Cost of a United Ireland and the GFA

Fionn1952

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120757749#Comment_120757749

I'll emphasise the following quote

Do you know how many members are currently in the loyalist paramilitaries?-1,000s and a Ui (which is centralised and run by southern Irish) will be a recruiting ground for UFF like Bloody Sunday was for IRA.

Not a single word about, 'supremacists', not a mention of 'disregard for your identity'. Just a comparison between a typical centralised government as voted for by a democratic majority to your state forces shooting innocent civilians at the behest of your government.

The only lies and spin are coming from you, Downcow. You show yourself to be an absolute spoofer who can't keep their own story straight time and time again.

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120762301#Comment_120762301

Francie somebody just tweeted this from RTE. You might want to be a good boy and let the guards know. I am sure, having read your recent posts, that they’ll send the blue lights out.

https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2023/0622/1390519-bonfires-st-johns-eve-june-23rd-folklore-traditions-ireland-bonna-night/?fbclid=IwAR3eLAPhzyIBM8J7amgOPi1I8YAg7ApkGx-wzaBY70LaPEivSXS5GHHAXfA_aem_AScRFuV0P-Sf5sPUdZpfm0W95P1_fRr8Vvczsvv8A8VNs3NAkJnfy6kOiq_TbddzBbc

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764565#Comment_120764565

Bonfires are illegal here downcow.

We know some people fight that and break the law. Your bonfires will be illegal too in a UI and my bet is they will be dealt with before a UI.

After that, I’m not sure you have a point.

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764557#Comment_120764557

Fionn. We will not agree. I believe this “a Ui(which is centralised and run by southern Irish)” will be as big a recruiting agent as blood Sunday, hunger strikes, Anglo Irish agreement, etc etc. if Bloody Sunday is somehow a greater massacre than warrenpoint, La Mon, kingsmill, newry, etc, etc, in your head then that’s fine, that’s where your upbringing and experiences have placed you. To me, the young men that were taken away from their kids and tortured for days (I’ll not go into the detail unless you ask) is a more difficult thing for families to deal with than any of the above incidents. That’s where my upbringing and experience has placed me. It’s not a competition so let’s just accept each others position

johannmall

Are we discussing cost in terms of humanity or pounds & schillings, if its the former then we have to move on , the latter will be resolved through the exchequer !

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764601#Comment_120764601

You are incredibly naive if you think bonfires are going away whether in the many countries across the world or OWC.

why don’t you get the girls made out of recycled paper. That would be safer and environmentally friendly

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764621#Comment_120764621

I guarantee you action will be taken on the obscenities you are building now. It’s inevitable.

The strategy geniuses will keep pushing it until the adults have no choice.

johannmall

You pair are gas ! Apart from certain nationalist / unionist enclaves , they're moving on , as brexit showed , 60 % remaining part of the EU , and to working class protestant kids the DUP Are an anachronism , and shinner populism will eventually be exposed !

Fionn1952

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764606#Comment_120764606

Downcow, a terrorist organisation are not comparable to state forces. Nothing about a United Ireland that doesn't involve your people being shot in the back by state forces is comparable to Bloody Sunday as a recruiting tool.

This doesn't make La Mon, Kingsmill or any other atrocity that your community faced any less horrendous, it doesn't make them morally or ethically less bad than Bloody Sunday, but you completely miss the point if you don't realise that Bloody Sundah being carried out by state forces as opposed to terrorists inherently makes it different.

I am very comfortable in saying that should Unification occur, your community will never face anything akin to the battle for basic civil rights that mine had to after the formation of NI. I'm also very comfortable saying that you will never be able to point to a single incident akin to Bloody Sunday afflicted upon your community.

The biggest fear Unionism has is the shoe being on the other foot and receiving the same treatment that they meted out to others.

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764664#Comment_120764664

Mmmmmm my memory is that 44% of the electorate of ni registered a wish to stay in the eu. 55.8% of those who cared enough to actually be bothered to vote, expressed a wish to stay in eu. Not sure where you are getting 60% from?

also not sure where you are getting the stats about young working class prods views on the dup. Can you give us a link?

