Undecided Scot decides

I still don’t know how I’ll vote in autumn 2014. But a few days ago, one thing at least was made definite for me: the Better Together vote is going to win. I’m certain enough of that to lay a bet on it, if I were the gambling sort.

What made me so sure?

It’s not just that the SNP are saying blithely that Independence Day will be March 2016, though that is a highly-unrealistic timescale. (It’s also not a binding decision.)

On 11th May I predicted, correctly, that Barack Obama was going to be a two-term President. My certainty was founded in Obama’s own sense of political security: that’s when Obama opted to come out for repealing DOMA and in support of lifting the ban on same-sex marriage recognition: for gay marriage.

For the most part, there are two sorts of politicians who come out for LGBT equality: the very principled, who will stand up for what’s right regardless of what this does to their future career, and the very confident, who are sure of their future career regardless of what they say. Barack Obama is not the first sort of politician (that sort doesn’t become President of the United States) but he is superb at the job of getting elected. I was sure Obama was going to win.

I’m now sure that the SNP leadership is certain they won’t win the referendum in 2014: they can set a date of March 2016 for independence because that’s not in their plans. They can separate off the “Yes Scotland” campaign as officially not-really SNP, and the morning after the votes are counted and the result is published, the SNP can move on with their plans for contesting Scottish seats in the May 2015 Westminster election.

On 2013

Things that will happen in 2013:

• It’s a beautiful morning in Edinburgh today: the sun is shining. It’s cold but not too cold. The weather in 2013 will be terrible with consequent knock-on effects on harvests and food supply. This in combination with legalised gambling on the price of food will mean food prices will be even higher by the end of 2013 than the beginning.

The Christmas Message

This year the Archbishop of Westminster, the leader of the Catholics in England and Wales, took the opportunity of his bully pulpit on Christmas Eve to tell his congregation that God hates LGBT people and does not want us to have equal civil rights. Peace and goodwill to all is so outdated: modern Christians are expected to hate as directed.

Vincent Nichols

told worshippers that the Government has no mandate for the change and had not followed the proper rules of British democracy.

“There was no announcement in any party manifesto, no Green Paper, no statement in the Queen’s Speech. And yet here we are on the verge of primary legislation,” he said.

In an apparent reference to the totalitarian state described in the novel 1984, he added:

“From a democratic point-of-view, it’s a shambles. George Orwell would be proud of that manoeuvre, I think the process is shambolic.”

Nichols told lots of lies about the lack of public support for equal marriage, but his key objection is – he claims – that in England & Wales, this was not done properly.

Gandalf for the Firth

This is a bit of a story, so have patience.

Kreetch is a fan of The Hobbit: as am I. Due to her shift-patterns, it was impossible for us to go any earlier that Sunday 23rd December, so I booked two seats in the Dominion Cinema, Gold 1 (because she’s worth it) for the 3.20pm showing.

The Dominion is described as “Edinburgh’s most unique and luxurious cinema”. Gold 1 isn’t quite as snazzy as Gold 4, but you get utterly comfy seats in a gorgeous building in Newbattle Terrace that’ll remind you of what cinemas used to be like before they went multiscreen and boxy. (Facebook has some photos.)

Matron of honour, Cristina Odone

Cristina Odone’s week: how many ways can you be smugly disapproving about religion, marriage, and gays being religious and wanting to be married if you try with both hands?

Cristina Odone on Monday, how appalling it would be if gay people thought they could be married just like us!:

I resent the way Cameron is ready to bulldoze over Tory and religious objections on this issue. It’s clear from his arrogant stance that the PM believes soon, even this bunch of hypocrites will embrace the Gospel according to Dave. They – Tories who live out in the sticks and not in fashionable metropolitan areas; people of faith who hold onto their traditional religious values – will experience a Damascene conversion to the PM’s way.

That’s Monday, with a side-order of I love my gay friends but they shouldn’t want to be my equals. (Why do homophobic bigots always claim to have gay “friends”?)

Cristina Odone on Tuesday, Christianity is great! not liberal at all!:

But I can’t help think – we’re not doing so badly after all. That, after a decade of Dawkinism, paedophile scandals and metropolitan secularism, the majority (59 per cent) of Britons should still cling to their faith strikes me as nothing short of miraculous. And that’s before the backlash to the atheists – it’s bound to happen – properly gets off the ground. If, after all the vicious kicks they’ve suffered from the liberal establishment, and their none-too-inspiring leadership, the Christian Churches in this country are still in existence, we who care about faith should celebrate.

Cristina Odone is a Christian. Christians aren’t liberal. Christians get kicked by liberals, and Christian leadership is none-too-inspiring. Muslims are all right, though. That’s Tuesday.

