Five men face dissident republican charges

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Mummy_of_Peanut
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27 May 2012, 3:45 pm

Joker, the Irish were not enslaved by the British. They may have been treated poorly and like second class citizens, but never enslaved.


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29 May 2012, 12:16 am

Joker wrote:
Declension wrote:
Tequila wrote:
A united Ireland will never happen now. The IRA have made any thoughts of this completely unpalatable to most unionists.


It's the other way around. If not for groups like the IRA, the idea of a united Ireland would be much more inconceivable than it currently is.

People always look back and tell themselves that it is the peaceful groups that make real progress, whereas the violent ones are shunned. But it's not true. Progress is only ever made when the threat of violence is looming overhead, so that the peaceful groups can be the "good cop" to their "bad cop". Martin Luther King wouldn't have gotten anywhere if the Black Panthers didn't exist.


That was awesome well done 8)


Trouble is that its nonsense.
King accomplished his legacy and died all before the Panthers even formed.



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29 May 2012, 11:05 am

No, I do not believe the vast majority of the Irish are content to let N. Ireland remain part of the U.K. Most, however, would also agree that the I.R.A. groups have devolved, and spend more time pushing drugs than they do pursuing their political agenda.

On a side note, the police/gardai and the entire criminal justice system in the Republic is weak both in terms of making convictions and sentencing violent criminals. Sometimes, a faction of the I.R.A. is called upon by a victim's family in order to exact vengence/justice where the government can't or will not. I have also known the I.R.A. to patrol neighborhoods in the Republic where violent offenses were going unchecked by the unarmed gardai (who in some cases were said to be too afraid to patrol).

I have seen a commemorative gathering (Easter Rising, maybe, I can't recall for certain)of ski-mask wearing I.R.A. members on the main street of a major Irish Republican town in the middle of the day. No one - police included - bothered them.
Whatever peace there is in Northen Ireland, I feel it is a temporary one.



Tequila
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29 May 2012, 11:16 am

YippySkippy wrote:
No, I do not believe the vast majority of the Irish are content to let N. Ireland remain part of the U.K.


Most people in Northern Ireland are happy to remain in the UK, and support for a United Ireland is falling amongst the Catholic population.

It doesn't really matter what the people of the Republic think, it's not their decision to make unless Northern Ireland agrees to a United Ireland in a border poll. Many of the Republic's people really couldn't give a toss about a United Ireland in reality anyway.



Tequila
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29 May 2012, 11:19 am

YippySkippy wrote:
I have also known the I.R.A. to patrol neighborhoods in the Republic where violent offenses were going unchecked by the unarmed gardai (who in some cases were said to be too afraid to patrol).


Look up the likes of RADD.

And yes, illegal republican parades are a problem. Loyalists generally go the legal route.



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29 May 2012, 8:22 pm

It matters what the Republic thinks. Where do you think a lot of the IRA members live?

Also, if everyone in the North is holding hands and skipping along nowadays, how about they remove all those "peace walls" and see what happens?
The peace is thin.



ZX_SpectrumDisorder
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30 May 2012, 1:17 pm

Republican parades are banned for being Republican, one of the little nuggets that still gets on people's nerves. I'd suggest banning both Unionist and Republican marches for the sake of progress. Every year Catholics see triumphalist marches, Apprentice Boys purposely antagonising protestors with bigoted hate filled ranting and frankly disgusting behaviour towards women and children, on a personal level I've been spat at and my mother called a 'Fenian c**t' in front of police who are supposed to serve me, too, while the whole thing is actually TELEVISED on every local channel. Not only this but we see the likes of the UVF, UFF, UDA, LVF or whatever brand of taxi driver murderers who are supposed to be disbanded and their weapons decomissioned. They come out from under whatever stone on the 11th night (11th July) in scummy Protestant estates with machine guns shooting into the air while burning Irish flags and effigies of the Pope on the news. All while the police are in the area.
The problem with the fragile peace here is exacerbated every year by these marches and displays of paramilitary force and triumphalism, protestants know this. They can also bang on about traditional routes for their marches all they want, but we all know why these routes are such a contentious issue. There's very little point actually marching unless you can march through catholic areas. It's been suggested to the orange order that they march up and down an airport runway all day and they refused. Of course they refused. There's no point to that, is there. Catholics are reactionary and protestants are wind up merchants. I just wish catholic people would stay away, if they did there would be absolutely no point in the orange order (N.I equivalent of the KKK) marching at all.
Anyway, the Shinners have come right out now and are now campaigning for a united Ireland on the basis of it making financial sense considering there's basically double everything running what is essentially a tiny country in a serious financial downturn. Their campaign runs along the lines of Sinn Fein serving Catholics, Protestants 'and those who've come to join us recently'. I was quite shocked when I first saw the political broadcast to be honest as it was so blatant. Sinn Fein have manoeuvered themselves into an advantageous position. If you take the troubles out of the equation, their stance actually makes sense to progressively minded people.
Also, about RAAD - there's absolutely no mainstream support for them here at all. They're perceived as backward idiots.



