The results are all in and Sinn Fein had a good day and Unionism a very bad day in terms of seats. Now I wonder are we any closer to getting parity of esteem. Will the Union Jack and the Ulster flag be flown outside our houses for 3 months of the year? Will the Tricolour be flown in Enniskillen Townhall and all other townhalls? Can we have our native language –the Irish language –respected and recognised in an Acht na Gaeilge? Will the nationalist people be mocked and treated with contempt by Unionist politicians as we were when we went to meet members of the Fermanagh and Omagh District council about Brexit? The DUP stood outside the door and the Ulster unionists came in to sneer and insult. I think it all now comes down to leadership -in particular the leadership shown by the DUP.
The results have shown that the DUP led by Arlene failed to pursue the GFA and showed great disrespect to the nationalist/republican community for whom the Irish language is very important. The UUP, at a local level anyhow, were no better. They also showed total disrespect over the Brexit vote.
The Catholic bishops must be most unhappy with the result of the election. After all they were urging Catholics to vote for the DUP. It does not look like too many Catholics paid any heed to them. Have the Catholic bishops learned nothing? When they should have been calling for parity of esteem and respect for all in government they were encouraging people to vote DUP! It’s no wonder the Irish Catholic Church is in the mess that it is in.
“Will the Union Jack and the Ulster flag be flown outside our houses for 3 months of the year?”
That’s entirely up to you, Joe. You can fly whatever legal flags you want.
“Will the Tricolour be flown in Enniskillen Townhall and all other townhalls?”
I wouldn’t have thought so (and, by the way it’s ‘town hall’: two words).
“Can we have our native language –the Irish language –respected and recognised in an Acht na Gaeilge?”
That remains to be seen. It will depend on the outcome of negotiations.
“Will the nationalist people be mocked and treated with contempt by Unionist politicians as we were when we went to meet members of the Fermanagh and Omagh District council about Brexit?”
That probably depends on what you do, what you say and how you behave, and whether or not it is deserving of mockery.
“The Catholic bishops must be most unhappy with the result of the election. After all they were urging Catholics to vote for the DUP.”
When was this?
“It does not look like too many Catholics paid any heed to them.”
How do you know?
When did the Catholic bishops ask Catholics to vote DUP?
“When did the Catholic bishops ask Catholics to vote DUP?”
They didn’t, Dominic.
Joe must be dizzy then with all that spinning he does on behalf of SF dressed up as principled thinking.
In the Irish Catholic monthly newspaper alive the dups were being pushed as the party of choice for hardline Catholics. The Catholic Church have been anti Irish language throughout history.
The dups must learn to respect the nationalist and republican people.
I would argue that their unequivocal stance on abortion is recommended as a choice which is not the same thing as endorsement of the party. The Catholic church is not in the business of politics or using culture for political ends. It’s business is preaching the gospel. The DUP must learn to respect all views.
“The Catholic church is not in the business of politics or using culture for political ends”
It isn’t?
Did the pope not make a political decision to cover up the child abuse in Ireland.
Politics in Ireland was shaped very much by the Catholic church and the problems that caused are still to be addressed.
The Catholic church did get involved in politics and did tell parishioners not to vote Sinn Fein for different reasons over the years, including on abortion where they applauded the DUPs intransigent stance on it.
That puts the Catholic church in the realms of dinosaur thinking in Ireland and part of the problem in my view.
It is why I believe Church of Ireland will replace the Catholic church as Irelands primary religion.
The DUP are being punished for their intransigence, the Catholic church will be also.
Numbers are dropping and if post brexit our polish community leave, the numbers will go through the floor.
They talk about the past when it suits them and take a hard line on abortion, but then you see unmarked graves filled with the remains of 800 bodies of children from foetal up to 2 years old and you see the rank hypocrisy of the Catholic church on all its festering glory.
“The DUP must learn to respect all views.”
The Catholic church must learn to respect all views also Dominic.
I’m not going to defend the indefensible with regard to child abuse, and those responsible for cover ups should hang their heads in shame. I often wonder what the Catholics intellectuals were doing during this awful period in our history.
The relationship between SF and the Catholic Church can best be characterised in the debate between Gerry Adams and Cahal Daley with regard to violence and Daley had a responsibility to warn people about the danger to their souls by getting involved with violence. There were also priests sympathetic to the Republican cause even to the extent helping the provos. The majority,however, tried to get on with preaching the gospel in difficult circumstances.
