1. It is easy to say unionism is the opposite of the nationalism but this is simplistic. Nationalists can become unionists, unionists have become nationalists. Both show elements of racism, but if we are all human, how can we be racists? What drives that in working classes?
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2. As a northerner the concept of England is a bizarre one because prior to the Act of Union the north didn;t really exist. It was harried by Normans and by Henry 8th and had become a semi rural buffer with an aggressive neighbour. We were a frontier, of little value or esteem..
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3. Then Crompton, and Arkwright, and Watt brought a fire to the North. Industry. Coal. Steam. To substitute carbon for human as the source of the power to transform. They may as well have been archangels...
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4. Modern Britain, and the North, were formed with a new identity. We no longer identified with who we are or who we were but who we could be. The future become malleable, changeable and then we identified with who we should or could be. That was the British awakening...
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5. In the 1840s a terrible famine struck the United Kingdom. Nearly 2m Britons died of starvation, another 2m fled to elsewhere within the UK where we made our homes anew. Nationalism reemerged in the UK, in Ireland. We finally lost that art of our family 100 years ago...
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6. In the 60s industry was broken by state misrule and trade union fundamentalism. Oil meant industry no ,onger was tied to the coalfields we based out entire way of life around. The industries started to move, the mines began to close. Likewise shipbuilding moved to Japan...
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7. So began the regression to nationalism in Scotland and to racism in the North. Without a stand alone nation to fall back on the north regressed even more, to industrial strife and to racism in mill towns. The pattern is becoming clearer....
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8. Nationalism and racism are regressions. Nationalism obsesses on what we were or could have been. Racism obsesses over another sense of loss, even of our own destiny, that the "other" is a threat because we are already losing what we had....
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9. it is not antinationalist to say stop being nationalist. It is not antiracist to say stop being racist. It is cruel to say to those who have lost and have lost hope of a better future that they stop being losers. It only insults and angers them and reinforces their view....
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10. That those with the power to change things have no wish or need to. It's fine for them. The south of England, the Cantebury archdiosise in cultural terms, has never lost. It is doing well. Good for them, but that other half of England is not. doing well. So....
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11. If you say you are English, and you neglect the North, be off with you. If you say you are British and neglect Glasgow, be off with you. You are not using identity as a shield for establishment and entitlement. No. We were in this together. We have not been for some time...
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12. The answer is unionism by which I mean something specific. We lift each other up instead of pulling each other down. There will be peace,harmony and pride in these islands when we learn to share the opportunities and wealth. We need to look again to the stars not the ground.
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