Law and Order: SVU Reviews W

  This is a set of reviews of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episodes. My general thoughts about that show are here. I’ll often do no more than make brief notes about an episode, although occasionally I’ll go deeper. Also, often there are dissenting main characters on almost any political issue, but you can usually tell what the general position of the show is. All the rest of the reviews are available by clicking on the l&osvu label at the bottom.

(Now that I’m watching the episodes that involve the character John Munch, I’m going to ignore most of his political statements)

(These are the four reviews I had postponed earlier)

“Grief” Season 4. Wikipedia summary is: “A waitress is found dead outside of a bar. Her death is ruled a suicide because the victim's boss (Paul Leyden) continually raped her and drove her into depression. When the victim's father (Joe Morton) becomes too close to Stabler, the victim's father snaps and vows revenge against his daughter's rapist.”

At one point a suspect (who is later cleared as innocent) refers to the 1997 NYPD rape of Abner Louima with the handle of a broom or toilet plunger. Even though it came from a suspect, it’s still worth mentioning as an example of what’s liberal or progressive on the show because about 5-10 episodes earlier there was another episode that was clearly inspired by what happened to Louima. I’m sure the reference to Louima in this episode was meant to remind people what the NYPD did In reality.

“Debt” Season 6. Wikipedia summary is: “A child abandonment incident prompts Benson and Stabler to investigate the disappearance of a mother. They learn from her sister (Ming-Na Wen) that she made a deal with human traffickers to have her teenage daughter (Jenny Wong) smuggled to New York from China. It is revealed that the teenage immigrant has been forced into prostitution and her life is subsequently used as a bargaining chip by the gangsters to avoid prosecution. When the squad captures the gang's leader (Jack Yang), Detective Stabler is able to get help from one of his junior members (Aaron Yoo) by convincing him that the bright future he was promised is a lie. After arresting a corrupt immigration attorney (Loren Dean), the NYPD finally learns where the captive women are being held. Detective Stabler arrives just in time to keep the promise he made.”

There are five things I want to comment on:
1) I was reminded recently by CNN that there is a stereotype of Asian women of being both hyper-sexual and also submissive. There is something about how non-Asian men see Asian women in this episode.
2) At one point the detectives assure immigrants that they come into contact with during the investigation that they aren’t Immigration officers.
3) I recently learned from a good source something that a more recent episode of SVU implied- that the “coyotes” who help people cross the US-Mexico border illegally are often bad and dangerous people. This episode said the same sort of thing about Chinese criminal organizations that help Chinese enter America illegally. I’m pretty sure that it’s a fair and accurate illustration of such criminals and it’s good for pro-immigrant forces (like Law and Order: SVU) to occasionally criticize them- I imagine that anti-immigrant forces would love to accuse us of liking coyotes because we’d look pretty stupid if we did like them.
4) For the second time recently a law enforcement officer on the show says that Chinatown doesn’t like cops, although it’s not clear why- do they fear gangs in Chinatown, or do they not like the police for roughly the same reason police are usually unwelcome in the Black community?
5) At one point one of the detectives offers the “we’re a nation of immigrants” argument in support of the pro-immigrant position. It’s not the worst thing I’ve heard, but when you think of American Indians and almost all black Americans, it’s a bad argument in favor of a good position.

“Ghost” Season 6. Wikipedia summary is: “A series of drug-related hits leads the detectives back to the notorious drug lord Cesar Velez. The detectives are left with one survivor (Reymond Wittman), a scared child whom the drug lords are trying to finish off. The gun used in the murders is linked to Liam Connors (Brían F. O'Byrne), one of Velez's top agents. Connors has a strong defense which almost gets him acquitted until Benson and Stabler arrest him for trying to kill ADA Alexandra Cabot a year earlier. Alex returns from witness protection to assist with the case.”

The drug cartel’s asassin is a former IRA member who drifted away from the cause because of the cease-fire and started working for the drug cartel. Through a character the writers say that a lot of former Volunteers did that. This is more or less total nonsense. It’s probably inspired by the case of the “Columbia Three,” three men who were members of Sinn Fein and/or the IRA that were arrested in Aug. of 2001 leaving that part of the Columbian jungle controlled at the time by the FARC, the largest left-wing insurgent army in Columbia’s civil war. They were accused of helping the FARC. I don’t know for sure what they were doing, but for a lot of reasons I doubt they were helping the FARC. There was a lot of concern in Ireland about the conditions they were living in in a Columbian prison- so much that there were multiple delegations of politicians and human rights activists with no connection to the IRA traveling to Columbia to investigate those conditions. My theory is that they were there to learn from the FARC about the military aspect of a peace process- there was such a process going on in Columbia and the FARC were participating in it.

