The history of vigilante patrols has been anything but ‘gentlemanly’…

Vigilante

Groups of (mainly) men are patrolling the Ravenhill and Ormeau areas at night, stopping ‘foreigners’ and asking them why they are out at night. This has correctly been viewed as disturbing by most (but not all) people. If you have been watching the news you will know that this is not just a local phenomenon, with tensions over immigration being a continuous theme in UK news in the past year and politicians from the Reform Party reinforcing the sense of threat from migrants.

The Gentlemanly Thing?

According to the Daily Express on Tues 13 Aug, the Deputy Leader of Reform, Mr Richard Tice called for men in particular to take part in patrols to keep women and children safe “within the bounds of the law”. Mr Tice described this on Times Radio as ‘the gentlemanly thing to do’ but unfortunately the history of vigilante patrols has been anything but ‘gentlemanly’.

In the early days of the NI Troubles, localised groups of men organised street patrols to watch for ‘outsiders’ and defend their streets. These vigilante patrols evolved into the brutal terrorist organisation called the UDA.
In the USA before the Civil War, slave-holding states had laws authorising slave patrols. These were groups of armed white men who would enforce curfews for black people and suppress the enslaved population by dispensing brutal ‘justice’. After the Civil War this tradition was incorporated into the club set up in late 1865 by six former Confederate army officers. That club became the Ku Klux Klan.

Excitement and Power

Most of us will remember from our school days, how when a fight would break out between two boys, others would gather round and enjoy the excitement, rather than trying to stop it. (Anyone who has worked as a teacher can testify to the ugliness and danger of such events.) Similar instincts lead people to enjoy fox hunting, or dog fighting.

A weakness in some of us males, is that we enjoy too much the excitement and feeling of power that a successful confrontation gives us. Yet this is exactly the sort of person who will volunteer to take part in a night time patrol. Normally, in our society, people who exercise authority over others (teachers, police etc) are subject to clear rules and to supervision. None of this applies to amateur vigilantes. Unless we are careful, we will end up with impulsive, angry men reacting on instinct on our streets at night, with no supervision. They may not end up committing the same atrocities as the KKK but the outcome will not be good.

Protecting Women

Even if any of the above were acceptable, we should not tolerate a pretence that such patrols will protect women.

Women are at significantly more risk from their partners and from other local N. Ireland men, than from immigrants. Where sexual attacks do occur, roughly 85% are by men already known to the women, sometimes partners or ex-partners. (Research by Glasgow University 2018 and CSEW 2020)

Immigration and Integration

When Ballymena erupted into violence earlier this year, one of the key complaints made was about migrants being concentrated in certain areas and the lack of integration by migrants.

By stopping and intimidating migrants on the street like this, the vigilante patrols will provide migrants with a strong incentive to live in areas with higher numbers of similar migrants for safety. We are effectively pushing migrants to seek night time safety by creating their own ghettoes.

Social Media

Political activists with significant amounts of money are deliberately stirring up fear about immigration. As I write this a friend has sent me an expensively produced video based on Pink Floyd’s The Wall, with a predictable distortion of the ‘leave them kids alone’ lyric. (Pink Floyd should sue.) There are clearly well financed political interests using tensions over migration and a pretence to care about women, as a means to exert power over the UK.

What Can Be Done?

I wrote two years ago (https://sluggerotoole.com/2023/11/27/it-is-different-for-working-class-communities/ ) about the fact that immigration impacts differently on working class communities and that this issue needs to be approached thoughtfully.

We need to encourage

better policing of working-class areas, supported by local politicians
a clear message that our streets will be policed by the PSNI
continued efforts in schools to help integrate migrant families and teach all children about the fact that societies inevitably change over time
clarity of information about the number of migrants in N. Ireland
sensible national debate about how much immigration is happening and how much is acceptable.

We should use our politicians to effect change in our society, not dangerous street vigilantes.