Scottish Devolution / British Federalism

[shakur420]

(10-23-2011 01:32 AM)Sean Wrote:  It's just how much powers a country's government has within the union, essentially.

So like the more autonomy they have, the less "evolved" they become? Like that's the background of the word? Don't tell me it really stems from that premise, that the more control England has over your territory, the more "evolved" you are. Or is it more like the more you more participate in the parliament of the kingdom, the more involved you are in a federalist type system the more "evolved" your political system is? Like is that where it comes from? Cause that makes some sense to me.


As for the culture, I reject other's cultures as my own because they're largely irrelevant to me, practically speaking. For example, some people will know how much I go on about Palestine, yet "Palestinian culture" is almost completely uninteresting to me, I've never looked into their food, their clothes, their music or traditions, and I've never cared to. The only aspect of their culture that interests me is their resistance. I don't give a fuck for Pakistani "celebrations" like I don't give a fuck for "Canadian" ones. Canada Day, Victoria Day, who cares? I really don't. It's not my culture. If it's yours, then fine, cool, do what you want, but when your culture is celebrating "Thanksgiving" by ignoring the genocide of millions, I fucking reject that outright. I spit, shit and piss on it. When people celebrate the "independence" of Pakistan but forget the suffering and pain it caused, it fucking makes me sick. And my mom's got a lot connected to it. Her parents lost a lot and her dad was fucked up after because of what happened. Yet, she cherishes something like that? It's as fanatic as religion, it's the religion of state, like marxism, republicanism and every other doctrinal system. It's fucked. So, sure, if something makes sense to me, like thinking and celebrating workers' rights and achievements on Labor day, or protesting on Canada day to remind ourselves that we can protest without being tortured - we just get beaten, arrested and maced if there's enough of us to cause a threat to the money - sure, that's my culture. Because that's what represents me and my values. Not how my parents grew up. I'm more interested in the history of Rome and the economic situation, the class realities and workings of societies than the music and traditions of Pakistan. I don't care to know because I could be reading about the economics and politics of Scotland. That shit is interesting to me and relevant to my education.

Like I love Mexican music, food, ingredients, people. Not because I was born there, not because of a flag, an idea or doctrine, but because when I was introduced to that shit, I loved it. I'm not interested in their "Spanish roots", fuck that, I'm interested in the history of Mexico, the people of Mexico and what's happened. I don't care about el Dia de los Muertos, I care about the deals between the cartels and governments. It's just the way it is. I couldn't give a fuck less if my country was called Canada or England, it's irrelevant to me, it serves no purpose for me and doesn't interest me. What interests me is that we pay money to the Queen. And the Liberal party voted for that bill along with the minority PC party last year (when they were a minority and needed the Liberals to pass shit through). That tells me something about the Liberals, I wanna know about that, not where the name "Canada" came from. Who gives a fuck? I'll spend 2 minutes reading about that and days reading about NAFTA. That's my culture, not Urdu, the maple leaf or hockey. That's not my culture.

Just listen to yourself on the globalization thing for a second. Did Hollywood co-sponsor Tahrir Square or something? The EU is a vessel for private, corporate power, that's true. But is there a law of nature or something, a law of physics that says global integration of markets, trade, production, communication and education have to be controlled by a very small number of people, for very narrow purposes? Again, that's their version of globalization. Ours was October 15 2011, February 15-16 2003, etc. Spain 1936. The #occupywallstreet hashtag. Wikileaks and "Collateral Murder". That's our globalization. Am I supposed to believe that "black helicopters" and "NWO" is the only possible outcome of international cooperation, solidarity and communication? I mean, the Luddites saw the destruction of their livelihoods as the probable outcome of technology and to a large extent, automation and technology have apparently hurt the working class in certain ways, at certain times, but is that all we got from it? The Internet allows the Man - Big Brother - to watch us and track us, is that because networks are inherently predisposed to this kind of usage? Every Joe Blow can put up a site or blog saying that "Bengazi has been retaken!", so what? Is there something that says it has to be like that, or that's even a bad thing? Is "amateur journalism" really a bad thing automatically? How is global integration of markets and communication a bad thing? Yeah, when it's controlled by a few people it only serves their interests. Who says it can't be controlled by us? Who says that while they do control things economically, while Zuckerberg and his 20 employees control Facebook, we can't use it to our advantage? Ask people in Egypt, Syria and Tunisia if they think the globalization of information and communication is a bad thing.

Anyways, maybe a thread about culture and one about globalization? I wanna hear more about the history of Scotland, it's integration into the kingdom - politically and economically - and that shit about the Roman era, who exactly everyone was, where they were, who they were fighting, etc. I got a little lesson from dude at work before I left but, lol, as always, we ended up talking about U.S.-Roman parallels and the evangelical right. lol.

[Boboulas]

Quote:If you look at the scene in the Braveheart movie where they stop the horse - after Wallaces wife has her throat cut - this was a clever reference to the kind of road blocks the English were using in Ulster - thats also why they included the Irish character - it was loaded with references to the present political situation - it was a specifically national independance message.

Ever seen Scrooty Mcboogerballs? Its kind of important you do. And why are you using braveheart as some kind of accurate historical referance?

Quote:This is why the SNP eclipsed the Labour Party - the first time in history. Scots independence is like Irish independence - its an historic inevitability.

Only in the Scotish parliment! Scots who want indepedance vote labour in general ellections because the SNP is powerless in Westminster. The only reason SNP get votes in their own parliment is because they have fairly decent policies....for scots! Independance isnt a concern when you are protecting many of the benefits that scottish people enjoy. If you look at the general ellection, look how many votes labour got in scotland, they hardly "moved away".

Quote:Break up the UK and you move towards breaking up the over-riding control of that structure of empire and monarchy and London banking institutions.

What structure of empire are you talking about? Im sure the poor oppressed scotts care about your odd views on the great and might british empire. Thats not why scottish people want independance.

Quote:You dont speak Gaelic you speak English - that makes you a colonised Scot.

Please stop talking out of your arse! Thankyou.

[Introcluse]

1871 was right, Scotland costs the british economy an excess of 15 billion a year. It only suits Scotland to be part of a stronger economy.

Another point, I think people are obsessed with the name of a place you live, what difference does it make? I don't care if the place i live is called faecesland, what i'm bothered about is my rights, liberties and freedoms where I live...what i care about is the place being egalatarian and no social groups(ie gender, race, ethnicity, religons) receiving privileges over other social groups.

[1871]

Hamish - I WILL RETURN TO THE DEVOLUTION IDEA SHORTLY. but just to clarify this cultural/national identity idea;

Shakur;

Quote:shakur So like the more autonomy they have, the less "evolved" they become? Like that's the background of the word? Don't tell me it really stems from that premise, that the more control England has over your territory, the more "evolved" you are. Or is it more like the more you more participate in the parliament of the kingdom, the more involved you are in a federalist type system the more "evolved" your political system is? Like is that where it comes from? Cause that makes some sense to me.

Its that there are ties between English and Scots because they really like fucking each other and they have baabies like Sean who have split personalities (see Sean I am really getting into this psycho analysis shit.

Scots. like the Welsh and English are British from the point of view that they share the same culture and history but historically speaking there was a periphery of a ‘walled state’ which meant a seperation. Some will say ‘that’s thousands of years ago’ - but that ‘thousands of years’ is very important for many people

Quote:As for the culture, I reject other's cultures as my own because they're largely irrelevant to me, practically speaking.

No you don’t. Otherwise you wouldn’t read Orwell or listen to tech (hes from Peru right?) I think it depends what you mean by your ‘own’ but you cant really make the argument that it doesn’t become your own over time even if you don’t originate it.

who said you have to ‘own’ a culture anyway?

Quote: For example, some people will know how much I go on about Palestine, yet "Palestinian culture" is almost completely uninteresting to me,

Pretty sweeping comment

Quote:I've never looked into their food, their clothes, their music or traditions, and I've never cared to.

So how do you know you would find it uninteresting? You would make a lousy anthropologist.

Quote:The only aspect of their culture that interests me is their resistance. I don't give a fuck for Pakistani "celebrations" like I don't give a fuck for "Canadian" ones. Canada Day, Victoria Day, who cares? I really don't. It's not my culture. If it's yours, then fine, cool, do what you want,

Cool

Quote: but when your culture

MY culture:???. Oh I get it, now Im the ’oppressor; right? Here we go…..

Quote: is celebrating "Thanksgiving" by ignoring the genocide of millions, I fucking reject that outright. I spit, shit and piss on it.

lolll Do you do all this at once? I bet they love you at thanksgiving celebrations.
Life and soul of the fucking party. Lol

Yes I have finally been outed. You are right shakur. I am General Custer, Adolf Hitler and Genghis Khan all rolled into one. I kill babies and toast them for breakfast and
I am soley responsible for the holocaust,. Infact I enjoyed it. I loved it.

