54 Comments

• seamus60 | Dec 15, 2012, 12:53 PM EST

  We will be owned until some one breaks the myth that its all about religion, the excuse used the world over for most conflicts.

• curtisjohnson | Dec 15, 2012, 10:27 AM EST

  Citizen6669 “You talk of ethnic cleansing, aparthied, pogroms & genocide... None of which applied to Northern Ireland” This is comedy gold. “the death and destruction is pretty equal on both sides” Coincidental that one side ended up with most of the property, economic clout, and political power. That same side can STILL engage in violent protest with virtual impunity whereas the indigenous population is subjected to police tactics reminiscent of apartheid SA or the American South during the civil rights movement for even a peaceful protest. Strange also that all of the supremacist rhetoric has been one sided. It looks like Ciaradexy has actually begun to wrap her tiny brain around the concept of irony.

• jetsnoone | Dec 15, 2012, 09:08 AM EST

  Both sides should worry about raising their families rather than which flay they raise....But, I'm sure the Protestants will be treated far, far better in a united Ireland than they treated the Irish Catholics in the partition years....

• seamus60 | Dec 14, 2012, 06:52 PM EST

  The flag issue can rumble on for as long as it takes. The damage to loyalism is done. They have activly hightlighted yet again their Britishness out stripping that of the brits themselves. Don`t remember any fuss when councills and local authoritys adapted what was voted in last week. Simple as.

• seanomelb | Dec 14, 2012, 05:30 PM EST

  citizen69 seems to be selective or in denial of the pogroms committed by the orange mobs after 1921. natipnalists were herded into ghetto like accommodation,they wrer also denied a fair go on employment wher the main criterion to obtain a job was to be protestant.Where nationalists wer murdered in the shipyards and elsewhere and the cry of the day was a protestant state for a protestant people. The statelet was founded on racism,bigotry and ethnic cleansing and you are happy to ignore or maybe condone those actions.

• ciaradexy | Dec 14, 2012, 03:24 PM EST

  First world problems lads. Get a grip.

• ciaradexy | Dec 14, 2012, 03:21 PM EST

  Curtis Johnson, what a brilliant British name!

• citizen69 | Dec 14, 2012, 09:53 AM EST

  @IrelandNorth: It's not that the St Georges flag is any bigger, it's just at the front. When you consider the population sizes of the respective countries then i guess that's fair enough. Talking of the tricolour, that reminds me of a joke Dublin comedian Andrew Maxwell(himself a protestant) told when he played a gig on the Shankill road... "You know when they were designing the Irish flag we prods did alright. We're only 3% of the population but we got a full third of the flag!". Having said that, i often see Irish tricolours flown in the north that are green, white and yellow, rather than orange. Is this a deliberate attempt to remove the protestant tradition? I've never seen any other nation get the colours of their flag wrong so often.

• citizen69 | Dec 14, 2012, 09:35 AM EST

  @seamus60: Yes i am under no illusion that was anything other than a dirty war... but then again that is the nature of conflict. I can't think of any war that wasn't dirty, that's why we need to avoid it. Fair play on the King Billy thing.

• IrelandNorth | Dec 14, 2012, 08:57 AM EST

  Citizen69! Let's get back to the respective designs of the two flags, and the intention behind the symbolism. One divides a piece of cloth into three equal parts, and colour screenprints the cotton or linen with colours with a certain significance. I'm not personally aware of who designed the union jack, but I do understand its significance. The larger Saint George's Cross of England superimposes both the smaller Saint Patrick's Cross of Ireland and the Saint Andrews Cross of Scotland. (The Saint George's Dragon of the Welsh is conspicuously omitted, having been constitutioanally snuffed out mediaevally. When it come to constitutionality, which would you prefer, parity of esteem or superimpositionism?

• seamus60 | Dec 14, 2012, 08:17 AM EST

  Citizen 69. It was the painting of King Billy that was handed back in Aug of this year. I can find nothing on the other.

• seamus60 | Dec 14, 2012, 08:02 AM EST

  Citezin69. We are only getting snippets of how dirty the war was. I am happy that you are acknowledging protestants were allowed to die as well as part of the game plan.

