Hamsterchops wrote: » And yet the security forces had to use force to stop the men of violence. They hadan no choice but to fight the men of violence. The (PIRA, INLA, UFF, UVF) etc had to be faced up to, and thank God the army did, otherwise things would have been a whole lot worse.
blanch152 wrote: » You don't have to have been there to see that many others like John Hume, Seamus Mallon and many many others took a different path. I have spoken to many who tell me the same. It is only the terrorism apologists who peddle the lie that there was no choice. They can also be identified by their refusal to condemn outright the IRA without having to deflect to the all violence is bad theme.
blanch152 wrote: » A lie, a blatant lie. I have not supported the "murder of catholics", whatever that means.
blanch152 wrote: » Because the likes of John Hume, Seamus Mallon and others took another path, away from the violence that the terrorism apologists support, we know that it is a lie that there was no choice. Factually, there was a choice, taken by men of peace.
JohnnyFlash wrote: » SF and the IRA enjoyed no popular support during their campaign of sociopathic violence. That false narrative needs to be challenged. Hume and Mallon represented the wishes of the vast majority of Nationalists in Northern Ireland. Sf supporters might justify child abuse, murder, kneecapping and intimidation in their own head, but trying to convince those of us who have a sense of morality isn’t ever going to work. It’s a waste of time.
FrancieBrady wrote: » Bull, SF grew their support while being shot censored and killed. Fact, and the last person who came up with this theory ran away when I presented the figures that showed their support growing. It's a bitter pill for some to swallow, but the people know who achieved and who was only interested in the comfy seats and the odd knighthood thrown as a scrap form the table.
Odhinn wrote: » Is that why they were the main suppliers of arms and intelligence to the UVF, UDA?
Truthvader wrote: » 3000 people did not "have to die...tragically". In most cases someone made a choice to kill them. Indeed in many cases cruel thugs made a choice to just kill any passing random person. Premeditated murder is not a "tragedy". "It was all wrong" . A stupid invasion or peacekeeping fantasy would have just added to and expanded the "all"
Truthvader wrote: » "Tragedy" brings with it a sense of inescapable fate which is what I was objecting to. It plays to the posters here who pretend that people had "no choice" but to defend themselves which is then elevated to an excuse for premeditated acts of both targeted and random acts of subhuman behaviour against innocent people who were not involved in attacking anyone. Plenty of choice but some chose to indulge their most base impulses or to mutilate other people for personal advantage.
JohnnyFlash wrote: » Killed? No one murdered more Nationalists/Catholics during The Troubles than the PIRA. Disappeared for talking to a Protestant, torturing a 15 year mentally disabled boy before shooting him in the head for a harmless comment he made to a IRA psychopath, blowing them up, making them drive cars with bombs in the boot into army barracks. Those are the lads that so many SF supporters consider heroes. They wouldn't know the meaning of the word Republican.
FrancieBrady wrote: » I don't do the hero thing Johnny. The list above and the atrocities committed by others is why I think it was all wrong from the start. I am not deluded enough to think that only one side engaged in these acts. Maybe that is because I have seen with my own eyes what damage it causes.
Hamsterchops wrote: » You're refering to those "bad apples", those bent members of the security forces who colluded with the Loyalist paramilitaries..... However, the vast majority did their best to confront the bombs, the bullets and the Molotov cocktails head on, and to stand up to and confront the terrorist threat in Northern Ireland, and that's what they did. A thankless task for the army who were really a blunt tool used to try and combat the bombers.
FrancieBrady wrote: » Well there is enough commentary on people who live in the luxury of peace. I think most realists would say that they don't know how they would react under an oppressive regime and escalating brutality from the govenment that was supposed to democatic and impartial. The weight of evidence, the huge weight actually, is that Irish people reacted the exact same way as any oppressed people anywhere. Of course there were also those who stood idly by and those who climbed up onto moral high ground. Takes all sorts I suppose. I never lose sight of the fact that there but for the grace of luck go I. I prefer to work to make sure I am never in a place of little or no choice.
