to think that I am not a scared ignoramus - Scotland

[iamnotacoward]

That's it really.
My FB feed, and real life conversations with people voting yes. So much aggression, and complete inability to accept that people have a different view point. So much talk of people being unpatriotic if they vote no, or that they just 'need to be educated' or need the facts explained to them so they can 'stop being scared' and vote yes.
I have educated myself, and yes I do fear for Scotland's future if a yes vote wins. That doesn't make me cowardly though, or someone who is too scared of change to vote yes.

Have you read the white paper, SirChenjin? The one accusation you can't level against it is that it's "light on detail". If anything, there's far too much, which is why so few people have bothered to read it.

I haven't seen any abuse levelled at "no" voters among my facebook pals. I'm voting yes, have had a few debates about it, but there's been no name-calling from either camp. I'm sure tempers get frayed because people on both sides recognise there's such a lot at stake, but I do think that it's lazy to characterise all "yes" supporters are Braveheart-fetishising firebrands. I'm English, for a start.

I think we'll be fucked a thousand different ways if we get independence. Have also given up discussing it - and agree heartily with the aggressive YES brigade as that's my experience too.

Not sure what we'll do if it goes ahead. I don't want to move South but I don't want to stay here either .

And that's my take on it. It's not for debate or questioning. I'm so over the shite thrown on all sides I'll be voting with my head not my heart.

It does seem to be the quiet cautious people who are voting no. I think it could go either way. If I had a vote I'd vote Yes. Though I know deep down it wouldn't be sensible. But on the other hand history hasn't been made with timidity and caution.

I highly doubt people will pull together if yes win. A good amount of them will leave Scotland, and many of them who stay will be furious. The scars from this will take years to heal - it has turned people against each other so badly.

But vivienne, that's the thing. It's not about timidity and caution, it's about being sensible and rational.

No, haven't read it all - has anyone? I started to, I flicked through it, I looked for detail, but there was none - plenty of rhetoric and Nationalist vision, but little detail. It fulfilled all of the expectations I had for it.

DH otoh did read it - he was required to in a professional capacity. It did not persuade him (or his colleagues who are all involved with the SG) that an independent Scotland would deliver.

I hope voters make an informed choice,based on fact not hyperbole

I really don't see how it has turned people against each other? But maybe I'm being overly Pollyanna. I know people who are voting yes, people who are voting no, people who haven't made their minds up - we all seem to get along alright.

MrsWedgeAntilles It is highly frustrating that in the arguably most important vote for Scotland that people are thinking about voting No because they think Alex Salmond will become dictator for life or the Gairloch will be annexed by rUK or we won't be able to travel or a million other mad reasons that I've heard

Ah yes. Standard reasons given by Yes voters for people not seeing the light:

• They confuse Scottish independence with Alex Salmond/the SNP/being a left wing country, because obviously, well you know, they must be stupid and not have realised that isn't the case until its just been pointed out to them. Right now.

• The BBC, despite its Scottish branch's continual outpouring of Scottish nationalistic propaganda, is biased (usually misspelt bias) against Scottish independence

• It is the fault of the English, particularly Margaret Thatcher and the Tory Toffs.

• It is the fault of the people for being cowardly/uneducated/not being directed towards the correct internet sources particularly the narcissist Wings.

• Various ad hoc reasons described in an amusing variety of Scots slang which hasn't been used in common parlance for decades. cf numpties/naysayers/etc.. Cue someone defending these usages and pointing out that in the East End of someone's kitchen in Partick, they are used all the time.

• There are 20% of Scottish children living in poverty according to the Rowntree Foundation (whose measurement guarantees such a sizable figure being used by Scottish independence supporters in perpetuity).

• Scots supremacy. Just. Is. Better. (for our children to grow up in). Just is. Because. cf numpties and naysayers.

When Nicola Sturgeon starts wheedling on about how Sco-ant is the best country in the world and the Scots the most superior race, I just cringe. Its so embarrassing. Are there any other first world countries where people actually talk like this in public?

