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Comment by spollo | Hacker News Reader

As a Canuck, I think this kind of thought experiment must be extremely offensive to the autonomy of Scottish people... I would be pissed if I read the same sort of thing coming from the U.S. towards Canada.

Nonetheless I love my Scottish brothers, if it were coming from you I wouldn't say no!

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I think the concept comes from the idea that Scotland, while defined as a "country", is already subservient to the U.K., a situation which clearly does not define the relationship between Canada and any other larger country, and so this is not about "stop being autonomous and come join Canada" but "maybe become part of Canada instead of part of the U.K.".

"Scotland's head of state is the monarch of the United Kingdom, currently Queen Elizabeth II (since 1952)." - Wikipedia

The Queen is the head of state of Canada as well, so that situation wouldn't change:

"Canada is a federal parliamentary democracy and a constitutional monarchy, with Queen Elizabeth II being the head of state." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada

Wow, and apparently she is also the Queen of Australia and New Zealand?!? Regardless: Scotland is usually compared at the level of Quebec, not Canada, and there are numerous things that they do not have control over, particularly and most relevantly including immigration.

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/15037874.Immigration_powe...

Not that its very relevant to your point, but quebec does have some measure of control over immigration.

Thank you. And I say that as a Scot married to a Canadian! I cannot believe how many times I've seen a version of this piece turn up on social media in the last week. Cringeworthy.

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