Extracts below from article published on ThinkScotland.org
Will Sturgeon’s totalitarian waltz speed up in 2021?
by Tom Gallagher
THE NICOLA STURGEON of 2021 is no Adolf Hitler.
But she is in the vanguard of an attempt to weaken and discredit democracy that is being rolled out across the world. Democracy has arguably never been weaker since the German Fuhrer took his own life in May 1945 after almost beating Europe into insensibility…
There is mounting evidence that (in the words of Craig Murray) Sturgeon went to great lengths to try and ‘fit up’ her predecessor Alex Salmond. At least one powerful person at the top of the civil service seems to have been amongst accessories in this seeming act of personal vengeance, the police were less willing participants, and lately senior law officials have appeared ready to cast aside their neutrality to try and protect the First Minister’s flank after her operation effectively backfires.
Due to its position within the democratic United Kingdom, Scotland is constrained from gravitating towards outright authoritarian rule. But the standardisation and synchronisation of political control – resembling the gleichshaltung which emerged in Nazi Germany – has made fearful advances. Party and state are increasingly fused, the opposition fears to oppose, much of civil society has been absorbed into the ruling power structure, local government is suborned, and private institutions are coerced into hailing the new political order.
The pandemic has been used to impose sweeping restrictions on public life that make Scotland one of the authoritarian outriders in the Western world. At the moment churches are closed, outdoor activities by citizens are subject to police swoops, and increasingly the life is being choked out of thousands of small businesses by ever-tightening restrictions on what they are permitted to do.
The impact of the pandemic on the normal workings of society has been felt far and wide. But in Scotland it has given a mighty push to normalise the abnormal in both daily life and politics. Hitler was able to do this thanks to the violent shocks Germany had endured in the twenty years before he came to power. Mobilisation of society for war, defeat and loss of territory, the rise of communism, endless economic troubles from runaway inflation to mass unemployment, weakened the hold of those old institutions promoting civility and restraint.
An ‘anything goes mentality’ increasingly took hold because given what it seemed the nation had already suffered, there wasn’t much else to lose. It all meant Hitler could be portrayed as a providential figure; his ways were harsh and often extreme but many were persuaded that the times warranted them. A cult of resentment and grievance was spread through society by the latest mediums of communications even when Germany’s traditional rivals were proving accommodating to the new order…
I hope I will be proven wrong but I am increasingly convinced that Nicola Sturgeon is creating a pre-insurrectionary mood by brazenly exceeding her powers, encouraging MPs to act as ruffians at Westminster, and above all diverting large amounts of UK pandemic business relief funding.
How keen the British government is to face up to the challenge of the separatists who have used the devolved institutions to entrench themselves in power, will probably determine whether Scotland can avoid becoming a new European trouble-spot in which political fanatics use old hatreds and gangster methods to get their way.
Most of the British governing classes eventually saw through Hitler and prepared Britain to resist his onslaught. There is insufficient evidence that decision-makers in London properly appreciate the gravity of the situation in Scotland. Unless this changes, Britain could face upheaval and tragedy as a result of territorial politics being cold-bloodedly harnessed behind an extremist purpose. Click here to read entire article.
Tom Gallagher is Emeritus Professor of Politics at the University of Bradford. He is the author of Scotland Now, a Warning to the World (2016). His latest book is Salazar, the Dictator Who Refused to Die, Hurst Publishers 2020 (available here) and his twitter account is @cultfree54
Comment:
There is plenty of food for thought in the above article. However, the idea that the opposition is afraid to oppose, puzzles me. It seems clear, all the way from the beginning of the ongoing totalitarian drive to rule by diktat, that all politicians are aiding and abetting the removal of our liberties, with the exception of an occasional intervention in London by – for example – Sir Desmond Swayne MP. The majority of parliamentarians, however, have supported the Government’s restrictions on our personal and religious freedoms. To their eternal (not kidding) shame.
The leaders in Westminster and in the devolved institutions seem, self-evidently, to be of one mind – that we have a deadly virus which must be suppressed and until that (impossible) day, we must sacrifice our liberty, even to the point where God is counted among the “non-essential items”. At least, that’s been the cover story.
Personally, I believe that the virus is a means of introducing us to permanent totalitarian Communist rule – and God is always “non-essential” in Communist countries; just ask the underground Catholics in China. So, share your thoughts – are we blessed to have Nicola Sturgeon, such a caring leader who is simply trying to make sure we “stay safe” (she said sarcastically), or IS Scotland “one of the authoritarian outriders in the Western world” as Tom Gallagher suggests?
Whatever the truth of the threat we face from coronavirus, it is always worth bearing in mind that the way science is understood and used is often determined by the prevailing political and cultural norms. For example, one of the key political trends of the past two decades has been the rise and rise of what is called the ‘politics of behaviour’.