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Free Staters? Term of Abuse?

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Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    Addressing someone as a 'free stater' because they did not join in a chorus as outlined above would seem that way to me. If that was correct I would say 99% of people would be classed as this.
    You have described them as ignorant and given the 'free stater' comment there is a historical connotation so we are on same path.

    You're reaching there I think. They could have been members of an Armagh historical society on a session (please take this as a joke) and comments were made, and tempers flared. I don't think they were expecting people to join in the chorus. I think they took issue when the cork guy (rightly) complained.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,230 ✭✭✭Solair


    It's more indicative of the person using it being stuck in a time warp from the early 20th century.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,934 ✭✭✭robp


    Coles wrote: »
    There won't be a United Ireland until we create a proper secular Republic that respects all traditions while bowing to none. People both sides of the border need to stop allowing themselves to be divided along stupid sectarian lines. And we need to start electing proper politicians, not the usual tiny little gombeens who have no vision for the place.

    The peace process in the North has nothing whatsoever to do with secularisation civil or social in Ireland. Very few sectarian divisions in the 26 counties.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    Solair wrote: »
    It's more indicative of the person using it being stuck in a time warp from the early 20th century.

    Blue shirts references stuck in the same place? It's not restricted to Northern Ireland. We are still suffering with pro and anti treaty politics and a civil war almost 100 years in the past.

    Residual anger from the CNRNIB community will remain for a long time. I don't really blame them either.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 35 captainzero


    so how can referring to freedom as free be considered abusive?


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  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    so how can referring to freedom as free be considered abusive?

    "Free staters" in their eyes another word for sell outs. Abandoned the wording of the proclamation and accepted a half arsed middle ground that left out the Irish living in the North East.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,230 ✭✭✭Solair


    Deedsie wrote: »
    "Free staters" in their eyes another word for sell outs. Abandoned the wording of the proclamation and accepted a half arsed middle ground that left out the Irish living in the North East.

    The only time I hear 'the free state' being used these days tends to be by people from Northern Ireland though and it's almost always intended to be derogatory.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    Solair wrote: »
    The only time I hear 'the free state' being used these days tends to be by people from Northern Ireland though and it's almost always intended to be derogatory.

    I know, hard to blame them for having grievances with us though PUL's and CNRNIB's communities both have very valid reasons for having grievances with the RoI! I don't blame them for making derogatory comments. And you would have to work pretty hard to actually be offended by the term free stater? Loyalists consider the term Fenian to be an insult, I would be happy to be categorised as a Fenian. I think there is a thing in Northern Ireland society, where everyone must be labelled to one group or another. People from the south are free staters, unionist/loyalist associate with Orange culture, Catholics Fenians or Taigs or chuckies etc...


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,230 ✭✭✭Solair


    I usually can't understand the accent anyway so the insults just go unnoticed.


  • Registered Users Posts: 127 ✭✭Gott


    Deedsie wrote: »
    I know, hard to blame them for having grievances with us though PUL's and CNRNIB's communities both have very valid reasons for having grievances with the RoI! I don't blame them for making derogatory comments. And you would have to work pretty hard to actually be offended by the term free stater? Loyalists consider the term Fenian to be an insult, I would be happy to be categorised as a Fenian. I think there is a thing in Northern Ireland society, where everyone must be labelled to one group or another. People from the south are free staters, unionist/loyalist associate with Orange culture, Catholics Fenians or Taigs or chuckies etc...

    I was actually reading a debate elsewhere about the demographics of Northern Ireland shifting in favour of the nationalists/Catholics with all the Eastern Europeans moving in over the past decade and someone, quite rightly, asked how the OP knew that the immigrants would automatically side with the nationalists.

    I would have thought that (first generation anyway) immigrants would be neutral on the subject to try and avoid taking sides, but I think you're right, especially among the less educated there seems to be a tendency for people in NI to try and categorise each other.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    Gott wrote: »
    I was actually reading a debate elsewhere about the demographics of Northern Ireland shifting in favour of the nationalists/Catholics with all the Eastern Europeans moving in over the past decade and someone, quite rightly, asked how the OP knew that the immigrants would automatically side with the nationalists.

    I would have thought that (first generation anyway) immigrants would be neutral on the subject to try and avoid taking sides, but I think you're right, especially among the less educated there seems to be a tendency for people in NI to try and categorise each other.

