Dessie Ellis - The Sinn Fein TD who is linked to 50 murders

oscarBravo

SoulandForm wrote: »

Again I think the PIRA's was foolish, some of the time actually immoral, and counter-productive, but I can see where it came from.

I can see where Anders Breivik's actions came from too. I still don't hesitate to unreservedly condemn those actions.

SoulandForm wrote: »

I dont understand your point. Full employment would be a very important part in bringing a real peace to Northern Ireland. You dont know much about the place if you cant see that.

A million pounds for every man, woman and child would be a big help too. The fact that something would be helpful doesn't make it a practical solution to a problem. You can't just create full employment.

It's also simplistic to suggest "British withdrawal" as a solution. It may have escaped your attention, but that's a "solution" that would make a great many people in Northern Ireland very unhappy.

SoulandForm

oscarBravo wrote: »

I can see where Anders Breivik's actions came from too. I still don't hesitate to unreservedly condemn those actions.

A million pounds for every man, woman and child would be a big help too. The fact that something would be helpful doesn't make it a practical solution to a problem. You can't just create full employment.

It's also simplistic to suggest "British withdrawal" as a solution. It may have escaped your attention, but that's a "solution" that would make a great many people in Northern Ireland very unhappy.

I thought you said human dignity was important to you? The right work and earn your pay while meaningfully contributing to society seems to me pretty key to human dignity. Human dignity and long term unemployment dont really go together at all.

I didnt say British withdrawal on its own-I said British with a real peace process between communities. Peace walls have doubled since the GFA so obviously its failed on that score.

oscarBravo

SoulandForm wrote: »

I thought you said human dignity was important to you?

OK, let's assume that full employment is an important step in the peace process.

How do you get full employment? Who does the employing?

SoulandForm

oscarBravo wrote: »

I can see where Anders Breivik's actions came from too. I still don't hesitate to unreservedly condemn those actions.

Problem is that paramilitaries on both sides had rather large levels of sympathy and support- comparing either to a solitary psychopath could been as silly, it certainly doesnt offer anything positive.

SoulandForm

oscarBravo wrote: »

OK, let's assume that full employment is an important step in the peace process.

How do you get full employment? Who does the employing?

Look at the example of Taiwan and how it built itself. Look at the example of the USSR. Cut out business and just have society and its needs maybe?

SoulandForm

We dont have to follow the negatives of either but should society serve the economy or the economy serve society?

oscarBravo

SoulandForm wrote: »

Look at the example of the USSR. Cut out business and just have society and its needs maybe?

So, in summary, your proposed solution (as an Irish republican) is to create a 32-county independent socialist Irish republic?

Genius. It's a wonder nobody has thought of it before.

SoulandForm

oscarBravo wrote: »

So, in summary, your proposed solution (as an Irish republican) is to create a 32-county independent socialist Irish republic?

Genius. It's a wonder nobody has thought of it before.

What is your alternative?

Long term unemployment, the worst housing in the UK, people killing each other over flags and scraps thrown from Westminster's table?

SoulandForm

Oscar I believe that what is Northern Ireland has the potential to be great. I want it to be great.

What do you want for it? That not disturb your southern paradise?

Chuck Stone

oscarBravo wrote: »

How many people were massacred in the 40 years before the start of the troubles? Was it more or less than the 3,500 people who were massacred during the troubles?

I don't know and I have no idea why you're asking such peculiar questions. I recommend you be a little less obtuse if you seek cogent replies.

It's a fairly bizarre worldview that sees the alternative to three decades of terrorist violence as a "sunshine and lollipops, candy floss cloud paradise".

As you have been told we work with the reality we have not the one we would have liked. We can't replicate the 'experiment' where instead of fighting back Republicans/Nationalist/Catholics decided throwing flowers at gun and baton wielding state backed forces who were party to ethnic cleansing would have been more gainful than fighting back.

Are you objecting to the idea of responding to violence with non-violence because you believe that Northern Ireland would have been (and would be today) a much worse place in the absence of the IRA's campaign of terrorism, and all that happened as a direct result of it?

No. I'm saying we work with the reality we have rather than the alternate realities you want to conjure. Consider too that if state backed militias with lethal weapons are poised to engage in pogroms against an unarmed equality seeking minority are met with pacifism by the unarmed minority the unarmed minority will only be massacred and ethnically cleansed.