The issue of abortion is a human rights issue and the DUP are right to oppose it. It’s a pity they can’t flexible about other issues that are important to people here.
more of a mind your own business issue than a human rights issue ie.abortion.
Are you saying an unborn child should have no human rights?
You have to speak up for those who can’t speak up for themselves billy.
The bishops not long ago had their secratary Fr Tim Bartlett attendind the DUP dinner and appearing on the platform at their party conference.
What does that prove. Jesus ate with sinners.
And then he was crucified. Just like Unionism in this election!
But he rose again in three days, not weeks, will SF perform a miracle like that for Arlene?
No. Because, and I hate to be the bearer of bad news. That whole Jesus resurrection story is a fairy tale.
So just like Jesus not rising from the dead, neither will Unionism. They will remain crucified. I mean, look at their leaders 🙂
If you truly believe that then you are *****
Jessica – you should know by now – name-calling is out. If you’re going to call someone a particular name, argue the case for so labelling them. – Jude
Joe, you can be assured that unionists, wounded or not, will never ‘give’ anything to their neighbours, any parity will have to be fought and negotiated for.
It is just not in the DNA to have any generosity of spirit. Their bible doesn’t include ‘Love thy neighbour’!
In this new era of openness and transparency, I would like to post this for the benefit of MT and say that as far as a UK passport is concerned he was correct.
From HMPO
Dual nationality means holding a passport of more than one country at one time.
HMPO does not amend your British (sic) passport to show dual nationality and has no rules to prevent you from holding a British (sic) passport at the same time as a passport for another country.
I am still awaiting an answer from Baile Átha Cliath.
“It’s no wonder the Irish Catholic Church is in the mess that it is in.”
I very much doubt that the Irish Catholic Church would be in a mess due to any particular political outlook it may or may not have at any given time. It is more like that a Church would be in a mess if it forgot that its main business was God and the eternal destiny of its parishioners.
And another thing.
Why would anyone write the word ‘Equality’ on the fingers of a closed fist?
Good point PF, nothing more closed than than a fist.
Unionism.
I suppose it’s simply for reasons of design, PF.Eight letter on eight fingers.It wouldn’t scan otherwise , I suppose.It’s a bit like that “love”/”hate” thing that people sometmies get tattooed on their fingers to their eventual regret
Fr Joe
I note other posters have asked you to provide the evidence that Catholic bishops urged their flocks to vote for the D U P in the recent election.It appears that this far you are unable to provide us with such evidence.It’s appreciated that you may not be the biggest fan of the Catholic hierarchy,but is it not reckless to make such an assertion without supporting proof?Maybe your loyalty to Sinn Fein takes precedence over anything else!
It will be interesting to see how the Summer goes. My guess is more flegs, bigger flegs and louder assertions that ‘the Union is safe!’ as the loyal sons of Ulster march ever closer towards their final curtain. Therein lies the tragic dichotomy that exists at the heart of Ulster Unionism, where its ‘strength’ will ultimately prove to be its greatest weakness. ‘The green reed which bends in the wind is stronger than the mighty oak which breaks in a storm’ as the fella said.
The redoubtable Am Ghobsmacht is always very good on this aspect of the Unionist psyche, I would be interested to hear his take on where he thinks Unionism will go from here.
Funnily enough RJC I used the tree-storm analogy myself only I replaced the word ‘mighty’ with ‘bonsai’ (it was in the context of the DUP so I couldn’t denigrate so fine a tree).
I’m afraid RJC my thoughts are blinded by hope, like an impoverished person looking for good omen in any change of weather or suchlike.
Unionism’s main problem (at grassroots) is the inability to tell the difference between change and ‘demands’.
The original Home Rule act was very reasonable, but was bogey-ised, so they got something ‘worse’ (from their perspective). Same with NICRA. As soon as someone asks them ‘whatabout this’ then the heels dig in.
I constantly have people on Slugger spitting the word republican at me (although the name and avatar don’t help) as they see my suggestions for change as ‘appeasement’.
That being said, there are some shoots of hope, some very, very big ‘U’ types including an overt DUP supporter wish to see the DUP tone down their British nationalism and another few support the idea of an ILA of sorts.
I’m going to publish my own proposal on a ILA soon over on Slugger, alas, I think the irony will be that some nationalists will see it as some sort of ‘appeasement’….
My own recommendations would be for the UUP to push their ex-military people to the fore and drop the nice guy attitude but go for a moral high ground; no poppy abuse, no fleg abuse, no tolerance of extreme behaviour from band parades and be harsh with it.