    Oh totally, and not just among the less educated... You have to be tagged and have your colours put on the mast... There is a significant minority that are pulling away from this carry on, but I have friends from Tyrone who for example would only shop in their sides shops etc...

    To be fair it's easy for us to look down our noses at those crazy nordies... If we had gone through anything like the struggle they went through our society would be just as divided...

    We are good to label down here to... Pavee's, boggers, proddie's, culchies, Gah heads... Rugger heads, D4's, nordies, tans... etc etc...

    Is free staters really that odd a label if it was slotted into that list?


  • Registered Users Posts: 31 Dr. Nooooo!


    I know a few people from the north who loath the defense forces, even a mention of the term "defense forces" gets one of them in particular into a rage and he goes on about how they were no where to be seen over the decades when there were Irish people who actually needed defending yet could swan off to Africa and the middle east. I can see his point to be honest, he was interned, a bunch of his cousins and brother were murdered by british forces or loyalists. Plus then you have the whole army beatings, abuse, raids etc. He's not a solitary example.


  • Registered Users Posts: 127 ✭✭Gott


    I know a few people from the north who loath the defense forces, even a mention of the term "defense forces" gets one of them in particular into a rage and he goes on about how they were no where to be seen over the decades when there were Irish people who actually needed defending yet could swan off to Africa and the middle east. I can see his point to be honest, he was interned, a bunch of his cousins and brother were murdered by british forces or loyalists. Plus then you have the whole army beatings, abuse, raids etc. He's not a solitary example.

    In fairness to serving members, who I know are quite dedicated and well trained, the Irish Army is in no position to conventionally defend Ireland, let alone invade the UK which had, at the time and still has, far superior naval, air, and land power and the means to project it.

    Though during the riots in 1969 they did consider it:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Armageddon

    While the intention was good, I can only imagine what sort of curbstomp battle would have resulted when the Brits got their sh*t together and responded.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 6,769 Mod ✭✭✭✭nuac


    Any invasion would have been a military and political disaster.

    I trained in the FCÁ in the fifties. WW1 weapons and tactics . The .303 Lee Enfield was a good weapon in it's time, but it's time had passed


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,543 ✭✭✭Conmaicne Mara


    I know a few people from the north who loath the defense forces, even a mention of the term "defense forces" gets one of them in particular into a rage and he goes on about how they were no where to be seen over the decades when there were Irish people who actually needed defending yet could swan off to Africa and the middle east. I can see his point to be honest, he was interned, a bunch of his cousins and brother were murdered by british forces or loyalists. Plus then you have the whole army beatings, abuse, raids etc. He's not a solitary example.

    Bad for them, but as nuac says Ireland couldn't do diddly militarily. So what did your friend want exactly, a token partial invasion which would be soundly defeated and who knows, maybe the Republic occupied, or more counties lost.

    If NI was all that bad, why did they not leave :confused:


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,934 ✭✭✭robp



    If NI was all that bad, why did they not leave :confused:

    That would be an insensitive comment to a Nationalist there, and infact overlooks the psyche of Irish in the six counties.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,543 ✭✭✭Conmaicne Mara


    robp wrote: »
    That would be an insensitive comment to a Nationalist there, and infact overlooks the psyche of Irish in the six counties.

    As insensitive as branding me a free stater, we're even :)

    That posters friend wanted the people in the Republic to sacrifice themselves for him. Would he do the same for them, I very much doubt it.

    A lot of people lived in questionable states, fact is people in NI could leave if they wanted to. First thing comes to my mind is the oppressed states behind the iron curtain. They really had no choice.

    The language and the mindset of the people who say things like free state is completely counter productive.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 200 ✭✭Citycap


    robp wrote: »
    That would be an insensitive comment to a Nationalist there, and infact overlooks the psyche of Irish in the six counties.

