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Humming the chorus of the summer song phonetically is something we have all done, it has even become a hit in itself, like Aserejé from Las Ketchup. Now imagine that Wikipedia articles were written like this. Well, this is what thousands of Scots have found when consulting the Scottish version of the encyclopedia.

"This is cultural vandalism!" It can be read in some comments on Reddit, a website where the user Ultach, whose name refers to an Irish gentile, has uncovered the linguistic outrage that would affect more than 27,000 articles (almost half of the entries in the Scottish version of Wikipedia) and 200,000 editions that, apparently, are made by the same person.

According to the discoverer of the trap, it all started when he set out to investigate why the Scottish version of Wikipedia was used to discredit the language, even denying its existence. "If the articles were an exact representation, they would probably be right, but the reality is that he uses almost no Scottish vocabulary, the little he uses is incorrect and the grammar conforms to standard English, not Scottish," explains Ultach.

Christian, introvert and fetishist

"Hi, I'm AmaryllisGardener and I help maintain this wiki! I have been here since February 2013 and am the main active administrator. Aside from Wikipedia, I am Christian, from North Carolina, introverted and 'furry' (a subculture made up mostly of adults who attend meetings and conventions dressed as stuffed animals). ", this is how the user behind this linguistic crime is defined.

Operating the volunteer role of administrator of the Scottish version of Wikipedia, this young American has been creating encyclopedia articles without any control for seven long years. The problem is that he is not Scottish, he does not speak Scottish and none of his articles are written in Scottish and despite this, more than a third of the Wikipedia in Scottish is written by him.

Considering that this version of the encyclopedia only has 60,000 articles, AmaryllisGardener's work is quite an evil feat that surprises with its constancy, an average of nine articles created a day since 2013. This war against Scotland, carried out since the computer in his bedroom has also gone against native Scottish speakers who tried, unsuccessfully, to correct wrong entries.

Snotty snotty

The articles are written in an English, with American grammar, riddled with spelling errors that try to imitate the spoken Scottish accent. "What he seems to have done is write the article in English and then look up each word individually, using an online Scottish dictionary to replace the word with the first result. Specifically, for words for which the author could not find a Scottish equivalent , English was used instead or a new word was invented, "explains the discoverer of the scandal on Reddit.

Many users ask to remove all articles from the Scottish version of Wikipedia due to the difficulty of reviewing such a number of entries, while others opt to remove only the content linked directly to the user AmaryllisGardener or all articles after 2013.

AmaryllisGardener himself has spoken on Wikipedia after the controversy declaring himself "devastated". He claims to have acted believing that he was doing a positive job translating articles into Scottish in his own way. In addition, he mentions that he began his work when he was only twelve years old "and sometimes when you start something young you cannot see that the habit you have developed is not healthy or useful to the extent that you think".

Apparently, the young American is suffering virtual derision that has turned into harassment, according to several administrators and regular users of Wikipedia. Even the very discoverer of the scandal, Ultach, asks that this cease and exonerates AmaryllisGardener alleging youth and ignorance of the consequences at the time of starting the work.

Cultural vandalism

As can be read in the claim that several users have presented in the online encyclopedia, much of the Scottish Wikipedia cannot function as a resource because of this scandal, causing active damage to the language in which it is intended to be written. "Scottish is a struggling language and replacing it with the disguised skeleton of another is cultural vandalism on an unprecedented scale."

What he refers to with difficulties is the discussion about the real status of Scottish as a dialect of English or as a distinct and autonomous language. This language has no official status in any of the countries where it is spoken, but the United Kingdom did accept Scottish as a regional language, and it is also recognized as an indigenous language of Scotland and a vulnerable language by UNESCO. Even so, the Internet continues to be used as a thrown weapon against the Scottish community.

Whatever the outcome of this discovery, it is clear that more than half of the Scottish version of Wikipedia will disappear. To which an anonymous user, anticipating such a disastrous end, wrote for the posterity of the Internet the phrase pronounced by Mel Gibson, characterized as William Wallace in the film 'Braveheart', adapted to the circumstances: Wikipedia may be taken away from us! , but they will never take away our freedom!

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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