Unionists like stern leaders, not ‘nice’ people, otherwise the Greens would clean up the Belfast Lough area (both literally and figuratively).
It would haemorrhage votes for the first 10 years as people get used to the new dynamic but a decade of staying the path of moral high ground would earn them respect. Mike TV tried to ride too many horses.
I’m not insensitive to the nationalist feelings towards the British military but from that party’s point of view they need to do something and nationalists aren’t exactly a key market for them. (Sorry).
That being said, if they did field ex forces people then they might have the moral authority to demand justice for what happened here, for it really needs to be examined (Anne Watchamacaller’s book should be compulsory reading for every 16 year old state school pupil).
I would rather see all of the parties rally to the middle ground and marginalise the anti gfa and pro brexit parties
As for justice, a good starting place would be with the truth and an end to the British state veto on national security
This parity of esteem notion will be dropped as soon as people start using it to demand equal rights and recognition for those in the middle ground who want nothing to do with either Irish or British nationalism.
There are those who just want to get on with their lives and are happy to be Northern Irish or simply Irish in the UK or simply ‘status quo-ers, right let’s go to the pub’.
The existence of this third wheel drives people from the other two extremes into hysterics and they’ll do everything they can to discredit them by tarring them with the same brush as ‘themuns’ (i.e. ‘you’re either with us or against us’) or by desperately trying to digitise an evidently analogue and nuanced status; “waaahhhh! You’re either pro or anti partition! wahhhh! you may not choose any other stance! How dare you exist!!! Wahhhh!!!!”
Till such times as this axis is acknowledged I will take such yearnings for parity of esteem with enough salt to kill a camel.
The DUP and indeed everybody else must learn to respect all views.
Parity of esteem applies to all and I think it is time we all changed to acknowledge the fundamental shift there has been to demand respectful politics here.
Some of us will need to change more than others and I include myself in this.
But where do you stand on the economy AG?
What if remaining in the UK will mean a hard border and cost jobs and real hardship for all of our people regardless their position on the status quo.
Do we still bury our heads in the sand?
Economically a UI makes sense. I’ve never denied that (I’ve went to Dublin for employment myself on 2 occasions as there was nothing doing up north).
The question then is why is a UI still so unconvincing to so many people? The lazy answer is ‘ unionist bigotry’ and the real answer is much more nuanced.
Northern unionists have made the union repulsive at nearly every opportunity and ditto with northern republicans and a UI.
The first group to sort this issue ‘wins’ (that’s why I celebrated the election result, the big ‘U’ unionists need to see that their approach is wrong, I hope that they get an even bigger kicking in the next election to disavow any fool notions of a ‘rebound’. ‘Old unionism’ must die.)
And if a hard border proves to be the death of NI I’ll spend the rest of my mobile life reminding former big ‘U’ unionists of it, I won’t rest till they take out a contract on my head.
I agree completely and I now see that is why Sinn Fein have spent 10 years reaching out to unionists and trying to build bridges,
I didn’t agree with the GFA, I didn’t agree with the IRA disbandment, I lost faith in Sinn Fein when they allowed the DUP to walk all over them and the british state to be so blatant in their disregard for what their state forces did here.
But then I have always been years behind Sinn Fein, but eventually it clicks with me and after this election it has once again.
I agree that we will not convince unionists to feel comfortable within a united Ireland by calling them bigots with a sweeping brush which I have done many times.
I was wrong and I acknowledged that in my last blog which Jude kindly posted.
The reality is, Sinn Fein are no longer a polarised view, they are the middle ground. The two extremes are now the DUP/TUV and continuity republicans who still refuse to accept the GFA. The DUP even refuse to accept the amended agreements they negotiated to make it more acceptable, and basically came clean that they never intended to honour them in the first place. How can a party like that be in power?
I agree with you that a UI makes economic sense and it is up to republicans to make a UI more attractive to as many unionists as possible and to marginalise the DUP/TUV and continuity republicans as much as possible.
I will go further and apologise for all the negative comments I have made against unionists in general and acknowledge that the negative views espoused by the DUP/TUV are not the majority view within unionism as a whole.
The worst thing we can do is refuse to acknowledge and accept responsibility for our mistakes.
http://m.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland-assembly-election/arlene-foster-faces-revolt-as-third-of-dup-mlas-want-her-to-step-aside-and-save-institutions-35504549.html
You still haven’t provided evidence for your accusation against the Catholic bishops Joe?