For Lefties too Stubborn to Quit
As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.
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Having a pub chat with someone the other day, and they kept talking about the importance of a united Ireland etc.
I realised midway through that I honestly just don’t get republicanism – I don’t understand the motivation behind it. At least with most political positions I can at least grasp why they believe it, but I’ve no idea about Irish republicanism (of any sort). Is it an attempt to right an historical wrong? Something else? Any questions I’ve asked just result in people restating the fact of their belief in different ways: “I fundamentally believe that Ireland will never be…” etc etc.
So many of the people who describe themselves as republicans would be well beyond an emotional nationalism, so is there more to it than that?
If anyone has a link to a piece which would explain why someone is a republican, I’d hugely appreciate it.
I view Ireland as a nation with a shared history and historical values that I subscribe to. I feel this should be reflected in a politically recognised state. I feel as at home in Drogheda or Dublin as I do in Belfast. I have more in common with my mate from Monaghan than I do with some guy living in London (no offence meant to any English people reading at all). I feel the Irish people are sovereign and have the ability and the right to govern themselves – this has been denied them for reasons well known historically. I enjoy Irish music, I enjoy Irish sports, I speak the Irish language, I carry an Irish passport, yet my section of our country is governed by an English millionaire called Owen Paterson, who despite Devolution is still the ultimate arbiter of government in the six north eastern counties. For its million faults, I love Ireland. As for Irish Republicanism, it’s a political ideology based on the rights of man, the French revolution, liberty, equality, fraternity, and social justice. It is multi-religious, it is internationalist and progressive, its founders were catholic, protestant, Presbyterian and atheist. It contains the five ‘isms’ – Socialism, Nationalism, Securlarism, Seperatism and Anti-Sectarianism and these are tenets I sign up to and aspire to. Maybe you don’t, Pidge, or maybe you just don’t actually have a clue what Republicanism actually is.
It might, in theory, contain those five isms, but actually-existing Republicanism is not socialist and not anti-sectarian.
One other thing: Irish Republicanism should be republican. There is no conflict between monarchism and some of the stated descriptions of Republicanism given so far.
I doubt if I’ll ever be a Republican per se, but I am an antipartitionist. Partition was intuitively appealing on the principle that “good fences make good neighbours”. In hindsight, though, there doesn’t seem to be a single case of partition acting to resolve ethnic or national conflicts. In fact it seems to make them worse.
chuck’s definitiion of Republicanism is interesting, though, because it could be bolted on to any form of nationalism. It could (to an extent) be allied to those ideologies that define the nation in chthonic “blood and soil” terms, but there’s no reason why it couldn’t define the nation in less . . . unwholesome ways.
This is just off the top of my head, mind. Last summer, I had reason to read Pearse’s Murder Machine, and I found it surprisingly persuasive . . . up to a point, anyway. I’d always assumed that with the “blood sacrifice” thing he should be put in the same category as someone like Gabriele d’Annunzio and other European nationalist precursors of fascism. So I was surprised to find him specifically condemning those who thought that in an independent (home rule) Ireland it would be OK to force compulsory Irish on protestant school children. This sort of progressive stance though, remained allied to a sort of conservative-with-a-small-c romanticism, especially in his remarks on the Irish west coast as the ultimate resource of Irish national identity.
Maybe that’s a problem with republicanism? That it’s an ideology that rests on a fundamentally unstable relationship between two kinds of nationalism – the democratic, civic form that comes out of the Enlightenment and the French revolution. . . and the darker form that descends from the Romantics. . .
The Murder Machine is fairly progressive for its time. I felt the same when I read it.
I wonder though if all forms of ideology political philosophy have some of the same tension.
I think it’s pretty simple really – to be an Irish Republican:
You should believe in an Irish Nation State
You should believe in the soil and resources of Ireland belonging to its people (a la Lalor, Mellowes, Connolly)
You should believe in the seperation of Ireland from England
You should believe in the seperation of church and state
You should believe in the unity of Protestant Catholic and Dissenter under the common term of ‘Irishman’.
If you believe in any of these things individually, that’s grand. It you take a few of these together and definie your self poltically, that’s grand too. But you need all five to be a Republican, a mon avis!
As well, that all men and women are born equal and should have equal opportunity in their lives. (That includes no silly titles and ‘honours’)
Woah, easy question to start off with pidge, but great stuff for getting people thinking.
I’m a Republican Socialist [and the Socialist bit is another whole world of pain, indeed I don't think Republicanism is necessarily per se socialist and hence the qualification] but it’s sort of difficult to sum it up entirely easily, though I’d pick from the points made above by chuck and Dr. X [incidentally I think Dr. X's position is particularly interesting being anti-partition but not 'R'epublican - capital R]. But I’d have to agree with Michael, first and foremost one has to believe in Republican forms of government and all that flows from that. I’m a bit busy at the mo but I’ll be back.
