GAA promises to attend all coming ‘milestones’ (even Unionist ones)…
You do wonder sometimes whether everything in Northern Ireland’s public space (and if I may be so bold, Slugger included) is a good five years behind where ordinary people are. Sam McBride has a fascinating piece on the front page of the News Letter today…
Danny Murphy, who is provisional director of the GAA in Ulster, said that his association – despite its long association with nationalism and republicanism – would attend “every event” in the next decade to remember the milestones that led to partition.
The promise to attend commemorations of events symbolic to many unionists such as the signing of the Ulster Covenant, the Battle of the Somme and the creation of Northern Ireland would have been unthinkable in past years.
The GAA, which has a strong Irish cultural ethos, did not take part in the 50-year anniversary of Northern Ireland in 1971.
Mr Murphy made his comment in a two-page article for the Presbyterian Herald, which he wrote in response to the challenges given to the GAA by former Presbyterian moderator the Rev Dr Norman Hamilton when he addressed a conference organised by the body in October.
Quietly ground breaking stuff from the GAA.
Topic: Government, Society and Culture
Region: Ireland, Northern Ireland, UK
Billy Pilgrim: You gloat about lack of Protestant participation in the GAA, but if you’re honest, you’d absolutely hate to see any such participation, wouldn’t you?
But it’s complicated, isn’t it? If Protestants joined the GAA in significant numbers, some nationalists would surely seek an alternative “powerful social adhesive” without the new gritty bits. So maybe the Ancient Order of Hibernians would get a new lease of life?
Reader
Er, no.
Certainly, large-scale participation by Protestants would change things within the GAA. But if you think existing GAA people would respond by deserting in droves, you simply don’t get it.
The GAA would simply become a more dialectical institution. I’d be all for that.
Barnshee,
“Number of Players playing GAA sports in N I –oh thousands– number of prods playing GAA sports in N Ireland er 1 (and he got roundly abused until the bad publicity spread)”
When you say there is just the 1 protestant playing gaelic games in the north, I presume you mean at inter-county level? If not, you are well off the mark! If this mistake was made unknowingly, please see below:
http://ulster.gaa.ie/2011/07/25/cross-community-team-boston-bound/
Yes, there is an absence of gaelic players from protestant backgrounds playing at inter-county level, and yes the GAA should do more to change that in the long term, but if one assumes that the participation of children/adults from protestant backgrounds will have risen following the GFA, then there won’t be many lads/lassies old enough yet to be on the inter-county stage anyway.
(Most) inter-county players will have been playing their respective sport from the word go, with club and school/college, before being called up to represent their county. Many players will have a strong GAA pedigree in their family or in their clubs, which helps any youngster pick up those extra skills required to really excel and play on the highest stage. Pick up a sport in your mid/late teens and I think its highly unlikely you will progress to the highest level any time soon, but that is not to say that lads/lassies from protestant backgrounds aren’t enjoying gaelic games recreationally.
Returning briefly to the case of Darren Graham – whom I presume is the sole protestant you were referring to – what happened to him is absolutely disgusting, and as far as I am concerned, a million times worse than what happened during the Derrytresk brawl the other week. I hope that in the long term he can be an inspiration to many other potential inter-county players from a background similar to his own, to prove that as far as the Association is concerned, there is no glass ceiling on protestant participation in any county in Ireland. Perhaps if/when that does happen, it will mean the end to sectarian slurs on and off the pitch by GAA supporter and critic alike.
Billy
Apologies for delay in returning to the fray. I think you have validated my point. You seem to be saying that the GAA is lukewarm about popularising its sports because non-Irish people are unlikely to embrace the non-sporting elements. Presumably that would include the substantial number of people who live in Ireland but don’t consider themselves to be Irish. By way of example, would it be acceptable for Poles to form a Polish-only GAA club to avoid all the extraneous stuff that froms part of traditional GAA clubs?
Old Mortality
‘You seem to be saying that the GAA is lukewarm about popularising its sports because non-Irish people are unlikely to embrace the non-sporting elements.’
No. I’m saying that the GAA is about Irish people preserving and promoting Irish sports, language, culture, and indeed identity; and doing so in the face of the rather rapacious forces of homogenization. (In the 1880s, it was the empire. Today, it’s globalization.) It simply does not exist in the same universe as professional, globalized sport. It does not define its success by revenues or market share.
The GAA basically just the name we give to an umbrella organisation that springs directly organically from communities throughout Ireland and the diaspora. Sport is only one part, albeit the most visible, of what the GAA is about. If there was never another football or hurling match, there’d still be a GAA, and indeed a need for it.