There’s a scene with an Irish-American supporter of SF who is accused of raising money for the IRA- it’s not clear that he wasn’t doing both- supporting SF and the IRA, although it seems like the detectives were just being lazy and conflating SF and the IRA. Anyway, this guy said that SF are “fighting for peace in Ireland.” The thing is, SF and the IRA bent over backwards to make the peace process work. They compromised when they would have been justified in refusing to do so. The Good Friday Agreement is alright but should have been much better. The IRA also would have been justified in refusing to decommission until after Ireland was united. The ANC’s military wing didn’t decommission their weapons until there was major progress on ending Apartheid- I think it was after the 1994 election that was won by the ANC.

“Night” and “Day”, Season 6 SVU, and Season 1 Law and Order: Trial by Jury. Wikipedia summaries are, respectively,

“Benson and Stabler investigate the rape and murder of a woman found with a wad of money stuffed in her mouth. They trace the money to a lawyer (Bradley Cooper) handling the finances of a wealthy family. The woman (Angela Lansbury) demands that the detectives stay away from her son (Alfred Molina) even though they suspect that he preys on illegal immigrants who do not report the crimes out of fear of getting deported. The people are short on evidence until a Bosnian immigrant has the courage to come forward. Angry about exposing the fact that she was raped, her brother (Stelio Savante), an Islamic fundamentalist, brutally assaults ADA Casey Novak.”

And

“ADA Kibre works to prosecute a serial rapist (Alfred Molina), whose trail of victims through the years has been whitewashed by his wealthy and protective mother (Angela Lansbury). Kibre must also overcome witness intimidation, and even sees her crucial DNA evidence tossed out, but the slippery suspect's lawyer has yet another surprise up his sleeve.”

Although they end up focusing on only one rape, they believe that their suspect is guilty of a string of rapes of working-poor undocumented immigrants. At one point SVU detectives make it clear that they aren’t concerned about the immigration status of witnesses and victims. A community activist who tells them about the string of rapes accuses the NYPD of not caring about them, but the rape survivors aren’t going to the police because of their immigration status, and it’s believed that’s why the rapist is targeting them. It's just one more reason to oppose anti-immigrant politics.

The one rape survivor whose case is prosecuted is a white muslim from Bosnia who sometimes wears a scarf over her hair but usually doesn’t. I’m not the sort of progressive who believes that every Muslim woman who dresses conservatively is a victim of patriarchy, but it’s nice to see a muslim character who appears to be religious but is flexible about it.

The brother of that woman says he was tortured by Bosnian Serbs in the Bosnian War. And one of the rape survivors is a Catholic from Belfast who refers to The Troubles as an “uprising.” I haven’t typed much stuff about N. Ireland in the last year but you can find the posts largely or totally about that topic here.

Brexit, A Hard Border, and Irish Unity

You should read this. It's about the Northern Ireland aspect of Brexit, the departure from the EU of the UK. While reading my thoughts below, you should also read this. It's about how a "hard border" between the two parts of Ireland might violate the letter and certainly violates the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement. It doesn't mention that much of the business community, probably the vast majority, in both parts of Ireland oppose a hard border

I might be over-reacting, but there might be a new push for Irish unity soon. Besides Sinn Fein's success in the South, and the growth of Nationalist political strength in the North, there's also Brexit, and since a majority of N. Ireland voters voted to remain in the EU, there were definitely some Unionists who voted to remain (of 11 unionst MPs at the time, one opposed Brexit). Although the SF Deputy First Minister did at one point express opposition to a border between GB and NI, I think that might be because it was difficult for her to avoid since the First Minister and a large chunk, probably a majority of NI's business community oppose a border in the Irish sea (I've read that SF opposes it for different reasons than the DUP have for opposing it, but I just found something on the SF web-site indicating they might be sort of in favor of it) but SF definitely opposes a hard border in Ireland and and I think they probably realize that the EU will not accept a soft border in Ireland without a border in the Irish Sea. SF and the Social Democratic and Labour Party opposed Brexit. And the EU seems pissed about what London might be intending to do, and might strongly suggest that the situation be resolved by uniting Ireland (I believe it should be a 30 year process, but it should start ASAP).

UPDATE 3/5/20 I could swear I read somewhere that a senior DUP politician, perhaps Arlene Foster (leader of the DUP) said that a border in the Irish Sea would be the end of the Good Friday Agreement. I just found an article where a senior DUP politician says that the spirit of the GFA would be threatened by such a border. And I also just found an article where Foster said that there is so much opposition to such a border in the unionist community that there could be violence from that community, and although she didn't specify this, she's probably talking about loyalist paramilitaries. IF the DUP do walk away from the GFA because of a border in the Irish Sea, that could easily see a resumption of republican violence. There is a chance that a "hard border" in Ireland would see a small increase in republican violence, which would probably result in loyalist violence and/or repressive activity by the security forces. Hopefully the EU and America can put enough pressure on the British to resolve this by uniting Ireland. Unfortunately, as I write here, it's possible that Trump won't give a shit what SF wants (UPDATE 3/7/20 also, it was just reported that he made his now former Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney his envoy to N. Ireland, and as far as I can tell, he doesn't like Mulvaney, and that makes me think that as flawed as his approach to the conflict would probably be, he also just doesn't care).

