Not because they do not have a right to stand – they do, of course. But because they haven't a snowball's chance in hell of ever getting enough votes to actually achieve anything. The WP – now that the Natural Law Party has given up – represents the last great example in Northern Ireland of the triumph of hope over experience. In fact it represents a good example of the triumph of hope over common sense, rationality, and even the efficient use of resources.
At local level the WP can, very occasionally, get a candidate elected – though possibly the last was in Craigavon in 1993. They have two local councillors in the south, but none in the north. In the most recent local elections in the north they polled a paltry 1,052 votes (0.15% of the total), standing in only 4 Council districts (Belfast (5 candidates), Craigavon (1 candidate), Down (1 candidate), and Magherafelt (1 candidate).
In the Assembly they have never had a single MLA elected, and in 2007 received only 975 votes (0.14% of the total). They stood in all four Belfast constituencies, and in Lagan Valley and South Antrim.
In the most recent Westminster elections (2005) their vote was a respectable (for them) 1,669 (0.23% of the total). Needless to say they lost their deposits in all six constituencies that they contested (the four Belfast constituencies, Upper Bann and Mid Ulster).
Logic would tell a small radical party like the Workers' Party that its chances in elections with a high success threshold are tiny, and that its resources might be better spent on building up a grass-roots organisation. If a party cannot even get a local councillor elected, then its hopes of getting an MP elected are zero.
And yet this year, as in every election year since its foundation, the WP will call on its members to find the £500 deposit required of each candidate – despite knowing that this money is already lost (a candidate who receives less than 5% of the vote 'forfeits' his/her deposit). If the WP again stands 6 candidates this represents £3,000 that the WP is voluntarily contributing … to what? ... the running expenses of the Electoral Office?
Does the WP have a strategy for its participation in elections? Does it have any strategy at all? Commitment is all well and good, but surely wilful waste makes woeful want?
32 comments:
The really sad thing is that there were and presumably still are some good people in the WP (well, you could hardly accuse them of jumping on the bandwagon). But rarely has any group of people been shackled with such a cracked take on Irish history. I remember WP members in the Students Union in Coleraine telling me straight-facedly that the SDLP (then the top dog in Nationalism) was a fascist organisation and that the Orange Order was 'essentially progressive' - because of its hatred for the reactionary forces of Irish seperatism and Catholicism. They called this tortured thinking 'dialectal materialism' but I think Orwell was closer with 'Doublespeak'.
Nordie Northsider,
However cracked the WP are/were, my all-time least favourites were the (now happily defunct) BICO (British and Irish Communist Organisation) who managed to find themselves supporting unionism through some convoluted reasoning. They were vehemently anti-nationalist (unless it was of the orange variety), and opposed Irish, Welsh and Scoittish nationalism. They were pro-Khmer Rouge, pro-Israel, and all sorts of other things. They were actually a dangerously fanatical group of people (yes, I knew several ... )
But they were oddly popular with many unionists, including Trimble (check their article on Wikipedia).
They subsequently turned against their own 'two nations' theory and now support a UI. They changed positions on almost everything before dwindling away. A wierd, troubled group of people who, like many fanatics, were often very intelligent - just deeply wrong (half the time).
Yes indeed, The WP were respected in The Unionist community and not only amongst the usual suspects (older UVF types).
It has often struck me how forward looking The Sticks were as regards NI. They saw what was developing was a bloody sectarian nightmare that would put back or even destroy any hopes of Irish Unity.
You see, what PIRA failed to understand was, that unlike the lads of 1916-1922 who drew their support from a relatively homogeneous community and could present their cause as purely a war of national liberation (whatever the truth was), NI in '69 contained a million Ulster British who saw themselves as separate from The Catholic Irish and had to be accounted for.
PIRA never really understood that a campaign of the nature as they fought it was effectively a great gamble. Win and you get a UI, but lose and the chances of Irish Unity would be badly damaged or even destroyed. They totally failed to understand the commitment of Loyalists to staying out of a UI and the commitment of The UK State to honouring it's commitments to Unionist consent. Abject failures.
