Is squeezing the lifeblood out of Protestant Londonderry, modern Derry’s quiet disgrace?
Today an existing group of Church of Ireland parishes of “St Peter’s, Culmore and Muff are to be amalgamated with the parish of Christ Church. The move means that one parish will serve an area stretching from Derry city centre right into Co Donegal”. As this University of Ulster report noted between 1971 and 1991 the Protestant population on the Cityside of the river declined by some 83.4%. When Londonderry and Foyle College leaves for the other side of the river, only a tiny community of Protestants in the Fountain area will be left. The often sterile quarrel over the legitimacy of the city’s official name, Londonderry, belies the underlying reality of profoundly separated human lives, rather than the genuinely shared future our leading politicians have committed to through their ministerial pledge.
Posted by IJP on Sep 04, 2007 @ 11:05 PM
Majority Rule was WRONG in 1921, it was WRONG in 1968, it was WRONG in 1972… and guess what – it’s WRONG in 2007!
This is Derry we’re talking about, it was MINORITY rule in 1968, a situation you seem to want to bring back.
“Which is just what happens when you let those evil hatemongering Jaffas run things.”
No, which was what did happen when Unionists politicians had a monopoly on power. That’s just historical fact, Sammy and sarcasm isn’t going to change it.
“You’re now occupying the classic Republican position which is “We would never be bigoted, not like those knuckle dragging Huns.†Either consociationalism is right or it’s wrong; saying its right when they’re in a majority but not when we’re in a majority isn’t actually terribly consistent.”
No Sammy, I am most definitely not saying that. Tyranny of a Republican majority is just as wrong as tyranny of a Unionist majority. But the general principle of majoritarian democracy is not wrong, otherwise practically all the Democratic world is wrong. The question is how to ensure proper checks and balances.
Context matters. So in some situations, consociationalism is right, and in some it is wrong. In general I prefer democracy by normal simple majority backed by a strong constitution and strong oversight (stronger than in the Republic, by the by, but the system there is helped by the fact PR makes even simple majorities difficult for one party). However, I have no trust whatsoever in Unionist politicians, or the fact that they still have an inbuilt majority with limited scope for change, so I support consociationalism here. If it was in the reverse, I would still accept it because I can see we’d get nowhere without it. It’s useful where there is a complete lack of trust.
But it also has limits. We have majoritarianism on the National Question. So it is perfectly consistent on this type of issue to say that there is a binary choice, and majoritarianism should apply like it does elsewhere.
But I am happy and I’ll bet most Nationalists are happy to compromise, if one is proposed, or at least talked about. I have already said it, others have already said it, and Nationalist politicians have proposed some. Unionists have not. So they bear some responsibility for keeping the poison in the system.
Brief thoughts.
The nationalist majority in Derry is absolute, and nothing around the name is going to change that.
Whether it stays Londonderry, commuted to the common name Derry, the two given shared billing, or the ‘walled city’ called Londonderry. I suppose you could a kind of partition as they have in New Hampshire and establish a separate town on the Waterside and call it Londonderry.
But: there is no local mechanism for changing the name. And, to make things more complicated, time is also ticking down for Derry City Council, the obvious authoritative forum for gathering a practical consensus.
Mick,
Perhaps it’s time one were called into being. Seems a simple enough piece of legislation to me, and I can’t see QE2 being unduly distressed about such a thorny decision being taken out of her hands.
Perhaps the good peeps of nearby Muff could obtain a similar empowerment :0)
‘Calling things into being’ is precisely what the Peace Process was all about. The ‘Londonderry’ problem appears to have been one of several that were filed in the ‘too difficult to do anything about so let’s do nothing’ folder.
Mick,
LOL. I for one am delighted with the way the Peace Process is panning out. We’re seeing the hitherto unthinkable happening, such as Paisley talking to Dublin about animal welfare, to take one small example.
If the Londonderry question exercises so many peeps (perhaps even more than does the fighting dogs issue) then it should be up there on the agenda.
I used to think it was a ludicrous issue, not worth bothering about, but now that I see the ramifications — thanks to the many hundreds of posts here — I understand its importance and believe it should be tackled toot sweet.
I suspect ‘masterly inactivity’ is more likely on the cards, in part because the subject is capable of stirring more than 350 comments. This looks like a bottom up problem. I suspect that no one at the top will spend their hard earned political capital pushing it through unless there is a agreement at base.
Mick,
“Bottom up”, as in someone outside politics suggesting a competition to rename the city completely?
Isn’t it often referred to as the Maiden City? So what would be wrong with plain ol’ Maiden? Would it not send out the message that the city is NI’s flagship of the, er, new dispensation?
Dawk – her goes another 350 !!!
http://www.qub.ac.uk/c-star/pubs/lloydetal.pdf
Not for the fainthearted but does show the degree of “spatial variation in segregation” over there.
