In the days following the death of Sinn Fein Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, political punditry and commentary became focused on the concept of apology and the deceased man’s lack thereof. Even fine Christians were seeking repentance from a deceased man – fine people who have no idea what is in any man’s heart or the conversations any of us may have with our Maker.
The deep residual hurts that still pulsate through Northern Ireland are presented as a one–way pattern – with republicans inflicting the pain. I am the last person to deny the grief, the anger and the sense of despair associated with the lose of a loved one to violence. I have nothing but the deepest sympathy for those who struggle to come to terms with the lose of someone they loved.
But violence can take many forms. Violence is not just inflicted by the bomb and the bullet. Violence is inflicted through discrimination, disenfranchisement and denial of education and housing. Violence is inflicted by combining your efforts and resources with your brethren to prevent your non –brethren from buying a few acres to better his condition. Violence is inflicted by denying any citizen a job based on his belief system. Violence is inflicted by terrorizing your neighbors triumphantly for decades.
The consequence of this latent type of violence is immeasurable. It is a violence against the dignity of the person. It is the violence that forces a parent to watch their child go un–fed and uneducated. It is the violence that punches you down when you try to get up. It is the violence that ultimately begets a violent response.
The comments from the pundits et al would have you believe that once upon a time, across the North of Ireland, thousands woke up one morning and became violent men and women. Until we are honest about violence, its many forms and manifestations and the deep hurt and suffering caused by all violence will be an endless lop–sided debate about apology that will continue on the road to nowhere.
An excellent article. Says it all.
Very well said Catherine, great article.
And mostly it had little or nothing to do with Nationalism/Republicanism leading to an United Ireland. It was fifty years of pure unadulterated sectarian bigotry and hatred from the majority Protestant/Unionist towards the Catholic minority that caused the outbreak of violence ..
Catherine
Violence is not the things you have listed. Those are certainly wrongs and may do as much harm as violence but it does not help to blur the lines between what is violence and what is not.
Did Martin McGuinness come to regret any of his actions as a leader of the IRA?
It appears we will never know just as we will never know the full truth of what he did and what he ordered others to do (unless he has left a memoir somewhere).
His victims deserve the truth at least would you agree?
As do all victims.
michael
Yes as I have said many times.
Gio , I think Catherine has made a fair enough case as to why violence or even the idea of violence is not simply casual acts of “brute force”, shootings or bombings. Violence , for one example…say in a domestic setting ,can simply mean that there is obsessive control being used over a partner in a marriage…a man controlling his wife or a wife controlling a husband to the extent that the behaviour becomes a sublimnal act of ongoing mental -violence. There might only be the threat of physical violence but that in itself , is a form of violence being portrayed. That’s the kind of thing that breaks up marriages.
You can also be reminded of some torture techniques which are not necessarily brutish but still cause grave psychological damage. Sometimes the person a being violated does not even need to be touched physically at all.There simply needs to be a threat of some kind. Your ideas on what violence can entail have to be stretched or you’ll never begin to gain a full understanding as to why a person or a group of persons considers an action or actions against him or them as violent one.What was experienced here was simple control by a majority community over a minority community .You might want to call it low-level violence which finally grew into the kind of baton -punching we all saw live on television before civil -rights marchers went apeshit and began to fight back at the police. You might say that the violence simply spent fifty years growing and brewing in the shadows until it burst into the full light of day before the television cameras on the streets. Policemen suddenly overwhelmed by unarmed people in large numbers , protesting at rotteneness and corruption which they were seen to be protecting.
The reciprocal violence which greeted those initial baton- assaults and then gunfire, did not simply spring up out of the ground fully -formed and for no good reason and as has been said , thousands of people did not wake up one morning with that light-bulb moment and decide to simply create mayhem for no good reason. There are reasons for everything and it’s foolish to believe otherwise. There was no one-way pattern of violence. One side was already armed to the teeth and fully-trained.