The Stickies outpolled RSF in West Belfast at the most recent Assembly elections.
For that I salute them!
Anonymous @ 16 March 2010 18:56
The big difference between PIRA and OIRA was that PIRA styled themselves as defenders of Catholics. So they knew full well about the "Ulster British"... Their raison d'etre was protecting Catholics from the more unruly elements of the Unionist side.
Probably not helpful in terms of community relations. And, I would agree that it hasn't brought unity closer. But whether their strategy was an abject failure... Well, Unionists in London and Belfast are scrabbling to prevent a Sinn Feiner becoming First Minister. Whereas the Worker's Party have got precisely zero influence.
I don't know what logic the two 'Anons' are using in determining that the PIRA campaign advanced us no further towards unity.
Before they started we had an almost exclusively protestant RUC baton charging civil rights marchers. Now we have a party whose raison d'etre is unification sharing government. We have north/south ministerial councils and Britain has at last declared that whenever the people of the north want to rejoin the rest of Ireland that they will not obstruct it.
It may have taken terrible methods to achieve it, but it doesn't sound like much of a failure to me.
Anonymous said:
"The big difference between PIRA and OIRA was that PIRA styled themselves as defenders of Catholics. So they knew full well about the "Ulster British"... Their raison d'etre was protecting Catholics from the more unruly elements of the Unionist side."
Fascinating stuff and of course a damning indictment. In other words PIRA were a sectarian organisation as OIRA maintained and as Unionists claim. They remain a community based political entity to this day and can hardly claim to be Irish Republicans. Catholic Nationalists perhaps...
"Probably not helpful in terms of community relations. And, I would agree that it hasn't brought unity closer. But whether their strategy was an abject failure... Well, Unionists in London and Belfast are scrabbling to prevent a Sinn Feiner becoming First Minister. Whereas the Worker's Party have got precisely zero influence."
Abject failures in the sense that they have damaged Irish Republican goals. A success in promoting themselves as a community based grouping at the expense of The SDLP. Well done...
NTNA said:
"I don't know what logic the two 'Anons' are using in determining that the PIRA campaign advanced us no further towards unity. Before they started we had an almost exclusively protestant RUC baton charging civil rights marchers."
And following the start of PIRA's campaign you had 'bloody Sunday', internment, thousands of Catholics imprisoned, McGurks Bar, The Shankill Butchers, Greysteel, mass unemployment, punishment beatings, etc, etc, etc. What a triumph of self defence!
"Now we have a party whose raison d'etre is unification sharing government."
It doesn't matter what their 'raison d'etre is, they are not in a position to deliver - thanks primarily to PIRA's campaign.
"We have north/south ministerial councils"
Which pale into insignificance compared with the links that exist between The UK and The ROI thanks to The EU.
"and Britain has at last declared that whenever the people of the north want to rejoin the rest of Ireland that they will not obstruct it."
Which Stormount (representing the people of NI) had the right to agree anyway, long before PIRA started it's campaign.
"It may have taken terrible methods to achieve it, but it doesn't sound like much of a failure to me."
See above.
"And following the start of PIRA's campaign..." yadda yadda yadda. Prior to PIRA's campaign there was a wee bit of violence towards Catholics too you know. Four centuries of it. I'm not going to list the ways in which Catholics are better off now than they were 40 years ago; you should know them already. Catholics in Northern Ireland have better opportunities and rights now than any Irish RC living under British Rule has ever had since the Battle of the Boyne.
Then again, maybe you don't know this. You don't even know how to spell our parliament's name.
Anonymous said:
""And following the start of PIRA's campaign..." yadda yadda yadda."
You're not from North America are you?
"Prior to PIRA's campaign there was a wee bit of violence towards Catholics too you know. Four centuries of it."
Four centuries of it! LOL. I think the furthest it's worth going back is to partition, if that. According to people like you, Germany should seize back Silesia, Pomerania and East Prussia from Poland - after all they only lost those German speaking lands half a century ago. Do you ever stop to think how stupid Irish Nationalists appear talking about events 400 years ago, as if they're yesterday and not centuries prior to The US being formed? Absolutely laughable - only in Ireland!
