Yesterday we witnessed the disgraceful scenes of a gang of men (one in drag) armed with battlefield weapons opening up on a group of unarmed people who were attending a perfectly legal function among hundreds of perfectly law-abiding people, many of them children.
What is to be done about thugs like this?
Some of our American cousins might be of the opinion that it would be much better all round if a few of the assembled people minding their own business had themselves been armed and they could have pulled out their pieces and had a party with the gangsters.
Without going into all those familiar and hackneyed arguments, let's just say that's not the Irish way.
As against that we have a largely unarmed police force (which is a good thing) but it does rather seem to suggest to the gangsters that they can do what they like because after all what is some greenhorn Garda just out of Templemore going to to do stop them armed with nothing but a baton and a walkie talkie?
Let's take a more traditional Irish approach: one made famous by the
Dunnes Stores strikers more than 30 years ago. For those too young to remember this was when some shop assistants in Dunnes Stores refused to handle South African produce (mainly fruit) in protest at the nature of the Apartheid regime there.
Could we adopt a similar approach to drugs gangs? If only temporarily?
Just say no. For say a month. A week even. If we all went off dope, coke and ecstasy for a period of time we would really hurt these bastards where they don't like to be hurt. In the pockets. I say we but in reality I mean You Young People because I am in advanced middle age and have no wish to start indulging in drugs at this stage in my life.
I "dabbled" to a very small extent when I was a bit younger and never got too interested in the whole scene. Cocaine turns otherwise nice people into slobbering gibbering arseholes, dope and ectasy SERIOUSLY screw up your taste in music. And heroin is for losers. You take heroin, you're a screw up, not entitled to any sympathy and only a blight on anyone who gives you any.
I am not saying this from a "Drugs are bad for you, you shouldn't touch them" viewpoint. They ARE bad for you but if that's how you get your kicks, then off you go. This is from the point of view of making a statement about the world and indeed country we live in. Just like the Dunnes Stores strikers did all those years ago. These gangster bastards think they can do what they like to the point of treating an ordinary hotel full of ordinary people like a war zone.
Just say no. For a month. And urge your friends to say no as well. Indeed, treat your friends with the same contempt that your parent's generation treated their friends who watched South African rugby matches or bought Del Monte pineapples. Peer pressure. It works.
I'm not saying you shouldn't ever enjoy your chemical enhancement ever again. After all, I don't think the Dunnes Stores strikers did what they did because of their dislike of citrus fruit. It was the bastards that sold it to them they didn't like.
Boycott the bastards. What do you think?