As for Martin McGuinness and whether he had regrets or not for his own actions and for his own life . No one really knows the truth of anyone ‘s thoughts.I think he has said before he died that he would have preferred a different kind of life and he regretted all the deaths that were involved. He lost may friends too and as yet no one knows the details of his “real” life, although many think they do. I’m sure there are many Prime Ministers , Presidents and generals of every ilk who regret the deaths of men, women and children in conflicts and wars, but let’s not be simplistic….conflicts still continue. There is no one who is entirely untainted if they can think or understand the reality of what being a human- being means at all. None of us are perfect creatures. We are warring animals who live and die. Sometimes we tell ourselves lies as to what is right and what is wrong .Sometimes we don’t even know the difference.Sometimes we argue about these things. In the case of Ireland, each family has its own specific story and much depends on which household you happen to be born into.
paddy
Respectfully I have to disagree.
Catherine says for example:
“Violence is inflicted through discrimination, disenfranchisement and denial of education and housing. ”
Now of course all those things are wrong and may well do more harm than certain acts of violence, but they are not violence.
I don’t think it is being overly pedantic to want words to have a meaning, otherwise all discussion becomes meaningless.
By all means use a term such as ’emotional violence’ when talking about controlling behaviour,say, but most people know what violence is and this seems like an effort to blur the reality of what violent men did.
“Psychological abuse (also referred to as psychological violence, emotional abuse, or mental abuse) is a form of abuse, characterized by a person subjecting, or exposing, another person to behavior that may result in psychological trauma, including anxiety, chronic depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder.”
Well …gio …it seems obvious that all those people who woke up on that morning back in the late 1960s /early 1970s and decided as one, to simply be violent people for no good reason at all, possibly do not agree with your version of what violence can mean and what it means to actually be violated . like I said , that’s how this specific “marriage” failed to work. Do you really think they thought they weren’t being violated?
paddy
There is that blurring I am talking about.
What does violated mean?
In a physical sense or in a broader sense?
If you want to describe other types of abuse or mistreatment them surely there are words to describe that.
How can we talk about things if we don’t agree on what words mean?
Why are you referring to people deciding ‘to be violent for no good reason at all’?
I made no suggestion of that kind.
Those things are violence, Gio. What you want to focus on is physical violence. Violence can come in many forms – sexual, financial, psychological etc. This isn’t the blurring of anything.
Ceannaire
I have never heard the term ‘financial violence’ before.
This seems like an Orwellian attempt to stretch the meaning of words to obscure reality.
Violence is generally accepted as meaning physical violence in most discourse.
Sexual violence is violence since it is physical.
Psychological violence is something different.
Gio, ‘what does violated mean?’
Maybe its a case of: ‘You can’t really define it in words, but you know when it happens to you’!
Sherdy
Thanks. That is suitably vague.
Like being strapped to a bomb and forced to drive it to kill other human beings while your family are held captive?
Would it be something like that?
It’s simple really gio.Many people actually do not agree on what “reality” is.Words are necessarily already vague abstract constructions to represent the noises our mouths might make which attempt to make sense of the world around us.We will argue and disagree about what to “terrorise” means or what a “terrorist” actually is .We can come at it from as many directions as we might wish but we understand that the recipient of the terror knows what it means to have been terrorised. We will each have our own ideas as to what a “victim” is and what that entails but politicians argue as to who is the better “victim”. That’s what politicians do.People want to argue as to the meaning of all these things .Another example is that some don’t want to believe in the hard -sought scientific evidence of the reality of our world and wish to believe that the planet is much younger than it actually really is.The evidence is there and yet they’ll argue in face of that hard evidence.Some people do not understand logic and “reality” if you like. Words are the only tools we have to deal with these abstractions.
