Yesterday in Derry was a day of handshakes. Michelle O’Neill leaned across several people in the Long Tower chapel (nobody in Derry talks about the ‘Long Tower Church’) to shake Arlene Foster’s hand. Gerry Adams shook hands with Michael D Higgins, and then led him and Bill Clinton across the front of the chapel to shake hands with Martin McGuinness’s widow Bernie and their four children.
I shook a number of hands myself. I shook hands with Padraig from Dublin, who told me he took a day off work and borrowed the petrol money to come up; I shook hands with Craig from Australia, now living in Sligo. And after the ceremony with Todd from New Jersey, who’d made the trip and was going home today. I shook hands with Rosaleen and her sister, up from Ederney. And at the Bus Centre in the evening, with Joe, another Dublin man who’d made the journey.
And so many more. With Denis Bradley, who later yesterday on The View would deliver a blistering attack on Gregory Campbell for his insistence on personalising the hurt of so many victims and pinning it on Martin McGuinness, even when he couldn’t have been responsible. With Father Joe McVeigh, a constant contributor to this site. With Father Des Wlson, who has dedicated a long life to the people of West Belfast.
And as they came out of the chapel, I shook hands with Alex Salmond, thanked him for coming and told him he was doing a great job. I shook hands with Peter Robinson and thanked him for coming; and I even shook hands with Arlene Foster and thanked her for coming. (Side note: I have many criticisms of Arlene but I could never fault her on her natural smiling friendliness. I don’t expect many people to believe that but it happens to be true.)
The funeral Mass was tear-inducing: we were inside, up on the balcony, waiting for at least two hours, when finally the sound of a piper could be heard, and shortly after Martin McGuinness’ coffin entered the chapel, covered in the Irish tricolour. It was moving when the officiating priest borrowed the epitaph of the great architect Christopher Wren: ‘Reader, if you seek his memorial, look around you’. it was moving when Bill Clinton, a masterly speaker, gave the compressed eulogy that Martin McGuinness could have given himself: “I fought, I made peace, I made politics. Now finish the job.”
Much has been made of Arlene Foster attending the requiem Mass. She did indeed receive warm and spontaneous applause when she entered. And hundreds, thousands of people were thankful that she came. That said, Susan McKay’s words on The View last night made another point that needed to be made: “It would have been outrageous if she hadn’t come.” While I was genuinely grateful that she attended, there should never have been a scintilla of doubt about her coming. Had it been, God forbid, Arlene’s funeral, no one would have needed to wonder if Martin McGuinness would attend.
One of the last people I shook hands with was the muralist Danny Devenny. Full of energy and even rejoicing, he said “Ah well, he’s up there now.” I was trying to absorb the surprise of Danny’s faith in the afterlife when he added: “With Tone and Emmett and the rest of them. People will know his name and who he was hundreds of years from now.”
It was glorious weather all day. And mingling with the air was the warmth and affection of ordinary people there, from the Bogside, from Derry, from Ireland, from around the world. The ‘respectable’ world, which forty years ago would have vilified him, had made their peace and were out in force to pay their respects. The people of Derry and Ireland and beyond were out too, to show their pride in and love for him.
It was a day of handshakes and grief and hope. Like Joe Hill, Martin McGuinness will never die.
Well said Jude.
Thank you, M
Thank you for this Jude. I watched the funeral on RTE News channel. I am still feeling sad. The songs and music upon entering the church and exiting was very moving.
That it was not televised by BBC or UTV is a disgrace. It spells out to me very clearly how the establishment still regard the Nationalist/Republican people with utter distdain.
George Best?
Indeed, Angela, indeed. Although I thought RTÉ, Channel 4 and BBC London did a decent job…
disdain sorry
Angela, I live in Scotland where we have concerns about political bias in the national broadcaster. In fairness to it , however, I watched the funeral on a live BBC stream. Jude’s piece captures well what I sensed was the ambience of the occasion. RTE ‘s DRIVETIME later reported that Arlene Foster got polite but cool welcome. That’s not what I saw and heard.
Thank you John
The coverage was almost secretive. No publicity before except for a Mention on some radio channels. That BBc only streamed it was excluding a large number of older viewers who are not computor literate.( I also noted that the quality was piss poor)
Compare this with the wall to wall screening of GBs’ funeral together with large screens etc erected over the north for the occasion.
As to RTE s bias of reporters well I never expect anything less of them.
Btw Good luck Scotland…wait til the barrage of fake news and political promises start again as in the last referendum.
It was indeed Jude a sad,poignant, and emotionally moving funeral occasion yesterday. I attended and met Martin’s brother, Declan, who was in my year at St Columbs and whom I had not seen since 1974. And again, as with Martin, Declan was warm, charming and genuinely glad to see me. I thought all the speeches, orations and eulogies were fitting and measured, and tinged with a genuine and natural warmth and affection for Martin. And as I said to his wife Bernie before I left….” Martin was a good man, a very good man, no matter what his detractors may say, and he will be seen in time to have been a great man “.
