ideology and questions of policy, Scotland and the rest of the UK are consistently shown to be extremely similar when they are polled.

I think a divergence of political opinion is healthy and entirely normal in a democratic country. Indeed, without geographical divergence, the UK would be a one-party state.



No, I think you're opposed to democracy. Democracy is one person, one vote. It doesn't recognise the "will" of minorities, it recognises the will of the single majority on any given issue. If it fails to do that, it is not democracy.

Yes but those same GERS firgures say that Scotland's total public sector revenue was 9.9% of total UK revenue and total expenditure was equivalent to 9.3% of total UK expenditure (2011/12 but similar in 2010/11). I'm not really sure why these figures seem to contradict the figures in billions- i assume it's something to do with the deficit? The UK is obviously spending more than it's making in general, Scotland too, so in billions we are going to be negative. In % terms it looks much better. I'm not an economist- I'm sure you've gathered! Anyway, you're right, it makes absolutely no difference now!

The differences between Scotland and rUK are not only cultural. Culturally we are very similar. The main differences are political. For example, Scotland is left leaning, as the results of many general elections have illustrated, and going by Thursdays result Scotland is clearly more europhilic.

We have always been separate nations and it's no surprise that individuals within these nations identify strongly with that. However, If we were politically similar, I honestly would have no notion to argue for independence- what would be the point? I, alongside MANY other Scottish people, resent feeling powerless. England is too big and Scotland is too small. You could argue that someone from the North of England who is typically left leaning could feel the same, however, there is no appetite there to break away because they undoubtedly identify with being English. So for me, being a Scottish person; I feel that it is undemocratic that Scottish people voted to remain with the EU but will be pulled out. I understand why you disagree with this. Perhaps it would be easier if all of us from the UK identified solely with being British, but for various reasons that is not the case.

After all, politics has very little to do with identity. People tend to have much the same basic political needs and desires - but dispute how to achieve them.

That is only true within homogeneous nation-states. Non-national states do tend to have bloc voting and a political trajectory dominated by birth rates rather than public intellectuals.

My argument against Scottish independence would be that Scotland and Britain simply don't have significantly different lifestyles or ideas compared to other countries; they are regional cultures within one nation. The same is true of Australia and Britain of course - I don't doubt that Scotland could thrive outside the UK - but I also see no real advantage to trying to do so while recognising that it would weaken both countries politically.

The SNP is trying to propose a contradictory notion, that Europe-except-England is a nation and England is a separate nation. My experience from my travels is that this is untrue, an ideological delusion held by people for whom continental Europe is an imaginary land onto which they project attributes they regard as positive. That in fact Scotland (and Ireland) are extremely similar to England and quite different from France or Germany let alone Italy or Greece.

But, against everything Boris and Nigel might tell you, joining the EU is not surrendering all democracy. Scotland doesn't need to be as closely aligned with Europe to justify being in the EU as they do with rUK to justify remaining in the UK.

Just as few Leave voters would accept EU law on the basis of the views being "not too dissimilar", few independence voters would accept the same justification for not leaving the UK.

As a very basic example, over the last decade or so rUK and Scotland overwhelmingly want different governments and different outcomes in referendums.