A couple of weeks ago they probably burned a Guy as well. I suspect there is a lot greater chance of anti-Catholic violence in Scotland than anti-Obama violence. No one gave a damn about the Glorious Fifth. Why should anyone care about this?

And I don’t see what the big deal about Mandela is either.

I remember when we burned Thatcher and Leon Brittain at Lewes bonfire. Happy days!

This story and the other one about Cambridge and David Willetts last night, don’t show students in the best light. But that’s because they’re young. They still have childlike ways.
Nothing to get too upset about, young people to daft things.

“Former chair St Andrew’s Labour Society James Mills, told Liberal Conspiracy:

One year they burnt an effigy of myself alongside Nelson Mandela. This is not ordinary behaviour even for Tory boys with too much time and money on their hands. ”

So was the burning of Mandela a recent event? I knew the Tories did this in the 80s, but now? The Big deal, incidentally (for No1) is that the main things he did was a peaceful transition to democracy and an end to aparthied. To burn an effigy you normally hate something they stand for or did – so these Tories hate democracy and racial equality?

@ 1. So Much For Subtlety

Anti-catholic violence in St Andrews? Unlikely. The sectarianism is in the west of Scotland, the bit closest to Northern Ireland. If Guy Fawkes was burned it was probably as a response to the current protestors using his face. Tories being tough on law and order etc.

@ 3

“Nothing to get too upset about, young people to daft things.”

Pretty much.

“A couple of weeks ago they probably burned a Guy as well”

Guy Fawkes’ Night is hardly politicised these days (I’ve never come across Catholic or anti-death-penalty groups portesting it), and it originated as an anti-treason thing more than an anti-Catholic thing.

I’m sure SMFS didn’t have a problem either when those white US students hung nooses on trees outside their college as a light hearted jape against their fellow black students. All in good fun after all.

Who is suprised, who is shocked and who, frankly, is so weak to be the slightest bit offended by this obnoxious act? Anyone who cant stomach this probably should leave politics to grown-ups.

Its interesting to hear about this, but I do hope the SASU dont do any censoring, because like it or not, both left and right have used bonfires to burn effigies in the past, its almost pantomime like in its enjoyment. Secondly I dont remember SUs around the country (thankfully) censoring or clamping down on socieities or people who were part of riots or occupations. Which, one could argue from the right, is more contemptable than a silly effigy.

Arthur Seaton @7. Do you mean like when some white school students hung some bits of rope from a tree in in the playground in Jena Louisiana?

In my opinion that was a bit of a flap about nothing – and I agree with John McWhorter who wrote about it and said as much.

”Some bored little piece of trash hangs a noose one morning, and spends the rest of the week watching his deed make national news on the internet and get discussed on the top talk shows. He and his friend do a high-five, while some similarly-minded web-surfing scum across the country decides he wants to do something like that too.”

http://www.nysun.com/opinion/walking-away-from-hate/64779/

2 ditto, But it took ages to make the Thathcer mask”

We Burnt a effegy Of thatcher on Bomfire night on My 15th birthday when I was In the Scouts in 1987, Come to think of most of the scout leaders were tories and Police they thought it was hilarious, and lo and behold she fell from power 3 years later

I dunno about all this ‘young people’ commentary but I reckon that we know what they (tories…to generalise) are; what they really are. So all good if their overt behaviour exposes them, whatever their age. Challenge it by all means but we shouldn’t try to suppress it (unless real harm is likely to result – the JSMill Harm principle). Good to know your enemy.

4. James

The Big deal, incidentally (for No1) is that the main things he did was a peaceful transition to democracy and an end to aparthied. To burn an effigy you normally hate something they stand for or did – so these Tories hate democracy and racial equality?

It is true that Mandela did stand for racial equality but he has never had much commitment to democracy except in the Stalinist sense of the word. Being, of course, a front man for the SACP. He also stood for a lot of other things like necklacing. Much better to burn someone in effigy than in reality don’t you think? Mandela’s reputation is largely the creation of guilt-ridden White liberals who do not want to even think about the reality.

Anti-catholic violence in St Andrews? Unlikely.

Sure. But then anti-Obama, or even anti-Black, violence is even less likely.

6. Chaise Guevara

Guy Fawkes’ Night is hardly politicised these days (I’ve never come across Catholic or anti-death-penalty groups portesting it), and it originated as an anti-treason thing more than an anti-Catholic thing.

I think it tended to be an anti-Catholic thing, not an anti-Treason thing. Especially in Scotland.

Arthur Seaton

I’m sure SMFS didn’t have a problem either when those white US students hung nooses on trees outside their college as a light hearted jape against their fellow black students. All in good fun after all.

I am not entirely sure this has happened at any college in the US in recent times, but you are right, I have no problem with it. Free speech ought to be that – free. Even for idiots and ar$eholes. A large section of the Left has had no problem demanding I be murdered and has done so my entire life. You don’t hear me demanding they are silenced. Nor should anyone else.

@13 – “You don’t hear me demanding they are silenced. ”

You come on here to disrupt the debate, and silence opposition. So yes, I do hear exactly that. Also, I’m not surprised you’re paranoid. It’s typical among the 1%, after all.

