Pressure to be “More Scottish” than you are?

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I grew up in Glasgow in a middle class family. My parents were both Scottish. My dad from an Edinburgh Anglo-Scots family and my mum from a working class mixed background, but who spoke Gaelic due to her one grandfather being a first language speaker.

We spoke both Gaelic and English at home. I was sent to a Gaelic language school. The pressure to be more Scottish than anyone else was insufferable, even bordering on slightly xenophobic. I hid the fact my father was not a first language speaker (he can’t speak the language at all). There was a presumption that I and my family would all be SNP voters and if you dared say you were anti independence then you might as well have been Maggie Thatcher herself.

I was wondering it anyone else has felt a pressure over the last 10/20 years, or even recently, to become “more Scottish”? Or if people in Ireland or Wales might also feel this recent national pressure?

There are lots of sharp-elbowed Glasgow west end parents desperate to get their DC into the Gaelic schools, not because of any deep seated desire to learn Gaelic, but because the school gets really good exam results.

I'm Scottish living in Scotland and just don't recognise this at all.

Sorry you feel this way.

It was toxic ten years ago at the height of the referendum.

But it really isn't anymore. If you've not been here in a decade you wouldn't know that.

Yep the only place I see this view is Scotsnet, I recognise none of it.

"Not all Scottish people were born in Scotland and will have lots of different accents.
Maybe it's a middle class thing?"

How can you be Scottish if you're not born in Scotland? I mean if you have Scottish parents but are born in England, are you not classed as dual nationality?

I have Scottish ethnicity but wouldn't consider myself Scottish because I wasn't born there.

Do you mean nationalist rather than Republican?

@PepsiAddiction you say your dh/kids don't have a Scottish accent, but presumably they have some kind of accent? How would you describe it - I don't know how that would sound? (Not being goady - genuinely interested)

That's puzzling. My kids went to summer schools in the Gaeltacht and there were children from all sorts of backgrounds. Very cosmopolitan in fact. Is Scotland more homogenous I wonder.

I don't recognise any of this. I consider myself scottish. Born here , parents born in scotland, gaelic culture important to them but less so myself. Spent my childhood until aged 15 in north America. I don't measure scottishness of friends, colleagues, acquaintances. Etc. My scottish friends have many different backgrounds. I have never for example considered myself less scottish than say my friends I met in scottish secondary schools throughuch of my growing g up was outside Scotland. In fact I have never given it a second thought.

Pressure to be more Scottish
Toxic????
Unable to say you don't want/unsure about independence
Unable to say you are not an SNP voter
Young adults not happy in Scotland

?????

Not the Scotland I know or recognise.

Apart from Scots always loving a good whinge.

I think Glasgow is much worse for this than almost all other places. They just assume everyone else in Scotland is just like them and if not they seem rather offended. I've experienced this with Glaswegians from all sorts of different backgrounds ( but not all Glaswegians obvs).
They are a bit like Scousers...

I view anyone making their life in Scotland as being Scottish, or at the very least having dual nationality. I have worked with children in schools who were born in Iraq, Iran, Nigeria, Poland, Czech Republic, Russia, Slovakia. There is also a large Asian community in Scotland and many of the older generations still have accents...but having lived here for 50/60 years they are very very much scottish.

Define yourself as you wish. There is no such thing as "Scottish nationality" as we don't issue passports. So it's a wide definition, people born here, people with Scottish parents born in Wales, people whose ancestors left 150 year ago can claim to be Scottish. Makes no difference to me. Doesn't make me any more/less Scottish because other people like to think they're Scottish too.

I have family in Scotland who maintain that the reason the health/education systems have gone to shit is because it was viewed as treasonous to question the SNP. If this is true, it doesn't make for a healthy nation to have a political party in charge that cannot properly be held to account. Hopefully better times are in store politically for both Scotland and England now.

