The Irish protocol.

The problem with this whole situation is that those on the other side feel exactly the same way about a border within the UK as those who are opposed to a border on this island.

Should we cave to the greater threat of violence? Should we do what is right? What actually is right? Given that the GFA gives autonomy to the people of Northern Ireland to decide their own future, should there be a plebiscite on where they want the hard border?

The problem is not that "on the other side feel exactly the same way about a border within the UK" but that those same people who now oppose the sea border had campaigned for the UK's exit without thinking of the ramifications, without concern for what the people of NI as whole wanted.

This is pretty much the crux of it.

Brexit is a UK decision and it's up to the UK to come up with the solutions to implement it while keeping within the agreements and commitments it has already voluntarily signed itself up to, even if those solutions or their implementation are not entirely what they'd like to happen.

It is ridiculous to expect others to move to your tune so that you can arrive at a destination of your sole choosing that is 100% to your satisfaction, all the while shouting about "sovereignty" and "taking back control".

However it seems that's exactly what the UK had banked on happening to "Get Brexit Done". As we've seen to date, anything other than the other side moving to the UK's tune is put down to belligerence, intransigence or more recently, bullying and strong-arming them into a deal done under duress, a deal that is being implemented far too stringently.

"The people of NI shouldn't be given a plebiscite on the border because one side will never be happy with whatever is chosen by the majority."

That is an extraordinary statement. If I were to say that the people of NI shouldn't be given a plebiscite on a united Ireland because one side will never be happy with whatever is chosen by the majority, I would be subject to severe criticism on here. Surely, if we in the GFA recognise the right of the people of Northern Ireland to freely choose their future, that also extends to this issue?

Unionists would be as militant about a poll as they are at the minute.

They don't have the majority of the public with them on Brexit and the Protocol and as any poll campaign would be asking for alternative proposals to the Protocol they would be stumped. Their objections to it are abstract not physical. The physical manifestation of the Protocol is causing next to zero problems and business and agriculture (about the only sectors affected in a physical way) are happy or require adustments and flexibilities built into the Protocol.

It's a case of...feels before reals trying to claim that the NI protocol border in the ports is just as bad in its effects on people's lives as a new customs border on land. Either not being truthful, or just blindness/complete inability to empathise.

You and downcow did suggest they are equivalent. You said "The problem with this whole situation is that those on the other side feel exactly the same way about a border within the UK as those who are opposed to a border on this island."

Downcow (after your post) - "A border in the Irish Sea splits my country, my people, my family."

Unrelated to above point...Downcow I think has this belief (alluded to in deleted comment about Daylight Saving time) that Ireland is going to reluctantly kowtow to the UK Brexit Govt. in the end anyway. It would refuse to implement EU Customs if they become needed at the border + will progessively distance itself from the EU and the other member states instead for sake of NI once Boris is Brave and twists and bends NI protocol to destruction. I think that may be a fantasy, you would not want to depend on it. 

^^Fair enough. Given Brexit, and how UK is going about it (unlikely to change any time soon) there will be a firming up of borders between EU (Ireland)/UK somewhere. That can't be wished away. Out of the 2 most likely places this can happen, 1 is objectively going to hurt more than the other. People should be honest about that fact as well as considering feelings.

People's feelings about them may be the same, but the issues themselves may not be equivalent. That nuance appears to have been lost on you.

So they are not the same or equivalent then, because the issues are very different. An Irish Sea border is causing abstract angst in the main while a land border will cause physical, very real separation and FOM issues again on this island with the prospect of fortification being likely.