Amy MacBeath

Amid further revelations that the Trinity Mirror are about to shed 70 staff in Glasgow it seems that the doom and gloom predictions for budding journos are never going to end.  After the Herald, Sunday Herald & Evening Times made 40 staff redundant and the Scotsman publications lost two Editors within a matter of days, I am left feeling a bit discouraged and admit I am a little concerned about hunting for a job later this year!  Anyway, here is an interesting article in today’s Guardian by Tim Luckhurst.

So today I experienced a fine justice system at work…a ’social delinquent’ as we’ll call the accused, who carried out extensive damage at a great cost to a fair number of people, walked smirking out of court scot free.  Now correct me if I’m wrong – generally if you were seen, identified and arrested for a crime I (naively of course) thought that the said delinquent would therefore be convicted.  Nope, not to be…a simple breach of the peace was to suffice..despite the fact that many innocent people each paid a small fortune thanks to this smug offender.  Fair?  Hardly seems so!

So it appears that I am doomed in this culturally diverse and accepting city to be forever labelled by that delightful (and derogatory term may I add) that us Highlanders just love.  A teuchter.  With my recent experiences whereby our region of fine folk have been dismissed by some as not worth worrying about all the way up there I feel that I should jump to the defence of my kind. 

First and foremost I have never considered myself to be a ‘teuchter’.  I am a towny through and through and to me the term always meant some rural Black Isler or islander with their broad accents/Gaelic and funny ways- both qualities I do not consider to have (or at least in any great amount..well the first one anyway).

So, I decided to look this up and put the matter to bed once and for all.  But alas, it’s not to be….every definition I have come across is just another way for a lowlander to have a dig at us poor Highlanders.  One even claimed that it was a positive term lowlanders use for us…who are they kidding?

“teuchter:  A Lowlander’s term for a Highlander, not exactly insulting but not to be used to a Highlander’s face”      …………….uhum!

Just when we thought those folks on Twitter couldn’t come up with anything else in the land of cyber socialising…you can now get a weekly newspaper!  The idea of James McIvor (known for Scooped!) micro-bloggers can send their news in with the best making it to the Twitter paper.  The BBC, Scotsman etc are already networking away so I suppose it is a further logical step as far as logic goes in the cyber world!