Dawks
think your on to something
Name : Maiden City
Divided into : Derry Quarter
Old Walled Londonderry Quarter
Waterside Quarter
Plus i thing the tourists get a kick out things like this. brochures are always full of the ‘old town’ and such and such quarter
jpeters, I don’t think your idea adds up……..
LOL! quarter short? maybe the fountain quarter?
I suspect ‘masterly inactivity’ is more likely on the cards, in part because the subject is capable of stirring more than 350 comments. This looks like a bottom up problem. I suspect that no one at the top will spend their hard earned political capital pushing it through unless there is a agreement at base.
Posted by Mick Fealty on Sep 05, 2007 @ 01:26 PM
‘This subject’, the name of the city, did not generate 350 comments. Your attack on the people of Derry as being especially sectarian compared to the rest and driving out the defenceless minority in their midst is what generated the heat. The name change issue is nowhere near so heated and has been conducted in a fairly calm manner, when it is not presented as a means for entirely innocent people to atone for their ‘disgrace’.
Well said Briso!
Now before this descends back down the rocky road we have just come by, let me admit that the thread has created more than its fair share of heat and light. Some of it fairly unpleasant. But let me also try to explain what base matter I’ve been puzzling at through all of this.
Wittgenstein’s advice to himself when he was puzzling out the relationship between language and the world about him:
We’ve been round and round the garden on the name debate for the last five years on Slugger and elsewhere and, as I have noted above, it is a profoundly sterile debate. All the more so now the process of judicial challenges have come to an end.
So let’s look again at the title:
Is squeezing the lifeblood out of Protestant Londonderry, modern Derry’s quiet disgrace?
It is a question, not a neat statement of fact. But does clearly imply that the name and Derry’s Protestant population ‘drift’ are tightly related. It doesn’t say how, just takes it as axiomatic that they are. The question of whether or not it is a disgrace is deliberately left open, but I suspect simply asking it in this way is what is responsible for the intense heat on this thread.
None of the information is new. The UU report is two years old and the census data is 16 years old. Neither is the linkage. It is muttered about in Protestant Derry, but, and again the Journal editorial would seem to bear this out, it is simply waved away as a irrelevance by Nationalist Derry.
Taken in isolation, the name debate has easily been pitched as the Prods kicking up, because they can’t stand the idea that they ‘lost’. Let this thread stand as exhibit C on that count. It is replete with multiple character assassinations of a small sub set of the people of Derry with one commenter talking (quite seriously apparently) about making them behave like ‘human beings’.
But when you broaden the view to take in the traumatic experience of Protestant Derry during the troubles, the picture changes somewhat. The view may not be a clear one, but it is a more complete picture in which to view the name debate and the city’s treatment of the loyal orders.
Derry has had relative peace because the two communities lead largely separate lives now, with the security of a wide river running between them. Again, as I pointed out in the lead piece, none of this matters if our leaders are committed to separate development. But they are not. Check out the ministerial pledge up above, Paragraph C:
It is not a case of atonement, it is a case of shifting strategic direction. Derry is not a basket case, separate lives certainly draws tensions out of what might otherwise be tense situations throughout the year. But that is not what the parties involved are committed to now, whatever they were doing before.
When all the people of Derry can welcome the ABOD without the aid of d-humanising police barriers, and the shops can stay open and the name be settled to the grudging satisfaction of all, it will know it has cracked the conundrum set it by the Belfast/St Andrews Agreement. But until then, those of us who continue to point out that the emperor is minus his shirt and pants, will just have continue taking the brickbats.
Mick – appreciate your time, thought and effort on this thread. (especially the “and finally” posts LOL)
Couple of points:
“the two communities lead largely separate lives now, with the security of a wide river running between them.”
Is it pedantic to point out that the “Protestant” side is fairly mixed ?
“Derry’s quiet disgrace” was a cause of the heat I’m sure. The nationalist political representatives in Derry have probably the most honourable non-sectarian record of anyone over some very troubled times.
THe name of city up to them but I’m ceratin will be resolved in a satisfactory fashion.
and Wittengstein always overrated in my book – didn’t seem to like Ireland much !!
I actually withdraw that comment – conflicting evidence of Wittingstein view of his Irish sojourn.
