GAA need to step up

So tell us what Michael stone done that was sectarian according to your unique definition francie??

Apologies for putting that up. I honestly didn’t click that it was the one that we done to death a few months back.

I think if you read my post again I said a “perceived Protestant team”. Unlike GAA, I think you will find it impossible to name a senior team that is exclusively or even predominantly one religion. With GAA it’s the other way around. It’s a struggle to name a senior team that is not either exclusively or predominantly one religion. That should tell you all you need to know

Oh I get it. I am quite sure the white South Africans in the 80s would have said

“Actually I find it impossible to perceive ANY sporting team in terms of a colour. That's just bizarre. 

People really need to stop thinking this way. It's not healthy.”

It was you tried to tie down sectarian to such tight anspecific parameters so as to exclude nationalists groups like the ira, GAA, etc and now it won’t even fit Michael stone - in my view a sectarian killer

I don’t know any of these places. Are they all in ROI? Take a stab, what would you guess would be the average percentage of those from Protestant community backgrounds in these teams?

also I think you’ll find early in the thread I acknowledged that things seem very different in south. Any lists of teams from the north that I could comment on?

I think the fact they applauded Arlene for having the courage to attend should tell you all you need to know.

as for lists. Here’s one for you. Maybe you’ll comment and tell me that’s all fine and then unionists should just accept it. I could well be missing stuff but I can’t think of a single football ground in ni named after a terrorist or indeed anything related to decision. That’s strange ?

Sorry it’s a bit long and a copy paste from a WhatsApp I received this morning

There are many reasons why the PUL community opposes the GAA, they are valid reasons, they are not imagined, and they are certainly not sectarian in nature and yet that is the accusation that our community faces once again because of the opposition to a GAA pitch being placed in a Unionist area of East Belfast.

Those from outside of Northern Ireland will probably not understand, they certainly won’t be told the truth about the GAA, to them it’s just a ‘sport’, why should we not want another sports ground, it won’t make sense to them, it’s time it did. The narrative that the PUL community are sectarian and bigoted when it comes to the GAA must be challenged.

When it comes to GAA sports grounds a closer look at what and who they are named after may give an insight into one of the many valid reasons the PUL community would oppose such a ground in their area.

What’s in a name? people may ask, I would ask them do they think it’s normal or acceptable to name a sports ground or club after a terrorist. A sport which is played by men, women and children being played in a ground named after an Irish Republican terrorist who murdered and maimed men, women and children is rather depraved don’t you think? 

Take for instance Casement Park, probably one of the most contentious grounds in Northern Ireland, the setting in which two British Armed Forces personnel were tortured and killed by the IRA live on television screens around the world after they had been dragged out of their car on the streets of Belfast on the 19th of March 1988. It was utilised by Sinn Fein/IRA during IRA terrorist Bobby Storey’s funeral in which the IRA took over the streets of Belfast in a show of strength in 2020. 

The ground itself is named after Roger Casement. During the First World War whilst our forefathers from both sides of the community fought against the German's Casement who was a British diplomat who was busily making efforts to gain aid from the Germans to assist the Easter arising in 1916. He was arrested and charged with treason, his knighthood was forfeited in June 1916 and he was executed by hanging on the 3rd of August 1916. Not exactly the glowing example of a hero, and yet the GAA have deemed him one. 

Another questionable character from many that the GAA have named a club after is that of O’Donovan Rossa. Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa was an Irish Fenian leader and a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). Rossa living in America advocated for the use of dynamite bombs to try and overthrow the British, he organised the first bombings by Irish republicans in English cities which was dubbed the ‘dynamite campaign’ and lasted throughout the 1880s. He had also set up a fund called the ‘skirmishing fund’ to arm like-minded republicans to fight the British. O’Donovan died in Staten Island in 1915.

The GAA also felt it appropriate to name another club in West Belfast after Michael Davitt, another member of the IRB. In February 1867 Davitt lead a group of fifty Fenians on a raid to obtain arms for the Fenian Rising from Chester Castle, the raid failed. Davitt went on the run and managed to remain underground until his arrest in May 1870 when he was caught waiting for a shipment of arms. He was convicted of treason felony for arms trafficking in support of insurrection and sentenced to 15 years. He died in May 1906. 

There are also several GAA clubs, and grounds competitions named after more recent Irish Republican terrorists listed below, again I ask how this is acceptable. How can anyone with a moral compass not be repulsed by this, and yet it is the PUL community who are branded sectarian and bigoted, simply because we oppose the glorification of terrorists and their deeds. 