UPDATE 3/5/20 I stumbled across an Irish Times article about a December 2019 opinion poll of people in N. Ireland by the University of Liverpool, . The first relevant paragraph is:

In the 2016 Brexit vote Northern Ireland voted by 56 per cent to stay in the European Union. Excluding don’t knows, those who refused to say and those who would not vote, the survey found that now 63 per cent would vote to stay in the EU compared with 37 per cent who would vote to leave.

The second relevant paragraph is:

On checks on goods travelling between Britain and Northern Ireland, and between the North and the Republic, 68.5 per cent of those who stated an opinion believed they would be unacceptable.

(Full) Equality Denied

Although the Peace Process is probably secure for at least the next 2-3 years, there have been some spikes recently in terms of problems with equality for Catholics that are worth a post on this blog (there have been several other such times in the last 8 years that I said little or nothing about, but that’s largely because I wasn’t reading the Irish News, with more information than you get from the BBC, until Spring earlier this year). Besides the fact that the border is still there, there is still not total equality for Catholics in N. Ireland. Although this post is not an exhaustive list of that sort of thing in recent months and years, it pretty much covers all such issues in the last two weeks or so and covers a lot of stuff if you look back further than that.

1) July 12th is a major unionist holiday in N. Ireland and the night before most unionist areas have giant bonfires. In recent years and, I think, long before that Irish flags, effigies and election posters of both SF and SDLP politicians are often placed on the bonfire material before it’s lit. Recently attention has been drawn to the approving attitudes towards this of senior DUP members. (see this (as far as I can tell, the only response from anyone in the DUP has been defiance from former health minister Edwin Poots)). Although anti-sectarianism doesn’t demand this of them, SF is so committed to good community relations and the Peace Process that it has been opposed to burning Union Jacks for at least two years if not much longer.

2) A march in commemoration of the 1971 introduction of internment, something that was leveled brutally and almost exclusively at the Catholic population, took place Sunday Aug. 7th. It was organized by dissident republicans in Belfast but when they were banned by the Parades Commission from the city center, a SF MP, Paul Maskey said that it should be allowed into the city center (where according to the Irish News loyalists have marched in recent months).

3) Although there has been very little conflict (in terms of nationalist rioting or large-scale nationalist protests) around this in recent years, there is still the problem of loyal orders (especially the Orange Order) wanting to parade more or less through Catholic areas. To a small degree they (contentious marches allowed to go ahead) still happen here and there (at least 3-4 times in the last two years), and there is potential for it to become a serious problem next year. As far as why it’s wrong for such parades to go more or less through Catholic areas, see this.

4) In recent years Catholics have been about 50% more likely to be unemployed than Protestants. That’s much better than it was during and before the conflict, but still leaves something to be desired in terms of equality.


The Police Service of N. Ireland

A huge chunk of what I’m talking about is about the police. In general, I should say that although the 2011 census found that 45% of N. Ireland’s population had a Catholic ”background” (whether or not they believe in God, they are part of the Catholic community (they’re regarded as “culturally Catholic”)), in recent years only about 31% of police officers come from that part of the population (and only about 20% of police staff come from that community). That gap for police officers is narrower than it was during and before the conflict, but it’s still pretty large and I think one likely partial explanation for it is that there are likely still a lot of times that PSNI officers engage in “political policing” when dealing with Catholics, nationalists and republicans. That's partly based on some anecdotal evidence I've read in the recent past and partly based on a 06 June, 2016 article in the Irish News that reported on something probably relevant to this. In recent years average PSNI strength was about 7,500 officers and the Irish News said:

"In December The Irish News revealed Police Ombudsman had recommended disciplinary action or sanctions against an average of around 300 police officers in every year since 2010.

At the time the PSNI described the figure as "concerning", but added that it was working to reduce the number of Ombudsman complaints, which have averaged at around nine every day since 2010."

I don't know how many of these complaints are about hostility towards Catholics, nationalists, or republicans, but in any case it's fairly alarming.

(If you want some more of my thoughts about the police there, see this)

With that background in mind, there have been some fairly serious crises involving the police recently.

First, recently two offensive banners were put up in County Tyrone celebrating a deceased loyalist paramilitary leader- Billy Wright. One of the initial two banners referred to the killing by the UVF of three IRA members and one civilian in 1991. Despite a complaint about these banners by a member of the public, the police decided they were legal and said that some people wouldn’t be offended by them. This prompted outrage and an unheard of (in recent years) refusal by a senior SDLP politician to meet with a senior police officer (the one who had made the statement about offending people). The response of the police to these banners has also been compared with the removal by police in 2013 of a large sign in Enniskillen that was a derogatory statement about Margaret Thatcher around the time of her death.

