The emergence of "Zombie" by The Cranberries as an Irish sporting anthem

The vast majority of people voting for SF in the last few elections do not support the Provisional IRA bombings

I don't think anyone's saying they're against it because it calls out criminal thugs.

Some people are against it because they feel it only calls out nationalist thugs.

Others because they feel it's broadly attacking all nationalists and not only those who committed atrocities, calling them 'Zombies'

Anyone who thought at time that Warrington was justified, or who thinks it now, is a certifiable idiot. Calling them a zombie seems like fair comment to me. I don't see who anyone could have a problem with that.

I'm well aware.

But it seems that at least some people who want to sing the song to make a political point don't make that distinction.

I better explain to you what the connection is of Damian Walsh and the Warrington boys who were killed by an PIRA bomb. The killing of the Warrington boys was rightly condemned by all both in England and in the South here. Protest marches were organised here at the time.

My point has and is that if anyone should be aggrieved about Zoombie its the families of the catholic children in the Northern Ireland troubles that were killed and completely ignored at the same time as the Warrington boys. Can you understand how offensive all of this is to Damian Walsh's family that his death was completely ignored while suddenly we in the south here developed enough of a conscience to protest the killing of British children.

Anyway, have you watched the official video of the song. Its clearly an anti-war song. Whatever equipment the PIRA had, they were not the ones with the tanks (if you listen to the songs).

What I don't like about this controversy is that some people are trying to turn it into an anti PIRA song, when it isn't just that. I always thought it was interesting that Tim Parry's dad didn't know that the song was about the Warrington bombings until Delores died. There is a good chance that most people singing it at rugby matches don't get it eitherm but I do see how the way that it is being portrayed by some now down here how hurtful it is to the families of those from the nationalist community who suffered losses in the Troubles and no one took any notice of them.

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That CAIN site is a pain in the hole to get through, you seem to know your way around it, so can I ask you a question:

You claim that the PIRA fought a 'cleaner' war than the British side, because the Brits targeted civilians while the provos targeted military targets, for wont of a better word, correct? If this is true, then the question has two parts:

a) How many civilians were killed by the British?

b) How many civilians were killed by the provos?

If b) is greater than a), then it doesn't matter who their targets were, they cannot be considered to be 'cleaner' (which is a terrible choice of word) by any stretch of the imagination. If you could include a link to where you're pulling these figures from, please, as the website is a mess to navigate.

It is also worth remembering that over 99% of the 16,200 bombs during the troubles were planted / set off by Republicans, often with the intent to kill and seriously injure because that is what bombs do.

As an Irish person, none were planted in my name....even though some misguided posters think it was "Irish forces" who planted them.

its a statement of fact ,

any other position on the subject is delusion

The only way in which a user could have been insulted by any of the comments or the song itself, is if they thought it was a good idea to bomb children in Warrington. Are you really sure that you were insulted?

No.... but wait for this...

It'll really blow your mind....

I think there's a degree of ambiguity in the lyrics, just as there is in almost every lyric, poem, work of art.

And while I don't think that's what Delores meant, I can understand that others might see it that way.

Just as you see 'Fields of Athenry' as a political song, I see it primarily as a romantic song.

Songs don't have one fixed meaning.

Thanks a million, this is exactly the stuff I was looking for. I was wondering why the other poster kept using the word "targeted" instead of the word "killed". I think we can all see why, now.