Is Ulster-Scots a class issue?

Over the years I have found that the greatest objection to Ulster-Scots is neither political nor religious. It is in fact demographic. The toughest group to get the cultural message through to are "middle class Prods", the people who like to think of themselves as sophisticated and upwardly mobile. The type who have a weekend holiday home in North Antrim but who avoid any contact with the locals. They probably never eat egg & onion sandwiches any more - their developed palates prefer couscous and skinny lattés.*

This is not unique to Northern Ireland. The urban and suburban media, worldwide, loves to mock and patronise rural people and our ways.

Two examples: Sarah Palin was savaged by the oh-so-smart media who loved to characterise her as an Alaskan throwback. Her apparent lack of knowledge of international affairs was wrapped up with her rural roots. Google "Sarah Palin" with "hillbilly" and you'll get over 240,000 returns.

"Hillbilly" is a classic term of abuse used by the media to demean rural people. A quick visit to GoogleNews will bring up this story, of yet another American author who has chosen the Scotch-Irish folks of Appalachian Kentucky as his target.

So does this apply to Northern Ireland? I believe it does. For example, in David Adams' (ex-UDP) recent piece about identity in the Irish Times, he reverts to the unthinking stereotype of "...The recent invention of the deliberate - and deliberately exclusive - misnomer "Ulster Scots" is a laughably pathetic late attempt to fill this self-created vacuum..."

Many people who have cushy columnist jobs in the print and broadcast media have now reached a self-congratulatory pompous stage where cynicism is analysis, and where sarcasm is humour. And the only remaining group that it's socially acceptable to be prejudiced towards and to pour scorn upon is the rural people - in America the hillbillies, in Northern Ireland the Ulster-Scots.

Sure Ulster-Scots is just Ballymena people who can't speak properly - there is no 400 year Ulster-Scots literary tradition, is there?

Dear help these folk if they ever dare to venture further south than Newtownards. As the Chief Exec of a major public organisation who was reared in Ards told me just last week "when we were wee, we were told we should never go beyond the flood gates"!. The flood gates mark the edge of the town, and are the last glimpse of civilisation before entering the Low Country. There is an unspoken cultural Maginot Line that runs from the flood gates up to Six Road Ends, and down the Cottown Road into Donaghadee. South of that line... beyonde this pointe thar be dragons and country folk.

Finally, a story was told to me a few years ago by another civil servant, who in a previous job with the Housing Executive had to visit an elderly couple in their wee house in Portavogie. He was cautiously welcomed into their home, set down on the wee sofa, and the man and his wife then retreated to the kitchen. He overheard the wife whispering to her nearly-deaf husband "Noo Albert, you watch thon boyo - he's fae Bangor!"

Of course there are many fine, committed, Ulster-Scots enthusiasts in the towns and cities of Ulster. Ulster-Scots is not limited to rural life. My point is one of media portrayal, and of the attitudes that pervade their world. Comments would be welcome as thousands read this blog but hardly anyone posts!

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* forget fancy grub. There is no culinary joy that can compare with the mouth-watering saliva surge of biting into the heel of a plain loaf, folded in half, with country butter and homemade blackcorn (blackcurrant) jam in the middle!

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