I read on Slugger O’Toole that there is no room for British flegs (sic) in British Fermanagh. Let me assure my British readers that this is not the case.
On Friday I travelled thru County Fermanagh on my way to Bundoran in County Donegal. In Ederney (a nationalist town) I cant say that I noticed any at all. In Kesh (a unionist town) there were a couple of British flags. And in Belleek (nationalist) there were a couple of Irish flags.
I hope people find this re-assuring.
On 7th Ocober 1968, I took part in my first Civil Rights march. A group of us bunked off school to march from Queens University to Belfast City Hall.We were stopped at Ormeau Avenue and we all sat down on the road.
I have often been told that Nick Ross led that march. Frankly I cant remember him. But he was an English student at QUB who later made his name presenting BBC Crimewatch. And he has become increasingly…conservative. A few weeks ago he outraged many people with what seemed to be a far too nuanced statement on Rape.
A few days ago he spoke of Catholic schools being “substantially responsible” for the Troubles in Norn Iron. This is the kind of nonsense that even the most bigoted of Norn Irons unionist community tend to avoid. As in most places…”faith schools” and indeed “non-faith schools” teach social and community responsibility which is USUSALLY to the benefit of all. Like most people, I am the person I am today because of the (mostly) influence of parents and education (Catholic).
It is also a simple fact that I learned the values of Republicanism and Nationalism at ” Catholic” school. And of course this is the main reason that nationalist parties will not push for integrated education. Unionists will not push for it either because of course so called SState schools promote defacto Protestant and Unionist values. And liberal unionists promote integrated education as an aspiration that Norn Iron will become a homogenous society.
Yet Nick Ross compares Catholic schools in Norn Iron with Muslim faith schools in Britain. And the implication is that these faith schools are in some way responsible for Islamist extremism.
In England it is ok to be anti-Catholic. Thats how the comedians on Mock The Week are hand-picked but it is not ok to be Islamophobic. Nick Ross completely missed the point. The parallels between Catholics and Muslims in English Society are not contemporary. They are HISTORIC….specifically in the period 1558 to well into the seventeenth century.
The focal point being the Gunpowder Plot…Guy Fawkes and all that.
Consider these parallels. England is a Secular Country. People would like Sharia-Islamist Law. These people include young English men who go abroad to fight in wars in Afghanistan and Syria. Or go to study in a madras in Pakistan. Back in England, they become involved in terror plots closely monitored by a security force which has infiltrated it.
Yet Modern Enland…whether conservative or liberal, whether Daily Telegraph reading or Guardian reading….is a product of the Whig Settlement that ended religious wars. The assertion of English Law over Roman Law….and in the sixteenth century they had people like Edmund Campion educated in a seminary on the continent and people like Guido Fawkes radicalised in Dutch Wars.
The suspicion that Catholicism was alien to the English character is at the heart of Modern England, including its supposed modernity which embraces Diversity. Occasionally the mask slips.
The present fuss over Internet usage being monitored by assorted spooks is one which should cause people of a certain age (my age) in Norn Iron to smile. There was always an assumption that our phone was tapped. It was one of only two in the street and one of the few in the area. It would have been in the interests of the British to tap phones…and whether they did so…legally or illegally …who really knows?
But say in the situation where there had been a gun battle and the British Army believed they had shot and wounded a gunman…it would surely have been at least logical to have the handful of phones in the area monitored to listen out for a phone call to a doctorWe assumed strange things…for example…RUC men wore black shoes. Therefore….logically ????….Special Branch when undercover must be wearing brown shoes. A whole generation of Falls Road men grew up with stooped posture as we scrutinised the footwear of strangers who were over 5ft 8 inches.
I suspect that Internet traffic is not monitored nearly so much as paranoid people think…and probably a little more than government ministers in United States or Britain tell us. They are not lying, merely making sure that they dont get involved in the minutae of how Security Services have operated.
My only known encounter with spooks happened in London. An amusing incident during an industrial dispute. But why are British people so surprised that interner conversations might be monitored. Britain employs thousands of spooks …mostly in London and Cheltenham. What exactly is it that the British people THINK they do?
Those of you with an interest in “Coherent Education” might like to attend a Platform for Change event at the Holiday Inn, Ormeau Avenue, Belfast. Date: Monday 24th June 2013. Time: 7.30pm.
Even if Education is of no interest, you might look to go and see what LetsGetAlongerists look like.
During the course of the evening they might want to mention that opinion polls state 79% of Norn Iron want some form of Integrated Education. But they might forget to mention that only 1.3% of the voters in Mid Ulster voted for a Party (Alliance) that advocates Integtrated Education.
Not that the Mid Ulster vote will worry Platform for Change. They probably dont know where Mid Ulster is.
I base this on the fact that Platform for Change conducted a survey on which constituencies their members lived. Very few lived in the West. Now aint that a surprise?
