This isn’t just religion. In fact, Religion is a very small part of the situation. Nationalists do not play up catholicism as much as Loyalists promote Protestantism. And suggesting the higher birthrate amongst Catholics is down to not using Contraception is slightly behind the times. We’re not a bunch of God-fearing paddies anymore.
You ask why people say “yes, but” when talking about IRA atrocities. This I can answer.
There is sympathy to the cause, but not to their actions. What they have done in the past has appalled Nationalists as much as it has done everyone else. Please note the distinction I am making. It is possible to be Nationalist and not a satans crotchscum thug. Hell, if I can do it, anyone can.
For those of you that don’t know, The IRA at times were the only people defending and policing Catholic Neighbourhoods at a time when they very much needed defending. If anyone is in doubt about that, Read up on Bloody Sunday. They couldn’t rely on the RUC, and most certainly not the British Army, who murdered Catholics while ignoring Loyalist scumbags.
I do not condone what the IRA do. I believe that talking is the way forward.
And one more thing.
This is a very small minority of people in Northern Ireland. Extremely small. and the troubles are confined noadays to very small areas of the North. In fact, its pretty much confined to North Belfast and Drumcree thesedays.
sorry if I rambled. There just seems to be loads of threads about this subject at the moment.
If you’re intending to imply that a British paper might have a pro-Loyalist bias, it’s also worth keeping in mind that, of all the British papers, the Guardian has the most consistently pro-Nationalist stance in relation to Northern Ireland. Ronan Bennett, who writes most of its feature pieces on Northern Ireland, has written at least one (quite good) novel centred aroud Republican terrorists, a ghostwritten autobiography for one of the Guildford Four and one (not very good) TV series about the Easter Rising.
As for the events in Ardoyne, they really do beggar belief, even by the standards of the unlovely bigots of Northern Ireland.
I have to say that the RUC appear to have been less zealous than they might have been in this situation. Situations like the Drumcree standoff, involving grown adults (even if they’re behaving childishly), are one thing. But if there was ever a case for rounding the participants up and aresting them all for breach of the peace (or worse), this is surely it. And bugger the consequences.
The other solution, I suppose, might be to close both schools down until the situation is resolved, but that would only have the effect of penalising the children.
I agree with what ruadh said in the other thread: they’re doing a better recruiting job for the Real IRA than the Real IRA could ever do for itself.
I’m from Ireland and believe me the troubles will never end.
I live in the south and we have all different cultures living in my town(refugees etc.) and we all get along fine but the troubles up in the North are a different story.
It’s an eye for an eye,for god only knows how long.If one side decides to stop a simple thing such as a drunken brawl outside a pub some night will start it all over again.
“Did you here they beat up a Catholic ‘young fellow’ outside the pub last night the Prod bastards” …and here we go again.
It will never end…Sad really when life is so short and to live it with such hate.
If only that where true in Dublin. Refugees get a very bad time from a lot of people here and some of the racist comments I hear almost daily make me sick to my stomach
Fact is that the British Army were originally sent in to NI to protect the Catholics from the excessess of the Protestants(and that did include the RUC) and were welcomed with open arms being seen as more neutral in the various disputes.
This did not suit individuals on both sides and the whole thing was badly mismanaged by the UK government resulting in serious incidents that were a godsend to the propagandists and terrorist recruiters.
UK politicians really did not understand the scale of how the loyalists were supressing Catholics and took only one side of the ‘debate’ and so were seriously ill-informed.
it is also good to remember that the Unionist parties had an influence over the Conservatives during the 80’s because of the seats they had in Parlament.
not thqat they have any sway anymore, really.
Er, the Conservatives had a comfortable majority in the Commons throughout the 1980s. Their tendency to side with the Unionists had more to do with disapproval of the IRA bombing campaigns on the mainland. Older Tory sympathies with Unionism also played a part.
The Major Government was almost entirely dependent on Unionist votes from about 1994 to 1997, after losing a few by-elections and withdrawing the whip from the Maastricht rebels, but even that didn’t stop Mayhew starting the direct negotiations with the IRA which ultimately led to the GFA.
The official name of the Tory party was at one time The Conservative and Unionist Party, and although their web site doesn’t use that title any more, you’ll still see it over the door of many Conservative Clubs.
Both UK government parties relied on support from “independent” politicians throughout the 1970s, when the troubles really started kicking off, and that’s one reason why this situation became mired in quicksand from the start.
Although the Conservatives held an unassailable majority throughout the '80s, I’m reminded of a comment that was attributed to Margaret Thatcher in the BBC’s recent documentary series Endgame in Ireland. Apparently when she was first shown a map of Northern Ireland her response was “I don’t like the shape of that border - it’ll be hard to police. Could we not make it a straight line?”
Yes, there was a brief period in the late 1970s, by which time the ‘Troubles’ were already well under way, when the Conversative opposition benefitted from the fact that the Unionists saw tactical advantages in voting against the incumbant Labour government. That however is not what TwistofFate, who ought to know better, claimed. The statement that ‘the Unionist parties had an influence over the Conservatives during the 80’s because of the seats they had in Parlament’ is just the sort of sloppy, half-remembered nonsense that we are all here to discourage.
