The debt the British people owe to Gerry Adams...

[LiamO]

ah! you mean the queen pays (although it's more likely to be the longsuffering taxpayer)

Call it a small downpayment on 800 years rent money.

Of course, alternatively britain could just fuck off and leave us to sort it out ourselves...

 

[Garek]

Of course, alternatively britain could just fuck off and leave us to sort it out ourselves...

Here's a side question I want to ask (good thread by the way) - between 1921 and 72, during the time or the Parliament of Northern Ireland, how much would you, or any other poster, agree with the statement that the north of Ireland was an autonomous region within the UK, which was allowed vast scope to manage its own affairs, way beyond anything even Scotland has these days?

(when I say "manage its own affairs" I do of course mean the Unionist tyranny, and not those gerrymandered out of the process)

 

[LiamO]

There is no doubt it was a little feudal estate run by the Unionist gentry, for the Unionist gentry.

 

[Garek]

There is no doubt it was a little feudal estate run by the Unionist gentry, for the Unionist gentry.

I find it interesting how it was effectively left to its own devices. Still part of the UK, but not seen or heard. Still all hell started breaking loose of course the silly bastards.

There have been people on this thread criticising the IRA, calling them murderous and the rest, with no seeming thought that they had to have come from somewhere. It is tragic really how preventable a lot of this has been. I mean obviously Ireland should be united, but the argument is a lot more academic if you have fair access to jobs, housing etc. and you aren't being burnt out your fucking homes.

 

[DotCommunist]

Yes. it is jolly generous of her maj isn't it?

All you have to do is bring in your script to the Chemist and hand it in. Then you just have to bend your knee, in front of a pictire of Good Queen Bess (and Cromwell), sing 'God save the queen' and bingo - free drugs.










Obviously the bit in blue is made up. But we DO get free prescriptions - which should annoy some british posters no end.

It's like the soup, only smaller and more pill shaped

 

[LiamO]

I find it interesting how it was effectively left to its own devices. Still part of the UK, but not seen or heard. Still all hell started breaking loose of course the silly bastards.

There have been people on this thread criticising the IRA, calling them murderous and the rest, with no seeming thought that they had to have come from somewhere. It is tragic really how preventable a lot of this has been. I mean obviously Ireland should be united, but the argument is a lot more academic if you have fair access to jobs, housing etc. and you aren't being burnt out your fucking homes.

Late to the fray, but incisive.

 

[LiamO]

It's like the soup, only smaller and more pill shaped

Actually DC I was trying to find a TV clip of Gerry Adams being interviewed, at length, about all sorts. One of the areas was religion and he described himself as a 'very protestant' type of catholic - meaning he was a 'freethinker' cathloic.

Whenever this interview comes to mind... I think of you.

e2a FOUND IT

http://www.rte.ie/tv/meaningoflife/avlong.html?2532767,null,228

 

[Garek]

Late to the fray, but incisive.

Why thank you.

I tell you what, I have been reading about this for years due to me Mum being from the north and growing up hearing all the stories and tales from her, but no amount of books provided as good and clear an insight as the Bogside tours organised by the Museum of Free Derry, and also wondering round the museum itself. Good place that. Very interesting.

 

[LiamO]

.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

It seems to me that you're talking more to Unionists than to British people here. You think anyone in Britain considers they have what they have 'thanks to the Queen'? People from the Unionist side in NI that I've met have tended to be more British than the British, and in a way that hasn't been relevant to anyone in Britain for more than 50 years.

 

[LiamO]

It seems to me that you're talking more to Unionists than to British people here. You think anyone in Britain considers they have what they have 'thanks to the Queen'? People from the Unionist side in NI that I've met have tended to be more British than the British, and in a way that hasn't been relevant to anyone in Britain for more than 50 years.

No. I am simply having a little sport.

I agree entirely with the rest of your post though.

 

[Garek]

that I've met have tended to be more British than the British, and in a way that hasn't been relevant to anyone in Britain for more than 50 years.

This reminds me of Obama's rather patronising and clumsily put, though in some ways accurate, statement about people clinging to guns and religion because it was all they had.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

There is no doubt it was a little feudal estate run by the Unionist gentry, for the Unionist gentry.

This seems a fair judgement of the situation.

Given that, do you think that there could have been alternative courses to fight for civil rights to those taken by the IRA?

My biggest problem with the IRA and the likes of Adams, which would almost certainly have seen me fucking off from NI as soon as I could if I had grown up there, is the way that they assumed the position of an alternative authority, meting out punishments, imposing 'taxes', etc. I'd have said fuck you to both the British and the IRA.

If you see what he was leading as a civil rights movement, it wasn't very successful on those terms.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

This reminds me of Obama's rather patronising and clumsily put, though in some ways accurate, statement about people clinging to guns and religion because it was all they had.

It always happens with isolated, insular communities. They get left behind. Britain has changed culturally massively since 1950 in ways that NI hasn't.

 

[Garek]

Given that, do you think that there could have been alternative courses to fight for civil rights to those taken by the IRA?

There was the Northern Irish Civil Rights Association...

 

[littlebabyjesus]

There was the Northern Irish Civil Rights Association...

How, if at all, did they relate to the IRA? (genuine question – I don't know that much about this)

 

[Garek]

They didn't relate: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Ireland_Civil_Rights_Association

 

[littlebabyjesus]

What I'm basically asking, I think, is how much we should condemn the likes of Adams for the course they took – one of violence and not only that but one of authoritarianism. I can't judge what I 'owe' him until I've answered this question first.

