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Thread: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

  1. #21

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    Please point out which part of this post is non-objective or partisan? I have never even met a British person who didn't acknowledge these basic facts about the conflict in Northern Ireland.
    This is my point. You have linked many Wikipedia articles and if you follow up the references, they are nearly all media articles. Now there is nothing wrong with doing that to get one point of view but they are not reliable and tell the story from a certain point of view. To complete the picture one should examine all points of view while understanding that these may themselves be biased.

    I do have some sympathy because getting to the truth on such a political topic may well prove impossible without significant time and possibly expense, but that does not mean that you should not at least try if the subject interests you.

  2. #22
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Yay Irish people want to wind the clock back to 1967 what a great idea .

    Every country has a history of bloodshed and violence, if you wish to privilege the suffering of a perceived faction as trumping the rights of another faction you're repeating the errors of the past, and hinting (to my mind) at obliterating them. If the northern Irish have no right to have their wants heard, what rights do they have?

    The EU provides a regionalist approach for provinces to move away from former colonial/provincial status and achieve satisfactory self determination without engaging in Empire breaking and other fun activities. I see a future where Northern Ireland moves, somewhat uncomfortably and with stumbles into a form of Union with the South that embraces economic cultural and sporting forms. Such a Union would perhaps lead to political Union, and at least make for less murder and more cheering for the same side.

    A surefire way to undermine this sort of humanist respectful and tolerant approach would be to start bleating about litanies of past crimes (every community can recite a killing list to justify their own agenda, the Orangemen have their loyal apprentices saving good Britons form Papist murther etc etc) and demanding "they" surrender to "us".

    If you want to win the Battle of the Boyne I have bad news for you, it was over three centuries and more ago. If you want to make the banks of the Boyne a place where people enjoy picnics without eyeing each other with murderous intent you have my best wishes: if you want more killing fields then get stuffed.
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  3. #23

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    The British army commit mass murder of Irish civilians from 1916 to 1921 and again from 1969 to 1998. In Northern Ireland the MRF literally commit drive-by shootings against Catholic civilians in order to stir up hatred.
    You need to focus a bit better than you did last time. Claiming that the British Army ran "death squads to randomly kill several hundred Irish civilians" is not the same as the conflicts that occurred a hundred years ago during the Irish War of Independence, and certainly cannot be generalised in comparison to the entire duration of the Troubles in the latter half of the last century.

    As for the MRF you utterly failed to provide evidence of this in your last thread. As far as we got is that the British authorities have not investigated because there is no evidence to investigate. If you have new sources, go ahead - but you'll forgive me if I reject any Wikipedia articles that you share.

    Much fewer people would have died had the North been forced into a united Ireland in 1922. The Troubles wouldn't have happened.
    A paragraph of worthless speculation, that again is an attempt to justify the repugnant disenfranchisement of peoples' democratic rights.

    It isn't. It's simply standing up to colonialist powers. I oppose the right to secession of Ottoman settlers in the Balkans, who have also been there since the 1600s. If they voted to secede from Bulgaria or wherever, I don't believe they should be allowed. The same goes for the more recent Russian arrivals in Eastern Europe.
    This is again the argument we should disenfranchise modern voters because of historical events, which is repugnant and all intelligent people on both sides reject.

    Your support for the existence of Northern Ireland is horrifyingly anti-democratic, borderline-racist sentiment.
    No it isn't. It's based on the democratic mandate that was granted to the Good Friday Agreement between the Governments of the UK and Ireland. An agreement that has been hailed by both sides as a huge achievement and has granted the most stable and enduring period of peace in a century.

    You haven't answered as to why you are so opposed to Northern British settlers being forced to live in Ireland by a democratic vote, when you aren't opposed to native Irish Catholics being forced to live in the UK by imperialist conquering and gerrymandering.
    I have answered this. Historical events are not important factors. for making sound decisions today.

    The fact that something happened in the 1920s and was done by the British Empire is automatically a reason to oppose it without hearing any further details. Nothing of that description was ever a good thing.
    Yes, I know. You're racist towards British people. I just wish you didn't waste both our time by pretending otherwise in this thread.

    I'm not the one who wants to disenfranchise anyone.
    Your thread title is literally that people should be forced into doing things regardless of what they want. God, you're such a push over in these threads mate.

