By Cassidy Selep
Photographer
September 18, 2014 will go down in history for Scotland. On Thursday, citizens voted either for independence from Britain or to continue their 307 year bond with Britain. The votes were tallied on the Friday and the “no” campaigners got their wish to stay with Great Britain.
Ruaridh (pronounced Rory) Frize, friend of Prospect alum Whitney Schmidt, participated in the historic vote on Thursday.
Frize lives in Glasgow, the biggest city in Scotland. He first went to the University of Glascow before graduating from the University of Oklahoma with a major in political science. Frize has family that lives in Durham, Great Britain, but he voted for independence from Great Britain.
“I think (I voted for independence) partly because it is a patriotic thing.” Frize said. “I don’t really consider myself British at all so I thought it would make more sense to vote yes.”
Frize also voted yes because he believed that there was no good reason that Scotland shouldn’t be independent.
Voting yes meant uncertainty. Citizens were worried that if Scotland became an independent country, they wouldn’t be able to keep the pound as the currency. There was another problem concerning the European Union. Scotland would have to reapply to the European Union and citizens were afraid that Scotland wouldn’t be accepted.
However citizens that voted yes are worried that nothing will change.
Prime Minister David Cameron promised that Scottish parliament would get more power if they voted no, but Frize saw the promise as a “last-ditch attempt to get votes for no.”
Frize still stands by his decision for independence.
“I didn’t understand that a lot of people were worried about the uncertainty,” Frize said. “but I thought it was worth the risk to be in charge of our own lives.”