How to recreate a community spirit in Ireland

brianhere

It seems to this observer that we are entering into some of the most difficult weeks on this island seen since the last 20, 1920 under the Black and Tan terror. We don’t really know what is truly going to help now except we will need God on our side, sin scéal eile, and we are going to need each other.

Veterans of that time would have told you of the great sense of community that Irish people rose up to in expelling the British army then, and we will need the same sense of community now no matter what happens. But its also obvious that many social practices have come into Irish society which destroy communities and I think its important to point these out now in the hope people will guard against them and so allow a community spirit to grow:

Judgementalism
Obviously its wrong to tell another adult what to do, as such, with only the odd exception such as an employer telling an employee something which is necessary to get a job done right etc. Generally speaking, you just don’t that, and if you do you can forget about any sincere sense of community involving that person forever.

Instead of that bit of common sense I notice one of our ministers advising people to intervene and give out to people who are breaking these social distancing rules. For what its worth, I would say DO NOT DO THAT, you will destroy good relations among people right there. And why? How do you know, or more to the point how does the Minister know, how the virus really spreads. A lot of serious scientists say it is spread through the air, by people who have no symptoms, and will stay in the air (in indoor air in confined spaces, such as trains, planes and buses) for long periods of time. Hence you might keep your ‘social distance’ but end up standing on a spot where somebody was standing, and breathing, a few minutes before and get it that way, you just don’t know. So, I would suggest, don’t lecture people about it.

Similarly its appalling to see so much abusive language going around towards people who visited Italy or Cheltenham etc. I don’t think going there was a good idea either but if you want to blame someone why not the government who didn’t close the air links to those areas or advise people against going to Cheltenham, again pointing fingers like this just destroys communities.

Lack of respect for some Irish people
But its also obvious that the modern air of judgementalism (it is a very modern and very growing phenomenon) derives from a lack of respect for human beings in general, as human beings. The religious view for example, to take one perspective that would have been prevalent here not all that long ago, is that all human beings are made in the image and likeness of God but instead its very obvious that some modern Irish people are deeply and inherently disrespectful of certain classes of humans.

We get for example a very unattractive class system in Ireland now, with seriously abusive thoughts and language against people who are poor by those who work too hard or are wealthy. We get a general air of arrogance towards the old in my experience, ‘useless eaters’ they clearly are in the minds of some. We get ludicrous over the top abusive language all the time on Irish web fora about politics, some are rehashing the Civil War with more venom than the people who fought in it and when they are not at that they are very abusive and dismissive of ordinary Irish people who might have concerns about immigration or the promotion of the homosexual agenda etc.

Young people are now pouring out of our schools completely brainwashed by ideas of ‘stranger danger’ and will almost need to see a Garda clearance from someone before they would even so much as proffer their name or where they are from. Women, in not a few cases, have a default abusive stance towards strange men on the basis of mostly false assumptions of attempts to court them, etc.

Anyway you can see where I am coming from, people who are like that now will have to change and think the best of Irish people they meet, rather than assuming the worst about them, if we are to recreate the great community atmosphere of the past.

A Nation of Informers
Another practice which will obviously destroy communities is this idea of ‘reporting’ people to the authorities in some shape or form. That was something they did not tolerate in 1920, and there would never have been the community spirit then if it was allowed. Clearly it has a hugely chilling effect on a sense of community if you think that the person you are chatting away to could quietly lift up their phone later and report what you said to some state or official body.

I would go so far as to say that we have become a nation of informers, with many people happy to boast of how they reported so and so to Social Welfare inspectors or tax authorities, or the Gardaí or whatever officialdom deals with complaints of racism or sexism or what have you. Basically this has to stop completely if we are to generate a true community spirit, ok if you genuinely think your neighbour murdered someone or whatever then yes report it, otherwise DON’T be involved in ‘reporting’ things to any official or employer created body I would say.

There are just a few thoughts on the subject, I am sure there are many more that people could add with profit.

johnnyskeleton

Kids these days, eh?

brianhere

If Meth Dealer has his way young people will be like the Hitler youth informing on their parents! Its obviously impossible for people to talk freely with one another if they think that one party will secretly inform on them to the state, and that closing down of community solidarity will, and is, way more of a loss than the supposed gain of keeping garda intelligence up to date etc.

JPCN1

Get them Connemara folk to do it, they seem a lovely bunch altogether.