Sometimes non-violence as a response is little more than a green light for massacres and ethnic cleansing. They had refugee camps at one point on the border for Catholics fleeing sectarian violence and the threat of being murdered or burned out of their homes.

SoulandForm

Chuck the PIRA's campaign was far from purely defensive. There aim was to force a British State withdrawal- under the circumstances this had very little chance of success and in the end they have become part and parcel of the sectarian game.

Chuck Stone

SoulandForm wrote: »

Chuck the PIRA's campaign was far from purely defensive.

Yes but in the people in Catholic neighbourhoods pleaded with the OIRA to protect them from the B-Specials/RUC/Loyalists and due to the lack of action the PIRA was formed and acquired weapons. Let there be no doubt that after the gun battles between the IRA and BA/RUC/Loyalists the threat of pogroms and ethic cleansing was gone. The Catholic target was no longer soft.

There aim was to force a British State withdrawal under the circumstances this had very little chance of success

I agree but that wasn't the only function.

and in the end they have become part and parcel of the sectarian game.

If the IRA had been as indiscriminate and sectarian as loyalists (backed by elements of the RUC/BA) their 35% civilian killing rate would have been a lot closer to the civilian killing rate of so-called loyalists which was 85%.

JustinDee

SoulandForm wrote: »

What is your alternative?

What we've got now is the best there can ever be. The sooner folk on this island grow up and realise that this compromise is the solution, the better. Those too young or too easily influenced by whatever campus cause-du-jour takes their fancy should be constantly reminded of just how utterly dismal, grey and depressing this place was before. The delusion that the island is either 'this' or 'that' was not helped once the civil rights movement was hijacked by the ill-informed republican movement. Their problem was a lot closer to home than at the foot of 'The Brits'. Also about time certain elected representatives grew up and shed rhetoric harking back to this hijacked cause of theirs, with use of terms like 'The Brits'. Mature enough for government with such a stuck vernacular? I'd think not.

RandomName2

Dob74 wrote: »

Indo anti Sinn fien agenda.

That doesn't necessarily untrue. Hell - you aren;t even claiming it's untrue

Dob74 wrote: »

The PIRA killed loads of people , so did the Ira during ttoubles1919 to 1921. People voted for ff and fg down through the years. So I don't see a differents.

This is the most garbage excuse for an argument that I've ever seen (but it crops up with depressing regularity).

Sure most American's support slavery - see: they voted Democrat!

Dob74 wrote: »

The only question is do you think the troubles was politically motivated or not?
I think they where politically motivated.
I am sure most conservative's will think they where not.

Most of the terrorist atrocities in Northern Ireland from both sides were politically motivated. Aaaaannnd.... ? Oh: that was the sum and total of the justification. I see.

junder

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Yes but in the people in Catholic neighbourhoods pleaded with the OIRA to protect them from the B-Specials/RUC/Loyalists and due to the lack of action the PIRA was formed and acquired weapons. Let there be no doubt that after the gun battles between the IRA and BA/RUC/Loyalists the threat of pogroms and ethic cleansing was gone. The Catholic target was no longer soft.



I agree but that wasn't the only function.



If the IRA had been as indiscriminate and sectarian as loyalists (backed by elements of the RUC/BA) their 35% civilian killing rate would have been a lot closer to the civilian killing rate of so-called loyalists which was 85%.

And maybe if the pira had worn uniforms the loyalist success rate of killing them would have been higher. Fact is loyalists AND your sainted pira targeted innocent civilians on purpose and without mercy

GRMA

junder wrote: »

And maybe if the pira had worn uniforms the loyalist success rate of killing them would have been higher. Fact is loyalists AND your sainted pira targeted innocent civilians on purpose and without mercy

The difference is that when the PIRA did it it was very much an exception to how they normally operated and in many cases was condemned by republicans.

For loyalists however it was their MO, and such acts were applauded by their supporters.

junder

GRMA wrote: »

The difference is that when the PIRA did it it was very much an exception to how they normally operated and in many cases was condemned by republicans.

For loyalists however it was their MO, and such acts were applauded by their supporters.

Much like you applaud the pira and excise thier actions

GRMA

junder wrote: »

Much like you applaud the pira and excise thier actions

I never applaud sectarian killings, and as for the PIRAs activities, its more a grim acceptance of their necessity rather than applauding them - war isnt nice and shouldnt be applauded.

oscarBravo

Chuck Stone wrote: »

I don't know and I have no idea why you're asking such peculiar questions.

