Fintan O’Toole, whose GAA footballing skills have delighted so many of us down the years, along with his tireless devotion to club management and the coaching of youngsters in GAA skills, has an article in today Irish Times. It’s headed ‘Honouring this fanatical racist by naming clubs after him shames our GAA’.
The fanatical racist Fintan has in mind is John Mitchel. As you almost certainly know, in the nineteenth century Mitchel was editor of the United Irishman. In 1848 Mitchel was sentenced to 14-years penal transportation, the penalty for his advocacy of James Fintan Lalor‘s programme of co-ordinated resistance to exactions of landlords and to the continued shipment of harvests to England. In 1846 he wrote:
“The Irish People are expecting famine day by day… and they ascribe it unanimously, not so much to the rule of heaven as to the greedy and cruel policy of England. … They behold their own wretched food melting in rottenness off the face of the earth, and they see heavy-laden ships, freighted with the yellow corn their own hands have sown and reaped, spreading all sail for England; they see it and with every grain of that corn goes a heavy curse.”
Fintan, however. Is most upset that Mitchel was an energetic pro-slavery advocate and engaged in the slave trade at the time. He clearly believed that black people were lesser human beings than whites. Fintan calls for the many GAA clubs around the country to change the name of their club, where it currently honours Mitchel.
This is an old moral dilemma. How do we respond to someone who has done a great deal of good but has a serious blot on their character in other areas. Daniel O’Connell was a great Irishman but (as Donal Kennedy has repeatedly told us on this site) he killed a man in a duel. Winston Churchill has been hailed as the greatest of Englishmen, yet he pursued policies that led to the death by famine of over three million Indians.
Mind you, Fintan doesn’t bother much with the positive side of Mitchel’s character or his condemnation of exporting food while Irish people died in their tens of thousands. He focuses on the pro-slavery aspect of his character.
So here’s my question for you, Fintan. If you believe the many GAA clubs should forget about Mitchel’s courageous stand against British injustice and, on the grounds that he was a racist, change the names of their club – would you argue equally for the removal of all statues and public hero-worship for Winston Churchill, in that he was guilty of the deaths of over three million innocent Indians, whom he described as “a beastly people”? And if (God forbid) you were having a brain operation, would you refuse the services of a surgeon of great skill and renown, if you knew he was cheating on his blameless wife?
Fintan using slavery as a stick to beat GAA with, ignoring the 14 years penal servitude imposed on Mitchel. by the British.
My reference to O’Connell’s duelling, not in his condemnation but in counter-attacking the corner-boy
attack on Patrick Pearse by a cowardly, lying Man of the Cloth who said O’Connell never shot anybody.
Fintan, though a scourge of all things Catholic is on the same side as the offensive Jesuit and shares his cowardice.
I am an Irish American and I am deeply offended by the virulent racism in my community.
Although the GAS clubs are in Ireland or England, I personally would like their names changed, as John Mitchell was clearly a racist. His views continue to cause harm here.
Many other Irish Republicans whether Protestant or Catholic, are anti-racist. Pick one of them to name a club after. They deserve to honor.
Maybe, Anne, before you worry about football clubs being named after Irish patriots you could start on the adulation of American society for the mass murderers in your own society. Concentrate on the millions that have been slaughtered to further US colonialism and their running dogs. At least when a club has been named here it has been probably before the other aspects of their lives have been common knowledge.
I don’t like how America behaves in the world.
I realize you are talking about an Irish sports league, but I have said what I think.
John Mitchel was not a patriot here. He was a virulent racist and a traitor in the name of slavery and such racism is still a major negative force here.
Ireland has real patriots, some of whom are not acknowledged. I would choose one of them but, that is clearly not my call.
Fintan is quite right to raise some of contradictions of John Mitchel and many other “leaders”. Since too much faith is placed in “leaders” they should be held to account. Jude makes mention of Churchill, who incidentally was advised by Brendan Bracken, but he was not universally admired, particularly in Britain. Johnson sought to walk in the footsteps of Churchill and look at the mess he made. We need a different and more inclusive form of humanitarian governance which seems to missing at the moment. To me this homage to past individuals is an example of idolatry. At least the GAA is a community organisation and should not be dominated by a single individual, past or present.