Stuart Hill (Captain Calamity) Forvik

[Marooned in Maywick]

....Whit doe you ah tink?

 

I tocht trow-ing wisna allooed apo' dis wubstead.

[merryholm]

....Whit doe you ah tink?

 

I tocht trow-ing wisna allooed apo' dis wubstead.

 

Weel man hit's an ishu oh freedom fi depression, shurly een oh wir civil rites in a democratic constitcushion. A bit lik wakin' doon da (i'will) at Liptons n' no beein wurried aboot wha mite say whit on an impromptuu encountre at da countre. Passin' da time oh day is eeh thing but infringing upon one's rights as a civilian in a society deemed hitherto to be democratic an so on, n'dat, is shurly an issue which, pleese, is somethin' idder and shurly a concern fur even da most liberal oh wis turdlanders (even those wi more central tings liberal tae consider); an' god da price oh diesel is no funny even if you run a peerie car on peetrol or a sma diesel hairdryer fae china .... da fact is dat even on a peerie flat boddam (and mibee unseaworthy skiff at dat) wi a modest meens oh propulsion, da bill at da end oh da week will be mare dan Calamity's freeloading activities for twa minutes ur less, dat is if dir's onybody still silly enof to be tun in we dis man's silleeness. Hit's bed time I tink.

[Ghostrider]

I think that the significant point is, practically speaking, it wouldn't matter whether history were reputable. No major government -- regardless of political orientation, anywhere in the world -- would accept the principal that 500 year old transactions hold any weight vis-a-vis the legitimacy granted by custom. If this were an accepted argument in international law, all hell would break loose as people scoured the law books for competing claims to territory.

 

I'm not going to dispute that legitimacy granted by custom doesn't have a significant role to play, but I think to appreciate where I'm coming from you need to see it in the context of one factor in a bigger picture, not as a stand alone issue.

 

If any changes are to occur to Shetland's status which originate from within, they will, in this day and age, be brought about through the democratic will of the majority of the people who care to express an opinion. Surely before one can form an opinion on the status quo or the possible alternatives which may be considered desirable, one must be in possession of the full facts. I would argue that how we arrived at the point we are at today, is one of, if not the most important one of those facts which need to be considered.

 

In a nutshell, *if* what Hill contends is anywhere near to being correct, and the last half Millennium of Shetland's history was created as a result of fraud, deceit and lies, I sure as hell want to be fully informed of what they were and who was guilty of them, and think long and hard before deciding if I can support any alignment with any one of those involved.

 

At the end of the day Hill has told us nothing we didn't know before, he's just put meat on the bones and dates and faces on the same old story that we've always heard.

 

Certain facts are unalienable, the original deal was between Monarchs, over time its passed through numerous Crown and Governmental hands and changes, and for most of that time the only people on the UK side with access to the full facts were those with a vested interest to keep things as they were and are. Until in to the 20th century few if any of the general population of Shetland had either education or means to research the issue, the only version they got to hear was from Scots and their descendants, where vested interests and bias *could* very well have done a great deal to censor and sanatise the truth.

 

Maybe the old stories handed down by word of mouth generation to generation were, as Brian contends, no more than perpetrated myth, or maybe as Hill contends, the real history recorded in the only way it could have been. Personally I don't know, but I do know that as a Shetlander I will remain extremely leery about supporting any version of the future, either the status quo or any other until the issue is put to bed once and for all.

 

IMHO, you need to start before 1468, you need to know what rights the Danish King actually had on us, then you need to know what rights he led the Scots King to believe he was giving to him, then you need to know what rights the Scots King claimed on us, etc etc. You need to plot a timeline of events right up to present, and prove one way or the other whether we are today is the result of fair play, or fraud. Then, and only then can you assess the true value of what has been legitimised by custom.

 

And the fact is, as long as you already have to argue for greater autonomy on non-legal grounds, there's no reason to bring legal grounds into the discussion at all since it should be clear that attempting to do so will, regardless of the correctness of your historical interpretation, provide opponents with an extra grounds on which to debate you.