Pink+Blue Marriage

Once again, the Christian right is trying to kick up a fuss over nothing. Reverend Andrew Fothergil (Church of Scotland, Strichen and Tyrie Parish Church, Aberdeenshire) said:

“My personal position is that I think naturally, we have as celebrants, some concerns about the assurances that have been given by the Scottish Government about the safeguards it intends to put in place to protect celebrants who would hold a different position from what the future government legislation might become. I think many of us are a bit nervous about what protection it can actually offer.”

Reverend Fothergil has evidently not read the Church of Scotland’s admirably clear guide to people who want to have their marriage ceremony performed by a Church of Scotland Minister. That’s a shame, because it would calm him down from being “a bit nervous”.

Of the Frequently Asked Questions, the first one is: Q. Can anyone be married in a Church of Scotland church? The answer is:

The Church of Scotland is ‘national’, in that every district has its parish church. The parish minister is willing to discuss conducting marriage for any member of the parish. If you are not a church member, the minister will want to discuss with you whether a religious ceremony is what you are looking for, whether it will have meaning for you, and whether he or she agrees it is appropriate in your situation.

In other news

Well, I called it correctly six months ago when Barack Obama came out in support of same-sex marriage.

Yesterday Maryland and Maine made history: the first two US states to authorise equal marriage by referendum vote.

Hero and Bigot

I asked some time ago why “Christian Concern for our Nation” was not concerned when Christians were being dragged from their prayers at the steps of St Pauls.

Giles Fraser was Canon Chancellor of St Pauls: he resigned because he could not tolerate the Church using the secular power of the state against protesters against economic injustice.

And he was nominated and won Hero of the Year at the Stonewall Awards by popular vote because he’d written in support of the freedom of same-sex couples to marry, but others have written in defense of the idea that Christianity’s central doctrine is not, as O’Brien claims, homophobia – Giles Fraser won because he is a hero: a Christian minister of religion who’d stood up to say that no, Christianity is not all about homophobia.

Bigot of the Year

Stonewall has been holding a “Bigot of the Year” award, decided by popular vote, for six years. This year, unsurprisingly, the voters chose Cardinal Keith O’Brien.

Ed West in the Telegraph suggested:

Wouldn’t it be nice if Stonewall and other SSM supporters agreed to stop using such words, and in return opponents agreed to drop the dubious “slavery” or “Nazi” analogies.

In that West has it muddled. It has to happen the other way round. Someday, maybe, the Bigot of the Year award will be dropped because there won’t be enough write-in nominations because nobody’s publicly said or done anything bigoted.
—
On Sunday 4th November, BBC Sunday Morning Live is to debate “Is Stonewall’s ‘bigot of the year’ award inappropriate?” (You can register and vote Yes or No.)

In December 2009, the BBC’s Have Your Say staged an online debate on the question “Should homosexuals face execution?” After massive protest, the BBC changed the title of the debate to “Should Uganda debate gay execution?” but did not apologise for or retract the idea that putting people to death for their sexual orientation could be a matter for debate rather than condemnation.

Will Sunday Morning Live debate whether it’s “appropriate” for the BBC to allow a platform for bigots to discuss whether gay people should be killed or imprisoned for life?
—

Alex Salmond is no Nick Clegg

I was disappointed when the SNP voted to join NATO if Scotland became independent on Friday. The only positive reason I have for voting Yes so far is that the SNP’s policy was to get rid of nuclear weapons if Scotland became independent. That policy would have been tough to maintain in the face of rUK opposition, since it would be impossible for rUK to build another base for its nuclear weapons at Faslane in the time planned between vote and independence, but it will be impossible if it’s attempted in a kind of “we want to join NATO but we’re getting rid of nuclear weapons: we don’t care that this means rUK loses its nuclear weapons” game.

As the Scotland on Sunday rightly notes, this is unrealistic: the movement in the SNP to reverse their anti-NATO policy is a means of reversing their no-nukes policy without officially saying so or needing a vote.

The other issue is the unrealistic basis of the entire debate, which was only about membership of Nato. This was endorsed, but without the SNP abandoning its opposition to nuclear weapons based in Scotland. As things now stand, the SNP is committed to Nato membership – but with the proviso that Nato’s nuclear weapons are not hosted on Scottish soil. To remain anti-nuclear while professing loyalty to Nato is an untenable position.

The Sunday Times poll noted that winning 50%+ support for independence is fundamentally dependent not on anything the SNP or Yes Scotland have announced they’re doing or campaigning for, but on whether Labour can win the 2015 election. There’s a hard core of support for independence, and from my own experience, the hard core are generally better at convincing themselves than anyone else. There’s a fairly definite proportion of people who are likely to vote No, and there’s about 17% who identify themselves, like me, as undecided.