In the case of people doing violent things or violating others ,we know what that means but it is done anyway, if it suits a specific purpose or an agenda …. such as if a ruling elite seek to control a specific community.They know exactly why they are doing it and those on the receiving end of their actions also know exactly what is being done to them.They use words to attempt to describe it.If it seems like abuse why would it not be describes as a violation or a form of violence?
If someone or even some animal is treated to a constant diet of low-level abuse or violence over a long period of time that may well be answered by a reciprocal explosion of violence in one single act , at some time in the future.You’ll see it when a dog is treated badly and eventually becomes a vicious animal and bites someone.
We are all the sum of our experience without a mind and will react over time to circumstance and events without thinking or working out consequences given our limited lights. We are incapable of deciding this is right and this is wrong and we are basically reactors to circumstance and stimulus?
That’s a perfect ‘dead cat’ Gio
If someone in the public square says you can’t have this or that you can go and have it out with them. If they beat you off the public square along with their supporters you can bring witnesses to bear on their behavior and show them up for what they are. If you bring a bomb into the public square and set it off you’ve changed the dynamic and nature of the argument.
Gio – just for the record: would you be equally tenacious in demanding explanation of violent deeds associated with the British armed forces? Or US armed forces? Or the RUC? Or the UDR? You do seem a little fixated on Martin McGuinness at the moment. Maybe you’ll do a blog on the violence of these others and what it tells us about them.
Jude
I have said many many times that the truth should be told about all those violent deeds.
I don’t know why you keep asking.
The fixation with MCGuinness is not mine. You may have noticed quite a few blogs here about him recently (a quick count shows 18 separate pieces in the week after his death) and I have simply commented on them as have lots of people.
But I should say I did not comment at all before his funeral as I think it is a time to respect those who mourn.
It was only the sheer volume of articles here praising him without ever mentioning victims as though they were a mere footnote on his path to greatness, which induced me to make comment.
Well, when I said financial violence I meant economic violence.
Fact is, there are different forms of violence. Some of the studies you can find online about this are quite interesting, Gio.
Who cares what the violence is called, violence takes all sorts of forms and if you are a victim of it you don’t care what it is called. I think as a society we should know more as some people are very dismissive of abuse in all sorts of forms and its victims.
Gio
Not for the first time,you seem to have struck one of Jude’s raw nerves.You quite rightly point out the fixation with Martin Mc Guinness is not yours but rather the various Sinn Fein posters who coincidentally try to outdo each other in posting admiring blogs on the former D f M.Predictably you are also asked if you condemn all the State and loyalist violence and once more whether you wish to contribute a blog.The vehemence with which your entirely reasonable posts are attacked does not inspire a great vision of the Sinn Fein version of “Respect ” which we have all seen in recent times on election posters!
Aw c’mon Argenta. I think you are being a little thin-skinned and precious here . Gio is an excellent contributor and I for one have no problem with most of his reasoned answers.I enjoy a little diversity and differing opinions .I think it is entirely reasonable for Jude to ask contributors such as gio to further express themselves in the context of the entire situation we find ourselves in…there was violence across the board so I don’t personally get hung up on only one of the players when I’ve lived through the entire story.I would welcome a more extended blog from gio , for example…or any of the contributers who can serve up a little more than a fuzzy one-liner.I don’t care if their viewpoint is different if it is well enough argued. If it isn’t , then that’s where the debate comes in and that’s healthy.Martin Mc Guinness ‘s life recently ended , so he is no more and the political process is in stasis, so it is reasonable enough for contributors to dig into what the man contributed to the momentum of what we loosely call the political project and why in his absence it has stalled.
Argenta
Thanks.
I understand the respect and admiration here for McGuinness and in regard to his later years I share it.
But when we try to dig any deeper and enquire if that admiration covers his deeds in the IRA it is generally met with deflection and whataboutery.
Catherine here seems to be saying that other forms of wrong which she calls different kinds of violence will inevitably be met with a violent response.
Sadly McGuinness and his comrades all too often responded not by fighting those attacking them but by bomibing and shooting easy targets including civilians including children.