Well, if you put it like that, maybe I am a republican. . .
Well I’m also, given the other side of my background, an English Republican. It’s stretching it on the Scottish side though there are family links there a long way back. But, yep, a Scottish Rep too.
In an earlier Open Thread EamonCork was looking for references on C20th farm labourers in Ireland – I’m posting another reply here as I figure he has more chance of seeing it here than in a weeks old thread –
McKay, Enda: The Housing of the Rural Labourer, 1883-1916 SAOTHAR, Vol.17 p. 17, Irish Labour History Society (1992)
Cunningham, John: Labour in the West of Ireland, Athol Books, Belfast (1995), (at least one chapter on the rural labourer – late C19th/early C20th)
Also look around for stuff by Pádraig G Lane (again this may be mostly late C19th early C20th).
Thanks, very decent of you, much appreciated.
A few more suggestions on rural labourers – not exhaustive by any means:
* J.W. Boyle, ‘A marginal figure: the Irish rural labourer’, in Clark & Donnelly, eds, Irish Peasants: violence & political unrest, 1780-1914, Dublin 1983, pp. 311-38
* Dan Bradley, Farm labourers: Irish struggle, 1900-1976, Belfast 1988, pp. 10-31.
* John Cunningham, ‘A “spirit of self-preservation”: herdsmen around Loughrea in the late 19th century’, in Forde et al, The district of Loughrea, vol. 1, History, 1791-1918, Loughrea 2003, pp.457-80.
http://www.aughty.org/pdf/herdsmen_loughrea.pdf
* David Fitzpatrick, ‘The disappearance of the Irish agricultural labourer, 1841-1912’, in Irish Economic and Social History Society Journal, vol.7, 1980, pp. 66-92.
* P.L.R. Horn, ‘The National Agricultural Labourers Union in Ireland, 1873-79’, in Irish Historical Studies, vol.17, 1971, pp. 340-52.
* Fintan Lane, ‘Rural labourers, social change, and politics in late 19th century Ireland’, in Lane & Ó Drisceoil, eds, Politics & the Irish working class, 1830-1945, Houndmills, 2005, pp. 6-26
* Padraig G. Lane, ‘The Irish agricultural labourer in folklore and fiction,’ in Saothar: journal of the Irish Labour History Society, vol.28, pp. 79-89.
* Emmet O’Connor, A labour history of Ireland, 1824-2000, Dublin 2011
Doing this essay for you at the moment John.
Some news that may thrill a few of you….
http://www.factmag.com/2012/02/23/john-peels-record-collection-to-become-an-online-museum/
John Peel’s record collection to become an “online interactive museum”
Peel’s collection is being made available to the general public, in the form of an “interactive online museum” [via NME].
The collection is understood to comprise around 25,000 LPs, 40,000 singles and “many thousands” of CDs. It’s going to be represented online as part of The Space, a new “experimental digital service” managed and largely funded by the Arts Council, with support from the BBC………
I can think of a number of people who, if they ever log on to that, will never be seen in the real world again
+1
Which was more or less the case when I was 15. Back to the future!
Say No to EU Austerity Treaty – Bailout People Not Banks – Public Meeting, Liberty Hall, Monday March 5, 7.30pm
http://tomasoflatharta.com/2012/02/28/say-no-to-eu-austerity-treaty-bailout-people-not-banks-public-meeting-liberty-hall-monday-march-5-7-30pm/
Paul Murphy, Socialist Party / ULA MEP, is currently visiting Greece along with other left wing MEPs. He has been posting detailed diaries on the Socialist Party website. Yesterdays one in particular, which features the KKE and SYRIZA quite a bit, is likely to be of interest to people who were following the discussion of the Greek left here recently:
http://socialistparty.net/international/887-greece-solidarity-visit-day-1
http://socialistparty.net/international/888-greece-solidarity-visit-day-2
Just getting this off my chest: the omnipresence of the savage/Prone family in Irish commentary and political life really gets to me. I don’t begrudge them their many jobs, but there seems to be a real effort now to get the public ‘on message’ that the worst is over, time to smile, smile, smile…
http://www.broadsheet.ie/2012/02/27/how-do-you-know-its-monday/
‘Ireland gets its mojo back’?!@***
That line has a wonderful history, previously being used by Harry McGee in the Irish times after the night, which now seems as distant as the days of Grattan’s parliament, when Brian Cowen gave a speech to the Dublin Chamber of Commerce which apparently led to multiple orgasms and spontaneous combustion among the assembled throng. Of course it turned out that Brian’s mojo was still AWOL. As is the Irish people’s, in the sense meant by Terry i.e. mojo being the willingness to touch the forelock in a cheerful manner while the latest senseless austerity measures are enacted.