Mummy_of_Peanut
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31 May 2012, 4:21 am

Orange parades are a regular occurrence, in the summer, in the West of Scotland, and the majority of people disapprove. People get hacked off at the traffic delays (what would happen if there was a major incident?) and they are regarded as education-deficient eejits. We had a massive parade in my town on Saturday, with people coming from all over. Thankfully, my daughter has a class in Glasgow at 10am, so we were out of here early and we stayed away until late afternoon. I was speaking with another Mum, who hadn't known it was happening. When she reached the main street, at about 10am, there were loads of thugs shouting, swearing, drinking and flying the flag. This sort of thing is really inappropriate and she was disgusted, especially as she had 2 young children with her. Anyway, you'd think by 2012 they'd have gotten over their battle victory.

For anyone who says it's fine, I think you are totally blinkered. My cousin was murdered for wearing a green shirt (this was here in Scotland, the same town as the one that march was in). As he was being stabbed, he was being called a 'Fenian B', so there's no debating the fact that it was sectarian. In actual fact, he wasn't even Catholic or a Celtic supporter, just a man out for the night, with his brother, a friend and their partners. Unlike those who attacked him, he wasn't brought up with bigoted attitudes and unfortunately saw no harm in wearing green. The gang of 10 who attacked them were all members of the local orange lodge and they are still members (any respectable organisation would remove membership for that). In fact, there was a party to celebrate their freedom. This is not a one-off.

I've held back from speaking about this before, because I do not want anyone to think I have a bias, due to that. I would like to say, that had he been murdered for being a 'Proddy' by Hibernian walkers, from the next town, my thoughts on the matter would be exactly the same. Nothing good comes out of it.


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ZX_SpectrumDisorder
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31 May 2012, 10:18 am

Horrible.



Joker
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31 May 2012, 4:48 pm

Mummy_of_Peanut wrote:
Joker, the Irish were not enslaved by the British. They may have been treated poorly and like second class citizens, but never enslaved.


They where enslaved I suggest your learn the history of oppression the Irish faced under English and British rule.



Declension
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31 May 2012, 5:11 pm

naturalplastic wrote:
Trouble is that its nonsense.
King accomplished his legacy and died all before the Panthers even formed.


It's not nonsense, it just doesn't survive a literal reading.



Mummy_of_Peanut
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31 May 2012, 6:04 pm

Joker wrote:
Mummy_of_Peanut wrote:
Joker, the Irish were not enslaved by the British. They may have been treated poorly and like second class citizens, but never enslaved.


They where enslaved I suggest your learn the history of oppression the Irish faced under English and British rule.
OK, I get what you're meaning. I had thought you were speaking about the Irish people living in Ireland. But, I suppose you're meaning individuals being taken into slavery and removed, just like Africans were. What you are talking about happened to the Scots too, at the same time in history. In fact, there are white Caribbeans, living in poverty today who have Scottish ancestry. Although I feel sad for those people and I would like to see some compensation for them, as a nation we don't keep going on about it and neither do the Irish. The Irish were not the only ones to be treated like this.

