January, 2007

If Gerry Adams were to tell me today is Monday, I’d doublecheck my diary just to make sure.

I don’t believe that Sinn Fein should be ever considered a truly democratic party, until there is a full and frank confession of the crimes committed by all its members during the last four decades.

I believe that The Cult of Leader Gerry inhibits true political debate and progress within not only Sinn Fein, but Northern Ireland as a whole.

I believe Sinn Fein are still essentially a sectarian party, uninterested in widening their electoral support beyond their own “traditional” narrow support-base….

Yet, yet…..  

I was talking to a very close relative last night, one who lost two of his best friends to Provo murder gangs in the early 80s. We were nattering, of course, about the day’s developments down at the RDS.  

His verdict on the passed Ard Chomhairle motion was posed in a rhetoric question, “well, is it good news for Northern Ireland or not?”   

“To achieve this the Ard Chomhairle is hereby mandated to:* Appoint Sinn Féin representatives to the Policing Board and the District Policing Partnership Boards to ensure that:- a civic policing service, accountable and representative of the community is delivered as quickly as possible, - the Chief Constable and the PSNI are publicly held to account,- policing with the community is achieved as the core function of the PSNI,

- political policing, collusion and “the force within a force” is a thing of the past and to oppose any involvement by the British Security Service/MI5 in civic policing”    Strip away all the macho posturing, the flowery speeches, the carefully stage-managed photo opportunities.   

Strip away all the macho posturing, the flowery speeches, the carefully stage-managed photo opportunities.   This motion is Republicans accepting, for the first time, that everybody in Northern Ireland deserves a police force, an impartial Northern Irish police force working under the normal legal guidelines followed by any other police force in the UK (or the rest of Europe for that matter). Crime prevention carried out not by the boys with balaclavas and baseballs, but by *normal*, on-the-beat coppers.  

And if you look at the end of the motion, that acceptance isn’t conditional:  

“That the Ard Chomhairle is mandated to implement this motion only when the power-sharing institutions are established and when the Ard Chomhairle is satisfied that the policing and justice powers will be transferred. Or if this does not happen within the St Andrews timeframe, only when acceptable new partnership arrangements to implement the Good Friday Agreement are in place.”  

Whether it’s a power-sharing executive or Plan B, Sinn Fein have agreed to the principle of supporting the PSNI and the criminal justice system. It’s there in back and white.

Now, of course, actions speak louder than words and of course, I still hold much of what Sinn Fein stands for in deep contempt, but… surely isn’t that statement good news for all of us in Northern Ireland?  

Monday, January 29th, 2007 // General

Have you ever seen the Fire Service posters where a child has scrawled “You forgot to check the smoke alarm batteries Daddy?” on a charred wall? What a horrible thought - that as the house was burning down around him, your child was vindictive enough to be heaping blame on you instead of bothering to escape!

Anyway, this leads me to an incident that happened a couple of weeks ago at my in-laws house. As they slept that night, someone set fire to a shed at the back of their house. The fire caught on quickly and spread to the house, filling it with smoke.

Their neighbours noticed the fire and started kicking the front door to alert them, but they didn’t wake up. It was only when the (badly placed) smoke alarms went off that they woke up and scarpered. The Fire Brigade later theorised that they may have already been affected by the smoke fumes - explaining how difficult it was to wake them up.

The Firemen also explained that the fire had almost reached the cavity layer and had it gone that far, the whole house would have been engulfed by flames. Apparently a few minutes later and they wouldn’t have stood a chance. Five minutes from being a headline - 5 people dead, 4 adults and an infant.

Now before you ask, I have an alibi! I was tucked up safely in bed far from the scene of the crime!

