On that long overdue ‘Mea Culpa’ from a Catholic politician…
NR Greer, a political columnist with the Newsletter was kind enough to omit Slugger’s comment zone from a list of places where is there is still a commonplace perception that there are two sides to the Northern Ireland argument and one is blameless and the other to blame for it all…
FOR decades a key publicity plank of Irish nationalism has been to act the “Mope” (Most oppressed people ever). It has been a successful tactic as the story has been swallowed internationally by a broad swathe of the politically correct liberal left. The Mope myth is reason that smug agitprop comedians feel entitled to make the kind of offensive remarks about Ulster unionists, that had they been made about any other ethnic grouping would have caused uproar.It is why documentary makers visiting Northern Ireland seem capable of only seeing one side of the story, thus rendering their output little better than propaganda. Believing that all unionists are subhuman violent bigots, the human rights industry frets about the welfare of republican terrorists while turning a blind eye to the thousands that they killed or maimed and dippy Californian girls weep into their organic skinny lattes at the fate of the little Irish babies that the British Army continue to this day to throw under tank tracks. And so it goes on.
At the same time, Henry Kelly (who was Northern editor of the Irish TImes in the early 70s) picks up on Dawn Purvis’s criticism of mainstream unionism’s blind eye to the causes of the troubles and in particular to the parlous quality of living for it’s own Protestant working class:
“They (mainstream unionists) deny discrimination existed. They deny that all working-class people but mostly Catholics endured in slums, squalor, poverty and unemployment in order to preserve the power of the political elite . . . You continue to deny working-class children, Protestants, the right to a decent education by holding on and wanting to hold on to academic selection . . . I have to say to you, you are living in denial and have to start looking at what caused the conflict here…”
It’s a text book example of what Senator Eoghan Harris calls good authority (ie telling the truth to your own side). But Kelly goes on to ask a question too rarely raised within nationalism (in public at least):
…was the situation in Northern Ireland before 1968 so oppressive for the Catholic minority that they had no choice but to follow the road embarked upon by the civil rights movement later hijacked by the IRA? And was the Protestant working class all that much better-off, with their mothers polishing their doorsteps in case the Queen Mother would pass down their street while their children were going to school in “mutton dummies” – Belfast home-made paper shoes?
And finally:
Unless, however, we ask ourselves some serious questions about why what happened actually happened and whether we might not have been better led by our politicians, we might – just might – make the same mistakes again. Dawn Purvis has started a debate. It is to be hoped, though I won’t hold my breath, that others might join that discussion. Is there, for example, a Catholic politician who might hold their hand up and suggest that mea culpa might be a couple of words that could wipe a slate clean?
Mick
O Contraire, Mon ami. I’ve read it all. And Greer. And Kelly. And Harris. And I think you know that. But you have developed a habit of going rather curt and cryptic when you want a conversation to cease.
So again, please, in simple words, explain to me my “nonsense on stilts”.
Nope. I’ve done my best already. And life is too, too short TS.
Mick
You really don’t like answering questions youself, do you, Mick?
I run a website where people are free to comment and criticise anything I write. You have that right. I’m not in the least interfering with it.
I am more than happy to engage with the time that I have with the people I feel are worth engaging with on a point worth engaging with.
The context of the post was pretty clear. As is Kelly’s argument. So is what I have said. Yet you keep asking about things I haven’t said and ignoring what I have said.
If you want to extrapolate beyond the bounds of reason to make it a ‘blood libel’ (invoking the political ‘ghost’ of ‘nationalists’ along the way), feel free.
And I’ll feel free to call it ‘nonsense on stilts’. As for the final arbitration, I’m content to let others be the judge.
Night.
Mick
the people I feel are worth engaging with
Well, at least I know where I stand. O worthless me!!
And I’ll feel free to call it ‘nonsense on stilts’.
1. Mick, you’re free to call it jam roly poly if you want, but it doesn’t make it true. I asked for an explanation. I got a hurrumpf.
The context of the post was pretty clear. As is Kelly’s argument. So is what I have said.
1. I’m not awfully interested in ‘context’. It’s all too often a ‘flubbery word’ open to endless and pointless analysis, and worst of all, evasion. It’s always a mistake to conflate the pretty with the true, and the elegant with the wise. Or, to simplify, the more someone hides behind ‘pithy’, the more I think they’re bullshitting.’clever’ and clever are two different things.
