Irish Republicanism - Turf, Hurleys, Celtic & Ballads

I'm on the home straight in relation to Ed Moloney's excellent book 'A Secret History of the I.R.A.' - yes, I know that I'm 5 years late but it's certainly better late than never. Maybe my belated reading of this important book is a subtle indication of how engrained partition has always been for those of us who were reared in the South of Ireland and had little or no connection with the so-called 'Troubles' in the northern part of our country. Therefore the following blog is not an attempt at reviewing or even relfecting on this book but will concentrate rather on reflections about how the situation in the North of Ireland seemed to one ordinary teenager growing up in a small village c. 80 miles south of the border, in a town called Banagher.

It has been Tim Pat Coogan's book on Irish independance leader Michael Collins, which I read recently in preparation for a presentation I gave to an anarchist group in Warsaw on Irish nationalism and it's relationship with the political left, which has helped me to ponder more profoundly my own past views on the northern situation when I was growing up. My lack of in-depth knowledge and ability to recall details of Ireland's struggle against the British empire, and also nationalism's internal struggles motivated me to re-search my bookshelf for Coogan's exhilirating biography of a man who, whether one agrees or disagrees with the decisions he took, made a deep impression on the 20th century (and beyond) Irish political landscape. Alongside Moloney's book it furthermore encouraged some self-introspection on the lines of - what the hell was going in my head and immediate environment that such contentious political perspectives did not seem to make an indelible impression? Was it just that the mark made on my psyche was as engrained and as deeply embedded as partition itself, barely ever to manifest itself overtly? If I had been born in the Bogside, Crossmaglen or West Belfast on July 12th 1980 instead of Ballinasloe hospital in Galway, how different would my life have taken shape?

These are questions I am interested in thinking more about - not least because as I approach my 27th year I am increasingly conscious of how the peaceful surroundings of my upbringing influenced the path I would eventually take. In retrospection it seems that the extent and depth of nationalist political sentiment which encircled our side of the boglands amongst my age-group lay merely in our passion for G.A.A. culture, i.e. heavy playing and heavy socialising; our 4 times a season support for Glasgow Celtic during their soccer derby against Rangers; our drunken recantations of ballads with lyrics like 'Go on home British soldiers go on home, have you got no fucking homes of your own'; to allowing ourselves get worked up into a media orchestrated and very controlled passionate fever about Ireland versus England in rugby and soccer internationals. I'm not trying to be cynical here, rather I feel that anybody affected by the violence and sectarianism in the north who visited our locality throughout the 80's or 90's, when the post-hunger strike recruitment surge transpired and the Tet offensive didn't, would have questioned whether what they were fighting for - self-determination without British presence and influence or a Unionist veto - was in any way connected in space or time to the pseudo-nationalist blabbering vision of the Irish midlanders!

As a side note, for those of you interested in the relationship between Irish republicanism and right-wing politics a fascinating debate is circulating around ex-I.R.A. man Gerry McKeough and his Hibernian magazine, arch-conservative politics, etc. The endless topic of the shenanigans between the nationalist political left-wing and right-wing is not the purpose of this post though.

Despite regular news bulletins and the odd arms find in a midlands barn or farm, I think those of us who were born around the hunger-strike era 25 years ago were amazingly closeted from the true nature of the brutality occuring not far from our homesteads. Apart from being semi-reared on songs and stories about great Irish feats against the British occupational imperialists, one's natural inner-forces of empathy towards the fellow Irish man, woman and child in the North was quite often and very successfully abated by the public outrage against atrocious I.R.A. attacks. The sense of reactive victimhood solidarity aroused within us as a result of loyalist, R.U.C. or British army violence on nationalist/republican communities was always soon quelled by the violent responses of militant republicanism. Images of blood-stained civilians and the mainstream media's hatred of the I.R.A. left little room open for debate about the just or unjust nature of their war. And thus, it seemed that life just carried on regardless for the ordinary child and teenager of the Irish boglands - the north seemed to end up as just another war zone played out on our TV screens. We rarely if ever even encountered someone from the north. In our ignorance we thought all yellow registered cars were loyalist or British connected and thus one was allowed to punch his comrade withpout reprisal if he spotted a 'yellow reg.'. Nor could we derive any parallel culchie sense of oneness with the residents of Derry's 'bogside'. Our side of the bog was as politically far removed from this nationalist hotspot as our love for a warm winter fire was the back-breaking summer work of saving each sod of turf.