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764767#Comment_120764767

Well we will agree to differ. Everyone in ni was connected in some way to the conflict. The young soldiers at warrenpoint would have little known where ni was never mind care about its politics. For me those young men going home to their families in body bags doesn’t get any worse. Also families hearing the details of three days torture doesn’t get any worse. So stop creating a hierarchy.

I completely accept that Bloody Sunday seems to have impacted you deeply. It was not something of significance to me.

let’s move on

johannmall

Again I wish I was that au fait with tech that I could port the link , the Guardian has a pretty thorough article backing up what I said , I'm not for arbitrarily throwing out unsubstantiated remarks !

johannmall

I reread the article and 63% of those kids were of the same persuasion when it came to abortion , gay rights etc , so pretty much the same as our Republic voted !

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764885#Comment_120764885

Good article on it here:

https://sluggerotoole.com/2022/09/24/houses-of-sand-unionism-has-a-problem-with-younger-voters-a-huge-one/

Fionn1952

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764861#Comment_120764861

If you don't get it, you'll never get it.

The issue isn't from the perspective of the aggrieved, Downcow. It is from that of the propagators of violence. It is absolutely different when that violence comes from supposedly legitimate state forces.

If the young fellas in Warrenpoint didn't know where they were or why they were there, they probably shouldn't have been there.

Absolutely from the perspective of anyone, their own individual tragedy is the most significant, but when we try to take a step back ultimately we have to ask the question, 'should we be able to expect more from our government than from terrorists'?

If you think not, you really can't be helped.

johannmall

Well done , excellent article, I'm of the stiff little fingers generation, " it's exams that count not football teams " , and having Jeffrey Donaldson telling you you're headed for eternal dam nation because you were lucky enough to find love ❤️ but it just happened to to be the same sex 😉

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120765009#Comment_120765009

the problem is that you are only seeing this from your paradigm. Of course we all are. The difference with you is that you seem to think your paradigm is the correct one.

I really am going to leave this after trying to help you understand (broadly) unionist paradigm. It will wind you up again but I won’t be bullied into placing the lives of BS victims above the rest.

BS victims went out in a controversial protest march in the midst of a violent conflict and a heavily armed city. There were a range of motives amongst the marchers, from entirely peaceful, honourable and law-abiding, right through to murdererous intent. A soon to become MP, using the cover of the marchers, opened fire and a BA commander instructed the young soldiers to shoot at the marchers.

La Mon victims went out for dinner with the intention of a family night out. Another soon to become MP,and indeed TD, instructed his young soldiers to take a bomb out of the catholic area to a hotel where only Protestants would be dining, surround the bomb in jars of petrol and place it among the diners.

In warrenpoint, another soon to become MP, instructed his soldiers to lay a massive land mine and blow up a convoy of soldiers, they should then open fire from the cover of the neighbouring country and murder any trying to give aid to their colleagues.

I’ll not bore you with enniskillen, loughinisland, Rising Sun, Darkly, Shankill Butchers, Kingsmills, etc, etc, etc, etc

I resist putting a hierarchy of tragedy on the above, but suffice to say, if forced, I think you will know BS certainly won’t be near the top.

now can we leave this we are not going to convince eachother. Both of us think we hold the logical position on this one

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764885#Comment_120764885

It would be helpful though if you acknowledged my stats were correct and yours were wrong

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120765078#Comment_120765078

Could we have a link to jeffry saying this?

I fear you are “arbitrarily throwing out unsubstantiated remarks !” - see what I done there :)

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764993#Comment_120764993

sarah Creighton is well known for this nonsense. The article referenced by her is behind a paywall but this looks like spin - read it carefully “ In an August 2022 poll for the Belfast Telegraph, only 14% of young people identified as British only. 31% identified as Northern Irish only. 41% of young people in that same survey identified as Irish”. If that is not the equivalent figure for Irish only (which I doubt it is) then her articles should be filed under ‘r’ for rubbish.

and give that the title of the article is “Growing number of young people identify as Northern Irish, new poll reveals. 18 to 24-year-olds more likely to see themselves as neither British nor Irish” seems she is not doing honour to it.

