Gleichschaltung Gaslight “The most effective way to destroy a people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” — George Orwell, 1984 Orwell’s warning was not about memory alone, but power. When a people lose ownership of their past, they lose the vocabulary to describe what’s happening to them. Their world can be rewritten without their consent. The map is still there, but the names have changed. In Germany, the process was called Gleichschaltung, literally “same circuit.” It was the term used by the Nazi regime to describe the synchronisation of all institutions under one ideology: the economy, education, culture, sport, press, and even thought. Everything that once had independent rhythm was re-tuned to a single frequency. The word sounds foreign, but the concept should not. Scotland, too, experienced its own form of “same circuiting.” Not with the jackboot, but with the handshake; not with a dictator, but with a deal. The Soft Machinery of Control The early eighteenth century found Scotland weakened but not conquered. The catastrophic failure of the Darien Scheme (1698–1700) had left the nation in financial ruin and humiliation. Westminster’s offer of union came wrapped in the language of rescue, salvation through partnership. But this partnership was conditional: Scotland could retain its church and legal system, yes, but not its autonomy over trade, foreign policy, or currency. Sovereignty was diluted and replaced with the promise of shared greatness. It was, in effect, an early exercise in political Gleichschaltung: every lever of power wired into a British circuit, humming to London’s frequency. The deal was sold as unity, but operated as absorption. The Rewriting of the Record In the decades following the Union of 1707, Scotland’s historical narrative was gradually redrafted to fit a British frame. The Scottish Wars of Independence were recast as prelude rather than principle, as stepping stones to a “greater” British destiny. Wallace and Bruce, once embodiments of constitutional defiance, were turned into romantic rebels; their wars reinterpreted as youthful quarrels before the mature marriage of nations.

Everyone knows the picture history painted for us. Tartan & Flags snapping in the wind, a desperate charge across the moor, and the inevitable defeat that supposedly proved Scotland’s rebellion was doomed from the start. The word Jacobite has been filed away beside words like romantic, futile, misguided. What almost no one asks is what came before Culloden - the slow erasure of a nation’s ability to fight back. By the middle of the eighteenth century, Scotland had already spent two centuries resisting absorption. From the Rough Wooing to the Darien disaster, every generation had faced a choice between submission or punishment. When persuasion failed, policy hardened into removal: leaders executed, sympathisers imprisoned, families cleared from their land or shipped to colonies as indentured labour. Long before the British bayonets lined up at Drummossie Moor, Scotland’s capacity for resistance had been deliberately dismantled. After the failed Union negotiations of the 1690s, the independent trading venture at Darien was strangled through English interference; its collapse bankrupted much of the country. The debt relief offered in exchange for signing the 1707 Act of Union was not partnership - it was ransom. When riots broke out across Scottish towns, they were written down in London as disturbances rather than acts of national protest. The men who refused the treaty were marked for treason; many would later reappear in the gaols of 1715 and 1745. Between those years, the British government did what empires do best: it made sure that when the next uprising came, it would already have its outcome decided. Garrisons were built along the Great Glen; weapons were banned; clan leaders watched, exiled, or executed; Gaelic stripped from schools; loyalty purchased with confiscated estates. By 1745, the rising that Charles Edward Stuart led was not the reckless adventure of a few romantic highlanders, it was the final act of a people who had already been hunted, weakened, and silenced.

History’s Already Told Us What Happens Next We know what the British Empire is capable of. We’ve seen its playbook, century after century, across half the planet. It conquers, it claims, it extracts. And when a place wants to leave, it doesn’t just let go… it rebrands the fight for freedom as rebellion. It talks of “restoring order,” “preserving stability,” “protecting interests.” But what it really means is control. They didn’t fight to keep colonies because they loved their people. They fought to keep the ports, the oil, the trade routes, the power. The empire’s moral compass has always spun toward profit. And yet we pretend not to see the pattern when it’s us. We act like Scotland’s case is somehow different. Like this time, they’ll be reasonable. Like they’ll just let go when we ask nicely. But they won’t. They never have. The empire doesn’t give up wealth willingly, it waits until holding on costs more than letting go. That’s the only thing that ever ends its grip. So when people say, “They’ll never let Scotland go,” they’re not wrong… not yet. Because as long as we’re useful as a profit stream, as a nuclear base, as political cover… they’ll fight to keep us. And they’ll dress it up the same way they always have: “unity,” “security,” “national interest.” History has already shown us what comes next. When control slips, they tighten their grip. When people stand up, they’re called insurgents. And when the truth threatens the narrative, it’s buried under ceremony, distraction, and spin. But the empire’s mask is slipping. We see the pattern now, not as outsiders, but as the last colony still pretending it isn’t one. So the real question isn’t why won’t they let us go? It’s how long will we keep asking permission from those who never needed it themselves? Because nobody hands you freedom… You build it. You plan it. You stand together long enough and strong enough that walking away stops looking like rebellion and starts looking like inevitability.