A few days after the incident, we were talking about it and it suddenly occurred to me what the unforeseen consequences might have been if the worst had happened. Being among the most immediate family members, we would have been expected to:

• Make funeral arrangements. My first thought was “how the hell would we afford 5 funerals?”
• Mrs L’s 11 year old brother was luckily out of the house on that night. Had the worst happened, we’d have become his full-time carers. There are a couple of immediate thoughts:
  • Is our house big enough? We look after him enough to be able to adjust to living with him, but do we have enough room to share our house permanently?
  • How would we work in commitments to keep up his relationship with his grandparents and other relatives? Particularly on his Father’s side, they’re not people we know very well.
• Other issues like do the in-laws have a will, how to handle their property and stuff like that. We’ve been lucky enough not to have too many deaths in the family and none close enough that we’ve become involved in the arrangements. Who helps out with this sort of thing?

Moving on, the bizarro part of the story is that, two days later the mother-in-law was bitching and moaning about the inconvenience of having to put in a new kitchen and having her house professionally cleaned! Everything is a problem to the mother-in-law, and having escaped with her life and her house more or less intact, she automatically went looking for problems.

Anyway, I’d never thought too hard about how something that happened to extended family would affect us. But obviously there are consequences. Another is that now I’m glad the mother-in-law doesn’t offer to babysit our kids too much, because what if they’d been in the house that night too?

Thursday, January 25th, 2007 // Family Life

I don’t want to get into the ins and outs of collusion or make too much of a judgement without evidence, as many in Northern Ireland no doubt will or indeed have already done. I am not surprised by the supposed “revelation” of RUC collusion or that certain members of the old Police force colluded with paramilitaries. Nobody can claim that our conflict was in anyway clean, even the terrorists called it a “dirty war”, and so to claim surprise when a dirty little secret is revealed makes little sense outside of political point scoring. I am not attempting to justify the crimes of people in the past or excuse them but to highlight that they were not uniquely evil. Policemen, many of whom came from the communities targeted by Republicans could not have all remained as decent as the majority of rank and file officers did, its just the impossibility of human nature, just like those Catholics in 1969 who watched their homes being burned by Loyalist gangs could not all have remained decent as the majority of Catholics did.

Within the context of our conflict the informants system was tragically going to fall prey to the instances of murder highlighted, however collusion is different from turning a blind eye, in order to collude the officers in question would have had to set up or help organise the murders - which some may well have done - but I don’t possess the evidence. However accepting that terrorists are going to kill and turning a blind eye to those few murders may have prevented greater acts of terrorism. Within the context of the dirty war we cannot see what was necessary from what was morally unjustifiable and plain sectarian murder with regards to the RUC. If evidence suggests otherwise then no one can morally argue against it.

What I will say is I am not surprised by the Republican hypocrites reaction to the whole sordid affair who of course jumped on the moral high ground.

Calling for heads to roll, people to be fired, prosecutions, justice and using the murder of 15 people to excuse or justify the terrorism of Nationalists. In an ideally moral country yes, certainly evidence of murder and collusion should be fairly dealt with, in an ideally moral country paramilitaries who murdered innocent civilians for sectarian reasons would be jailed and serve their full sentences for those crimes…but you see, we don’t live in either an ideal or a moral country, we live in Northern Ireland.

I will agree with Martin McGuinness that ex-RUC members, Special Branch officers, former Chief Constables and the like be imprisoned for acts of supporting or overlooking acts of murder; when Mr McGuinness is put on trial for his crimes, when OTR terrorists are hunted down and locked up. When those who did not serve their full sentences thanks to the GFA are returned to prison or when Mr McGuinness gives up those members of his organisation who were not prosecuted for acts of sectarian murder. Until then Sinn Fein members and supporters have no moral high ground on which to stand to accuse others or hold people to standards of prosecution they themselves feel exempted from because of their ‘political idealism’ or supposed ‘cause’.

If I may indulge my own idealism: we should have an amnesty for all those involved in the 30+ year conflict, if we cannot be consistent with our standards, and should seek to build a better future for all of us and our future generations. I cannot change the dark days of what we allowed to occur in our country, nor do I wish to go on a moralistic revenge trip, rather I’d be happy to remember only so that it spurs us on to never again allow ourselves to return to such a dark place. I don’t believe a South African style “Truth & Reconciliation” commission would be anything more than a sop or a cynical exercise, but perhaps we require something similar, which allows a blanket amnesty for those who partake in it in order that it is firmly placed in the past once and for all, I believe it would be a welcome relief for many…apart from of course most Republicans and most Loyalists.

