‘Progressive’ Ireland to take on next ‘nationalist shibboleth’ July 30, 2007
Posted by franklittle in Art, Culture, Ireland.trackback
I hope one of our newer contributors, Damian O’Broin, doesn’t mind being credited with the inspiration behind this post but a comment he made as a Labour member and Wexford supporter of his delight, one shared by all neutrals I can assure you, at their success on Saturday reminded me of something I have been meaning to post on. It might be particularly interesting in light of some of the comments on nationalism, labour and republicanism in Ireland.
For some time there has been a consistent anti-GAA trend in what passes for liberal intellectual circles in Ireland. Rules 21 and 42 were used for many years as sticks with which Irish liberal thought could chastise the reactionary peasant classes of rural Ireland. With rugby teams playing in Croke Park and PSNI hurlers, it seems that some are looking for the next windmill to tilt at.
Last February, Fergus Finlay opened up the new front with a fairly vile attack on our national anthem that I’ve been meaning to get back to. Confessing that he is unable to sing it, a rather curious omission in one’s education for a former Deputy Government Press Secretary, his argument is based on the sort of extremist literalism so beloved of columnists. The anthem, he points out, uses the phrase ‘Soldiers, are we…’, but “I don’t want to be a soldier, never did”. Fair enough Fergus, nor do I, but the song refers to a struggle of national liberation when an entire people arose and all, to one extent or another, were soldiers.
Finlay concludes with this terrifying prospect:
“In the interests of reflecting the modern, open country we have become, for the sake of giving a new generation a chance to find their own voice, and because it has outlived its usefulness, I reckon we should set about finding a new national anthem rather than worrying about anyone else’s.
“The Soldiers’ Song says nothing to us any more. It’s time we retired it with honour.”
Good grief. Could anyone imagine anything more terrifying than a process of finding a new anthem? We would end up with some monstrosity selected by a committee or, in the worst scenario, a Louis Walsh type “You’re a Star” competition.
Finlay argues that the anthem is out of touch and especially that it is too bloodthirsty and militaristic. Although he does acknowledge that the French Marseillaise is not without some revolutionary imagery. But other countries too take their inspiration from their struggles for independence. The Italian anthem uses the phrase ‘We are ready to die’ four times in its chorus and in one verse accuses Austrians of drinking the blood of Poles, Russians and Italians. Presumably metaphorically.
Greece refers to the ‘dreadful edge of your sword’ while the Mexicans optimistically see a future filled with ‘War, war! Let the national banners be soaked in waves of blood’ in a song that uses the word blood often enough to be genuinely disturbing. The Poles swear to ‘..fight with swords for all that our enemies had taken from us’ and later credit Bonaparte with teaching them how to fight. The Dutch anthem, somewhat bizarrely, contains a reference to an oath of loyalty to the King of Spain. Even that paragon of social democracy, neutral Sweden refers to ‘faith until death will I swear….With God shall I fight for home and for hearth’.
National anthems are not meant to appeal to the intellect or the political correctness wing of Irish life. They are supposed to appeal to the emotions, to one’s patriotism. Despite advancing years I still feel an electricity in Croke Park when the national anthem is sung. They are products of their time and for most countries celebrate and acknowledge struggles for independence, against tyranny foreign or domestic. Stirring national anthems have not yet led to race wars. Mexico is unlikely to be going to war with anyone. Italy is not expected to invade Austria anytime soon.
Irish nationalism and republicanism did not begin when Peadar Kearney sat down to write a new patriotic song. It will not, however devoutly some might wish, disappear if the song is changed. The Irish national anthem might mean nothing to Fergus Finlay anymore, but to be honest, I suspect that says more about Fergus than it does the Irish people.
The Cedar Lounge Revolution 
The Dutch anthem, somewhat bizarrely, contains a reference to an oath of loyalty to the King of Spain
Curiously enough this is more than can be said for the Spanish anthem, which I believe has no lyrics at all – on the grounds that nobody could agree on them. This strikes me as a perfectly civilised state of affairs given that anthems do indeed tend to have a rather bloody and violent aspect to them. When England and Scotland play each other at football, for instance, each side sing an anthem which commenorates military victory over the other. (If the Spanish insist on having them – the question was raised by the Partido Popular the other day, reason enough to view it with extreme suspicion – then my personal proposal is that it should consist solely of the most commonly-used expressions in the language, these being “poco a poco”, “tranquilo” and “no te preocupes”.)
Presumably this one can be filed under “people who are so aggressive about being so modern and progressive that they don’t notice how arrogant they are”? Even so, is there really no mileage in pointing out that said modernisation would never have happened had a lot of people whose ideas were often less perfectly modern than Mr Finlay’s had not been prepared to lay down their lives so that Ireland was no longer ruled from London?
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Yeah. I too love hearing it sung at Croke Park. Shame so few people know the words though the big screens in the stadium are no harm, and I’m never entirely happy to see the last phrase obliterated by cheers about the forthcoming game (although in a way, I don’t mind, because it’s not the worst prioritisation). Incidentally the actual melody is quite good as anthems go…
Doesn’t it come down to being comfortable in our own skins, that we shouldn’t have to apologise or alter every small detail in our societal mix simply because it might reflect some aspect or another of a long and complex history.
Sorry to drag that conference up again that I was at recently, but one of the plenary panel complained about Irish Studies pretty much along the lines of ‘there was a thirty five year war and concentrating on Irishness – more recently in Irish Studies – was part of the problem and perhaps part of the dynamic that led to that war’. Well, if we think Ireland and Irishness and national identity has an alpha and omega centred on 1969 or even 1916 then we’re in deep deep trouble.
On the other hand, it may become necessary in some new all-island context to consider the incorporation of a broader anthem…but that won’t be today or tomorrow…
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“Sorry to drag that conference up again that I was at recently,….”
Admit it. You were only ever at one conference in your entire life 😉
I think the very last point is one well worth making. I’ve often found it interesting that Shinners tend to be very good on the rhetoric of ensuring a united Ireland will be a warm house for those who see themselves British, but raise practical issues around symbols like the flag and anthem, or the status of Irish, and they tend to get a bit uncertain.