Breaking the Gravy Chain – The Necessity of Abstentionism. A GUEST. ARTICLE FROM THE ISP CANDIDATE So the Rutherglen and Hamilton West campaign is nearly over. During the past few weeks, we’ve handed out thousands of leaflets, met lots of people, had tons of conversations, made a fair few friends (and enemies) and we had an entertaining hustings with Women Won’t Wheest, which like all good hustings, had blow up chickens and a candidate blowing up at the end. It’s been a blast. And it’s been a good testing of the waters for some of our policies. ‘Why should we vote for you?’ has been the most common question. People out there are ready to engage – but they need a reason to do so. We could give a number of answers to that, but we think that the best answer to it is our policy on abstention from Westminster. We think that is the standout reason that you should vote ISP. And that you should not vote for any party that doesn’t abstain from Westminster. Bear with us and we’ll explain why we think this is the policy that marks out the political sheep from the goats. Let’s explain very briefly what abstention means for the MP. It means that they do not take the oath to the monarch and does not attend Parliament sittings or committees. They cannot vote in debates. They can still pursue cases on behalf of their constituents and represent them individually to Westminster on individual issues. They can have an office staff who will manage their cases and the staff can draw a salary. But the MP gets no salary – unless they take the oath and attend Parliament. Do you remember in August 2014, that procession of Labour politicians going up Buchanan St, accompanied by the best troller of the referendum campaign, playing the Imperial March from Star Wars and shouting for people to bow down to their imperial masters? How we laughed. Fast forward a few months after the shock of the No vote and we were sending down 56 nationalists in their place. That’ll sort them out, we thought. But it didn’t. And right now, the independence movement is reeling from that failure. Our party and others were formed as a result of it. And if we want to avoid repeating that failure, we need to understand what led to it. And to do that we need to understand our past. For we are in chains but we cannot see them.

On the 31st of January 1919, George Square in Glasgow became the stage for one of the most shocking betrayals of Scotland’s working people. An event that’s been buried under “British history” for over a century: the Battle of George Square. Tens of thousands of workers - men who had just returned from war, women who had kept industry alive during it, and the poor who were expected to swallow “business as usual” in the aftermath, gathered to demand something simple: a 40-hour working week. Not a revolution. Not the overthrow of the state. A fair week’s work to spread the jobs around and stop mass unemployment. Glasgow answered the call, with some 60,000 to 100,000 people filled George Square. They were loud, they were proud, but they were not armed. This was democracy on the street. And what was Westminster’s response? Fear. Pure fear. The establishment was so terrified of Scots finding their voice that they labelled it the start of a Bolshevik uprising. The police waded into the crowd with batons. Violence exploded. And when the workers held their ground, Westminster escalated in a way that should chill every Scot to the bone: They sent in the army. Tanks. Machine guns. Troops on the streets of Glasgow. Within 24 hours, 12,000 English troops were sent to Glasgow. Six tanks and machine-gun units were stationed at key points. They deliberately didn’t use Scottish troops (many were war veterans sympathetic to the strikers). Hundreds were injured, contemporary reports suggest dozens of serious head wounds from police batons. Exact numbers were never properly recorded (which in itself is telling). This wasn’t Berlin. This wasn’t Petrograd. This was Scotland. Ordinary Scots, fresh from the battlefields of France, now facing down the weapons of their own state for daring to demand fair work and dignity. No revolution ever came. The strike was broken. The tanks rolled away. But the message lingered: when Scots challenge the British establishment, Westminster does not negotiate. It suppresses.