Those feelings are something that many who believe in an independent Scotland have almost certainly encountered at some point in our lives. Up until recently I very much felt that way and to this day I am still wary of mentioning my Scottish independence yearning in some circles.
To be fair, most of us born in or around the island of Great Britain probably have that socially-conditioned reflex to Not Talk About Politics. This is something that those of us who favour independence are simply going to have to get over, in order to win the 2014 referendum. However, I'm getting ahead of myself. Back to that guilty secret.
My own personal guilty independence secret was born in the dark decade that was ruled by a certain 'iron lady'. As a child in the '80s I was not fully conscious of the world around me, yet like all kids the world around me had an enormous impact. I grew up in a single parent family, in a council house, under Thatcher. It left indelible marks that reveal themselves in adulthood as a deep leaning towards what, apparently, is now called social democracy. I'm led to believe this is a common leaning in Scotland.
The Thatcher period also gave rise to a feeling that England is quite different from Scotland, that what England wants is often not what Scotland wants and yet Scotland has little choice but to like it or lump it.
The first time I really became aware of our lumps was when I saw a (probably) surprised grey man in a grey suit elected to continue in Thatcher's footsteps. Blair followed, of course, and while the lumps for a while had the appearance of being smaller, they clearly were not. The divorce between what Westminster was doing and what was in Scotland's best interests only grew.
By the mid-'90s, I had acquired a viewpoint that aligned roughly with that of the Green Party. This followed the return of the Scottish Parliament and, with its semi-proportional representation, for the first time in my life I was able to vote for a party that I broadly agreed with. Here was progress. I even joined the Green Party.
The Greens, even back then, were advocating independence for Scotland and it was the first time I properly considered the viability of such an idea. Previous to this, the idea of independence as far as I was aware was solely that of that tired old drum-beating group of mismatched separatists, the Scottish National Party, and their endless talk of 'our oil'. No one I knew took them seriously. They were a joke party that occasionally somehow landed a seat at Westminster.
With the return of our parliament, the SNP were no longer quite the joke they had been portrayed as. Still, as someone who grew up in a Labour-dominated area, I was suspicious of them. The Green Party, however, I could get behind and if they thought independence was good, then maybe I could give it some serious thought.
Sometimes with distance comes perspective. From late 2005 onwards, I spent nine months living on the south coast of England. I was listening to a lot of Radio 4 then and through that whole time I heard Scotland mentioned on the six o'clock news only twice. Once the country was mentioned in an item about a proposed smoking ban in England (Scotland's having been introduced a few months earlier) and the other time in a laugh-at-the-foreigners moment at the end of one broadcast, when we got to hear about how some deer had wandered onto the A9 and that the road had to be closed.
The impression I gained wasn't so much that Scotland was being dismissed, or put down (even though during a previous period working in England, I had been called a 'Jock' several times) – rather that Scotland wasn't even worth mentioning. It was an afterthought or simply even a joke. A cliché.
When I moved back to Scotland, I thought again and the more I thought and the more I read, the more independence seemed the best solution for Scotland. As a kid and then a young adult, an independent Scotland was no more than a day dream, brought on by fits of romanticising the past, or as an unreasoned reaction. Now as an adult, with full and clear rationalisation, with a care for both how people and the planet are treated, the idea of independence became a concrete belief.
When the SNP won the 2007 election, here was the beginning of a chance to rid ourselves of a distant and uncaring rule. By 2012, a second SNP government established the right to carry out a straightforward yes or no referendum on independence.
In a fair world, most of us who want independence could relax at this point and let the politicians put forward their cases and let the question be asked. Sadly, we do not live in a fair world. It has become clear to me that, as I follow the 'independence debate', both sides are not being given an equal opportunity to put forward their cases. Even that self-declared bastion of impartiality, the BBC, recently noted “…we are not in an official referendum campaign and therefore do not have to balance it out between yes and no.”
Added to this, we witness British nationalist politicians and their supporters wasting no opportunity to personally insult Scotland's First Minister, or attack its government. January even saw Scottish MP Anas Sarwar claim in a debate in the House of Commons that the Scottish Parliament was "not a democratic place" and that it was a dictatorship! Astonishingly, the claims went unchallenged and uncensured.
This suggests that the British establishment in its various forms is attempting, as it did in 1979, to snuff out Scotland's aspirations. Clearly those of us who share those aspirations cannot sit back and hope that our viewpoint will prevail. If we want to see an independent Scotland, then we all are going to have to do something to help it come about. As Margo MacDonald MSP noted last year "If a third of scots believe in independence… every one of us has got two years to persuade another one Scot and then we’re home and dry."
I've been trying to do this since hearing Margo speak in September and I will admit that it is not always easy – I'm no great debater and have a better way with the written word than the spoken. So while I am still trying to encourage three people to vote yes (two of whom I'm pretty sure I've persuaded), I put other skills to use, as well as placing as much positive information in my social media feeds as seems sensible.
Fear of change is one of the biggest obstacles we face in our task. While the Yes campaign has been doing its bit to make the change to independence seem relatively unobtrusive, the No campaign has equally been doing its utmost to stoke fears about each and every aspect of independence that it can, not least by calling it 'separation', a term so partial that it was banned from use in a debate at Westminster.
As supporters of independence, we have the job of allaying those fears. We need to put aside our impulse to Not Talk About Politics and start having conversations, with our families, our friends, our colleagues and with anyone who might be open to listening (and maybe even some of those who are not). We need to find out what fears are stopping people from seeking independence and, with a little preparation or investigation, address those fears, because there is not one fear that cannot be reasonably put to rest.
In my experience, it takes time and patience. We are at this point making a case that is opposed by our mass media and that can be hard for a lot of people to accept. However there is clear evidence that among those who do not get their news from mass media outlets, support for independence is increasing. A recent Ipsos-MORI poll showed that not only is support for independence growing in the age range of 18-24, support increased from 27% to 58%!
One on one, or in groups, we can make the change because in my experience persistence pays off. We owe it to ourselves and to future generations to do all that we can to bring about independence. It is time to admit that Scottish independence is no dirty secret.
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