New BBC documentary asks ‘Who Won the War in North?’

[armaghniac]

You don't realise though that while it might not look like a huge disparity in percentage of Catholics to Protestants in gainful employment - there was a huge disparity in the level of employment and associated salary ( indeed casual contract v full time contract etc)

Northern Ireland was designed to make Catholics or Irish people hewers of wood and drawers of water.

Things have changed.

One issue in the near future is that the graduates in many professional categories are mostly Taigs and there will shortly be problems with the Health Service maintaining "fair employment", as 60% of the available occupational therapists and the like are from the Catholic background.

[Maguire01]

John Hume virtually ignored.

Taylor needs to be reminded about who was the main nationalist force behind the IRA ceasefire

Seamus Mallon was representing the SDLP - maybe he should've emphasised Hume's contribution a bit more. John, unfortunately, isn't able to speak up for himself these days.

Hume and Mallon lead the nationalist charge long before sf came about

Two fantastic men and politicians

But by your logic, they didn't have a clue what they were talking about, given that they totally opposed violence.

You said to me:

if you had actually personal and family experience and knowledge of what had historically gone on for decades prior to gfa - you might and prob see things a whole lot differently.

Well surely these two men had very real personal and family experience? How can they be fantastic men and politicians if they got it so wrong?

No harm to you maguire but if you have to ask those questions - I really depicts that you don't have the foundation of knowledge to question any opinions let alone try to force your own as being correct.

I agree with you though on that Catholics having student loans is actually a good sign.

You don't realise though that while it might not look like a huge disparity in percentage of Catholics to Protestants in gainful employment - there was a huge disparity in the level of employment and associated salary ( indeed casual contract v full time contract etc)

What is wrong with those questions? I suspect it's just another attempt by you to patronise and play the man. But maybe you could humour me and tell me how Hume and Mallon could be such fantastic men and politicians, yet the same time, so far off the mark.

As for the point on employment, I don't dispute what you say. I was responding to another poster who implied that over 50% of Catholics were unemployed. Regardless of the undeniable discrimination at the time, that claim was clearly ridiculous and adds nothing to the argument.

[Tony Baloney]

Lynchboy is the local equivalent of "But you weren't in Nam, maaann"

[lynchbhoy]

Lynchboy is the local equivalent of "But you weren't in Nam, maaann"

Not quite
It would be the equivalent of someone now telling us all how 'nam should have been handled.
All well and good but it completely discounts all the variables and environment 'there' at the time - which are crucial to any decision or informed opinion.
Hindsight and reading the info doesn't give the full picture.

Maguire- huge and Mallon brought the war against oppression to the tv screens and even though they were shouted down at every programme by the loyalist/unionists - they showed the people just how ridiculous the second class citizenship was and thus folk realised it wasn't 'just them' that they were right in feeling victimised and saw the disparity between the first class and second class treatment.
There was no sf then. Sdlp were not the diarrhoea back then ( ok some of them were) as they are now

[Ulick]

 Just watched it. By the looks of his marijuana plant Gerard Hodgkins is without doubt the clear winner 

[glens abu]

Just watched it. By the looks of his marijuana plant Gerard Hodgkins is without doubt the clear winner 

Ha ha you know him so well

[glens abu]

Nah, Sean McKinley obviously was.

Yeah thought that was very sad.

[Maguire01]

Lynchboy is the local equivalent of "But you weren't in Nam, maaann"

Not quite
It would be the equivalent of someone now telling us all how 'nam should have been handled.
All well and good but it completely discounts all the variables and environment 'there' at the time - which are crucial to any decision or informed opinion.
Hindsight and reading the info doesn't give the full picture.

Maguire- huge and Mallon brought the war against oppression to the tv screens and even though they were shouted down at every programme by the loyalist/unionists - they showed the people just how ridiculous the second class citizenship was and thus folk realised it wasn't 'just them' that they were right in feeling victimised and saw the disparity between the first class and second class treatment.
There was no sf then. Sdlp were not the diarrhoea back then ( ok some of them were) as they are now

And my point is, if my opinion is wrong, then the logic follows that their opinion was also wrong. I wasn't there in the 1960s, but they were.