Jude, could to tell me what real contribution or enlightenment anyone gets from Professor Deirdre Keenan? She’s a fixture as a commentator on BBC but I find her the queen of cliched thinking. This was especially obvious last night when her companion commentator was Susan Mc Kay. And I relished seeing Dennis Bradley getting rattled last night. Gregory has long had that effect on me. I usually turn off the radio/television when he’s on to cut down on the number of sins of frustration/anger I’ll have to atone for eventually…..
Well, Nuala, Deirdre has very nice curly hair, for one thing. And she’s a prof, for another. I didn’t think Denis was rattled so much as mad as a rattle-snake. He’s usually very even but last night I thought he was going to take a swing at Gregory. I think we need more forthright talking like his. I also agree with a poster here (maybe somewhere else, not sure) who said that BBC radio this morning talked to the victims’ commissioner as though all the victims were those who suffered at the hands of the IRA. Nobody should deny what the IRA did; equally nobody should forget what the nationalist population had done to them, before as well s during the Troubles. It’s only when we get a complete history, not an amputated or sliced-down-the-middle one, that real progress can happen.
The hand shake with Alex Salmond, Esteemed Blogmeister, was particularly apt: a Donegal-born scribe in the city of another Donegal-born scribe, pressing the flesh with a Great Scot upon whose great country Colmcille left a not unremarkable mark.
Meanwhile, in other media outlets:
THE TIMES and TONES of TOMM.ie G
The ochone tones of Tomm.ie G of RTE
Are right well known to we: you, me ‘n he
Soft as shalimar
As an air guitar
To tip-toeing through the tulips Tomm.ie.
No hint yesterday of the Big Stick which he had wielded earlier in the week: yesterday he was all Speak Softly in a rare, heartfelt Teddy ‘Bear’ Roosevelt kinda way.
Re-spect.
So, the Big Stick was left back in the RTE Studio, then?
Well, actually, no.
Somebody else did in fact manage to pick up the Big Stick: or rather, took the small baton, under which guise the BS was cunningly camouflaged:
“Martin McGuinness was not a terrorist. Martin McGuinness was a freedom fighter,” he said at the graveside to cheers and applause.
-The young and old – gunman to statesman – both the same, according to Adams. Others wouldn’t agree.
Thus penned Miriam Lord, a Lady of the Language, in The Unionist Times today.
The relay team of said Times and RTE hasn’t gone away, you know.
‘A life well lived’ seems an odd choice of words for a man who was responsible for the deaths of a number of others some of them non combatants.
Certainly I think, the latter part of his life was well lived in that he worked hard to move things forward and to reconcile our divided society.
But let us not gloss over the things he did and the lives that could not be well lived because McGuinness was responsible for ending them.
I agree – no glossing over of anything. I’m assuming from your tone (have I asked this before?) that you’re a pacifist. As GA said, Martin McGuinness didn’t go to war – war came to him, in his city, in his street. Civil rights marchers attacked, friends shot dead by the British army. Maybe you remember Paul McCartney’s question in the (banned) ‘Give Ireland Back To The Irish’: ‘Tell Me How Would You Like It/ If On Your Way To Work/ You Were Stopped By Irish soldiers/ Would You Lie Down Do Nothing/ Would you give in or go berserk?’ We all know what the answer would be for English people in those circumstances, and they’d be lauded for it. In fact, they’re lauded when they go half-way round the world and tell some other natives what to do and where they can go. So again – are you a pacifist? If you are, I salute your consistency. If you’re not, it’s time you stopped seeing the conflict here as the bad IRA and the good British soldiers and unionist people. It’s a bigger picture than that and frankly I’m tired of partial analyses
Jude
Whether I am a pacifist or not is irrelevant.
My point is that a life well lived as you describe it included the taking of other lives.
So were those parts well lived too?
When did I ever (give me one instance) portray the conflict as bad IRA and good British/Unionist? That is a complete misrepresentation of my views and you should withdraw it or back it up.
Check your last comment, gio. You say we mustn’t forget McGuinness’s past of violence. I make the point that this is to ignore the circumstances which drove McG and so many others to take up a violent opposition to violence. You are clearly aware of McG’s violence but I don’t remember you being nearly as eloquent on its root causes. Or have I missed those contributions? As I say: partial analyses – had enough of them. To the back teeth.
Jude
You will notice in my comment I acknowledged the positive contribution McGuinness made in later years, so my analysis is hardly partial, unlike some of the rather partial comments here recently which you did not challenge.
So do you include his deeds in the IRA as part of a well lived life?
It was your choice of words after all so I am just trying to explore that a bit.
“When did I ever (give me one instance) portray the conflict as bad IRA and good British/Unionist? That is a complete misrepresentation of my views and you should withdraw it or back it up”
All the time, you are doing it now.
