Sinn Fein and how do they form a government dilemma

While I abhor the violence from the beginning it is the hypocrisy of those who owe their freedom to others who saw 'no alternative' that grates.

It's quite possible to hate and condemn the violence but understand why it happened in the first place and why it is so difficult to stop once those in responsible positions allow it to begin.

They intentionally murdered a 14 year old when killing Mountbatten.

Their bombs intentionally targeted civilians including children.

The pope is infallible, that's hilarious 😂! Is the Giants Causeway only a few thousand years old too?

Take two possible IRA targets as an example. A pub, if your morals allow it , it could be argued as targeting adult civilians. A shopping high street or a Boots during daytime would definitely have children about. In that case they would be intentionally targeting children as well as adults.

The spinners have probably spotted an opportunity for some of their people to dress up in black clothes, berets and sunglasses to provide protection security 😉

So you accept now that MON believes they had no choice but to murder children is a legitimate descriptive term given it is factual?

The honesty to accept it? If that was the case you would have accepted the legitimate descriptive term in the first place.

So what has changed today to back then? England are still in Northern Ireland

The PIRA was seemingly created to protect nationalist and killed more than anyone else

The criminal sections of the PIRA are still running today by all accounts and PSF are still linked today with drugs and killings of people.

Are you trying to say this is England faults?

I believe that once a conflict/war of that nature begins, innocents are going to get killed. I know of nowhere where it didn't happen. It would happen here again if the same situation arose.

All sides killed children, women and innocents, willfully and by accident.

Why did that happen? Because society was allowed to degrade to the point that the place went up in flames. And if you read about the period, speech's in HoC, the thoughts of the period's PM's Wilson, Heath, Callaghan etc, they knew what would happen. That is not an excuse by the way, just an explanation for my views.

Didn't answer the question though. Had they no choice but to target civilians including children? It is a yes or no answer.

I don’t know is the answer.
Why would it matter though if they intended it or not, they died on all sides.
It matters to you because it scratches the itch to blame one side and characterise them as unique.
They weren’t.

Yes, unequivocally, the evidence demonstrates that the IRA did intentionally target children.

Two examples:

(1) Mullaghmore: This bomb was detonated by remote control, requiring a direct line of sight on the boat. The IRA murderer knew, as he pressed the button, that he was killing children

(2) Warrington: Deliberately confusing bomb warnings were given to ensure that women and children out shopping would be murdered. One of the bombs exploded outside a McDonalds.

The PIRA were pure evil, of that there is no doubt. Those that continue to succour and revere and defend them today must be viewed through the same lens.

So there was an alternative to killing children, and Michelle O'Neill was wrong.

We have finally got there.

@FrancieBrady and @blanch152 This is not the thread for debating the troubles,theres a united Ireland thread for that,would ye both continue that there please and keep this one for the topic at hand

I read an article dicussing a new survey showing SF has up to 60% of the under 30's vs 10% for FG.

This is surely good news for Sinn Féin after a dismal few weeks and its a vote that didnt bother to get out in the Euro's etc that will get out in the GE.

So theres plenty of positivity in the growth story for Sinn Féin in the Dáil yet.

It depends on who votes,if you can get even half that 60% out,you'll be up at or above 2020 again.

That being said you'd need to be up in the high 60's in turnout as you've only a little over a tenth of the rest and do you know,they DO vote

I think the lesson we can learn is never believe what a anonymous account on the internet posts

I know supporters of the PIRA during the troubles, none of them would make the excuses etc we see posted on here of the actions they did during the troubles.

In terms of PSF, well trying to break the conversation of PSF and the PIRA is hard when they constantly bring it back up and throw it in peoples faces

I see a little video today of MON on some program, I guess from the North, which said MLMD wouldn't attend PIRA events if she is Taoiseach, when asked if MON would not attend them as well she went around in circles, couldn't just answer yes or no. Typical PSF.

Do you have an article that shows that? I would guess it relates to polls from a year ago.

If Sinn Fein has 60% of the under-30s, then it must be around 5% of those over 30 to reach a level of 23% in the polls.

People fully understand that Sinn Fein commemorate terrorists to hang on to their core vote, however, that is reason enough for decent people not to vote for them, and it is also wrong.

I won't vote for Aontu because of their stance on pro-life and I won't vote for Sinn Fein because they refuse to apologise properly for the actions of the PIRA. Fundamentally, any political party that supports, or apologises for non-state actor terrorists is a threat to democracy.

Northern Ireland voters have different priorities to Republic of Ireland voters

Their priorities are very accepting and tollerating of Republican commerations and for a strong share of their vote up there expecting of that

Ergo Southern voters asking/demanding MoN drops Republican comemorations is unreasonable

Allied to that younger Southern voters minded towards Sinn Féin ,on the whole clearly don't give a twopenny damn about it

That bit I undéstand very well

If MLMD says she won't attend, why would MON think it is ok?

She is supposed to represent all the people in Northern Ireland, attending those events to celebrate the PIRA murdering people ia hardly a good representation of any community? after all the PIRA killed more nationalists than anyone else during the troubles.

People want to move on, forget the troubles as much as possible. Yet PSF want to rub it in their faces whenever they get a chance. Of course this plays to a couple of people, but does is it what everyone else wants?

Do you have anything to back up the 10-20% of PSF in the North are "fringe lunatic anti gfa"? the people I know are nothing of the sort, of course you have few but they are the people when they are drinking in the bar you go into the lounge if you get me

In terms of locking down the thread, well you are here in the good times, before this you had one person running 10+ accounts, having full blown conversations with himself and a number of prominent accounts using PM's and all sorts to attack people who didn;t agree with them.

If you ignore the nonsense and 101 posts on the same topic, you will find a good discussion.

As I said, if PSF want to stop talking about PIRA, they should stop bringing them up all the time