• citizen69 | Dec 14, 2012, 06:45 AM EST

  @curtisjohnson: You are typical of the attitude i am talking about here. You constantly talk in the language of myth and propaganda. You are a cardboard cut-out Republican. You talk of ethnic cleansing, aparthied, pogroms & genocide... None of which applied to Northern Ireland. There were no enforced segregation in NI or government enforced genocide. In the first formative years of Northern Ireland you speak of almost as many Protestants as Catholics were murdered, hardly a one sided pogrom. It was civil unrest and part of the reason for that unrest was IRA attacks on the Northern Ireland both from the south and within the north. You speak of ethnic cleansing yet the Catholic population of the north has grown year on year throughout NI's history, it did not decimate. Historically when things are bad and the going is tough for Irish people they emigrate to the four corners of the world in seek of a better life. If things were really so bad in Ulster then why was there no mass exodus of emigrants? In fact over NI's history more Irish Catholics have moved into Northern Ireland from the Republic than moved in the opposite direction. Contrary to popular belief Catholics did have the vote in NI and it was the same system for Protestants & Catholics. NI did not have anti-Catholic laws unlike the Republic which had anti-Protestant laws. If you tot up all the killings in NI throughout it's history you'll see that there was no mass murder of one side over the other, the death and destruction is pretty equal on both sides. Trouble is you've been spouting the propaganda so long that you are starting to believe it yourself.

• citizen69 | Dec 14, 2012, 06:04 AM EST

  @seamus60: the collusion process didn't just affect Catholics. Many Protestant deaths could have been prevented by inside knowledge MI5 had of planed IRA atrocities but didn't act on them. Seems to me they didn't have the unionist community's best interests at heart either. In fact it seems the sole person the acted to protect was Gerry Adams. What does that tell you?

• citizen69 | Dec 14, 2012, 05:57 AM EST

  @seanmelb & seamus60: I understand your points and i fully acknowledge that the Irish suffered wrongdoings under the British & Unionists. At the same time i'd like to see more acknowledgement of wrongdoing from past Irish Governments and from elements of your community. The reason I highlight them here is because no-one else is going to do it on the Irish Central website, and that includes the so-called 'journalists' . There is also a lot of myth and blown-out-of-proportion propaganda that people feel comfortable with here.

• pilib04 | Dec 13, 2012, 07:07 PM EST

  The protesters are disillusioned? Right. The PUP represents no one but their terrorist paramilitary. No MLA's, No MP's and only 2 out of almost 600 council members. The PUP is front for murderers only. Dawn Purvis saw it and quit.

• anglo-norman | Dec 12, 2012, 10:48 PM EST

  seanomelb- Get a grip on reality son.

• curtisjohnson | Dec 12, 2012, 09:48 PM EST

  @citizen6669 - "It's hardly going to endear itself to Loyalists then!" The same loyalists who immediately began to ethnically cleanse the indigenous population shortly after the creation of their artificials little statelet?

• seamus60 | Dec 12, 2012, 06:15 PM EST

  Citizen69. Yet today we have another admission that the Catholic population was victimised by the state with the help of loyalists death squads. I didn`t make this up in an effort to be seen as part of a victim culture.

• seanomelb | Dec 12, 2012, 05:43 PM EST

  Citizen69!! your maudling retort ignores the treatment of nationalists in the north under British rule. In fact Britain turned its back on the second class status nationalists lived. Your answers smacks of typical Btitish attitudes toward the nationalist and the Irish in general.

• citizen69 | Dec 12, 2012, 01:43 PM EST

  @IrelandNorth: You ask "What problem do they have with an emblem which espouses peace between Ireland's two main tradition". Let me try to answer that for you. The original intention of the flag may well have been espousing to peace between green & orange but that's not how many Unionists see it. It is the official flag of the Irish Republic. A state that facilitated, sponsored and encouraged attacks on Northern Ireland from the day of the North's founding, from Michael Collins up through to the 1980's. The Free State/Eire/Republic of Ireland historically gave safe harbour to those that committed Republican atrocities in NI, claimed the north's territory as it's own and claimed it had no right to exist. It's hardly going to endear itself to Loyalists then! It is seen by them as an IRA flag. If you can understand why many Republicans hate the Union flag then you should also be able to understand why Loyalists hold the tricolour in similar regard. I hope this helps answer your question. Having said that, i personally have no problem with the flag and would condemn anyone who would disrespect the flag of any nation.