OK, we’re winding down, so I’ll be brief. Mick suggests that when “all the people of Derry can welcome the ABOD without the aid of d-humanising police barriers, and the shops can stay open and the name be settled to the grudging satisfaction of all, it will know it has cracked the conundrum set it by the Belfast/St Andrews Agreement.” I would strongly caution against using unrealistic unanymity as a marker of success, even metaphorically. When Rabin and Arafat shook hands on the White House lawn in 1993 the (idiot) newspaper headlines read “An End to Hatred!” Please. To use one of Mick’s examples, I ask people in D/L’d if there will come a day when police are no longer needed at ABOD parades, and every single one of them points out that large gatherings require policing, so don’t use that standard to measure. So ok, setting that aside… fewer police in hard gear, fewer spit barriers, fewer Bog kids up at the corner of the Richmond Centre, no helicopters, more shops open, and traffic moving up from Butcher Gate through the Diamond while the parade is going on. Amazing! In just a few years I’ve witnessed enormous transformation.
OK, at the same time, the interface areas in the town continue to see regular low level violence, residentially the town is still segregated, etc. etc. But those that seem to suffer most from sectarianism, and to engage in it (politicians aside), are the working class and the young. Big surprise. So sure, people have long memories in the town and there’s no shortage of hard feelings and hatred to go around. But on the whole, there’s potential for real progress, linked, as always/everywhere, to money to make it happen. I’m not expecting the sectarian issues to vanish, just hoping that they take their place in line behind class issues. Meanwhile, give Derry/L’derry its due… it could be better, but it could also be a helluva lot worse, and was not so long ago. Cheers, Ben
Ben:
“When Rabin and Arafat shook hands on the White House lawn in 1993 the (idiot) newspaper headlines read “An End to Hatred!†Please.”
Agreed.
It would seem that we have failed to answer or even ask the real problem, and the people with that problem are undoubtedly Derry Prods, who have been historically unable how to live in peace and equality with their neighbours.
The Waterside is now going the same way as the City, i.e. the nationalist population is increasing, a process which will accelerate with the new university, while the old unionist population is falling.
Then again the question should be asked – are there any colonies which have not seen a fall in the British community as their freedom approaches?
Colonial masters, and that is how the Derry unionists behaved up until very recently, don’t find it easy to deal with the rise of democracy. Why would Derry or NI be any different?
As for the name change? Either one realises why Cassius Clay became Muhammed Ali or one doesn’t. Certain people will never understand why he didn’t know his place and the loss is theirs.
Here’s my solution to the Derry/Londonderry name issue, tell me if this would not work.
The Dublin Government makes it crystal clear that the two official names of the city are Derry and Doire, and all Irish government documents, passports and road signs will use these terms, An Post will also deliver mail addressed to Londonderry. In fact there is no actual need for them to make this clear as it is the situation that has pertained for three quarters of a century already but reading some posters here this may not actually be apparent so no harm in a public statement.
At the same time London government says the two official names are Derry and Londonderry and the Post Office and all government agencies will be instructed to use both terms according to the desires of the citizen with whom they are dealing. Again this is PRECISELY what is already happening but a public statement would help. As a final gesture the road signs in Northern Ireland will direct travellers to either a) Derry/Londonderry b) L’Derry or c) a 50/50 split of Derry and Londonderry or d) a combination of all three.
Honours even all round, everyone happy, anyone got a problem with this solution or do we still want to ram “one size fits all” down our neighbours’ gullets?
Posted by lib2016 on Sep 05, 2007 @ 08:48 PM
…
The Waterside is now going the same way as the City, i.e. the nationalist population is increasing, a process which will accelerate with the new university, while the old unionist population is falling.
Actually, that’s not exactly true. The latest figures reckon the Protestant population is rising very very slightly, but of course dropping as an overall percentage of the population because the Catholic population is rising more quickly.
As for the rest of your post, I just wonder how you can post with such authority about what is going on in other peoples heads.
Posted by Mick Fealty on Sep 05, 2007 @ 05:42 PM
…..
Mick, that was a long post with plenty of good and bad in it. Rather than go through it point by point, let me explain what I would have done in your place.
1) Given a quote from the IN article which prompted the post, the only new thing in the thread, as one can’t access it without an account.
2) Assuming I felt that this could be a symptom of a ‘cold house’, checked to see if perhaps the same process was occurring in Catholic parishes. I posted the link showing that to be the case.
3) Given that I felt it was related to the cold house, irrespective of point 2, I would have posted up the report into this very subject and checked it to see what Protestants were saying about alienation and what they wanted done about it. Not only did you not do this, when I pointed out that it was on page 16, you requested that I post it up! Which I did. I would also have noted that the massive reduction in the numbers of Protestants was quoted as having happened before 1991 and tried to find out what had been happening since then to see if it could answer to the amalgamation of the parishes. (Could I point out that Pam, the only other person on this thread apart from myself to have formed part of this Derry migration, gave a clear and sober personal account of what was happening to the amalgamated parishes which everybody else seemed to ignore.)
4) Assuming I thought that the continuing reduction in Protestant numbers in recent years (for which I still haven’t seen the evidence, but that aside) was based at least partly on the city name discussions, I would have quoted a relevant section in the report. I couldn’t find a reference to it in there, but perhaps you could.