Of course those deaths are dismissed as the fault of the Brits because the IRA had no responsibility for their own actions, and after all bad things happen
It seems like a classic example of cognitive dissonance to me.
McGuinness was a great man who had a life well lived, so any thing which contradicts that view cannot be faced.
Tell me lies about Vietnam
I would say it is fair to hold the Axis powers responsible for all the deaths of WW2. Likewise the British state is responsible for every single death in Ireland. Even if England declared war in both cases.
fiosrach
I don’t agree.
Responsibility is not so black and white and often has to be shared.
Even though the Axis powers may be primarily responsible for WW2 deaths there is still an element of responsibility on the part of others who engaged in the violence of war.
Bombing civilians,such as in Dresden is an obvious example and is surely the responsibility ,primarily, of those who ordered it and carried it out.
Even if you subscribe to a just war theory there are unjust actions within that framework too, so arguing that the IRA campaign was justified and unavoidable (which it was not in my view) does not absolve them from responsibility for their actions.
Hi Gio, no one is try to absolve responsibility for the IRAs actions. Martin McGuinness took responsibility for his actions and said he was sorry that people died. It is just very unusual for people to call for others to be held accountable just after their funeral when people are still mourning. When Margaret Thatcher died Martin McGuinness said that people should not be celebrating, he wasn’t calling her out for the murders she sanctioned and the violence she unleashed when she ordered republican funerals to be attacked.
You also contradict yourself by defending the British army:
Bombing civilians,such as in Dresden is an obvious example and is surely the responsibility ,primarily, of those who ordered it and carried it out.
Now why attack the IRA for the actions of one unit? Do you have some evidence that we don’t to link Patsy Gillespie’s death to Martin McGuinness? I find your use of victims and attacks so soon as after Martin’s death as distasteful.
Once you declare war or engage in war, all civilized behaviour is suspended. It’s kill or be killed. You can’t judge what happens in war by normal human acceptable standards. If you are not prepared to accept this, then don’t go to war and take a chance on being annihilated. The Geneva Convention is a laugh, trying to superimpose decent behaviour on people who have become savages.
fiosrach
Are there any rules of war in your view?
It makes no difference if civilians including children are deliberately targetted?
Everything goes and no complaints?
There might be an argument to be made for that view I suppose, but it would mean there could be no holding to account for state forces for example or for any group, over anything they did no matter if it was grossly cruel or disproportionate.
It sort of boils down to who wins. I mean there weren’t too many trials of British or American war criminals. So winner takes all. I do believe that the fighting should be between “war machines” and not civilian populations.
fiosrach
So if one war machine (or one soldier even) kills civilians should there be any repercussions or is the slate wiped clean after the war?
Is that all you have fiosrach, excuses and clichés ?
I want to make it clear that I am not a member or supporter of the SDLP but I do have the odd Indian. He has to wipe his own slate clean.
The thing about guerilla warfare is that the forces are not numerically equal so you can’t have set piece battles. Sometimes civilians are hard to distinguish from combatants. But you either believe that killing it wrong or you invent weasel excuses. You choose.
fiosrach
I am struggling to get a clear picture of your position.
Killing is wrong, you say I think.
All killing always?
Are some killings more wrong than others?
Is murder no worse than self defence?
Was all the killing the IRA did wrong or not?
I am not trying to catch you out as it is a very difficult issue in my view.
I just don’t understand your position.
Gio, I think you are calling for fundamentalist judgement. I believe neither in fundamentalism of judgement. You will find that most people don’t have a simple ‘black’ and ‘white’ approach to life. I find that people who do have this approach usually have had a very sheltered life and many lack empathy. I will ask you again can you please outline your views? Everyone is engaging with your criticism but I think it would get you more respect to ‘show your hand’.
