Monday, July 09, 2007

Anti-Welsh Claptrap

As I mentioned in a previous post, there's a lot of English-only speakers in Wales who are happy to support the Welsh language. Here's an excellent letter from David Rodway in Cardiff which perfectly demonstrates this (Daily Post, July 9).

An an English-speaking Welshman visiting beautiful North Wales during the fall-out from the Thomas Cook Welsh ban, I am amazed to see how much sheer, nasty anti-Welsh claptrap is still bandied about.

Various people have written in to tell us how they see nothing wrong with a language being banned, or accusing protesters of being "paranoid", "extreme", etc.

This whole affair has had the merit of showing us just how far some are prepared to go in their attempt to smear and eradicate a language.

Welsh is an historic language of Wales, despite all that has been done to destroy it, and the majority language of Gwynedd.

It deserves respect and equal status.

It is, to me, far more "bigoted" or "racist" to refuse to learn your neighbour's language, than for your neighbour to ask you to do so.