So you claim that Catholics were "massacred" for 40 years because of their demands for civil rights, but when I ask you to put a figure on those "massacred", you retreat into arm-waving? Colour me shocked.

I recommend you be a little less obtuse if you seek cogent replies.

It's amazing how often I'm described as obtuse when I try to engage republicans in a process of imagining the mere possibility that Northern Ireland might conceivably have been a better place without three decades of terrorist campaigns by armed groups of people who deeply hate each other. It's almost as if republicans have some sort of vested interest in needing to believe that the 3,500 people who were murdered in the course of those terrorist campaigns were a price worth paying; the fiction that more people would have died in the absence of three decades of terrorist tit-for-tat, and that no civil or human rights improvements could ever conceivably be achieved except by means of mass murder - if that's what republicans need to tell themselves in order to avoid the realisation that the IRA campaign only made things worse, then that's what they'll tell themselves, and woe betide anyone who tries to point out the fallacy.

As you have been told we work with the reality we have not the one we would have liked. We can't replicate the 'experiment' where instead of fighting back Republicans/Nationalist/Catholics decided throwing flowers at gun and baton wielding state backed forces who were party to ethnic cleansing would have been more gainful than fighting back.

It would be interesting to see what would result from applying that sort of blinkered thinking to other areas of my life. If, for example, I made a business decision that resulted in the loss of a million euros, and the board of directors asked me to evaluate whether I could have done things better - I wonder how I'd get on if I snapped at them that I can't replicate the 'experiment' where instead of making a disastrous business decision a different decision might have been more gainful.

There's nothing laudable about a refusal to accept the possibility that you might have made a mistake. The blind insistence that the choice you made - no matter how catastrophic the consequences - was the only choice you could possibly have made is a symptom of deep-rooted arrogance.

No. I'm saying we work with the reality we have rather than the alternate realities you want to conjure.

And yet, I don't see you tearing into SoulandForm for conjuring an alternate reality in which there's a job for everyone, communities will magically work together when the politicians get out of the way, and the British state withdraws without a word of objection from the Unionists and Loyalists.

Consider too that if state backed militias with lethal weapons are poised to engage in pogroms against an unarmed equality seeking minority are met with pacifism by the unarmed minority the unarmed minority will only be massacred and ethnically cleansed.

Sometimes non-violence as a response is little more than a green light for massacres and ethnic cleansing. They had refugee camps at one point on the border for Catholics fleeing sectarian violence and the threat of being murdered or burned out of their homes.

I get it, I do: the retrospective justification of a three-decade-long campaign of mutual terrorism requires that you conjure as utterly inevitable the spectre of mass murder by an EU member state of a significant percentage of its own population.

I don't feel a need to justify terrorism, and as such I'm capable of understanding that the calculus isn't as simple as you'd like to make it out to be.

GRMA

But you do justify terrorism... state terrorism by Britain.

But sure if the croppies lied down all would have fine eventually in the world of Oscarbravo and mistreatment would have magically stopped if only they would have put up with it

oscarBravo

GRMA wrote: »

But you do justify terrorism... state terrorism by Britain.

No, I don't, and it's getting very, very tiresome having to listen to accusations like that from people who would get their knickers in a twist if I accused them of justifying dissident terrorism.

But sure if the croppies lied down all would have fine eventually in the world of Oscarbravo and mistreatment would have magically stopped if only they would have put up with it

You know, as long as you keep making up stuff to argue with instead of actually discussing what I say, you're doing nothing but confirming your inability to bring any logical arguments to bear in the discussion.

Offy

oscarBravo wrote: »

So you claim that Catholics were "massacred" for 40 years because of their demands for civil rights, but when I ask you to put a figure on those "massacred", you retreat into arm-waving? Colour me shocked. It's amazing how often I'm described as obtuse when I try to engage republicans in a process of imagining the mere possibility that Northern Ireland might conceivably have been a better place without three decades of terrorist campaigns by armed groups of people who deeply hate each other. It's almost as if republicans have some sort of vested interest in needing to believe that the 3,500 people who were murdered in the course of those terrorist campaigns were a price worth paying; the fiction that more people would have died in the absence of three decades of terrorist tit-for-tat, and that no civil or human rights improvements could ever conceivably be achieved except by means of mass murder - if that's what republicans need to tell themselves in order to avoid the realisation that the IRA campaign only made things worse, then that's what they'll tell themselves, and woe betide anyone who tries to point out the fallacy. It would be interesting to see what would result from applying that sort of blinkered thinking to other areas of my life. If, for example, I made a business decision that resulted in the loss of a million euros, and the board of directors asked me to evaluate whether I could have done things better - I wonder how I'd get on if I snapped at them that I can't replicate the 'experiment' where instead of making a disastrous business decision a different decision might have been more gainful.