I’m interested in straightforward questions, preferably using an active, rather than passive tense, to aide understanding, and in the answers to those questions.
For goodness sake, I initally sought only a yes or a no – and you ran away – what the hell am i supposed to do with that, Mick?
2. As I described, I think you mischaracterised Kelly’s argument to make your own. So Kelly’s argument was not all that clear after all. Neither was yours.
If you want to extrapolate beyond the bounds of reason to make it a ‘blood libel’
Oh, for goodness sake, grow up, Mick. You’ve never empoyed hyperbole, or ‘reductio ad absurdum’ to make a point?
Look, it’s entirely up to you if you take your ball and go home. No one can stop you, and I wouldn’t try if I could. I don’t care enough.
You will know that I’m an infrequent enough contributor to this site. I’m certainly content to become more infrequent, as I’ve said before at other junctures. I’m generally more interested in spiking poorly constructed arguments than taking an obvious side in our passion play.
But a series of sulks and humps is a poor return for spending effort trying to get to the heart of the argumental construction by questioning the columns on which the ediface rests.
But before I leave, I’ll make a wee suggestion, Mick. There is a vast difference between argument and assertion.
Greer’s piece was more or less pure assertion. No evidence, no logic, no ‘working out’ – just a stream of hyperbolic truisms his readers are invited to agree with. It sells papers, no doubt, and good luck to him, but it’s not conducive to debate on the issues.
Unless “is not! is too! is not! is too!” is your idea of debate.
Protestants are so few in number that they must be short of the critical mass needed to exercise themselves effectively as a political cohort in today’s republic.
Subsumed into the innards of everyday irish cultural life. ,
They are about 5% and rising; as opposed to a falling Catholic population. In the ROI’s PR democracy 5% would certainly by a highly significant, outcome determinative bloc. But that is the point: they are not a bloc. They see themselves, and are seen, as part of the general community and not as a community within a community.
Please refer to the CSO website:
http://www.cso.ie/census/census2006results/volume_13/volume_13_religion.pdf
Scroll down to 24 to get general population stats and down to 114 to get a handle on Protestants’ disproportrionately high representation in managerial and higher professional classes.
If Catholics in the north had been treated half as decently as Protestants in the south the original Stormont would still be intact and the decades of mayhem after 1968 would never have happened.
Erasmus u are 100% correct. I don’t see what any nationalist pre 69 has to apologise for. I have worked in th ROI for 15 years and religion doesn’t even come up. I live in the north however where it always comes up.
Whilst I accept, broadly, the basic nationalist line that Prods in the RoI are not discriminated against or seen as alien or foreign, that fact cannot be used to:-
1. Make any direct comparision to the treatment of Catholics in NI which though unjustified took place in a very different politicla context; or
2. Lead to the conclusion that in a United Ireland the NE Ulster Protestants would be treated the same way or adopt the same political allegiances as Prods in the RoI. Indeed there is a risk that anti Prod prejudice in the south could develop if northern Prods started “kicking off” in some way.
Brit,
I think you (and others?) underestimate how embedded southern Prods are in their society. They are not a people apart – they are entirely integrated in everything bar the particular building a diminishing number visit on Sunday morning.
Anti-Prod prejudice is so unlikely in the south as to be laughable. Quite apart from other things, the proportion of southern (ex-)Catholics who have a Prod parent or grandparent is actually quite high – the result of mixed marriages, and one reason why Prod numbers declined during the 20th C. So for anti-Prod feeling to ‘develop’ would involve people turning against their own parents, cousins, or friends. The only reason they’d do that would be if southern Prods start to ‘side with’ the recalcitrant northern Prods – and that won’t happen.
“I think you (and others?) underestimate how embedded southern Prods are in their society.”
I accept that they are well embedded and integrated. I have no direct and little indirect knowledge on the issue but I hvae no reason to dispute what you say.
“I accept that they are well embedded and integrated”
that is because from 1921 to Pre Celtic Tiger they existed in a State that was Institutionally Catholic, Gaelic and inherently anti British. They had little choice but to join in or leave.
There is no point referring to the current environment for ROI Protestants as the damage was long done. They are no longer a threat and have been largely subsumed into the traditional nationalist and republican view of Ireland so why would there be any tension ?
John East Belfast,
I see you’re joining the ranks of the ‘others’ mentioned in my Nov 12, 2009 @ 12:10 PM post.
