by Paul Kavanagh
ON A SUNDAY afternoon at the end of May, I was driving to one of the many yes meetings which are springing up all over Scotland like daisies in a springtime field. On BBC Radio 4, Sarah Smith, the Corporation’s main reporter on Scottish affairs, was explaining the developments in the independence movement for a UK-wide audience. Tens of thousands of people marching and rallying in Glasgow can’t be ignored, even by those far from Scotland. Of course Sarah’s report didn’t include anyone from the yes movement, instead what we got was the official view from the lofty heights of the British establishment. That official view is of course a variation on the theme of move along, there’s nothing to see here. It’s just a blip, according to the BBC. Sarah was there to reassure middle England that the recent surge in activity in the yes movement is just so much Scottish sound and fury which signifies nothing.
It was of course entirely predictable that Sarah Smith’s report was couched in the usual language employed by the UK media when reporting the independence movement. Naturally we got the divisive klaxon. The British nationalist media loves telling us how divisive independence is. The yes movement has divided Scotland, making it unsafe for poor wee smoothy British nationalists to sound of in the golf club about how rubbish Scotland is without being contradicted. There was a time, not too long ago, when anyone could opine about how inadequate Scotland was and it was taken as simple common sense. British nationalism is upset that it no longer gets to define the narrative.