-Ralph-

Personally not disgruntled, so don't worry about that. National pride matters full stop, so I have to admit to having a frown when I read that particular post, but, hey! The guy has had the balls to admit he phrased it badly (we've all done that) and apologise, so it's completely forgiven.

I think most folk would also realise that this forum covers the whole of the UK and so you have to categorise the localised groups somehow and call them something, be it regions, sections, clubs or regiments! Having the same number of folk in London alone, as we have in Scotland, you couldn't do it with countries 'cos the England section would be so big it wouldn't be localised, hence defeating the object.

So I really couldn't give a hoot how the joint is carved up or what we decide to call the slices. Never going to please everybody is it!

I'll try to explain one of the reasons why many Scots get sensitive about national pride -

We have a general problem up here with folk thinking we're "just wee region way up north". At work I'm having hell trying to get IBM to run a training course anywhere north of Newcastle. The guys in London who schedule the training just don't think there is a necessity, despite hundreds of folk hammering on the doors at IBM in Greenock crying out for training to sell and implement IBM products. They are so convinced that Scotland not is big enough to make it worthwhile, that they are not even prepared to consider it. If it's worthwhile running weekly courses for 6 million Londoners, why is it not worthwhile running at least quarterly courses for 6 million Scots?

A lot of folk down south just don't realise that it takes 7 -8 hours to drive from John O Groats to Carlisle. Scotland is a big, big, place - nearly as big as England (Get British Isles map out, the borders runs from Berwick upon Tweed to Carlisle, a lot of folk split the UK in their head at the next narrow point, between Edinburgh and Glasgow. Weather maps that folk see every day don't help either, they are not to scale). Whilst not as heavily populated, we have a significant population, London is significant is it not? Lots of Scots will have very similar stories to mine above that they could tell, where they face the same attitudes on a daily basis. Eventually it grinds you down and ordinary sound people get ****ed off.

I'll admit that some Scots can develop or grow up with counter productive attitudes that no self respecting Scot is proud of - England shirt wearers getting beaten up, etc, etc, but you get chip on the shoulder 'ers in every country. I'm talking about ordinary decent folk getting jacked off with it.

So when folk say things like "take the national pride where it matters", it's really getting shoved in your face, and you can understand the reaction. So K, you have apologised and it's absolutely forgiven mate, but sorry, i had to quote it again to make my point, now it's forgotten too. I'll buy you a pint if your coming to AR07.