 

Sorry, but I can't disagree more strongly. I find that attitude pessimistic, defeatist, and somewhat dangerous. There is every need to bring all relevant factors in to the discussion to ensure a full and accurate overview is formed. If you can argue on both legal and non-legal grounds at one time surely it makes your case twice as strong? Going with just non-legal ground is as rash as going with only legal grounds, as Hill appears to be doing, hit them with both if you have them. If they win the day on one side, you still have the other to push, go with just one and you're up that creek..... Debate is good, and the sooner it's had the better, if your grounds are strong you will win it regardless of when it's held, suggesting a course of action to avoid debate with opponents could be taken to insinuate that that debate is likely to be lost. In which case it's best to be had and lost at the earliest possible opportunity so that it's settled and out of the way.

 

By making this about law, Stuart has essentially ensured that the cultural aspects won't be looked into at all. Whether or not there are good reasons to press for greater autonomy, this is not the way to go about it.

 

Agreed, see above.

 

I'll also make a brief reply to Ghostrider's idea that somehow the democratic illegitimacy of a law-making authority in any way retrospectively deligitimizes the laws it creates:

It's not as though Shetland was the only place suffering under all-powerful landowners. Should we suggest that legislation from throughout Europe in the Early Modern period should be disregarded on these same grounds? Denmark had an absolute monarchy until 1849. What if the people of Denmark today felt that King Frederik the VI was unjustified in granting Norway independence in 1814 because he was not under parliamentary contol? Would the Danes have any right whatsoever to attempt to reclaim Norway? The whole debate is absurd. And this is only 1814, not 1469!

 

Difficult for me to comment, as I have minimal knowledge of European/Scandinavian history, but at face value I would say your example is not a direct comparison, and in any case you are looking at it from the wrong way round, when comparing it to a Shetland situation.

 

Regardless of whether the Danish ruler of the day was installed democratically or not, is there any question that he acted outwith the powers he actually possessed? Has there been a general undercurrent of resentment and disapproval of the action within the Danish and/or Norwegian population ever since? It is also a reverse example though, it centres on a seperate territory and its people being given freedom of self-determination, that is not relevant to a Shetland context where we have being transferred from one form of control to another permanently, without having a say in any of it.

[Malachy]

Adam's Shetland Life article on autonomy in the Aland archipelago is available free at http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2008/07/04/politics-culture-our-baltic-counterpart/#more-511779

[ArabiaTerra]

Excellent post Ghostrider, a good summation of the current situation.

[Brian]

Listening to the two lecturers on the Hansa at the Johnsmas Foy the other week, I realised more strongly than ever just how lucky Shetland was to get out of Denmark's clutches in 1469. The fate of the Faroese and Iceland trade in the 17th century, under the influence of Danish noblemen and trade monopolies favoured by the Danish crown, was awful. By contrast, Shetlanders themselves controlled the trade with North Germany during the same period. Of course, Shetland's own fortunes went steeply downhill after 1700. But that was because of actions of Shetland's own merchant-lairds.

[frunco1]

Listening to the two lecturers on the Hansa at the Johnsmas Foy the other week, I realised more strongly than ever just how lucky Shetland was to get out of Denmark's clutches in 1469.

 

Not to mention the violence that accompanied the state-enforced religious Reformations in Iceland and Faroe. Shetlanders complained of 'dear meal and greedy ministers'...

[Ghostrider]

Of course, Shetland's own fortunes went steeply downhill after 1700. But that was because of actions of Shetland's own merchant-lairds.

 

The vast majority of whom were "Scots", either direct incomers, or their descendants, who obtained slews of land, often by arguably very dubious and/or possibly illegal methods. In many cases they maintained as much or more personal and business interests outwith Shetland than in it, they made minimal attempt to integrate in to the local population, almost exclusively only marrying among themselves or among "professional" incomers, again Scots. They created and promoted a very "them and us" society, with very different attitudes, habits and lifestyles to those of the rest of the population. While they were Shetland residents, I very much doubt many considered themselves "Shetlanders", and if they did it was not in the same sense that the rest of the population considered themselves "Shetlanders". By all intents and purposes they were Scots lairds of Shetland, who sometimes lived in Shetland.