"I'm not going to list the ways in which Catholics are better off now than they were 40 years ago; you should know them already."
And you think PIRA brought about those changes do you? They wouldn't have happened anyway? Forty odd years ago, people in England could put up signs saying NO BLACKS - times change you know, even without blowing children's arms and legs off.
"times change you know, even without blowing children's arms and legs off."
They do indeed. Witness the reunification of our country within the next generation or so.
And not a day too soon!
What a pair of day dreamers. I'd hate to spend my life wishing on a star...
"And following the start of PIRA's campaign you had 'bloody Sunday', internment, thousands of Catholics imprisoned, McGurks Bar, The Shankill Butchers, Greysteel, mass unemployment, punishment beatings, etc, etc, etc. What a triumph of self defence!"
And following all that, a say for Dublin in Northern Irish affairs, equal rights for Catholics in jobs and government, the end of gerrymandering, the PSNI, Nationalists in ministerial positions, and a guaranteed right to reunite Ireland if and when the majority so wish. None of that came from peaceful marches in the 1960s. It SHOULD have, but the intransigence of Unionists made the kinds of things you listed necessary to get where things are today... which is where they SHOULD have been over 90 years ago.
"Which Stormount (representing the people of NI) had the right to agree anyway, long before PIRA started it's campaign."
And which they made a dead letter of when they opted out of the Free State on that day that will live in infamy, Dec. 7 (though in that case, 1922, rather than 1941), and by subsequently gerrymandering Catholics out of political existence for the next 50 years. Don't be coy. The Provos' campaign RESTORED a right stolen and denied.
"According to people like you, Germany should seize back Silesia, Pomerania and East Prussia from Poland - after all they only lost those German speaking lands half a century ago."
If the Germans had been holding Essex since 1940, wouldn't you want it back? And if they'd spent a couple of generations stuffing the place with families from Frankfurt and Cologne, goose-stepping up and down streets where the Union Jack was banned and spouting off about how the "majority" there wanted to remain German, just how much ice would that cut with you? I'm curious.
"And you think PIRA brought about those changes do you?"
Yep. Do you remember what happened to the folks who tried to march in Derry in '68? Or from Belfast to Derry in '69? Watching the fate of people who tried to play by the rules was what brought the PIRA back after the failure of the Border Campaign.
"times change you know, even without blowing children's arms and legs off."
Yeah, and without children having to risk being shot down dead in the streets of Derry by an army their own parents' taxes armed against them to deny the rights for which they marched. Yeah. Times change, because someone FORCES them to change.
Paddy Canuck said:
""And following the start of PIRA's campaign you had 'bloody Sunday', internment, thousands of Catholics imprisoned, McGurks Bar, The Shankill Butchers, Greysteel, mass unemployment, punishment beatings, etc, etc, etc. What a triumph of self defence!"
And following all that, a say for Dublin in Northern Irish affairs, equal rights for Catholics in jobs and government, the end of gerrymandering, the PSNI, Nationalists in ministerial positions, and a guaranteed right to reunite Ireland if and when the majority so wish. None of that came from peaceful marches in the 1960s."
You assume that all these changes came about as the result of PIRA violence - I'm not so sure. You seem to believe in violence as a way of achieving political goals. If there is ever an attempt to impose a United Ireland on The Ulster British will you be as sympathetic towards large car bombs being planted in crowded Irish shopping centres by Loyalists? Especially if it brings about the desired political results?
"It SHOULD have, but the intransigence of Unionists made the kinds of things you listed necessary to get where things are today... which is where they SHOULD have been over 90 years ago."
Well thankyou for confirming your belief in the necessity of using violence to achieve political goals. Of course, you don't live on the island of Ireland and as such can adopt such a casual attitude to scraping babies of the street and into plastic bags. The phrase 'on another man's wound' springs to mind...
""Which Stormount (representing the people of NI) had the right to agree anyway, long before PIRA started it's campaign."