    This is not a historical event. 60% of the Irish population were alive when they didn't have the right to a fair trial in 1975. Almost as many were alive when the British army massacred peaceful activists protesting against voter suppression by a racist state that was bent on ethnically cleansing them from their historical homeland in 1972. Why do you think the British treated the Irish and second class citizens in Northern Ireland? Because they wanted them to leave for the Republic of Ireland. When will Northern Ireland's native Irish population be compensated for this? Oh, that's right, never. This is why the reunification of Ireland is a social justice issue.
    All of the Northern Irish population, more or less, regardless of their religion, are Irish. Don't be racist by telling people who they can and cannot be. In the last thread you were repeatedly made to acknowledge the British Government actively attempted to protect Catholics from corrupt Protestant Government officials in Northern Ireland, eventually dissolving the whole NI Parliament to achieve this.

    You keep talking about British political thought in the early 20th century. None of that is relevant. Britain at the time was the world's largest perpetrator of racism and genocide and believed other any non-British group had only the right to live in servitude until the British could find a way of exterminating them and replacing them with British settlers. Hitler wanted to exterminate Eastern Europeans and replace them with German settlers. Britain actually managed to do that in such places as Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the USA, South Africa, Northern Ireland, and most recently, the British Indian Ocean Territory. Why do you believe that the British are the victims of anti-democratic, borderline racist sentiment by its Irish victims? That's impossible.
    Modern Northern Irish would be the victims under your policy. It's unacceptable, to both sides of this issue. You are an extremist.

    My opinion is the overwhelming majority among young liberal Irish people who claim to care about social justice.
    Yeah bollocks to that mate. Source that. No Wikipedia pages you've vandalised please.

  4. #24

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quotes and stats aside, as someone who actually lives in Northern Ireland and can gauge the mentality of people here, all I can say is if that were to happen it would probably lead to severe civil unrest and lots of bloodshed. So yeah...
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  5. #25

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    In your post you say
    "You think it's wrong for British settlers in Northern Ireland to be forced to join the south. Why aren't you equally outraged that native Irish people are forced to be part of the UK?"
    I seriously doubt that "British Settlers" and "Native Irish" are in any way the right way to describe the ...uh... divisions in Ireland. The line has been drawn between Protestant and Catholic, for many centuries and now even more so, thanks to the stubbornness of all concerned parties...if ever their was an inclusive idea of Ireland, wether in Dublin in 1916 or earlier in 1798, or in the minds of English socialists etc., it died with the poetic rebels who dreamt it up...as in all revolutions, soon the lowest common denominator takes hold. In Ireland, that is simply religion. The free Irish were as zealously catholic as the unionists had been protestant, and before them their respective militias were the same. The neat line you wish to draw between the people inhabiting the Irish homeland does not, in fact, exist.
    You go on to say
    "You strongly oppose the idea that Russian settlers in the Baltic nations have the right to secede and join Russia. Why do you support that exact thing when it happens in Ireland?
    You strongly disagree with Russian colonialism in the Ukraine and Greek/Turkish colonialism in Cyprus. Why don't you oppose similar British actions in Northern Ireland?"

    For someone who (seemingly) doesn't like the Unionists very much, you seem to know a lot about their political views. Again, I doubt you could find such a seamlessly united political stance within any community. Just because they feel the same way about one issue, that doesn't discount for other disagreements. Unionists (I suspect) come in all shapes and sizes, gay and straight, rich and poor, educated and illiterate, just like the "native Irish". In short, you seem to be shouting out opinions based on your own delusional and emotional understanding of a (probably) personal issue, and not opinions based on cold hard facts.

  6. #26
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    It might be an unpopular opinion but I'm with Enros. I'm English myself and as far as I'm concerned, if there are of people of British descent who've had generations in which to raise the means to return to proper society, we have no need of them being in our country. I don't know why our government isn't pushing for this. I'd even go as far as to suggest the Irish build a wall around their country so no Brits accidentally end up there in the future too.


    On a related note concerning minorities dating back to the 1600s, there are a number of Catholics in this country -the kind of people who attempted to kill our dear King James I and IV. Considering that at the time they were supporting the Hapsburgs, I think the best solution would be to deport them all to Spain, regardless of what they want. They'll probably only say they weren't planning on another coup d'etat. If anyone wants a debate, I can link wikipedia articles bout historical events when Catholics killed people. I'd be more than happy to do so.