5)Given that the report was two years old, I would have looked at the recommendations in there and tried to find out if they were being acted on. Specifically, has the Nelson Drive bus stop been moved? What is being done about leisure facilities in the Waterside? What is being done about those parts of the city centre (Waterloo Place and Guildhall Square) which Protestants avoid? What about the physical disconnection of the Waterside and the mooted footbridge? What are the issues which are helping or hindering these plans? I did some of that for you, you didn’t bother.
6) Given I placed importance on the treatment of the ABOD, I would have looked into the way in which DCC and the majority community rlated to them regarding Lundy Day, the Relief of Derry, the siege commemorations etc. Most importantly I would have noted the fate of the excellent Maiden City Festival and maybe tried to find out what went wrong. I would have loooked at the development of the 12th August over the past few years to see how it was progressing or regressing in terms of security and disruption. I did some of that for you too.
You didn’t do any of this Mick. You knew which hobby horse you wished to ride and you didn’t bother checking if it was a racer or an old nag. As Kensei said, you showed the difference between blogging and journalism, and from there arose the heat. Wittgenstein me arse.
So much for my great idea of renaming the disputed city “Maiden”.
Word reaches me (although it’s yet to be confirmed) that moves are afoot to twin Muff with Maidenhead, Berks.
Oh well….
Briso,
Thanks for that. You’ve included some interesting detail. We could certainly do with more of that kind of attention to detail, and less of the wide pallet treatment that’s been dished out on parts of this thread.
As for the church thing, Pam’s most civil and gentle contribution was much appreciated. But so too was Sammy’s, who is familiar with the dynamic in both churches and who pointed out a critical difference between the two.
There seems to be a general assumption that I alone am responsible for bringing all relevant (and potentially relevant) facts to light. That’s neither reasonable nor practical.
Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not using this as an excuse for having assembled an ‘incomplete brief’. But it’s a blog, the comment zone is for challenges, amendments, and the addition of important context.
All too often people use the comment zone as means of blowing off steam about a subject they feel passionate about. But that’s not what it’s for. It’s for the enjoining of debate: ie, civil but robust engagement on a whole roster of subjects.
All in all, despite the heat, this thread has been as useful as any at throwing light on an underdiscussed issue.
Mick wrote:
>All in all, despite the heat, this thread has been as useful as any at throwing light on an underdiscussed issue.
Indeed, fair point, and perhaps that’s what blogging can do that journalism in the modern form cannot. When I looked back at what I wrote about the blog versus journalism question in my previous post, it read like rather a hard jibe. It was intended more ambiguously. Certainly, no Belfast Telegraph or Derry Journal writer would have engaged in the way you have done here and perhaps there is only so much research you can expect from a blogger. Perhaps the answer is to post what you know and ask questions about your hunches.
The only remaining worry is that I always read the blogger posts, but select the comments sections I will dive into. I think someone reading your first post and deciding not to wade through the reams of emotional verbiage in the comments section (“375 posts! No thanks!”) might have the impression that the same old story continues in Derry without end. Perhaps that’s just the way it is on Slugger and there’s nothing can be done about that. You can’t force people to read everything! It just emphasises the importance of the first post, but it’s clear you know that anyway.
Briso
This is Derry we’re talking about, it was MINORITY rule in 1968, a situation you seem to want to bring back.
Hold on, hold on, you’ve made many useful contributions to this thread, but that’s a bloody awful one.
Can you point me to even a single letter of anything I’ve written that has suggested that?
If not, I would appreciate an apology.
Dewi
Forgive me if I’ve missed a response to my earlier point on this, but as I stated earlier, one should not confuse a 60/40 population with “mixing”.
Other than bits of Kilfennan and bits around the outskirts, the Waterside is no more mixed than (50/50) North Belfast is. It’s still separate lives.
IJP, sorry.
“Other than bits of Kilfennan and bits around the outskirts, the Waterside is no more mixed than (50/50) North Belfast is. It’s still separate lives.”
Didn’t get that impression from the map on the report – is that because the segregation is like street by street ? No peace walls waterside are ther ?
Anyone know roughly what page Pam’s comment was on ???
Sorry if what I’m about to say has been said already, but I skipped the middle 10 pages or so.
another big factor in the “flight” was value for money, you get more house for your money in the Waterside.
I (catholic) bought my 2 bed terraced house in Rosemount in the early 80s from a protestant family who had lived there for 40+ years. The price they got bought them a 3 bed bungalow in Kilfennan with garden which suited their retirement plans perfectly.
Definitely no coercion involved just a normal move determined by time of life and property values.
Dewi,
That would be P.6, boyo, post 10, (Aug 30, 2007 @ 09:56 AM).
A damn fine post it was too and I should have said so at the time.