Northern Ireland has seen a lot of changes in its 100-year history – Carson, with his finger sticking in the air, wouldn’t recognise the place if he was here today.
For the first 50 years Northern Ireland was basically a unionist club to protect Protestant interests. For the next 25 years we fought a dirty little war that sent many innocent people to an early grave. Then, to top it all, we have spent the last 25 years listening to Sinn Féin rewrite history as they tell us the Troubles were never really about unity but “equality”. A surreal story for a surreal country.
Also, in the last century Britain has seen a few changes: “The 1926 Imperial Conference was the fifth Imperial Conference bringing together the prime ministers of the Dominions of the British Empire. It was held in London from 19 October to 22 November.” (Wikipedia)
Can you imagine England having one of those today? In the same 100 years Britain has gone from an empire to a third-rate country, swirling around in unchartered waters as it tries to rebuild relationships with old colonies after huffing with Europe.
While unionists of all hues have shown no real ability to treat Catholics as equals since they were forced to sign the Good Friday Agreement (GFA), Britain has shown itself to be an unreliable signatory to the Brexit agreement, backing off from promises made.
All this poses a question for nationalism – as we continue to increase our representation and will soon overtake unionism, how can we change the underlying hatred at the heart of Northern Ireland. Nationalism should develop a five-prong panzer movement.
First, we should keep pushing education. Educated people cannot be kept down. Second, highlight and defeat every example of discrimination and work for genuine, inclusive equality. Third, show respect for unionism and the unionist people. Fourth, promote and be proud of our culture.
Last but by no means least, prepare the unionist people for the day when Little Englanders turn their back on ‘Ulster’, renege on promises made to unionists and leave an almighty mess at the edge of Europe. In history 100 years is a short time.
Unfortunately for us, we won’t have a united Ireland. The ‘six counties’ will be made some sort of ‘ward’ of Europe. We will swap one mess for another.
TURLOUGH QUINN
Portglenone, Co Antrim
Time for civility in politics
In his address on receipt of the Dr Martin Luther King Non-Violent Peace Award in 1999, John Hume said the bullet that killed Dr Martin Luther King aimed not only to destroy the man but his ideas. More than 50 years later, we can bear witness that instead of killing the ‘creative force of peace and non-violence’, Dr King’s words and ideals continue to inspire and guide peaceful non-violent change.
The brutal murder of Sir David Amess MP, of Jo Cox MP a number of years ago, and the killings of political representatives in Northern Ireland and across the world, remind us that democracy comes at a high price. Tragically, we have lost dedicated parliamentarians, but their dreams of a society built on the principles of equality, democracy, freedom and the dignity of the individual live on.
Difference is an essential feature of public discourse in free societies. However, in more recent years in particular, difference in political discourse is often perceived and experienced as negative, acrimonious and polarising as politicians, their followers and opponents engage in torrents of hostile rhetoric.
With the ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ on the political stage losing focus on the true interests and needs of the people they represent, what results is a loss of public confidence, a belittling of politics and our political institutions, and a gradual erosion of parliamentary democracy.
As John Hume said in his Nobel Peace address, ‘Difference is an accident of birth and it should therefore never be the source of hatred or conflict. The answer to difference is to respect it.’
Respect for difference is a core value that sits at the heart of the peace and reconciliation work of both the John and Pat Hume Foundation and of the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation.
We believe there is an urgent need to promote civility in politics where differences are respected, where ethical and civil dialogue is embraced and where efforts are focused on working together to enhance and better serve democracy, diversity and political decision making.
In Ireland and in Northern Ireland in particular, we can do so by rededicating ourselves to the Good Friday Agreement commitments to ‘partnership, equality and mutual respects as the basis of our relationships’.
BARBARA WALSHE
Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation
DR SEÁN FARREN
John and Pat Hume Foundation
Time for truth recovery running out
If nothing else, the death of Denis Hutchings during his trial for the shooting of John Patrick Cunningham in Tyrone in 1974, and now the death of another soldier involved in the fatal shooting of Stan Carberry, a father of six in west Belfast in 1972, are warnings that time is fast running out for victims and their families of achieving truth and justice through the courts. There is an alternative, which is a Truth Recovery Process that provides victims and survivors with an alternative to the tortuously slow pursuit of cases through the judicial process, where cases often end in disappointment and the traumatisation of many participants.
We will shortly be holding a Webinar on the legal aspects of the process and the draft legislation that would allow it to be incorporated in the Stormont House Agreement through the Independent Commission on Information Retrieval.
We will also be launching a new journal, Legacy Matters on December 3 in the Linen Hall Library.
Our proposal is challenging but that is all the more reason why it needs to be addressed.
Anyone looking for further information can do so at http://truthrecoveryprocess.ie or by contacting truthrecoveryireland@gmail.com.
PADRAIG YEATES
Portmarnock, Dublin
Continuing a boycott tradition
Sally Rooney, the 30-year-old best-selling Irish author, supports Palestine. Today’s Genocide of the Palestinians by the Jewish State outrages ordinary decent Irish citizens.
Sally supports the boycott of the Israeli regime – Ireland has a long and noble tradition of boycott dating from 1880.
Palestine is today’s Vietnam, today’s apartheid South Africa.
Sally is continuing a boycott tradition, more recently exemplified by the Dunnes Stores women’s boycott of apartheid South Africa.
She has the full support of our interfaith group of moderate Jews and Gentiles.
DR JOSEPH O’NEILL
Interfaith for Palestine,
Letterkenny, Co Donegal