Finally, in a bizarre coincedence, one of our regular readers pointed out this year is the hundreth anniversary of the song and there’s a piece in this week’s An Phoblacht about the history of it.
It’s quite interesting. I wasn’t aware that Kearney wrote the words, but not the music, which was written by a guy called Paddy Heeney, who died in abject poverty and was buried in an unmarked grave. Largely forgotten in Irish history.
http://www.anphoblacht.com/news/detail/20014
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When I start inspiring posts here it probably means I should be getting back to work…
WBS, you beat me to the point I was going to make about the anthem and an eventual all-Ireland settlement. As did you franklittle regarding the disconnect between shinner rhetoric and the inevitable compromises that unification would bring.
The sound of a full Croker singing the anthem on a sunny Sunday never fails to send a shiver down the spine (even more so if the Hill is full of flag waving Dubs). But. I would be quite happy for the anthem, flag and more to be negotiated away for a united Ireland.
Going back to the discussion on the Labour/nationalism thread, one of the things that makes me most uncomfortable about Sinn Fein is the assumption in their rhetoric that a untied Ireland will be achieved without compromise and our terms. Not quite driving the unionists into the sea, just what they believe in.
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To be fair to SF I think confusion or not over such issues they’re miles ahead of 32CSM and RSF and others for who it seem – to me at least – there is a complete inability to understand just how complex any all-island settlement is going to be in terms of the sort of society that eventually develops and that such artifacts seem take precedence for them over actual political or social structures. Actually, I’ve also found, oddly that some in FG and FF also strike incredibly absolutist stances over same…
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I think with the Shinners, they’re aware that compromises will have to be made, but since Unionists say a united Ireland is never going to happen and the political establishment here doesn’t want to talk about it, they don’t have to face the question of what they would be willing to give up. I think they’re up for it in theory, especially at a leadershup level, they just haven’t had the practical choices or implications of same put to them.
That said, one Shinner I raised the issue with said he’d have no problem with the new, united Ireland, having neither tricolour nor anthem. He argued that both were republican symbols long before they were national symbols (Technically true enough from an historical perspective) and would continue to be so in a united Ireland. Neat way of squaring the circle I thought!
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It’s not just liberal intellectuals who hate the GAA you know; any football fan old enough to remember the ban and the subterfuge that anyone who, quite reasonably, enjoyed playing both codes had to go through in order to do so, will, you might find, still harbour a certain bitterness. The imputation that by playing the world’s most popular field sport – a ‘foreign’ game – you were betraying your heritage stung many. I remember having to be alert on our school playing fields for the approach of any priest or teacher when playing the wrong code; on the signal the ball would be picked up and we’d revert to bogball. Not unnaturally, I’ve hated the GAA ever since.
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A fair point, but the fact that English grammar schools generally took a similar attitude to association football has never been considered by newspaper columnists a clinching argument for their closure.
More’s the pity.
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A good change from the situation sonofstan recalls is the way in which it is no longer unusual to find people who harbour a love for both. I was at a funeral recently where if I remember correctly there was both GAA and soccer memorabilia given up as representative of the life of the deceased.
Have to be honest, I’m not much of a football fan, much more in GAA. Some years ago I though, feck it, I’ll give it a shot and started to ‘follow’ Manchester City for no better reason than Joy Division and the Chameleons came from Manchester and they appeared less annoying than their larger rival from there. A path of tears I will tell you as they promptly went into free fall in the Premiership.
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Following Man City? Life of luxury, WBS. You should try being a Watford fan. Ah, how the decisions you make as a 10 year old can cause misery for decades…
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Eh, there are Irish football teams you know…. not just “Irish” ones like “Roy Keane’s Sunderland” (as they are inevitably called on RTE these days)
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A Dublin friend of mine, who’s lived in Oxford for many years, started taking an interest in Manchester City after going to watch them play. Not because they were great, but because he was fascinated by the approach of the supporters which appeared to him to have a depth of intensity that he was not used to in Irish football.
Specifically, he mentioned an incident wherein a supporter, displeased by an apparent failure of perception on the part of a linesman, proceeded to follow that official up and down the touchline for the rest of the game, informing him persistently that he was a —-.
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Hmmm.. ejh… good story, close to madness, some forms of fandom. sonofstan, that’s a good point about Irish soccer teams – although on a slight tangent if we followed that idea through of “Roy Keane’s Sunderland” in other areas perhaps we could have “Ireland’s England” – just my energy for following sports has been fairly limited to supporting the Irish team internationally, hurling during the 1990s and football in the 2000s. And like a lot of people my initial interest was music which has been a much more dominant part of my life than sport.
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I NEVER thought I’d get to use this piece of information anywhere. Really, the times when the Dutch national anthem comes up in conversation are covered in cobwebs.
the Dutch national anthem dates from the 1600s, when the Netherlands were under Spanish rule. The speaker in the song is supposed to be Prince William of Orange, who does indeed acknowledge that, as a prince, he has sworn allegiance to his King, but then goes on to say how his allegiance has been undermined by the present King of Spain, and that now it is time to revolt and fight tyranny. The song is an impassioned plea for national unity against foreign oppression.
great post, by the way.
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It’s not only Irish liberals who feel queasy about their national anthem though; the co-option of the union jack and the George cross, along with the anthem by the far right in ’70s and ’80s Britain left much of the liberal/ left there uneasy about flag waving and anthem singing, and for honourable reasons; if the main association was with groups who were eager to reinforce the ‘Ain’t no black in the union jack message’ it seemed necessary to distance oneself from symbols that, for many, spelt exclusion.
I must admit i go at least halfway with Finlay on this; the use of the tricolour and Amhrain Ná bFhiann by republicans makes me – the sort of Labour (ex-) member/ voter who detests SF as set out by Conor in a previous comment here (I think?) – a less than enthusiastic participant in the communal sing- song at Lansdowne.