Why are you not campaigning on other sites to call on all british soldiers who murdered in Iraq, Afghanistan and other parts of the world to come forward with the details of the tens of thousands of people the british forces murdered?
Are you just a keen to learn the names and circumstances of each of those deaths gio?
Or is it because they were Muslims in a far away land you don’t really care?
How many families were torn apart?
How many children’s lives blown to pieces?
Those conflicts make our own look tame, should we bring every british soldier who fired a weapon to come forward and publically let us know the circumstances?
Should every soldier who sent a missile which destroyed schools or hospitals and so many innocent lives in them, stand public trial and face the same scrutiny you apply so selectively gio?
Thanks to Martin, the new divide will not be orange and green, but those willing to live together as Irish people in peace with one another and those who unable or unwilling to do so such as Gregory Campbell and that is the camp you are in gio.
People like you are a greater part of the problem here than you even realise.
You should be pitied, not taken seriously
The speed with which the whataboutery comes out is telling.
The subject under discussion is the life of Martin McGuinness, not the British army not Harry Truman, not Cromwell or anybody else.
Try to focus (and maybe drop the personal stuff too!)
Whether you like it or not gio, the British army played a significant role in shaping Martins path in his early years.
As has been explained to you over and over again, to have true understanding, you cannot simply scrutinize what so many people did without the same scrutiny as to why so many did.
It is disgraceful that we have yet to scrutinize the unionist and british side of our conflicts as was acknowledged by president Higgins, so if you want to discuss the rights and wrongs of what happened, then we must first understand fully the why those things happened.
That is what needs to happen now as well as british acknowledgement of their true role in the conflict. The two cannot be seperated
I don’t know if you heard Talkback today but the interesting concept of ‘corporate guilt’ came up. All the deaths etc were laid at MMcG’s door. He seemed willing to accept corporate responsibility. Is the English King in waiting corporately responsible for the work of his paratroopers in Derry? Are all the RUC men corporately responsible for the one who opened fire in the Sinn Féin office? Is the English Queen ultimately responsible for all the atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan? Was the grubby early life of the Butcher Churchill spread out to be picked over when he had his state funeral?
fiosrach
Determining where responsibility lies is not straightforward, I agree.
I tend to put primary responsibility on the person who chooses to pick up a gun and pull the trigger, but those who give the orders are of course also responsible.
I am sure no-one would deny that McGuinness gave such orders, possibly pulled the trigger too.
So I am just wondering if those particular events were ‘well lived’ or not?
It is possible that not all his life was well lived. What do you think?
There you go again, gio. Selective moral umbrage.
To an impartial observer or at least someone trying to be impartial this would be obvious.
So you hold the british soldiers who pulled the trigger killing men women and children in Iraq more responsible than those who decided to train them, arm them and ship them over to those shores to pull the trigger in the first place?
I would not agree with that either.
Many things are possible, some of them distasteful if your mind is in the gutter.
Unfortunately too many gutter minds are given more coverage to spread their vile message across the media and unfortunately where enough mud is thrown, some of it sticks.
As I said, there is a new divide no longer orange and green but those who accept we are a post conflict society who choose to make peace and those who deny the conflict and cling on to the old divisions like a contaminated safety blanket unaware even of the poison it spreads.
Regardless of what Gregory Campbell and even Jim Allister have said in recent days – it was a very fitting tribute that dignitaries from across the world held Martin McGuinness in such high esteem and made the journey to his native Derry to pay their final wishes and respect. Maybe I am religiously naïve – but do both of these men not deem themselves Christians? Where’s the not judging element? Where’s the peace and reconciliation element?
I have little time for Arlene Foster, but I respect her decision to attend the funeral of Martin McGuinness along with a number of colleagues. I am sure this will not go down well within some strands of unionism / loyalism but it’s about time a leader within Unionism stood out from behind the hedges.
Some leaders forget that they are leaders because of the support of their members/voters. Move too far away from the party line and you will soon find yourself an ex leader. This is the same the world over. Think Mike Nesbitt, John Hume, Ian Paisley. If you can’t bring the supporters with you what do you do?
‘It’s only when we get a complete history, not an amputated or sliced-down-the-middle one, that real progress can happen.’
Indeed, and when we get that full history, people will wonder how on earth far more did not make the same decision Martin McGuinness and countless others made in joining the IRA.
We are not all blessed with the same courage that Martin had in spades Alex
Jude,I was there too and for me the image I will carry for the rest of my life is that of Christy Moore singing “the time has come” while a noticably devastated Gerry,Mary Lou and Michele look on.Their sense of loss is palpable and the image can be seen on “upper crotlieve SF” twitter account.Maybe you could post the image on here as I am not computer literate enough to do so?
I was very proud to have been at Martin Mc Guiness’s funeral yesterday, although, unlike Jude was outside to witness the huge crowd and the first sight of his flag draped coffin brought a tear to my eye. Gio, I have one question for you, “Is it ever morally justified to kill another person?”.