Second, an independent (ex-SF) local councilor, Padraig McShane, was violently arrested at an Orange parade July 12th after getting into a confrontation with orange bandsmen who verbally attacked him in connection with an arson attack on his home in 2014. I haven’t heard anything about it in about 3 weeks, but the article I read said an SF assembly member was complaining to the police about the provocative behavior of the bandsmen who verbally attacked McShane.

if you want to go much deeper into this subject see the following:
https://www.policeombudsman.org/Investigation-Reports/Historical-Reports
https://www.policeombudsman.org/Investigation-Reports/Case-Studies
https://www.policeombudsman.org/Statistics-and-Research



So, the Statelet retains an Orange tinge here and there. I still believe it’s unlikely that Catholics will experience total, sustainable equality with Protestants in the British-occupied part of Ireland. Uniting Ireland should definitely still be towards the top of the agendas of progressives, republicans, and nationalists. I talk more in a post here about how Catholics have been treated and how a United Ireland would very likely not see the “tables turned” on Protestants and more generally about the argument in favor of uniting Ireland. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The KKK are Fools: Three more poems

I have three more poems. for a description of how and why I do these poems, see this.

1. Join The IRA. Guess what it's about.
2. No Surrender (to the KKK). Guess.
3. Orange Fools. About the broad Nationalist/Republican struggle in N. Ireland, only slightly pro-IRA.

For the rest of the poems click on the "lyrics" label at the bottom (there are at least four pages worth of posts, so click on the "older posts" at the bottom of the first page).

“Join The IRA” based on, “Join The Klan” by The Klansmen, original lyrics are here.

1. The Klansmen was a project of Ian Stuart Donaldson, who was a supporter of the British and Unionist causes in N. Ireland.
2. Volunteers are members of republican paramilitaries.
3. This is about the Provisional IRA (in recent decades known simply as the IRA) and is basically set during the Troubles, prior to 1997, and probably AFTER the mid-1970s, since it includes a lot of socialist talk and I don’t think there was a socialist majority in the leadership of the PIRA until sometime around 1980. Something at least close to revolution was on their agenda for around 15 years after that point. (in general it seems safe to say that SF’s politics more or less mirrored those of a majority of IRA members). Also, there’s reason to believe that the armed struggle of republicans inspired other forms of resistance (the African National Congress said that about their armed struggle in S. Africa). It refers to "the People" at the end and that's basically a reference to people who are more or less IRA supporters as described below.
4. The BA is the British Army.
5. James Connolly was Ireland’s greatest republican/socialist. Michael Collins was a major leader of the IRA during the War of Independence and has been credited with developing urban guerrilla warfare. Che is Che Gueverra, who has been credited with developing rural guerrilla warfare.
6. “Óglaigh na hÉireann” is the official name of the IRA and means “Irish Volunteers.”
7. In the Irish-British context, orange is the color of anti-Catholic bigotry.
8. Geographically, N. Ireland could sort of be called the north-east of Ireland.
9. I give this poem two stars out of five.
10. **68% of this version is me, 32% is the original.
11. UPDATE 5/14/12 The "People" was basically just the nationalist population, but they were the ones being oppressed and were 1/3 of the population (I'm not saying that entire 1/3 was in support of the IRA, but 40% of that population supported the IRA and probably around 40% KIND OF supported the IRA, and to either a large or small degree there was mass struggle).
12.  UPDATED 2/5/16 Based on what might be called a fairly scientific look, only about .2% of the IRA's operations intentionally resulted in civilian death.


be a Volunteer, fight for what is right
Socialist revolution, we will ignite
Fighting for the day, when the BA’s gone away
In the tradition of Connolly, Collins, and Che

Óglaigh na hÉireann, the people's Army
Freeing the country from the Brits and bourgeoisie
The orange terror raised it's ugly head
With the Provos, resistance became widespread

The Irish flag is held up high
James Connolly’s spirit will never die
The People are rising in the north-east
In battle the IRA takes on the beast

*****

“No Surrender (to the KKK)” based on “No Surrender (to the IRA) by Strikeforce UK, original lyrics are here.

1. This is about non-violent opposition to the Ku Klux Klan. Uusally the original lyrics my poems are based on leave little room for writing a poem like this, but I wanted to a poem about non-violent opposition to the Klan and this seemed like the best chance.
2. The original is by a racist band.
3. Fighting the Klan would partly involve, directly and directly trying to change their minds in various ways and alternative events during klan rallies, etc..
4. The line about David Duke is, in the original (with Gerry Adams instead) a reference to death. But in this version, it would be either prison, and/or isolation and defeat as his followers leave him.
5. This version is **37% me, and 63% the original.
6. I give this poem four stars out of five.
7. I know Duke technically isn’t a Klansman.