I was sitting on a bus today when I noticed an advertisement for NICIE….the Norn Iron Council for Integrated Education. Simple enough advert…three photogenic children and a contact number to phone to find the addresses of Integrated Schools in the area.
Slightly uncomfortable feeling. An advert for integrated education….it is now so much. Prt of the new narrative that it is hardly noticed. We dare not say that this is…POLITICAL. Would Translink the bus company, feel comfortable allowing an advert for Catholic Education? And if such an advert was produced would the massed ranks of letsgetalongerists tolerate it?
On the subject of Education, I started Catholic Grammar School fifty years ago this year? The most famous alumnus was Cardinal William Conway who was awarded his red hat when I was at the school. And who would have guessed that Gerry Adams, who is three years older than me would grow up to be…..Gerry Adams. Or that Belfast’s newest Mayor would be a past pupil. Congratulations Mairtin O’ Muilleoir.
Taking a short break away from home this weekend.
Hopefully there will be a Tinternet connexion.
Pretty big turnout. Nine rows of ten seats. A group of journos and cameras standing to the right. Group of staffers and volunteers standing to the left in front of curtains which would be drawn apart to reveal the Logo. To me it had a slight suffragette feel to it. And I think I have seen Norn Iron tracksuits like it. A bit late in starting.Seemingly there was an over-spill audience in another room And that caused the delay. Oddly the Launch got underway when Mr Eamonn Mallie, even more bohemian than ever entered the room. For a brief moment I thought Mallie expected people to stand up and applaud. Few introductory remarks from the new Chair (?). John McCallister spoke sincerely and upbeat.
About seven people were invited to speak. It seemed to go down well, although it is not really my kinda thing. For the most part, these were people who had not voted before. Two maybe even three, had been or still are politics students. The amateur feel CAN be a strength but there are no “big names” and ultimately the Party may need a tier of local councillors and it will be interesting to see if they can do well in 2014. No mention of financial backers either. There were one or two lobbying “faces” there…but significant non-appearances.
There were several SDLP faces there. That should not be interpreted as “support”, except in the general sense of goodwill.
In his speech, Basil made a virtue out of the grassroots nature of the Party but to me it lacks muscle. No Alliance “faces” there (so far as I know). But really thats the battleground. This is a genuinely non-sectarian unionist Party and a worry to Alliance Party.
I wish NI21 well but my overall impression is that this new Party has in some way or other been on the cards for three years and the collapse of the UUP-Tory Coalition. That MIGHT have been the opportune time for a new liberal unionist Party and that ship may have sailed with Bradshaw and Hamilton in the Alliance Party and Ringland with the Conservatives and Ian Parsley (for now) with Alliance.
Great excitement over on Slugger O’Toole with the publication of the annual Life and Times Survey. This is like Christmas Day for LetsgetAlongerists as it shows them that despite voting Sinn Fein and SDLP, nationalists are not really nationalists at all.
All complete bollix.
Most younger people will be unfamiliar with the name Ruairi O’Bradaigh. He died yesterday.
He was a familiar figure in the 1970s. The Roscommon schoolteacher was a familiar figure in the 1970s and was often on TV alongside Sean MacStiofain.
It seems a lifetime ago. O’Bradaigh was President of Sinn Fein and MacStiofain (English born John Stephenson) was Commander of Irish Republican Army. They were unlikely figures and I dont think were overly popular with northern nationalists, even those of a militant persuasion. To some extent O’Bradaighs Connachtness, Mac Stiofains Englishness and their combined Dublinness distanced them from political reality and the “front line”.
Yet O’Bradaigh is interesting. Despite the obvious look of an schoolteacher, complete with pioneer pin and fainne…he was a paramiltary man in the 1950s leading raids in England and across the border, during Operation Harvest…so he was a peculiar throwback to the old IRA (1916-1922) when young men were village schoolteachers by day and leading flying columns in the mountains by night.
When the new breed of northern Sinn Feiner, Gerry Adams took over the Leadership and the organisation went “legit”, O’Bradaigh looked even more out of his time, out of his depth and increasingly shrill as the voice of the breakaway, Republican Sinn Fein.
Yet in the mid 1970s he was involved in talks with Loyalist paramilitaries which were surprisingly far-sighted for the time. And they were scuppered by no less a waste of space than Conor Cruise O’Brien.
We talk about a Decade of Centenaries. Actually its a decade when people who were once powerful….die. Margaret Thatcher. Ruairi O’Bradaigh…..
Former Sinn Fein councillor Breege Meehan has been found guilty of child abuse. The abuse relates to a step-daughter (the child of prominent Ardoyne Republican Martin Meehan). It brings overdue justice to the victim.
Sordid business but it has to be recorded here.
Keeping An Eye On the Czar of Russia 