Have you heard my party music?

Quote:When people celebrate the "independence" of Pakistan but forget the suffering and pain it caused, it fucking makes me sick. And my mom's got a lot connected to it. Her parents lost a lot and her dad was fucked up after because of what happened. Yet, she cherishes something like that? It's as fanatic as religion, it's the religion of state, like marxism, republicanism and every other doctrinal system. It's fucked. So, sure, if something makes sense to me, like thinking and celebrating workers' rights and achievements on Labor day, or protesting on Canada day to remind ourselves that we can protest without being tortured - we just get beaten, arrested and maced if there's enough of us to cause a threat to the money - sure, that's my culture. Because that's what represents me and my values.

Good for you. For me that’s only one aspect of what I think of - the economy. The ‘class struggle’. That’s not the be all and end all for me. I hope that one day you will find your own ancestral culture interesting also and Im not telling you what to find interesting at all - that’s for you to decide. I speak from my own experience and learning also. I don’t know about your family history and wouldn’t comment but I will say that its always interesting to get the stories of older folks before they die - that’s how histories and patterns of history are understood and connected with. I know II know that I wish I had got more of the stories of my own grandparents before they died. Once they die their life stories are gone forever - unless they are recorded. Its not so much the personal as seeing how history works. I know with family relationships difficult for some people to be objective about it.

The fact is that your position is ever bit as doctrinal with what YOU consider to be relevant (or not). Marxism and Republicanism had nothing to do with the partition of India and Pakistan - but -from what little I know of it - there was both the legacy of fuedalism, the class system is pretty much the same as the caste system (there was a caste system in early British feudal society - which is one reason why Britain and India coalesced as well as religious differences

Quote: Not how my parents grew up. I'm more interested in the history of Rome and the economic situation, the class realities and workings of societies than the music and traditions of Pakistan. I don't care to know because I could be reading about the economics and politics of Scotland. That shit is interesting to me and relevant to my education.

India and Pakistan also surely arise out of the legacy of imperialism, self determination> These very same things. You can connect the dots across history. Its interesting - or at least I find it so - which is only one reason why I would be interested in those countries and their culture - also just because I find them interesting - but then I am pretty much interested in history as a subject having studied it for years - so its something which interests me. In some ways they are divided but then you see the ways history and economic policy has specifically shaped them http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company

Quote:Like I love Mexican music, food, ingredients, people. Not because I was born there, not because of a flag, an idea or doctrine, but because when I was introduced to that shit, I loved it. I'm not interested in their "Spanish roots", fuck that, I'm interested in the history of Mexico, the people of Mexico and what's happened. I don't care about el Dia de los Muertos, I care about the deals between the cartels and governments. It's just the way it is.

.

Scotland to Mexico is a big leap.

If you study the history and the present the fact of the Spanish roots will inevitably arise - that’s the way it is. Chino and Diegoscop made some interesting comments on exactly this subject on this forum in connection with Mexico and how the ruling class continue power precisely because of their ‘Spanish roots‘.

Quote: I couldn't give a fuck less if my country was called Canada or England, it's irrelevant to me, it serves no purpose for me and doesn't interest me.

Yeah I get that by now

Quote:What interests me is that we pay money to the Queen. And the Liberal party voted for that bill along with the minority PC party last year (when they were a minority and needed the Liberals to pass shit through). That tells me something about the Liberals, I wanna know about that, not where the name "Canada" came from. Who gives a fuck? I'll spend 2 minutes reading about that and days reading about NAFTA. That's my culture, not Urdu, the maple leaf or hockey. That's not my culture.

It is called Canada not England btw. And it isn’t about ‘labels’ or names but how those institutions were formed and how these power structures continue. To me understanding that is also a means to getting those power structures changed and seeing where those problems are. Otherwise it becomes merely about repeating the same old mistakes. People change the law by studying the law right ? Labor laws. Rights for workers etc . And who gives a fuck whether you give a fuck.lol.
Like anyone gives a fuck about that. Not only that but you bring a lot of different arguments to an issue where historical ideas and identities ARE relevant and are far more relevant than mere ‘symbols;

Quote:Just listen to yourself on the globalization thing for a second. Did Hollywood co-sponsor Tahrir Square or something?

Below a good essay on the subject. I’ll post it in its entirety because its pretty good on the relationship between culture and politics and economy.

Quote: The EU is a vessel for private, corporate power, that's true. But is there a law of nature or something, a law of physics that says global integration of markets, trade, production, communication and education have to be controlled by a very small number of people, for very narrow purposes?

No there is no law of physics which says this. The law is not so much the law of nature - unless people see it in terms of Adam Smith - it is the law of capital, who owns the capital and the means of production and therefore influences the culture, the political system, what should and should not be said or shown, peoples livelihoods etc, hence the link between culture; (culture is also political) and economy.

This affects the Scots as much as the English - as elsewhere.

Here is the essay I referred to which outlines the argument better by screenwriter Jonathan Gems;;

Quote:Jonathan Gems;