Wednesday, January 24th, 2007 // Northern Ireland: Politics

Right, imagine you were approached by a friend or colleague and asked to recommend a good Northern Irish political blog….

Who would you recommend?

I’ve lamented the state of the Northern Irish blogosphere a while back, and now that I’m starting to get back into the flow of things I’d like to update my reading list. Damien Mulley pulled out a good list of Irish political blogs late last year.

I’d like to see something similar for Northern Ireland specifically. Roll up your sleeves, and help me out with your suggestions in the comments below!

Monday, January 22nd, 2007 // Northern Ireland: Politics

Ouch! I noticed the Google ads were displaying an advert at the top of the page tonight (I’m not allowed to click on them - part of the terms of service), saying “To Hell With Our Customers”. So, I took a note of the URL and followed it.

Somebody doesn’t like the Donnelly Cars dealership in Belfast!

The page I linked to above is a Wiki, a user-generated site that virtually anybody can edit, although I doubt they’ll be letting Donnelly Cars edit it any time soon! I particularly liked the “Ask for Paul for some free hot air!” offer - I might actually do that for a laugh!

But *ahem* on a serious note, this is a lawsuit just waiting to happen. Whoever is posting this page dislikes Donnelly’s enough to pay to advertise it - do the search and you’ll see sponsored links on the right hand side.

Just remember folks, the customer is King (or Queen).

Monday, January 22nd, 2007 // Observations

While surfing the Internet I came across a number of Irish-American websites excitedly counting down to ‘Paddy’s Day’. I began thinking about Christmas and its annual countdown and the similarities between it and St. Patrick’s Day. For St. Patrick’s day celebrations have as much to do with a 5th century teetotal Christian fundamentalist, as Christmas has to do with the birth of Christ.

I for one am amused by Paddy’s day. Not least by the sight of “Plastic Paddy’s” everywhere bedecked in green, with leprechaun hats, black thorn sticks, the obligatory pint of Guinness and sometimes an Irish tricolour. Indeed even I, in the past, have been known to join in the festivities of celebrating our “Patron Saint” (minus the hat, stick and tricolour) and from what I can remember I thoroughly enjoyed my indulgement of Paddywhackery culture (for it is anything but authentic Irish culture). But the most amusing thing of all about March 17th or there abouts, is the seriousness with which both our tribes and Irish America take it. Some DUPer will always be waiting in the wings to inform “us Prods” that Saint Patrick “Is ours too, you know”, like somehow we didn’t?!

And the small but dreadfully annoying ‘grumpy Prod brigade’ so disdainful of supposed “Irishness”, however unauthentic, plastic or non-threatening it is, must insist on projecting their misery onto others by demanding parades with no green, no tricolours (mmm…what about the orange bit?), no alcohol, basically no fun for anyone!

Lest I should forget all those “liberal internationalist” Republicans out there, I’m also equally amused by their idea of what an “authentic” St. Patrick’s day is, much like the one mentioned above, only with Celtic shirts, Armalite T-shirts, Toicfaidh Ar La key-rings and various pro-IRA tack! “We’re not alienatin’ anybody, so we’re not” is the cry from rebel whiners when you question their precious sacrosanct expression of “Irishness”, considering they’re supposedly defenders of traditional Irish culture its surprising their clinginess to a decidedly unauthentic display of pure plastic paddyness.