There's nothing laudable about a refusal to accept the possibility that you might have made a mistake. The blind insistence that the choice you made - no matter how catastrophic the consequences - was the only choice you could possibly have made is a symptom of deep-rooted arrogance. And yet, I don't see you tearing into SoulandForm for conjuring an alternate reality in which there's a job for everyone, communities will magically work together when the politicians get out of the way, and the British state withdraws without a word of objection from the Unionists and Loyalists. I get it, I do: the retrospective justification of a three-decade-long campaign of mutual terrorism requires that you conjure as utterly inevitable the spectre of mass murder by an EU member state of a significant percentage of its own population.

I don't feel a need to justify terrorism, and as such I'm capable of understanding that the calculus isn't as simple as you'd like to make it out to be.

Your thinking on this subject is completely deluded. From reading your posts you seem to have absolutely no first hand knowledge about the subject at hand. Your opinions seem to be formed either from that the media print, what government officials claim or alternatively from a deep rooted hatred for any and all republicans. To anyone that desires a 32 country Ireland Dessie Ellis is one of the few that stood up to oppression. You seem to hate him for this but you seem to revere an empire that committed horrendous crimes against the people of Ireland.
Can you say in all honestly that you hold the British government in higher regard than the Irish republican movement? Can you honestly say that you believe the British government committed less horrendous crimes than the Irish republican movement?

flutered

oscarBravo wrote: »

Yes. Yes, we've done that. And Dessie Ellis is in prison right now on foot of this news story.

Jesus, the arm-waving is getting ever more frantic.

i do not see any thread demanding that billy hutchusion be tried for any thing, i am sure that uk inteligence has its suspicions about him.

RobFowl

flutered wrote: »

i do not see any thread demanding that billy hutchusion be tried for any thing, i am sure that uk inteligence has its suspicions about him.

Seeing as how he was convicted for murder and served 16 years it makes your point a little less pertinent.

oscarBravo

Offy wrote: »

Your thinking on this subject is completely deluded.

That's not a rebuttal of anything I've said; it's just arm-waving.

From reading your posts you seem to have absolutely no first hand knowledge about the subject at hand. Your opinions seem to be formed either from that the media print, what government officials claim...

cf. my post earlier about having an opinion on the middle east, concentration camps or Guantanamo. It's also still not a rebuttal of anything I've said.

...or alternatively from a deep rooted hatred for any and all republicans.

Now you're just being petulant.

To anyone that desires a 32 country Ireland Dessie Ellis is one of the few that stood up to oppression.

This may come as a total shock to you, but not everyone who wants a 32 county Ireland agrees with the use of terrorism to achieve it.

You seem to hate him for this but you seem to revere an empire that committed horrendous crimes against the people of Ireland.

I don't hate him, nor have I expressed any hatred for him. That's just another in a long line of stuff that you've invented, along with my "reverence" for the "empire".

Similar to GRMA, the fact that you need to constantly invent fictions to berate me for betrays your inability to present any logical arguments to counter what I've actually said.

Can you say in all honestly that you hold the British government in higher regard than the Irish republican movement?

The British government, for all its faults, was elected by the British people. It is at least nominally answerable to its electorate. If the electorate dislike its actions, they can vote them out of office.

The Irish republican movement is self-appointed and answerable to nobody.

On that basis alone, the British goverment holds itself to a higher standard than republican terrorists have done.

Can you honestly say that you believe the British government committed less horrendous crimes than the Irish republican movement?

I'm not particularly interested in getting into a dick-measuring contest of comparing atrocities - no side covered itself in glory during the conflict - but you're asking me to compare a self-appointed, unanswerable terrorist group to an elected, sovereign government. If you're going to claim that it's OK for one group of people to commit atrocities on the basis that another group has committed atrocities, then all you end up with is "it's OK to commit atrocities".

I prefer my internally-consistent view that it's not OK to commit atrocities.

Chuck Stone

oscarBravo wrote: »

So you claim that Catholics were "massacred" for 40 years because of their demands for civil rights, but when I ask you to put a figure on those "massacred", you retreat into arm-waving? Colour me shocked.