Bridget
That is a bigger question.
I do think if I had killed another person particularly one who was not trying to kill me I would not be able to look back and consider my life well lived.
That is why I wanted Jude to expand on that a bit but I know it is a waste of time.
Any discussion of such things quickly falls apart in whataboutery.
I wonder did McGuinness consider his life well lived. I suppose we will never know.
Glad you made it, Jude ,injured peg notwithstanding.On television it was mostly sidelined to the events happening on the streets of London.I think on some news bulletins it came in at third news story….but then we don’t really count in Norneverland. I can still remember Churchill’s funeral on black and white television in the 1960s, as I think fiosrach mentioned somewhere and there was no mention of his wartime antics as a young man . No mention of Gallipoli or his opposition to Home Rule for India. There was a huge state funeral , which seemed to go on all day, live on television with horse -drawn carriages and the like .It’s not as if he was that generously loved by one and all either or that he hadn’t spent many years in the political wilderness in an alcoholic haze.
You’d imagine that one of our very own Joint First Ministers would have been worthy of a little more media attention, but then again, I’m sure no one is too surprised at the media’s general response and tone. I’ve said before… where are the stories of Martin McGuinness’s murders? Who did he murder exactly and when? Many reporters snidely talk about it and show a picture of him with a pistol. …but there’s also a picture of Peter Robinson with a rifle , surely. How many Prime Ministers have been blamed for any murders anywhere in this past fifty , sixty, seventy years? Who did Margaret Thatcher order to be killed ? Who did Tony Blair order to be killed? I know a lot of people died when they were in control of events.Where exactly should we ask the the buck to stop?Didn’t Thatcher order the sinking of the Belgrano?
When Susan McKay had the temerity to reference the DUP’s sordid contacts with assorted loyalist paramilitaries, she was quickly sidelined by Carruthers. I mean you’d think that there had never been proven collusion between UVF killers and the benighted RUC and UDR. Sure numerous enquiries have shown that. If that’s not terrorism I don’t know what is; the state forces murdering their citizens. The partial reporting has been very frustrating.
The demands of the civil rights movement were met in 1972, including power sharing. Marty presided over 3 further decades of murder and mayhem. (there is some context for you).
Queenie continues to preside over murder and mayhem still. How’s that for context. Of course if it’s in somebody else’s country it doesn’t count especially if they are tinted persons.
And what? Why weren’t the demands of the NICRA met in 1967 when they were established? Why were they established seeing you are referring to context? (yet providing an inaccurate one) – Basic, civil and equal rights, free from fear and discrimination – In actual fact, why weren’t equal rights for Catholics / Nationalists afforded at the onset of the state?
In regards context – By 1972, the Troubles were in full flow, in fact it was the bloodiest year of the conflict – Allied to that you had numerous Catholics murdered by the Army and RUC pre 1972, interment had occurred, Ballymurphy had occurred, Falls Road Curfew, Bloody Sunday had occurred – there’s context for you! Too little, too late! The British and the unionist hierarchy created the PIRA – the created and laid the foundations for a prolonged and protracted future of conflict!
That’s about it TH .The genie was well out of the bottle by 1972 and it was completely out of control by then..I lived and worked in Belfast through late 1971 and 1972 and it wasa truly horrific time . Internment without trial was instigated and the way the arrests were carried out, and the abuse of those arrested, led to mass protests and a sharp increase in violence. Amid the violence, about 7,000 people fled or were forced out of their homes. That’s a lot of displacement and bad vibes just to get started….It is really little wonder that people kicked back.it simply grew and kept on growing ..I suppose it helps to understand how things happened if you lived through the events as they grew organically from one thing to the next..I’m not always sure which contributors have done that and there’s no real way of telling unless they tell their own stories.
‘Equal rights’ – the former prime minister Basil Brooke said Stormont was ‘a Protestant parliament for a Protestant people’.
They told us we lived in a democracy where the majority ruled ‘and we Protestants are the majority’!
And JB – context again – power sharing – remind me who brought Northern Ireland to a standstill after Sunningdale? In case you don’t know – the Ulster Workers Council strike – the combined loyalist groupings who opposed power sharing with Irish Nationalists who subsequently succeeded in bringing down the power-sharing Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive.
“The demands of the civil rights movement were met in 1972, including power sharing. Marty presided over 3 further decades of murder and mayhem. (there is some context for you).”
Doesn’t matter JB, the conflict had already well and truly started in 1972 and the british state was a fully involved driving force in the cycle of violence of that time.
It should have ended with the ceasefires in 1975 but Nairac and his glenanne gang wanted to escalate the conflict to bring the sas into it, which they succeeded in doing via the reavey killings and the kingsmill massacre.
It was unionists who started the conflict and the british army who entrenched it in the early 70s.