• citizen69 | Dec 12, 2012, 01:17 PM EST

  @Seamus60: In all of the reports i have read the portrait was burned on the bonfire. In an interview with the dean of the cathedral himself, the Rev. William Morton expressed his outrage at the burning of the Bishop's portrait, so obviously he didn't recall any good samaritans from the INLA handing it back. Anyway, the point of my initial post is that many nationalists (plenty to be found on this site)would rather get all high & mighty about loyalist sectarianism or hark back 100 or 800 years to previous Irish oppressions for excuses rather than acknowledge any sectarianism from their own community or accept any responsibility for their contributions that led to conflict. They like to have exclusivity on victimization. It's in their interests to present everything in black & white... one side good, one side evil. It's the very same with this website's prejudiced reporting. Did you read one line on I.C. reporting any of this week's stories i highlighted in my initial post? Or anything about the two Unionist politicians who received death threats this week? If it were Nationalist politicians who were threatened by Loyalists do you think you would hear about it here? Damn right you would. Don't believe your own hype.

• IrelandNorth | Dec 12, 2012, 08:02 AM EST

  The Republic of Ireland is as much the Irish Republic as Northern Ireland is Ulster! There were no union jacks burnt in the capitol cities of Ireland's three other provinces: ie Cork (Munster/southern Ireland) - Dublin (Leinster/eastern Ireland) and/or Galway (Connacht/western Ireland) as tricolors were in Belfast (Ulster/Northern Ireland). Not even in the Irish capitol! What problem do they have with an emblem which espouses peace between Ireland's two main tradition, whilst flaunting one which represses the intra-nationalities of others?

• maireadinmelb | Dec 12, 2012, 03:47 AM EST

  Curtisjohnson dont forget the seven centuries before when the language and culture of Ireland was banned, the people were starved and enslaved. The poor little unionists must be feeling a little threatened!! But at least they are not being tried in Diplock courts or being interned without trial.

• curtisjohnson | Dec 11, 2012, 09:48 PM EST

  " Republicans have a numerical majority in the Belfast Council - their vote is symptomatic of wanton majoritarian rule." Ok - so the indigenous population, who has been forced to live under the boot of an ochlocratic supremacist statelet for the last 9 decades, must be sensitive to the supremacist's feelings even what they're doing is perfectly legitimate and democratic - right.

• seanomelb | Dec 11, 2012, 06:51 PM EST

  Torytory carried the torch but he gave to a fellow traveller to light the fire. I'm aamazed at his sentence "Sinn Fein bullied a unionist minority". A bit rich don't you think Tory my man.

• seamus60 | Dec 11, 2012, 06:27 PM EST

  Citizen69. I have also said that the use of baton rounds against anyone is not on. They are lethel force as proven with the lives of many men woman and children. Look at Ardoyne and compare it with this spate of violence and the differance in reaction from the RUC is transparent. As for that painting the INLA retrieved it and gave it back. The bonfire, one of 4 when previously there was always around 4 times that had to do with your beloved flag. But we won`t get all hot and bothered over one or two of either flag when my irigional post was making just that point. No need for a big headline over the burning of any 2 flags. There you`ll feel better now.

• Curitiba | Dec 11, 2012, 02:50 PM EST

  I resent paying my taxes for this lot to strut their stuff in their little theme park of Britishness. How many have jobs? How many have jobs that are not fake jobs in the public sector. Why should the hard-pressed UK taxpayer keep handing over money to them just because their hardman politicians keep strong-arming our lily-livered ones? What is the benefit to Britain to keep NI in the Union? Why, when America, Australia, Canada, NZ etc. threw off the shackles of being ruled by London, this lot is unable to do anything but put their hand out for more taxpayers money? Stand on your own two feet NI, or emigrate and find a job, just like everyone else in Ireland is having to do!

• leahkinsella | Dec 11, 2012, 01:53 PM EST

  Don't involve the Irish Republic in it. We are not interested!

• RedBranch | Dec 11, 2012, 01:31 PM EST

  You go citizen!

• citizen69 | Dec 11, 2012, 12:05 PM EST

  @Seanmelb & Seamus60: You guys must be sleeping because just yesterday on this site i condemned these thugs in the strongest possible terms (something you seem incapable of when Republican rabble decide on a bit of recreational rioting.). I live in a Loyalist area and i have no problem condemning thuggish behaviour where i see it. A thug is a thug regardless of which community they belong. Seamus60, there are still plenty of internment bonfires. Surely you remember the one in your neck of the woods a little while back when bigots went to St Columb's Cathedral and stole a portrait of a Protestant bishop and burned it, pride of place on their republican bonfire? I regret & condemn the killing of any innocent person by plastic bullets but lets be honest here, fortunately no-one has been killed here by a baton round since the 80's. Don't pretend things haven't changed since then.