No surrender!

No surrender to the KKK
Across the US, defeating them is our crusade
We stand by the multi-racial working-class
The Klan’s hate and division, workers will surpass

Chorus:
No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the KKK
No surrender, no surrender, we’ll fight them every day
No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the Ku Klux Klan
No surrender, no surrender, we’ll fight until they understand

Their terrorist attacks are going on still
And they don't give a fuck who they maim and kill
David Duke better wave bye bye
Cos the Ku Klux Klan’s defeat is nigh

Chorus

No surrender!

We will smash that racist scum
No time to lose cos the battle's begun
We're loyal to the working-class and we're gonna win
We will not back down and we'll never give in

Chorus

*****

“Orange Fools” based on “Reds Are Fools” by Kill, Baby, Kill. The original lyrics are here.

1. This is set pretty much in July 2002.
2. The original is by a Belgian band. I’m not sure, but since there is probably close to zero Irish diaspora in Belgium, they probably agree with the late Ian Stuart Donaldson and support the British and Unionist causes in N. Ireland.
3. Although the vast majority of republicans have, to some degree, put the push for a United Ireland on hold, I’m sure all of that vast majority agree that the GFA is kind of a stepping stone to their goal.
4. Some things that indicate a continuing inequality for Catholics (the first two indicators were worse in 2002):
A: In 2010 Catholics were 50% more likely to be unemployed than Protestants.
B: I discuss some recent figures relevant to reforming the police in N. Ireland in the first five or so paragraphs of this post.
C: In the year before July 2002, there had been three sectarian murders of Catholic civilians and one murder of a Protestant civilian socializing with Catholic friends, all by loyalist paramilitaries. (The Ulster Defense Association was blamed by pretty much everyone, but the British government said their cease-fire was intact)
D: During the Marching Season of 2002 at least three times Orange parades were forced through Catholic areas and there were at least three times when nationalists protesting this were attacked by the police and the Army. (For why those marches shouldn't be forced through catholic areas, see this)

5. The Union Jack is the British flag.
6. The Good Friday Agreement, when considering the context and related elements, such as the use or absence of internment, is better than the earlier efforts at creating peace. As far as the actual text of the Agreement, republicans got: Prisoner releases (which would have been at least sort of important for probably about 80% of the Nationalist community); a stronger committment to reforming the police; and in general their inclusion without prior decommissioning by the IRA. More of my thoughts relevant to the GFA are in the first 1/3 of this post.
7. The Orange Order is an anti-Catholic group. More on them here.
8. Besides being anti-Catholic to one degree or another, a lot of Unionists are also racist. There’s some more of that in the first 1/2 of this post (I also read an article by an African-American who visited the North and he said that in a Unionist area he saw lots of Confederate flags).
9. The UDA is a Unionist death squad that overwhelmingly just killed Catholic civilians.
10. Orange in the British-Irish context, is the color of anti-Catholic bigotry. That line is about the beginning of the Troubles.
11. The Short Strand is a Catholic enclave surrounded by Unionist areas (and a river to the west). For some number of weeks in early-mid 2002, it was under siege. Although I think this went too far, a senior member of the moderate Social Democratic and Labour Party compared what was happening to the Short Strand with what happened to Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II. That line doesn’t mean that the IRA should have gone back to war.
12. Overwhelmingly, the enemy in the N. Ireland conflict is/was not the “Nazi clowns”- that last 1/3 of that line is simply an anti-fascist statement.
13. **61% of this version is me, 39% is the original.
14. I give this poem four stars out of five.
15. This is more or less about the broad anti-Unionist/Nationalist/Republican struggle with the sort of exception of the line about going to war, which is more specifically about the IRA.
16. UPDATE 2/9/13 In the third line of the third verse, I replaced THEY with MANY.

The struggle’s not over, we’ve got a long way to go.
We haven’t won our freedom yet, that's a fact that we all know.
There are still too many ways equality is denied,
but soon the truth will break free and unionism will die.

The Union Jack in Belfast is a symbol of oppression.
But after decades of resistance, we extracted some concessions
With bullshit propaganda the Orange Order kept people divided.
The unionist rich are to blame, for decades hate they incited

We’ll always fly the Irish flag, no matter what they try
Cause Unionists are bigots, Confederate flags they fly.
Many supported the UDA, a choice filled with hate
We’ll keep on working, till their bigotry we negate.

Orange Democracy was a lie, we had to go to war.
Now the Short Strand is under siege, a fact we can’t ignore.
Why are they still trying? They can’t keep us down.
Ireland belongs to the workers, the people, and not the Nazi clowns

Eyes On The Prize: Three More Poems

Below are three more poems. For an explanation of how and why I "write" the poems, see this.