You have a very selective memory / ignorance. You forget the IRA border campaign. In the interests of context, you forget that Northern Ireland was created (by treaty with the Free State….Ireland created NI just as much as the mainland did) to avoid conflict….if Ulster Volunteers had entered the Irish civil war, they would have won what would have been an open sectarian war. McGuinness and his other terrorists friends tried to create just that; they failed. Marty’s day came when the British establishment tried to put lipstick on a pig….now his day is over.
Kingsmill by the army? I suppose Enniskillen was too? You are deluded.
In the interests of balance (I think that is the new term for whataboutery?) you should really understand that the rest of Ireland is embarrassed by northern Shinners. I lived in Dublin for years and have hosted many sons and daughters of friends I met down there when they have studied in Belfast. Most of them arrive, misty eyed about the “cause” and by the end of their first term realise that they have ZERO in common with the bigots of the Republican movement and believe that partition was and is the only viable solution for a divided island.
Don’t ever forget: the provos killed more Irishmen than the British army ever did.
There would have been no provos to kill anyone had it not been for british misrule and the murders by british police and army that led to the conflict in the first place
Martins legacy is only just beginning.
Ireland has had many martyrs and many fenian dead.
Ireland unfree will never be at peace has been replaced and now Ireland unfree can have peace, we have been shown how to fight for our freedom using a new arsenal, one which will not fill our graveyards and hospitals, but also one which will be more difficult to wield, its tools will be patience, forgiveness and reaching out the hand of friendship while at the same time standing firm against division and misrule.
It is time for a better Ireland and it will only be better together.
It is now up to Britain to support us achieve this and to build bridges between our nations also.
The gauntlet of peace has been thrown.
Ireland has never been united and never will be. This “nation once again” nonsense is just pie in the sky.
That will be for the people of Ireland to decide, no one else
yep. Contrary to everything the provos stood for.
There was that British rule thingy…
high moral ground there Gio, alas no surprises…………..
Bridget
Killing someone, I imagine, would be the most significant thing a person could do in their life.
To me it would require a lifetime atoning for robbing someone else of their life.
You think that is the high moral ground? I think it is a fairly basic moral ground.
Feel free to contradict me.
Was his life well lived in your view?
‘He who is without sin, let him cast the first stone’!
Sherdy
I have never killed anyone or ordered the killing of anyone.
Does that entitle me to cast a stone?
“I have never killed anyone or ordered the killing of anyone. Does that entitle me to cast a stone?”
I don’t know if you are a Christian gio, but you fail completely to understand the meaning behind those words.
Perhaps you should focus more on your own soul and less on judging the souls of others.
jessica
Jude made the judgement when he referred to a life well lived.
Do you agree with that description?
Were McGuinness’s deeds as an IRA commander well lived or would it have been a life better lived if he had not done those things?
It is not a slur as you suggest below, to examine the reality of his life rather than try to gloss over it.
How do we define a life well lived gio?
If it is by the love we receive from friends and family, Martin was a rich man.
If it is by the sorrow felt on our passing, very few deaths impact so many or are met with such sorrow.
If it is in how we will be missed, what I fear the most, is that without Martin we are in a worse place and have lost a champion, a true Irish leader and a very good person.
Whether he would have achieved so much without having first had the colourful past you choose to focus on, I don’t know but I doubt it.
But I care not for such malicious speculation.
We have lost someone special who many people are very proud off among friends and foes alike and those are the facts which will endure long after the detractors contaminate this world no more.
So just for the sake of clarity Gio, are you a pacifist or not?
To answer your last question; I certainly believe Martins was a life well lived. He had the courage to fight against oppression, discrimination and injustice and he had the courage and force of character to help bring it to an end too. He was able to help bring about a situation whereby catholics/nationalists would no longer be treated like the 2nd class citizens they once were and the fight for Irish reunification could happen via politics. In my opinion he will rightfully take his place in the pantheon of true Irish greats. When you take that into account along with the fact that he was very happy in his family life then I’d say that his was indeed a life well lived.
Is it your belief that someone can’t have lived their life well if they had killed someone?
Patrick
I don’t suppose I am a pacifist in the strictest sense no, although I don’t see how that matters.
You focus on what you see as the positive things McGuinness did and I agree there was much to admire in his political life.
But as the leader of the IRA in Derry he was involved in terrible things,most likely directing them, you must accept that.
I presume you think the lives he was responsible for ending are not significant enough to outweigh his own well lived life.
I cannot see it that way.
Certainly someone could live the rest of their life well, but the act of taking a life would surely be an overwhelming thing above all.
It is not necessary to decide that Martin McGuinness was either a great man or an evil man.
I think we like to simplify peoples lives in such a way so we can make sense of the world.
But we can say he did some good and he also did some terrible things.
To call it a well lived life is an insult to those who might have lived their own lives well (Joanne Mathers?) if it were not for him.
I am sorry he is gone, but we should have the courage to look at his life in full, the bad as well as the good.
There are war memorials all over this place for wars where millions of people were murdered.
Should we remove them do you think?
