The First Minister's behaviour

GlynD

tara747 wrote: »

<snip to part which requires my answer>

Which changes do you agree with, and which do you not? Asking purely out of interest as I value your views.

Oh, and I totally agree with the bit in bold.

Firstly we should stop our politicians referring to "both" communities. There is only one community in Northern Ireland. Some of them just happen to go to different churches: Church of Ireland. Presbyterian, Methodist, Roman Catholic, Evangelical, Baptist etc etc.

Do away with putting Gaelic on street names, roadsides or whatever. It makes some members of the community feel unwelcome and is a block to full reintegration. I would except those names which have always been in Irish. Keep them Irish because that's how we know them.

Make murals glorifying terrorists illegal.

Make it illegal to fly flags, bunting etc or paint kerbs in partisan colours. Planning permission should be required to erect flags or bunting for festivals or parades.

Teach proper Irish history in all schools.

Keep existing integrated schools and have more of them. Over time eradicate religious or single creed schools entirely.

Commence reintegrating people into publicly owned housing estates, even if it means having CCTV to ensure anyone with extreme views doesn't try to run the estates.

Make the expression of sectarian views illegal. Much in the same way as they do with Nazism in Germany and impose the same severe prison sentences.

Ensure the religious balance of the PSNI stays at least 60/40. 50/50 is preferable.

Ban the Orange Order from politics - in fact ban all the loyal orders from interfering. Make it a condition that MLA's, MP's, TD's and MEP's cannot belong to any sectarian organisation. LOL, AOH, or whatever.

Make more progress on federalisation: more shared cross border initiatives.

Above all, make it as offensive to be sectarian as it is to be racist. As long as we accept sectarianism it will always be there. If we look down our noses at people who are sectarian it will change things. That may sound difficult but it used to be acceptable to drink and drive, we've changed that so it shows the impossible is possible.

GlynD

The_Hurricane wrote: »

To me it's as bad, I find it offensive and quite threatening - why does it need to be shoved down my throat?

What do you find offensive about Gaelic sports?

missmean

Reading this thread with interest! To put it bluntly there will never be agreement in NI. It is impossible to ever see it happening, sadly. The divisions can never be overcome. Ever.

I never thought I would see Gerry up on the hill, or Marty either!
There are some truly hideous people in the government now.

This country could be so much better, but it is soo narrow-minded in so many ways that it will never reach its full potential. Its a real shame.

lazer

The_Hurricane wrote: »

You are looking at this from a strongly Nationalist perspective, I am neutral but even I can see that cricket is not reflective of Unionism/Protestantism while the GAA is reflective of Catholicism/Nationalism. It has to be about parity either both or none.

The_Hurricane wrote: »

To me it's as bad, I find it offensive and quite threatening - why does it need to be shoved down my throat?

You are a neutral and you find GAA as bas as influenza - I think you are as neutral as Ian Paisley!

Golden_Anemone

The_Hurricane wrote: »

To me it's as bad, I find it offensive and quite threatening - why does it need to be shoved down my throat?

Can you give an example of how it is shoved down your throat?

I am not interested in sport of any kind, soccer, gaelic, tennis or tiddlywinks and I manage not to take any notice of any news or media coverage relating to any of them. I therefore find it difficult to understand how anyone could have a sport they have no interest in "shoved down their throat".

As to "threatening" - come on? That sounds a bit like the people some might claim leave their houses at 8 in the morning to walk to the end of their road so they can be offended by a parade.

lazer

GlynD wrote: »

What do you find offensive about Gaelic sports?

I can guess what is answer is and some of it is even valid

1) They play the Irish National Anthem
2) The programmes, announcements etc can sometimes be in Irish
3) Grounds, tournaments and Trophies named after Terrorists.

As much as i support the GAA and in particular Down, I do think there could be some changes made to make the GAA more accomodating to unionists, but the difficulty with this is that the Aim of the GAA is more than just sport it is promote Irish Culture, so it involves a whole change in attitude and a recognition that the unionists in the North have a different culture. The HQ is based in Dublin and most major changes in the GAA have to voted through with each county voting, so it would be difficult to get a vote passed to change some of the above things.

GlynD

missmean wrote: »

Reading this thread with interest! To put it bluntly there will never be agreement in NI. It is impossible to ever see it happening, sadly. The divisions can never be overcome. Ever.

I never thought I would see Gerry up on the hill, or Marty either!
There are some truly hideous people in the government now.