And which they made a dead letter of when they opted out of the Free State on that day that will live in infamy, Dec. 7 (though in that case, 1922, rather than 1941), and by subsequently gerrymandering Catholics out of political existence for the next 50 years. Don't be coy. "
But you see my North American friend, Stormount constituencies weren't gerrymandered in any way, shape, or form and as such were representative of the Northern Irish people as a whole. So there's been no change in NI's right to vote itself into a UI following The Belfast Agreement - oh, apart from the fact the final say now rests with a UK Secretary of State.
"The Provos' campaign RESTORED a right stolen and denied."
No it didn't - see above. In fact their campaign resulted in The ROI withdrawing it's claims to NI and amending it's constitution accordingly. As for North/South bodies, they also deliver a UK input (through Stormount) into the affairs of The ROI. Provo progress indeed.
Paddy Canuck said:
""And following the start of PIRA's campaign you had 'bloody Sunday', internment, thousands of Catholics imprisoned, McGurks Bar, The Shankill Butchers, Greysteel, mass unemployment, punishment beatings, etc, etc, etc. What a triumph of self defence!"
And following all that, a say for Dublin in Northern Irish affairs, equal rights for Catholics in jobs and government, the end of gerrymandering, the PSNI, Nationalists in ministerial positions, and a guaranteed right to reunite Ireland if and when the majority so wish. None of that came from peaceful marches in the 1960s."
You assume that all these changes came about as the result of PIRA violence - I'm not so sure. You seem to believe in violence as a way of achieving political goals. If there is ever an attempt to impose a United Ireland on The Ulster British will you be as sympathetic towards large car bombs being planted in crowded Irish shopping centres by Loyalists? Especially if it brings about the desired political results?
"It SHOULD have, but the intransigence of Unionists made the kinds of things you listed necessary to get where things are today... which is where they SHOULD have been over 90 years ago."
Well thankyou for confirming your belief in the necessity of using violence to achieve political goals. Of course, you don't live on the island of Ireland and as such can adopt such a casual attitude to scraping babies of the street and into plastic bags. The phrase 'on another man's wound' springs to mind...
""Which Stormount (representing the people of NI) had the right to agree anyway, long before PIRA started it's campaign."
And which they made a dead letter of when they opted out of the Free State on that day that will live in infamy, Dec. 7 (though in that case, 1922, rather than 1941), and by subsequently gerrymandering Catholics out of political existence for the next 50 years. Don't be coy. "
But you see my North American friend, Stormount constituencies weren't gerrymandered in any way, shape, or form and as such were representative of the Northern Irish people as a whole. So there's been no change in NI's right to vote itself into a UI following The Belfast Agreement - oh, apart from the fact the final say now rests with a UK Secretary of State.
"The Provos' campaign RESTORED a right stolen and denied."
No it didn't - see above. In fact their campaign resulted in The ROI withdrawing it's claims to NI and amending it's constitution accordingly. As for North/South bodies, they also deliver a UK input (through Stormount) into the affairs of The ROI. Provo progress indeed.
Paddy Canuck said:
""According to people like you, Germany should seize back Silesia, Pomerania and East Prussia from Poland - after all they only lost those German speaking lands half a century ago."
If the Germans had been holding Essex since 1940, wouldn't you want it back? And if they'd spent a couple of generations stuffing the place with families from Frankfurt and Cologne, goose-stepping up and down streets where the Union Jack was banned and spouting off about how the "majority" there wanted to remain German, just how much ice would that cut with you? I'm curious."
Like many ill informed North Americans you have a strong tendency to answer questions that haven't in any, way, shape or form been asked. Perhaps it's a cultural thing? What I was pointing out is that The Irish have a strong tendency to live in the distant past without actually learning anything from it. Now why don't you answer my question? Can The Germans now recover Silesia, Pomerania and East Prussia, which were not only part of Germany for centuries, but also fully comprised of ethnic Germans prior to WWII? If so, will you require The Poles living there now to leave?
