I submitted the Guest Opinion below to the Daily Camera about three weeks ago. I am not sure why it wasn't published- probably because they have a policy where in any rolling 365-day period no one can get more than four Guest Opinions published, and I think I had about 1-2 months left before it started over for me. The essay is a little TOO honest about something- I AM behind on staying informed about political developments here. I kind of HAD to say that, at least because of my Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
I think it has some potential, more or less, to get more Irish-Americans to support immigrants, and to emphasize that for some reason(s) we are not hearing about white undocumented immigrants being deported.
Tom
I am a bit behind on reading articles about current events and politics, but I did some research for this, I have a 2003 CU-Boulder BA in Ethnic Studies, and I was with the “Irish Solidarity Movement” in America between 1997 and ending somewhere 2005-2020 (the ISM were people, some non-white, concerned about Northern Ireland Catholics).
Because I am about 2.5 months behind (I have a system where, for example, I save today’s articles until I read yesterday’s articles) I only just now read something that concerns me greatly. GOPers, including many in the Trump administration, are expressing hostility towards the Mexican flag, which has become prominent at many recent protests in America.
The main thing that needs to be said is that I don’t hear any GOPers complaining about the display of the Irish flag at US demonstrations, etc. in the 70s, 80s, 90s. For about a year in college I displayed a very visible Irish flag outside my house. I took it once in the late 1990s to a progressive pro-Zapatista protest at the Mexican consulate in Denver and was welcomed.
I haven’t heard anything from GOPers about how in Colorado (and maybe elsewhere) there are special license plates you can get that have the Italian flag and a note that the driver is Italian-American. And the thing is, that statement, especially in the Denver area, could be described as incredibly offensive. I don’t know much about this parade post- 2000, but I am sure that many people with that license plate were involved with or supported the Denver Columbus Day parade, which was a celebration of the genocide of American Indians. I have not heard of American Indians and their allies denouncing those license plates as racist and trying to get them banned- but I wouldn’t blame them if they tried. Genocide is A LOT worse than the worst thing Mexico has done to the US.
Going back to Ireland and The Troubles, it wasn’t just British patriots who said that when Americans displayed the Irish flag, it was often in support of what some mislabeled a “terrorist” organization- the Irish Republican Army (the one associated in the past with Gerry Adams, and the one that bent over backwards around 2000 to help the Peace Process). I have, in an April 2014 post on my blog, proven objectively that the IRA were not terrorists (that is, I explain in detail the math and analysis involved). There is no Mexican organization attacking the US the way that the IRA attacked the British, and most of the people angered by the Mexican flag being displayed here would never feel that way about the Irish flag.
There are strong connections between the Irish struggle and the chicana/o movement here. A veteran chicano Denver activist I used to know named Leo Griep-Ruiuz told me that “politically aware” chicanos don’t think it’s a coincidence that IRA member Bobby Sands died on hunger strike MAY 5TH 1981. In 1998 or 1999 I attended a Cinco de Mayo fund-raiser in Denver for the Chiapas Coalition (which was supporting the Zapatistas in Mexico). I asked if I could speak for a couple minutes about Bobby Sands and they agreed. The audience, probably hundreds of Zapatista supporters, responded very positively.
I have also been wondering, have there been any white undocumented immigrants arrested and deported in the last 7 months? Between the fact that I HAVE read a TON of articles about Trump’s agenda between January and June and I recently consulted some friends, I get the impression that there haven’t been so many that it would reflect their numbers here, or any at all. Specifically, any Irish? I know that there must be a lot of undocumented Irish here, partly from the fact that around 10-20 years ago at least two large Irish political parties (SF and Labour) frequently called for legalizing them. Various other facts I’ve come across also contribute to my certainty that there is a substantial population of them.
The double standard we see among GOPers when it comes to Mexicans on one hand and the Irish on the other, is simply racist.