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  7. #27

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    So Enros, how long does a family have to inhabit an island before they fully integrate? Are you saying that every non-white immigrant to Ireland, and a decent chunk of the white ones will never properly be irish? What's your policy for them?

    I don't think anyone here will endorse the endless rivers of blood that were spilled as Unionists and Nationalists murdered each other over the 20th century and earlier. But now that the Protestants in Northern Ireland have been there for longer than most nation-states around today. If they can't be considered to be at home, then nobody is.

    Edit: What happens to people who come from mixed families? Or the Protestants who supported Irish Nationalism? Do they get forced back to "home" as well?
    Last edited by Hazzard; November 10, 2016 at 11:43 AM.

  8. #28

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    I'm very busy and don't have time to reply properly right now, but I will see if I can write one this weekend.

  9. #29
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Hazzard View Post
    how long does a family have to inhabit an island before they fully integrate?
    Integration is not a question of time, it is a question of actions.

    Are you saying that every non-white immigrant to Ireland, and a decent chunk of the white ones will never properly be irish?
    If they choose to integrate; of course they'll be Irish.

    But now that the Protestants in Northern Ireland have been there for longer than most nation-states around today. If they can't be considered to be at home, then nobody is.
    Their entire identity is based on being non-Irish or even anti-Irish, constantly reminding all and sundry of their bloody conquests and massacres as a matter of pride and essential to their identity. They view themselves as conquerors and "benevolent" civilizers of the savage natives. They have no interest in integration, their identity is directly opposed to the idea, their identity is British, they maintain a deliberately foreign identity.
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  10. #30
    Dude with the Food's Avatar Campidoctor
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Himster View Post
    Their entire identity is based on being non-Irish or even anti-Irish, constantly reminding all and sundry of their bloody conquests and massacres as a matter of pride and essential to their identity. They view themselves as conquerors and "benevolent" civilizers of the savage natives. They have no interest in integration, their identity is directly opposed to the idea, their identity is British, they maintain a deliberately foreign identity.
    If they view themselves as a foreign entity then it's only logical that they belong to a foreign government? Similarly to the way that as soon as British colonists stopped viewing themselves as British they set up independence movements in favour of USA/Canada/Australia. Regardless of the where the moral high ground was in the 1600s/1920s, the majority of the Northern Irish population would rather be governed by the UK than the Republic of Ireland.
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  11. #31
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Dude with the Food View Post
    the majority of the Northern Irish population would rather be governed by the UK than the Republic of Ireland.
    Sure, but they literally had to invent a brand new border to ensure an area would have an engineered majority.
    There are areas in London where the majority would rather be governed by Shariah Law. Regardless of where the moral high ground is: the majority wants it. Foreigners refusing to integrate isn't unique to Northern Ireland, what's unique is the military they can call upon to justify their refusal to integrate: might makes right after all.

    Perhaps you don't think might makes right: If the actions of Irish partition are justified based on the principles you have stated, then the same must be done for those who desire Shariah Law in various pockets in the UK.
    The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so certain of themselves, but wiser people are full of doubts.
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  12. #32

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Himster View Post
    Sure, but they literally had to invent a brand new border to ensure an area would have an engineered majority.
    There are areas in London where the majority would rather be governed by Shariah Law. Regardless of where the moral high ground is: the majority wants it. Foreigners refusing to integrate isn't unique to Northern Ireland, what's unique is the military they can call upon to justify their refusal to integrate: might makes right after all.

    Perhaps you don't think might makes right: If the actions of Irish partition are justified based on the principles you have stated, then the same must be done for those who desire Shariah Law in various pockets in the UK.
    Comparing the wants of a minute population of residents in the south of England to hundreds of thousands of Northern Irish-born nationals seems a little contextually far fetched. Northern Ireland is already an established nation - be realistic.

    The general retort from the unionist side is, as you've mentioned, one of firmly splitting themselves apart from the Irish identity. However, the majority of people in Northern Ireland still wish to remain part of the UK and partly be seen as British despite being a part of Éire. That said I remember seeing in the Belfast Telegraph a fair while ago a poll which highlighted the new phenomenon of people choosing to identify as Northern Irish instead of British or Irish - something I've even come across myself. Don't be jumping to conclusions for the sake of trying to justify your own argument though.