""And you think PIRA brought about those changes do you?"
Yep. Do you remember what happened to the folks who tried to march in Derry in '68? Or from Belfast to Derry in '69? Watching the fate of people who tried to play by the rules was what brought the PIRA back after the failure of the Border Campaign."
And you assume that had there been no PIRA murder campaign that there would have been no political or other changes in NI? I doubt that. Demographic change for one thing would have had an enormous effect, as it has done.
""times change you know, even without blowing children's arms and legs off."
Yeah, and without children having to risk being shot down dead in the streets of Derry by an army their own parents' taxes armed against them to deny the rights for which they marched. Yeah. Times change, because someone FORCES them to change."
What a laugh you are Paddy. 'Bloody Sunday' followed the commencement of The IRA's campaign and has to be placed firmly in that context. Context is something you find extremely hard to account for for some reason. Again, it might be that North American political style. I have, to be honest, come across it from US Loyalist sympathisers as well. It grates with The UK temperament to say the least.
http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scotsol/homepage/news/2897105/Scotlands-not-working-as-unemployment-soars.html
http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scotsol/homepage/news/2898691/The-staggering-rise-of-Scotlands-public-sector.html
"You seem to believe in violence as a way of achieving political goals."
Not as a primary option. But I'm not talking about forcing Northern Ireland into the Republic. I'm talking about what it took just to normalize life for Catholics in the statelet. When peaceful marchers, who were trying to get fairness in housing, policing, employment, and voter rights – regardless of what country they happened to be in at the moment – were first met with bricks and bottles, and finally bullets, then you tell me who it was who brought violence as a method into the issue. To my mind, after 1968, there were two options for the Catholic people of Northern Ireland: shut up and take it, in which case there would have been no impetus whatsoever for either Stormont or Westminster to have changed the status quo of what was a quasi-apartheid state, or to raise the stakes. They chose the latter, as anyone with an ounce of self-respect – not to mention self-preservation – must do, and that is, sadly, how those goals were achieved.
"If there is ever an attempt to impose a United Ireland on The Ulster British"
Define "imposed". And again, the constitutional statue of the North was not in the set of achieved goals listed previously, so you should be asking something more like "if Ulster Protestants suddenly found themselves being shot down in the streets of a united Ireland for demanding their councils not be gerrymanded so they have no control of their own neighbourhoods, would you...?" And yeah, in that case, I'd say they had a legitimate casus belli. Anytime someone's brutalized just for raising their hand, they automatically start off with my sympathy.
"Of course, you don't live on the island of Ireland and as such can adopt such a casual attitude to scraping babies of the street and into plastic bags."
If that's how you characterize the attitude, then clearly it doesn't require living outside the island of Ireland to adopt it. Apparently so could the unionists of Northern Ireland, because they evidently preferred "scraping babies of the street and into plastic bags" even to simply giving Catholics equal rights. It took the abolition of their abused privilege of self-government to even get that ball rolling, and another 30 years to accomplish it, however shakily.
"The phrase 'on another man's wound' springs to mind..."
Yeah, the whole history of Ireland for the last 800 years in a nutshell.
"Stormount constituencies weren't gerrymandered in any way, shape, or form"
So explain to the world, please, how it is that no Catholic ever held ministerial office in Northern Ireland between partition and direct rule, and how no major piece of Catholic-sponsored legislation ever made it to the books except for The Protection of Wild Birds Act. Why gerrymander when you evidently don't have to?
"So there's been no change in NI's right to vote itself into a UI following The Belfast Agreement"
Yes, there was. The North was offered an opt out in 1922, which it exercised. Please show us where the act offered it a retroactive "opt back in".
"But you see my North American friend, Stormount constituencies"
StorMONT. There's no "u" in it; even your North American friends know that. Maybe you're just reading one in courtesy of your unionist glasses.
"Like many ill informed North Americans you have a strong tendency to answer questions that haven't in any, way, shape or form been asked. Perhaps it's a cultural thing?"