As with most things in Northern Ireland St. Patrick’s day is a means by which to express our ingrained sectarianism and hatreds for one another. I do not believe St. Patrick’s day is something of great importance or significance, to either our culture, identity or conflict, rather it is a non-issue made into a sectarian mud flinging exercise and propaganda battle. Of course I can see the fun side to it and am not a complete dreary sod, I don’t think it should be banned, suppressed or excluded, nor do I believe it has much authenticity or relation to Irishness. After all Irishness defined as a celebration of the Irish Nationalist identity and republican cause, is only a narrow view of what it means for someone to be ‘Irish’. There are the Anglo-Irish, Ulster-Scots, Anglicans, Presbyterians, Methodists, Atheists, non-indigenous people of various backgrounds and religions. If I am to celebrate my Irishness as I see it, I cannot express it fully in the context of a republican “triumphalist coat trailing exercise”, my symbols of identity, culture, history and heritage are not respected in the context of such a supposed celebration of Irelands ‘Patron Saint’.

Solution? I’m not sure if there is a solution beyond my own idealism. Ideally I’d like to see a celebration in Northern Ireland that was truly inclusive, all embracing, open minded and welcoming. Where not only are tricolours, Gaelic culture and nationalist symbols celebrated, but were all the other strains of Irishness were equitably accounted for and given space. If it were up to me I’d have everybody bring as many flags as they’d like, British, Irish or other. Imagine if you would a sea of red, white & blue; green, white & orange? If you think it would be a colour clash then perhaps you should tell that to Irish-Americans where Paddy’s day parades in the USA are awash with tricolours and stars & stripes. Think about a lively music performance of bodhrans, tin-whistles, fiddles, flutes and bagpipes…and dare I suggest lambegs? If you believe lambeg drums are threatening then you’ve never heard one played well (yes such a thing is possible) and it is regarded amongst ‘Prods’ with the same passion as a bodhran player regards his small but worthy tool.

There is more than one musical tradition in Ireland, one identity, one type of cultural tradition, if inclusiveness is supposedly the bottom line of a multi-cultural society - which Britain and Ireland pride themselves on being - then we should be able to incorporate each others culture into our celebrating St. Patrick’s day and beyond that limited scope as well, by doing so we might be able to strip away the negative sectarian cloud hanging over our various traditions and cultural celebrations. I have no doubt this will NOT happen. Sectarianism appears to be Northern Ireland’s main cultural tradition - and until people are brave enough to truly be inclusive and tolerant - then we’ll forever be going around in circles.

“Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it”

Friday, January 19th, 2007 // Northern Ireland: Politics

This is the second post from our new contributor, CJ on the latest goings on in Celebrity Big Brother. Admit it, you’re all talking about it!

I have never watched an episode of Big Brother beyond the first airing on British TV, the idea of watching someone being filmed 24/7 holds no appeal to me, it strikes me as being as so far away from reality as to make the term “Reality TV” an oxi-moron of moronic proportions. But apparently now a reality show for has-beens, non-celebrities, and niche market actresses, has the power to cause an international incident.

“Big Brother Racism” is now the cry from numbskull viewers, MP’s, Indian government spokesmen and Hindu nationalists. In my humble opinion to accuse Big Brother contestants and viewers of having the brainpower to decipher plain ignorance from racist bigotry, is beyond their synaptic capacity. What really happened as far as I can make out is that Jade Goodies mother, who I don’t believe is a contestant on the show? Asked whether Bollywood diva Shilpa Shetty lived in a “house or a shack” - now forgive me if I forgive Jade’s mother for her complete and utter ignorance - Jade Goodie is half Black and some racist idiot could make a connection between Kenyan Massai huts in Africa and ask her a similarly moronic question, which could be seen as racist if it weren’t for it being such a dumb attempt at causing upset.

Now as for racism inside the Big Brother house, as far as I can make out there, one of the other contestants accused Ms Shetty of wanting to be “White”. Well I can’t see the racism there unless we consider that “White” is something one can become by acting in a certain way, much the same as accusing someone of acting “Black” because they conform to certain shallow stereotypes. I would perhaps see the racism in the statement if it didn’t have some truth in it.