Wearing of the poppy symbolises honouring of those same murderers and is considered offensive to many over its one sidedness.
Should the BBC show some respect to its customers who are offended and ban people from wearing them on TV?
Michael Collins is one of my heroes, Martin McGuinness is right up there with him.
His legacy will be of the same calibre and there is nothing anyone can do to stop history remembering him as such.
Your efforts to slur his memory will only offend.
People who refuse to accept we were in a conflict which Martin helped to end, deserve no respect in this society or on this island.
It’s ironic: Michael Collins’ negotiations in the Anglo-Irish treaty led to the creation of Northern Ireland. He signed off on partition.
Marty negotiated the IRA’s surrender, accepted the principle of consent regarding the future of the province created by Michael Collins and was an enforcer of British law and governance in NI.
Your “heroes” are failures from a Republican perspective.
They put Ireland first above even their own lives which they dedicated to Ireland.
It is the love of this country which inspired them and what binds so many of us together.
They were loved and respected by millions in Ireland and beyond even among their enemies and I am proud to consider them my heroes.
Two countries, Jessica.
Ireland is one country Joe, that is a fact
NI is considered by some to be a province of the UK by others to be part of Ireland and part if Ulster
Regardless, Northern Ireland on its own is not a country and never will be
“Marty negotiated the IRA’s surrender, accepted the principle of consent regarding the future of the province created by Michael Collins and was an enforcer of British law and governance in NI.
Your “heroes” are failures from a Republican perspective.”
Then why all the hate and vitriol from your good self? Surely you should be happy that Marty negotiated this ‘surrender’ etc that you have mentioned above?
wolfie – I am glad that both were defeated and surrendered despite their aspirations.
Jessica – you are deluded. The “country” of Ireland is all in your head – read the terms of the GFA, or the (amended) constitution of the Republic of Ireland. Anyway, I though you were advocating an independent 9 county Ulster a few months ago?
The country of Ireland existed long before the GFA and will be around long after it is defunct which many believe it already is..
It should be up to the people of this island both home and away to decide both the future and the boundaries of Ireland.
“I don’t suppose I am a pacifist in the strictest sense no, although I don’t see how that matters.”
You see, Gio, it really does matter. A pacifist approach is an honourable refusal to accept that violence is appropriate under any circumstances. It is an approach that is worthy of respect. A pacifist is prepared to accept whatever the world throws at them without responding in a physically aggressive manner.
Most of us do not have the courage to be a pacifist.
Many of us, however, assume the mantle. We condemn violence, but not all violence. We argue that life is precious, but not under all circumstances. We choose to condemn one, but not another.
You suggested that Martin McGuinness chose to engage in armed conflict, when other options were open. This is true.
It is also true that every RUC man, UDR man and British soldier made that choice when they accepted the gun they were provided with. They also accepted the cloak of respectability offered by a state which authorised them to inflict violence, the salary, pension and protection from imprisonment when they ended someone’s life.
An easier choice than that made by Martin McGuinness.
When all is said and done, a pacifist sees no difference.
The rest of us are simply choosing a side.
Brian
So on the topic, do you agree with Jude that it was a life well lived?
All of it including what he did in the IRA. All well lived?
Thank you for your response Gio.
I’m more than happy to look back at all of Martins life. I’m as proud of him for his earlier life as an IRA leader as I am for his later involvement in playing a massively important role in building the peace. It was all the one Martin.
The attached article is well worth a read and I think articulates what so many of us think when we think of Martin and his life.
http://ourmaninstockholm.com/2017/03/21/there-was-only-ever-one-martin-mcguinness/
Patrick
Thank you for that.
You at least have answered my question.
The article talks about the reasons behind his choosing violence but does not go into any detail.
Everyone has a story. The child abuser who was raped as a child, the woman beaten by her husband who one day stabs him with a kitchen knife, the soldier who believes in what he is fighting for and so on.
It helps to explain but it does not diminish the hard fact that taking a life is a terrible thing.
I do not think that someone who has ended the lives of others should be described as having lived life well.
Clearly others disagree.
Gio, my question to you was in regards to the use of violence (killing) in order to further political ends, which I carefully used the word “moral”, This applies to conflicts in which the use of violence is often tragically the course taken, think wars, in which most countries of the world engage in from the beginning of time. You seem unable to think beyond the conflict in the north. As far as you being a pacifist or a part time pacifist, your comments here would suggest a deep seated anger and who knows where that would lead.
A question Gio, do you think soldiers in battle anywhere reflect on who they may have killed on any given day, after all that is what they are trained to do, kill that is……………
Bridget
Thanks for your reply though the personal stuff is not helpful.
I am trying not to get sidetracked as I really wanted to explore Jude’s claim of a life well lived for Martin McGuinness.
I am happy to discuss pacifism or conflict in general on some other occasion.
Do you think his life was well lived and if so do you include his deeds in the IRA’
If you had killed someone maybe several people could you at the end of your life consider it to have been a life well lived?