‘Presumably that would include the substantial number of people who live in Ireland but don’t consider themselves to be Irish.’
I wouldn’t accept that even a majority of unionists ‘don’t consider themselves to be Irish.’ But yes, there are some people who hold this view. They too are free to join the GAA.
But I would say that a person who regards the preservation of Irish sports, language and culture to be a bad thing, is a person who’d be unlikely to join the GAA in any circumstances. I regard as preposterous the idea that there’s an onus on the GAA to change itself to accommodate such people – who, frankly, are much fewer in number than their loud proclamations would suggest.
‘…would it be acceptable for Poles to form a Polish-only GAA club to avoid all the extraneous stuff that froms part of traditional GAA clubs?’
I think an exclusivity rule (i.e. non-Poles aren’t welcome) would be disgraceful. But I know Poles, Lithuanians and Ukrainians who play Gaelic football, and they have no problem with Irish culture, and the GAA’s role in its preservation. Why would they have?
But why are you taking the debate down this blind alley, talking about Poles? Why not come out and ask what you’re really asking: would it be acceptable for Protestants to form a Protestant-only GAA club?
Billy
No I’m asking whether it would be acceptable to form a club which completely ignored all the non-sporting baggage of the GAA and just played sports in the same way as an amateur football club just plays football. I’m sure you’re right that some Poles play but they might not if they had the other stuff pushed down their throats. South of the border, in particular, I’m sure there are many GAA clubs which just don’t bother about all the ‘cultural’ stuff.
OM
The GAA doesn’t have ‘baggage.’ The Irish language, Irish dancing, storytelling, poetry, quizzes, club bingo, raffles, social outings and events – these things are not ‘baggage.’
And what do you mean by the phrase: ‘pushed down their throats?’ What exactly do you think goes on at GAA clubs?
Let me just reassure you that there are countless GAA clubs that do nothing other than organise football and hurling matches. You can take your pick from any number of them, if you’re interested being disabused of some of your more lurid notions of what the GAA is about.
(Though, anecdotally, that these clubs tend to be less successful on the field than the more holistic clubs. A bit of chicken and egg here, certainly.)
Perhaps, though, what you are positing is a GAA club that is actively hostile to Irish culture, language and sports?
I’m not sure how that would work, to be honest. And the GAA is as entitled to act out of self-preservation as anyone.
But there would be no contradiction in, for example, Markethill (the largest village in south Armagh without a GAA club) fielding a team with a name like True Blues. Or one could envisage a local derby between Annaghmore Pearses and Loughgall Carsons.
OM,
Why? Your question shows that you don’t understand. Lets take a theoretical Irish village. One pub, one shop and a Gaa club. If someone came along to your new football only club wanting to take part in the scor (Gaa singing dancing talent etc competition) I don’t think it would be acceptable to tell them ‘No We won’t have that stuff shoved down out throats round here.’
What about handball or hurling are they allowed at your Football only club or do they need to have a seperate pitch and facliaties in this one horse town? When I was young our club facilaties were used for both a french and Irish language summer school. Would it be acceptable in your football only club to turn these away? Or just the ones you feel have “baggage”
Our club also had Irish dancing classes and Judo classes. Would the judo be allowed?
It is perfectly acceptable to be a member of any Gaa club and participate only in the Football many do.
I seem to recall Ian Paisley once telling a story from his (much) younger days of local AOH and OO members sharing musical instruments with one another on ocassion. I’m sure you’d agree that the ‘cultural baggage’ attached to the instruments didn’t stop them playing any differently for members of the respective organisations. Seems to me that baggage is only baggage for people who want it to be so…
Much talk about ‘Irish culture’ within the GAA but of course it is a very particular, perhaps partisan, view that is exclusive and not inclusive of the Irish who do not self identify as so-called ‘Gaels’.
JR: What about handball or hurling are they allowed at your Football only club or do they need to have a seperate pitch and facliaties in this one horse town?
Without wanting to get bogged down in the “baggage” row:
What about Soccer – is it allowed at your GAA Community centre in this one horse town?
Actually, that might be a ‘baggage’ issue after all.
Strongbow Óg
Of course the Gaelic Athletic Association exists to preserve, and insists on the importance of, a particular kind of Irish culture – i.e. the Gaelic part of it. The clue’s in the name.
What’s wrong with that?
Where do you get the idea that this means the GAA believes that only Gaelic culture is truly Irish?
Who told you such a thing? Not a member or friend of the GAA, I daresay.
Indeed, the GAA has always been far more likely to get into trouble for insisting on the Irishness of unionist people, rather than denying it.