The Prone/Savage tribe are a pretty cretinous bunch. Not the least irritating bit about TP is her attempt to show her streetwise nature by using out of date American slang. It’s like when Brenda Power uses the phrase, “bling bling.”
Who else is in that tribe?
the willingness to touch the forelock in a cheerful manner while the latest senseless austerity measures are enacted.
Forgetting mojo (whatever that may be) for a moment, this actually seems to be the contemporary standard for judging the economic health of a nation. Forget growth, per capita income and what have you, the yardstick appears to be how much you can slice off GDP and get away with it.
In the present conjuncture it is vital that confidence be restored so that expansionary fiscal contraction can work its magic. The government should ensure that every household receives a copy of Norman Vincent Peale’s ‘The Power of Positive Thinking’. It would be money well spent.
Excellent clip. Fair play.
In addition to The Power of Positive Thinking, we should also be issued with a copy of Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment by The Ramones with special reference to the line, “happy happy happy all the time, shock treatment, I’m doing fine.”
http://www.rte.ie/news/2012/0228/referendum.html
The Taoiseach has told the Dáil that a referendum will be held on the Fiscal Stability Treaty.
Hard to know if it will pass or not.
“Hard to know if it will pass or not.”
First time do you mean?
Heh
They have the ultimate scare tactic of being fecked out of the Euro , the EU and so on.
Although as one FGer in the office was saying
“Not a hope unless we get a rake of money written off!”
Will the parties be even able to mobilise people to canvass on this. Doubt well see a Yes to Europe front campaign group ( getting huge sums from undiclosed sources) like with the Lisbon.
It will be an all out barrage of propaganda in the media allied with the sudden reappearance of the well funded astroturf “civil society” groups from Lisbon 2.
I mean theyll no doubt try but a lots changed since Lisbon. The only thing they can do is scaremonger and threaten. Hardly mobilising stuff for the ground troops.
Stephen Kinsella, with whom I tangled on this blog a couple of years ago, is pessimistic about the chances of austerity restoring us to what Churchill called the “bright sunlit uplands”:
Is Ireland really the role model for austerity? | Stephen Kinsella | Cambridge Journal of Economics
Abstract
This paper describes the causes and consequences of Ireland’s economic crisis in the context of the policy solution implemented to contain that crisis: protracted fiscal austerity. I describe the causes of the recent crisis in Ireland and look at the logic of austerity with a simple model. I compare the current crisis to the crisis of the 1980s, when fiscal austerity was touted as the trigger for the Celtic Tiger. I discuss the measures implemented to date in the current crisis, tracing their effects on sectors of Ireland’s macroeconomy. I show that Ireland is not the role model for austerity policies.
Link at:
http://www.irishleftreview.org/2012/01/21/ireland-role-model-austerity-stephen-kinsella-cambridge-journal-economics/
50k on cartridges.
My first question is not why but how.
Maybe he thought they were the other kind of cartridges?
Excellent.
How it was thought that this would get past public scrutiny is beyond me.
At least SF can say they are now a normal, mainstream party.
What is it that politicians are unable to define, that cannot be adequately conceptualized, but yet must be measured and incorporated into the Irish constitution as the basis of economic policy? The structural deficit.
Apropos of nothing in particular, Google are planning to change their privacy policy to allow them to retain all manner of personal details on Google users.
As the link below says:
Tech News Daily reports that once Google’s new unified privacy policy takes effect all data already collected about you, including search queries, sites visited, age, gender and location will be gathered and assigned to your online identity represented by your Gmail and YouTube accounts. After the policy takes effect you are not allowed to opt out without abandoning Google altogether. But now before the policy takes effect, you have the option of deleting your Google Web History by modifying your settings so that Google is unable to associate data collected about you with your Gmail or YouTube accounts.
Tech News Daily reports that Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a nonprofit organization based in San Francisco that advocates for online privacy, says: “Search data can reveal particularly sensitive information about you, including facts about your location, interests, age, sexual orientation, religion, health concerns, and more.”
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/320137
The solution, therefore, is to delete your Google browsing history now, before it becomes impossible.
That link will give you the lowdown on precisely how to do it (I’ve just done it myself, and it’s a matter of seconds).
Remember, just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean they won’t get you.
Day 3 of Paul Murphy’s visit to Greece:
http://www.socialistworld.net/doc/5608