India has millions of people, many of diverse ethnic, geographical, religious and racial backgrounds, most of them being fairly dark-brown to almost black - yet Ms Shetty and many of the most famous Bollywood starlets are light skinned and light eyed - there are literally thousands of young Indian girls all across the sub-continent using God-knows-what to lighten their often beautiful skin, simply to appear or in an attempt to become “White”. Hundreds of people then seek to blame the unrealistic “European standard of beauty” for the culture of “colourism” in India, which I would also believe, if it weren’t for the thousands of years old Caste-system. Not so long ago Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called it “a form of apartheid”, where the lower caste ‘Dalits’ (Untouchables) suffer horrific and barbaric treatment, most of them in positions that could have been found in deep south Alabama in 1945. So for the Indian government and people to cry racism for a rather pathetic non-incident which took place on a third rate (non) reality TV show, is the most pathetic case of the pot calling the kettle black that there has ever been. Indeed even Shilpa Shetty’s fellow Bollywood stars aren’t immune from the racist legacy of India’s caste-system, Aishwarya Rai the star of ‘Bride & Prejudice’, stated in an interview: “Rohit Shetty is amazing as a director. He can make even a black African look pretty”.

But of more concern to me, beyond supposed racism in Big Brother, is the power of such an “ugly” show to cause such an incident. Call me hysterical but the concept of Big Brother to me, which was undeniably lifted from George Orwell’s “1984”, is an attempt at normalizing the concept of watching peoples every move 24/7. I see “Big Brother” as real-life manifestation of the propaganda posters in Orwell’s book “Big Brother is Watching You”, the main character Winston walked by them as a normal part of his everyday routine, so used to the idea of people being watched he could afford not to notice such a threatening statement. Yup, I know I sound like a conspiracy nut-job but its not such a leap of the imagination to see a future were governments would seek to spy on their citizens every action - look at the “Patriot Act” in the United States - what better way of implementing a system of 24 hour surveillance of the population than to have a population already normalized to the idea of spying on other peoples every move. IMHO
we’ve had too much “Big Brother”, it’s old and stale, and if I had my choice it’d have to go into room 101.

“WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH” 1984, George Orwell.

Thursday, January 18th, 2007 // News & Media

Alexander Solzhenitsyn (Russian writer), Vaclav Havel (ex Czech President) and Aung San Suu Kyi (Burmese pro-democracy activist) are all, for different reasons and in different parts of the world, very courageous people. They were also (and in the case of Aung san Suu Kyi still is) dissidents. And. no, that doesn’t mean they firebombed DIY stores or they couldn’t bear having a fenian about the place.

For, despite what the Sinn Fein/DUP Politburos and lazy N.Irish journalists may tell you, “dissident” is not a dirty word, a person to be shunned by all those naice people “committed” to the *Peace* Process.

Back to faithful Wiki, for a rather broader definition of the word “dissident“:

A dissident, broadly defined, is a person who actively opposes an established opinion, policy, or structure. The term is most often used to refer to political dissidents, usually against authoritarian regimes or established constitutional order (although there are rare uses of the phrase philosophical dissident). Political dissidents use non-violent means of political dissent, including voicing criticism of the government or dominating ideology, or protesting individual actions by the authorities.

“Dissent”, “Protest”, “Opposition to the Established Norms” and even,”Dissidents” are, (but whisper it gently in Norn Iron), generally recognised as good things for democracy.

Fact: party apparachniks and an electorate who obediently nod at everything Gerry and Big Ian tells them is not going to push forward the democratic process in N.Ireland.

Whilst I’d much rather that the present challenges to the DUP/SF were coming from secular, liberal Unionists and genuinely socialist Republicans respectively, if the end result is the same –the splintering of the DUP and Sinn Fein monoliths and the future development of a non-sectarian, fully functioning political system in Ulster, then I ain’t going to complain.

So, good luck to all the political dissidents!

Paul
A Dissident Unionist
(http://www.betterunion.co.uk)

Tuesday, January 16th, 2007 // Northern Ireland: Politics

This post was submitted by CJ, one of our new contributors at The Levee Breaks…

After hearing about the incident in Clifftonvilles match with Glentoran, I was reminded of something about Northern Ireland, and its not that a lot of us can’t get over our respective “dislike” of each other or our political differences enough to even respect the dead; I was reminded that Northern Ireland is the most hypocritical nation in the world.