I don’t want to anticipate any discussions about Irishness that may be forthcoming here or elsewhere; i am struck by the fact that it seems less problematic for those i take to be younger than me. The country i grew up in did not inspire me with uncomplicated patriotic fervour; rather, I defined my position through opposition to what i took to be the dominant expressions of Irishness -Catholicism, Fianna Fail and the GAA. I still find extravagant identification with one’s country – any country – suspect; a patriot to me is ‘someone who knows how to hate his country properly’ (can’t find the source for that).
I do agree, though, that the prospect of finding a new anthem is a terrifying vista.
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Besides, compared to God Save The Queen where’s the problem? In the UK they’ve already excluded atheists (like me) and republicans (like me) before we’ve finished the first line, and the fourth line’s about looking forward to victory in war (which I don’t).
Sod that for a game of soldiers.
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[…] a bit of a discussion going on over on Cederlounge at the moment, around Fergus Finlay’s comments that Ireland needs a new national anthem. […]
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“Really, the times when the Dutch national anthem comes up in conversation are covered in cobwebs.”
Here at the Cedar Lounge, we’re all about the niche market.
To push it on a bit, two stories come to mind, one brought back from comments by sonofstan. There was a debate in the British left, I think the Weekly Worker covered it but I don’t have time for a more than a quick trawl and a search on the CPGB search engine came up blank, about whether it was ideologically sound to support England in the 2006 World Cup. The argument against was based around the suggestions that the cross of St George had for many on the left, and the associations with some of the far right.
It reminded me of a campaign started by the SWP in Cork to stop Cork GAA fans from waving the Confederate flag during matches. Far from expressing a desire to back Georgia in seceding from the Union, it was a reference to the nickname of the Cork team as the Rebels and the colours on the flag. The SWP however, said it was endorsing racism, deliberately or not. One wonders if the use of the Japanese flag in Páirc Uí Chaoimh is seen as retrospectively endorsing the invasion of China.
The common thread in both is an ill-concealed dislike among some people on the left for sports that are a real and genuine part of working class culture, both in Ireland and Britain.
Sonofstan, I think the ban on foreign games was a disgrace and went on far too long, but in saying that I clearly imply some support for it from the start and I have to admit I do. In the first 20-30 years of the GAA everything was being done to destroy it and maybe something like that was necessary but certainly no more than that and never to the destructive levels that it reached.
Even today I opposed the opening up of Croke Park not out of any nationalist recidivism but simply because I believe that the GAA is a uniquely special phenomenon that requires protection. Irish, but inclusive, positive, progressive, amateur going up against the biggest and most powerful media-sport conglomerates in the world.
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I’d tend to agree with what you say franklittle, re Croke Park. I was quite supportive of the opening up until it happened. I’m always worried that that indicates a need for the ‘sacred’ in my psyche. Ah well, so what? But. Another part of me is delighted to show to others what an amateur game can deliver.
sonofstan, it might surprise you but I feel very similarly albeit with a love of GAA. What is the old quote, given the choice of betraying my country or my friend I hope I’d be brave enough to betray my country. Summat like that anyhow. But, as regards age, I’m in my early 40s and I agree, in some ways those who thankfully evaded the worst of the Troubles seem less conflicted by such things. I’m happy about that.
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Frank – The GAA now may be going up against the ‘most powerful sports media conglomerates’, but at the time the ban was operating, football here and in Britain, while professional or semi- pro, was hardly the bloated cash cow it is today – players earned an industrial wage and travelled to games by public transport.
To many football fans here, the perceived bigotry of the GAA was a corollate of the way the censorship board was operating at the same time (or the anti- communist efforts of the church) – a blinkered and arrogant promotion of Gaelic ‘specialness’ with no foundation in fact, a specialness that needed to be protected from a fallen world outside because our delicate and sensitive souls wouldn’t bear exposure to the same books or the same games as the rest of the world. Of course it wasn’t specialness; it was a deep seated insecurity. We play a game that no one else can play – or would want to – and therefore we’ll always be the best.
As to the pride in the amateur status of the GAA; well firstly it’s a fiction, becoming more threadbare by the minute, and secondly, what on earth is so wrong with paying people to do what they’re good at? (by which i don’t mean the silly money premiership players are ‘earning’ – but then the great majority of footballers don’t play in the prem.) football became a professional game early on because it was impossible for working men to do a hard week down the pit or in the factory and still play – this is also why Rugby league became pro while Union remained ‘amateur’ ; the middle-classes could take the time off.
And finally, before I stop ranting, your example of the SWP in Cork trying to stop rebel flags being waved may seem to you a patronising affront to the working classes, but consider the progress football has made in eradicating racist abuse from the terraces, a process initially started by left- wing cranks and now pretty much completely absent on terraces in these islands; and compare that to the documented abuse the likes of the Ó hAilpín’s and Jason Sherlock have gotten from adherents of the ‘positive, progressive organisation’ you champion (not to mention the fairly shocking on-pitch violence and intimidation of referees your Corinthians go in for)
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As to the pride in the amateur status of the GAA; well firstly it’s a fiction, becoming more threadbare by the minute
How is it a fiction?
the documented abuse the likes of the Ó hAilpín’s and Jason Sherlock have gotten from adherents of the ‘positive, progressive organisation’ you champion
The GAA has always been a family and community based organisation in a way soccer has never been. Anyone who has attended a premiership game would be shocked at the undercurrent of poisonous agression oozing from the ‘fans’, so much so that they have to be kept in separate enclosures and not allowed to mingle before, during or after the match. To blow up the rare ignorant gobshites drunkenly abusing Ó hAilpín or Sherlock as an examplar of all that’s wrong with the GAA is pretty feeble by comparison.
consider the progress football (sic) has made in eradicating racist abuse
A lot done, more to do, as the dominant expressions of Irishness once said.
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The common thread in both is an ill-concealed dislike among some people on the left for sports that are a real and genuine part of working class culture, both in Ireland and Britain.
I don’t think this is true, in fact I think the claim is a specious one. I also don’t think the argument about patriotism and supporting national sides has anything to do with it.
