“In some Unionist areas, it would be tantamount to erecting a Tricolour from a flagpole.”

The root cause of our current political crisis remains political unionism’s opposition to the development of a shared and equal Northern Ireland.

Of course, twas ever thus.

The Loyal Sons will not be rerouted on their fateful march to Ulster’s precipice in spite of more enlightened pro-Union voices regularly exposing the hypocrisy and instinctively supremacist thinking at the core of Unionist politics.

The News Letter’s recent campaign rallying Protestant and Unionist opinion against an Irish Language Act has included a remarkably non-newsworthy front page lead proclaiming that the Orange Order Grand Master opposed an Irish Language Act (I kid you not.)

But this gem, from the DUP’s East Antrim MP, Sammy Wilson, in today’s paper stands out for obvious reasons:

[On Irish language road signs] But Mr Wilson has claimed such a move would prove “foolish and divisive”, adding: “It would lead to Irish street signs being imposed in places where they are not welcome and where few people would understand them. In some unionist areas, it would be tantamount to erecting a tricolour from a flagpole. They would be vandalised and torn down.”
In the centre of the overwhelmingly nationalist village of Crumlin, of which I am a resident, a Union Flag is currently flying from a flagpole.
Across the north, in many majority nationalist towns and villages, unionist flags fly from flagpoles (and quite a few lamp posts.)
In many of these same towns and villages, many roads, bridges and buildings are named for British and Unionist figures from our past.
There are quite a few British war memorials dotted across town and village centres where nationalists form a clear majority of the local residents.
Should they all be renamed, vandalised or torn down, Sammy?

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