United Ireland Poll - please vote

Yes, because when the UK left the EU, the Brits invaded Belgium to force the issue?

Oh, the hardman keyboard warrior is out in force tonight.

Tell us, if diplomacy doesn't work today, what should we do? Go back to blowing up shops and bars?

I live on the border mark, I can see with my my eyes where the wrong side of history is every single day. Just driving to Cavan will spell it out for you. You should try visiting the place that occupies your thoughts so much some time, and stop channeling others..

Did you ever hear of Gandhi?

What war did he wage for Indian Independence?

What war did the SNP wage for Scottish Independence?

If the 'war' is over how will we get a UI, given that NI is still part of the UK?

As great as Gandhi was, I suggest you look into the numbers who died in the struggle for Indian independence before getting in your high horse. As a single example, a thousand peaceful protestors were shot dead in ten minutes in 1919. While Gandhi certainly remained peaceful, it is ridiculously naive to say India achieved independence with no violence. Time and time again, failed peaceful means gave way to violent uprising (which Gandhi certainly decried in much the same manner the likes of John Hume did in our own situation). Even at that, there are serious questions as to whether India would've achieved independence at all without the economic pressure WWII put on Britain, or if India hadn't become less profitable. It is impossible to isolate out one factor (Gandhi's peaceful resistance) and pretend that it alone is the sole factor that led to independence and ignore the rest completely.

When your colonisers think of you as, 'a beastly people' and blame the famine in your country on you, 'breeding like rabbits' rather than the grain they're exporting, independence becomes a need rather than a want, and that need has historically come at a great cost.

It certainly doesn't justify the excesses of either the, 'Old IRA' or the Provos, but please take off the rose tinted glasses when talking about Indian independence, the human cost of which was many times greater than The Troubles.

My response was to Blazz who stated that the only way to get your way with the British is via violence.

Gandhi makes this claim null and void.

There is a clear agenda at play with some posters that state that the PIRA had no choice to kill the women and children that died at their hands as if it was inevitable. That is why the usual crew hate people like John Hume, because he offered an alternative, a non-violent alternative.

This is all about writing and controlling the history of today, so they can shape the narrative of tomorrow. It is so so obvious.

John Hume FAILED up until he made a solo run and had talks with Adams. Fact.

But India didn't achieve independence without violence is my point, Mark. Violence was very much a part of India's struggle for independence, as of course were Gandhi's non-violent means. We don't have the time-altering capabilities to establish if India would've achieved independence with purely the non-violence pushed by Gandhi in isolation. We can of course speculate, but if we're sticking to facts, India did not achieve independence without violence, it achieved independence with a great deal of violence unfortunately.

To accuse others of attempting to rewrite history when you're doing the same yourself is quite hypocritical.

We've interacted enough at this point that I'm sure you're aware I'm not among the cohort who tries to defend the PIRA, but I do have the lived experience of being in the North during the Troubles enough to understand how and why they came about.

I had all the time in the world for John Hume, but much like the India situation, we can only speculate if his non-violent approach alone would've actually secured Unification or if it would've even got us to the civil equality point we reached with the GFA, or indeed somewhere in between.

All we can say factually about the North is that the mixture of violent and non-violent means that did occur

a) didn't achieve Unification and

b) did achieve equal rights for the CNR population of NI.

Acknowledging the historical reality of the situation rather than speculating doesn't make me any sort of apologist for the PIRA, but addressing the point Blazz made, what we do know is that in both of the examples we've discussed so far, violence was indeed one tool used to, 'get their way' with the British, and we have thusfar no examples of times were anyone got their way without violence. That isn't a statement of support for violence from me to be clear.

Not just once either - yet still we have the partitionists and Unionists defending them.

Ending partition is the beginning of the solution. I'm not sure what country you live in but the one I live in is Ireland and it has unification as its destination. As for Brexiters, you Paritionists are their bedfellows, you think if you get your way you get to keep the privileges that have been bestowed upon you by those who removed the colonisers by force. You won't, of that I assure you.

And this...

'We'll tell you what you can talk about' journalism? 😁

In the context of there being no plan presented they are very encouraging figures.