you do know who hates the growth of Northern Irish? Watch SF try to manoeuvre over the coming months and years to embrace Northern Irish. They despise it. They can’t even say Northern Ireland. But as you correctly point out, they are on the wrong side of history on this one. Not like them to get their strategy and pr so wrong.

nothern Ireland, northern Irish, etc assumes partition from the 26 but it is fully compatible with a Uk containing England, NI, Scotland and Wales

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120764993#Comment_120764993

We have heard this for 40 years ‘wait until the young people get older, look at their views’.

this completely misses the point that young people are radical and crave change - then they get older, get steady jobs, have kids, less energy and just want things to be settled.

when I was 20 I wanted an independent NI and would have voted for it in a heartbeat. I grew up and wised up.

Ask these same 20 year olds of today, in 20 years:

are you still vegan?

do you engage in highly risk-taking behaviour?

Do you think NI should leave its 200+year comfort home in the Uk and head out into a volatile unknown?

my guess is that 90% of them will answer no to all three questions , and many more things they felt passionate about when they were 20.

that the republicans biggest problem - and has been for generations. If only young people could decide they’d be flying. But that’s not how democracy works

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766050#Comment_120766050

Hope you have plenty of ammo to shoot all the other messengers saying the exact same thing.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-65176760

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/aug/04/northern-irish-unionist-parties-alienating-young-protestants-study

I think you are symptomatic of the head in the sand, siege mentality infesting Unionism.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766064#Comment_120766064

Problem for Unionism, (who cannot gerrymander or deprive people of their vote), is that their vote counts the same as anyone else's and there will always be young people voting and they ain't voting for the DUP or TUV.

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766118#Comment_120766118

What do you think about the growing number of young people who have a identity that SF members are strictly instructed not to utter its very name?

downcow

Probably the single most important advance for unionism is for SF to get into power in the south. Preferably a landslide.

the honeymoon with the voters will then be over. The pretence in opposition will have to stop. The mask will slip. It’s all down hill for the shinners then.

they will have to step up or shut up on presenting the case for Ui.

they will have to deal with the many simmering situations in the south.

they will have to explain how a country claims to be £10b in the black this year and NI is broke, yet when I get on the train in Belfast there’s not a spaced out junky or homeless to be seen but when I get off the train in Dublin it’s like another world.

Im your new Ui would you see us all boasting together about £10b profits and still not build houses or help those worst off?

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766132#Comment_120766132

And the usual pivot/divert to something else is in when you can no longer deny the facts placed in front of you.

It's fairly clear and established that SF are way ahead with young voters

The LucidTalk tracker poll puts the party on 26 per cent among all voters, six points ahead of the DUP – but 15 ahead among voters aged 18 to 24 and 11 ahead among those between 25 and 44.

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766279#Comment_120766279

I don’t know why any young person would vote for the dup currently, so their figures against the dup is hardly a ringing endorsement.

sf are riding due to a very expensive pr campaign. Their bubble will burst and they will be seen for what they are.

just this morning all the party leaders, EXCEPT SF, have signed a letter condemning the intimidation of prison staff. The shinners refused and then put out an ambiguous statement that all public workers should be free from intimidation. Sf love signing letters attacking bonfires, seeking border poles, anti brexit, etc. I wonder what mask is slipping this time?

I assume they would have no issue supporting prison staff in roi. Another contradiction as to how the operate in the two countries. One country my ar*e

downcow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766132#Comment_120766132

Francie try answering the question. Although I am interested more in what broad thinking nationalists on here think about this SF conundrum. Or do you think it is not a conundrum and will not bite them on the bum?

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766887#Comment_120766887

Any of the analysis will tell you why young people are not voting for the DUP.

It's not a huge secret and those young voters are quite open about it.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120766913#Comment_120766913

I don't think much about it at all.

The Northern Irish identity is not that important politically as it is split along traditional lines when it comes to voting. It is not a homogenous bloc you can depend on to save the Union etc, in other words.

Why somebody who cannot bring himself to properly spell Irish names like O'Connell Street and McGuinness etc would have an issue with SF not using the words 'Northern Ireland' defeats me tbh.