I do agree about oppression and the poor treatment of Irish immigrants. My Dad was a victim of anti-Irish or anti-Catholic discrimination, in the workplace, in Scotland. I can't speak for those in Northern Ireland, but anti-Irish discrimination is largely a thing of the past, elsewhere. We have sectarianism here and bigoted folk, but discrimination against Irish people is illegal, not tolerated and just not done, although you have to account for employers' own personal bias. If it is happening, it is not getting the backing of the UK government, no matter who is in power.


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Joker
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31 May 2012, 6:22 pm

Mummy_of_Peanut wrote:
Joker wrote:
Mummy_of_Peanut wrote:
Joker, the Irish were not enslaved by the British. They may have been treated poorly and like second class citizens, but never enslaved.


They where enslaved I suggest your learn the history of oppression the Irish faced under English and British rule.
OK, I get what you're meaning. I had thought you were speaking about the Irish people living in Ireland. But, I suppose you're meaning individuals being taken into slavery and removed, just like Africans were. What you are talking about happened to the Scots too, at the same time in history. In fact, there are white Caribbeans, living in poverty today who have Scottish ancestry. Although I feel sad for those people and I would like to see some compensation for them, as a nation we don't keep going on about it and neither do the Irish. The Irish were not the only ones to be treated like this.

I do agree about oppression and the poor treatment of Irish immigrants. My Dad was a victim of anti-Irish or anti-Catholic discrimination, in the workplace, in Scotland. I can't speak for those in Northern Ireland, but anti-Irish discrimination is largely a thing of the past, elsewhere. We have sectarianism here and bigoted folk, but discrimination against Irish people is illegal, not tolerated and just not done, although you have to account for employers' own personal bias. If it is happening, it is not getting the backing of the UK government, no matter who is in power.


Yes the scots and the irish have always be viewed poorly by the english britch french german italian ect. In America the irish are treated the same as african americans.



ZX_SpectrumDisorder
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01 Jun 2012, 3:46 am

That was a weird thing I found when I was living in DC. I wound up in Baltimore (where The Wire's set) accidentially as I was literally just off the plane and hadn't got a clue where I was going, and I wound up chatting to a bunch of black guys who I knew were out to mug me, but wound up chatting to me for nearly an hour once they found out I wasn't English and from Northern Ireland. The question I got that got me off being mugged was when they asked me if I 'supported' the North or the South. When I said my mother's family are from the South, their attitude towards me completely changed and it felt like I just got out of jail if you know what I mean. They saw paralells between the civil rights thing in America and here in N.I and the orange order and the KKK and let me go on my way. My heart was in my throat.



Mummy_of_Peanut
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01 Jun 2012, 5:25 am

My best friend is black and her parents are from Jamaica (obviously descendant from slaves). I was telling her about the anti-Irish sentiment and discrimination in the workplace, that used to be widespread. She knew nothing about it, strange I thought, as her husband is from Dublin. Anyway, I was saying that my family were not slaves like hers (yes there were Irish and Scottish slaves, prior to the African slave trade, but they were not my ancestors) and I wouldn't want to claim that our heritages were comparable. However, there's some sort of understanding or affinity, which many other white people perhaps couldn't have. Her husband's family have always lived in the South and never been immigrants, so perhaps they haven't the experiences that the Irish immigrants have had or maybe he has just never had reason to speak about it.

This is why I can't stand Irish jokes (or any other racist jokes for that matter). It's based on the idea that Irish people are unintellgent, therefore they can only do menial/unskilled jobs. This was reality for many Irish immigrants, until the middle of the last century, at least. My Dad (who is only 76, so I'm not talking about a very long time ago) lost a very good apprenticeship because of it and this had an impact on his life and of course affected me. This is not something to be joked about, it's something to be ashamed of.


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01 Jun 2012, 6:49 am

Quote:
In America the irish are treated the same as african americans.


Not where I live. My husband is Irish, and everybody thinks he's the greatest thing since sliced bread. When he had more of an accent (it's faded now, more's the pity) he used to avoid speaking in front of strangers because they always lit up at the sound and wanted to have lengthy discussions about Ireland and their own family tree.