Carl von Clausewitz, the Prussian military strategist, said: “War is business conducted by other means.”
In other words, wars are about money. Most wars are like home invasions: you get your pals together, break into someone’s house and grab their stuff. The war in Iraq is a case in point: started by the US and UK (using terrorism as a pretext) in order to grab Iraq’s massive energy wealth. The war in Afghanistan is not dissimilar. Again, using terrorism as a pretext, the US and UK invaded Afghanistan to establish secure access to the massive oil and gas fields of the Caspian Sea region and Kazakhstan. At present, there is no greater source of wealth in the world than oil and gas – the most lucrative commodities on the planet.
The inversion of Clauswitz’s statement: “Business is war by other means” is also true. Almost all the wars fought in the world are business wars. It’s only when business deals involving major corporations can’t be agreed, or leveraged, that military intervention is considered. When a shooting war breaks out, it means the business players have failed. It’s a great deal easier to steal the wealth of other nations through business than through military action.
In 1969, Britain lost a 25-year business war it had been fighting with America for control of the UK film market. In 1969, the British government capitulated to Washington in a secret deal, and removed the protections that, until then, had sustained British Cinema. When these protections were removed (primarily certain tax breaks and the Eady Levy) the British film studios were doomed. Associated British Pictures and the Rank Organisation quit film operations in 1970, and British Lion scaled back, hanging on by its fingernails, until giving up the ghost in 1976.
Since 1970, Britain – a nation of over 60 million – has released an average of 6 British films per year. Denmark, a nation of only 5.5 million, has averaged 29 films per year over the same period. How is it possible that tiny Denmark can generate almost five times our movie output?
Simple: in Denmark, 12% of the market is protected for Danish films by the government.
The French government protects the French film industry in the same way. In France, 12% of the market is reserved exclusively for French films. Since 1970, this policy, combined with certain production subsidies, has enabled France to have a thriving indigenous industry turning out an average of 102 movies per year.
France’s population, at 63.4 million, is comparable to Britain’s, so it’s reasonable to assume that, if our government protected 12% of the UK film market for UK films (easily done with the stroke of the pen) we, too, could be putting out a hundred films a year.
Can you imagine what a creative explosion that would produce? There’d be opportunities for new writing, new producers, directors, film composers, cinematographers, editors, sound designers, set designers, art directors, costume designers, actors; can you imagine all the new stars it would create? Also, the great pool of British talent in Hollywood could come back and make films here – which they’d love to do. Los Angeles, for most ex-pats, is a lonely and hellish place.
It’s almost shocking how easy it would be to revive British Cinema.
People who are old enough to remember when we made our own movies, back in the 1950’s and 60’s, will tell you that, sure, there was a new British film every week – sometimes two a week – but the public didn’t get excited because most of them were crap. The Hollywood movies were much better. This is what French people say about French films today. I’ve even heard French people say protection should be withdrawn from
French Cinema because it would ‘force the filmmakers to make better films’. These mopheads have no idea how lucky they are. If they got their wish, and protection was removed, the French film industry would collapse and die almost immediately.
The same argument has been made for the removal of subsidies from British theatre. Most British theatre is, let’s face it, unwatchable. We must be grateful to our government for not legalizing firearms, or there’d be more suicides among theatregoers. I’ve yet to meet a single professional theatre critic who isn’t either clinically insane or on heavy medication from having to sit through so many plays. But, if the Arts Council stopped funding British Theatre, there wouldn’t be any – or hardly any – which would be terrible. So, even if protected films are unwatchable, they should still be supported for cultural reasons.
The reason why every country in Europe assigns a small share of its market to its own cinema is culture. Governments see their role as not only protecting their nations’ territorial integrity but also its cultural integrity. After all, what makes a nation? It’s culture. What’s the point of protecting a nation physically, if you don’t protect it psychologically?
UK governments have a blind spot when it comes to culture. In the past, the British were regarded as philistines – if not barbarians. When the ruling class went abroad to conquer and pillage, they showed little interest in the cultures they were despoiling. They couldn’t see the value in culture. What was the bally point of it? It wasn’t meaningful like hunting, shooting, fishing or military campaigns or the Royal Navy.
Our European neighbours thought differently. Their ruling classes revered culture. It was a badge of good breeding to take an interest in – and patronize – composers, painters, sculptors, poets, architects, dancers and so on.
Because of the British establishment’s philistinism, we produced relatively little ‘high art’. In the past, when a British aristocrat needed a painting done, he would often send abroad for a Van Dyke or a Rubens to do it. If he wanted a country house, he’d send his man to Italy to copy the work of Italian architects. If a musical concert were required, he’d secure the services of a Handel or a Haydn. It wasn’t until the 19th century that a minority of the ‘superior class’ began to revise their disdain for the arts.
Because of the vulgar and insensitive character of the British ruling class, most of our artistic innovations and developments came from (ironically) the oiks. British painting, design, poetry, music, dancing, story writing and theatre were largely produced from the ranks of the yeomanry and – later, in the 18th century – the middle and lower classes. William Shakespeare was the son of a small town alderman; Christopher Marlowe’s dad was a shoemaker; Thomas Nashe was the son of a curate; Ben Johnson’s father was bricklayer. William Congreve was the son of an Irish soldier; Daniel Defoe’s pater was a tallow chandler (sold candles), and John Milton’s dad was a scrivener (legal secretary).
In the 18th century, Keats, Shelley, Coleridge, Southey, Wordsworth, Jane Austen, and Charlotte Bronte were all middle class. It was rare for an artist to come from the ‘nobility’ – Lord Byron was an honourable exception. Nor were these ‘middling and lower class’ writers patronized by ‘Quality’; they earned their living by writing for commoners. As a result, most British art was ‘low art’. Rowlandson and Gilray were “low” artists; Geoffrey Chaucer, William Blake, John Clare, John Donne, and Robbie Burns were “low” poets.
Britain’s history of “low culture” distinguishes it from the rest of Europe, where “high culture” was more the norm. The culture of Britain is pretty much proletarian – apart from some Church patronage, which produced composers such as Henry Purcell, and a vast number of forgotten organists.
Charles Dickens was a lower-middle class man writing for proletarian audiences; Gilbert and Sullivan, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Arthur Conan Doyle all aspired to be ‘gentlemen’ – and achieved this ambition through the commercial success of their work – but they were born common and wrote for common audiences. This low culture tradition has continued into modern times with composers like Lennon and McCartney, Ray Davies, Pete Townshend, Roger Daltry, David Bowie, Freddie Mercury, and Morrisey; artists like Francis Bacon and David Hockney, and designers like Vivienne Westwood.
So, maybe the reason our government won’t protect British Cinema is because our government officials (the executive branch of the ruling class) don’t care for art or culture because most of it’s a product of the lower classes. The only culture supported by the establishment is museum culture – that is: “heritage” – preserving relics of the upper class past (not the proletarian past), and mostly foreign, 19th century opera and ballet, which provide a milieu for ruling class socializing. No doubt, if opera and ballet became fashionable among the plebs, the government would stop subsidizing it.
Let’s be clear how serious it is that our government doesn’t support British Cinema (and don’t be fooled if someone tells you the UK Film Council supports British Cinema – it doesn’t; most of its money goes in enormous bribes to Hollywood producers to make their films in Britain).
It’s serious that government doesn’t protect British Cinema because film is the greatest art form – the greatest medium for cultural expression – ever devised. A motion picture combines almost all the arts: writing, acting, poetry, theatre, painting, music, dancing, stage design, costume design, architecture, graphic design, the decorative arts, and the new arts of film directing, editing, and special effects.
So, is our government’s indifference to cinema (the greatest cultural medium we have) due to films being proletarian and therefore contemptible? No, this can’t be true because a significant minority of the British ruling class actually fell in love with cinema.
In the 1920’s and 30’s, the ruling class despised movies because they were popular. At that time, British filmmakers were lower or – at best – lower-middle class people like Edgar Wallace and Alfred Hitchcock. No one who’d attended a public school was likely to admit to seeing a film; their entertainments were opera, ballet, theatre and orchestral recitals. But, by the late 1930’s this changed.
Sir Winston Churchill, a flower of the British ruling class, was an enthusiastic fan, as were King Edward VIII and Henry Herbert, the 17th Earl of Pembroke. The Rank Organisation, Britain’s largest movie studio, was founded, in 1937, by two scions of the upper class: J. Arthur Rank, the patrician son of a flour baron (Hovis) and Lady Anne Henrietta Yule, a close friend of King Edward and Mrs. Simpson.
After the Second World War, lots of ex-public schoolboys renounced the civil service and the law in favour of careers in films. Directors Carol Reed, the Boulting Brothers, Basil Deardon and Lindsay Anderson all went to public school.
By the late 30’s, when the upper class deigned to grace the British film industry with its favour, it had grown into a rich and thriving industry. From when British Lion set up shop in 1919, to when the British government pulled the plug in 1969, this one company released 552 movies – an average of 11 films a year.
Because of studios like British Lion, the Rank Organisation, and Associated British Pictures – each of them putting out close to a dozen films a year – it was possible for film directors, writers, actors and technicians to have life-long careers in British films. They didn’t have to go to Los Angeles to look for work.
Carol Reed (The Third Man, Our Man in Havana) directed 33 films; (Charles Crichton (The Lavender Hill Mob, The Titfield Thunderbolt) directed 35 films; Basil Deardon (The Green Man, The League of Gentlemen) directed 44 films. The now-forgotten Leslie Hiscott (Sabotage At Sea, The Butler’s Dilemma) directed over 60 British films. The actor John Le Mesurier – just one example – was in over 100 British movies.
And British Cinema produced lots of stars. Today, if you want to put a play on in the West End, you must get your star from America. We don’t make British stars anymore because we don’t have a British cinema. Have there been any British stars created by British movies since the 1960s? Not really, unless you count Bob Hoskins with The Long Good Friday – a British film that wouldn’t have been released had it not been picked up by Paramount.

