If someone starts selling “26+2=28” bumper stickers now then I want my cut. 
No shit. But in the North the dominant strain is “stone-age”, whatever the denomination. As is shown by their views on social issues.
Well, you said it yourself - there are more varieties of Protestant, and so there isn’t a single institution directly comparable to the Catholic Church. But that doesn’t mean that the Protestant churches have been innocent of the offences committed by the Catholic Church. There have been abuse and cover-up scandals in Protestant residential institutions, see for example Bethany Home in the 26 Counties and Kincora Boys’ Home in the North (the latter wasn’t officially a Protestant institution but the man in charge was a Free Presbyterian preacher and the boys were pimped out to Protestant clerics among others). Protestant churches north and south have backed segregated education; the first Six Counties administration actually wanted mixed secular schools (probably the only good thing I’ll ever say about it) but the Protestant churches joined forces to demand that state schools be run as Protestant schools. And the Protestant churches have certainly attempted to exert their (conservative) influence on social policy, as this letter shows (the four named there are respectively Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian and CoI). And when you start getting into the Free Presbyterians - Ian Paisley’s church - well, I wouldn’t even know where to start.
Jeez, there’s a whole field of social research on how diasporas see their homeland politics differently to the people actually living there (particularly in conflict situations). This isn’t limited to the Irish - the same phenomenon has been observed among Armenian expats and Palestinian refugees, just to name the first ones that come to mind.
Who said that they are?
Which seems to contradict your assertion that Protestants would be happy to live in a united Ireland if only they weren’t treated so poorly.
I don’t doubt that attacks on Protestants by people who identify as Irish reinforce unionists’ perception of themselves as not Irish. Attacks on Catholics by people who identify as British, and there is no shortage of examples of those, undoubtedly have a similar effect. But none of that is the point. Unionists are no more interested in joining the Irish state than they would be in joining Norway, if that was a practical possibility. It’s not a coincidence that they lean towards euroscepticism too (as indeed do Sinn Féin, and the more hardline republican parties are openly eurosceptic). It’s a form of nationalism, though obviously not as that term is normally used in Ireland.
Incidentally, I’m away for the next week so won’t be able to continue this discussion for a while.
Well, you’re kind of making my other point… even hardline Orange Prods mellow out when they’re not stuck directly in the NI conflict zone so there is probably nothing inherently stone-age conservative about their community. But in the ROI itself, Catholics remained stone-age conservative even with almost zero Protestants in the country and NOT being in a conflict zone, so what’s up with that?
My underlying point is that there is absoutely nothing in it for the Protestant community under the typical nationalist vision of a united Ireland. The choices facing Protestants are,
1, Be Protestant in the ROI and face marginalization/extinction (like I mentioned earlier - only 3% Protestants left in the ROI), and maybe violence
2, Be assimilated as a Catholic in the ROI and be treated even worse by the Catholic ruling class
3, Become a Unionist
What would YOU do if your family happened to be good old Orange Protestants? Choices 1 and 2 are pretty dismal, don’t you think?
And I’m not even considering the other economic / political differences that the ROI has with the UK, like EU membership.
Well, they didn’t exactly start that particular discussion … nobody has been telling them for years that they’re actually living in rightful Norwegian territory (I think… correct me if I’m wrong. :eek:) Anyway, how do nationalists reconcile euroskepticism with a united Ireland?
[QUOTE=ruadh]
Incidentally, I’m away for the next week so won’t be able to continue this discussion for a while.
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Enjoy your vacation.
What on earth are you talking about?
The decision on the flags at city hall was made democratically by the elected officials of Northern Ireland. We elected these people to act on our behalf on decisions like this. In the build up to the vote on this issue there was very visible public consultation on the issue, and various opportunities for members of the public to attend meetings and speak their mind on the proposal.
Rather strangely considering the supposed strong feelings from the unionist community, these meetings were rather poorly attended. Strange that.
After all the consultation, the members of all elected parties in Northern Ireland held a vote on the issue.
"Do it the proper way"? “Have a dialogue beforehand”? The way it was done was democracy 101, it was done completely properly. The dialogue was there start to finish.
You make it seem like one party railroaded this vote through. This isn’t America, the people voting didn’t just vote against whatever the other side was doing. It was a democratic vote.