For the rest of the poems click on the "lyrics" label at the bottom (there are at least four pages worth of posts, so click on the "older posts" at the bottom of the first page).

“Internment Night” based on “Fiery Cross” by Hate Society, original lyrics are here.

1. This is about the annual rioting on “Internment Night” in N. Ireland during the earlier years of the conflict (I'm not sure how much that has happened in the last 1-2 decades) (the rioting for some number of years was accompanied by creating bonfires (at least in 1988) in republican areas). I read that at some point, probably 15-20 years ago, a community festival in west Belfast was started partly to give teenagers something else to do instead of rioting. Is this poem meant as a criticism of the organizers of that festival? NOT AT ALL- as far as I can tell, that festival was/is a great idea, and of course it is/was anti-Unionist and anti-Imperialist and was therefore a form of resistance (considering the progress made so far with the Peace Process, I’m not sure if “resistance” is the right word for today). But I also believe that during the conflict, rioting was generally a good thing- it was closer to mass struggle than the IRA’s campaign. It was just one more way of resisting along with rallies, marches, the IRA, elections, etc.
2. The phrase, referring to POWs is usually “men behind the wire” but “fence” rhymed and made sense. 1971 was the first year of internment. There’s a good, academic summary about internment here.
3. Squaddies is a word for British soldier, peeler is a word for the police.
4. Provos are the Sinn Fein and the IRA that in recent decades have been called simply Sinn Fein and the IRA. I haven’t really nailed down when this takes place, so I’m not sure what to say about them being “on the rise.” It’s a bad line in what is a bad poem.
5. BA is the British Army, and they didn’t defeat the IRA.
6. The phrase “freedom’s seeds” is based on a republican song called “Your Daughters and Your Sons” (it's my favorite song). The idea is that the children of (for example) Catholics in N. Ireland were the seeds of freedom in the future.
7. The idea behind the 2nd line of the 2nd verse is that the rioting of youth could possibly be seen as a small taste of what the security forces would get from the IRA (there’s more than that, the rioting also was to some degree mass struggle).
8. Normalization was a part of Thatcher’s N. Ireland policy where they tried to convince people the war wasn’t having much of an effect on N. Ireland society. Although they were rioting very frequently for years before that, nationalist youth rioting could be seen as doing a pretty good job of undermining normalization.
9. I deleted the last verse for various reasons.
10. I give this poem two stars of five.
11. **71% of this version is me, 29% is the original.
12. The reference to fascism towards the very end. For the most part, you’re right- their enemy was not fascist. But they were anti-fascist youth.
13. The original is by an American band, and so I made a point of including some anti-fascist/right/bigot or pro-left (I explain that a bit more here). With this one, it’s the term “anti-fascist” (Overwhelmingly, the enemy in the N. Ireland conflict is/was not fascists- that part of that line is simply an anti-fascist statement).

They’ve been lighting their bon-fires for years as resistance
And remembering those in ‘71 taken behind the fence
Already rioted a hundred times and never were arrested,
the squaddies and peelers presence would not go uncontested

Chorus:
Fiery resistance still burning - lighting up the land!
Better watch out squaddie - the ‘RA will shoot you where you stand!
Fiery resistance still burning - lighting up the skies!
Better watch out peeler - the Provos are on the rise!

Another army the BA couldn’t defeat, they are freedom’s seeds
They will let the crown forces know, a warning they should heed
Anti-fascist youth in one struggle - an army of the poor
Rejecting normalization, it’s their battle in a people’s war

chorus

****

“We Are Standing” based on “They Stand Alone” by No Remorse, lyrics are here (not exactly what I used, but close).

1. The first verse is about “Operation Motorman,” a British offensive against no-go areas (Nationalist areas where the security forces couldn’t easily enter because of barricades and armed Volunteers (members of republican paramilitaries)) For more info, see this. At that point, in 1972, the British Army (BA) were in complete conflict with the nationalist community. I’m not sure if that means they were there to support the status quo since the regional government in Belfast had been suspended, and the BA wasn’t in complete lock-step with the Unionists. But they were continuing the oppression of the nationalist community. And a year earlier, they had carried out the internment operations demanded by the Unionists. And in 1974 they allowed the Unionists to bring down the power-sharing government. So it largely makes sense.
2. “Orange Jim Crow” is my way of referring to the anti-Catholic environment of N. Ireland back then (orange is the color of anti-Catholic bigotry in N. Ireland). In the period around 1972, there were still some Jim Crow-type laws, and certainly four years earlier they had them. You could also say that in some ways it continued up until somewhere around 10 years ago.
3. The second verse is about the formation of the state of Northern Ireland. The USC was the Ulster Special Constabulary, a kind of state militia to help the police, but they were worse than the police in terms of sectarianism. Britain paid a lot for the various efforts of establishing and securing N. Ireland- they turned the Six Counties (a republican term for N. Ireland) into an armed camp.
4. As I have explained in the last 1/3 of this, I believe the Left in many countries dropped the ball in terms of doing work on N. Ireland. The media didn’t help with that problem.
5. The line about Soldiers of Empire refers to the build up in the early 1970s.
6. I give this poem three stars out of five.
7. The Ulster Unionist Party was the main unionist political force in N. Ireland for decades until about 7 years ago. It’s leadership was overwhelmingly upper-class and the rich benefited greatly from UUP governments.
8. No Remorse was British and supported the unionist and/or British causes in N. Ireland.
9. **70% of this version is me, 30% is the original.
10. UPDATE 5/15/12 The last line of the first verse could be seen as conflating those who supported the IRA with the nationalist population in general. That's not my intent, although I could almost do that without it being more than sort of inaccurate- beyond the 40% who definitely supported the IRA, there's evidence that something like another 40% sort of supported the IRA. You could say it's a look at N. Ireland that could be shared with non-IRA supporters, but in this poem it's coming form IRA supporters.