• ancavker | Dec 11, 2012, 08:42 AM EST

  torytory: Go get your dole check Hurry on now.

• seamus60 | Dec 10, 2012, 06:55 PM EST

  Torytory. It was nothing more than was to be expected by protestants.Why would the flag fly more in Belfast than it does in the rest of your UK. However the over the top reaction have given SF the pedestal to claim they are making big changes.

• ToryTory | Dec 10, 2012, 06:52 PM EST

  Sensationalism from Warrenpoint, harbinger of hate and Anglophobia. The DUP & UPP merely highlighted the complicity of the Alliance Party in ensuring the republican proposal went through - the bone of contention amongst unionists or the unionist community is the implicit unionism in the Alliance Party itself: it is the protestant vote the Alliance relies upon. The pamphleteers are critical of the Alliance for not voting against the proposal (somewhat unfairly in my view); the perception of unionists is the Alliance Party have acted perfidiously. The main unionist parties are capitalise on it.

• seamus60 | Dec 10, 2012, 06:47 PM EST

  Citizen69. Not very many compared to the past because SF have put an end to most of the bonfires in Aug. They cream off the money that councils now provide for alternatives that no one avails of. But hey they`re all happy without the bonfires. How about you answer my question in regards to how many protestants have been beat to death by RUC thugs ? how many killed by plastic bullets ? Bigroty is a 2 way street but your lack of an answer to the above tells its own story of victimhood.

• ToryTory | Dec 10, 2012, 06:45 PM EST

  Who's condoning riots and wanton destruction? Certainly not I; what I pointed out was the obvious: that such blatantly provocative measures will undoubtedly have deleterious effects.

• warrenpoint00 | Dec 10, 2012, 06:43 PM EST

  Terror chief Peter Robinson initiated some diplomatic terrorism ,urged his billy boys to target Alliance offices with hate letters, of course we all know that is a green light to the loyalist thugs to burn and then we all become terrorist targets.Something similar to the terroristUWC strike but much less supported.

• ToryTory | Dec 10, 2012, 06:42 PM EST

  Curtis, stop being moronic. Republicans have a numerical majority in the Belfast Council - their vote is symptomatic of wanton majoritarian rule. Given the very delicate dynamic that exists in NI, the bloc parties of republican & unionist have to defer to the sensitivities of minority interests so a semblance of a polity can be maintained. Sinn Fein have effectively bullied the minority unionist community by bludgeoning through a needless & completely trivial proposal that has no purpose other than a) massage Sinn Fein's bigotry and b) stoke animosity in and amongst the community. So many dullards have banally cited the supposed democratic mandate when the fact of the matter is that none exists, what's happened in Belfast is an inversion of democracy where the dominant group has bullied and antagonised a minority political group. That simply isn't on in a modern democratic state, nor can it be maintained in a combustible province like NI. This is gross politicking by Sinn Fein.

• merefalow | Dec 10, 2012, 06:02 PM EST

  always?allways is a long time,it took the jews 2000 years,time yet outspans.

• seanomelb | Dec 10, 2012, 05:27 PM EST

  Why are The orange thugs getting a softly softly approach from the PSNI/RUC where are the watre cannons and the rubber bullets. Maybe justice is selective in the "statelet". WE have the typical mindless drivvel from torytory and citizen69 who fail to condemn the illegal acts of their bigoted fascist brothers.

• curtisjohnson | Dec 10, 2012, 04:59 PM EST

  “The usual dross on Irish Central want to pontificate about 'loyalist thuggery' and yet the consequences of the Council vote was inevitable.” So because there was a democratic vote the loyalist are justified in their ostensibly illegal violence (although the PSNI/RUC thugs seem deeply sympathetic) – got it. You have to love how the british endlessly pontificate about “democracy” until it does not work in their favor (for instance Iran in 1952 when the toppled a peaceful democratic regime to facilitate the theft of resources).

• citizen69 | Dec 10, 2012, 03:51 PM EST

  @seamus60: And how many Union & Northern Ireland flags are burnt every year on internment bonfires in August without so much as a mention from yourself, warrenpoint or anybody else here? Oh, and not surprisingly, no mention of this weeks attacks on Protestant churches, orange halls and memorials to innocent victims of Republican terrorism either. But of course you'd all rather play the victimhood card rather than face up to the reality that bigotry is a two way street in N.I.

