Irish Atheist

An open-exchange base for Irish Dissenters. Hopefully, a platform enabling Ireland's non-believers to make contact, exchanging opinions and experiences, at least until I become aware of a more competent platform.

Name:
Location: Dublin, Ireland

Born in Summerhill, a centre-city slum. Now 63, I remember the '60s as a time of economic relaxation in Ireland, with greater freedom of expression being taken for granted. Of course, abortion and euthanasia were still very much taboo subjects, but merely hurdles which would be jumped eventually. The '70s would be Socialist! How wrong we were back then.

Saturday, April 16, 2005

A Haven From Heaven!

Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined anything like this!
Being able to speak freely, and not only to myself, but to the world at large.
Who cares if nobody is listening, right now that's grand by me, as I am looking forward to unburdening myself quite a lot more before considering replying to silver-haired saintly Irish mothers who are praying for my soul. No, I'm not on a wild ego-trip, I'm simply recalling my first-hand experience of the late 1960's, when I first tried calmly writing of my different views in a variety of newspapers and magazines in Holy Catholic Ireland.
Back then, the Irish Christian Brothers were one of Ireland's much revered exports!
Back then, the only conceivable brand of socialism was Christian/Catholic socialism.
That's why, with the British Parliament sustaining a blatantly sectarian state in the North, permitting violent Protestant pogroms against Catholics to go unchecked, it was so easy to whip up a frenzy amongst Southern Catholics.
Back then, the National Governments throughout Europe found their control slipping.
They were not properly prepared for the popular growth of socialist ideas & values.
Working-class socialists on the street had learned the popular lingo of politics and were very ably challenging the conservatives. For example, a French Archbishop sought (and was granted)permission from the Vatican to set up a (something) for Dialogue With Non-believers In France.
Combatting the growing popularity of socialism was then the No.1 priority in the mind of every conservative power-bloc in Europe!
Thus, so it came to pass that violent Protestant pogroms against Catholics in Northern Ireland led to the creation of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association. The possibility of unity between Catholic and Protestant workers loomed as a horrible nightmare for the conservative powers.
The most obvious and easy to use of these forces were the Churches.
That's why the first and only real success of Haughey's newly created puppet organisation, the Provos, was it's role in destroying the Civil Rights Association, safe-guarding the sectarian division for another generation, or two. or three or more.

That's all the Provos were ever created for, nothing else, to serve as a pawn for the powerful. Nothing very heroic, patriotic or glorious about that, to my simple mind.
For Adams and McGuinness to delude themselves that members of the largest party down South would create and sustain the means of Fianna Fail's own future downfall is incredible! No, intrigues like that are the stuff of children's fairy tales, not real politics.
One can only speculate on whether or not a Civil Rights Association, properly supported on both sides of the border, would have achieved so little and cost so much! In the 35 years that have passed, so much has changed, the world has passed by the old reasons for keeping sectarian feuds alive - quite regardless of the Provos or the Paisleyites - in spite of them, in fact. It simply remains to be seen how much the 2 real powers still depend on keeping up the charade, pretending that that which is NOT HAPPENING is wonderful news. How many more HISTORIC EVENTS can the spin-doctors expect to get away with? How many more HISTORIC SPEECHES must we listen to from Adams/McGuinness?
The plain truth is, whatever mess may exist today, it is only because both Governments nurtured the warring factions for 35 years. Today's Peace Process Provos have been rewarded enough for crippling the Civil Rights Movement, to my mind, and both Governments can simply get on with the job of putting real criminals behind bars. What are they waiting for?

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi Joe

Great 'bloggs' - well worth the effort.

Sat Apr 30, 07:57:00 AM PDT  

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