Nor does it have anything necessarily to do with the St George’s flag and any far-right connotations it may or may not have, though that argument is put by some people. It does have to do with the general question of whether identifying oneself with one’s country is something healthy or unhealthy and whether (say) a World Cup would not be a good time to raise one’s voice against it.
It is as well to consider the arguments properly, if only because they are basically never put: half the problem is that the assumption is made that we all support and should support our country – which is in itself a dubious state of affairs. One paradox, to put it kindly, is that whenever I’ve debated the question on the internet there has never been any shortage of opinions or any shortage of interest in the topic. Yet when I proposed a book on the topic to a publisher some years ago (and bear in mind that I’m a published football writer) they said there wa no market for it. It’s a closed circle.
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and not allowed to mingle before, during or after the match
This is a considerable exaggeration.
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After coming home from a night out to find the Wind That Shakes The Barley playing a few of us had this very discussion about the anthem. I was of the opinion that if Ireland ever did become this unified 32 county entity that we would need a new anthem. And a new flag.
I can’t remember what drunken conclusion we came to, but I’m sure it was a great one that solved all the world’s problems.
But I’m a fan of the current anthem. I love singing it, I loved it even more when they used to play it at the end of the night in Equinox in Sligo. Those were the days 🙂 And it doesn’t really matter about the actual lyrics, because they aren’t what you mean when you sing the anthem. All you mean is that you are supporting your country, most of the time, in the sporting arena. Although I suppose there is another argument over whether patriotism is a good thing.
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The anthem can go, not because of its martial stance (check out the Marseillaise and countless others) but because it’s a dreary dirge (no better than God Save the Queen in this respect. The thought of it being replaced by Ireland’s Call or The Fields of Athenry is horrible though. And hands off the tricolour; it might have been sullied by its association with the PIRA but it is still a unique expression of Irish nationality: simple, economical and inclusive.
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You refer to your last post as a rant stan, and on that alone, we can wholeheartedly agree.
I am not defending everything the GAA ever said or did. But it is a unique aspect of Irish cultural life that has withstood increasing cultural homogenity and thrived. It has done so through an organisation that is democratic, at times bewilderingly so, and one that by retaining it’s amateur ethos (Still alive and well), has avoided the tragedy that is the role of money in soccer where the more money a club has the better it’s chances. The amateur status has not kept it a game for the middle classes. Far from it. The strongest Dublin clubs being predominantly working class and a glance through the county senior teams shows a good societal mix.
No-one is going to defend racist abuse, or attacks on referees, but no-one could seriously compare the levels of either to the far higher levels in soccer, especially in England, but also in France, Italy and other European countries. Indeed, Sherlock and Ó hAilpín themselves would make this point.
I don’t want to get into a soccer versus GAA debate. I don’t like soccer, but this is not because of some dewy eyed love of Mother Ireland. I just think it’s a poor and fairly uninteresting sport. It doesn’t bother me that soccer fans might think the same of GAA games.
Finally, the notion that money has corrupted soccer, especially the Premiership, is one I’ve heard more from soccer fans than GAA supporters who tend to be fairly uninterested in the travails of the other code.
Do we really want to get into a ‘Your sport is better than mine’ debate?
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“Anyone who has attended a premiership game would be shocked at the undercurrent of poisonous agression oozing from the ‘fans’”
Been at a Dubs match recently? Packed full of drunken yobs. Armagh have their yobs too, but the Dubs are in a league of their own.
Personally, as a kid, I was always seriously put off playing GAA by the ideological stuff surrounding it. I just wanted to run around the pitch, batter a few poeple and kick the ball into the goal. I just didn’t see where nationalism and celticness came into it. At least soccer didn’t expect you to buy into any notion of identity. Soccer was also definitely the sport of the urban proletariat – even today the best clubs in Dublin are in middle class areas like Kilmacud and Drumcondra and are largely made up of first or second generation culchies.
My big problem with the GAA nowadays is how effing seriously everybody takes it all. I mean, all it is is a few dozen men running around after a ball – with a bit of escapism and vicarious heroism for the fans. This has evolved into a situation where players are expected to essentially devote their lives to their team for a decade or more and they carry the weight of their county’s expectations on them like millstones. The lasting bitterness and hatred that can be built up towards players who have been deemed to not perform is shocking to see. I still feel sorry for the Mayo players of last year. They will be reminded of the shame they brought their county for decades.
I also think all the nationalistic pomp and ceremony is basically silly. I mean all that parading stuff – what’s with that? Marching bands and neat columns of men – playing at soldiers as is the norm for anything associated with nationalism.
Having said all that, I’ll be at croker on saturday to see wicklow win Tommy Murphy and Tyrnone crush Meath.
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I have indeed been to a few Dubs matches recently. Brought the kids too. We were in the Davin stand, opposite end to the Hill. Didn’t see any drunken yobs and had a great time.
I’m a member of the club in Drumcondra you refer to. Most of the members are Dubs born and bred. Most have roots (parents, grandparents) in the country – as do most Dubs full stop. Most of its members these days would be from a white collar background. Whether that makes them middle class or working class depends on your definitions. And it’s run by Bertie’s men and women.
To describe the GAA clubs in Kilmacud and Drumcondra as “the best” is to invite argument from the members of the dozens of other clubs around the city and county. Including the one in Kilbarrack which I played for as a younger man. A great club. 90% of its membership came from the working class estate of Kilbarrack.
“Soccer was definitely the sport of the urban proletariat.” A question, I suppose, is whether it still is.
Hill 16 on a Sunday the Dubs are playing is full of Dubs, half pissed and sober, urban proletarians. Discuss.
When I was a kid, English soccer was the only game we were passionate about. Then the Dubs arrived in 74(?) and everyone was mad about the GAA – well nearly everyone, me and my best mate were bewildered by the sudden change. He never went with the flow, I eventually did.
I love the nomenclature too. Good luck to the Garden County on Saturday but the Metropolitans for Sam!