I don’t have a position. I’m just saying that all killing is either wrong or it isn’t. Can’t you feel the hypocrisy of a crowd cheering when one of ‘their boys’ get a murder charge dropped to manslaughter and these same people have the nerve to call Martin McGuinness a terrorist. When people lionise (a darling word) a man who vapourised perhaps a hundred thousand civilians in Germany and the same state rabbits on about ‘Irish terrorists’. It’s the double standards that sicken me. If England had been invaded, would the fighting have stopped or would the terrorists have continued fighting a guerilla war against the invaders? Winner takes all and writes the history.
fiosrach
You don’t have a position yet the British are responsible for every death in Ireland?
I’m not sure fiosrach said that, gio. It’s fine for us all to pontificate from our little ivory towers when there is no ongoing conflict beyond the front door, but I’d imagine that that position might change if someone was literally battering down your door as you typed. You’d quickly discover just how “non-violent” you thought you were.
Let’s put it like this. Say for example Hitler had been successful in WW2 and had finally invaded Britain.There’s a good chance that some might eventually accept the Germanification(!) of England , Scotland and Wales.Some would eventually embrace the invaders and inter-marry with them, but I’d say that many would fight back in a guerrilla war for generations and refuse to accept their lot. No doubt the state would brand them terrorists and we know how good the Germans were at propaganda .There would be bombings and there would be “collateral damage”(a lovely American obscenity, that). There would be shootings and there would be much viciousness.Sometimes there might be fallow periods but then it would start up all over again. It would run on for years and years .Swastikas would be hoisted and many would be torn down during darkness to be replaced in the morning.We all know what governments and politicians are capable of.
You could ask yourself eventually …say fifty or seventy years down the line ,who was responsible for all the assorted deaths and all that violence that had occurred and possibly even some that you might have been involved in yourself.You’d have to accept what you personally were capable of doing , of course , but who would you hold responsible for the whole of it?I really believe that it depends of personal situation in many respects. If for example , you lived way up in the Mull of Kintyre, you might never see any violence at all and might never feel any urge to react at all or get involved,, but if you lived in London you might feel differently.it’s very obvious that although many proclaim that violence is wrong they are quite capable of using it when it suits an agenda. I’m always reminded of Margaret Thatcher and “the Belgrano”.I wonder how she really fely about the deaths of all those young men.I wonder did she ever feel sorrow for any of it and did she ask herself why she ever wanted to be a Prime Minister in the first place when the job actually entails the occasional planned death of a perceived foe. There’s no getting around any of that.
paddy
It is good of you to leap to fiosrach’s aid!
But he did say the Brits were responsible for all deaths in Ireland thus absolving all paramilitary groups of any responsibility for their own actions.
Certainly as you say, I understand that any non violent notions I might have would be quickly abandonded if violence came to my front door, but that is not the issue.
He has said rules of war are a joke including the Geneva Convention and once in a conflict it is kill or be killed.
I am trying to pin down if this means there should be no repercussions for what we might call war crimes, say targeting civilians, torture, that sort of thing.
So what is your view?
If it is as fiosrach says that all civilised behaviour is suspended then we should forget about seeking any further investigations into wrongful acts.
Do you hold the same view?
Well gio , i’m sure I’d jump to yours too. No gio .I think responsibility is more complicated than that.Most of us have precious little control of the nuts and bolts of our lives. These days there is the semblance of each of us being free-thinking individuals, each choosing how our lives should run .We feel that we control most of the levers of our lives and the things that we can do . We mostly believe that we are making our own free choices, only restricted by the limits of education and so on. The real truth is that we have precious little real control.Okay we live better than anyone has ever lived in any time in the world’s history.We have all the comforts of warm, clean homes and every conceivable aid, but when it comes down to it we are still reliant on the “State” to look after us from birth until we get our Old Age Pension and our eventual death. We even expect our waste to be ferried away before it causes disease for us and our communities ..and our dead bodies to be buried.
