IMAGINE you are a Scottish Tory MSP bidding to lead the party with a message of bringing “decency” back to politics. Who might you want in your corner?
The list might not be too long, considering the term could hardly be applied to some in the Scottish Tory group.
But some people you would definitely not want behind you are the ultra-Unionist, abolish-Holyrood, irony-proof campaign group “The Majority”.
Unfortunately for frontrunner Russell Findlay, that’s exactly who he has in his camp.
At Russell Findlay's leadership launch event. 'No to a separated Scottish Party'. 'Return to decency'. 'I'm a fighter.' pic.twitter.com/ztEQCpdGnQ
— The Majority (@themajorityscot) August 19, 2024
Run by Mark and Mary Devlin, who were both spotted at Russell’s campaign launch on Monday, “The Majority” has something of a cantankerous online presence, to put it lightly.
In one example from 2023, the group shared an image of demonstrators marking the third anniversary of the UK leaving the EU. They wrote: “‘You went full Nazi, man. Never go full Nazi.’”
In 2024, in response to then first minister Humza Yousaf tweeting about a “call to prayer in Bute House with friends from across different faith communities”, The Majority wrote on social media: “This really feels like a Muslim takeover of our civic institutions.”
“We would really like it if not a single MSP ever mentioned Gaza again,” the group wrote in another post on Twitter/X, where they have more than once called Yousaf the “first minister of Gaza.
Voted for Israel. Fuck Hamas and that whiny Irish cow.
— The Majority (@themajorityscot) May 11, 2024
And amid the Eurovision song contest, the group tweeted: “Voted for Israel. Fuck Hamas and that whiny Irish cow.”
Away from social media, their track record isn’t much better. Ahead of the 2021 Holyrood elections, the group was left red-faced after paying for a truck with the message “Resign Sturegon” to parade about Glasgow. Sturegon. That's what the truck said.
And, then just months later, a so-called academic and expert on nationalism who had written copiously for The Majority magically vanished forever after this paper asked for proof of his existence.
All very charming and decent.
But then, Findlay’s probably not one to talk about “decency”.
At his leadership campaign launch, he compared the SNP to an organised crime gang in one “joke”, and said the party were the “basketcase of the year”.
Such decency.