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Coc – While the premiership may have floated free of anything like community or family, I defy you not to see exactly the same thing which you take to exemplify GAA clubs in almost all LoI football clubs and in most English and Scottish teams outside the prem. Secondly, on the subject of racist abuse – I’ve been to matches at Millwall and Colchester, both formerly right-wing bastions in recent years as well as every LoI ground, and I can honestly say that, while I’ve heard players abused for everything – I can think of precisely one instance of straight racist abuse, from a Bohs fan, I’m ashamed to say, and he was immediately rounded on by everyone around him.(I accept that continental europe, particularly eastern europe remains notorious in this respect)
Secondly, although its true fans tend to be segregated inside grounds, in most cases they mingle freely beforehand – the venom is ritualistic and, unlike in GAA, it tends to be quickly forgotten; nothing like the lasting bitterness and hatred that chekov points too ever really lingers in football – probably because the players are pros and move between clubs. It is understood that loyalty is provisional. What seems like viciousness to an outsider is a well understood form of cathartic theatre to the insider.
Frank – I don’t like GAA for reasons noted above and because it doesn’t really appeal on the level of skill or spectacle, but I’ve no difficulty with anyone playing any game they want short of bear baiting; I do object to a fairly ordinary game being presented as a national treasure, to be treated with piety and reverance for being part of our national heritage – especially since football and especially cricket (there were over 200 cricket clubs in Tipperary in the middle of the 19th c) can comfortable lay claim to having been played for a lot longer here.
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nothing like the lasting bitterness and hatred that chekov points too ever really lingers in football
This is a considerable underestimation.
Colchester must have cleaned up their act big-time since the one time I’ve been to Layer Road (a 0-0 draw with Bristol City about five seasons ago). I’ve been to seventy-odd English grounds and must have seen around a thousand games of English professional football and it was without exaggeration the worst for racial abuse I’ve ever been to.
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my only thought sonofstan is that it is de facto a national treasure, but a treasure because of its very ordinariness… but cricket and football, and particularly cricket are also part of a heritage and culture. It’s not an either/or, and that’s the great thing about it. Or to put it another way. Those debates are essentially over. If you want to opt in to either, neither or just one that’s fine.
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ejh – I’m honestly surprised at that in Layer Rd. – I lived in Colchester for a year in 2000-2001 and went to most home matches, and while there was plenty ‘no surrender to the IRA’ type stuff, i really didn’t hear any abuse of Black players (on the basis of their colour anyway) and that was on the Barside (the standy-up bit).
WBS – hope that’s true: really.
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I think what struck me was the breadth of their repertoire. They covered a lot of ground – they weren’t just abusing players, they were abusing teams that weren’t even playing on the grounds of the ethnicity of the population in the towns from which they came.
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probably to distract themselves from the quality of the football they were condemned to watch at the time ….BTW interested in your observations upthread about the assumption that you should support your country; many club fans don’t particularly bother about their national team – if you look at the banners at an Ingur-land match they’re generally from Yeovil Town and the like; never the bigger clubs.
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I was at a Conference-level match between Dover and Gravesend in the early 1990s, and after five minutes one of the Gravesend players brought down an opponent, at which point the Dover fans began chanting “You dirty northern bastards.”
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never the bigger clubs
It’s a true observation and an interesting phenomenon, but I wouldn’t take it to mean that (for instance) English supporters of Arsenal or Chelsea don’t support England. They’re quite likely far less likely to travel abroad, probably because all their money is spent going to European games.
Or home games, in the case of Chelsea.
after five minutes one of the Gravesend players brought down an opponent, at which point the Dover fans began chanting “You dirty northern bastards”.
I was at a Sunderland-Oxford game around a decade ago in which the home fans were chanting “you hate Cockneys” and the away fans “we hate Geordies” entirely oblivious to the inaccuracy of their abuse.
Wouldn’t have happened at Colchester…
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Agree with WBS that the debate re GAA versus foreign sports are largely over now. In some ways a completly artificial debate anyway. Read CS Andrews ‘Dublin made Me’ mentioned on another thread, BOHs fan, member of Dublin IRA, out on Bloody Sunday, played for UCD the night before along with fellow Squad member. Interned in Civil War and found that most Dublin internees played soccer or rugby. He wasn’t unique; Oscar Traynor, O/C Dub Brigade, goalkeeper Belfast Celtic. Kevin Barry; rugby and cricket for Belvedere my good man!
Chekov is also correct re crowd aggression. It is GAA mythology that violence and abuse at games belongs to the ‘Brit’ sports. Read newspapers from the 1970s and 80s at big games usually involving the Dubs and northern teams (but not always) bottle throwing, baton charges on the Hill, players assualted, fans fighting outside the ground, trains wrecked. All this happened. Now the majority of time stuff like this doesn’t go on and the GAA is in many ways a great organisation (where else do Provos and cops get to share dressing rooms) and Waterford/Cork last Sunday was the best thing your likely to see ever. But less of the romanticism. You can be Irish and follow your county team, your parish club, Glasgow Celtic, Manchester United and the New York Mets if you want. And don’t get me started on how people try and make unsuccessful teams seem more left wing than successful ones…
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WBS,
I was expecting to read that your last vestige of support for Manchester City went out the window when Thaksin Shinawatra took over the club. Perfect out for someone of your political leanings, I would have thought.
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Ed
Any Mets fan worth his salt should realize that Manchester United are the Yankees of English soccer and should be abhorred at all cost.
{I had to throw that in there simply because I never imagined the Mets would find a mention on these pages.}
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Frank,
Should I take it as a given that you don’t feel you can recommend Life is a Rollercoaster as the new anthem if we should go that route? Maybe you never heard it in Irish as I did once on TodayFM?
(Probably not “anthemic”, but pretty funny I have to admit.)
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Eagle,
But are the Mets really all that different; multi-million deals for Mike Piazza etc, contrived history that they are somehow realted to the Brooklyn Dodgers (which old Dodgers fans contest), claim to be the team real New Yorkers support, against all the evidence…wait a minute they are the Man City of baseball! Still like them though.
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Ed,
I suspect you and I could carry on this discussion for quite a while, but (and I’m only guessing here) the rest of the gang would probably not find much of interest.