So if they were great men and great politicians in advocating the pursuit of civil rights and equality by peaceful and political means, and opposing violence, how is it that i'm supposedly so far off the mark for sharing that same opinion?

[lynchbhoy]

Lynchboy is the local equivalent of "But you weren't in Nam, maaann"

Not quite
It would be the equivalent of someone now telling us all how 'nam should have been handled.
All well and good but it completely discounts all the variables and environment 'there' at the time - which are crucial to any decision or informed opinion.
Hindsight and reading the info doesn't give the full picture.

Maguire- huge and Mallon brought the war against oppression to the tv screens and even though they were shouted down at every programme by the loyalist/unionists - they showed the people just how ridiculous the second class citizenship was and thus folk realised it wasn't 'just them' that they were right in feeling victimised and saw the disparity between the first class and second class treatment.
There was no sf then. Sdlp were not the diarrhoea back then ( ok some of them were) as they are now

And my point is, if my opinion is wrong, then the logic follows that their opinion was also wrong. I wasn't there in the 1960s, but they were.

So if they were great men and great politicians in advocating the pursuit of civil rights and equality by peaceful and political means, and opposing violence, how is it that i'm supposedly so far off the mark for sharing that same opinion?

Where did I say they were great men for opposing violence?
Seriously you just don't get it. That's why I say it's because you are missing the insight of understand in the place during the 'troubles' as you weren't there or party to any of it.

[Maguire01]

Lynchboy is the local equivalent of "But you weren't in Nam, maaann"

Not quite
It would be the equivalent of someone now telling us all how 'nam should have been handled.
All well and good but it completely discounts all the variables and environment 'there' at the time - which are crucial to any decision or informed opinion.
Hindsight and reading the info doesn't give the full picture.

Maguire- huge and Mallon brought the war against oppression to the tv screens and even though they were shouted down at every programme by the loyalist/unionists - they showed the people just how ridiculous the second class citizenship was and thus folk realised it wasn't 'just them' that they were right in feeling victimised and saw the disparity between the first class and second class treatment.
There was no sf then. Sdlp were not the diarrhoea back then ( ok some of them were) as they are now

And my point is, if my opinion is wrong, then the logic follows that their opinion was also wrong. I wasn't there in the 1960s, but they were.

So if they were great men and great politicians in advocating the pursuit of civil rights and equality by peaceful and political means, and opposing violence, how is it that i'm supposedly so far off the mark for sharing that same opinion?

Where did I say they were great men for opposing violence?
Seriously you just don't get it. That's why I say it's because you are missing the insight of understand in the place during the 'troubles' as you weren't there or party to any of it.

Ok, so they were great men and politicians even though their fundamental principle of non-violence was wrong/misguided? Reads like a contradiction to me, but whatever.

But this idea that I don't get it because I wasn't there doesn't stand up to logic, given that many of those who WERE THERE, including Hume and Mallon, reached the same conclusions.

[LCohen]

At the time the primary focus of the republican movement was the unification of Ireland. It was was obvious at the time that they could not achieve that aim by military means. As obvious then as it is now. Now that mainstream republicanism has caught up with that fact they need to find other ways of justifying their futile "war". That justification needs to dwell on a wrong that was put right during the same timeframe. Civil rights is theri obvious go-to for that. The discrimination/mis-rule within NI was real and it has been addressed so there will always be an opportunity for republicanism to link this progress to their campaign of violence. This is not an argument that will go away.

It is impossible to determine what progress a peaceful civil rights campaign would have made and what timeframe it would have delivered this progress. But I don't think we should let republicanism get away with an automatic conclusion that such a peaceful campaign, if not forced to operate in a "war" backdrop could not have achieved real progress by 1997 or any milestone between then and 1969.

The reality is that the onus is on republicans to prove that their campaign of violence delivered greater levels of equality and delivered them more quickly becasue their campaign came at a greater cost in terms of deaths, injuries, trauma, inter-community distrust and wider criminality.