Kenneth Branagh, right, in Henry V - a role that got him noticed in Hollywood
You might argue that, say, Rupert Everett became a star from the 1984 movie Another Country (a British film picked up by Twentieth Century Fox) but that was his debut; he only became a real star after he moved to LA and got work in Hollywood. You might argue that Kenneth Branagh became a star in 1989 from Henry V (a low budget BBC film given a tiny theatrical release by Curzon Cinemas) but, again, this simply got him noticed in Hollywood. You might claim that Daniel Radcliffe became a star from the Harry Potter films – and you’d be right. He did. But the Harry Potter films are Hollywood films – made and owned (in perpetuity throughout the world) by Warner Bros. Inc.
But let’s go back to when Britain had its own cinema and see who some of our homegrown stars were then. If we dissolve back to 1960, we find a plethora of movie stars – enough to guarantee full houses in all the West End, and regional theatres, in the country. Here are just some of them: Margaret Rutherford, Joyce Grenfell, John Mills, Leslie Phillips, Joan Sims, Virginia McKenna, Denholm Elliott, Fenella Fielding, Alec Guinness, Leo McKern, Diana Dors, Terry Thomas, Richard Burton, Dirk Bogarde, Peter Sellers, Laurence Olivier, Joan Greenwood, Hermione Baddeley, Moira Lister, Oliver Reed, Dennis Price, Michael Hordern, Robert Shaw, Michael Redgrave, Robert Morley, Laurence Harvey, Paul Scofield, Richard Harris, Tom Courtenay, Leslie-Anne Down, George Formby, Peter Ustinov, Peter Finch, Harry Andrews, Maxine Audley, Nigel Stock, Eric Porter, Noel Coward, Dinsdale Landen, Bernard Cribbins, Patrick Wymark, Shirley-Anne Field, and Moira Redmond…
Sometimes there’s confusion about what is and what isn’t a British film. Some claim (especially politicians like Tony Blair) that a film is British if a British company produces it. Nothing could be further from the truth. This is like saying a Ford Fiesta or a Honda Civic is a British car because it was made in Britain. These are not British cars; they are not products of British culture.
The cars we used to produce, when we had a car industry, like the Rolls Royce, Mini Minor, Wolseley, E-type Jaguar, Morris Oxford, Bentley, Austen Healey, Aston Martin, and Bedford van were British cars – products of our culture; and they contributed to our British identity, which is what culture does.
Likewise, when we had our own indigenous film industry, it contributed to our identity in a big way. Movies, like all art forms, hold a mirror to nature. In British films, we saw ourselves depicted, our values expressed, our issues debated.
In, for example, I’m All Right, Jack, starring Peter Sellers (British Lion, 1959) we are presented with the conflict between British trade unions and the ruling class, done with insight, humour, and attention to the details and idiosyncrasies of different British types.
Above all, when we had British films, British people were the protagonists – and the stories and subjects related to British life. This gave us a sense of our society, our place in the world, where we fitted in and where we didn’t; what kind of person we wanted, and didn’t want, to be.
John Donne wrote: “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.” When we had our own cinema we could see that continent; it was constantly being illuminated for us, and new aspects of it revealed, by successive films, brought to us by writers, actors, directors and producers with talents for observing and describing our society. This is culture – the thing not valued and tossed away by government – and it is this that gives us identity, security and purpose as a nation.
So why are films produced by British companies not British films? Because if you produce a British film for a Hollywood studio, the studio executives call the shots: the film’s sensibility must be American, or designed to interest Americans. Four Weddings and a Funeral is a case in point: a film that depicts an American view of the British.
At present, it’s almost impossible to make British movies because there are no British movie studios. In Finland, where the government protects and subsidizes Finnish films, there are two major Finnish film studios and one mini-major. In Britain there are none. Sometimes a misunderstanding arises here because production houses, such as Pinewood and Shepperton, are referred to as ‘film studios’. But a film studio is a company that chooses, finances, markets and releases the films it pays to be made at production sites like Pinewood.
If you want to make a film in Britain, the first company you call is Pathé. Pathé is a French film studio with an office in London. The guys at Pathé are very nice, and they feel sorry for us, but there’s little they can do to help. The reason? The main purpose of Pathé’s London office is to distribute French films. They simply don’t have the time or resources to make more than two or three British pictures a year.
Everyone is grateful to Pathé, but this French movie studio cannot give us a British Cinema. Pathé likes doing business in the UK and wants good relations, so it lets its facilities be used by a few lucky film producers each year; and, as a sop to the constant wailing and gnashing of teeth from frustrated wannabe British filmmakers, the government funnels subsidies through Pathé to fund these few British productions. But this is simply tokenism. You can’t have British cinema without British distributors, and you can’t have British distributors unless at least 10% of the UK market is reserved for British films.
As previously mentioned, the French government mandates that a minimum of 12% of the films released in French cinemas are French. This guaranteed market share supports a French Cinema robust enough to release a hundred films a year and market them world-wide, and distribute them in Britain, and even throw a lifebelt to a few British production companies. Two of Mike Leigh’s most recent movies, Topsy Turvy (Pathé) and Vera Drake (Les Films Alain Sarde), were made possible by the French film industry. Ken Loach’s It’s A Free World and The Wind That Shakes The Barley were both made possible by Pathé.

The Wind That Shakes The Barley, a Ken Loach film made possible by Pathé
If you’re British and living in Britain and want to make a British film but Pathé can’t help you, you have three choices: 1) take your screenplay to a Hollywood studio (which means, they call the shots), 2) take it to a European studio (difficult), or 3) try and put together the budget from a British television company, private investors, the UK Film Council, and various regional, state and EU film funds, and then persuade a sales company to take the film (either before or after it’s finished) to the film markets in Toronto, Milan etc. and sell it, country by country, to local distributors.
This is extremely hard to do (the film Trainspotting was done this way, and the producer said he would ‘never again’). Unless your film is not only accepted by a prestigious film festival, such as Cannes or Sundance, but also wins awards – or the film has something to make distributors want it (such as Johnny Depp’s in it) – you’ll waste your time and lose your shirt.
In most other European countries, when you want to make a film, you take the project to your local film distributors and hammer out a deal. Sure, you might be rejected, but you have somewhere to go. There are distributors (studios) looking for locally made films to finance and release. This doesn’t exist in Britain.
Mind you, even in Scandinavia, France, Spain, Germany, Portugal, Eire, Belgium, the Netherlands, Czech Republic, Austria, Italy, Slovakia, Switzerland, Poland and so on, it’s hard to get films made. Throughout Europe, Hollywood distributors are dominant. In most EU countries Hollywood has an 85% or better market share. The only exception is Spain.
In 2007, desiring to stimulate economic growth in the Spanish film industry, the Spanish government passed a law protecting 30% of its domestic market for domestic movies. As a result, several Spanish film studios have started up and there’s now a boom in Spanish filmmaking.
This is laudable but the Spanish government’s radical act of protectionism makes little difference to the reality of America’s dominance. America still controls 70% of Spain’s market. Moreover, Hollywood has already subverted the legislation, via loopholes in coproduction deals, allowing movies such as Woody Allen’s Vicky, Christina, Barcelona to be made there, part-funded by Spanish regional grants, and fraudulently qualifying as ‘Spanish’.
As you might expect, the United States protects its own domestic market. But it doesn’t do this by legislation – it doesn’t need to. Virtually 100% of its market is protected by the Hollywood studio cartel. No American cinema chain dares show a film offered to them by a foreign distributor because, if it did, the cartel would put them out of business.
In 1980, George Harrison bankrolled the HandMade Films production of Time Bandits – a brilliant movie

