How Not to make friends and Influence people

Prior to the last minute announcement of Alex Salmond and the appearance of the Alba party on the scene I was so downhearted that I was seriously considering not voting at all in the upcoming Scottish Parliament Election.

I didn’t feel that I could give the SNP my vote after the debacle of the Salmond affair and all that had come out in the Holyrood enquiry. Nor could I understand why they were seemingly intent on holing their chances and our chance of Independence under the waterline by introducing 2 seriously contentious issues as the Hate Crime Bill and the Trans rights issue just prior to election.
I had watched the run of 22 positive polls for Independence come to an end during all of these things. To say that I was seriously depressed about it all would be an understatement.

I had however joined the Independence for Scotland party when it was the only alternative Independence party in town, and hoped that if I did vote I could at least help to make a difference. It made no sense to me this SNP mantra of both votes SNP, when all I could see from that strategy was letting in Unionists like Murdo Fraser on the List vote.
My hope for a second vote going to an Independence party was somewhat diminished with the appearance of AFI and another even smaller grouping. In my view this was equally self-defeating as the SNP mantra, as these votes would be split even further.
So no wonder I was prepared not to vote at all.

Instead, with the announcement of Alex Salmond back into the fray and the subsequent agreement of ISP and AFI to get behind Alba I found myself energised and full of hope again. Yes we can do this! We can get a supermajority, we can get that Independence referendum, and this time win it!
Hope once more was in the air.

Unfortunately that sense of hope didn’t last long, my previous sense of despair was instead replaced by a sense of horror of what I was seeing.
What should have been in effect the YES movement reborn and made whole again with the SNP on one hand winning the constituency vote, and the rest of the Yes movement as represented by Alba making huge inroads into the Unionist parties share with the help of SNP 2nd votes and getting that supermajority for Independence, to my horror I was watching elements of them both at war with each other.
I have seen some Alba supporters, particularly some of those who follow Wings, trashing the SNP, and I have seen and been the recipient of some extremely nasty SNP supporters attacking Alba.
It has been utterly horrific at times on social media, and it made me wonder if some of those undecideds in 2014 had eventually decided to vote NO because of some of the intolerant aggression.
Although I don’t agree with Paul Kavanagh of Wee Ginger Dog on the way to proceed in this election, I was equally angry at some of the treatment he was getting and making him stop his excellent blog for the sake of his health. To be clear, those who subjected him to abuse should think shame on themselves.

This election campaign has hardly started and already it is the nastiest election I have ever had the misfortune to experience. The damnable thing is the nastiness is between those who are supposed to be on the same side on what they want to achieve. Neither side appears to be paying much attention or directing their ire on those we are supposed to be opposing!
Meanwhile those we are meant to be opposing are sitting in the sidelines rubbing their hands together in glee watching us doing their job for them.


Do we want Independence or not? If we want Independence, attacking those who also want it is not the way to achieve it. Indeed, keep throwing muck at each other and we will lose the opportunity altogether.

If this is a defacto Independence election, we have to put whatever differences we may have aside and support each other. If we continue to put petty politics and make it about tribalism and personalities, we are severely in danger of losing the best chance we will ever have of achieving it, and then we will only have ourselves to blame.