No excuse for Scots letting the side down
IT’S a funny thing, being Scottish. One minute we’re shouting from the rooftops about being the best small country in the world (we invented penicillin, don’t you know, not to mention the television), the next we’re banging on about the detrimental effect of the Scottish cringe.
Just occasionally, though, I feel a deep shame about my nationality. Like when Ritchie Cleeton, Connor Inglis and Brett Grant drunkenly taunted England rugby coach Eddie Jones the day after his team lost to Scotland in the Six Nations.
The trio hurled ‘vile’ abuse at Jones, simply because he was the England coach (and despite the fact he had been gracious enough to pose for a selfie with them). They were fined at Manchester Magistrates Court this week after admitting using threatening behaviour. Not one of them has shown the slightest bit of remorse.
Then there is football legend Paddy Crerand, who at the same court this week blamed a foul-mouthed rant at police on his ‘being Scottish’ after he was arrested for drink-driving after ploughing into a car.
According to his defence lawyer: ‘He is a Glaswegian, he is a Scotsman, and he had used bad language during this incident. But it wasn’t used aggressively, it’s just the way he speaks.’
Oh, well then. Case closed. Except it really isn’t. Since when is nationality a legal form of defence when you’re trying to excuse rude and boorish behaviour?
‘Sorry, Your Honour, but we’re just a bit sweary up here, no harm meant.’ That’s almost as offensive as the swear words Crerand used in the first place.
Being a Scot – because, let’s face it, there are only five million of us – means that when you’re not at home, you stick out. It’s part of the deal, then, that when you’re abroad, you represent your country well.
Generally we do this pretty well. Anyone who’s holidayed in the US will be familiar with the wide-eyed enthusiasm that greets the phrase ‘I’m from Scotland’, while the Tartan Army is beloved worldwide.
Yet it seems some Scots didn’t get the memo. Perhaps it’s small country syndrome, or perhaps it’s because we have spent so much time debating our nationality recently but, however convoluted the arguments, being Scottish is not an excuse.
It’s not an excuse for hurling abuse at a rugby coach. It’s not an excuse for swearing at a policeman. And it’s not an excuse for the sort of vile abuse vented on Westminster politicians by keyboard warriors on social media north of the Border.
Crerand’s behaviour is an embarrassment to all Scots, and the three young men who targeted Jones will certainly be an embarrassment to Scottish rugby fans who, for the most part, conduct themselves with grace, decorum and stolidly good humour.
Being Scottish, in my humble opinion, is a privilege. All of us should remember that – particularly when, in our own small ways, we represent our country anywhere in the world.
There’s nothing wrong with national pride but there’s a great difference between that and national ignorance.
OH, be still my beating heart! Alex Salmond says he will return to frontline politics the moment the starting gun is fired on a second independence referendum. Talk about an incentive… not to have a second referendum.