Time Bandits, a Terry Gilliam film bankrolled by George Harrison
directed by Terry Gilliam featuring Sean Connery, John Cleese, Shelly Duvall, Michael Palin, Ralph Richardson, and others. This film was made very economically for about £2million. Test screenings in the UK and the US received high scores. The film looked like a hit. All the Hollywood studios (except for Disney) wanted to buy it.
However, Hollywood business practice is to pay as little as possible for ‘pick-ups’, and no studio would offer HandMade more than £2m for the film. (Something similar happened recently with the FilmFour production of Slumdog Millionaire, which had no choice but to take a deal that – to use Hollywood parlance – ‘fucked it up the ass’.)
George Harrison decided to go a different route. The HandMade team went to the US to try and distribute the film themselves. They sat down with the heads of the US cinema chains who, though pleased to meet George Harrison, were negative about releasing the film in their theatres, for fear of what the Hollywood cartel would do.
To persuade them, HandMade offered them 50% of the receipts for the first two weeks of release – a far better deal than the 5-15% offered by the studios. But the exhibitors still refused.
Believing Time Bandits could succeed even with a heavy financial burden, George Harrison offered to pay for all the exhibitors’ prints and ads. This meant the cinemas would be taking no risk. All they’d have to do was collect and bank 50% of the cash they took from ticket sales (and all the cash they took from the popcorn). This was an offer too good to refuse.
The film was released throughout the US and was a smash hit. Handmade made more than £10million net profit on the theatrical release – equivalent to about £30million today – and the US cinema chains made considerably more.
When HandMade finished their next movie, Privates On Parade, they called their friends, the exhibitors, to discuss releasing it, and were turned down flat, without discussion. The exhibitors didn’t even want to see the film. Hollywood had been incandescent with rage at their ‘betrayal’ and threatened dire consequences if they ever did “another Time Bandits”. So that was that.
Since then, so far as I’m aware, no foreign-owned film has been released in the United States.
So what’s really going on here? Is it just aggressive business competition or is there a hidden agenda? Why does the UK government persist in behaving as if British Cinema ‘doesn’t matter’ because it’s ‘only entertainment’? Why do they maintain the fiction that there’s a “free market”? Why do they claim British people aren’t interested in British films because ‘American films are better’? Why has the British government capitulated utterly to Hollywood, but our European neighbours have not?
Some people say it’s down to language. Language is the most profound element of a culture. Destroy a nation’s language and you destroy the nation. People in Norway want to see at least some films in Norwegian. But we, in Britain, share the same language as the Americans, right?
We wouldn’t like it if, say, 95% of the movies shown in Britain were in German – even if they had subtitles. We’d want to see some films in English. So we’d find a way to make our own films in English. But we don’t need to do this because 95% of our movies are American, and they speak English. No problem.
But there is a problem. We don’t speak the same English as the Americans. I can attest to this because I spent 9 years writing screenplays in Los Angeles and it was very difficult to do because of the language differences. I had to learn to write and speak American. And, even after nine years and 30 screenplays, I was still making mistakes – despite the advantage of having spent six months in grade school in Arizona when I was ten years old.
American is similar to English. We can understand it without (usually) needing a translation. But it’s not the same language. Our language is the most profound expression of our culture; it conditions the way we think. The more it is replaced by American English – with all the assumptions inherent in that language – the more we lose our identity and coherence as a nation.
I’m not anti-American. I love America, and American culture. But I was born and brought up in jolly old England. I’m English and, much as I’d like to, I can never become American – and neither can anyone else who didn’t emigrate to America before they were sixteen.
I respect and love America, but I want to be allowed to also love my own country, and my own culture too. France is only next-door. It has a fantastic culture. There’s nothing more stimulating than taking the Eurostar and getting out at the Gare du Nord in Paris. I’ve often thought how lucky the French are to be French and live in such a beautiful country with such amazing food and art, and only a 35 hour work-week, with an hour for lunch, and two months’ holiday in the Summer, and efficient, elegant high-speed trains, and the best healthcare in Europe, and cheap electricity, and beautiful, seductive women who enjoy philosophical discussions. French culture is awesome – but it doesn’t threaten me. It doesn’t seek to conquer me. It’s live and let live.
The Americans know better than anyone else the true, jaw-dropping power of the movies. They know it because their nation was shaped by it. The vast American continent, populated by clusters of disparate and always-on-the-move immigrants, was – and still is – given a shared reality by Hollywood.
Most Hollywood movies are moral tales: stories about good guys and bad guys; parables and sermons designed to condition human and social behaviour. Like Christianity, the Hollywood religion faces up to the dark side. In the past, Christian preachers horrified their congregations with stories of Hell. Today, we see Hell in the movies. To encourage obedience, the movies (and the broadcast media) scare the pants off us.
In the past, the Church frightened people with threats of eternal damnation if they did not obey the authorities (‘follow God’s laws’). Today, this is done in fictional form by the movies, and documentary form by the media. As Noam Chomsky said (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 15-2-04), “Government policy is to keep the rich happy, and keep the people frightened’.
Hollywood movies, like the old Bible stories, teach us to aspire. But here the Hollywood Church diverges from Christianity. Christianity taught us to aspire to abstinence and self-negation. Virtue was defined as a rejection of luxury, materialism and the ‘sins of the flesh’. If you were a poor Christian, you had a better chance of getting to heaven than a rich Christian. If you had the misfortune to be wealthy, you were urged to be charitable – to give your money away. “Faith Hope and Charity…The greatest of these is Charity.” (1.Corinthians 13:13)
The Hollywood Church takes a different view. Virtue is conferred by money. Getting (and keeping) a hundred million dollars confers virtue and salvation. If St. Francis of Assissi – the model of virtue in the Christian Age – were alive today, he would be despised as a homeless bum loser in need of sedation.
Hollywood preaches American values such as: ‘have fun, look good, look like a ‘good guy’, work hard, and believe in the get-rich ‘American Dream’. The studio executives who decide what movies and TV shows to make and distribute, are the priests, bishops and cardinals of the Hollywood Church; and Los Angeles is the Vatican – the Holy C.
The Hollywood Church is not in the truth business – it’s in the belief business. It doesn’t, for example, tell us that of the 20 richest nations in the world, the United States has the least social mobility (The Spirit Level – Richard Wilkinson & Kate Pickett. Published by Allen Lane.) It doesn’t tell us we have more chance of getting richer in Portugal or Greece than we do in America. It teaches belief in a free enterprise system that does not exist. It teaches: ‘never play by the rules, play to win’. It teaches: ‘violence works’. It teaches hypocrisy: ‘look like a nice guy but be an asshole, because nice guys finish last’. And it provides a template for world domination.
Our own frozen-hearted ruling class got, and pillaged, an empire using the Bible and the Sword. Our American cousins are doing the same with Hollywood and the Sword.
When I was a schoolboy in Scottsdale, Arizona, I remember seeing a map of the United States that included various outlying regions depicted in the same colour. I asked the teacher if these regions, which included the Philippines, Hawaii and Alaska, were American colonies. The teacher was very firm that they were not. ‘America doesn’t have colonies,’ she said. ‘These are American territories.’
Even today, the official line is that America doesn’t have an empire and is not – and never has been – interested in empire building. America is democratic – not imperialist. It certainly doesn’t want to conquer the world. Far from it, it wants to ‘help’ the world. Yet the Pentagon operates more than 700 military bases in over 150 different countries and has divided the world into five ‘combat zones’ – each zone under the command of a U.S. general. And United States military expenditure, excluding Iraq and Afghanistan, is $640 billion per year.
There are US military bases in Belgium, Bosnia, Denmark, Greenland, Serbia, Egypt, France, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Luxemburg, Portugal, Macedonia, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, Turkey, Peru, Venezuela and many more. There are 73 US military installations in Germany. There are 24 US military installations in the UK, not including seven RAF bases controlled by the US. And the Pentagon controls our nuclear weapons.
To understand why we’re not allowed our own cinema, we need to understand the reality of the world we live in. Movies are the Bible of the American Empire. They condition the thoughts and beliefs of the subject nations; and we, like the rest of Europe, Egypt, Iraq, Canada, Central America, South America and much of Far East, are a subject nation.
Fortunately, America is (mostly) a benevolent ruler, so long as you don’t defy it. Iran is in trouble right now because it wants to be independent. It refuses to ‘cooperate’ (pay tribute to) the Godfather. If Iran won’t bend the knee, it must be taught a lesson, lest its defiance encourage others to go their own way. America must maintain its credibility. Iran (and the rest of the world) must be clear who’s boss. The alternative, which is the potential disintegration of the American Empire, and an ensuing economic collapse, is unthinkable.
The UK government is not as dopey as it looks. It knows the score. It can never acknowledge that Britain is a vassal of the US because British voters wouldn’t like that. But our government knows full well that its best, and only, policy is to lick (and keep on licking) America’s butthole like a porn star on meth.
So, that’s why the government won’t let us have our own Cinema, and why we are being taken over, bit-by-bit, by American culture.

^
Jonathan Gems - Why we Don’t have a British Film Industry.


Shakur;

Quote:shakur Again, that's their version of globalization. Ours was October 15 2011, February 15-16 2003, etc. Spain 1936. The #occupywallstreet hashtag. Wikileaks and "Collateral Murder". That's our globalization.

Bradley Manning whose family is from Wales originally joined the army and is said to have released the collateral murder video. People join the army a lot because there are few prospects elsewhere. Re; Spain;

Quote:Many of the most powerful poems of the war are by Miguel Hernandez, of whom Pablo Neruda wrote, 'his face was the face of Spain'. Hernandez, a self-educated peasant, served in the Republican Army and was sentenced to death by Franco at the end of the war. He died in prison 3 years later, aged 31. In 'To the International Soldier Fallen in Spain', Hernandez writes tenderly of the solidarity shown to Spain by members of the International Brigades:

Around your bones, the olive groves will grow,
unfolding their iron roots in the ground,
embracing men universally, faithfully.
(trans. by Ted Genoway)

The war was a central theme for three of the leading South American writers of the age: Pablo Neruda, Cesar Vallejo and Octavio Paz. All three spent time at the Front and their strongly anti-fascist poems about what was happening in Spain are among the most remarkable war poems of the twentieth century.

http://www.warpoets.org/conflicts/spanish/


Lorca at 0:25

Quote: The Clash - Spanish Bombs


Spanish songs in Andalucia,
the shooting sites in the days of 39.
Oh, please leave, the VENTANA open.
Federico Lorca is dead and gone:
bullet holes in the cemetery walls,
the black cars of the Guardia Civil.
Spanish bombs on the Costa Rica -
Im flying on in a DC-10 tonight.

Spanish bombs; yo te quiero infinito.
Yo te quiero, oh mi corazón.
Spanish bombs; yo te quiero infinito.
Yo te quiero, oh mi corazón.

Spanish weeks in my disco casino;
the freedom fighters died upon the hill.
They sang the red flag,
they wore the black one -
but after they died, it was Mockingbird Hill.
Back home, the buses went up in flashes,
the Irish tomb was drenched in blood.
Spanish bombs shatter the hotels.
My señoritas rose was nipped in the bud.

Spanish bombs; yo te quiero infinito.
Yo te quiero, oh mi corazón.
Spanish bombs; yo te quiero infinito.
Yo te quiero, oh mi corazón.

The hillsides ring with free the people -
or can I hear the echo from the days of 39
with trenches full of poets,
the ragged army, fixing bayonets to fight the other line?
Spanish bombs rock the province;
Im hearing music from another time.
Spanish bombs on the Costa Brava;
Im flying in on a DC-10 tonight.