Besides, I wouldn’t place too much weight on the rioting as an indicator of anything, there is a reason “recreational rioting” is a common term back home. The scumbags out doing that don’t identify with a single thing you wrote in this thread, and you are uninformed if you think they do.
I get your point, but this was also a democratic decision. Just because a specific community has the numbers to pass a certain measure, that doesn’t mean that measure can’t be bizarre and open to criticism. Maybe I am uninformed if I can’t grasp exactly what problems are being solved by measures like these.
Be clear though again, the flag hasn’t been removed, just the flag timetable has become the same as for every other single public building in Northern Ireland.
Bizarre, maybe, open to criticism, of course but should politicians (and the general public) be intimidated by sore losers in a fair democratic process? Alliance party members have been terrorised over the last few weeks, police officers have been injured, seasonal commerce disrupted irreparably and non-Unionists intimidated by masked flag-wielding arseholes. I was going to actually take a few photos when I was up in Belfast to show you the preponderance of union jacks in mixed community public places, just to make it clearer to you that unionists/loyalists are not being oppressed as to the symbolic expression of their identities.
Fair enough, and I’m not trying to apologize for hooligans. I realize there can be some very shameful and paranoid behavior within the unionist side and the flag thing shouldn’t have become a real issue all on its own.
I was just trying to say that I thought I also detected a cynical motivation (like, poking the bear to get a public reaction) behind govt initiatives like this. I can’t prove it of course, but that type of behavior deserves criticism too, when and if it happens.
It also adheres to the advice from the College of Arms,a body which is;
I think you’re mixing up a whole bunch of issues here. Irish Catholics in the 26 Counties aren’t expats, and thus not directly comparable to Six County unionists in Canada. And besides, there are plenty of examples of “hardline Orange Prods” not mellowing out when outside the conflict zone, most notably in the west of Scotland.
What is the “typical nationalist vision of a united Ireland”?
Well it’s higher than that now, although admittedly not by much. It would be much higher in a united Ireland - around 17% by my calculations. That’s higher than, say, the Hispanic-American population and not too much lower than the French-Canadian. They’d still be a minority, but one with considerable clout and certainly nowhere near at risk of extinction.
There’s barely any anti-Protestant violence in the Republic and hasn’t been for a long time. And anyone who wanted to commit it against northern Protestants could just as easily do so now. Nobody’s talking about forcibly relocating them into staunchly Catholic areas of the south (to the extent that those even exist anymore, with all the immigration of the past couple decades).
Not much evidence of that - the Protestant population is growing and the Catholic population shrinking. Incidentally, it’s the other way around in the 6 Counties.
“Become”?
Both countries are EU members.
What’s there to reconcile? It’s an entirely consistent position. A more logical question is how pro-EU nationalists justify ceding sovereignty to Brussels after fighting so hard to win it from London.
So, this raises the question: In the flag of the Republic of Ireland the green represents the Catholics and the orange the Protestants, but does the white represent No Man’s Land?
My my !
Mutt and Geoff are alive and well !
Perhaps as this is all about compromise, the Dail could fly the Union Flag on the days that Belfast isn’t.
I mean, none of it actually MEANS anything, so flying a flag, or not flying a flag isn’t really important.
And I’m sure the neighbours in the mostly south would totally agree.
As it shouldn’t mean anything much to the majority population in their own country, then it also won’t mean anything to the population of the country that adjoins Britain.
Over to you Mutt !
Or is it Geoffs turn ?
“26+6=1”
Fine, but my question remains, is there anything that would make Unionists actually prefer to live in a united Ireland instead of the UK? I’m reading your argument as basically “it won’t be as bad for them as it would have been 50 or 100 years ago.”
These community votes on the flag, etc., seem to be validating the most hardline Unionists’ position that the nationalist community is highly motivated to tear down all visible traces of the Unionist/Protestant community and throw up monuments to nationalist extremists every time they get a chance. Although it may be fair play and democratic under the GFA, maybe it’s still not such a good road to follow? (I mean, they democratically introduce outrageous sectarian crap all the time in Quebec)
I meant that the UK has a different relationship to the EU… they are not in the euro currency or Schengen zone, and are openly talking about leaving the EU completely these days. It would seem more productive to be a euroskeptic based in the UK than in Ireland.
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As it shouldn’t mean anything much to the majority population in their own country, then it also won’t mean anything to the population of the country that adjoins Britain.
Over to you Mutt !
Or is it Geoffs turn ?