I don’t disagree with what you’ve written about the Mets, but the Yankees are clearly the media darlings, the team with the most money and most fans (around the country and outside the US). Yankee caps and Manchester United shirts are the two sports teams’ items that come closest to Coca-cola in the global marketplace.
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What is interesting when you talk about American sports as compared with European sports is that the American sportsworld is much more of a socialist domain. Each of the major sporting leagues has all sorts of rules that are intended to provide something close to parity (read equality) among the teams in the league and the players’ unions seem much stronger there than here. I think there’s also a great effort made to help older retired players among the American sports leagues.
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WBS
I should have realized that any interest you had in Manchester City probably disappeared when Noel & Liam (yes, that band) announced themselves as committed fans.
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Each of the major sporting leagues has all sorts of rules that are intended to provide something close to parity
I wouldn’t go overboard on that: it’s done on the basis that that’s the best way to ensure that everybody’s franchise remains profitable because everybody has a chance of winning.
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Well, maybe, but the efforts to ensure that “everybody’s franchise remains profitable because everybody has a chance of winning” comes at the expense of bigger profits for those teams that could probably make more money. In baseball, for example, teams pay a “luxury tax” based on their payrolls (the Yankees are the only team this really hurts). Merchandising sales are grouped so that all teams (& players union too) benefit, etc.
In football, the schedule is unbalanced to give those teams who did badly one year a better chance to improve the next. New players aren’t signed by the highest bidder, but they are bound to go to those teams who did worst the year before. This goes for basketball too.
You might say these rules are intended to benefit each league in entirety, but that’s my point. The leagues see a benefit in organizing themselves this way even though it is not based on the free market model.
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Ah, Eagle. So many reasons for me to jettison Man City. So many…
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Depressing story over on Slugger O’Toole today: “Protestant player gives up GAA over sectarian abuse.” http://www.sluggerotoole.com
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I saw that and it is depressing. Plenty of people will claim that ‘our side’ don’t do that sort of thing of course. I remember Peter Withnaill also getting some abuse for being Protestant.
On a less serious note funny that Slugger goes on about the glorious skills of Gaelic football. If we want to talk about invented traditions, it was only created as a copy of soccer and rugby to try and nullify the influence of both. Hurling on the other hand, has real roots in Irish history and does involve all manner of skill. I saw recently that one of Sligo’s midfielders only took up football at the age of 19. You couldn’t do that and win a championship in hurling. Gaelic Football; pulling and dragging for big strong fellas. Discuss.
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How about “There is an Isle” as a National anthem ?
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On the other hand, why should anyone in Ireland give a damn about what a bunch of smug Dublin 4 pseudo-intellectuals think about anything, be it the national anthem, the GAA or anything else?
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Hmmm Ed, interesting, Irish sports as an ‘invented tradition’ a la Eric Hobsbawm. There’s got to be a post-grad thesis or two in there…
Mind you, all games are ‘invented’ so whether it makes any great difference I don’t really know…
Idris, they too are of the nation… yes, even them… 🙂
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No, they’re not. Really. They’ve deliberately and explicitly rejected their nationality, and anyway Dublin city (as well as being a cancer on Irish society [nb, this is not a joke]) is essentially an English city in exile, in much the same way that Glasgow and Liverpool are Irish cities in exile.
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“Dublin city (as well as being a cancer on Irish society [nb, this is not a joke]) is essentially an English city in exile, in much the same way that Glasgow and Liverpool are Irish cities in exile.”
Ya wha?
Only if you buy into some sort of devalera-esque notion of what it means to be Irish. Dublin is actually one of the only cities in Ireland that predates anglo-norman rule. As for a cancer on Irish society – I don’t effing think so. If you look at the results of the social referendums which have dragged this place out of the crushing embrace of the catholic church, the population of Dublin has been absolutely crucial. For example, the huge majorities in Dublin in favour of divorce legislation and against criminalisation of abortion in recent years were key to these very narrow victories. On social matters, Dublin generally splits 70-30 in favour of liberalism, while the culchies split nearly the opposite against.
Dublin is also the only place in Ireland which has a reasonably strong left. As for diversity in cultural, artistic and social life – Dublin is certainly not Paris or London, but it’s an infinity ahead of anywhere else in the country. As an example, it’s the only place in Ireland where it’s viable to be openly gay.
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Idris, I’m dubious about the capacity of any of us to determine nationality or identity so clearly that we can easily place people within or without the ‘nation’. I’d consider Unionism to overlap the Irish nation (and the British and/or English nation). I’d think it’s easier to see that the Dublin 4 mentality (which in any case stretches far far beyond that post code and across all classes – note the ‘realism’ of certain people in the working class, or more accurately the indifference, to the North over the past thirty years) also overlaps the nation.
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The sprawl of Dublin is the geographical expression of the distorted nature of Irish development under the Celtic tiger. The alienation and palpable atmosphere of tension I often sense on the streets of Dublin is the social and cultural expression of those distortions. If it’s possible to be openly gay in Dublin, that’s only because of the anonymity the city offers – not because the city has embraced it’s gay citizens.
As for cultural diversity, I assume you’re talking about high culture (or even so-called ‘popular culture’) rather than Malinowski’s ‘imponderabilia of everyday life’. The Dublin literary scene as viewed through its products is a nest of self-satisfied and narrow-minded mediocrities, with Patrick McCabe as the pet culchie. Glenn Patterson (the best writer on the island of Ireland today, and a Belfast Prod) has more talent than the whole lot of them put together. Culturally, Dublin is very much a neo-colonial city (the same adjective can be used in terms of politics and economics as well, of course) that catches cold whenever London sneezes.
As for Dublin leading the charge against the dreaded Church. . . I’d say that the importance of both the church and the ‘liberal’ fight against it is exaggerrated. The power structure in post-counter revolution Ireland did involve a partnership between church and state, but the church was always the junior partner. As for the ‘liberal agenda’ it was essentially about provided some Dublin 4 yuppie swine with the opportunity to have a nice lifestyle. But let’s keep kicking the church – after all, we don’t want Mister Jones the farmer to come back, now do we comrades?