And many unionists squirm and change the subject rather than have to answer them. It's DEFINITELY a cultural thing. Grow a pair; answer the question. If part of what you consider your country was invaded, occupied, and populated by people who not only denied your nationality but actually persecuted those who did, how would you feel and what would you consider a valid response to that? We'll let Germany answer that in its own way... I'm asking YOU.
"And you assume that had there been no PIRA murder campaign that there would have been no political or other changes in NI?"
Precisely. Just like if there'd been no ANC in South Africa.
"Demographic change for one thing would have had an enormous effect, as it has done."
The Catholic population in the North has been growing since 1922. It was over 2/3 of the population of Derry in the 1960s, and yet, it controlled far less than half the council seats. How did demographics have "an enormous effect" on that injustice, for instance? I'll tell you how... that injustice was in fact a RESPONSE to demographic change. The "enormous effect" was a NEGATIVE one for Catholics. And when they raised the issue, they were bloodied in the streets. Don't try to tell me they were met with liberality and understanding and a gentle bowing to the inevitable. There's surely a crock at the end of your wee unionist rainbow, but it ain't filled with gold; not for Catholics.
"'Bloody Sunday' followed the commencement of The IRA's campaign and has to be placed firmly in that context."
So because some Britons are off killing people in Afghanistan and Iraq today, that justifies murdering their peaceful civilians in the subway on 7/7? I mean, we're putting this firmly in the context... right? Or let me guess; having raised the point and having had it turned around, you're now going to do what you did at the outset: ignore the question, change the subject, and squirm away.
Paddy Canuck Said:
""You seem to believe in violence as a way of achieving political goals."
Not as a primary option. But I'm not talking about forcing Northern Ireland into the Republic. I'm talking about what it took just to normalize life for Catholics in the statelet..."
I don't believe for one moment that the direct discrimination that existed in NI prior to 1969 would have continued indefinitely. According to your view point divorce and contraception and homosexuality would still be illegal in The ROI and signs saying 'NO BLACKS' would still be posted in England. Things do change and they usually change without violence. Civil rights would have been imposed by The UK State (as they eventually were), in line with other 'progressive' changes across The UK. Again, you fail to address the context of Unionist/Loyalist reaction to The Civil Rights Movement, which was widely assumed to be a Republican front (rightly or wrongly). Context is everything.
""If there is ever an attempt to impose a United Ireland on The Ulster British"
Define "imposed". And again, the constitutional statue of the North was not in the set of achieved goals listed previously, so you should be asking something more like "if Ulster Protestants suddenly found themselves being shot down in the streets of a united Ireland for demanding their councils not be gerrymanded so they have no control of their own neighbourhoods, would you...?" And yeah, in that case, I'd say they had a legitimate casus belli. Anytime someone's brutalized just for raising their hand, they automatically start off with my sympathy."
You're just selective in your support for violence (as are we all). Where we differ is that I don't see anything in pre-1969 NI that would merit the ferocity of The Provo campaign. In any case, they claimed to fight for a UI, not to resolve a selection of social issues - and I for one believed them.
""Of course, you don't live on the island of Ireland and as such can adopt such a casual attitude to scraping babies of the street and into plastic bags."
If that's how you characterize the attitude, then clearly it doesn't require living outside the island of Ireland to adopt it. Apparently so could the unionists of Northern Ireland, because they evidently preferred "scraping babies of the street and into plastic bags" even to simply giving Catholics equal rights. It took the abolition of their abused privilege of self-government to even get that ball rolling, and another 30 years to accomplish it, however shakily."
Those who commit acts of violence are responsible for those acts. As I say, there was nothing in NI prior to '69 to merit The Provo onslaught. Again, PIRA did not fight for civil rights, but for an independent UI - the clue's in their name.
""Stormount constituencies weren't gerrymandered in any way, shape, or form"
So explain to the world, please, how it is that no Catholic ever held ministerial office in Northern Ireland between partition and direct rule, and how no major piece of Catholic-sponsored legislation ever made it to the books except for The Protection of Wild Birds Act. Why gerrymander when you evidently don't have to?"