For that reason the “State” has a greater responsibility than any single one of us. The “State” is what inveigles us and our children into wars and disputes and it is the “State” that carries the burden of being better than any one individual. If we expect that “State” to protect each and every one of us without favour , then when that “State’s” servants fall down in their responsibilities , then they commit a greater crime than any one of us , because that is actually where the buck stops. It has to be remembered that the State’s servants are being paid to do this work by that same State. In the end we pay for the State and it all by our labour and our taxes ,so we have to expect ultimate protection too. The State is the first one to conscript each and every one of us if it wants to inflict war for its own protection or for financial and economic adventure …as it has done across the world.
As for the State’s servants being expected to wage wars by “civilised “means , that is ultimately the biggest conundrum , given that war is not civilised behaviour at all. Of course there are some who might argue that the waging of war is the ultimate expression of the human species’ development.To have “rules” for barbarity is the ultimate black joke anyway and we know that human beings can and do some awful things to each other under the blanket of war, but it doesn’t stop the politicians from attempting to excuse even starting that war in the first place.I do feel that war is the ultimate failure of civilisation ,but it’s obvious that I am of a minority view in this anyway.Many have a great delight in the accoutrements and machinery of war.Many have a great love for the “Armed Forces” and actually seek out a life under their umbrella .Indeed, they may even encourage generations of their families to join in.It has to be said that a soldier is ultimately being trained as a weapon …a sophisticated machine which is trained to kill.That is what they are for and what their paid-job entails. Should they overstep their own strange rules within their own State and use that position against their own paymasters, they probably have a case to answer.The Geneva Convention presents the illusion thta war is really a board -game played by gentlemen of honour , which is in reality a nonsense that might just have existed for a short time during a time of honour-duels.Duel between gentlemen were practiced in early modern Europe althought hey probably began in the medieval code of chivalry…all that slapping down the gauntlet and proceeding with a well -laid out regime of rules for the game…. and continued into the near- modern period of th 19th to early 20th centuries. This was really an absurd game of life and death ,especially among military officers.
paddy
Thanks for your thoughts. Interesting as always.
I am unsure if in the end you agree with fiosrach or not?
Ought there to be rules of war or not?
No gio .There ought to be no wars at all.Wars are only waged to kill human beings.How does the song go …”War!…What is it good for?….Absolutely nothing!”
Thanks,Harry,for pulling me out there. The words savaged, dead sheep come to mind. It’s hard to get through to obruno sometimes. How many times do you have to say EITHER ALL killing is wrong OR it is not. If you believe the first then more power to you. You will be tested. Does this also apply to grievous bodily harm or suicide? If,however, you have get out clauses like just war or ethnic cleansing then the world is your oyster.
paddy
Of course there ought to be no wars…you wouldn’t be dodging the question now would you?
i think that sometimes we lose the meaning in hard cold print, fiosrach. It’s like President Ronald Reagan using that Springsteen anti-war song “Born in the USA” as a campaign tune and completely missing what the man was actually saying.Sometimes we all do a bit of that .I think that violence of any kind is always going to be a hard -sell, but it’s only governments who never really feel hypocritical about its use.
Born down in a dead man’s town
The first kick I took was when I hit the ground
You end up like a dog that’s been beat too much
Till you spend half your life just covering up
*
Got in a little hometown jam
So they put a rifle in my hand
Sent me off to a foreign land
To go and kill the yellow man
*
I had a brother at Khe Sahn
Fighting off the Viet Cong
They’re still there, he’s all gone
He had a woman he loved in Saigon
I got a picture of him in her arms
fiosrach
I realise you are not interested in genuine debate but I will try one more time’
” EITHER ALL killing is wrong OR it is not.”
Which do you believe yourself?
It has to be one or the other so you tell us.
I thought i’d answered that one by saying that the idea of having rules for something as obscene as war is a ludicrous thing in itself.It’s plainly mad .
You show me yours, gio, and I’ll show you mine. Thanks for being so interested in my opinions.
paddy
So no rules then.