Wibbs

The great community atmosphere of the past? More in the head of rose coloured spectacle wearers than in reality. Try be anything but a kiss the bishops ring good little "catholic" in that romantic past. Try being a pregnant teenager. Try being Gay. Try being a working women. Try being a raped wife. Try getting contraception, even if you were married. Try being anything even slightly different. And that was in urban areas, the wrong word from a priest in the rural towns and villages and people were shunned. I caught the tail end of that as a small kid in the 70's waiting in the Phoenix Park for Pope John Paul George and Ringo, being serenaded by two of the cloth with mistresses and god knows how many more with sexual preferences far more deviant in the crowd. Oh it was a great time to be a kid, far more freedom, but beyond that, I'll take the Ireland of today thanks very much.

Oh and that rose tinted lens is also pointed at the fight for Irish Independence too. I had rellies in it when many who later claimed to be a part of it were hiding behind their mammy's skirts. One was shot to death for his trouble, by other Irishmen.

SEPT 23 1989

These government measures better be very temporary

A Staggering attack on civil liberties in the last month when you actually think about it

DeanAustin

brianhere wrote: »

It seems to this observer that we are entering into some of the most difficult weeks on this island seen since the last 20, 1920 under the Black and Tan terror. We don’t really know what is truly going to help now except we will need God on our side, sin scéal eile, and we are going to need each other.

Be great if he/she/it would just take away the virus they sent...

Wibbs

I suspect they will be S. Our government has barely the stones to run this war against the virus, they've no extra to double down. That part is a positive.

Gretas Gonna Get Ya!

Can't believe I wasted 2 mins of my life reading that...

Once I seen the reference to "God" in the first paragraph, I knew what type of opinion I was about to read. The godly always think they know what's best for everyone else.

Btw OP - what is a homosexual agenda? I know I'm going to regret asking that, but I think you should be made to explain such a loaded term.

brianhere wrote: »

they are very abusive and dismissive of ordinary Irish people who might have concerns about immigration or the promotion of the homosexual agenda etc.

FloatingVoter

Wibbs wrote: »

The great community atmosphere of the past? More in the head of rose coloured spectacle wearers than in reality. Try be anything but a kiss the bishops ring good little "catholic" in that romantic past. Try being a pregnant teenager. Try being Gay. Try being a working women. Try being a raped wife. Try getting contraception, even if you were married. Try being anything even slightly different. And that was in urban areas, the wrong word from a priest in the rural towns and villages and people were shunned. I caught the tail end of that as a small kid in the 70's waiting in the Phoenix Park for Pope John Paul George and Ringo, being serenaded by two of the cloth with mistresses and god knows how many more with sexual preferences far more deviant in the crowd. Oh it was a great time to be a kid, far more freedom, but beyond that, I'll take the Ireland of today thanks very much.

Oh and that rose tinted lens is also pointed at the fight for Irish Independence too. I had rellies in it when many who later claimed to be a part of it were hiding behind their mammy's skirts. One was shot to death for his trouble, by other Irishmen.

Nicely put....and Michael Collins probably shot more informants than he did Black & Tans.

tayto lover

That OP is pure unadulterated bull****.
People are trying not to get the worst virus most of us can remember. We are not fighting Black and Tans, we are trying to keep the people we love alive. That is the best community spirit of all.

WashYourHands

Stay inside except for essential shopping, helping vulnerable people and exercise.

Too many disrespectful, horrible people out there imo.

brianhere

Sept 23 1989
"These government measures better be very temporary"

I seriously doubt that. You know it was a great shock to Irish civil liberties when they abolished jury courts and allowed the Gardai to arrest people for a number of days, or years, on the say so of senior Gardai only, with the bringing in of the emergency legislation called the Offences Against the State Act in the very early 1970s. Of course the legislation is still with us and used regularly long after the Troubles are over.

When they introduced the emergency bank guarantee legislation during the 2008 financial crisis people were assured it would never be invoked, never cost the state anything at all, while actually, 10s of billions of taxpayers funds later, AIB, Ireland's largest bank, is still majority state owned.

I had different relations who fought in the Easter rebellion, war of independence, civil war and then in Spain against Franco.

The public were not all on their side, the church wanted to excommunicate them and the state that they fought for forgot about them as soon as the civil war ended, regardless of the side they fought on or not.

The same state and population allowed women and children to be locked up and abused for decades because of neighbors judging them, and the victims are still accused of being only in it for the money by idiots on this site.

The same idiots think gay people should be discriminated against and that they should be denied the same rights as everyone else.

The same type of idiots would have arseholes like the national party in power, trying to bring us back to our glorious past.

For all the faults we have and no country is perfect because being an arsehole is an universal thing, the country, it's a lot better place to live in than it was.

Ken.

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