Truthvader wrote: » Still grimly running on with the "no choice" bollockology. A lie Plus revealing quote from you above "More often than not, that is preventable if those responsible behave with responsibility." The same dupicitious cowardice where responsibility for the choices of the criminal thug are transferred to an innocent person who never decided to kill anyone.
Odhinn wrote: » What would you have done?
FrancieBrady wrote: » Can you explain why there was no GFA in place in 69 Truth. Or even when a bodged GFA in the form of Sunningdale was put on the table the Unionists were allowed to bring it down? Who do you blame for that? Had the British faced down Unionists, as they did when they got sick of them, nobody or very few would have died.
Truthvader wrote: » Agree the Unionists dragged down Sunningdale. Agree it was wrong. Agree it was an unfair one sided society. Don't agree there was "no choice' or no solution but to embark on a sick campaign of savagery. Quite clear at this stage that you are 100% Sinn Fein IRA beneath all the spoof and "it was all wrong" drivel. Bottom line; you will continue to promote and support cruel sociopaths while blaming everyone else for the behaviour they chose to indulge in. Bottom line for me Sinn Fein IRA are a dangerous infection riddled with thugs and their apologists and I would live with any other government that does not include them.
FrancieBrady wrote: » No Truth. You need to listen. I didn't vote for SF in a GE until the previous one. Not until I was personally certain that they were committed to democratic politics. .
JohnnyFlash wrote: » They don’t even recognise the legitimacy of the Irish Republic, its constitution, or its defence forces. You might want to do a refresher on what democratic means. SF are a party who glorify psychopaths and serial killers, and offer nothing new only cheap and nasty populist nationalism. It’s amazing how ill informed people are to fall for this.
blanch152 wrote: » Excellent post, exposing the terrorism apologists.
FrancieBrady wrote: » One day we will have a normal society and you guys might then stop trying pointlessly to flush out the terrorist sympathisers. I doubt though.
JohnnyFlash wrote: » You live in a normal society, dude. You’ve just gone so far down the rabbit hole you can’t even see the light anymore.
blanch152 wrote: » Listen, this is a factual definition. If one indulges in a “there was no choice” lie, when it is clear factually that other people made a different choice, then one is a terrorism apologist. Simple fact, simple definition, just like partitionist is a simple definition. Similarly, if one refuses to condemn the IRA without invoking “there was wrong on all sides “, one is, by definition, a terrorism apologist. A poster places themselves in the category by what they post.
FrancieBrady wrote: » I don't even share your definition of terrorism. Anybody who uses terror is a terrorist. And they were all terrorists. I know that is why you are silent on collusion until you have to be asked, because you know that makes the above a true statement. I believe it was all wrong from the very beginning, something you have never said on here. Don't be climbing up on any high moral ground please.
blanch152 wrote: » I don’t share your definition of partitionists but I have to live with it. I have set out a definition of terrorism apologist and I am ok with the fact that you don’t agree, won’t stop me using it when appropriate.
FrancieBrady wrote: » Knock yourself out. I think the people of Ireland have worked out what FG and partitionists want - some sort of pointless and pathetic hindsight win. Maybe it is the guilt of doing nothing that makes you so disparate.
blanch152 wrote: » Keep living in the dreams of the past, why don't you? As I keep telling you, nationhood no longer requires territory as recognised by our own Constitution so partitionist is a term of the past along with the old-style xenophobic nationalism of Sinn Fein.
It is the firm will of the Irish Nation, in harmony and friendship, to unite all the people who share the territory of the island of Ireland, in all the diversity of their identities and traditions, recognising that a united Ireland shall be brought about only by peaceful means with the consent of a majority of the people, democratically expressed, in both jurisdictions in the island. Until then, the laws enacted by the Parliament established by this Constitution shall have the like area and extent of application as the laws enacted by the Parliament[a] that existed immediately before the coming into operation of this Constitution. Institutions with executive powers and functions that are shared between those jurisdictions may be established by their respective responsible authorities for stated purposes and may exercise powers and functions in respect of all or any part of the island.