Where did I claim Catholics were massacred for 40 years?

It's amazing how often I'm described as obtuse when I try to engage republicans

I'm not a Republican - I sympathise with Nationalists/Republicans because I was born a Catholic in NI. I'm not all that bothered that the UK administers the north as long as the tribe I come from get fair treatment which is well on its way to being the reality. That's good enough for me for the moment.

in a process of imagining the mere possibility that Northern Ireland might conceivably have been a better place without three decades of terrorist campaigns by armed groups of people who deeply hate each other.

Oh ffs of course peace is better than conflict. You're talking about mights and maybes and I'm talking about as it was.

It's almost as if republicans have some sort of vested interest in needing to believe that the 3,500 people who were murdered in the course of those terrorist campaigns were a price worth paying;

You're subtly trying to pin the blame for every death on Republicans here. This is not the case. Also describing every fatality as a murder is disingenuous. If people are shooting at you and attempting to burn you out of your house and they get shot - well tough **** really.

the fiction that more people would have died in the absence of three decades of terrorist tit-for-tat, and that no civil or human rights improvements could ever conceivably be achieved except by means of mass murder

Who's to say? In my alternate reality (this is your game so I'll play) the British stood down the RUC and forced Unionists into accommodating those who were seeking equal civil and political rights and everyone lived happily ever after with an abundance of lollipops, sunshine, romance and ponies.

if that's what republicans need to tell themselves in order to avoid the realisation that the IRA campaign only made things worse

Impossible to prove or disprove although I am sympathetic to the idea that perhaps Catholic area defence associations (yes, with weapons) might have led to less violence but again it's little more than idle conjecture.

And yet, I don't see you tearing into SoulandForm for conjuring an alternate reality in which there's a job for everyone, communities will magically work together when the politicians get out of the way, and the British state withdraws without a word of objection from the Unionists and Loyalists.

Well that's about the future rather than the past so is technically possible although I do think his socialist paradise ideas are bat-**** insane (no offence intended).

I get it, I do: the retrospective justification of a three-decade-long campaign of mutual terrorism requires that you conjure as utterly inevitable the spectre of mass murder by an EU member state of a significant percentage of its own population.

Well considering the experiences of Catholics at the time; the pogroms, Ballymurphy, Bloody Sunday, the B-specials poised to invade the Bogside of Derry, I'd imagine the fear of ethnic cleansing was very very real. Did the violent push-back delay something that was inevitable i.e. that Catholics would achieve parity by non-violence? Who the hell knows? Again we work with the reality we have not the one we would have liked.

I don't feel a need to justify terrorism, and as such I'm capable of understanding that the calculus isn't as simple as you'd like to make it out to be.

There's a difference between justifying 'terrorism' (spit) and trying to expose double standards and place a context around a conflict.

flutered

RobFowl wrote: »

Seeing as how he was convicted for murder and served 16 years it makes your point a little less pertinent.

does it, no, he was tried and found not guilty in the uk, if there were even 10% proof he would have suffered the same fate as many more before and since, i am sure that the brit intillegence would have their suspisions on every nationalist who lived up there at time, why do somebody not do a poll on all the young nationalist youths who were hauled in by the bmen to see if they were in the ira, who then left the barracks with broken ribs trying to plant the idea in their heads that they should not join.

oscarBravo

Chuck Stone wrote: »

They continued unchecked for the 40 years before when Catholics were massacred for trying to change their situation.

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Where did I claim Catholics were massacred for 40 years?

.

Chuck Stone

oscarBravo wrote: »

So you claim that Catholics were "massacred" for 40 years because of their demands for civil rights, but when I ask you to put a figure on those "massacred", you retreat into arm-waving? Colour me shocked.

I see where the confusion is here.

I said.

They continued unchecked for the 40 years before when Catholics were massacred for trying to change their situation.

What I was trying to say was (in my mildly impaired state)

Civil rights abuses continued unchecked for the 40 years before when Catholics were massacred on Bloody Sunday for trying to change their situation.

michael999999

Sierra Oscar wrote: »

Conspiracy to cause explosions alongside possession of explosive substances with intent. Ellis argued that under the then legislation under which he was charged, the CPS had no jurisdiction - as he was not physically within England at the time of the offence. The CPS then wished to alter the charge to overcome the loophole, however as he was extradited under a different pretence the case was dropped.