One must also take a look at the GAA’s ‘introduction’ to the rules and constitution of the GAA. I have attached a copy for all to see. The GAAs rules and constitution indicate clearly that this is no ‘ordinary’ sporting body. It is politically motivated with political objectives, something the PUL community have been pointing out for decades and something which the media and other commentators choose to ignore. It shouldn’t be ignored and it cannot be ignored any longer. There is no place in Northern Ireland’s society for an organisation to undermine Northern Ireland’s constitution within the United Kingdom under the guise of a sporting body and there is certainly no place in any society across the globe to have an organisation which glorifies terrorists and their deeds all in the name of sport. 

That does not make us sectarian, it does not make us bigoted to quote Lord Shaftesbury ‘what is morally wrong can never be politically correct.

Irish Republican terrorist names associated with the GAA. 

Kevin Lynch

The GAA hurling club in Dungiven, Co Londonderry, is named after INLA member and former player Lynch.

He was the seventh of the 10 hunger strikers to die in 1981, after being sentenced to 10 years for stealing shotguns and conspiring to disarm the security forces. Lynch was captain of the 1972 All-Ireland-winning under-16 Derry team.

Joe Cahill

An under-12s football contest is played at Cardinal O’Donnell Park, west Belfast, in honour of the IRA veteran who died in 2004.

Cahill joined the IRA aged 18 and was convicted for his part in killing Catholic cop and dad-of-ten, Patrick Murphy, in 1942. He also was a key figure in founding the Provisional IRA in 1969.

Bobby Sands

The Cumann na Fuiseoige GAA club honours IRA hunger striker Sands, who grew up near its base in Twinbrook, west Belfast.

The club’s badge shows a lark, barbed wire and a capital ‘H’ representing the H-block in the Maze prison where Sands — who was convicted of arms offences — was the first IRA hunger striker to die.

There is also a Bobby Sands Memorial soccer cup contest, held during the Feile an Phobail festival in west Belfast.

Mairead Farrell

A girls’ camogie championship played in Tullysaran, Co Armagh,

was named after IRA woman Farrell.

She spent 10 years in jail for bombing the Conway Hotel, Dunmurry, and was killed by the SAS in Gibraltar with fellow IRA members Sean Savage and Daniel McCann in 1988 with whom she allegedly planned to bomb an Army band.

Martin Hurson

A commemorative Martin Hurson Memorial cup final is played every year at Galbally Pearses Football Field near Dungannon in Co Tyrone.

The fifth of the H-block hunger strikers to die, Hurson was arrested in 1976 and quizzed over the attempted murder of UDR soldiers in a bomb attack.

The charge was dropped but he was convicted on several other charges.

Michael McVerry

The first member of the IRA in south Armagh to be killed in the Troubles, McVerry was shot by soldiers in 1973 after placing a 100lb bomb at Keady RUC station, helped by five men who fought a running battle with cops after the device exploded.

The Michael McVerry cup is played in Cullyhanna, Co Armagh, each year.

Gerard and Martin Harte

These East Tyrone IRA brothers were killed in a carefully-planned SAS ambush at Drumnakilly in 1988. Many branded it revenge for the Ballygawley bus attack 10 days earlier, which killed eight soldiers and injured 27 others.

Played at Loughmacrory, the Gerard and Martin Harte Memorial cup is now one of Tyrone's foremost under-12 Gaelic football tournaments.

Louis Leonard Memorial Park

The ground in Donagh, Fermanagh, was named after IRA man Louis, who was killed by loyalists in 1972 while working late in his shop in the village of Derrylin.

Loughgall bomber Paddy Kelly

The Paddy Kelly cup was played in Dungannon, Co Tyrone as part of commemorations for the IRA Loughgall “martyrs”. A heavily-armed IRA unit including Kelly and O’Callaghan was trying to blow up a part-time police station in Loughgall, Co Tyrone, with a 200lb bomb when they were gunned down by the SAS.

McDonnell/Doherty Park

The home ground of the St Teresa's GAA club in west Belfast is named after hunger strikers and former players Joe McDonnell and Kieran Doherty.

McDonnell had been arrested in 1976 with Bobby Sands following a bomb attack on a furniture store in Dunmurry and Doherty was convicted for possession of firearms, explosives and hijacking.

Jim Lochrie and Sean Campbell

Lochrie/Campbell GAA Park in Dromintee, south Armagh is named after IRA members Jim Lochrie and Sean Campbell who were killed when a land mine exploded prematurely at Kelly's Road, Killeen in 1975.