It's not about timidity and caution, it's about being sensible and rational

Exactly. Think of it this way. If you were deputy in charge of a site, and Head Office offered you your own site would you accept the offer and blindly accept that this was a fantastic opportunity to shape your own destiny - or would you want to know how much you were being paid, where you would be working, who your staff were, what your hours were, what your job would involve etc etc etc?

I'd choose the latter - no matter how hard they tried to persuade me that this was a great opportunity and I should be my own boss - if the T&Cs didn't benefit me I wouldn't take the job.

I hate the term 'iScotland', makes it sound as though it would be sponsored by Apple.

It's interesting OP because my FB feed is full of the opposite, lots of Better Together voters trashing 'ignorant, uneducated NATs'. It probably depends on your friends/social circle which brand of aggressive campaigning you experience. I've seen far more negative, patronising no comments than I have yes but it's just what zi've experienced rather than trying to indicate it's a representative sample... Hmmm?

I'm genuinely undecided. It's an emotive campaign neither side can claim a high ground of behaviour IMO.

Agree squoosh. iScotland - one of the most irritating things to have come out of the campaign.

A lot of hyperbole on this thread!
No one knows which way I'm voting. I know how dh is voting, don't know about any other friends or workmates. I don't move in circles clearly were people are abusing each other over their choices!
I really, really don't want my dcs growing up under Tory governments, whichever vote will minimise that chance is the way I will go.

Completely agree with you, OP. I think splitting up would be disastrous, and the sheer aggression exhibited by the Yes campaign that I have seen does look awfully like a spirited attempt to disguise the facts.

Along with rUK, I quite agree Squatting

A somewhat unbiased depiction of hyperbole there Iggi.

Its almost like you were trying to plant a little subliminal message.

There is a lot of aggression from yes voters on fb. They are a minority in my feed. I would say that 2% of my friends are yes voters. They are rude and aggressive. When likeminded folk chip in on their threads its quite shocking the way they, as a pack, terrorise no voters. The Scottish parliament are getting more powers anyway. They are working on this now. If it is a no vote we will have more say in what happens in Scotland, seems a better idea than independence.

Hyperbole aside, can anyone explain to me how the situation would be likely to pan out if a minority of the people in Scotland, but a majority of those who voted, voted in favour of independence?

e.g. say 38% of the electorate voted in favour of independence, 34% voted against and 28% didn't vote at all. So the vote was carried with only 38% of the country in favour of it, and the majority of people, who did not vote for independence, found themselves marching towards it?

What sort of country would that be likely to produce?

I'm not in Scotland, nor am I Scottish, so obviously I don't have a vote.

That documentary with Donald Trump, Salmond and the golf courses wasn't a great advertisement for the Yes campaign however.

Chelsy. I'm not making assumptions, the things I quoted in my post are things that people have actually said to me.
As I said, I have the utmost respect for people who have educated themselves and want to vote No, same as I'm frustrated at the idiots who based their Yes decision on Mel Gibson's blue face or because they want David Cameron to lose his job.
I'll say this again - the day after the referendum, which ever way it goes, we all have to live together and make Scotland work and attacking people on the other side is only going to make that harder.

Chelsy, I'm not that clever!

I imagine a "majority of a minority" vote - in either direction - would be accepted by the minority in the same way we accept whoever rules parliament, who are often (usually?) in the same position.
I doubt anyone will try to blow up the Scottish Parliament.

MrsWedgeAntilles you make some strange assumptions. Perhaps people "don't educate themselves" but are in fact educated elsewhere. Even outwith Scotland perhaps.

And of course "we" don't "have to live together and make Scotland work" - up and until Scotland becomes independent, any Scots citizen is free to move anywhere in the EU without a Visa and of course can move anywhere in the world they choose. There is no compulsion on anyone to stay and make it work. What a ridiculous thing to suggest.