Throw out the Geneva Convention.
In the aftermath no war crime trials, just wipe the slate, bad things happen end of story?
And here there should be no prosecutions for state forces involved in any killings?
fiosrach
Are we 12 years old?
I was hoping you would develop your ideas a little bit as it is an interesting subject but you know what, if you don’t want to engage that is fine.
Gio …you know and I know that there will be no prosecutions for state forces involved in any killings.That is never ever going to happen and everyone already knows it.Remember we are kicking cans down the road and waiting for everyone to die ,….right? Now and again there will be a little kerfuffle and there’ll be a bone thrown out ….like today..soldier found to have acted unlawfully 45 years ago when he shot down a teenager from a watchtower.Then you discover that the soldier is also dead ….so that’s Jim Dandy. his commanding officer got to apologise for him , of course ,so everyone is happy andthe book has been balanced for a little while.
Thta’s the way it’ll be eked out . What you will not hear is how a killing like that on the street…on the way to the chippie ….would have pumped up the volume in 1972 to the extent that other teenagers wouldhave been queueing up to strike back.They didn’t want some soldier picking them off the streets.
As for War Crimes trials …well take the Nuremburg trials for example ….did that change the behaviour of governments and soldiers afterwards anywhere else in the world ? Did it stop people being massacred in Vietnam a couple of years later ,or the deployment of Agent Orange ? Some four million Vietnamese men ,women and children suffered from that one How did it work in Iraq or at Guantanamo? Those soldiers obviously weren’t told about the Geneva Convention before they set out. Governments will still do whatever suits their agenda.
paddy
Fair enough.
Perhaps doing away with all such conventions would be better.
Wars will continue any way.
We should make no effort to punish the worst abuses.
It is a depressing view of the world and I think on balance I would prefer to see some attempt to hold people to account no matter how inadequate it may be.
Well it might not be the way i would like it to be ,gio, but it’s certainly the way it has always been from time immemorial as far as I can see….and then you’ll have the deniers who don’t want to believe the reality of the horrors in front of their eyes. When you look at the millions of Jews destroyed by a government, you’d be inclined to think that an entire population of Germans was deaf, dumb and blind.
I’ve recently watched the new film “All The Way”.It’s basically about L.B. Johnson’s tenure i as President between 1963 to 1968 the time of his s death. It’s worth catching to watch the fine acting of Bryan Cranston(Breaking Bad) and a great ensemble cast, but the political shenanigans in the background as he pushed through his Civil Rights Bill are a revelation too. I was sixteen at the time and didn’t know of all the details then. Remember , this was at the same moment when Civil Rights also became a huge issue here too.LBJ was dealing with the same kinds of objections from his native Texans as people here met with but it was him who pushed through with JFK’s work to transform America. Yes …the clock seems now to have run backwards ……
The dissembling nature of PIRA along with the accelerant of British policy was responsible for a lot of the deaths in the early troubles. The conditions were ripe for conflict and a lot of people wanted it, though not a majority. Paisley, PIRA and the Brits were all culpable.
And what about the mealy mouthed hurlers on the ditch who retired to their careers and sniffed that this behaviour was abominable. So backward, you know. Anyway, Harry, you explain me very well. I meant too that although I have a personal position, I do not wish to impose it on anybody else. You have to square everything with the God in your own head.
….and in my case , I’ve only to square it with meself! …It’s lonely in here !!!
“The conditions were ripe for conflict and a lot of people wanted it, though not a majority. Paisley, PIRA and the Brits were all culpable.”
What about the church Dominic? Has it any culpability? Did it contribute to the ‘conditions’? Btw, there was no sign of miracles(that you are fond of) at that time but the churches were pretty full. Just saying.
I remember coming home from midnight mass one Christmas to find my mother in a state of shock. Someone had attacked Bishop Daly who was saying mass on the television and praising parents who kept their children out of paramilitaries. Does that answer your question WT?
