this post was submitted on 10 Mar 2025
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And this is exactly why England tried to wipe out Welsh, Irish, and Scottish culture and language.
It's hard to sincerely say you're part of that culture if you can't even say that in your own tongue. Best you can do is say you're British which is just a ball hair away from being English.
Culture wars work, they just take a long fucking time.
Is mise Albannach, tha cultar nas cudromaiche na beairteas. Not the other way around.
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I am Scottish, culture is more important than wealth. Not the other way around.To be fair, we had been trying to wipe out our different cultures and languages long before the union with England. Pictish didn't make it, Cumbric didn't make it, and Gaelic had been getting slowly pushed out of the centre of power since Malcolm Canmore's time. Even the Statutes of Iona were James VI.
Rinn na Sasannaich e na bu mhiosa, 's cinnteach, ach chan robh sinn cho diofraichte
To be fair, saying to be fair and giving examples of it happening in the past doesn't justify allowing it to happen again.
The powerful cannot be allowed to control such fundamental aspects of our lives as how we communicate with one another.
And yet it's happened. It is happening. Some times more brutally than others. From Pictish, as you said, to Palestinians today. In comparison, Gaelic may have had it easy, but it still doesn't make it okay.
Every aspect of our lives is Anglicised, from our media to our way of speech. I can speak fluent English and understand many weird accents. I can barely get by in Gaelic without Google Translate, and I'm fucked if anyone has even a bit of a weird accent. I can tell you more about the politics of London or Manchester than I can my own city. I know how the English and American legal systems work far better than I do my own. My friends talk about English football teams, not local ones they have a connection to. English and American propaganda media have taken over the world. Even such cultural titans as the French are under attack from Anglicisation and have bodies like the Académie Française to ensure French stays French. Apply this same concept across the globe and it's scary to think about how much influence English has, how many cultures are dying because of it. And therefore, how many people a media empire can influence.
Now you may say, "but nobody's forcing you to consume English media" and this is true. But that wasn't always the case, Gaelic was persecuted and oppressed over a period of years. It has only seen a resurgence in numbers since devolution, and the regained ability to control some aspects of our lives. Less than 2% of the population understand it now. Why oppress a culture and a language that is no longer a threat? How many Gaelic speakers does that leave to create Gaelic media?
Culture wars work, they just take a long fucking time.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acad%C3%A9mie_Fran%C3%A7aise
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Gaelic#Number_of_speakers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Scottish_Gaelic#Persecution,_Retreat,_and_Dispersal
A bheil Gàidhlig agad dha-rìribh? An urrainn dhuinn barrachd conaltraidh a dhèanamh?
I'll say this bit in English first for the benefit of anyone else that's reading: I absolutely do not intend to attempt to justify the suppression of those cultures with my comment. It's fucked up and it lessens the richness of our culture, regardless of who did it. I'm more just wary of a certain current within Scotland of blaming the English for a lot of stuff that we very much did to ourselves, and I think it's good for us to reckon with the fact that it was the same Scotland that we identify with that did (a lot of, not all of) it
Tha mi ag ionnsachadh Gàidhlig ri cùrsa eSgoil UHI (OGE sa Ghàidhlig? Chan eil fios agam). Tha deuchainn agam a-nochd, a-rèist is e seo stuidearachd! Feumaidh mi faclair cuideachd, ach feabhas mi slaodaiche. Bithidh mi toilichte barrachd a bhruidhinn, fiù is ged nì mi mearbhallan. Tha mi airson an cànan a chumail beò