It was a technicality. Anyone who is trying to portray otherwise is not exactly up to speed with the case - or else they are trying to rewrite history, and there are many out there intent on ensuring SF do not rewrite history. It is well known that Ellis was one of the kingpin bomb-makers within the IRA. This has been openly admitted by Ellis and others within the IRA. To claim that his bombs did not kill people is ludicrous. It is not acceptable for SF to try and rewrite history now that it does not neatly fit in with their new political aspirations.

Bull****, a technicality never stopped the british locking up the Guildford 4, Birmingham 6, helping in the killing of Pat Finucane or blaming the Hillsborough dead for the tragedy at that football match!

Nothing the british security forces say can be believed!

And are you the same Mod that was banned last week for your particular views of the Irish, might have even been on this thread?

Chuck Stone

michael999999 wrote: »

And are you the same Mod that was banned last week for your particular views of the Irish, might have even been on this thread?

Pretty sure that was a different dude altogether.

Rascasse

It was indeed a technicality that saved Ellis. From the BBC's article on Danny McNamee's appeal;

"Crucially, his defence was unaware that many more prints had been discovered belonging to Desmond Ellis, a self-confessed IRA member who had been extradited to the UK from Ireland to stand trial for a series of bombings. The case against Ellis collapsed when his defence successfully argued that he had already saved six years of an eight year sentence in Ireland for explosives offences relating to the bombing equipment found in Berkshire, aided by photos which showed that the equipment was indeed the same."

Due to extradition rules he could not be charged with alternative offences so had to be sent back to Ireland.

So we know from McNamee's appeal that Ellis made the Hyde Park bomb, so that's 4 of the 50 deaths accounted for. Probably be easy enough to find more but I'm on mobile.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/news/07/0703/mcnamee.shtml

dickwod1

This started with post #290 on page 20 (Which is still unanswered)

Vladimir Kurtains wrote: »

I'm well aware of what Mandela did alright. But are you actually claiming that the fight against Apartheid in South Africa was comparable to the IRA campaign?

Yes I think that when 26 unarmed civil-rights protesters and bystanders get shot and 14 die (murdered) by soldiers of the British Army during a peaceful civil rights march to get the same voting rights and employment opportunities as their protestant counterparts is comparable to apartheid South Africa.

JustinDee wrote: »

I do love the attempt at moral relativism by some. On one hand, you have someone involved in a resistance against an apartheid regime. On the other is an individual part of an organisation who took to arms in the late 60s/early 70s against a sectarian regime and proceeded to hijack the cause with an equally anti-democratic means towards a goal of 32 county republic.
Hardly the same circumstances. Not by a long shot (definitely no pun intended).

JustinDee wrote: »

I do love the attempt at moral relativism by some.

Moral relativism? I had to look that up and still dont understand, I was asked and question and answered.

JustinDee wrote: »

On one hand, you have someone involved in a resistance against an apartheid regime. On the other is an individual part of an organisation who took to arms in the late 60s/early 70s against a sectarian regime

As I said exactly, Only difference is inequality towards blacks in South Africa and inequality towards Catholics in the north.

JustinDee wrote: »

and proceeded to hijack the cause with an equally anti-democratic means towards a goal of 32 county republic.

? Anti democratic ? At the time they couldn't vote, march in a peaceful protest, get housing or jobs. What option had they exactly?

JustinDee wrote: »

Hardly the same circumstances.

I never said they were the same circumstances I said they were comparable

michael999999

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Pretty sure that was a different dude altogether.

My apologies if true, but the first 2 points stand!

junder

dickwod1 wrote: »

This started with post #290 on page 20 (Which is still unanswered)


Yes I think that when 26 unarmed civil-rights protesters and bystanders get shot and 14 die (murdered) by soldiers of the British Army during a peaceful civil rights march to get the same voting rights and employment opportunities as their protestant counterparts is comparable to apartheid South Africa.




Moral relativism? I had to look that up and still dont understand, I was asked and question and answered.


As I said exactly, Only difference is inequality towards blacks in South Africa and inequality towards Catholics in the north.


? Anti democratic ? At the time they couldn't vote, march in a peaceful protest, get housing or jobs. What option had they exactly?