A tank rolls up the Creggan Rd.
The BA’s here to support the status quo
The Volunteers escaped, to fight another day
Our day will come- victory to the IRA

Chorus
British Army man, you must go.
We’ll defeat you and Orange Jim Crow.
Northern Catholics, now we are standing
Freedom and justice, we are demanding

A State built on sectarian violence of the USC
An Orange system for the rich of the UUP
Propped up by pillars, of British pounds
Thousands of guns, to occupy Irish ground

Chorus

Oh! Northern Catholics, No-one on your side
Hopes are nearly fading. Freedom’s nearly died
come on

Chorus

Silence from the Left, while Nationalists die.
World-wide news media won’t ask why.
Soldiers of the Empire, build up in Six Counties.
It's an imperialist creation, they want us on our knees

Chorus

Take back your land...

*****

“Eyes On The Prize” based on “Final Attack” by Final War, original lyrics are here.

1. This is about Ireland, close to the day when Ireland is unified. UPDATE 4/27/12 I just realized, I was a little lazy with part of writing this poem- I'm kind of conflating the northern Catholic population with the Irish population in general; in the next week or so, I'll fix that (same thing with supporters of the armed struggle and those who didn't support it).
UPDATE 4/29/12 It’s overwhelmingly about the nationalist population in the North. I don’t know if this is really a good idea, this will probably be the only poem I do this with, but I am going to use asterisks to indicate which lines mean this or that. * Just nationalists; ** Nationalists and the South; *** Largely pre-N. Ireland and more general; **** Northern Protestants. And there is only one line that refers to the use of force as part of a wide variety of efforts to unite the island and/or work for equality for the nationalist and Catholic populations; that doesn't mean that it was supported by the entire nationalist community (about 40% strongly supported the IRA and somewhere around 40% sort of supported the IRA).

2. The Dail is the parliament in Dublin. There’s a good chance that unification will begin shifting Ireland towards the Left. There’s some more about that towards the bottom of this post.
4. As far as I can tell, with Ireland united and free, there would be very little left of British imperialism.
5. As far as dialogue and reconciliation and helping the unionist bigots move beyond the end of N. Ireland, there is some info about that here and (as far as my record on supporting dialogue and reconciliation), here. You might also want to read this.
6. The red, white and blue are the colors of the British flag.
7. The Republic is already much more secular than it was decades ago (gay rights are fairly advanced) and even decades ago, Catholic fundamentalism rarely took the form of anti-Protestantism.
8. Anti-Catholic bigotry in Ireland was largely encouraged by the British.
9. It’s difficult to say when The Troubles ended. It was a gradual process, probably beginning with the Good Friday Agreement, and ending with Sinn Fein accepting the new police force.
10. “Eyes on the prize” was the name of a documentary made in the 1980s about the Civil Rights Movement in the United States (and the years between that era and 1985). I’m not sure if it’s a perfect fit, but the last line in this poem, I believe, works very well.
11. In the last line, “we’ve all” refers to about 90% of the Northern Catholic population and what would be a growing minority of Northern Protestsants.
12. I give this poem four stars out of five.
13. **80% this version is mine, 20% is the original.
14. The original is by an American band, and so I made a point of including some anti-fascist/right/bigot or pro-left (I explain that a bit more here). With this one it’s the title of the poem.
15. Orange is the color of anti-Catholic bigotry in the Irish-British context.
16. UPDATE 4/21/16 I replaced the word "enslaved" with "killed" in the 3rd line of the 2nd verse.
17. UPDATE 11/8/16 In the 3rd line of the last verse, I changed "many" to "hundreds of thousands" because "many" would probably be interpreted as MUCH less than "hundreds of thousands." At this point there's about 1.1 million Protestants in the North and although "hundreds of thousands" is kind of a mouthful, I think that TODAY there might be about 75,000-100,000 adult anti-sectarian Protestants there and this poem is about a possible near future where a lot more progress has been made.