The turf was turned and footed each summer then drawn home before the heavy rain precipated saturation on the hinterland; the G.A.A. schedules of hurling and Gaelic football were adhered to more religiously than Sunday mass (only fitness training around a heavily mud-ridden pitch was comparatively less eagerly awaited for and endured); and evening tea was usually eaten around the same time as the 6 o'clock news was flashing upon the screen in our living room. The only bombs I alongside my colleagues feared were stink bombs being let off in the school cloakroom. The only army we feared were the omnipresent eyes of our school principals and teachers lest we were caught engaging in our regular deeds of mischief. The only armoured cars that dawned upon our weekly lives were the opposition hurling or gaelic football trams whom we hoped to massacre. The only battles we engaged in were with our parents regarding homework not done, niteclubs we wanted to attend to hook up with the boarders in our school, and as mentioned previously the one-to-one combat to gain possession of the sliothar or the football. That was the everyday reality for most families in my hometown of Banagher, situated by the beautiful river Shannon in the county of Offaly.

My flirtations with Irish nationalist politics can be summarised as follows:

1. I was an avid collector of mainstream newspaper material on the Northern situation from the age of 14.

2. I had a tricolour above my bed from the age of 14 until my mum took it down along with all the Sinn Fein/I.R.A. materials I had stuck up on the walls of my bedroom (I tihink this happened after the ceasefire was broken in December '95)

3. I initiated the idea of wearing a green, white and gold peace ribbon in the aftermath of the '94 ceasfire amongst my school colleagues, some of whom embraced the symbolism. Many people throughout Ireland wore a white peace ribbon, whereas republican wore green ribbons, the symbol of the Saoirse prisoner campaign.

Symbolically, in retrospect I think the tricolour peace ribbon encompassed both traditions in the conflict, although this certainly wasn't my intention at the time. It was to make an obvoius gestrue of solidarity with the nationalist community of the north. After one teacher vociferously opposed my colleagues and I wearing it we gave into the whote peace ribbon idea.

4. At 15 years old, in my penultimate year at secondary school, I penned an article for our end of year school magazine firmly placing British intransigence as the quitessential factor for the breaching of the I.R.A. ceasefire and the consequent resumption of the war. The father of my girlfriend at the time remarked that it is was very 'republican in tone' with a seeming air of approval.

5. In college my party piece was to sing Sean South of Garryowen - little did I know that he was a member of the Ailtirí na h-Aiséirí (Architects of Resurgence)whose motto was 'Ireland needs a Salazar' - a reference to the Portugese dictator.

6. The first time I was ever in the North would be amazingly late, as a 22 year old seminarian. I initiated the idea and tried to push for our 1995 school trip to be in Belfast, but the I.R.A. ending of their ceasefire dashed them hopes.

7. My brothers and I would often pin a picture of Margaret Thatcher on our dartboard for target practice, albeit, not half as often as arch-enemy Liverpool goalkeeper Bruce Grobbelaar ended up being assailed at Bullseye!

8. Across the road from the Catholic church in Banagher a commemoration stands for the executed I.R.A. prisoners James McCormick and Patrick Barnes, the latter hailing from my home town. He was executed on Feb. 7th 1940 in Winson Green prison, Birmingham. Interestingly he was never mentioned in any history class I had in primary or scondary school.

So apart from the above memories and being a fan of rebel/emigrant songs by the Wolfe Tones, The Pogues, The Dubliners, etc. that was far as my meddling with republican politics travelled over my adolescence and into early adulthood. My early teenage impression that the nature of the Sinn Fein/I.R.A. strategy was a just one eventually fizzled out and were overcast by my own teenage insecurites (acne, puberty, braces, susceptibility to peer pressure, etc.) and awareness of their being very real and very innocent victims amongst both sides of the conflict.

Some say college politicised them - I would have to wait until I entered a Catholic seminary before I became politicised. My college years were quite apolitical - other priorities, too obvious to mention, took a predominant role. I'll tackle this young adult politicisation and growth in awareness of Irish nationalist struggle and contact with it's spect-actors in another blog entry (I hope). Suffice to say, I didn't expect to ever have a bodhran (traditional Irish drum) upon which was painted a disarmament symbol and was conctructed by I.R.A. prisoners in Portlaoise prison, to be sitting in my living room!