I never said they were the same circumstances I said they were comparable

They already had the same votes as thier Protestant neighbours, if you owned your property you had the vote, if you didn't own your property like my entire Protestant neighbourhood you didn't have a vote. Such a shame the nicra didn't campaign for thier working class Protestant neighbours to

michael999999

junder wrote: »

They already had the same votes as thier Protestant neighbours, if you owned your property you had the vote, if you didn't own your property like my entire Protestant neighbourhood you didn't have a vote. Such a shame the nicra didn't campaign for thier working class Protestant neighbours to

Like the protestant workers in harlem and woulfe sought for equal rights for Catholics?

LordSutch

Rascasse wrote: »

So we know from McNamee's appeal that Ellis made the Hyde Park bomb, so that's 4 of the 50 deaths accounted for. Probably be easy enough to find more but I'm on mobile.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/news/07/0703/mcnamee.shtml

Would that be this Bomb > http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/10/01/article-2211181-154C166F000005DC-288_634x430.jpg questionmark?

flutered

michael999999 wrote: »

Like the protestant workers in harlem and woulfe sought for equal rights for Catholics?

like the nationalists lived high up on the poor ground, actually it could be said that they have always had first choice to the poorest of the land.

dar926

The only thing we know for sure is that Gerry Adams is innocent.. Because he was "Never in the IRA" ...

SoulandForm

junder wrote: »

They already had the same votes as thier Protestant neighbours, if you owned your property you had the vote, if you didn't own your property like my entire Protestant neighbourhood you didn't have a vote. Such a shame the nicra didn't campaign for thier working class Protestant neighbours to

It did. Have you never heard of Betsy Sinclair? And there were others who names slip my mind at the moment. It was not the fault of NICRA that the mass of the Protestant working class decided to follow Paisley instead.

SoulandForm

oscarBravo wrote: »

And yet, I don't see you tearing into SoulandForm for conjuring an alternate reality in which there's a job for everyone, communities will magically work together when the politicians get out of the way, and the British state withdraws without a word of objection from the Unionists and Loyalists.

I dont think that communities will magically get on if you take the politicians out of the way. What do think is that for a real peace process to work it has to be done at grass roots- as well as tribal hatred there is a lot of tribal fear in Northern Ireland, if that could be gotten out of the way it would really make the place a lot better. Also politicians use the tribal division to cement their own power.

Actually the recent death threats and vandalism against Protestant small "u" Unionists by Loyalists show that Loyalism is anything but a paper tiger that some Republicans like to paint it as. Its an incredibly dangerous political beast that no one seems interested in in doing anything about. Infact the southern government invited UDA chiefs down to meet the Queen and like the EU throws money at the Orange Order (a poison in the life and history of Northern Ireland, Canada and to a lesser extent Scotland). The emergence of the Unionist Forum bodes very ill for the future. I would like to see people in the north both Protestant and Catholic live without fear.

oscarBravo

SoulandForm wrote: »

I dont think that communities will magically get on if you take the politicians out of the way. What do think is that for a real peace process to work it has to be done at grass roots- as well as tribal hatred there is a lot of tribal fear in Northern Ireland, if that could be gotten out of the way it would really make the place a lot better. Also politicians use the tribal division to cement their own power.

There's a great deal of truth in that - don't forget who elects the politicians, though.

Actually the recent death threats and vandalism against Protestant small "u" Unionists by Loyalists show that Loyalism is anything but a paper tiger that some Republicans like to paint it as. Its an incredibly dangerous political beast that no one seems interested in in doing anything about. Infact the southern government invited UDA chiefs down to meet the Queen and like the EU throws money at the Orange Order (a poison in the life and history of Northern Ireland, Canada and to a lesser extent Scotland). The emergence of the Unionist Forum bodes very ill for the future. I would like to see people in the north both Protestant and Catholic live without fear.

I don't disagree with much, if any, of that either.

Listen: it's a new year in Northern Ireland, same as in the republic. Just as I do every year, I live in hope that we can all get along better together. I apologise if I get cranky during some of these discussions; I know that most of those I argue with are genuinely well-intentioned (if somewhat misguided ).

I wish you, and all Irish republicans, nationalists, unionists, loyalists, and a-pox-on-both-your-houses-ists a truly peaceful, prosperous and productive new year, with peace and human dignity for all.

southsiderosie

MOD NOTE:

OK, enough.

First, do not put words in other peoples' mouths or attribute beliefs to posters who have not explicitly stated them. Just because a poster supports an organization or a policy that you disagree with, does not mean that they support terrorism (state or paramilitary), hate Ireland, etc - these kinds of generalizations are lazy and insulting, and have no place in this forum. I also find them ironic coming from republican posters, as one of the main complaints that many republicans have in this forum is that support for Sinn Fein gets stretched into support for the IRA: please do not apply the same warped 'logic' to other posters.