Finally, the point about the reasonably strong left – I’d say the Dublin centric nature of the Irish left is one of the major impediments to its wider growth.
WBS – do you think the likes of Myers, Harris, or Dudley-Edwards would thank you if you told them you still considered them part of the nation? As for indifference to the North, you’re all guilty of it, and therefore you all bear your share of the responsibilty for the violent death of the 3,500.
Anyway, I much prefer watching your collective re-enactment of the last days of Ancient Rome from the security of the diaspora.
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I would love to see you explain how the influence of the church has been ‘exaggerated’ to the hundreds of women who ended up incarcerated in Magdelan institutions for their ‘sins’ (while their partners, consensual or otherwise, escaped censure), to the countless children abused by a priesthood, secure in the knowledge that no one would believe a child’s word against them, to the many children who worked barefoot in the fields of industrial schools run by religious orders with next to no supervision or inspection by any instrument of the state, to the children packed off to adoptive parents in the US or Australia with their birth records destroyed.by Catholic adoption agencies to whom the state had abrogated all responsibility…….
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It is exaggerated in this sense; because the Irish nation refuses to accept its own share of the responsibility for the crimes you mention, preferring to pretend that it was under the influence of nefarious mind control rays beamed directly from the Vatican.
Also, given that neither sexual abuse, nor distorted sexuality has disappeared from glorious, post-Tiger Ireland, I’d say that the real roots of the continuing sickness have to be sought elsewhere. The dominance of the church was a symptom, not a cause.
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I take your point to a degree; catholicism in ireland is – or was – certainly a thing apart. But it doesn’t really answer my point; whether or not the sins of the Irish Church were an expression of a brutality inherent in Catholicism, or an embodiment of a repellent streak in Irish society, the prestige of the church was what protected the guilty, and therefore it was necessary that the institution be challenged and its social power dismantled.
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You are of course right: but the swine of Dublin 4 were not motivated by any love of justice and freedom, nor any other such high ideals.
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I don’t quite agree with Idris at #60. I do think that there’s a genuine anger at what they feel were backward, wicked people who did backward and wicked things which did much hurt to real people. I do also think though that there is a lot that’s being smuggled in with that and that it is often mixed up with a vast sense of moral superiority, not just over child-abusing priests but everybody else on the whole island.
I also think that if criticism of the Church is left to these people then essentially it will do nothing but strengthen the Church since it will be very clear to people in general that the people who loathe the Church loathe them as well.
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And that’s one of the things I mean about Dublin city being a cancer on Irish society.
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Idris, you seem to have contracted the mystical nationalism virus, something that’s very very common amongst the diaspora.
It’s just total bollocks though. Dublin and its environs is where about a third of the population lives and it is far from the case that people only move there for the jobs. The cultural conformity and suffocating culture of minding your neighbours’ business has been as much a driver of migration as economics. If you live in a small town in Ireland, you are pretty much obliged to suppress any differences that you might have with normative culture. You can’t, practically, be a non-believer, a drug-taker, a non-conformist, a punk, a queer, a revolutionary socialist etc, as the road to being an outcast is a very short one indeed.
One of the big problems the anarchist movement has had in expanding beyond Dublin and Cork is that as soon as a young person decides they’re an anarchist, they move to Dublin. I’d say that over 60% of the Dublin membership of the WSM are first generation culchies.
The best cure for mystical nationalistic sentimentality about rural Ireland is living there, or coming from there. It’s a place where suppression still hangs heavy in the air and which remains a cultural desert – and no I’m not talking about high or popular culture and especially not about Malinowski. I’m talking about people being in a position to do stuff that they want to do – listen to music that they like, dress how they please, spend their leisure time doing stuff that they enjoy, express their opinions openly, all without becoming a social outcast.
Furthermore, this D4 versus the rest of Ireland crap is just not how this place works at all. It’s a nationalist myth. For example, the last abortion referendum was heavily defeated in every single Dublin constituency, including those which are most working class. The intelligentsia is not the ruling class – the capitalists – who are more likely to be multinational shareholders or narrow-minded gombeen ignoramuses than they are to be west-brit aesthetes. The intellectual elite of this country, while they obviously suck in every way possible, are just not that influential.
“the Irish nation refuses to accept its own share of the responsibility for the crimes you mention”
Sounds like some sort of variation on original sin. Nations, as abstractions, can’t possibly bear guilt. People bear guilt for stuff that they do. I kick the church whenever possible, partly because it, as an institution, operated as an active participant in facilitating and covering up child rape rings and it is an institution that remains extremely powerful in forming the ideas of the people who live on this island.
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If you live in a small town in Ireland, you are pretty much obliged to suppress any differences
Does Waterford count as small? I remember seeing a fair few anarchist posters when I was there last.
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The anarchist posters in Waterford were probably the result of a WSM speaking tour. Neither anarchist group has a branch there. Waterford is a good example though in that it does have a serious radical tradition. The Workers Party was the biggest party in the city at one point not all that long ago and it still has a couple of councillors there. Other groups have also been organised there, including a once-strong SWP branch.
If the 50,000 people in Waterford makes it too big for this discussion, you could look at Clonmel which also has a strong radical tradition and it only has a population of 16,000 or so.
Now both of these examples are a bit unusual in an Irish context, given that they both towns had a significant industrial base, but they do rather undermine the idea that Ireland outside of Dublin and perhaps Cork was just one big sea of parochial idiocy. The West of the country still had a strong element of agrarian radicalism right up into the 1950s, to use another example.
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“they do rather undermine the idea that Ireland outside of Dublin and perhaps Cork was just one big sea of parochial idiocy”
I’m obviously overstating the case, but in my experience when people consider Dublin to be a cancer on Irish society, it’s not Clonmel that they’re counterposing it with, it’s the small rural places without industrial bases. And I also don’t think that rural culture is at all uniform or unchanging. However, it’s definitely true that, as a rule, in most of the country, small rural places tend to have much stronger and narrower boundaries on what is culturaly acceptable. They just aren’t the sentimental resevoirs of homespun traditional community life that people who visit them sometimes imagine.
