It’s very interesting that posters who routinely post posts of zero substance project their failings onto others
For example, @Rocko here
He’s made zero contribution to the thread yet is somehow offended at others making substantial contributions without being able to engage in any way to dispute their content
That’s terrible INTERNETTING
Mods, please ban him from the thread
I remember once years ago I spent an afternoon wandering around Glasnevin Cemetery. As anyone who has been there will know, it is a vast site and to walk through it is to walk backwards through generations of Irish history. Collins, DeValera, Parnell, O’Connell. There are large Anglo-Irish mausoleums in the centre but most graves in Glasnevin are dilapidated or even unmarked.
I was enjoying my patriotic expedition on a nice summer day. As Morrissey said in “Cemetery Gates”, “all these lives with passions just like ours, where have they gone, where are they now?”
I stopped suddenly when I stumbled across a large gravestone towards the back wall, dedicated to numerous RIC men who had been killed during the War of Independence. This grave was far away from the graves of Republicsn heroes at the front.There were at least 10 names on the gravestone. The names all seemed of true-Gael origin and some of the boys were very young, early 20s. These were just ordinary policemen, who wanted to live locally and have a stable job.
I suddenly felt deeply moved. These were the men that i had to sacrifice to gain my freedom. I stopped and for the first time that day I said a prayer, not from my head, but from my heart. Perhaps I was praying for myself as much as for them but if so I was not aware of it at the time.
The men who died in service if the IRA have to be remembered above those RIC men and it’s wrong to equate them but the RIC men cannot be completely forgotten. The problem of course is that the Black and Tans were made RIC men. That is the complicating factor.
You can kill an innocent man because it’s proportionate to win the freedom of a nation but you can’t kill an innocent man and spit in his grave. The historical treatment of the American loyalists of Lexington also upsets me.
Some excellent thoughts on here about the sinister language of “maturity”. Lord Bruton once said the proudest moment of his entire life (above being elected Taoiseach of the Irish government presumably) was meeting Prince Charles, he’s in no position to talk to anyone about maturity.
we should have done to him what the norse did to quisling
No bitterness at all mate. Much happier with that situation than the alternative.
It depends what you mean by maturity
Maturity does not mean forgetting history
Maturity does not mean airbrushing or denying unambiguous wrongs
Maturity means acknowledging a common humanity and complexity of history
All sorts of people struggle with maturity
Take Soloheadbeg for instance
Sean Treacy was no hero
Dan Breen was no hero, he was a savage and a supporter of the Nazis, but if that’s pointed out all sorts on here go mental because they have internalised a romantic notion of him as a hero and they sing songs about him, and any challenge to that introduces a cognitive dissonance they cannot deal with
That’s no different to Unionists who can’t accept that there were butchers in the RUC
Look at the way Poland and Russia and the US struggle to acknowledge the wrongs and complexities of their histories
Romantic notions of the past are bullshit
Will the Iranians commemorate Trump in a 100 years do you think?
Good God what have you done.
I doubt it
And why would they
I doubt the Iraqis will be commemorating George W. Bush or the Poles Hitler
I wonder would the French consider commemorating Vichy policemen. 
. Sure they were only ordinary lads looking for steady work.
That comparison isn’t remotely valid
It’s rabble rousing nonsense
A valid comparison might be ordinary Soviet police in Ukraine in say, 1989/1990
They were the police force of a country, the USSR, which was imperialist in nature but the country which was about to go independent, Ukraine, had never known independence
Not completely fair, the RIC weren’t rounding up Jews and they probably never thought that Ireland could be independent.
Also Irish Unionism is a cultural identity with rounder routes than a French man who supports Germany taking over his country, you’re basically saying all Irish Unionists are Nazis.
I wouldn’t say ALL of them
The lads are saying that until Ireland was independent there should have been no organised policing in Ireland.
It tallies with the rastoolers continued support of vigilante activity in marginalised communities.
It is not included in the list of events and themes we suggested should be formally commemorated by the state. What we stated was that ‘consideration should be given to the organisation of specific initiatives to commemorate the RIC and the DMP and to acknowledge their place in history.
That seals it for me, event should be cancelled and rethought. The big problem is no one can trust what that cunt Charlie Flanagan would say. You could be standing politely and he’d start going on about this brave organisation caught on the wrong side of history and it would look like you had endorsed it all.
You mentioned reconciliation above which would mean a restoration of a broken down friendship or unity. There was no prior friendship to reconcile. The special reserve of the RIC Aka the black and tans raped, pillaged and murdered across the country. Our founding fathers lived in a deeply subverted police state. And to actually call the RIC a police force is a euphemism in the extreme as the Auxies were a paramilitary part of the RIC who reeked havoc and consternation everywhere they went. There is nothing to commemorate here and it is deeply shameful part of our history.
As time passes memories fade and stories fall between the cracks of time. But I can always recall my grandmother recalling how her own mother was brutally manhandled in Galbally. My great grandmother who was pregnant at the time with gave birth to my granaunt some months later. She was born with special needs but lived to the ripe old age of 90. Who knows what kind if life my granaunt could have had. Who knows if my great grandmothers treatment lead to her impediments but they certainly didn’t help her be it distress or post traumatic symptoms etc. I’m sure they are many anecdotes like the above and much much worse that occurred that are being resurrected these last couple of days. I am saddened but not surprised at the latest attempt to rewrite Irish history.
I look forward to Liverpool fans honouring David Duckenfield in a few years.
Mr Ferriter may have participated in the meetings but he obviously didn’t see the same minutes that @Tim_Riggins kept referencing (without linking) earlier.
maybe he’d use his father’s maiden speech to the dail
“I should like to co-operate with the Government or with any Party that I believed was going to introduce legislation in the best interests of the Irish nation. I should like very much to be in a position to support any measure brought forward in this House with that object, but I am very sorry that I cannot associate myself with this Bill or with anything relating to the public safety measures introduced by the Cumann na nGaedheal Government or by the present Fianna Fáil Government because I have seen that most of these Emergency Acts were always directed against Republicanism. How is it that we do not see any of these Acts directed against the Jews, who crucified Our Saviour nineteen hundred years ago, and who are crucifying us every day in the week? How is it that we do not see them directed against the Masonic Order? How is it that the I.R.A. is considered an illegal organisation while the Masonic Order is not considered an illegal organisation? You do not hear one word in these Acts against the banks who are robbing the people, right, left and centre. I told the electors in Leix-Offaly that the banks were robbers. The police were listening to me. Does the Minister for Justice think that, if the banks were not robbers, the police would have allowed me to make that statement in public without attempting to make me prove it? This Government is introducing an Emergency Powers Bill now to prevent the suffering masses of the Irish people from ridding themselves or the poverty, emigration, debt, seizures and a thousand and one other national ills which I could continue to enumerate in this House until this day-week, but I do not propose to waste your precious time doing so.”