    If you're looking to force the majority of the population into something against their will then read up how well that's turned out in practice. The million dollar question from a nationalist perspective though would be how to democratically convince or shift the opinion without causing further violence - answers on a postcard.
    Last edited by Guy; November 17, 2016 at 03:13 AM.
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  13. #33
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    I'm going to copy paste my response to a very similar thread that Enros created not too long ago;

    http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...1#post15098221

    This post got me some +rep as well as Pike Stance and Oda's endorsements that got me my TWC Citizenship, so I think itt's a more fitting response than anything I can come up with off the bat at the moment


    ''When I was younger and less well informed I would have been in agreement with you Enro's, English + colonists = bad, native Irish = good. However with the wisdom granted by age (and more importantly a degree and a masters) I know now that the reality is far from clear cut.

    Many Native Irish Catholics played a significant part in assisting the English in their conquests, be they Gaelic lords pledging their allegiance to the crown or individual mercenaries fighting for money against their own people, so it's simply inaccurate to blame everything on the English and the colonists. Take for example the battle of the yellow ford (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Yellow_Ford) considered by many to be one of the greatest native victories over crown forces; at least half of the 'English' force were made up of Irish Catholics who were either mercenaries or levies.

    While the Gaelic nobility had a common enemy in the English/Colonists, they generally spent most of their time and efforts fighting each other. On the rare occasion's when the Gaelic nobility were united under one banner (and they were pretty damn rare when you consider that the Normans landed in Ireland in 1169 and Ireland wasn't fully conquered until 1601 with the conclusion of the 9 years war) they managed to give the English a serious headache and even reconquered vast swaths of land on more than one occasion. But such events were few and far between, so the treachery and disunity of the Irish nobility had as much to do with the colonization as the dastardly evil English did

    The English were ruthless and committed many acts of barbarity and ethnic cleansing, but they were not uniquely evil for the time period and the Irish are not blameless either. In virtually every war and rebellion throughout Irish history during the period of English occupation and colonization, civilian colonists were seen as legitimate targets and would often get massacred. Here's two of the more notable examples; 12,000 protestants killed in the rebellion of 1641 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_...ster_massacres) and the Scullabogue massacre where 200ish protestants were crowded into a barn which was then set on fire (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scullabogue_Barn_massacre).

    I have no doubt in my mind that if the Irish nobility had successfully driven out the english during the 9 years war or if any of the major rebellions that happened there after had been successful the above mentioned massacres would have paled in comparison. The Catholic Irish may have been perfectly justified in their desire to get rid of English/Scottish colonists, but the result would still have been the brutal massacre of tens, if not hundreds of thousands, of men women and children. The English may have been pretty heinous, but we were no angels either

    As for the specific topic of the Partition of Ireland, I believe that it was a necessity, but that it was very, VERY, badly carried out. Those hundreds of thousands of heavily militarized Ulster protestants would simply have refused to accept the authority of the new Irish state and that would have led to a civil war beyond the scope of anything Ireland had seen before. The civil war we had IRL was already pretty bad and cost the country a hell of a lot (the aftermath still effects Irish politics today for feck sake!), can you imagine how much worse it would have been if it became an all out sectarian war between two well organized paramilitaries that would easily number in the hundreds of thousands? That's assuming that the English don't immediately side with the Unionists and simply crush the fledgling Irish state.

    Northern Ireland had to be partitioned, but the way they went about it was a disaster. Large swaths of predominantly Catholic areas such as Derry City, Tyrone, Fermanagh, South Armagh, etc should have remained within the new Republic. They were attached to northern Ireland as the division was done on the basis of the existing county administrative boundaries rather than properly taking into account the local religious/ethnic make up of the areas and was primarily done to make the new Northern Irish state as economically feasible as possible (something of joke really as N. Ireland has been a net burden on the UK economy since before WW2).

    Then of course you had the Irish Catholics left in the Northern Irish state who were treated as second class citizens and would continue to be treated as such until the troubles petered out in the 1980's-1990's. That was a recipe for disaster from the very start and is probably one of the most deplorable aspects of the Partition as a whole as it led directly to the Troubles and all the bloodshed and violence associated with it.