It is interesting how much effort is going into not answering the question.
It is a difficult question to answer, at so many levels, Gio.
You complain about personalising the discussion, yet it is difficult to see how much more personalised your question could be.
Your assumption that Martin McGuinness was personally responsible for killing someone is dubious, to say the least. You present no evidence for this, yet expect it to be taken as a given.
Should this question be asked of those mourning the passing of another person who had engaged in the conflict, say for example a member of the UDR or RUC (unionism is replete with living and deceased members of this faction), would you be as exercised?
This is a genuine question, Gio, please treat it as such.
The reason I ask that question is because I think it is central to our understanding of where we have come from.
For republicans, the six county state was not a legitimate entity. It naturally follows that it’s laws and armed elements were not legitimate either. When non republican nationalism attempted to bring about reform in a peaceful manner and were met with force, many began to share the view of republicans, i.e., the state did not discharge it’s obligation to it’s citizens in an even handed manner, it discriminated against and used force to oppress a large section of those who lived within its control, therefore it was not legitimate in the democratic sense. The state proved that it was prepared to kill citizens in order to enforce its illegitimate will (a brief perusal of CAIN will demonstrate this). Many young people responded with violence to this situation.
Were they right? A pacifist would say no. A partisan observer (like you and I) would say yes or no.
A unionist may say that the state was fine and violence is never justified. They would, of course, be referring to violence from the other side.
Was Martin McGuinness’ life well lived. I think so. He did more to bring about change in his lifetime than I ever will.
In the words of W.H. Auden;
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.
Brian
Thanks for the reply. I will try to answer your points.
My comment about personalising was in regard to Bridget’s notion that I am harbouring a ‘deep seated anger’
How does that have any bearing on whether my argument is sound or not?
As to what McGuinness did, you are right that I am making some assumptions, since he did not reveal the details.
I think my assumption was a reasonable one though. Do you not?
Or was he a pacifist IRA commander?
Regarding a UDR or RUC member I would ask exactly the same.
If they had deliberately taken a life, how in all honesty could they be described as having a life well lived?
It is insulting.
Now supposing I went out one night got drunk and killed someone, say a young woman, Mary, by reckless driving.
Say Mary had a family, a husband John and children.
Maybe John cannot cope and commits suicide.
The children get taken into care.
One of them is abused while in care and goes on to become a child abuser himself..
Meanwhile I am still drinking, my wife has left my own children don’t want to see me and they get bullied in school.
Eventually I turn myself around, stop drinking and spend the rest of my life campaigning against drunk driving.
Would you say that would be a life well lived?
I would not.
When you take a life you are destroying more than one life.
Now consider the same scenario only instead of drunk driving I go out with a gun and execute Mary.
Not well lived, in my view
Thanks for the response, Gio.
Your analogies are based on the premise of an attempt to redress obvious wrongdoing as being insufficient to neutralise the initial wrongdoing, yes?
In my earlier response I attempted to contextualise the circumstances in 1969/70.
It is clear that armed response to state violence would not have been seen as wrongdoing, except from the perspective of a pacifist. As we have already established that you are not a pacifist, then one can reasonably assume that your concern is based around something other than the application of violence for political purposes (the process engaged in by both the state and the IRA).
If there is no evidence to suggest that Martin McGuinness was personally involved in taking someone’s life, how does his membership of the IRA warrant regarding him in a different light to, say Jack Hermon for example, who was another leading protagonist in the conflict?
Brian
Yes I am suggesting that a lifetime of redress should be only the very least one could do to make reparation for taking a life.
I would have thought you might agree but perhaps not.
You say armed response to state violence would not have been seen as wrongdoing, except from the perspective of a pacifist..
That is a sweeping generalisation and does not touch on the nature of the state violence the duration of the response, the proportionality of the response amongst other ideas which I am sure you are familiar with..
However my point here is based on an agreed understanding of the activities McGuinness was involved in.
If we cannot start from that agreed point (that he was responsible for the taking, or ordering the taking, of lives) then we are wasting our time.
Gio,
Then we are indeed, wasting our time. I will not base my assessment of anyone’s life on the claims of that persons opponents.
For me, Martin McGuinness strove to improve the lives of the people around him, all of the people. His opponents cannot make that claim.
Those who accept the right of a state to behave in an uncivilised and violent manner toward it’s citizens will always regard armed opposition as unacceptable, unless it is in a foreign country, in which case they will support the arming of the opposition.
I try to avoid that type of hypocricy.
Thank you for the engagement.
Brian
Can I just point out that McGuinness admitted to IRA membership. More than that he was proud of it
I think we all know broadly what the IRA in Derry were doing when he was in charge.
Assumptions by his opponents are not required.
Anyway it is clear no mention of IRA victims will be made on these pages.
“Anyway it is clear no mention of IRA victims will be made on these pages.”