Your’s is a common but incorrect unionist myth. The truth is much more complex than you appear to think.
Southern Prods come in all shapes and sizes, including many who supported (indeed founded) the ‘nationalist view’ through politics, language, sport, and so on. Many others, though not particularly ‘gaelic-minded’ were not strongly opposed to such things (such opposition is a more recent northern growth). But more importantly, most southern Prods were not ‘oppressed’ and forced to keep their heads down, as you imply. They continued, post-1922 to run their businesses, farm their farms, go to TCD, own most of the big shops and industries, and live perfectly normal lives.
Any subsumation that has happened has happened with the complete agreement and cooperation of southern Prods. Its called convergence, and it happened quite painlessly in the south. Pity the north cannot learn the lesson.
Horseman
I wont deny the Truth is much more complex – including in NI – but I am not glossing over the fact that the post 1921 Republic was a cold house for former Protestant Irish unionists.
I have made comments earlier in this thread about the institutionalised bias and posters like Erin explained how her grandparents were intimidated out of their farms.
I dont see the need to repeat all of those.
In my opinion there is ample evidence of what the ROI State was like post 1921 and if you were a Protestant and an Irish unionist it could not have been something you would have felt at ease with. To keep denying that is being unrealistic.
We will all just have to agree to disagree then
John East Belfast,
Firstly his/her pseudonym was Orin, and secondly, he/she provided no evidence whatsoever. He/she could have been a troll (it wouldn’t be the first time).
I’m not going to be specific, but I did have Prod ancestors living in the 26 counties at that time, so I have a certain knowledge of the issue.
You are narrowing the discussion, I see, to “former Protestant Irish unionists“. Not all southern Prods were unionists – in fact most were pretty apolitical, I imagine. Just because northern Prods now are mostly unionists you cannot extrapolate backwards – not without better evidence, anyway. How about comparing the unionist vote in 1918 with the known Prod % per constituency? (PS I’ve done that, and it doesn’t support your argument).
I know that the IRA committed some purely sectarian anti Prod atrocities in pre partion Ireland.
As for the views of southern Protestants on indepenedence I dont know what the figures are but I’m sure a far larger proportion were unionist that amonst southern Irish Catholics.
However do reason do think that has any direct relevance to the position of southern prods in the 21st C.
Genuine question: Are Prods disproportionately represented in the higher-income groups of the RoI because:
a) Prods have done well out of the Free State/RoI; or,
b) the wealthier Prods could survive the IFS/RoI, while the poorer had to cut and run?
b) is probably the better of the two alternatives.
Given that social class divisions are as entrenched in the RoI as in any other modern Capitalist society those born into an middle/upper middle class / upper class family are likely to remain in one – and that pass on the same to their children. Given that the Prods were mainly ruling elite, or succesful farmers, landlords then its no surprise they are still in the “higher” socio-economic groups.
It doesnt neccesarily mean that the Prods didnt fell somewhat lost and marginalised post independnece (nor indeed that a degree of marginalisation and alientation amongst this minority group was not a legitimate price worth paying for Irish independence).
Thanks Brit,
In point of fact you are offering a third alternative, which is that the Prods were always better-off and just stayed that way, ie there never were many “lower-class” Prods (in the South). I am happy to accept such a hypothesis, especially as it could explain the proportional decline in the Protestant community after Partition in terms of its greater economic and social mobility, but other posters could usefully contribute some statistical evidence on this.
Brit,
Sorry to disagree, but this is wrong: … the Prods were mainly ruling elite, or succesful farmers, landlords …“.
In pre-partition times in the 26 (as in the 6) Prods were mostly small farmers, artisans, lower civil servants etc. Only a tiny proportion were ‘ascendancy’.
My own 26 county ancestors were small farmers and shop-keepers (no RIC AFAIK). In the extended family as a whole there was not one member of the ‘ruling elite’ or a single ‘landowner’. The same is true of most other people I know.
Dublin had a substantial Prod working class. Much of it has been subsumed through mixed marriages etc, and a lot emiograted (like their Catholic neighbours).
If southern Prods are doing well it is because they had/have a very good education system, and had smaller families (more money to invest per child, etc). But there are still poor Prods, and Prod small farmers. You’d be surprised how many ordinary people, when you talk to them, will mention that their father (for example) was Protestant. The idea that Prods were/are all big-house horsey types is completely wrong.