    Had the partition been much smaller, accurately representing the religious and ethnic make up of the area so that large swaths of Catholic populations did not end up in a Protestant controlled state and if the remaining Catholics within Northern Ireland been given equal rights from the get go, then the partition would have been the best possible outcome for all parties. However, that's just not how it played out unfortunately.

    No, simply put, that many people cannot be forced to join a nation without there being A LOT of bloodshed. The only way a united Ireland will ever come to pass is through peaceful reintegration via a referendum, which is something that may actually come to pass in the not so distant future due to the UK leaving the EU, while N. Ireland voted to remain. There have been growing calls from both sides of the border for a referendum to take place, so who knows what might happen! ''

  14. #34
    Himster's Avatar Praeses
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Guy View Post
    Comparing the wants of a minute population of residents in the south of England to hundreds of thousands of Northern Irish-born nationals seems a little contextually far fetched. Northern Ireland is already an established nation - be realistic.
    There are 3 million Muslims in the UK, 23% want sharia law: that's hundreds of thousands directly opposed to the common consensus. Just as there were hundreds of thousands objecting to the common consensus of the Irish people used as a justification for partition.
    Yet, it's interesting that one group's refusal to integrate is "justified" grounds for partition, but not so for the other.

    However, the majority of people in Northern Ireland still wish to remain part of the UK and partly be seen as British despite being a part of Éire.
    How interesting.
    Asking a thief if he'd like to keep what he's stolen and is answer is "Yes, I'd like to keep it." Who would have possibly thought such an eventuality so unexpected as to be even remotely note worthy?

    That said I remember seeing in the Belfast Telegraph a fair while ago a poll which highlighted the new phenomenon of people choosing to identify as Northern Irish instead of British or Irish - something I've even come across myself. Don't be jumping to conclusions for the sake of trying to justify your own argument though.
    Yes, we've discussed this before and we both agreed that this is new and possibly an avenue towards a lasting peace, you might recall. But it has been apparently stalled of late, thank you Brexit. Back to the same old same old.

    If you're looking to force the majority of the population into something against their will then read up how well that's turned out in practice.
    They're a minority in Ireland.
    The act of artificially making them a technical majority from a particularly skewed perspective is the primary cause of the entire conflict.

    The million dollar question from a nationalist perspective though would be how to democratically convince or shift the opinion without causing further violence - answers on a postcard.
    No matter what is done: nothing will end the violence as long as British occupation continues. Ending British occupation would obviously incur violence, maintaining British occupation will also incur violence. The deck is stacked. Extended violence for another thousand years or more, or a short spat of exceptional violence as foreign insurgents are repatriated home.
    Jaysus, it's like choosing between Hillary and Trump again.
    Last edited by Iskar; November 17, 2016 at 12:49 PM. Reason: masla d'fhan masla, i nGaeilge fiú (pretty sure I messed up the grammar)
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  15. #35

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Guy View Post
    The million dollar question from a nationalist perspective though would be how to democratically convince or shift the opinion without causing further violence - answers on a postcard.
    I would be fine without a united Ireland if Britain admitted the troubles were caused by their oppression and ethnic cleansing of nationalists 1922-1975, apologized for the terrible crimes they committed against the Irish nation, and declared that the partition of Ireland was against the principles of democracy. They also have to pay compensation to all of the refugees who fled Northern Ireland during the Troubles, the victims of internment, and the victims of voter suppression and other state discrimination (such as the nationalist population of Derry). If they did all of that but added "for realist reasons we cannot have a united Ireland now because there will be violence, but every UK party will begin canvassing for a united Ireland sometime in the distant future", I wouldn't mind. Why won't the British ever do that? Why won't you support that, Ferrets54?
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    You need to focus a bit better than you did last time. Claiming that the British Army ran "death squads to randomly kill several hundred Irish civilians" is not the same as the conflicts that occurred a hundred years ago during the Irish War of Independence, and certainly cannot be generalised in comparison to the entire duration of the Troubles in the latter half of the last century.

    As for the MRF you utterly failed to provide evidence of this in your last thread. As far as we got is that the British authorities have not investigated because there is no evidence to investigate. If you have new sources, go ahead - but you'll forgive me if I reject any Wikipedia articles that you share.
    You don't seem to be familiar with how the burden of proof works in when discussing social justice. It's not like science where it lies on the one making the claim. If someone claims to be oppressed, they don't have to prove it. Others have to verify it themselves. This follows from the very simple truism that no oppressed groups should have to prove anything to anyone.

