The emergence of "Zombie" by The Cranberries as an Irish sporting anthem

If you just look at the lyrics, you wouldn't particularly think it was about Warrington (or any other specific incident).

It just sounds like a lament to all sorts of violence, why are we still fighting. Obviously in a fight there are two sides. Everybody was fed up of all violence by the early 1990s, a few years later we had ceasefires and later the Agreement. I'm sure it reflected public sentiment at that time.

Terrible things were done on both sides and I think the song reflects that.

We don’t accept anything of the sort. The Provisional IRA were not, never have been or never will be “Irish forces “.

Any claim that they were is “in your head “.

When you say "Irish forces", the only legitimate Irish forces south of the border were the Irish army and Gardai, both of whom the pira murdered.

If you were around during the troubles you would have seen how SF only got 1 or 2% of the vote south of the border and how detested the provos were by most people north and south. And do not forget it was not unknown for Irish state forces to kill Republicans. For example DeValera executed IRA prisoners in cold blood in the forties. No outcry from the public. And during the troubles it was Republicans murdered here south of the border, and kidnapped and done numerous bank raids, which cost everyone. And sometimes Republicans got killed back here south of the border ( for example when the border fox got stopped at a Garda/Irish army checkpoint and his companion in the car killed). No big outcry about shoot to kill then either.

I singled out Damian Walsh because it happened at the same time as the Warrington Bombings and his mother made the comment the other day about no condolences coming up from the South for him or indeed any songs being written about the loyalist paramilitaries (in collusion with the British State) murdering children.

Yes indeed, by 1993/94 people were sick to their back teeth of the violence and endless killings. There was a sense that even republicans in NI had had enough....there was no mood whatsoever for another decade of killings and bombings.

The song reflected the mood at the time. People were now sick of the IRA (this doesn't mean that they had suddenly become West Brits....it's just that the public were getting totally turned off by the atrocities and killings on all sides and support for Sinn Fein was actually in decline).

So first of all we were told it was dividing people, then we were told is was offensive to some people, later on we were told it was goading people, now we are reduced down to it goading the opposition in the stadium. Well, WTF, if you are singing songs in a stadium at a match, and the songs are not goading the opposition, then what are you doing there?

At the end of the day, this is song born of revulsion at one of the worst atrocities committed by the PIRA. If you are in any way offended by it, you are the one with the problem, because you are defending the bombing of children.

My pleasure. I enjoy calling out attempts to twist the truth.

But it's no longer about a tiny amount of people. Look at all the anti SF comments here.

How many people on this island vote for them?

It's become bigger now. Who's fault that was, I'm not sure, but that's now how it is.

The vast majority of people voting for SF in the last few elections do not support the Provisional IRA bombings

I don't think anyone's saying they're against it because it calls out criminal thugs.

Some people are against it because they feel it only calls out nationalist thugs.

Others because they feel it's broadly attacking all nationalists and not only those who committed atrocities, calling them 'Zombies'

Anyone who thought at time that Warrington was justified, or who thinks it now, is a certifiable idiot. Calling them a zombie seems like fair comment to me. I don't see who anyone could have a problem with that.

I'm well aware.

But it seems that at least some people who want to sing the song to make a political point don't make that distinction.

I better explain to you what the connection is of Damian Walsh and the Warrington boys who were killed by an PIRA bomb. The killing of the Warrington boys was rightly condemned by all both in England and in the South here. Protest marches were organised here at the time.

My point has and is that if anyone should be aggrieved about Zoombie its the families of the catholic children in the Northern Ireland troubles that were killed and completely ignored at the same time as the Warrington boys. Can you understand how offensive all of this is to Damian Walsh's family that his death was completely ignored while suddenly we in the south here developed enough of a conscience to protest the killing of British children.

Anyway, have you watched the official video of the song. Its clearly an anti-war song. Whatever equipment the PIRA had, they were not the ones with the tanks (if you listen to the songs).

What I don't like about this controversy is that some people are trying to turn it into an anti PIRA song, when it isn't just that. I always thought it was interesting that Tim Parry's dad didn't know that the song was about the Warrington bombings until Delores died. There is a good chance that most people singing it at rugby matches don't get it eitherm but I do see how the way that it is being portrayed by some now down here how hurtful it is to the families of those from the nationalist community who suffered losses in the Troubles and no one took any notice of them.