Originally Posted by
Splott David
The vast majority who try to sing it, at any speed, haven't got a clue what it means.
The debate is worthwhile on here, as it directly affects thousands and thousands of people from a generation who have been sold the notion that simply by learning the language in school, it will assist, or somehow help them when they are seeking employment in the country.
That is a fallacy, pure and simple, because the vast majority of those will not have come from a traditional Welsh speaking part of the country, will not have a family background associated with an entirely Welsh speaking culture, and will not share a tribal, nationalist background, or hold an empathy with such a background.
If the issue was just as simple as allowing those who wanted to learn Welsh in the same way as some who may wish to learn, French, German, Italian, Russian, or Arabic, then there would be no problem.
But the language became a vehicle for the promotion of nationalistic values and objectives which previously had been as vigorously pursued as those pursued by nationalists in the IRA in Northern Ireland.
The evidence that there simply isn’t that much of a demand for people to use it in daily life can be seen from the extremely poor lack of usage of The Welsh Message Board on CCMB, and the complete lack of the same facility over on ****.
Between the two boards there have been tens of thousands of threads on all sorts of subjects, where does the demand exist for a separate Welsh Forum, certainly not on ****, and hardly on CCMB at all?
I am old enough to remember that we had terrorism in West Wales, Mid-Wales, and North Wales for large parts of the 60’s and 70’s. There were terrorist training exercises in Mid-Wales, people went to prison for terrorist offences, hundreds of holiday homes were burnt down or attacked by Welsh Nationalists, and at one point the Queen’s own yacht was targeted for an attack while visiting North Wales.
The training that went on in Mid-Wales with Welsh Nationalists was no different from that carried out by extreme Islamic fundamentalists in England. They (like the Islamic fundamentalists) posed a direct threat to the security and safety of people in this country, and like them were caught and imprisoned as a result.
When it was realised that direct extreme action would only alienate the majority population, the strategy was changed (in the same way that the IRA changed) to that of bringing about strategic aims and objectives through the political route.
Now, as they say, we are where we are. What we are seeing are former nationalists who are attempting to mould and shape the future direction of Wales, to fit in with a particular minority culture, one whose shared values exist with only a very small minority of the population within Wales.
Thousands have been fooled with the notion that their education and job prospects would be seriously disadvantaged, if it wasn’t for the strong emphasis that has been laid on embracing the language. This is a political objective, a nationalist objective, one that seeks to promote a strategy for nationalism through the artificial creation of a ‘need’ for people to learn the language.
We are years into this now, do we see any benefits from it?
The vast majority who have been misled with this nationalist agenda will never be able to use the language in order to pursue a career of their choice. For example look at BBC Wales. How many Welsh speaking Cardiffians are employed there?
You will not only find a massive disproportionate amount of Welsh speakers to non-Welsh speakers employed there, but they will tend to come from family backgrounds where Welsh as a language was prominently used on a daily basis.
What you won’t find is too many people born and bred from Splott, Ely, Roath, Canton, Penylan etc, etc, working there.
From my discussions with staff from the BBC apparently you won’t find one. It matters not a jot how many of them learn to speak Welsh, they don’t have a shared cultural background, they never have and they never will.
I used the BBC as an example, the same applies to the Welsh National Museum, St Fagan’s Museum, The Millenium Centre (which is dominated by interference and meddling from the WAG) where staff are ‘encouraged’ to give a warm Welsh greeting (in Welsh) to people from Bristol or Gloucester who have come to Cardiff to see a London West End production!
The Centre is targeted by Welsh Nationalists who constantly write (in English of course) to complain that they couldn’t find enough members of staff to converse in Welsh with, when they visited it.
My view is that more and more of this kind of absurdity will continue to creep into our institutions slowly but relentlessly, until we end up with a fractured, divided society. On a macro level, it will affect businesses in Wales in the same way as it has affected any form of official letter that you may receive in the post.
It will destroy competitiveness, blight our economy as well as ruin our chances of attracting outside companies to relocate here, leaving thousands of young job seekers feeling completely cheated and disillusioned for years and years to come.
They will end up victims of a long term political aim to promote nationalism, imposed on the majority in the country, for the sole benefit of a culturally small minority.
On a micro level it will be socially divisive. Only the other day I witnessed a young couple with a North Wales accent board a bus in Albany Road and insist to the driver that they will ask for fares and directions in Welsh. He was understandably confused and we all watched as he was delayed explaining to both of them that he didn’t understand a word that they had asked him, when they had reverted to using Welsh. Both got frustrated with him, finally speaking only in English, and then proceeding to complain loudly to each other in Welsh when seated.
Something which we never have expected to see on the streets of Cardiff could well become commonplace in the next few years. That will lead to more and more cases of social friction on a local level, between those who believe that their right to use a minority language far outweighs their consideration towards those who don’t understand it.
That’s the way nationalism works the world over.
All views are welcome, but remember some are more welcome than others...