Got it in one. Unionists had a majority so could pass what laws they saw fit, as in any other democracy. Why didn't The Irish Free State have power sharing following partition? Not just with any remaining Unionists, but between pro and anti treaty factions?
Gerald Benedict Newe served as Minister of State in the PM's office. Newe was the only Catholic to serve in a Northern Ireland Government during the 51 years operation of the Government of Ireland Act 1920. He served from 1971-1972.
Paddy Canuck Said:
"And many unionists squirm and change the subject rather than have to answer them. It's DEFINITELY a cultural thing. Grow a pair; answer the question. If part of what you consider your country was invaded, occupied, and populated by people who not only denied your nationality but actually persecuted those who did, how would you feel and what would you consider a valid response to that? We'll let Germany answer that in its own way... I'm asking YOU."
Sorry, when and where did all this happen?
""And you assume that had there been no PIRA murder campaign that there would have been no political or other changes in NI?"
Precisely. Just like if there'd been no ANC in South Africa."
Ah, The ANC and South Africa. Actually, you're making my point for me. The ANC was militarily useless! If all The South African State had to concern itself with was The ANC's military wing, there'd still be apartheid today. Apartheid was ended in South Africa because of international pressure, not the odd 'necklacing' of blacks by other blacks. By the way, it's best not to compare apartheid era South Africa with NI pre-1969 - even most Irish Nationalists find the comparison embarrassing.
""Demographic change for one thing would have had an enormous effect, as it has done."
The Catholic population in the North has been growing since 1922."
Not really. It was about a third up until the eighties.
"It was over 2/3 of the population of Derry in the 1960s, and yet, it controlled far less than half the council seats. How did demographics have "an enormous effect" on that injustice, for instance?"
As a population grows it's voice gets louder - simple as that. Even if Stormont had remained under the old electoral system, there'd have been a large Nationalist block elected by now.
Hoboroad said:
"Gerald Benedict Newe served as Minister of State in the PM's office. Newe was the only Catholic to serve in a Northern Ireland Government during the 51 years operation of the Government of Ireland Act 1920. He served from 1971-1972."
Hardly surprising given that NI was a grossly divided society. In any case 'Catholics' (or more accurately Nationalists) had no interest in making NI work - in fact they wanted it destroyed and were led to believe that would happen. Led to believe this by Nationalist politicians in The Free State/Republic who used NI in the same way Hitler used The Jews, as a diversion. Corrupt politicians came to a concordat with The Catholic hierarchy who were given a free reign in The South in return for supporting The South's claim to NI. We all now know what price the people of The Free State/Republic paid for this Franco style arrangement.
"I don't believe for one moment that the direct discrimination that existed in NI prior to 1969 would have continued indefinitely."
What, are you nuts? It's a feature of life in Northern Ireland TODAY, and that's WITH the Troubles and the GFA. All that's gone is the official sanction... and look what it took just to achieve THAT.
"According to your view point divorce and contraception and homosexuality would still be illegal in The ROI and signs saying 'NO BLACKS' would still be posted in England."
So how many divorce-seekers, condom advocates, and gays were shot down in the streets of Limerick, Cork, and Dublin to achieve THEIR civil rights? How long did Wicklow have to hold out as a Gardai no-go zone to get the Pill on the shelves? Do tell. I'd love to hear the body counts that make your example analogous to what was going on in Northern Ireland...
"Civil rights would have been imposed by The UK State"
Yeah, THEY WERE. That's the point. And it only happened once it was clear it WASN'T forthcoming domestically, and that people were being KILLED over it. And even then, they had to pussyfoot around it for 30 years because of buttheads like Reverend Redacted and his hate-headed legions.
"You're just selective in your support for violence (as are we all)."
No I'm not; I just told you if the Protestants of a united Ireland found themselves oppressed in the same fashion as Catholics in NI with no alternatives, I'd understand. If you're asking me if I support them blowing up Ireland for no other reason than that a democratic majority voted for a different constitutional arrangement, that's not at all the same question.