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Was that my cue? Anyway, I had wondered at first if Westminster would back up the NI Unionists on the flag issue. (I guess they aren’t)
I doubt it.
No more then they’d intervene in Bradford City councils actions.
This was nothing more than pointless threadshitting.
Knock it off.
[ /Moderating ]
I’m afraid I don’t agree with your description of the political dynamic. There is no doubt that it is a debate about the place of Quebec in Canada, but it is a debate amongst the francophone majority, not a linguistic majority/minority split.
LC Strawhouse linked to a story about the flag issue in Quebec, which the PQ Government lost: Canadian Flag In Quebec National Assembly: Parti Quebecois Loses Bid To Take Down Maple Leaf.
If it were a straight debate between the francophone majority and the anglophone minority, then the motion should have carried, since the Members of the National Assembly are overwhelmingly francophone. (See: list of Members of the National Assembly.)
Rather, this was a debate among the francophone majority about the place of Quebec in Confederation. There are three parties in the National Assembly: the Parti Québécoise, the Quebec Liberal Party, and the Coalition Avenir Quebec. The Liberals and the Coalition together voted down the PQ’s motion.
Neither the Liberals nor the Coalition are parties of the anglophone minority. The Liberals traditionally draw support from anglophones and allophones, but the majority of their members are francophone. The Coalition’s members are entirely francophone, going by their last names. In fact, the only MNA with a clearly anglophone name, Scott McKay, belongs to the PQ.
The current debate over the flag may be an indication of an ongoing shift in the federalist/sovereigntist debate generally in Quebec, as another article suggests: Hébert: Separatist PQ victory has produced unexpected boost for federalists. Hébert also takes the position that it is a debate amongst the majority community in Quebec about their role in Canada, with a shift in favour of federalism and away from sovereigntists.
Finally, it is significant that the Maple Leaf flag was adopted in the 1960s with the express intention of creating a national flag based solely on Canadian symbolism, replacing the old Red Ensign with the Union Flag in the canton. It was adopted in the Commons with overwhelming support from the Quebec MPs, from different parties. The main opposition to the new flag came from the Progressive Conservatives, which had primarily anglophone members, and were led by John Diefenbaker. Given that history, the Maple Leaf flag has been seen as a federalist symbol in Quebec, not a linguistic/ethnic symbol, as was the case with the Red Ensign.
No, there isn’t, and that is precisely the point that I have been arguing. They simply don’t want to live in a united Ireland.
I’m curious as to where you’re reading in my argument that it would be bad for them at all, as Protestants.
Progress under a peace agreement can’t be made contingent on the acceptance of the most extreme elements. There wouldn’t be any progress if that was allowed… the hardliners would stop everything.
Ireland is not in the Schengen zone either.
The Tories are, but it’s questionable whether the public would agree in a referendum. In any case, I can’t say I’ve ever heard any unionist justify their position on the basis of Ireland’s relationship with the EU.
I do agree that there are certain differences between Ireland and the UK that make the latter a more attractive country to live in - the NHS, for example, versus our free market primary care system - but their actual impact is probably felt more keenly among nationalists than unionists. In other words for nationalists these things may (and for some people I think they have) make a real difference in terms of whether or not a united Ireland is desirable. For unionists, at most they reinforce a view they already hold.
Fair enough, I was assuming that was the analogy LC was drawing. If not, the situations are even less analogous.
So I’m curious what you think the final endgame of all this will (or should) be. Is NI heading for a Kosovo-like situation where it simply becomes an independent state? (If roughly half the people refuse to be British and the other half refuse to be Irish…) Will Protestants be pulled into a UI against their will? Or will NI stay in the UK but without any overt trappings of the UK?
I guess you’re saying that there would be no problem, but it’s a pretty big part of the unionist argument that the Catholic establishment created an unacceptable environment for the Protestant community and others in both overt and subtle ways, which makes them gunshy about a united-Ireland (the fact that there are almost no Prods left in ROI is thrown around a lot). I didn’t make those things up, I heard them directly from NI expats and their families. Maybe it sounds like a bunch of Orange nonsense but it was a fairly convincing argument to me.
Oops, sloppy of me. LOL
I don’t know how any good can come from this. It’s liable to raise hackles down here and it’s completely irrelevant what anyone in Leinster House or in the Republic Of Ireland thinks about the Union flag. I don’t see any purpose for such a protest other than to annoy people here.