• ToryTory | Dec 10, 2012, 03:07 PM EST

  The usual dross on Irish Central want to pontificate about 'loyalist thuggery' and yet the consequences of the Council vote was inevitable. The vote in the Belfast Council was an elaborate piece of politicking by Sinn Fein, and lo and behold it has handsomley paid dividends. It was a piece of calculated duplicitousness to solicit the ire of a disenfranchised working class. Sinn Fein are the bigots: there was no need for them to push this proposal through, it was done to massage their own bigotry and to stoke hatred in an already fragile region.

• seamus60 | Dec 10, 2012, 12:48 PM EST

  Spot on Warrenpoint00. How many tricolours burned on every bonfire during the summer months, without a mention.

• warrenpoint00 | Dec 10, 2012, 11:28 AM EST

  Nothing new in this story about the same old bigoted terrorist the so called guardians of Ulster.The terror activities of the loyalist domain occur frequently here in the North East of Ireland every July though not reported accurately on by the pro unionist media. That those pro union political leaders who encouraged terror tactics against those who disagreed with their bigoted pro union agenda is nothing new to those of us who live here in the North east of Ireland..A protestant parliament for a protestant people is still on the agenda here and that will give you an insight into the mentality of these people that we have to live with in this part of Ireland

• IrelandNorth | Dec 10, 2012, 08:01 AM EST

  What will they do if their mainlanders no longer want union with them? What will they do if HM EIIR doesn't want their peculiar brand of loyalty? Some loyalists draped themselves in pound shop/dime store union jacks (ie screen printed on one side only, the other plain white cotton). Does this mean they are ambivalent about their loyalty or just on a budget economy? Were the tr[y]colours they burnt also one sided, in which case less offence can be taken. If they are proud of their 'Britishness', (whatever that means these days?), why wear hoodies and Ranger scarfs over their faces? If as their homemade placards proclaimed: "Ulster [sic] is British!", why not picket Donegal, Cavan and Monaghan town councils for NOT flying the union jack? A spontaneous protestor addressing the crowd claimed: "Ulster (sic) is now, always has been, and always will be Br[a]tish - No surrender!" (Sat RTE 6/1 News), how could it have always been British before the concept of Britishness was conjured up in 1707. How will it always be British if shifting demographics (even in a gerrymandered statelet) vote otherwise? Are middle class pro-union British nationalists and working class loyalist not democrats? NB This public disorder is reputed to be a down range ripple of an electoral turf war between DUP and Alliance parties for seats in the NI Assembly/Executive - with PUP/UVF and UPRG/UDA the meat in the constitutional sandwitch. (PS For a hoot and a half, YouTube 'The Shining/Belfast').

• Gearoid4 | Dec 09, 2012, 09:03 PM EST

  The dominance of orange supremacy as represented by loyalist thuggery are at an end in reality and we are currently seeing the last kick of the loyalist donkey.

• aloistmartin | Dec 09, 2012, 05:38 PM EST

  Their could be lots of reasons for Burning one of those Things ( The Tri Color, verses the Starry Plough, or the Hammer and Sickle, for example. ) these Days; A Little Nationalist “Fervor” over the New Royal, among them ~

• aloistmartin | Dec 09, 2012, 05:20 PM EST

  Let It All Hang Out !

• curtisjohnson | Dec 09, 2012, 04:25 PM EST

  Yes, the North, meaning Ulster, has always been majority indigenous Irish my little brit trolless.

• Madeliene | Dec 09, 2012, 02:40 PM EST

  - and they want to say the North is Irish HA is Irish! HA!

• curtisjohnson | Dec 09, 2012, 12:31 PM EST

  sorry, should read "if the indigenous community burnt the butcher's apron in such a fashion, there would be numerous homicides and pogroms aided and abetted by the PSNI/RUC.

• curtisjohnson | Dec 09, 2012, 12:28 PM EST

  Yes, not very bright are they - centuries of being handed everything just because they are Protestant has taken its toll on their collective intelligence - as demonstrated by their academic underperformance. The bottom line is at this point they are simply a community of violent supremacist thugs (including their PSNI/RUC cohorts). If the indigenous community burn the butcher's apron in such a fashion, their would be numerous homicides and pogroms aided and abetted by the PSNI/RUC).

• thetint | Dec 09, 2012, 11:09 AM EST

  Burning other flags to get respect for ‘their’ flag. You couldn’t make it up! Sounds like something from Catch 22.