St Andrews Day Holiday?March 18th, 2008 @ 7:12 pm
Over the past couple of years, there have been moves to convince the Scottish Government to make St Andrews Day a public holiday to celebrate our country in much the same way as the Irish do with St Patrick’s Day. Yesterday, there was an announcement that employees of the Scottish Govt would be allowed to take it as a holiday if they wanted. At the moment, I’m not sure how that fits in with the Court Service and whether it means the holiday has to come out of our annual leave entitlement or not. Part of me thinks it would be a great idea to use the day to promote Scotland to the world as at the moment the day is largely ignored.
It’s much more bearable to me than the idea Westminster has to have a national holiday to celebrate British patriotism in much the same way as the Americans have the Fourth of July. They even want us to swear allegiance to the Queen in the same way as the Americans do in classrooms and such! As you can imagine, the idea has been met with great deal of derision and laughter. The truth is many in our country do not feel they are part of one united Britain and, good or bad, I certainly consider myself a Scot first and foremost. If I’m going to be flying any flag from my front porch, it would be the Saltire long before the Union Jack.
I’m not saying there is anything wrong with feeling patriotic and I’m sure our country could probably do with a large dose of it but do we really need to copy the Americans? The only time we seem to get patriotic in this country is to get behind our football team and then the flags start flying out of windows and streaming from car aerials but we are not all football fanatics.
So, my dilemma is I love Scotland but I feel nothing for Britain.
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Gattina
said,
March 19, 2008 at 8:19 am
I can understand that you want to stay Scot you were raised this way. If you had been born in another country for example Italy you would want to be from Northern Italy and not from the South. It’s in all countries the same. In Germany there are the Bavarians and I really don’t want to be one as I am from the North ! My case is even more difficult. I am German (because of my parents and I was born there) but I spent 50 years (so far) in Belgium but I don’t feel belgian. My husband is Italian and I am Italian by marriage but I don’t feel Italian either. Our poor son is a mixture Italo/German but born and raised in Belgium. You know what he feels ? He feels European ! He has lived and worked 10 years in London (but he doesn’t feel English for that) now he is since 6 years in Amsterdam. You see being patriotic is completely out of fashion. Keep your scottish origins and your flag on the balcony but think you are European. That’s what I feel ! I hate patriotism and especially the american one. Look what happens to my parents generation with their patriotism , there was a certain Mr. Hitler !
Caledonia
said,
March 19, 2008 at 11:16 am
I don’t feel European either - that’s the trouble. The majority of Brits don’t care whether they are part of Europe or not.
A.
said,
March 19, 2008 at 10:22 pm
I must say I think St Patrick’s Day has become Disneyfied, and not something you’d want for St Andrew’s Day. A bit like Halloween really. All I seemed to see last week were hideous green cartoon characters everywhere. I was born in Ireland and it used to be a much quieter affair, but still fun. No need for green beer - wherever that comes from.