It is wrong to focus on one group of victims or survivors over others gio.
We are all victims of conflict.
You choose to focus on one group of victims for your own political agenda.
The same agenda unionists want to pursue, the demonisation of republicans and covering over the root causes of the conflict in the first place.
No one wants to talk about how the conflict started. Only that the IRA were the most aggressive and determined combatant. The conflict was not an IRA terror campaign, it was a conflict started over unionist discrimination, misrule and the murder and terrorisation of Catholics.
That will never change no matter how long you and others like you choose to focus on one specific group of victims simply to support your agenda. Which will fail, eventually intransigent voices will be ignored, even by the media and life will go on in the peace which has been delivered.
Truth has to be in the round and total. It is the british state who refuse to step up to the plate and the ball is in their court.
jessica
At this point in time we are looking at the life of Martin McGuinness.
All I am saying is lets not gloss over the bits that are not so good.
In all of Jude’s eulogising, and Father Joe’s I have yet to see an honest examination of the lives affected by McGuinness at that time.
As though they did not matter.
I don’t think it would be fair to focus any of the lives affected by the troubles conflict on any individuals.
You are unhappy about the attendance of his funeral, the fact he was considered a statesman and respected the world over, the kind words spoken by friends and foes alike,
You don’t like it and you choose to focus on one group of victims you think you can attribute directly to him to make things more comfortable and to your liking.
Just because he had the courage to take the responsibility for the IRA on his own shoulders, does not mean he should be blamed for all individual actions or all lives affected.
No one has said victims do not matter, those are your words.
As I say, you have your own reasons for feeling like that and as with the more belligerent unionists it has nothing to do with empathy for victims.
jessica
Once again you resort to attacking me and putting words in my mouth.
I have no difficulty with the attendance at his funeral or the kind words spoken.
A funeral is not the moment to examine the evil that men do.
If the victims of his time in charge in Derry do matter why have they not been mentioned here by Jude or Father Joe or many commenters?
A simple enough question.
How am I attacking you?
I am giving my own views on what I believe is your agenda based on having listened to you on this site for years.
Others can decide what to believe, but I will always express my own opinions just the way you feel the need to express yours.
Are you including the victims of the paratroopers on bloody Sunday and what about the victims of state violence in Derry before his time in charge?
Are they to be included in this examination and what would be the point in looking at victims in Derry separately from all of the victims of the conflict as a whole?
It is a simple question?
If you want to focus on one group treated wrongly, what about the victims of state violence who not only lost their loved ones but had their memories tarnished by being branded terrorists by the same state that murdered them in the first place even though they had no involvement in the conflict.
The conflict extended beyond Derry. It is wrong to cherry pick.
We should not have to explain that to you.
Gio,
Can I point out that Jack Hermon never, to the best of my knowledge, denied membership of the RUC. Jeffrey Donaldson has admitted membership of the UDR on many occasions. In fact, he said he was proud to have been a member of that organisation. Paddy Ashdown has spoken many times, in public no less, of his membership of the British army and has admitted walking the streets of Belfast carrying a gun.
For the record, I think Martin McGuinness was one of the greatest Irishmen of his time and I thank him for his contribution to the creation of a more equal society for my children than the one I grew up in.
You may or may not understand that, Gio, although I am fairly sure you won’t agree. You won’t agree because you don’t accept the premise I base that view on. You are entitled to disagree. You are not entitled to assume moral superiority, however, simply because your world view differs from mine.
War is inherently wrong. People die needlessly. In almost all cases one party is attributed with starting the war and henceforward blamed for the casualties. The Germans invaded Poland, the Russians invaded Afghanistan etc. In our small conflict, the unionist state attacked a section of it’s citizens. The responsibility lies with the state for starting and later escalating the conflict by enacting draconian powers and arming unionist death squads to terrorise the nationalist population.
That is my world view. I understand yours might be different. Not superior, or more accurate, just different.
If we accept that, perhaps we can put aside the silly out of context questioning.
Brian
Is there no room in your world view to acknowledge the victims of the IRA in Derry?
Not even worth a footnote in the story of a great man?
Yes Gio, there is. All victims of war should be acknowledged and mourned. Families who have lost loved ones should be remembered, whatever side they were on.
Remembering a single group of victims over the others is not. Apportioning blame to an individual, for political reasons, is also not part of my world view.
Brian
That is fair enough as a general principle.
This week we are looking specifically of the life of one man-Martin McGuinness.
Can we not look honestly at his whole life?
I am not talking about apportioning blame I am simply saying some acknowledgement in amongst all the talk of a lovely fella, poet and fisherman, and a life well lived, that he did in fact create victims and and he and his comrades destroyed other lives.
Those are facts.
It is interesting how hard this is for supporters of SF, almost a kind of cognitive dissonance.
No one can look straight at what he did back in the day so we have to gloss over it with talk of a poetry loving reluctant warrior.
By all means add as much context as possible but at least give them a mention.