Spanish bombs; yo te quiero infinito.
Yo te quiero, oh mi corazón.
Spanish bombs; yo te quiero infinito.
Yo te quiero, oh mi corazón,
oh mi corazón,
oh mi corazón.

Spanish songs in Andalucia:
mandolina, oh mi corazón.
Spanish songs in Granada, oh mi corazón,
oh mi corazón,
oh mi corazón,
oh mi corazón

Hope you didn’t think that when I mentioned Lorca, Orwell and Malraux that I wasn’t dropping in some ‘culture’ there - (being as its supposed to somehow be a dirty word n’ all.)

Quote: Am I supposed to believe that "black helicopters" and "NWO" is the only possible outcome of international cooperation, solidarity and communication?

Er - when did I say that?

I said globalisation refering to the globalisation of power structures. It is not the only possible outcome but the most likely one given the ownership of capital, media (which controls and influences public opinion to further the political agenda.

What I said specifically was in answer to Seans comments when I said

[quote[1871
the class struggle frequently takes place within the nationalist struggle. Especially for the self determination of smaller nations. That was the context of the struggle in Ireland and in the Latin American countries.

'No borders' merely plays into the hands of the glovalist capitalists and the corporates who have more capital to prevail. Thats why the nationalist struggle is also relevant to Socialism.[/quote]

My comments were within that context - not the context in which you have placed them.. I am all for international co-operation solidarity and communication as long as theres a respect for peoples identities and culture - of which a national culture - a culture from a geographical location and shared history is a part.

Quote:I mean, the Luddites saw the destruction of their livelihoods as the probable outcome of technology and to a large extent, automation and technology have apparently hurt the working class in certain ways, at certain times, but is that all we got from it? The Internet allows the Man - Big Brother - to watch us and track us, is that because networks are inherently predisposed to this kind of usage? Every Joe Blow can put up a site or blog saying that "Bengazi has been retaken!", so what? Is there something that says it has to be like that, or that's even a bad thing? Is "amateur journalism" really a bad thing automatically?

That’s Ned Ludd right? The man who took the name ‘Ned Ludd’ knew what the word ‘Ludd’ meant and where it came from. There was a centuries old knowledge of the resistance - hence the name;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lludd_Llaw_Eraint

The elites have attempted to portray the resistance of Ned Ludd as; ‘anti technological advancement’. That is a lie. The Luddites were not against the technological advancements - or progress -( this shows you how academic elites financed by elites will rewrite history.)

They were against the capital ownership and control of the means of production which put them out of work, left them starving and condemned their families to misery and hunger - but profited the rich who exploited cheap labour.

Infact that Revolution included many who were not loomers;


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentrich,_Derbyshire


The breaking of looms and the war with that exploiting class led to a workers war with the capitalist owners and the British army and the deportations to America and Australia enforced by the military who also committed the genocides in those countries in further implementation of the same domestic policy which oppressed their ‘own’ people. People were coerced or executed.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_transportation


http://www.marxists.org/archive/riazanov...a/ch01.htm





Amateur journalism tou refer to is no bad thing- Im all for that tradition of amateurism - often the best professionals are amateurs (in spirit) but the landlord has to be paid and the kids fed.

Do you go to work for free?

Quote:How is global integration of markets and communication a bad thing? Yeah, when it's controlled by a few people it only serves their interests. Who says it can't be controlled by us?

Well it isn’t is it? That’s why we are seeing the riots you refer to. Presently it seems we are fucked. Larger scale of economies and increasing regulation have put smaller businesses out of business - I have seen it happen in the Uk and Ireland - even formerly robust national industries have been deliberately and systematically destroyed - much of it due to deals, regulation and protectionism of markets by specific interests - they are the ones really in charge of the process of glabalisation.

I am still not sure of how you would monetise the opposition to that. I can see clearly though how specifically protecting national interests for workers would have an effect - but I would be really interested in what practical measures would be taken which were not national and local interests. America argues free trade but it is the most protectionist country in the world - it protects its own economic interests.

Quote:Who says that while they do control things economically, while Zuckerberg and his 20 employees control Facebook, we can't use it to our advantage? Ask people in Egypt, Syria and Tunisia if they think the globalization of information and communication is a bad thing.

Again ‘ Show me where I said the globalisation of information and communication is a bad idea.

Quote:Anyways, maybe a thread about culture and one about globalization? I wanna hear more about the history of Scotland, it's integration into the kingdom - politically and economically - and that shit about the Roman era, who exactly everyone was, where they were, who they were fighting, etc. I got a little lesson from dude at work before I left but, lol, as always, we ended up talking about U.S.-Roman parallels and the evangelical right. lol.

The Romans brought in another culture in an attempt to eradicate the existing culture which was already there - which is why when they invaded they cut down the Nemeton- (which was the sacred grove for the indigenous people) as a way of erasing cultural identity to impose their rule which - as a symbolic act in the same way that invading Europeans attempted to destroy the indigenous cultures of native americans. All that happened in Europe and Britain early on and in many respects is ongoing.

But then other cultures are irrelevant to you - right?


Bobolarse

Quote:This is why the SNP eclipsed the Labour Party - the first time in history. Scots independence is like Irish independence - its an historic inevitability.

Only in the Scotish parliment! Scots who want indepedance vote labour in general ellections because the SNP is powerless in Westminster. The only reason SNP get votes in their own parliment is because they have fairly decent policies....for scots! Independance isnt a concern when you are protecting many of the benefits that scottish people enjoy. If you look at the general ellection, look how many votes labour got in scotland, they hardly "moved away".

Wow. Scots vote for Scots interests,. What an AMAZING insight.

Since the election there has been a shift towards the SNP. The issue is independence more than devolution.. The ‘move away’ is from Unionism - supported by Labour towards the Independence wanted by the SNP.


FUCK THE UNION AND FUCK THE LABOUR PARTY and Boboulas guess what,…….

Quote:The Scottish National party has won a majority in the Holyrood elections – a dramatic result that will allow its leader, Alex Salmond, to hold a historic referendum on independence for Scotland.
After a series of astonishing victories over Labour and a collapse in the Liberal Democrat vote, the SNP leader saw a landslide for his party take it beyond the 65-seat mark. Holyrood has 129 seats.
After a night of defeats for some of Labour's best-known figures and a near defeat for the Scottish Labour leader, Iain Gray, Salmond declared he would stage an independence referendum within five years.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/...ictory-snp

Quote:Quote:Break up the UK and you move towards breaking up the over-riding control of that structure of empire and monarchy and London banking institutions.

What structure of empire are you talking about?

Monarchy. Banking System. Imperial Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq etc Trident in Scotland. Scotlands oil.

In relation to world influence of this hegemony. Canada for instance;

Quote:Land ownership in Canada is held by governments, Native groups, corporations, and individuals. Canada is the second largest country in the world; at 9,093,507 km² or 3,511,085 mi² of land (and more if fresh water is included) it occupies more than 6% of the Earth's surface. Since Canada uses primarily British-derived common law, the holders of the land actually have land tenure (permission to hold land from the Crown) rather than absolute ownership.

*^
wiki - landownership in Canada

Quote:boboilas Im sure the poor oppressed scotts care about your odd views on the great and might british empire. Thats not why scottish people want independance.

Lol. Did I say they care about what I think? ‘Poor oppressed Scots‘. And you claim to speak for all Scots. Get outta here.

If you are going to comment on my posts - either read them properly or don’t comment at all - and like I give a fuck about what you think other people think about my posts - let people think what they will I’ll say what I want and if you don’t like it



I don’t agree with a lot of what this guy says (eg; EU and Brown lol ) and I don’t like Taggart (lol) he still makes some succinct points about British Empire. And the points about colonial domination eg. Trident have been made elsewhere;




[quote] 1871 Quote:You dont speak Gaelic you speak English - that makes you a colonised Scot.

Please stop talking out of your arse! Thankyou. {/quote]


Obviously you have a poor understanding of history - and in your trolling you failed to read what I subsequently posted wgich explains what I meant by that comment.

The long term effects of colonisation which span centuries and has affected EVERYONE and created the society institutions we live with today. My interest is in an objective undertanding of this as linked to cultural identity and creative expression and ideas in particular - that’s just my interest. The economic prosperity of the west was largely built on slavery and economic exploitation for instance which continues to this day. Its an historical fact whatever the feelings of outrage about it are that’s not going to change it. History happened. I think that by understanding history you don’t have to be tied to those mistakes but you can understand the present more fully.

Re English cultural colonisation - this is fairly well understood by many writers - Irish, Scots, Welsh and English.