    The mass murder of Irish civilians by the British security forces in Northern Ireland is well documented. Google is your friend. Panorama did a good program about it.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    A paragraph of worthless speculation, that again is an attempt to justify the repugnant disenfranchisement of peoples' democratic rights.

    This is again the argument we should disenfranchise modern voters because of historical events, which is repugnant and all intelligent people on both sides reject.
    40 years ago your country put thousands of people like me in internment camps for the crime of merely existing. Your country also engaged in sectarian voter suppression and state discrimination. The purpose of this discrimination was ethnic cleansing - to force the native Irish to leave their homes as refugees. 60% of the population are old enough to remember this.

    Because of Britain's horrific crimes of aggressive war and ethnic cleansing against Ireland which most people are old enough to remember (and against other countries in the same time frame, such as the British Indian Ocean Territory), Britain must cede territory as a punishment. It must cede Northern Ireland and several of its overseas territories to the groups they belong to that have been the victims of genocidal British policies. It must cede these territories because it never had a right to them in the first place. As a British person you should be extremely supportive of this idea. I certainly would be because I'm a strong believer in justice and don't believe myself to be part of a master race. Don't think I'm not as supportive of groups who have been victimized by the Irish government.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    No it isn't. It's based on the democratic mandate that was granted to the Good Friday Agreement between the Governments of the UK and Ireland. An agreement that has been hailed by both sides as a huge achievement and has granted the most stable and enduring period of peace in a century.
    An unequal treaty forced on Ireland by the threat of violence. I would actually have voted for it myself for the sake of peace despite believing it to be tremendously unjust. That's how bad Britain is. I have discussed it with my parents and their others of their generation who did vote it, though they all agreed Northern Ireland is a colony. This is a tremendously common view in Ireland, so much that every single political party caters to it.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    Yes, I know. You're racist towards British people. I just wish you didn't waste both our time by pretending otherwise in this thread.
    Poor British people. I feel so sad.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    Your thread title is literally that people should be forced into doing things regardless of what they want. God, you're such a push over in these threads mate.
    Democracy is all about forcing people to do what they don't want. Scotland doesn't want to leave the EU. A democratic vote means they'll have to. If NI doesn't want to join Ireland but a democratic vote is for unity, then that's what it will be. Any constituency smaller than the island of Ireland is gerrymandering and is against democracy.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    All of the Northern Irish population, more or less, regardless of their religion, are Irish. Don't be racist by telling people who they can and cannot be. In the last thread you were repeatedly made to acknowledge the British Government actively attempted to protect Catholics from corrupt Protestant Government officials in Northern Ireland, eventually dissolving the whole NI Parliament to achieve this.
    They don't want to be Irish and they don't identify as Irish. They call themselves British and not Irish. Because that's what they are. This is not racism.

    This is about identity. Many of the unionists are of Irish descent but identify as British settlers, so that's what they are. Many of the native Irish are of British descent butidentify as Irish. Who can tell them otherwise? There's a lot of admixture. Not that it matters how people identify. I don't care if people identify as British settlers in a united Ireland.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    Modern Northern Irish would be the victims under your policy. It's unacceptable, to both sides of this issue. You are an extremist.
    They aren't the victims if it's a democratic vote. If the whole island of Ireland votes for reunification, then that's a democratic decision. Any vote in an area smaller than the whole island is gerrymandering and not democracy.

    Quote Originally Posted by Hazzard View Post
    So Enros, how long does a family have to inhabit an island before they fully integrate? Are you saying that every non-white immigrant to Ireland, and a decent chunk of the white ones will never properly be irish? What's your policy for them?

    Edit: What happens to people who come from mixed families? Or the Protestants who supported Irish Nationalism? Do they get forced back to "home" as well?
    Ireland is a lot less racist than Britain. In Ireland teenage scum sometimes call brown people names. In Britain the government commits ethnic cleansing against brown people. That's how the naval base on Diego Garcia was built.

