The Auld Enemies Still?
Gerry Hassan
The Scotsman, March 19th 2010
The Scotland-England relationship is one of the defining ways many Scots view the world. It ranges from football and rugby rivalry to history, politics, culture and identity.
At the weekend Scots rugby fans booed English players at Murrayfield, while we have grown accustomed to Scots football crowds booing the playing of ‘God Save the Queen’ for England at Hampden. And then there is the ‘Anyone But England’ phenomenon.
Why should Scotland define so much of its identity and sense of itself via what we think of England? This gives the power over who we are to someone else. Some argue that none of this really matters, and that it is all harmless fun about football and sport, but most of us know this is about much more, and tells us something uncomfortable about ourselves.
The ‘Anyone But England’ opinion uses a lot of false memory history syndrome. It dares to suggest that the English are the ones who have the problem from arrogant English football commentators, to the constant misunderstanding of ‘England’ as ‘Britain’, and 1966 and all that.
Apart from the fact that anyone looking at the sum total of Scottish football commentators would find a sorry summary of Scotland, lets get a bit of perspective. Scots football fans like to mark down England for its commentators and reporters having a sense of joy, passion and pride about their football, qualities we value in ourselves. Parts of the English media are not edifying, but there is a global problem about football, stereotypes and xenophobia, that we don’t just need to pull the English up for.
The 1966 myth needs to be put in context. For a start, the Scots have tried to diminish this thanks to the Wembley triumph of 1967, even suggesting in jest, that given this was England’s first defeat since winning the World Cup, this made Scotland ‘unofficial’ world champions.
Then there is the tale that the English wont stop going on about ’66, when in truth the only people who cant get over it seem to be the Tartan Army. It is a fact that England did win the World Cup and don’t make that much of it anymore. And what if they did?
Scots football seems to consist of going on and on about a few very poignant events from Jim Baxter’s keepie-up at Wembley ’67 to Archie Gemmell’s 1978 goal against Holland, combined with the Lisbon Lions. Imagine if you can for a second that we had won the World Cup in ‘66; Scots football fans would constantly refer to it every minute of every day for the rest of eternity!
There is an argument in recent decades that Scotland has changed dramatically, and become more confident and outward looking. This states that once what mattered was beating England every year at football, oblivious to the fact that we often never qualified for the World Cup.
The great Scots team of Baxter and Denis Law never qualified for seven World Cups and European Championships in a row, a worse record than now, but all we choose to remember is beating England in ’67.
When the ‘Anyone But England’ group is challenged, and the mostly harmonious nature of Scottish-English relations pointed out over the last few centuries, this is discounted. When you argue that ‘the auld enemies’ is not Poland v. Russia, or even Ireland v. Britain, respondents explicitly compare Scotland’s plight to that of Ireland.
This is inaccurate and bad history, close to a collective amnesia which is both insulting to the brutal British colonialism and oppression of Ireland, and a complete misunderstanding of Scotland’s role in the union, and the obvious fact that this nation was never colonised by the English. Instead, the comparison of Scotland v. England invests in a Scots sense of victimhood and a ‘Trainspotting’ version of our history.
Such a perspective draws every slight and grievance against the Scots from the Highland Clearances to Scots soldiers losses in the two World Wars, Margaret Thatcher, and the poll tax, and sees them as part of an anti-Scottish plot. It is not a very attractive interpretation of our history to put it mildly!
The excellent Scots football, psychology and culture website More than Mind Games run by James Hamilton, shows that it is possible to have an erudite, thoughtful conversation about football, far removed from the pub bores of Stuart ‘n’ Tam. Hamilton believes that the ‘Anyone But England’ mindset ‘isn’t a first order expression of Scottish nationality’, but the equivalent of ‘a ginger wig on match day’ and ‘an inflated haggis’.
I am not so sure. The appearance of ‘Anyone But England’ t-shirts produced by Slanj tells us that such views are mainstream, seen as appropriate and legitimate enough to be commercialised. Aberdeen Police were going over the top looking into the selling of such merchandise as ‘racist’, but a police investigation into the health of Scottish culture is obviously going beyond their remit.
Where Hamilton is right is in arguing that ‘Anyone But England isn’t about England at all’, but about the limitations the Scots feel about themselves, in sport and elsewhere, and the bizarre, out of date stereotypes and caricatures we feel we have permission to create about the English.
Really things have gone way too far. Instead of cheering ‘Anyone But England’ we need to desperately normalise our relationship with our southern neighbours and friends.
If this does not involve people actively supporting England it has to challenge the small minded, knee jerk unreflective prejudice which passes for much of the public sentiment in Scotland. At the absolute minimum this has to entail not supporting not supporting England at least as a start.
Things have come to such a sorry pass that I am almost inclined to get an England strip and wear it around Scotland during the World Cup. What sort of reaction would I get? Why would people find it such a provocative act? Why would it be seen as inappropriate or boorish in a sea of Scotland football fans wearing the colours of England’s opponents?
