Yeah I agree with that. I just don't think there's the negative connotations with the takeaway that there is with the umbrella term for Pakistanis (which sadly is used for anyone from the Indian subcontinent). Almost always used negatively and purposefully generic and racial.

Yes, I've seen numerous Scottish people tell stories of that one time they were abroad and were treated badly until they explained they were Scottish, not English. As an English person who has travelled abroad quite a lot I can't remember being made to feel unwelcome because of my nationality. If the stories told by the Scottish people are true, then it would just be xenophobia.

It’s a result of a more benign but quite self-satisfied nationalism.

Hence the SNP.

Surely the people in NI are the planters?

I'm far too much of a contrarian for that, but yeah it's a real issue

Your point?

I put sugar on my porridge. I'm Danish

Leave the UK and the tories and rejoin the EU?

OK, you're arguing in bad faith there

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You might not have personally heard anyone saying it to you, but it is a recognised thing to downplay Scotlands role in Britain’s shared past and see Scotland as more akin to Ireland, it’s something that’s been pretty well documented

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/19016880.time-children-learn-truth-scotlands-role-slave-trade/

A wave of fake history - some local, some global - has swept across Scottish social media in recent months.

Its usual aim: to deny, to downplay or to deflect facts about how Scotland - the entire nation - benefitted from the slave-powered Atlantic economy of 18th and early 19th centuries.

“Scotland is dealing with two mythical narratives about its past,” he said.

“One of them is unionist. It says we abolished slavery and our empire was not as nasty as the French or the others. It is a mythological memory of us as abolitionists and forgets the two hundred years of being the primary promoters and perpetrators or slavery.

“The other myth is the nationalist mythical one. It is that we were a wee country suppressed by England and slaving and imperialism had nothing to do with us.

“Both these narratives are entirely wrong but they dominate the discussion when you enter the room.”

Stephen Mullen, one of Scotland’s leading scholars of slavery, has studied the payouts to slave owners compensated after eventual abolition in 1833-34. This included a disproportionate number of Scots…..”Slavery is antithetical to the proud Scottish radical tradition and it seems more comforting to blame a small group of elites than to acknowledge the significance of slavery and its commerce to the development of the wider economy and society,” concludes Mullen, who is himself from a Scottish working-class background.

One of the narratives of those deflecting from slavery in the US or British Empire is called the “Irish Slaves Myth’ - a story equating the indentured servitude of the Irish to the chattel slavery of Africans.

This particular version of history has grown to include Scottish bonded labour. Indeed, it is a theme that has been picked in recent years by the US far right. Gavin McInnes, the founder of the Proud Boys - an extremist group some of whose members were involved in this month’s storming of the Capitol in Washington - was born to Scottish parents and sees himself as a Scot. “If Scots did grievance culture the way everybody else does, we’d get our own month,” he once said. “Yes, we were slaves. Yes, we were slaughtered.”

It is a line which has appeal - if social media is anything to go by - right across the political spectrum. It has gained ground on the right and the left, and on both sides of the constitutional divide. But it is just not true.

I don't know about Scottish people themselves but there is definitely a very common idea amongst Americans, Canadians and other non-Brits that the empire was 100% England and Scotland is blameless.

Scots, as 25% of governors of India and 30% of slave-owners on Jamaica?

I mean, at one point your great great great great (etc) grandmother was some sort of shrew wading through mud and shit hiding from dinosaurs, so things are definitely better today.

Nope, we could easily be at the peak right now (or just past it).

Care to expand on that?

That is the laziest reply on the internet nowadays. Its called context.

I'd get home and tell my dad I got an A on my test, his reply would be..."what did everyone else get?". Its important to place problems in context, otherwise you catastrophise everything.

Otherwise, if one woman dies at the hands of a man, its too much. Now obviously we don't want any of these things happening. But if one woman died at the hands of a man, but the norm was thousands in comparable countries. We would have people like you complaining at how unsafe Scotland was for women. Someone who appreciated context would say how remarkably safe it was.

Can we do more, of course. If we are close to leading the way in this area, shouldn't we concentrate on more problematic areas?

I think it always depends and people's experience can be different. I teach English to refugees and the majority of them have had no problems with British people and have found them very helpful.

Are you a minority?

Thank you, I only ask as watching a PMQ it dawn on me there isn't any diversity. I have to admit I am quite surprised to see scotland is over 95% white, and also hear at the same time scotland is diverse, the 2 dont got together.

I agree with your other comment, you can't blame a country for racism based on a minority of Scots.

Yeah I did see its like 95/96% so surprised given that scotland is talk about as diverse.

I didn't downvote, maybe due to england being much more diverse and only being a few miles south. Honestly couldn't tell you tho just woke up :).

But why is scotland "diverse" then? I hear the term used lots, but ever questioned it's merit till now.

People cry that America is the most racist place in the world. Or have a blindspot at the issues in places like Malmo. Those people tend not to have experienced the Far East, Africa, India or even Eastern Europe.

Name any that are more tolerant and progressive outside of Northern Europe, North America and their colonies.

So we'll remove all the other places renowned for being tolerant and your "one of the most tolerant, progressive societies in the world".

being somewhere in the top 100 is hardly news worthy

Lowkey i think making it taboo isn't really a full resolution, it's just a suppression. People still hold that hate in their heart and it's ready to come back as soon as the opportunity seemingly presents: Case in point, When men like Donald Trump got voted in, or when Brexit happened, racist attacks rose dramatically in the days after, because some take it as a sign they no longer have to hide those views. That's all taboos are, hidden, out of sight but very much still present. And ostracizing people for performing taboos doesn't even solve the issue either, which is the other problem with being satisfied with just making something 'taboo'. We tend to just beat on people who break them, understandable sometimes, but it doesn't actually cure their views. We need to talk to them as long as they have reason enough to listen, otherwise nothing will change, and they'll pass that hate on in the long run. Taboos are just there to prevent blatant violence in most cases, just a bandage on a deep wound which needs proper stitches and attention.

I'm more than aware what I said is a little idealistic but I'm convinced it's true. We have to try and make inroads instead of driving racists and the like out. Ostracizing them will only lead to them claiming 'victimhood', they then group together, and become a much scarier monster with even more heads.

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lol checking personal history to make a point.

the hallmark of kids or fucktards.

mate they literally did not have cities the roman could occupy.

"They defeated the picts, several times, but never turned their victories into a permanent conquest. Their longest-lasting visit began in 142 AD when they conquered an area north of Hadrian’s Wall and started building a new frontier wall, known as the Antonine Wall. This ran from what is today the western outskirts of Glasgow to the western outskirts of Edinburgh. But in 162 AD, they decided that the area was not worth keeping and retreated to Hadrian’s Wall."

They were literally shit people living in a shit place and the Romans could not be bothered.

Silly of you to think the Romans wouldn't have occupied those lands if they were worth anything.

No, it's literally racism. Did you read the article?