All politicians are the same they just dream up different ways of how to kill men women and children,yours at http://www.Tomthumb.info/ thanks

A large section of the Left has had no problem demanding I be murdered and has done so my entire life. You don’t hear me demanding they are silenced. Nor should anyone else.

I’m not much of a leftist but, still, could I be the first to say that I have no desire to murder SMFS.

@16 – Quite, I’m sure he has cooties, I don’t want to be anywhere NEAR him.

16. BenSix

I’m not much of a leftist but, still, could I be the first to say that I have no desire to murder SMFS.

Thank you Ben. I am touched. Although, in all fairness, the quality of the Left, and their programme, has gone into steep decline since the end of the USSR. Which means they are not quite as many of them wanting to murder me these days. Still some, but a declining proportion. Of course if they were within a Soviet invasion of being able to implement their programme I would have no doubt those plans would be revised in record time. No point alienating people with threats they have no chance of ever carrying out.

@2

But will Sunny write an article about it?

Good one Sunny, this proves beyond all doubt DC and Tories are evil.

What a fail, again.

@13

You’re wrong

Halloween was always the big festival in Scotland. Bonfire Night, not really Guy Fawkes, came became big relatively recently.

Never noted any particular sectarian thing hanging around it

It’s sad niw that Guisin has given way to the Yank Trick or Treat, and the Bonfire night is less about small parties and big events, such is homogenisation

@19 of course Torys or DC arent evil, but they are a bunch of f * * cunts.

This sounds like the sort of thing that the YBF would get up to. I suspect that St Andrews Conservative Student’s Association is dominated by them. So why Obama? Have you read the Telegraph blogs recently? With all the blogs written about Obama by the likes of Nile Gardiner and Toby Harnden, anyone would think the paper had upped sticks and hopped across the Atlantic.

Guardian article on the YBF
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/mar/06/tory-madrasa-young-britons-foundation
My blog
http://buddyhell.wordpress.com/2011/04/07/h-f-tories-and-the-right-wing-madrasah/

I’m not much of a leftist but, still, could I be the first to say that I have no desire to murder SMFS.

Strictly, I have no desire to murder SMFS either. To use the old moral example – even if pushing him off a bridge into the path of a runaway rail cart would prevent many more deaths, I still couldn’t bring myself to do it.

On the other hand, if there was a runaway tram careering towards a fork in the track and I was standing in front of a button with a choice of either a) doing nothing, letting the cart continue thus letting lots of people be killed or b) hitting the button, diverting the cart and thus killing SMFS instead… Well, I’d be hammering that button like I was on a gameshow called Hungry Hippos For Money. I’d pound the damn thing to pieces.

Hope that’s clear.

@ SMFS

“I think it tended to be an anti-Catholic thing, not an anti-Treason thing. Especially in Scotland. ”

Depends where and who you were. It ORIGINATED as an anti-treason thing, as I said. That’s why they burn an effigy of Guy Fawkes instead of, for example, the Pope.

Anyway, I’ve yet to come across a Catholic who objects to it, maybe for that reason, or maybe because it’s so old that it’s changed from “unpleasant revenge-fantasy” to “time-honoured tradition”.

Depends where and who you were. It ORIGINATED as an anti-treason thing, as I said. That’s why they burn an effigy of Guy Fawkes instead of, for example, the Pope.

Come down to sunny Lewes. Home of the finest beer in the world, and annual burnings of the Pope in effigy. Or, strictly speaking, annual burnings of Pope Paul V in effigy.

@ 24 TimJ

That probably IS anti-Catholic…

@SMFS #13:

I’m sure SMFS didn’t have a problem either when those white US students hung nooses on trees outside their college as a light hearted jape against their fellow black students. All in good fun after all.

I am not entirely sure this has happened at any college in the US in recent times.

Jena

I remember when we burned Thatcher and Leon Brittain at Lewes bonfire. Happy days!

I’m assuming they were effigies or I’d have heard about it.

Anyway, I’ve yet to come across a Catholic who objects to it, maybe for that reason, or maybe because it’s so old that it’s changed from “unpleasant revenge-fantasy” to “time-honoured tradition”.

Most people tend to think of Guy Fawkes as an anti-hero these days (hence the proliferation of V for Vendetta masks), even though he was a religious fundamentalist.

Is the final sentance of the Original Post meant to imply racism? I just ask because I haven’t seen any evidence of racism in this story – just mindless political opposition at a university with strong US links which might mean impressionable idiots were parroting the stupidity of impressionable idiots amongst the US Republicans. Nothing to do with race – they just hate President Obama for his politics.

27. Robin Levett

Jena

Well apart from all the facts, you may have a point. Jena was a High School, not a college. The nooses were probably hung by White students but we do not know. The local investigation said they were aimed at some other White students, not any Black students. So apart from every single detail, yes, you’re on to something.

“Anyone who cant stomach this probably should leave politics to grown-ups.” Leaving politics to bullying “grown-ups” who are callous, ruthless, aggressive, violent and bigoted has led to this mess.

This is far from a one off.

Three of the last five Tory Presidents as Glasgow Uni have been disgraced. One for dressing up a slave owner, one for burning an EU flag and one recently for posting UVF lyrics on his twitter. These are people who work for the Tories in Scotland.

They are viewed with a mixture of sympathy and contempt; why people down South keep voting for such idiots I’ll never know.