It is much too easy to dismiss all of this as something about nothing or just a little joke. Part of Scotland has grown up in recent years, but part of it has deliberately chosen to wallow in a collective childhood of unattractive views. How we pull this back will be difficult to near nye impossible, but at least we have to stop and reflect on what we as a nation and culture are becoming, and how this appears to others.
An interesting piece, and I agree with much of it (hell, I’ve written similar myself). Generally, Scottish football commentary can be summed up as:
‘Look Celtic are playing’
‘Look Rangers are playing’
‘Look Scotland are playing. Let’s be friendly drunks’.
‘Look England are playing. I’m supporting the other team’.
RCM
http://leftbackinthechangingroom.blogspot.com
Who cares?
Its in the nature of the beast to wish disaster on ones rivals and friends alike.
Never heard of Schadenfreude?
These symptoms of healthy rivalry should never be considered to be a purely Scottish disease.
Many Dutchmen and women would be delighted to see Germany getting gubbed, Belgian fans look forward to witnessing Dutch humiliation at the hands of anybody, need I go on.
Its ‘Anyone But England’ for me this summer. And to hell with this reverse cringe.
.
Found your site following a piece on Carol Craig’s new book in the Sunday Times and am I glad I did! It has put a lot of things into perspective for me, an Englishman of 67 years who has lived on and off in and around Glasgow for a total of twenty-odd of them.
I too think it sad that so many Scots appear to define their attitudes in relation to England and the English, as it can be quite limiting. However other potential polemics such as politics, sport, religion and class also have a huge bearing on the psyche.
For my own part I regard myself strongly as British and would support Scotland in sport against Anyone but England!
There’s no real malice in the Scots attitude to the English. I think what irks many (most?) Scots is the basic thought: why on earth *should* we be in a union with England?
Is Portugal in a union with Spain? Is Denmark in a union with Germany? Is Norway in a union with Sweden? Are Monaco or Luxemburg in a union with anybody? Is xxxxx in a union with yyyyy (fill in your own blanks)? No, like other independent countries, we should be standing on our own two feet, taking the rough with the smooth, managing by our own resources, taking responsibility entirely for our own policies, wishes and actions. There are no guarantees in this world. But then nobody’s guaranteeing the above countries either.
There is no good reason for us sticking with an unequal “partner”. Our identity and recognition in the world are equal to any other country’s. It’s time (and it’s been time for ages) to step out on our own.
That’s why I personally would like to end our “union” with England. I like most English people (just as I like most Germans, Norwegians, Danes, Italians …) and I look forward to greeting them as neighbours – not unwelcome, unjustified “partners”.
All I can say, as an individual with no interest in football, is that I am really hurt by many of the comments English people have made to me. Last night was the last time I will ever use the BBC messageboards after reading yet another tirade of anti-Scottish abuse.
I am not a “jock”, a “sweaty” or “Scotch”. I am not drunken, scrounging or violent. If I complain about this stuff I am not just a “whinger with a chip on my shoulder”; I am genuinely offended. Scots are somehow responsible for a socialist state but when the banks collapse, they are responsible for that too.
Does the Scottish media spend as much time insulting and stereotyping the English as they do us? I honestly don’t see it. Where is the Scottish equivalent of Jeremy Clarkson, Paxman, David Starkey or Kelvin MacKenzie?
Sometimes I wonder if we should just go back to like it was in the 1980s. We had no voice and no political power then but at least we weren’t the targets of such endemic hatred.
I tend to agree with the substance of the comments above. There’s no question that we as a nation suffer from an inferiority complex (sporting or otherwise), but what Gerry hasn’t acknowledged here is that this doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Much of the ‘Anyone But England’ phenomenon stems from culturally imperialistic broadcasting practices, or, to put it otherwise, having the trials and tribulations of England’s football team rammed down our throats. While tubthumping displays of their sports media is fine of itself, we’re probably unique in the footballing world in having to stomach this in unconstituted form. To recycle the examples used in another comment, how much would the stakes be raised between Belgian and Dutch fans, or Dutch and German fans, if the partisan broadcasts of one received priority billing on the former’s television channels?
More generally, inferiority complexes on a national scale are borne of a sense of frustrated helplessness at one’s lot. Accordingly, I think that Scots can be broken down more or less as follows: 1) An extreme minority of dogmatic unionists (moronic, posturing Rangers fans aside) who to a greater or lesser extent identify with the British state in all its pomp; 2) Those, and I include myself in this category, who see independence as being the only viable means of redress; 2) Notional Scots who do not subscribe to ‘Britishness’, but are demotivated from supporting independence due to a failure to disassociate it with general apathy towards party politics and electoral processes, and 3) the naysayers who would “prefer not to make a fuss”, “don’t see the sense in wasting all that money” “don’t think we’d manage”, etc etc.
Aside from the first two categories, I think that all of this is pretty indicative of a nation that is still lacking in self-confidence and might explain some of the petty, needless excesses of the ‘A.B.E’ phenomenon (kicking the sh*t out of wee boys wearing England tops during the World Cup, etc). Self governance and, by extension, control of broadcasting, would surely act as the balm that would in time place our sporting rivalry firmly in the ‘harmless fun’ category.