I get this a lot in my family, they are very anti-English. For most of them the only issue at the last General Election was the fact we are being ruled by Westminster. Even today my brother sent me some anti-Labour article.

i fed up with the SNP, fed up with the independence at all costs rhetoric, we had a referendum, they lost albeit narrowly now get on with running the country and stope blaming everything on the Tories. Our country is a shambles, our once great education system is a disgrace, our children are in poverty, they couldn’t build two ferries, then there was all the scandals. As much as I despise the Tories I hate the idea of paying more tax for the privilege of living in Scotland, we have a ridiculously high benefits bill, a lot of adults do not work or need their wages topped up as they don’t get paid a living wage. I feel the middle classes are getting squeezed and squeezed and whilst I wouldn’t mind opening my dues in tax of the public services were decent there’s not enough tax payers in this country to support our welfare bill. We have a huge drug and alcohol problem that needs tackling too. Whilst I applaud the free uni places and prescriptions they all got to be paid for somehow. You just have to take a walk up Glasgow, Edinburgh and St Andrews Uni and there’s hardly a Scottish voice to be heard. The DCs were told unless you’re a SIMD 1 you’ve no chance of getting into one of these unis they need foreign students for the money.

I’ve digressed a bit but yes I’ve been accused of being anti-Scottish because I don’t support the SNP. I don’t believe we would become an overnight utopia if we separated from England.

I find the most annoying supernats (including Gaelic speakers now) are actually from England. No greater extremist than a convert etc etc.

Agree

I think people in Scotland who behave as you have described have a huge chip on their shoulder. I class myself as British. I think i was happy enough being Scottish until about a decade ago, the snp and their supporters have made Scotland a complete and utter embarrassment.

Oh good, more evidence of the Scottish cringe.

I don't recognise what you say at all OP. Never heard of pressure to be more Scottish!

Echoing another poster, do you mean nationalist?

I don’t recognise the scenario you describe, and I have a child who was born and lived in England till the age of 8, and is proud of that, despite living around people who are Irish speakers, trad musicians etc. No one has ever suggested he was any less Irish for being born abroad. I’m an enthusiastic Irish speaker (but from the inner city, with just school Irish I’ve revived after living in the UK for many years) and have been on TG4 programmes as a talking head in my field quite a few times, and I can assure you I know no one. The people I’ve encountered at local ‘pop up Gaeltacht’ events have included Finns, Germans, and Brazilians.

I wonder if you’re just misusing language? ‘Oirish’ implies ‘stage Irish’, performing paddywhackery for a foreign audience, rather than ‘authentic’, and it simply isn’t clear what you mean by ‘Republican’.

Never felt this need to be more Scottish and I’m half Irish. I have to say that when I hear people complaining about how toxic Scotland is now, clearly weren’t living around the west coast during the peak sectarian years. Now that was and sadly continues to be very toxic.

I do get a bit a fed up by anyone telling me how much better things were and it’s so terrible now. In my lifetime I’ve seen most of the slums, deprivation and astonishing levels of violence that were so prevalent decrease significantly.

Indeed

Can't say I've ever felt any "pressure" to be more Scots than I already am. It's accident of birth.

I have met a few pathetic cases of "Scottish Cringe" though, i.e. people who almost seem ashamed to be Scots, downplay it, and try their best to be something else. Something I'll never comprehend.

I don't believe in patriotism. It's a ridiculous concept. Being "proud" of where you happen to be born when it's complete happenstance is odd. At the same time, there is absolutely no reason to be ashamed of it either.

Thanks for this thread, OP, it’s very interesting reading for me. My mam is Scottish and I’m from the English side of the Borders, so I originally had a very very strong Northumbrian accent which many people heard as Scottish. I lost it when I went to university because people couldn’t understand me, and I always felt jealous of Scottish people who invariably seemed to manage to keep their accents and it was fine/encouraged! It’s geopolitically interesting.

Yes. This is my experience too.
I think in the past the Gaelic school was much smaller. And run by a small group of passionate enthusiasts.
So, I can well imagine OPs experience as a youngster was somewhat different.

I grew up in Scotland with English dad and Welsh mum. I got so much shit for not having Scottish parents. I think the Scottish are particularly intolerant and have a HUGE chip on their shoulder about the English that borders on racism/xenophobia and which, if said about any other nationality, would be unspeakable.

I recently found out that DH's dad, who is professionally Glaswegian, was actually born in Brighton to an English mother and moved to Glasgow as a child. He has never mentioned it because he wanted to keep it hidden - as though it makes him "lesser" or something.

I now live in England and feel that it's a much more tolerant and welcoming society. #notallscottishpeople