The English language - itself evolved from Chaucer )as recognisable ‘English’ was out of a process of colonisation itself. The Anglo Saxons didn’t speak English and the language evolved as a hybrid of forms due to the various stages of colonisation and everyone was affected by that colonisation - the class system grew out of it - and well before industrialisation infact - some benefited (as the aristocratic class who trace back to Norman lineage) as others didn’t eg; as with the Tolpuddle martyrs or of the Irish famine.

The British do not speak the language they spoke centuries or thousands of years ago though early forms are being revived or have been kept alive closely linked to both revolutionary and nationalist self determination movements..

Theres an essay here about it - though as you are a fuckwit Bobolarse I doubt whethet you will read it - and infact don’t give a fuck whether you do. Lol.

But this relates specifically to what I was writing about - and is why the Gaelic culture is fostered in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Cornwall.

http://www.siol-nan-gaidheal.org/gaelic.htm

http://english.emory.edu/Bahri/Language.html


Your reference……South Park? Yeah - funny it might be…. . Like I am going to take what you say seriously through that.



Braveheart was fairly accurate on the history. Leave aside the logistics of filming and the depiction of the story for dramatic purpose {eg; the fact that Wallace divided the forces at Stirling Bridge, the fact that English initially tried to demand that he hand over a fishing catch etc) -its still fairly accurate and it even depicts the political machinations of Robert de Brus younger and elder. But the, Boboularse I have also read the history as well as seen the movie.

Randall Wallace was an American from Scots roots and his screenplay is impressive and well researched;

Your reference……South Park? Yeah - funny it might be…. . Like I am going to take what you say seriously through that.

[Boboulas]

+1 for having a horrificly laid out post.

I dont care about your essays and whatnot. Someone in scottland speaking english does not make them a "colonised scot". Im not here to argue if the language has been marginialized which im sure it has. Does it really make any difference though?

Quote:Braveheart was fairly accurate on the history. Leave aside the logistics of filming and the depiction of the story for dramatic purpose {eg; the fact that Wallace divided the forces at Stirling Bridge, the fact that English initially tried to demand that he hand over a fishing catch etc) -its still fairly accurate and it even depicts the political machinations of Robert de Brus younger and elder. But the, Boboularse I have also read the history as well as seen the movie.

Braveheart the film was historicly innacurate and full of distortions.

Wallace organizied the rebellion with another man, Andrew Moray who was killed at stamford bridge. He wasnt mentioned in the film even though he commanded more men than wallance and came up with the idea to fight at stamford. The battle scene in the movie didnt even mention a bridge.... Wallace never penetrated england as far as york and certainly didnt besige it. His father wasnt a farmer, he was a knight.

The truth is the film is a massive insult to the scotts that fought throughout that time period. Id like to know why someone so big on the whole anti-hollywood culture thing would endorse a movie like braveheart? Its a terrible film by a crazy asshole.

[1871]

So all the Scots were insulted when they saw Braveheart. Yeah sure. Funny how my Scots friends thought the movie was brilliant, but I suppose thems some that didnt like it. .

The 'distortions' you refer to remind me of those revisionists who attempt to discredit what is a depiction or story by attempting to pick out every luttle detail as though an omission of these details discredits the work itself. How clever therefore of you to say that the film doesnt show Wallaces father as a landowner and knight -

it also doesnt show the sacking of Berwick on Tweed

or Philip of France

or the details of John de Menteiths background.

Funny how all those English commentators and Unionists at the Daily Telegraph said exactly the same thing as a way of attempting to discredit its underlying message.

Perhaps the film should have also have detailed every year of the mans life right?

I suppose if thyey had another billion extra they could have made it four times as long and included details of Moray, the court at Lanark in 1297, (a court not a post but still the same action by Heselrig http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_at_Lanark

Godammit it didnt even show the full details of Wallaces death'

Quote:Following the trial, on 23 August 1305, Wallace was taken from the hall, stripped naked and dragged through the city at the heels of a horse to the Elms at Smithfield. He was hanged, drawn and quartered — strangled by hanging but released while he was still alive, castrated, eviscerated and his bowels burnt before him, beheaded, then cut into four parts. His preserved head (dipped in tar) was placed on a pike atop London Bridge. It was later joined by the heads of the brothers, John and Simon Fraser. His limbs were displayed, separately, in Newcastle upon Tyne, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Stirling, and Aberdeen. A plaque stands in a wall of St. Bartholomew's Hospital near the site of Wallace's execution at Smithfield.

Yeah, but I know-

THE SCOTS REALLY HATED BRAVEHEART. Its TRUE.

Quote:Braveheart wins battle to be top Scots movie of all time
Published on Monday 23 June 2008 22:42

IT MAY have been filmed 13 years ago but Mel Gibson's stirring portrayal of William Wallace in Braveheart was unforgettable.

So much so that Gibson's 1995 epic came top in a survey of cinema-goers asked to name their favourite Scottish film of all time.




In second place was Trainspotting, Danny Boyle's 1996 dark comic adaptation of the novel by Irvine Welsh. Twelve per cent of voters said the film, which launched the career of Ewan McGregor, was their favourite Scottish film.




Another comedy – albeit one filmed in 1949 in black and white – romped into third place. Whisky Galore, the film of a Compton Mackenzie novel based on the true story of a shipwreck raided for its cargo of whisky was fondly remembered by cinema-goers.




The sentimental Disney version of Greyfriars Bobby, made in 1961, still has many fans, earning 9 per cent of the vote.




The 1997 film Mrs Brown, the tale of Queen Victoria's relationship with her Highland servant John Brown, was in fifth place, while Bill Forsyth's much loved schoolyard fable Gregory's Girl was the seventh most popular.




The Last King of Scotland, made in 2006, was the most recent film on the list with 6 per cent of the vote, while the historical epic Rob Roy, made in 1996 and starring Liam Neeson, was the eighth most popular film. The 1973 film The Wicker Man came in ninth place and Dog Soldiers, from 2002, came tenth.

http://www.scotsman.com/news/braveheart_..._1_1077219

Quote:The truth is the film is a massive insult to the scotts that fought throughout that time period. Id like to know why someone so big on the whole anti-hollywood culture thing would endorse a movie like braveheart? Its a terrible film by a crazy asshole.

tsk tsk

again not paying attention.

Read the Gems article which I posted because I agree with. The point is not that I am entirely anti Hiollywood (check out the avatar you simpleton) but, like Gems I think we should have our own industry and not be colonised by a larger dominant presence and this constitutes a form of cultural colonisationm - and that is also applicable to Scotland - - something which a Government focussing on preserving its culture would protect and nuture and give specific funding for - even more than they do now

As for your languge comments.Again you did not read the links or take time to read what I had written to take time to understand what I said.

Anyway Bobolarse maybe one day they could make a biopic about you - thats if the wardrobe department ever find a big enough balloon to contain all the shit.

Now be a good boy and go back to your south park cartoons.

[ClichéGuevara]

Scots are idiots when it comes to patriotism. I doubt most even know that Braveheart was actually Robert The Bruce. It's understandable that they'd think Braveheart was fantastic.

I'll have you know that ADHD and a laid back attitude when it comes to everything doesn't equal a split personality.

[Boboulas]

Quote:So all the Scots were insulted when they saw Braveheart.

I never said that, for someone who trys to pick out the hypothetical reading errors in someones post you sure like to call the kettle black. I guess americans loved watching The Patriot for the same reasons scottish people like watching Braveheart, it invokes some kind of national pride. It still doesnt do any justice to history or to the people who fought against what you call the "structure of empire and monarchy and London banking institutions".

Quote:The 'distortions' you refer to remind me of those revisionists who attempt to discredit what is a depiction or story by attempting to pick out every luttle detail as though an omission of these details discredits the work itself. How clever therefore of you to say that the film doesnt show Wallaces father as a landowner and knight -

THERE WAS NO FUCKING BRIDGE!!!

Quote:its underlying message.

ha...haha..hahaha.HAA.HAHAHA.PAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA Underlying message? Of braveheart? A film made by holywood to make money? Had an underlying message? About scottish independance? That would benefit the working people of scottland? And further the world towards freedom?

Quote:Again you did not read the links or take time to read what I had written to take time to understand what I said.

I thought you said i didnt have to read them? So inconsistent.

Quote:something which a Government focussing on preserving its culture would protect and nuture and give specific funding for

Uh huh. And what part of any Scottish Independance party/pressure group/forum/facebook page is actually trying to create or re-ignite some centuries destroyed culture?

---

Oh and please construct your posts better, you dont need to start a new paragraph for 4 words. Do the same with the quotes you are using, its kinda annoying.

[TheMythOfSisyphus]

1871 and Boboulas cut out the personal attacks and focus on the content of your arguments, you guys should know better than that. Especially considering that 1871 is about as old as the treants off Lord of the Rings and Boboulas is a filthy European, you Europeans are supposed to be so refined .