    The Republic has a huge Protestant population who are extremely nationalistic and support the idea of a United Ireland (like the entire Irish political spectrum). Why would I want to kick them out? Unlike the British government I am not a sectarian hell bent on ethnically cleansing people who have a different imaginary friend. I don't want to deport anyone from anywhere. I refer to the unionists are British settlers, but that doesn't mean I want to evict them.
    Quote Originally Posted by Hazzard View Post
    I don't think anyone here will endorse the endless rivers of blood that were spilled as Unionists and Nationalists murdered each other over the 20th century and earlier. But now that the Protestants in Northern Ireland have been there for longer than most nation-states around today. If they can't be considered to be at home, then nobody is
    The endless rivers of blood spilled due to British attempts to ethnically cleanse Irish people from Northern Ireland during the 53 year period 1922-1975. Your government is the most guilty entity in the Northern Ireland conflict.

    Quote Originally Posted by Dude with the Food View Post
    Regardless of the where the moral high ground was in the 1600s/1920s, the majority of the Northern Irish population would rather be governed by the UK than the Republic of Ireland.
    It's nothing to do with the 1920s. 60% of Irish people are old enough to remember being put into internment camps and prevented from voting. You must agree that Britain is an evil terrorist regime that must be punished for this.

    The majority of the island of Ireland would prefer to be united. That's the only democratic decision. Unless you think the pro-independence parts of Scotland can leave the UK even though they lost the independence referendum?
    Last edited by Enros; November 17, 2016 at 10:22 PM.

  16. #36

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Ferrets54 View Post
    At this point, I would bring up that the last major thread in which Enros wanted to talk about British "death squads", and was pressured to produce evidence from them existing, Enros was exposed engaging in Wikipedia vandalism, actively changing the articles on the Troubles and other matters to fit his agenda. At that time he promised to quit the forum after his thread ended in the forum widely mocking him over this tactic.
    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    You don't seem to be familiar with how the burden of proof works in when discussing social justice. It's not like science where it lies on the one making the claim. If someone claims to be oppressed, they don't have to prove it.
    Not sure what is funnier, that absolute roast or the nonsense post about social justice. I feel oppressed by this post, I demand it be shut down regardless of what anyone else wants!

    Irish reunification should happen if that's what the people want. That's how government works, a representative will of the people. People that claim to know what is better for someone else by the mere reasoning of "I know better than you" are no different than people who claim rule by divine right.
    Last edited by tgoodenow; November 18, 2016 at 12:04 AM.

  17. #37
    IrishBlood's Avatar GIVE THEM BLIZZARDS!
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by tgoodenow View Post
    Not sure what is funnier, that absolute roast or the nonsense post about social justice. I feel oppressed by this post, I demand it be shut down regardless of what anyone else wants!

    Irish reunification should happen if that's what the people want. That's how government works, a representative will of the people. People that claim to know what is better for someone else by the mere reasoning of "I know better than you" are no different than people who claim rule by divine right.
    Agreed, the people need to vote on it. Any other resolution of the matter will lead to further bloodshed. It would be nice if the British government apologized for the abhorrent actions of their predecessors, but as a political realist I know this will not happen. Nor does it even need to happen.

    A democratic referendum (preferably monitored by neutral international monitors, lets say the Swiss and the Mongolians ) by the people of Northern Ireland is the only way forward.

    Also Enro's, to my knowledge they're are few, if any, British troops left in Northern Ireland. Day to day policing and security operations are carried out by the Police Service Northern Ireland (PSNI), an organization which Catholics are now able to join.
    It would (thankfully) be extremely rare to see British troops patrolling the streets of NI any more.

    I will admit however that there is a large disparity in the police service whereby Protestants are dis-proportionally represented, particularly in terms of higher ranking positions. This is something that needs to be remedied. However a contributing factor to this is no doubt the ingrained distrust/hatred of the Police Service by the majority of the Catholic community as it was the 'first line of defence' that the Protestant government(s) traditionally used for repressing them.

    http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/ne...-35023903.html

  18. #38

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    You don't seem to be familiar with how the burden of proof works in when discussing social justice. It's not like science where it lies on the one making the claim. If someone claims to be oppressed, they don't have to prove it.
    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    They aren't the victims if it's a democratic vote.
    What if they claim they are?
    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    You don't seem to be familiar with how the burden of proof works in when discussing social justice. It's not like science where it lies on the one making the claim. If someone claims to be oppressed, they don't have to prove it.


