Scottish vs. Scots

[Lachlan09]

One wonders if this is not a sort of, "Asian / Oriental" argument? People are "Asian," Rugs are "Oriental." Are people Scottish or Scots? Are Sporrans Scots or Scottish. I tend to go with the idea that Scots are the people of the "race or heritage" Scottish are Citizens and objects.

Indians/Sri Lankans/Pakistanis/Bangaldeshis in Britain have commandeered the term “Asian”. Now, even British officialdom honours them with that title, at the expense of the rest of Asia. On official British forms, my (Filipina wife) had to fill in, she has had to put "Others", as there “Asian” didn’t include Philippines and there was no other suitable regional box.

[Leprechaun 91]

Indians/Sri Lankans/Pakistanis/Bangaldeshis in Britain have commandeered the term “Asian”. Now, even British officialdom honours them with that title, at the expense of the rest of Asia. On official British forms, my (Filipina wife) had to fill in, she has had to put "Others", as there “Asian” didn’t include Philippines and there was no other suitable regional box.

Philippine Islands are generally listed as "Pacific Islanders" are they not? (At least I see that box here in he States.)

[Lachlan09]

Philippine Islands are generally listed as "Pacific Islanders" are they not? (At least I see that box here in he States.)

No they are not. In the UK, there is no sub-group called Pacific Islands mentioned in official forms. If there were, it would not apply anyway, as the Philippines (comprising inhabited/uninhabited islands including large land-masses, totaling 7,107 nos) is not included in Pacific Islands. It is properly counted as part of South East Asia.

As I said, the only available box was “Others”, as the forms didn’t even have “South East Asia”.

That brings me to my own experience whilst seeking a temporary flat in 1984. A friend I was living with temporarily in Hoxton suggested I contact Hackney Borough Council (a rather loony-left-wing London borough council based in Mare Street which supported Colonel Gaddafi and such-like) to house me with council-owned rented accommodation until I could buy somewhere. I had to fill in a form which would be appraised by HBC and points awarded for deservedness. When I came to the ethnic background section, I noticed lots of tick-boxes. There was a whole mass of boxes covering the Indian sub-continent, including Gujerati, Punjabi, Kashmiri, Chettinad, Karnatika/Tamil to name a few; likewise many boxes covering African backgrounds plus various Caribbean and North/South American etc, there were some Arab/Middle East boxes too. They also had boxes for gay and lesbian etc. Then there were 3 more boxes – white, Irish and Others. So all the Eastern part of Asia had to put “Others” (including the various diversified Chinese regions, Indonesia, Philippines, Japan, Korea, Thailand, etc etc), while Caucasians of various nationalities and ethnic backgrounds had to put "White" of all things (not even the modern Caucasian version !). So, Scotland, England, Wales, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, USA, Canada, Russia, Sweden, Poland, Lithuania, Aus, NZ etc were all lumped together.

The one which got my goat in a big way was “Irish”. Hackney Borough Council passively (sometimes actively) supported the IRA at that time and I have been in a pub in that borough when they passed round a black beret for a collection. I certainly did not give and no doubt people in the pub saw that. Hackney thought Irish people merited special treatment, that their culture was so foreign it needed special care. My reaction to the form was, the Irish are no more and no less different than the Scots. So I ignored “White” and filled in the “Others” box and wrote below it “Scottish”.

Suffice to say, I didn’t get the flat as I didn’t qualify, I was too bourgeois for them.