 

[8den]

There is no doubt it was a little feudal estate run by the Unionist gentry, for the Unionist gentry.

Hmmm. A few years ago I worked on a documentary for BBC NI on the Ulster Workers Council Strike An event that most English posters on this board may be completely oblivious of.

One of the points of the documentary was that recently released documents showed just how close Harold Wilson was to abandoning the 6 counties to their own devices.

Whether it would be a little feudal estate at the start? No doubt about it, but wouldn't last. The Catholic civil rights movement would have been up in arms. And it was only 1970, that Haughey, who was then Minister for Finance, stood trial for sending friggin guns to IRA. And he wasn't exactly the most ardent republican (Yes LiamO that was sarcasm). Arms Crisis

A little feudal state for the Unionist gentry would last about a year, before the Irish invaded, and our weedy little army, and the IRA would still have walked over the pathetic Unionist state (and having been booted out of the union, it's unlikely Wilson would have lifted a fucking finger to help them).

Most UK posters have no idea just how fucking grim it was back in the early 1970s to be a Catholic in Northern Ireland. The Republic had honest to god refugee camps (later estates) for Catholics who had been run out of homes, often with the help of the B specials.

Mary Mc Aleese our current president, was one such refuge. The family business in Belfast was shot up, and her teenage brother had his throat slit, and he was already blind at the time this happened. Yes yes she's a FF (turn around and say her name three times and spit, and curse) but she's taken a hands on approach to the Peace Process.

I'd like to have seen Major, Ahern, Blair or Reynolds sit at the table with representatives of the people who assaulted their blind brother.

 

[N_igma]

I'd have said fuck you to both the British and the IRA.

You'd say that but if you grew up here you would think differently. From a very young age you are taught which side you're on and who the good and bad guys are.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

You'd say that but if you grew up here you would think differently. From a very young age you are taught which side you're on and who the good and bad guys are.

The NI people I worked with when I was in the US 20 years ago, who were mostly brought up Catholic, nearly all had this attitude. That's why they upped and left.

 

[N_igma]

The NI people I worked with when I was in the US 20 years ago, who were mostly brought up Catholic, nearly all had this attitude. That's why they upped and left.

Yeh I suppose it depends on what area you're from and class also has a major part to play.

 

[8den]

The NI people I worked with when I was in the US 20 years ago, who were mostly brought up Catholic, nearly all had this attitude. That's why they upped and left.

My parents did. I could have been brought up in Belfast, my dad saw what was going on before my sister was born and applied for and was lucky to get a job in the republic.

 

[Santino]

Have we got a ballpark figure yet?

 

[N_igma]

2 armalites and a SAM oughta do it.

 

[Jon-of-arc]

Fair enough. I can respect that viewpoint, but does it stand up to a little scrutiny?

Perhaps you could enlighten us how, exactly, we could have gotten from the situation in the mid 90's (Britain's airports & motorways closed often; a 'ring of steel around the city of London; Manchester city centre destroyed etc etc) to where we are now - without the input of Adams & Co. to break the impasse

What you think of Gerry Adams or what you think he might have been responsible for is not really the issue here. Like I said in the OP, Adams & the rest of the leadership could have just left as many had done before them. I'm sure gerry could have made a cleaned up on the after dinner circuit in the US - particularly if he was a 'man who had rejected vbiolence'.

To stay, adopt a pretty much 'heretic' strategy and to shift the Republican movement from the entrenched militarist position that was completely dominant at that time, to where it is now, is nothing short of remarkable. If you told IRA Volunteers at the time how things would pan out, they simply would not have believed you and laughed in your face... and would then have pointed their rifles in your direction.

Tell ya what, lets have a whip round. We'll see what the british people think they owe Gerry Adams...

Oh look, a ring pull from a 35p can of budget redbull, a couple of used syringes and a folded up bit of paper with the words "fuck of you child killing cunt" written inside.

We owe Gerry Adams the same as the NI people owe the British government - sweet jack fanny-adams diddly-shit all.

 

[LiamO]

Thank you for your incisive contribution. No need to ask if you have read the thread. Did you even bother to read the OP?

 

[Jon-of-arc]

no need to ask if you pay any attention to the bullshit you write, then, given that what I quoted was your own direct response to my first contribution.

Boring, thick, try-hard wanker.

 

[LiamO]

no need to ask if you pay any attention to the bullshit you write, then, given that what I quoted was your own direct response to my first contribution.

Boring, thick, try-hard wanker.

don't sit on the fence old son, get it off your chest.

Still maintain you haven't read the thread, given your post is in response to my post #29. we are now at 260-odd and you have treated us to another 'drive-by'. Incidentally, both of your posts indicate you either didn't read the OP or you simply did not understand it.

Give us a shout back when you have had a read and maybe learned something, there's a good chap. Oh, and enjoy your evening.

 

[Jon-of-arc]

Why on earth do I need to read a whole thread to reply to your reply to my reply?

And there's nothing in this thread that will make me believe that being the political figurehead of a terrorist organisation is anything but utterly despicable. The fact that the bombing campaign "worked" doesn't make it any less of a cuntish thing to do. They murdered innocent civilians, and Adams used these crimes (and the threat of continuation of them...) as political capital to achieve his own goals. Great! Fanks Gerry, and fanks Liam, for a Job Well Done!!!