    They didn't put up much of a resistance between 1922 and 1969. From a military point of view there were a few border skirmishes in the 50s and early 60s. Where was the great civil disobedience campaigns or were they bought off by the Welfare State


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,020 ✭✭✭Coles


    Citycap wrote: »
    They didn't put up much of a resistance between 1922 and 1969. From a military point of view there were a few border skirmishes in the 50s and early 60s. Where was the great civil disobedience campaigns or were they bought off by the Welfare State
    What welfare state? How about you do a bit of research first.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,934 ✭✭✭robp


    Citycap wrote: »
    They didn't put up much of a resistance between 1922 and 1969. From a military point of view there were a few border skirmishes in the 50s and early 60s. Where was the great civil disobedience campaigns or were they bought off by the Welfare State
    I am not sure what your point is. If your taking a shot at the movement's sincerity well then just look at the civil rights movement in the US and observe how it was non existent over decades of black discrimination.

    The welfare state in its modern form only began to come about after WW2. There were eruptions of violence there before the 1960s but wide scale civil disobedience or violence takes many factors to coalesce.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 200 ✭✭Citycap


    robp wrote: »
    I am not sure what your point is. If your taking a shot at the movement's sincerity well then just look at the civil rights movement in the US and observe how it was non existent over decades of black discrimination.

    The welfare state in its modern form only began to come about after WW2. There were eruptions of violence there before the 1960s but wide scale civil disobedience or violence takes many factors to coalesce.

    My point is that there were open borders between the North and the Republic and ready access to the UK. Why did the Nationalists just sit back and take what was given to them. They had options. When the Nazis started to act up thousands of German Jews left Germany.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,934 ✭✭✭robp


    Citycap wrote: »
    My point is that there were open borders between the North and the Republic and ready access to the UK. Why did the Nationalists just sit back and take what was given to them. They had options. When the Nazis started to act up thousands of German Jews left Germany.

    I don't think even the most extreme dissent republican would compare themselves to Jews in Nazis Germany. Their was persecution in the North but it was in no way comparable to what Jews suffered even before their extermination commenced in the 1940s. It takes a huge amount of intolerance to leave your home. Its easy to appreciate that for a northern catholic taking refugee in the republic would feel like letting the 'colonists' win.


  • Registered Users Posts: 78,218 ✭✭✭✭Victor


    Citycap wrote: »
    My point is that there were open borders between the North and the Republic and ready access to the UK. Why did the Nationalists just sit back and take what was given to them. They had options. When the Nazis started to act up thousands of German Jews left Germany.
    Is that victim blaming?


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,020 ✭✭✭Coles


    Citycap wrote: »
    My point is that there were open borders between the North and the Republic and ready access to the UK. Why did the Nationalists just sit back and take what was given to them. They had options. When the Nazis started to act up thousands of German Jews left Germany.
    Eh? Why would they leave their homes?

    You really should read up on the period 1922-1968 in Northern Ireland. Here's a good start.

    This point is not directed at you Citycap, but the level of absolute willful ignorance about what was happening in Northern Ireland during that period is staggering. When you start researching it you realise just what a gross abomination the Orange State was. Sure, the Republic had it's issues but absolutely nothing compared to the North.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 560 ✭✭✭markomuscle


    have never heard the term being used myself but I often here 'free state' when referring to the republic, mostly older people use it, I don't see the problem with it, isn't ROI a state? Isn't it 'free'?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,401 ✭✭✭Seanchai


    If NI was all that bad, why did they not leave :confused:

    Jesus Christ, give the trolling a rest: it's pathetic. If you were making a serious point, it could be easily pointed out to you that, in fact, emigration was far higher from nationalist areas than from unionist areas and that, furthermore, Stormont government policy was designed to keep nationalist areas poorer with the intention of increasing emigration and keeping the native Irish population more manageable by the unionist herrenvolk in this last pathetic remnant of Britain's Irish colony. Oh, and for a citation on that Stormont policy you can read any textbook on the conflict since 1921. Here's a nice, simple synopsis just for you from a 1983 study.

    But you are not making a serious point; you're merely trying to troll us. A serious answer is therefore not warranted.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,401 ✭✭✭Seanchai


    Citycap wrote: »
    My point is that there were open borders between the North and the Republic and ready access to the UK. Why did the Nationalists just sit back and take what was given to them. They had options. When the Nazis started to act up thousands of German Jews left Germany.

    Why would you make such an ignorant comment, without even looking at the far higher emigration figures from the nationalist community living under British occupation in the Six Counties?


  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Music Moderators Posts: 3,635 CMod ✭✭✭✭Ravelleman


    It seems to occur in common parlance but it's certainly not an adequate historical term.


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