 

The actions of the lairds may well have been the cause of the downturn in Shetland's trade and fortunes, but one thing is for sure, they themsleves were the last to be impinged upon by it. The first and hardest squeezes always came upon the rest of the population, whom the lairds, by whatever means they saw fit, had elevated themselves above, and subjected everyone else in to a state of slavery by any other name. Where of course it stayed, until the end of the 19th C. and an English Government finally took enough interest to rein in the worst of the Scots excesses.

 

When you're looking at the big picture back over a number of centuries, it hardly matters in which of the century's the hard times came, it matters who brought them.

[Brian]

One of the best examples of a pioneering Shetland merchant-laird of the early 18th century was Henderson of Gardie, who built Gardie House in Bressay. He was a direct descendant of Magnus Ormson of Gardie in Uyeasound, Unst, who married his next door neighbour Marion Thomasdaughter of Ronan around 1550. Marion was a granddaughter of Einar of Ronan, who was probably born around 1469.

 

The relationships that Ghostrider is concerned about are class ones, not national ones. They afflict every society, not just Shetland. To go back to my original point, I would rather have been a Shetlander in 1660 than a Faroese.

[Ghostrider]

^^ On the flip side you have Bruce of Sumburgh/Symbister, a native of Fife, owning extensive lands in Shetland by the latter 1500's, you have Stewart of Bigton, who, although illegitimate, I believe can claim ancestory right back to the Scottish Monarchy, he was here and owning extensive lands before 1629. Both pioneers of the laird-merchant system in their own ways. I could go on, but I think I've proved my point, for every one who can claim ancestory back in to the native population, there's at least two to be found that are Scots, who remained virtually exclusively Scots down the generations.

 

"Class" has nothing to do with it, if you knew me you'd know I neither acknowledge or recognise "class", each individual has to stand or fall on their own merits, or lack of them in my eyes. What riles me is that whenever a Scot had aspirations of power over Shetland and Shetlanders throughout history, they took it to excessess of greed and abuse, and by all appearances those Scots with the same aspirations today have learned nothing from the past and changed none.

[Brian]

You should have a look at the evidence that Shetlanders gave to the Truck commission in 1872. 'Class has nothing to do with it' is the last thing they said. No, correction: the very last thing they said was 'It's aa da fault o Scotsmen'!

[Ghostrider]

^^ I've read a lot of it off and on over the last few years, but it's not changed my opinion of the bigger picture one iota yet. I daresay like much else of the written word, there is rarely a definitive black and white meaning to any one passage, but the perspective and interpretation that each individual gleans from it, based on pre-existing beliefs and information.

[Brian]

Whh do you think the Shetlanders who gave evidence to the commission - who, after all, were on the spot, and might have beedn regarded as experts - hadn't come up with your own insight that it was 'Scots' who were the root of the problem in the islands?

[Guest posiedon]

Has this thread not gone just a teensy weensy bit http://www.thinkhumanism.com/phpBB3/images/smilies/offtopic.gif?

[Ghostrider]

Whh do you think the Shetlanders who gave evidence to the commission - who, after all, were on the spot, and might have beedn regarded as experts - hadn't come up with your own insight that it was 'Scots' who were the root of the problem in the islands?

 

 

I don't think I ever said "'Scots' were the root of the problem in the islands", rather that the 'Scots' [Lairds] were the reason for many of the problems that existed in the islands at that time.

 

However, that aside, maybe, as a certain local well published author, who, when commenting on the (mis)fortunes of some of his ancestors, states in one of his works, that folk tempered what they said as a direct result of their own current local situation, and the possible outcomes of finger pointing, in case nothing changed.

 

It could also be said that folk were too close to the situation to be able to fully see the overall perspective, and neither had the education or the knowledge of the whole thing to appreciate cause and effect, only how the effects created problems then and in the relatively recent past.