The bottom line is that liberal social attitudes in Ireland are almost entirely correlated with urbanisation. And having the freedom to do stuff that you want to do without becoming a social outcast is definitely not something that is only desired by those from D4.
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Well, I have less of a problem with the more moderately phrased version of your argument, but I still think it is too sweeping and too one sided.
Liberal social attitudes in Ireland do correlate with urbanisation but they also correlate on a time axis with both increased wealth and increased penetration of Irish society by a dominant foreign media, the EU and so on. And on a geographical axis, while there certainly is a correlation between city living and more liberal social attitudes it is far from absolute. Taking the 70/30 split you describe at face value, that still leaves a very substantial minority in rural constituencies with what you describe as liberal social attitudes. Believing something which 30% of your parish also believes is unlikely to make you an outcast.
Yes there is less social freedom in most small communities, but rural communities in Ireland in 2007 are not the gulag of the imagination which you seem to be describing. In many small towns in Ireland you will find “a non-believer, a drug-taker, a non-conformist, a punk, a queer, a revolutionary socialist etc”. In fact the only one of those ways of life which would be very likely to cause serious social difficulties would be being gay, and that can cause serious problems in many Dublin suburbs too. Drugs can get people in social or legal difficulty anywhere, but I think you’d be surprised at the scale of the use of many drugs in rural parts of the country.
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I do think Idris has something of a point though in that there is a certain sort of liberal Irish commentator (and I’m thinking of liberal in its modern sense of individual freedoms and tax cuts, not the old one of sympathy for trades unions and civil liberties) who clearly finds almost everything bound up with Irish identity embarrassing.
If the 50,000 people in Waterford makes it too big for this discussion
Makes it quite useful from my point of view as I live in a Spanish town of that very size! Quite a few anarchists here, although their main activity seems to be spray-painting. We also have a labour movement that is currently involved in what looks very much like a UK 1990s-style dispute (i.e. the people have already out the door, they’re talking about setting up camps, this will go on for a couple of years and is certain to lose).
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1. Chekov – I have indeed contracted the ‘mystical nationalism virus’. Every month on nights when the moon is full, I dance skyclad on top of a dolmen, in order to commune with the restless spirits of Pearse, Connolly and Granuaile. (nb, this is a joke).
2. Even if Dublin provided the social base for certain necessary changes in Ireland in the old days, it is now the bastion for the remorseless capitalism that wants to turn the country into a third rate version of Britain crossed with a fifth rate version of America. And the liberalism it preaches today is very much of the Thatcher/Harney variety, not that of JM Keynes or JK Galbraith. That’s what makes it a cancerous influence on contemporary Irish society.
3. As far as drugs are concerned, the whole country seems to be awash in them (and the hard drug problem began in Dublin, let’s not forget). Someone in Belfast asked me where in the south I was from and I said ‘Castlebar’ to which he replied, ‘that’s the drug capital of the republic’.
4. Back to kicking the church – whenever I hear Irish people lambasting the church I’m reminded of the old line about all the Italians who went to bed one night as fascists and woke up the next morning as christian democrats. The church couldn’t have abused its power if the great Irish people hadn’t given it that power in the first place.
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Meanwhile back at the anthems…
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idris, to respond point by point.
1. The symptomology of the mystic nationalism virus is limited to the sufferer imaging unrealistically positive stuff about traditional things, and having an overly simplistic view of things today. I reckon that considering Dublin as a “cancer” on Irish society hits all the diagnostic criteria.
2. Ireland is the bastion of “remorseless capitalism” not Dublin. Or, more specifically, people with property in Ireland are its bastion. Attempting to become richer is a very widespread pastime, both within and outside the pale. The notion that a collective thingie called “Dublin” is driving this dynamic is just totally wrong. The housing bubble and the vast inflation of land-prices, for example, was much more universally supported in rural areas than it was in Dublin. The greens, for example, are hugely unpopular in rural areas as they are perceived as a threat to the ability of landowners to develop whatever they want on their lands. One of Fianna Fail’s major rural mobilising issues has opposition to anything approaching sane planning laws – in support of “one off housing” and doing their very best to insert enough loopholes in legislation to allow vast profits to be made from land. There are a not inconsiderable number of “southforks” littering the countryside.
3. The dude from Belfast was obviously high. While there are drug sub-cultures in many of the medium sized towns, they have a much more outcast existance than they do in Dublin. You don’t go pulling out a few wraps of coke, or sparking up a spliff, at dinner parties in Westport (and if you do you will find that you quickly become socially isolated and looked down upon).
4. You’re once again dealing in abstractions rather than people. People do stuff, not abstractions. So, for example, when I kick the church, one of the reasons for doing so is to remind people why they should never let the church do that shit again. That’s a good thing. In general very few people turned around overnight from believer to kicker. The sex-scandals basically allowed the people who were opposed to church authority (who had always existed) the opportunity to expose some of the nasty stuff about it and provided them with the social freedom where they could start dismantling its control.
To be honest, when I hear an Irish person having a go at the church, I see it as a great success in self-liberation. You, on the other hand appear to think that Irish people shouldn’t kick the church because they have some sort of national collective responsibility for its crimes.
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1. I spent friday night listening to the Chieftains first CD – and I wasn’t imagining it’s positive features.
2. There may be little fish involved in property speculation all over rural Ireland, but the big sharks are still Dublin based.
3. And they’re the ones who find it acceptable to chop out a few lines – and as I think I said before, that’s one thing I mean when I say that Dublin is a cancer.
4. Self-liberation? Or just an exchange of new lies for old? The Dublin 4 Irish Times reading classes will happily agree with you regarding the church. Try telling them that more state money should be spent on the record numbers of children in what is called with no apparent irony ‘care’ and you’ll suddenly find that their liberalism has certain limits.
They used to worship our lord and his blessed mother; now they worship the almighty dollar. The human sacrifices go on regardless.
Nothing wrong with ‘southforks’ or bungalows by the way.
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