Profile for JR
From South down but living in South Armagh. Wouldn't be super knowledgeable on politics but have opinions none the less
Latest posts from JR (see all)
JR has posted 2 times (0 in the last month).
Nollaig Shona Duit
Tweet There are currently 6000 languages in the world. Of these 6000 according to UNESCO approximately 85% are in danger of ceasing to exist within a generation. As everyone with a second language knows a language is more than a way to say the same thing in a different way, language creates short cuts in [...] more »
What does this say about us all?
Tweet I was on the way home yesterday evening at around 6. While driving along through Camlough I saw an old lady on the side of the Road, just at the mini roundabout with her thumb out. It seemed very odd for a pitch black December night and the thermometer on the car was reading [...] more »
Latest comments from JR (see all)
JR has commented 881 times (7 in the last month).
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Books
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Children of the Revolution (Bill Rolston)
Tweet What was life like for children of political activists during the Troubles? A new book by Bill Rolston and published by Guildhall Press during the summer has collected together the stories of twenty Children of the Revolution whose parents’ activities – and in many cases, imprisonment – had a significant affect on childhoods and [...] read our review »
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A poem for the day – Launching the Whaler Juan Peron
Tweet A Belfast epic, and one of my oldest poems, the opener of my first collection, Grub. The gist of the story was found in Moss & Hume’s Shipbuilders to the World: 125 Years of Harland and Wolff, Belfast, 1861-1986, which tells how Eva Peron was due to launch a huge whaling vessel in Belfast, [...] read our review » -
“Good Friday. The death of Irish Republicanism” by Anthony McIntyre: a review
Tweet This was a book that I first reviewed at the same time as “Unionism Decayed” back in 2008. Like Vance’s work, it is the author’s portrayal of a defeated political movement or ideal and as a Unionist it was instructional to read an interpretation of the immediate post-Agreement period from the other side of the [...] read our review »
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Comment on Radical Independence & The Jamaican, Ugandan & Pakistani UKIP candidates
on 18 May 2013 at 11:36 am
You forgot to mention that a number of those “hard core anti-English nationalists” were English. Including one of the two arrested.
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Comment on Futile Border Poll campaign to launch
on 9 May 2013 at 11:03 am
RG,
Ceart go leor, char dtug mé sinn faoi deara.
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Comment on Futile Border Poll campaign to launch
on 8 May 2013 at 5:24 pm
I’m talking about conversations I have had in work at lunchtime, I am talking about people looking at the posters in the street and chatting about them not organized debates.
I totally agree with you on the Unionist prospective. This process should aim to have significant numbers of Ulster Protestants on board in some shape or form. In that sense it is good to see no tricolors on the branding, logos or posters, I also notice there is no Irish language versions of the posters or on the branding.
It is a pity that this initative had to come from Sinn Fein and not some other organisation but at least it has come. One of the benifits of a UI is it would consign Sinn Fein, (and the DUP and the UUP for that matter) to the political Dust bin and alow normal left right politics to evolve here.
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Comment on Futile Border Poll campaign to launch
on 8 May 2013 at 3:25 pm
I live in the area in which this mock border poll will take place. I think it is a good start. It is sparking some debate and is getting people thinking about the realities of how the Island of Ireland could be united into a single nation state. It can be used as a tool to figure out a road map and proposals which can be put to the electorate here in the future.
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Comment on Irish Justice Minister: “a tribute to how far we have come as a society”
on 8 May 2013 at 12:19 pm
As wrongs commited during the WW2 period go this in my view was a minor one. There isn’t a country in the world where desertion goes un punished and although the south was neutral it was under real threat of invasion. It must also be seen against the fear of ocupation in Ireland at the time, given the fact that the South had been an occupied territory for hundreds of years but for the previous 20. That said I think this is a positive move at this stage. What good could come of continuing to penalise a group of old men?
It must also be asked though. What about the Irish men from the north who were conscripted when in Britain (as happened to my great Uncle) then deserted while on home leave in the north by crossing the border? My great uncle lived out the rest of his days just south of the border and never returned home, according to my grandmother he often said it ruined his life.
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Comment on Are we settling for a society where the dominant communities are going to remain separate?
on 21 April 2013 at 7:46 pm
Barnshee,
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/confusing-cause-and-effect.html
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Comment on Are we settling for a society where the dominant communities are going to remain separate?
on 19 April 2013 at 2:02 pm
Was at a very encouraging talk last night. “Protestants and the Irish Language”. It seems there is a scheme happening at the moment where pupils in some protestant schools are given an afternoon taster session on the Irish language. Those that like it can go on and do a further course, one afternoon a week for six weeks.
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Comment on Halappanavar Inquest: Midwife’s remarks rather than clinical mistakes beg legislation and public debate
on 11 April 2013 at 11:11 am
This is a very tragic case. I don’t think the midwife was really thinking too hard about what she was saying. I certainly would not like to have some of the things I say brought before a tribuneral. Am I the only one who interpreted the midwifes comment as her light heartedly criticizing catholic Ireland? I herd another of the midwifes testimony. She said that she had never seen a woman’s condition deteriorate so quickly. She also said she had been a midwife since 1992. Savita Halappanavar’s case was obviously very rare. Given there are in the region of 30 abortions carried out in Ireland annually the conditions which merit one are also very rare.
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Comment on Margaret Thatcher dies….
on 9 April 2013 at 3:06 pm
“Of course as a physical force Republican it would be hard not to resent the havoc she wrecked on the movement”
I would argue that she drove many into the ranks of physical force Republicanism.
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Comment on Margaret Thatcher dies….
on 8 April 2013 at 5:04 pm
I suppose she did sign the Anglo Irish agreement. Small though that step was it was the first time since the foundation of the state Unionists didn’t get their way.
Reading some quotes Unionist politicians made at the time it is hard to believe what seems in todays context their massive over reaction to the smallest of concessions. Some of the quotes are so hysterical, incoherant and disgracefully bigoted.
It is strange reading coments from pro Good friday agreement unionists who are still anti Anglo Irish agreement given that the GFA goes much much further.
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