The reaction of certain Clifftonville fans to the minute silence was disappointing yes, but I had to laugh at the reaction of many who were struck with moral outrage and disgust, many but not all of them Loyalist or Unionist (like myself) the Newsletter summed up the C’ville fans behaviour as “Shameful”. I’m not saying I agree with those C’ville fans but did anybody really expect it to be otherwise? David Ervine was a member of an organization that murdered Catholics (Nationalists), so it would have been more hypocritical I suppose of certain C’ville fans (a majority of whom are Catholic/Nationalist) if they hadn’t reacted the way they did. But also the reaction of “Loyalists” was predictable and of course totally hypocritical, if Gerry Adams had popped his clogs would certain Glen’s fans have reacted any differently? Also I’m probably not defaming C’ville fans when I predict that a portion of its fans are supporters of “political parties” such as Sinn Fein whose members are responsible for the murders of innocent Protestants (Unionists).

Not only was I thinking of the hypocrisy of footie fans, but hypocrisy in the wider context . Take the DUP moral outrage brigade for instance, never too shy to boast about its independence from terrorism or paramilitarism, the DUP behave as though they’re as clean as baby angels in this whole mess. Ian Paisley may be a reverend, but his memory lapses sure to seem as close to lying as he’ll admit to getting, because they seemed to forget about the past connections to groups such as the Ulster Protestant Volunteers (UPV) and Ulster Resistance (UR). Big Ian’s also guilty I’m afraid of sparking the distrust and hatred of many young Protestants towards Catholics in the 1960’s who went on to join paramilitary groups.

Sinn Feiners also never fail to make them selves’ look like the innocent victims, they accuse the Police of being murderers and colluders, as though the IRA were some sort of boy-scout troop. The PSNI are unacceptable to Catholics is a constant rejectionist theme of Republicans, despite the increase in Catholics joining, and if the news is anything to go by a number of Polish people seem to be eager to fill up positions, yet they cannot promote that more Catholics (including those from Ballymurphy, Andersonstown and the Falls) should join? Of course they want their “own” community Police force with influence most likely from IRA volunteers to keep on top of their own ghettos, yet they pretend they couldn’t allow those senior Republicans to cooperate with the PSNI (like some of them haven’t already?).

While the hypocrisy of politics blocks progress towards the continuity of the peace process, those who believe you can’t get more extreme than SF/DUP should beware of those extremists on the fringes of both sides preparing to take the reigns away from Sinn Fein and the DUP; if that happens then any chances of a peaceful future for Northern Ireland goes down the toilet.

Friday, January 12th, 2007 // Northern Ireland: Politics

The Levee Breaks is now accepting applications from contributors.

We’re looking for contributors who can provide thought-provoking pieces on current affairs in Northern Ireland and beyond. You can be Nationalist, Unionist, Catholic, Protestant or Muslim….whatever. The wider the range of opinions the better.

You’ll receive an account and logon details for the site and be able to post articles straight away. I’ll be on hand to help you learn how to use the blogging software and guide you through putting your posts on the site.

If you have a blog, we can provide a link back to it from each of your posts, and a short profile to tell the readers about you.

Contributor Policy

There are a couple of rules for contributors:

• If you have a website or blog, you can mention it, but don’t shove it down our throats! Excessive self-promotion will get you banned!
• Keep it civil. Politics is a passionate arena, and people can get easily insulted. Let’s keep the debate calm and respectable, both in the posts and in the comments.
• Your opinions are your own. You are fully responsible for any posts you write, and if we receive any complaint you may be asked to modify or remove the offending post.

It may be necessary to change or add to the Contributor Policy as time goes on. This list reserves the right to change at any time!

Contributor Applications

Use the contact form to apply for a contributor account.

Wednesday, January 10th, 2007 // General