[lynchbhoy]

At the time the primary focus of the republican movement was the unification of Ireland. It was was obvious at the time that they could not achieve that aim by military means. As obvious then as it is now. Now that mainstream republicanism has caught up with that fact they need to find other ways of justifying their futile "war". That justification needs to dwell on a wrong that was put right during the same timeframe. Civil rights is theri obvious go-to for that. The discrimination/mis-rule within NI was real and it has been addressed so there will always be an opportunity for republicanism to link this progress to their campaign of violence. This is not an argument that will go away.

It is impossible to determine what progress a peaceful civil rights campaign would have made and what timeframe it would have delivered this progress. But I don't think we should let republicanism get away with an automatic conclusion that such a peaceful campaign, if not forced to operate in a "war" backdrop could not have achieved real progress by 1997 or any milestone between then and 1969.

The reality is that the onus is on republicans to prove that their campaign of violence delivered greater levels of equality and delivered them more quickly becasue their campaign came at a greater cost in terms of deaths, injuries, trauma, inter-community distrust and wider criminality.

no one wants to 'justify' death.
the proof is there that after decades of pleading and trying to highlight the persecution etc the unionists/loyalists were not entertaining dialogue that would actually result in any concession and equality.
look at today - they are still of the same mindset and are keeping to the old stick in the mud mentality.
...and that is what you think would have yielded equality from the 60's to now?
sounds great, but in practicality you are completely 100% incorrect about it.

as for republicans motives for fighting
the 'call to arms' was not under the banner of re-unification, that was the headline.
but I know a few relatives and friends of theirs who were members/locked up on long kesh who joined up due to the treatment they and their families were getting from the b specials, ruc, udr, then the british army etc etc - unprovoked stuff.

the civil rights people in the USA had the same hassle at the outset, but their oppressors were not as bitter as the unionist/loyalist overlords as bad as these American persecutors were- they at least conceded to human rights after a couple of years.
the aggressor mentality still remains in the unionist/loyalist main today.

[johnneycool]

You still won't get a unionist/loyalist leader today to come out and admit that the inequality of Stormont and local government leading up to the civil rights movement in any way contributed to the troubles.

They just don't see it that way.

[foxcommander]

At the time the primary focus of the republican movement was the unification of Ireland. It was was obvious at the time that they could not achieve that aim by military means. As obvious then as it is now. Now that mainstream republicanism has caught up with that fact they need to find other ways of justifying their futile "war". That justification needs to dwell on a wrong that was put right during the same timeframe. Civil rights is theri obvious go-to for that. The discrimination/mis-rule within NI was real and it has been addressed so there will always be an opportunity for republicanism to link this progress to their campaign of violence. This is not an argument that will go away.

It is impossible to determine what progress a peaceful civil rights campaign would have made and what timeframe it would have delivered this progress. But I don't think we should let republicanism get away with an automatic conclusion that such a peaceful campaign, if not forced to operate in a "war" backdrop could not have achieved real progress by 1997 or any milestone between then and 1969.

The reality is that the onus is on republicans to prove that their campaign of violence delivered greater levels of equality and delivered them more quickly becasue their campaign came at a greater cost in terms of deaths, injuries, trauma, inter-community distrust and wider criminality.

wum.

[Rossfan]

You still won't get a unionist/loyalist leader today to come out and admit that the inequality of Stormont and local government leading up to the civil rights movement in any way contributed to the troubles.

They just don't see it that way.

They still have the blinkered ubermensch mentality that they were, are and always will be right, that the 6 Cos was a grand place till the IRA started using violence for no reason.
They still seem to see the starting point in any talks as
1- Republicans need to apologise ( "for starting all the trouble")
2- Orangemen to be allowed to walk where they want ( "Civil rights")
3- Union Jacks to fly everywhere ( "NI is an integral part of UK and totally British")

They totally ignore the demographics that will likely see the "Catholic/Nationalist/Irish" Community being a majority by 2021.