Second, I have already infracted some of the posters in this thread, but let me repeat one more time: some of these comments are getting way too personal. Statements like "You and your ilk..." or "Well where are you really from", etc. also have no place in this forum - and if you are unclear on this, you need to read the charter before posting in this thread again.

Finally, this thread is ostensibly about Dessie Ellis, and has essentially turned into a referendum about Oscar Bravo's thoughts on the national question. If this doesn't get back on topic pronto, the thread will be closed, and those who contributed to its further derailment will be infracted.

murphaph

dickwod1 wrote: »

So do you think Nelson Mandela should not have went into politics upon his release from prison?

Mandella was plotting to bomb a school. I don't think he's quite the saint some people make him out to be. However, by the time Ellis started bomb making for the IRA the position of Catholics in NI couldn't be compared to that of black south Africans under apartheid!

rainbowdash

Rascasse wrote: »

Due to extradition rules he could not be charged with alternative offences so had to be sent back to Ireland.

So we know from McNamee's appeal that Ellis made the Hyde Park bomb, so that's 4 of the 50 deaths accounted for. Probably be easy enough to find more but I'm on mobile.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/politics97/news/07/0703/mcnamee.shtml

I presume this information about the link between Ellis and the 4 deaths has been in the public domain for years, and not new information released in the 30 year papers.

My point being, why are people like charlie Flanagan trumpeting about sensationalist headlines and resurrecting information already in the public domain for donkeys years?

Other than of course to deflect from his own party?

RobFowl

rainbowdash wrote: »

I presume this information about the link between Ellis and the 4 deaths has been in the public domain for years, and not new information released in the 30 year papers.

My point being, why are people like charlie Flanagan trumpeting about sensationalist headlines and resurrecting information already in the public domain for donkeys years?

Other than of course to deflect from his own party?

It's in the news as documents alleging his fingerprints were on explosives used in PIRA bombing.s were released under the 30 year rule in the UK recently.

tipptom

Its in the news because the UK came out with their usual lies and propaganda and put him down to being involved in 50 deaths to the US authorities to sensationalise his case for extradition without a shred of evidence of him being involved in 50 deaths.

Charlie Flanagan joins them with the accusation with no evidence after 40 years as he does,a no mark who never done anything in his life bar take over his anti semite fathers seat and became spokesman for FG on equality of all things, seeming charged by FG with attacking Sf at any opportunity no matter how silly because they are worried about them taking seats of them when the election comes around.

Why does Charlie not go back another 40 or 50 years before this accusation and hold a commision in to why his fellow party members decided to drag out 4 innocent men because they were from the 4 provinces and being held in jail,with no evidence and no trial and murdered them in cold blood.

Rascasse

LordSutch wrote: »

Would that be this Bomb > http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/10/01/article-2211181-154C166F000005DC-288_634x430.jpg questionmark?

That's the one. Interestingly that occurred after he was incarcerated which gives us a clue about how he may have worked. If you look at the telex, his charges and the McNamee appeal it seems he may have made remote control detonators and not bombs (at least not in the Hyde Park case). Those were then stored until needed. If that is so, then one wonders about his involvement in other radio controlled devices of that time such as Warrenpoint and Mountbatten.

tipptom wrote: »

Its in the news because the UK came out with their usual lies and propaganda and put him down to being involved in 50 deaths to the US authorities to sensationalise his case for extradition without a shred of evidence of him being involved in 50 deaths.

For the umpteenth time, it's an internal telex. Ellis was caught by the yanks trying to enter the country illegally and the official in Washington is letting London know. No propaganda, no conspiracy and as he was entering the country illegally it would have been a simple case of deportation, not extradition.

rainbowdash

RobFowl wrote: »

It's in the news as documents alleging his fingerprints were on explosives used in PIRA bombing.s were released under the 30 year rule in the UK recently.

The information about his fingerprints was in the public domain since the 1980's, there is nothing new there.

howiya

Rascasse wrote: »

For the umpteenth time, it's an internal telex. Ellis was caught by the yanks trying to enter the country illegally and the official in Washington is letting London know. No propaganda, no conspiracy and as he was entering the country illegally it would have been a simple case of deportation, not extradition.

It was a case of extradition as the British were seeking to have him extradited to the UK and not deported to Ireland.