[1871]

Quote:1871
Quote:
The 'distortions' you refer to remind me of those revisionists who attempt to discredit what is a depiction or story by attempting to pick out every luttle detail as though an omission of these details discredits the work itself. How clever therefore of you to say that the film doesnt show Wallaces father as a landowner and knight -

Quote: boboulas

THERE WAS NO FUCKING BRIDGE!!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Stirling_Bridge

Yes - and the William wall;ace character in the film didnt have a beard and a whole host of other details. It wasnt a documentary lol - it was a dramatic retelling of an event. You can make the same reference to almost any historical film - that isnt the purpose of a film - the purpose of a film is to convey a sentiment - an idea - a message - a film, like a play is an art form not a step by step literal translation - especially of events not entirely recorded.

Do you know something as well Boboulas? You know that film Schindlers List? Well you know what - there was really no music as it was happening and people back then were not in black and white they were in colour. You know what as well? Liam Neeson who played Schindler is Irish and Schindler wasnt even Irish ! The cheek of it. The Irish were neutral in the war ! I ask you !

A films intention was to convey the spirit of something - its a dramatic account not sa 'literal truth' it is about the essence of what that struggle was about - not a collection of factual details.

Next you'll be telling me that Shakespeare is invalid because people back then didnt speak blank verse. it was a drama with a message to convey. Obviously that had no resonance for you as you have stated - but for many people it did. I suppose they all have to conform with your view right?

Quote: boboulas Quote:
its underlying message.

ha...haha..hahaha.HAA.HAHAHA.PAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA Underlying message? Of braveheart? A film made by holywood to make money? Had an underlying message? About scottish independance? That would benefit the working people of scottland? And further the world towards freedom?

Of course it made money. Duh. You think tech doersnt make money from his music?

Do you expect novelists not to make money? Or film-makers? Or writers? Or actors? They are not working people also right? Randall Wallace is not expected to make money from his writing?

If their primary purpose had been merely 'to make money' then they could have made any other type of film - they didnt - they made that story - and it had resonance with the audience because it had a recognisable truth - though obviously not to Unionists such as yourself and Sean..

With referennce to the 'working class' - the specific reference - though it may have gone over your head - was with the two actors at the battle scene were in the audiences mind known for two roles - one is the guy who played the son in the Rab C Nesbitt series - the other is the actor who has starred in the Ken Loach movies who says 'right lads - lets go' -
it was a reference to what the working class would do who didnt want to fight for the 'nobility' - hence the speech that followed of why they should fight the invaders of their country (historical fact there btw). This however Boboulas is completely unforgivable since there were actually NO CNN journalists recording what Wallace actually said !!!!

Randall Wallace MADE IT UP !!!!! Bastard!

Quote: And what part of any Scottish Independance party/pressure group/forum/facebook page is actually trying to create or re-ignite some centuries destroyed culture?

It wasnt destroyed - not entirely. Its still salive well and fighting.
Despite those who have attempted to destroy or belittle it or say because THE find it irrelevant everyone else and future generations should conform to the mainstream view.

read the link above with reference to the language

Also you can check on the SNPs own website. Do a specific search via google and you'll find loads of stuff refering to the Gaelic lamguage and culture - its a specific policy for the SNP and other nationalists band groups who are not SNP.

From Facebook;

Quote:Election 2010 - Where does Gaelic stand in the manifestos and opinions of the candidates?Back to Gaelic.Discussion BoardTopic view.Topic: Election 2010 - Where does Gaelic stand in the manifestos and opinions of the candidates?.Displaying all 4 posts..Gaelic
I have been asking candidates standing for Election as MPs what their views are on the promotion of the Gaelic language. Here's what I asked them:

Dear Candidate for Member of Parliament,

I would like to know:

* If you are for or against the promotion of the Gaelic language?
* If you are for or against spending more money on educating the Scottish General Public about the Gaels and the Gaelic language?
* What are your views on Gaelic language, Culture and Heritage?

I hope to hear from you soon.
over a year ago.Gaelic
I used http://news.stv.tv/election-2010/constit...andidates/ to find out the candidates for the South Lanarkshire area, and starting with the constituency including Lesmahagow I sought out contact details to put forward my questions - to be honest I was shocked at how inaccessible most candidates were (in South Lanarkshire) - not even an Email or phone number!

The message to Graham Simpson of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party bounced as the mailbox was too full. I've sent a Facebook message to John Loughton of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. I'll update his response when I receive an answer. Unfortunately, I have been unable to source contact details for The Green Party and Labour Party candidates. If you are reading this, please respond so we can see a balanced opinion.

John McKenna is standing for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow for the SNP party and he responded this morning. Here is his response:

John McKenna Says:

April 26, 2010 at 1:23 am

Dear Mr Wallace

Thank you for your query and I am happy to hear from you on this very important subject. The SNP is absolutely committed to the promotion of Gaelic language and culture and I am delighted to support that policy.

Gaelic is a rich and precious part of our heritage, which has been systematically denied and suppressed, but which continues to make a great contribution to the diversity of Scottish culture and society.

That’s why the SNP Government has increased funding for Gaelic medium schooling, fully supports Sabhal Mòr Ostaig on Skye, and takes every opportunity to promote the use of the Gaelic language. Also, through the Youth Music Initiative and Fèisean nan Gàidheal, Gaelic song and music are being well promoted.

You are right that there is an issue about education of the general public about the rights and benefits of Gaelic. The SNP is committed to doing what it can to spread the word – by our First Minister and MSPs such as Linda Fabiani standing up for the rights of the Gaels and Gaelic heritage.

I believe that the right message is being promoted and that promotion will be given a new focus by the publication by Bòrd na Gàidhlig of ‘GinealachÙr na Gàidhlig: An Action Plan to increase the numbers of Gaelic speakers’ earlier this month.

John
Source: http://johnmckennasnp.wordpress.com/2010.../#comments
over a year ago.

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=11...8&topic=73


http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/...06161418/0

Quote:Quote:1871
Again you did not read the links or take time to read what I had written to take time to understand what I said.

Boboulas; I thought you said i didnt have to read them? So inconsistent.

If you want to engage with the discussion here - follow the links and construct an argument in response to them at least - otherwise whats the point of commenting on my posts?

but hey Boboulas - you are a regular George Bernard Shaw right? I'd like to see a film you made or a play - given that you referred to south park Im sure it would equal something by Kurosawa, Leone or Ken Loach YEAH? LOL.

Quote: bOBSARSE Oh and please construct your posts better, you dont need to start a new paragraph for 4 words. Do the same with the quotes you are using, its kinda annoying.

So are you - now fuck off and stop trolling.

[Boboulas]

Why cant you admit that you fucked up? You said it was historicly accurate and i proved it wasnt. So now you've changed your argument to something impossible to refute, some mystical underlying meaning that only you know of.
The last thing ill say on the whole Braveheart issue is this. I feel bad for you if you get history lessons from hollywood films. For the love of god, dont watch 300.

A scottish person talking English does NOT mean they are colonized.

[1871]

You proved only that you hadnt read my post properly.

I said;

Quote:1871 Braveheart was fairly accurate on the history. Leave aside the logistics of filming and the depiction of the story for dramatic purpose {eg; the fact that Wallace divided the forces at Stirling Bridge, the fact that English initially tried to demand that he hand over a fishing catch etc) -its still fairly accurate and it even depicts the political machinations of Robert de Brus younger and elder. But the, Boboularse I have also read the history as well as seen the movie

You understand the meaning of the word 'fairly' right? Thats why I used it.

Are you going to tell me that it isnt fairly accurate - even when I have written and referred to details that differ from the film eg; the battle at Stirling and the fishing incident - two events which were not in the movie - regarding the history and explained to your dimwitted barely alive intelligence the purpose of a 'dramatic reconstruction which somehow you think people dont understand because you dont understand it yourself

You understand that the Stirling bridge and fishing references were references to written accounts outsuide of the film - thats why I refered to that yes?

You understand that the stopping of the horse was a reference to Northern Ireland road blocks and that there were no machine guns in Wallaces day and that there were no jeeps yes ?

A Scottish person talking English merans that they have as a people - and as individuals been subject to the process of colonisation if formerly their language was not English.This occured both in Ireland and in Scotland and in Wales This is why there is a policy to reinstate the Gaelic language by nationalists. Again this has already been explained above in the context of defining an historical process of colonisation.

Sean said he was half English. I said that explains it. .

As for me studying my history from films - again you obviously did not click on the links in my previous posts which refer to written references