And the priests who blessed useful idiots on their way to wars for Britain? Any view on that Dominic? Where did the boul bishop stand on that issue?……….’tyrants, hypocrites and liars!’
Is your problem that they blessed their lot and not your lot WT. Sean South was a member of the legion of Mary and Gerry Adams is a daily communicant. None of my business or yours. Priests have to be priests to all, it’s in their contract.
“Is your problem that they blessed their lot and not your lot WT. Sean South was a member of the legion of Mary and Gerry Adams is a daily communicant. None of my business or yours. Priests have to be priests to all, it’s in their contract.”
Nope my ‘problem’ is that they and their self righteous cheerleaders are hypocrites and liars and regularly lent credence to violent groups just as long as them groups were the rulers. Btw I couldn’t care less what Sean South or Gerry Adams did/do in their spare time.
As for priests and their contracts?lol ‘just doing their job’ eh? Dear oh dear. How’s about doing what is right?
Denis Faul and Raymond Murray didn’t challenge the Brits as well as the provos then WT.
How’s about the Catholic Church standing at the pulpit and stating clearly the British presence in Ireland is not welcome? Whilst they are at it they could state the British presence has brought untold suffering upon the Irish people I.e the truth?
Btw, there’s no point standing at the pulpit and condemning ‘all violence’ allthewhile assisting imperialist and colonial armies by lending credence to them. Ffs some priests were embedded with Brit army. Jesus did indeed weep.
Btw, I look forward to any poll on the unification of Ireland because logic would suggest the Irish Catholic Church would give unification its backing? Just watch as they squirm and stall and avoid ‘taking a side’……..’tyrants,hypocrites, and liars!’
There is no Irish catholic church just the catholic church in Ireland and it’s not it’s job to tell the Brits to get out of Ireland but to preach the gospel. It’s up to the Irish people to deal with such things as they see fit under the auspices of their elected leaders.
“There is no Irish catholic church just the catholic church in Ireland and it’s not it’s job to tell the Brits to get out of Ireland but to preach the gospel. It’s up to the Irish people to deal with such things as they see fit under the auspices of their elected leaders.”
Rubbish. Your head is up somewhere dark if you don’t think the church involves itself in politics. It must have been some sort of miracle then when archbishops regularly stood at the pulpit and condemned and excommunicated republicans for daring to challenge the British, be it in the tan war or recent times? Those same archbishops had no problem sending Irishmen of to commit violence for Britain or indeed Franco…..’tyrants,hypocrites and liars!’ Wouldn’t you agree?
Where were all the intellectuals during this period. Where were they hiding. If the Church was put on a pedestal who put it there? That slave mentality is gone now and rightly so but you go ahead and bang your drum, you’ll find that no one is interested because times have moved on.
“That slave mentality is gone now and rightly so but you go ahead and bang your drum, you’ll find that no one is interested because times have moved on.”
Yip, and who helped remove that ‘slave mentality’ Dominic? Could the church’s greatest threat , irish republicanism, have contributed to that removal? You bet your life on it. In fact, in the present day the church would still view republicanism as a threat……..as it could challenge their selfish interests in society.
Btw, speaking of ‘moving on’ you are the one that regularly comments on here about the past, albeit it normally concerns digging at pesky republicans. And yet I refer to the past and you don’t wanna know?mmmm……..’hypocrites and liars!’ is most apt indeed.
Maybe we’re both struggling to catch up WT and I certainly don’t recognise the republicanism you appear to be talking about.
I think the politicians who sat back and did nothing are culpable. The people who had power and authority but sat and did nothing are culpable.
As Homer says,when you come to a certain age, for every new fact you take in an old one goes out. I really meant that we,each, build up our own God in our head,from nature and nurture and all our actions need to align with this god. Otherwise you get guilt, complexes and all sorts of phobias and phrenias. Keep your god simple and there is less aligning to do.