The day is approaching, the day of unity n/a
for you and your family, will finally be free *
gonna celebrate, and remember the dead **
gonna paint the Dail a light shade of red **

We’ll have equality and justice, with our liberation *
we’re also gonna have truth and reconciliation *
the Brits took our land, and killed many of us ***
Now British imperialism has been turned to dust n/a

Chorus:
Oh no, what are the bigots gonna do ****
when the Brits lower the red, white and blue n/a
We need to talk with them, make them understand- **
We’re all gonna share this island **

the Brits introduced sectarianism and kept the Nationalists down ***
Occupied all our cities and all our towns ***
explosions and gunfire had been part of our struggle *
As well as voting and marching, during and after the Troubles *

Chorus

We've got our sights set on a new democracy **
We guarantee, it won’t be, a Catholic theocracy **
Hundreds of thousands have broken free from the orange lies ****
And we’ve all got our eyes, yeah, eyes on the prize **

Star Trek: The Original Series Reviews M

This is one of my posts where I “review” Star Trek episodes. I will be giving each one a star rating. I sometimes will make some comments about non-political parts of them that I like or don’t like. I’ll sometimes use the issues raised in the episode to discuss similar issues in real life. And I will sometimes simply high-light the progressive politics of ST. ST is in-line with the three original themes of this blog, as I explain in the first ST post where I offer some general thoughts about ST.

I have been more or less ignoring this- the need for me to become familiar with The Original Series. In general I don’t like much of what I’ve seen. In any case, I am now watching it and will be doing reviews of those episodes. I will be giving pretty low scores, probably no higher than three stars out of five- I just don’t like TOS.

Lastly. multi-culturalism is such a pervasive theme in ST that I only comment on it when it goes beyond the norm (i.e. inter-species partners).

“Is There in Truth no Beauty?” See this for a plot summary.

A non-political episode. I give it two stars out of five.

“Spectre of the Gun” See this for a plot summary.

There are basically three political aspects to this episode:

1) The Enterprise is ordered to make contact with an alien race “at all costs.” When they encounter some kind of space buoy and are told to turn around and not enter the aliens’ space, Kirk acknowledges the buoys message and explains his mission to the aliens. He then takes a small landing party and transports down to the planet.

It reminds me of the United States forcing Japan to open itself to the US. In general, that sort of thing is wrong.

2) There is some talk about how humanity “overcame” it’s “instinct for violence.”

3) At the end, it turns out it’s another episode where an alien race wants to test the Federation citizens to see if they take life when it’s not totally necessary, and then the aliens move towards friendship with the Federation. Some times Kirk goes a bit far in proclaiming the Federation’s commitment to non-violence, but over all it’s fairly true.

I give it three stars out of five.

“Day of the dove” See this for a plot summary.

There are two minor political points made- 1) there’s an incident of sexual assault (or at least attempted sexual assault), which in the context of ST can be seen as a feminist statement (when Chekhov did that, he was under the influence of an alien); and 2) some incidents of racial hostility, which lead to statements against racism.

The political aspect that really deserves some attention comes from Spock: “Those who hate and fight must stop themselves, otherwise it is not stopped.” This presents a problem for me, although I feel comfortable disagreeing with ST on some stuff here and there. But I have gotten the idea that, for example, UN Peacekeepers usually are doing something good that helps with ending conflicts. I also believe in something similar with the non-armed aspects of conflict resolution- for example, I believe that it was a good idea that the International Decommissioning Commission in N. Ireland was led by people from third party countries. In a mid-1990s publication of the Pat Finucane Center in Derry, they called for the police patrolling nationalist areas to be replaced by officers from European Union nations. Partly inspired by those last two items, I wrote up a proposal for resolving the conflict, one that would involve such international elements.

I still believe in such an approach (there’s a possibility that Spock’s theory doesn’t apply to the North, since there is really not much anti-Protetsant bigotry coming from the Catholics) (the Peace-Keepers should come from countries that don't have any selfish interests in the conflict, and civilian 3rd party personel should meet similar criteria). The thing is, when Ireland is close to being united, there will be some degree of loyalist backlash, and I think a UN force dealing with that would be better than either the British Army or the Irish Army would be. That’s because if it were the BA, some soldiers would be sympathetic to the loyalists and hostile to the nationalists, and their presence on the streets might attract attacks by republicans. If it were the Irish Army, that might increase the backlash if they’re suspected of being sympathetic to the nationalists. Third party peace-keepers (who would also have to be conducting raids when necessary) would probably be at least a little better.

I give this episode one star out of five.

“For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky” See this for a plot summary.

A non-political episode. I give it two stars out of five.