This country could be so much better, but it is soo narrow-minded in so many ways that it will never reach its full potential. Its a real shame.

We'll overcome all our difficulties because so many of us are working at it. A large percentage of us don't care for party politics. It's up to those of us who see the futility of bigotry and sectarianism to teach the rest - by example.

lazer wrote: »

You are a neutral and you find GAA as bas as influenza - I think you are as neutral as Ian Paisley!

That may be the case but how is your comment going to change the mind of anyone who does have a bias? If the Hurricane is basically neutral but just finds GAA a sticking point is that so bad? Possibly by discussing GAA a little more you might be able to provide enough information to show, as we know, that GAA sports are just sports and nothing to be wary of.

Some of our citizens don't like the Irishness of some aspects of the culture which nationalism has brought to the fore over the last 40 years. For my part, and mostly because of army service (ironically) I am very proud to be Irish and am much less wary of aspects of culture I wasn't brought up sharing. They were there ok, just not as prominent and not shared by everyone.

What wasn't there when I was a boy were street signs in English and Irish. People didn't paint kerbstones or murals. The union flag was flown on 18 designated days a year - and everyone accepted it.

GAA was there and was well reported in the press and media but at that time rule 27 (I think) prohibited policemen and servicemen from joining. That's been done away with now and that should make Gaelic sports more accessible to everyone. as they should be. After all, Sam Maguire was a Prod and he's arguably the best remembered exponent of GAA in all of Ireland.

GlynD

lazer wrote: »

I can guess what is answer is and some of it is even valid

1) They play the Irish National Anthem
2) The programmes, announcements etc can sometimes be in Irish
3) Grounds, tournaments and Trophies named after Terrorists.

As much as i support the GAA and in particular Down, I do think there could be some changes made to make the GAA more accomodating to unionists, but the difficulty with this is that the Aim of the GAA is more than just sport it is promote Irish Culture, so it involves a whole change in attitude and a recognition that the unionists in the North have a different culture. The HQ is based in Dublin and most major changes in the GAA have to voted through with each county voting, so it would be difficult to get a vote passed to change some of the above things.

1. Nothing wrong with the Irish national anthem. It's a sporting event and different anthems get played at many of these.

2. Announcements/programmes in Irish should be done away with to make the sport more inclusive, or at least be bilingual.

3. I wasn't aware that any grounds, tournaments or trophies were named after modern day terrorists. I could personally accept names from 1916 - 1921 on the grounds that the conflict there was almost 100 years ago and not worth arguing about now. I would have issues about namings things after modern day terrorists.

There's always a compromise. The GAA has made a big one by removing rule 27. I think they would agree that more can be done to attract Protestant membership, support and tolerance and I think they would do it because Irish culture isn't reserved just for Roman Catholics as my comments about Sam Maguire show. I've remarked before about how being Northern Irish is special. We're neither 100% Irish or 100% British. We should strive to make everything we have inclusive for everyone and to keep alive OUR culture which shares aspects of our own history and development.

As well as the first Catholic Orange Lodge we can have the first Protestant Hurley team: Clan na Ian Paisley

mezza101

GlynD wrote: »

We'll overcome all our difficulties because so many of us are working at it. A large percentage of us don't care for party politics. It's up to those of us who see the futility of bigotry and sectarianism to teach the rest - by example.

A very large percentage of us here voted for sf and dup. People here do care for party politics but try to pretend that they dont. The sooner people here realise we have the dreaded disease of sectarian bigotry then something can be done about it. Until then we'll just continue to have sectarian bigots on both sides criticising each other for being sectarian bigots! :cool:

GlynD

mezza101 wrote: »

A very large percentage of us here voted for sf and dup. People here do care for party politics but try to pretend that they dont. The sooner people here realise we have the dreaded disease of sectarian bigotry then something can be done about it. Until then we'll just continue to have sectarian bigots on both sides criticising each other for being sectarian bigots! :cool:

A lot of people vote for SF and DUP because they are afraid of the consequences of not doing so. Prods think if they don't vote DUP they're on the road to a united Ireland where they will be treated as the second class citizens many of them once treated RC's as.

Many RC's are afraid if they don't vote for SF that things will go back to the way they were with a unionist majority and they will become second class citizens again.

What's heartening though is that not everyone votes for these two parties so neither can truly say they represent the majority in their own section of the community.

What we've got to do is educate the people who live in the estates: the masses. Get rid of bigotry and sectarianism at grass roots level and you get rid of the popularity of parties who prey on people's fears and pander to the bigots.