"Where we differ is that I don't see anything in pre-1969 NI that would merit the ferocity of The Provo campaign."
I can't speak everything done by everyone over 30 years or more, can I can certainly see the merits of what had to be undertaken in Derry and parts of Belfast. And like it or not, it was the agony of Northern Ireland and the embarrassment that caused the British that brought about real negotiations and the changes we see today. There's absolutely no way that was going to happen if peaceful taigs just kept lining up in the streets to be knocked out from under their placards, year after year, generation after generation, and you know it.
"In any case, they claimed to fight for a UI, not to resolve a selection of social issues"
If my government made it clear they weren't going to give me my rights – that simple "selection of social issues" upon which the ship had long since sailed – I'd eventually abandon any semblance of allegiance to it, too, in favour of something else. Honest to God, what did you expect after 1969? To quote Mr. Jefferson: " We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness."
"Those who commit acts of violence are responsible for those acts. As I say, there was nothing in NI prior to '69 to merit The Provo onslaught."
You're wrong. And when those who beat down and finally shot down the marchers are brought to justice for their responsibility, then there'll be some steel to your point. Till then, it's a hollow mockery.
"Unionists had a majority so could pass what laws they saw fit"
And what was there about unionism that meant that Catholics were conspicuously absent from among their ranks to share in that power... and still are? There are Protestants in the SDLP and Sinn Fein... where are they in the DUP and how many are there in the UUP, even now?
"Why didn't The Irish Free State have power sharing following partition?"
What, you mean like having Protestant senators and presidents and cabinet ministers...? Uh, they did, actually.
"Sorry, when and where did all this happen?"
In historical reality, after the Norman invasion of Ireland. Hypothetically, after the German invasion of England. Are you just going to dance around the minutiae or are you actually going to muster the guts to answer a tough question?
"Apartheid was ended in South Africa because of international pressure"
What, and you think apartheid in Northern Ireland wasn't? It's the violence that kept it in the news, here and there. NICRA marches, Sharpville; Bloody Sunday, Soweto. That the blacks in South Africa didn't have the means to push back, and Johannesburg couldn't have its plugged pulled from Westminster, was all to the benefit of the whites. Given the Catholics in Northern Ireland were an artificially-created minority, I'd say they did pretty well to get as far as they did in the face of similar intransigence and willingness to use state terror against them.
"even most Irish Nationalists find the comparison embarrassing."
I highly doubt that. There wouldn't have BEEN any Troubles in the first place if people thought they were doing just fine under good ol' John Bull's Sunkist Oranges.
"Not really. It was about a third up until the eighties."
Yeah, Catholics didn't discover sex till disco was passé, sure. Pull the other one; it plays Jingle Bells. The Catholic population of Northern Ireland has increased 24% in absolute terms since 1961. Ten percent of that 24%, or 2/5 of it, occurred from 1961 to 1981. See http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/ni/popul.htm#cath. So yes, really, for as far back as I can find stats, it's been steadily growing, and despite that, the willingness to accommodate them got harder and meaner till RUC men were herding marchers into unionist ambushes.
"As a population grows it's voice gets louder - simple as that."
And in most places, that gets legislative action. But in Northern Ireland, it was met with violence, both official and casual. You may be naïve about that, but I'm not.
"Even if Stormont had remained under the old electoral system, there'd have been a large Nationalist block elected by now."
And how much you wanna bet one of them would be education minister, much less Deputy First Minister?
"Gerald Benedict Newe served as Minister of State... from 1971-1972."
Pretty much says it all, doesn't it? Token taig in the terminal ticks.
FAO Paddy:
You're hopelessly brainwashed aren't you? I have heard a similar approach from some Loyalists, but I regard them as unhelpful to The Unionist cause. Perhaps you should reflect on that.
I'm assuming you actually give a toss either way...
"I have heard a similar approach from some Loyalists, but I regard them as unhelpful to The Unionist cause. Perhaps you should reflect on that."
Well, in general terms, I'm hoping to be unhelpful to the unionist cause myself, at least in the long run. So thank you for that.
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