  19. #39

    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by sumskilz View Post
    What if they claim they are?
    They do claim they are the victims of oppression. And they don't have to go to any effort to back up their claim. It's up to us to check the facts without them having to do anything else. I did the right the thing and investigated their claims. I have decided that they are not oppressed.

    We don't expect the victims of crimes to prove that they were victimized. That would be an evil burden to saddle on someone who is already a victim. The police investigation and public prosecutor will do that for them. Similarly, we shouldn't expect the victims of oppression to prove anything like that either. People who doubt it should investigate the matter themselves.
    Last edited by Enros; November 18, 2016 at 04:36 PM.

  20. #40
    Dude with the Food's Avatar Campidoctor
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    Default Re: Irish reunification must happen regardless of what Northern Ireland wants

    Quote Originally Posted by Enros View Post
    They do claim they are the victims of oppression. And they don't have to go to any effort to back up their claim. It's up to us to check the facts without them having to do anything else. I did the right the thing and investigated their claims. I have decided that they are not oppressed.

    On what legally recognized ground can you make that decision? Be British, Irish, EU or UN law?


    We don't expect the victims of crimes to prove that they were victimized. That would be an evil burden to saddle on someone who is already a victim. The police investigation and public prosecutor will do that for them. Similarly, we shouldn't expect the victims of oppression to prove anything like that either. People who doubt it should investigate the matter themselves.

    You're making the assumption that someone who claims to be a victim is a victim.


    An unequal treaty forced on Ireland by the threat of violence. I would actually have voted for it myself for the sake of peace despite believing it to be tremendously unjust. That's how bad Britain is. I have discussed it with my parents and their others of their generation who did vote it, though they all agreed Northern Ireland is a colony. This is a tremendously common view in Ireland, so much that every single political party caters to it.
    However many living people still remember the acts of racism and violence, the actual colonization process took place in the 1600s as has already been mentioned in this thread. At a similar historical period to the establishment of colonies in America. Should the entire White population of North America be deported back to Europe regardless of what they would democratically vote for? The idea of independent native American nations has gone beyond unrealistic to the point of being irrelevant and a unified Ireland is heading a similar way - even if Northern Ireland secedes from the UK there's no longer any guarantee it wouldn't be an independent country with a capital at Belfast rather than Dublin. The fact is the population are natives and not colonists.

    They aren't the victims if it's a democratic vote. If the whole island of Ireland votes for reunification, then that's a democratic decision. Any vote in an area smaller than the whole island is gerrymandering and not democracy.
    What if the whole of Northern Ireland votes to remain a part of Britain? By forcing them to accept the will of a foreign country you have essentially become an invader and then you end up with civil war and decades more filled with violence and hate crimes that only serve to increase divisions in society.

    Secondly, in the Scottish independence referendum, only Scotland voted. Shouldn't the whole island vote considering their independence would have affected all of the UK? Otherwise it's like you said, it's gerrymandering.

    Thirdly, Northern Ireland sits in the middle of a Venn diagram with culturally Irish on one side and politically British on the other. If Ireland reunifies, it will only do so under the mutual agreement of each group independently. A democratic vote involving two but only two of these groups is gerrymandering, discrimination and not at all democratic. However, any vote that includes all three groups is skewed in favour of the larger population of Britain and renders any decision reached in both Northern and Southern Ireland completely irrelevant. Democracy is about making all voices relevant and the Northern Irish opinion about heir own state is the most relevant. Therefore the only democratic decision that can be reached is by letting them and only them vote on their independence. Only if the conclusion of that vote is secession from the UK do the opinions of the secondary demographics (the Republic of Ireland and the rest of the UK) become relevant. If they voted remain then the best possible situation is to not reopen old wounds by forcing upon them the will of a foreign nation. That, by the way, is an invasion.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
    I am me. You are not me. You are you. If I was you, I wouldn't be me.
    If you were me, I'd be sad.But I wouldn't then be me because you'd be me so you wouldn't be me because I wasn't me because you were me but you couldn't be because I'd be a different me. I'd rather be any kind of bird (apart from a goose) than be you because to be you I'd have to not be me which I couldn't do unless someone else was me but then they would be you aswell so there would still be no me. They would be you because I was you so to restore balance you would have to be me and them meaning all three of us would become one continously the same. That would be very bad.


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