Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.Post by Ex_OWMHarry, when you are replying to a post from me, please refrain from
quoting things from other posters as if I said them when I didn't.
I never said or implied that you did.
Post by Ex_OWMThat sort of devious behaviour does nothing for your argument.
It makes it very easy for you to avoid answering my main points though
"Ones as bad as the other.
Harry that is a direct CONTRADICTION of Loyalist killings being "small fry"!
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.YOU of course, like all Republicans, refuse to
accept any blame for the actions of Sinn Fein and their IRA wing.
This is riddled with errors too! The point was made to you that the OP was
not a Republican and that the poster WAS a Republican but didn't support
violence. Indeed MOST Irish Republicans do not support either SF or the IRA!
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.All you
can do is quote jaded statistics,
Just how do statistics become "jaded" Harry?
Is the fact that most WWI Irish deaths in the British Army were from the
Catholic/Nationalist South of Ireland a "jaded" statistic?
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.and your own and other peoples opinions as
if they were written in stone and unarguably right, which they are not.
Harry, when an opinion is backed up my objectivce evidence like statistics
it becaome FACT and not personal opinion!
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.I
find you and your Crossmaglen type friends to be totally hypocritical and
despicable in that all you do is to try to justify the deaths of innocent
people and your support for the IRA.
which is just "when I can't win the argument I attack the person making it"
Not alone that, but you display your bigoted attitide by labeling all people
from a specific place (in this case Crossmaglen) as supporters of terrorism!
Whats next Harry? - accuse all blacks /Chinese/catholics/Muslims of being
terrorists as well? Or only those who live in Crossmaglen?
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.I just wonder at, and am disappointed
at Falcon being so nieve as to follow your example rather than defend the BA
which he served in! Logic is all very well, but empathy and sympathy for
others is more important.
apparently Harry logic does not sit well with you since you constantly
contradict yourself and leave logic aside when it does not suit your bigoted
opinion.
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.The fact that Republicans decided to take up arms
rather than follow the political route?
You were already pointed to the contradictory historic reality here.
Nationalists DID take up the political route. After 50 years of
gerrymandering and abuse they had a Civil rights campaign. It was only AFTER
these people were brutalised that the IRA rose to promenence as the
alternative to politics!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles#Northern_Ireland_1912.E2.80.931966
Northern Ireland came into being in a violent manner--a total of 557 people
being killed in political or sectarian violence from 1920-1922, during and
after the Irish War of Independence, most of which were Catholics.[15]
...After the initial turmoil of the early 1920s, there were occasional
incidents of sectarian unrest in Northern Ireland, a brief and ineffective
IRA campaign in the 1940s, and another abortive IRA campaign in the 1950s,
but by the early 1960s Northern Ireland was fairly stable.
...The origins of the Troubles can be traced back to the formation of the
UVF.[21] The UVF claimed that it shot dead 28-year-old storeman John Patrick
Scullion in west Belfast on 11 June 1966. On 26 June 1966 Barman Peter Ward,
an 18-year-old from west Belfast, became the second victim of a UVF gun
attack in which three other men were shot and seriously injured.[20] Victor
Arbuckle, aged 29, was shot dead by Loyalists during street disturbances on
the Shankill Road in Belfast in October 1969, the first RUC officer to die
in the troubles. The UVF was also responsible for a series of attacks on
power stations and reservoirs in Northern Ireland during 1969.[22] It was
hoped that this campaign would be blamed on the IRA, forcing moderate
unionists to increase their opposition to the tentative reforms of Terence
O'Neill's government.
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.The fact that the BA was sent to try
to contain the situation?
The government of Northern Ireland requested that the British Government
deploy the British Army in Northern Ireland to restore order and to prevent
sectarian attacks on Catholics.[33]
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.Fact that the RUC was deliberatly entrapped by
propaganda to make some people think they were deliberately targetting
catholics?
In 1968, the marches of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association
(NICRA) were met with a violent backlash by police and civil
authorities.[23] This group had launched a peaceful civil rights campaign in
1967,[24][25] which borrowed the language and symbolism of the Civil Rights
Movement of Dr. Martin Luther King in the United States. NICRA was seeking a
redress of Catholic and nationalist grievances within Northern Ireland.[26]
Specifically, they wanted an end to the gerrymandering of electoral
constituencies that produced unrepresentative local councils (particularly
in Derry City) by putting virtually all Catholics in a limited number of
electoral wards; the abolition of the rate-payer franchise in local
government elections, which gave Protestants disproportionate voting power;
an end to unfair allocation of jobs and housing; and an end to the Special
Powers Act (which allowed for internment and other repressive measures)
which was seen as being aimed at the nationalist community.[27][28][29]
Post by Hal à Mearadhaigh.YOU know the arguments pro and con of all these things over some
years of endless accusation on these Usenet groups. So, WHY do you keep
fostering the wounds, keeping them open? BOTH sides are victims. Republicans
have been proven to be wrong in doing what they did in the way they did it,
and the Irish people on all sides told them to stop on a referendum of some
90% or so. So, why do we not do it?
Here is Harrys reasoning:
You move your family into my house start using my car and eating my food and
take my job and enjoy all the comforts of my home. I complain.
You got your brother to beat up my brother. I kill your brother. you kill my
brother. I kill your sister. you kill my sister.
The neighbours get involved and then say "Violence is getting us nowhere" I
agree. We agree to sit down with the neighbours and settle things.
You say
"well my kids have grown up in this house now so I can't really move out can
I? If I do then THEY might grow up and get back into the cycle of violence.
Ill tell you what though you can have you car and job back. I am the only
one using them so I can agree to give them to you"
I say "well okay that's a start".
You say "but I wont give you anything until you have given up violence"
I say "but I have" you say "ah but your other brother is threatening
revenge" "I say well I cant really speak for him all I can do like you is
promise that I will not be violent"
you: But you will have to get your brother to say in public he is not
threatening my family
Me: Ok ill do that
I do it
you: right now you have to prove to me you have given up violence
Me: I have
You: But you might have all those knives and baseball bats that you family
used when they were beating upon my family.
Me: We are not going to use them
You: No that's not good enough! I want a committee of the neighbours to
collect them and see they are destroyed
The committee is formed. In the meantime the brother is talking to a cousin
and the cousin thumps one of your family but that is settled down. then
another cousin does it and I have to disown the cousin and say he is not in
my family.
You : Maybe the committee is not competent enough to check ALL the weapons
are gone? I need someone to check that the committee is really making sure
the weapons are gone
That is done
You: Okay here is your car back.
Me: there is not petrol in the car.
You: Hold on the deal was for the car. If you want petrol you have to do
something else.
Me: I'm getting fed up of this. I stopped fighting but it takes ages to drag
things out of you.
You: there you go again "dragging" ! next you will be beating people up
again! I knew I couldn't trust you.
Me: But you are still in my house and eating my food and I want my job back!
You: No sorry. The neighbours agreed to stay here if there was any threat of
violence happening again and I'm not going any further in this until I'm
convinced you will not return to you violent bad old ways. And I'm not
leaving the house until my family agree to it. Look we have done some
decorating. We put up bunting and pictures . Look! There's a lovely one of
the King. Now can't we all just calm down and we will leave as soon as all
of us are ready to go.
You know violence is wrong and most of your family want no violence. WHY do
you keep
fostering the wounds, keeping them open? After that lovely car I have given
you?
[snip]