(Admittedly, one does sometimes find tedious, more-Irish-than-thou bores propping up social club bars. When you meet such a person, you can bet the mortgage that they never kicked or pucked a ball in their lives.)
Reader,
Why wouldn’t it be? My brothers attended a samba soccer school years back which used some of the neighbouring town’s GAA facilaties. And hasn’t Corker been used for Soccer and rugby internationals?
Reader
Rule 42
‘Grounds controlled by Association units shall not be used or permitted to be used, for horse racing, greyhound racing, or for field games other than those sanctioned by Central Council.’
Fairly self-explanatory.
Billy
Do you think that teams from a unionist background would be accepted in the GAA, just to compete in the sporting side of the association? Would they be expected to display the tricolour at their ground to be part of the association? Would they be allowed to fly the Union flag, NI flag or indeed the St. Patrick’s flag at their grounds if they desired to do that? If they did would other teams play against them?
I think the brand of football is a fantastic game. I would have loved to have had the oppurtunity to have played it as a boy. Alas I’m to old now. A good way to introduce the game to young unionist’s, would be by letting them have their own clubs, with support from the GAA, to see if they would enjoy the game. Let them play in areas where they feel safe, just to get them started. I’m not sure to many many would feel comfortable in grounds named after republican gun men, or indeed Casement park. It might take a few years but who knows where it might lead too. Do you think that the GAA would be up for it?
Alan N/Ards,
I accept what you say re letting kids from unionist/protestant backgrounds get into the sports in more familiar/comfortable surroundings, but having ‘their own’ clubs could potentially lead to the same hostility akin to the Old Firm as time goes on.
I think a lot could be learned from the Ulster GAA’s Cúchulainn Initiative, whereby cross-community teams were formed based on secondary schools. Extending that initiative to primary level could help forge friendships at an earlier age, allowing young protestant lads/lassies to develop their skills at a similar rate rate as the kids who would probably be playing the games anyway. In the long run, cross-community bonds forged before a better understanding of ‘us’uns’ and ‘them’uns’ can fully develop in the young folk (I acknowledge they’re there from a ridiculously early age), as well as giving young protestant kids a better chance of advancing in their chosen codes and playing at higher levels on merit, rather than just as quota-fillers. What is there to lose in trying?
In relation to your questions about flying the tricolour etc, they are in the GAA’s official guide. However, as a grassroots organisation, what’s to say this can’t be changed at the behest of a cross-community team? Admittedly it is a bit of a chicken and egg situation though…
Alan
Actually, former GAA president Nicky Brennan talked about just this sort of thing a few years ago, in an interview with the Church of Ireland Gazette.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/northern_ireland/gaelic_games/6389043.stm
His heart was in the right place, but if you think how it’d actually work, it would probably actually foment division. (GAA rivalries can be incredibly intense. They’re usually harmless, but add in a sectarian dimension and one could envisage some real nastiness.)
However, if you had new GAA clubs being set up in places that don’t presently have one – say, in County Armagh, places like Tandragee, Hamiltonsbawn, Markethill, Loughgall, Richhill, Killylea – it’s simply a demographic certainty that they would draw membership overwhelmingly from the Protestant community.
One would expect that those clubs would reflect their memberships. (So a hunger strike commemoration would be unlikely.)
And yes, other teams would, of course, play them. A team would never fail to fulfil a fixture. You might find the corner backs being particularly robust in their tackling, mind you…
As regards the flag issue, I’ll let you into a secret, if you promise not to tell anyone. Promise? Ok. At most club games, there’s no tricolour. For the bigger games, sure, county games, certainly. But most of the time, there isn’t one. It’s a technicality.
As I said earlier, in the event of large-scale take-up of Gaelic games by unionists, the GAA would become a more dialectical institution, and I’d be all for that. The transition would not be without problems, setbacks and controversies. But so what? Problems, setbacks and controversies are nothing to be scared of.
Personally, I think the introduction of Gaelic games to state schools is the key. That way, young Protestants could take their tentative first steps in an environment where they feel safe. Wouldn’t it be fun to see, say, Methody, play St Colman’s in the MacRory Cup?
Alternatively, Protestants could just take up hurling en masse. It’s such a niche sport in most parts of Ulster that they’d take it over in no time. Then football could be the ‘Catholic’ game and hurling the ‘Protestant’ game!
‘I would have loved to have had the opportunity to have played it as a boy.’
I would have loved if you’d been able to. I sincerely hope you at least get to watch your children (or grandchildren?) play the games. I can’t overstate how enriching they are.