My Two Favorite Things

My Two Favorite Things
A Review by Tom Shelley of “Where Are You Really From?” memoirs by Tim Brannigan

As you might guess from reading this blog, my two favorite things are fighting racism in America, and the politics of Northern Ireland. When they (or anti-racism in the North and Irish republicanism) intersect I get pretty excited. For example, after reading a book in 1998 about connections between blacks in America on one hand and Irish nationalists and republicans and  civil rights activists on the other I proposed to the student group I was organizing on the issue of the North that we get funding to bring the author, Brian Dooley, to speak on campus. Or, when Gerry Adams tweeted the n-word in the Spring, I wrote what might be one of the best posts I’ve written on this blog.

It was when I read about that tweet that I first learned about Tim Brannigan- he was described as being a republican ex-prisoner and of mixed race. Not long after that I learned a little more about him and then I bought his memoirs. I have read the book twice now and it’s great. It’s called “Where Are You Really From?: Kola Kubes and Gelignite, Secrets and Lies- the true story of an extraordinary family.” It includes a fair amount of biographical material about his mom, but is mostly about him. Two-thirds of it is political and about one-third is personal (which is almost as interesting to me- his life is a great story). He writes about experiencing racism in the nationalist community, his family’s involvement with the IRA, school, supporting the Hunger-Strikers as a teenager, his first job, going to college, being interrogated at the notorious Castlereagh interrogation centre, the many interesting details of being a republican prisoner (first on remand and then in Long Kesh prison (informally but partly run by the IRA prisoners)), his career as a journalist, his mother’s death, and meeting his dad for the first time.

His mom became pregnant with him as a result of an affair with a junior doctor from Ghana in 1966. She convinced the relevant staff of the hospital she gave birth at to say that the baby was stillborn and to take him to a baby home (with instructions he wasn’t to be adopted by anyone but her). A year later she adopted him (she had long ago made it clear to friends and family that she was anti-racist). Part of the fascinating story is that she didn’t tell him that she was really his mom until he was 19.

His description of how bad racism was in Belfast is a bit mixed. He says that unlike what was happening in some British cities there wasn’t much racism in Belfast because there weren’t many people of color there. His description of the racism he experienced from people in the nationalist community as a child in the 1970s made me think I had seriously under-estimated how racist the nationalist community was back then. On the other hand, he says that, although he doesn’t want to overstate this, in the nationalist community, “to be a racist was to have crossed a line.” In the middle of the book he describes some of the racism he experienced as a teen-ager- it sounded like it was not as bad as it was when he was a child, but still kind of surprises me. He also writes about how British soldiers on patrol in west Belfast would abuse him racially, but that’s not a surprise at all.

His mom was a republican and she often let the IRA use her home for meetings and for hiding weapons or explosives. In 1981 initially he wasn’t interested in the Hunger-Strike by republican POWs, but his mother made him go on the first march in support of the strike. After that he went on more marches and attended at least two funerals and started selling Sinn Fein’s newspaper. On May Day 1984 he joined SF.

Like most republicans, his opposition to injustice went and goes way beyond the usual issues for N. Ireland (the division of the country, the police, etc.). One story that’s brief but worth a mention is that he tried unionizing his work-place. It didn’t work out, but it’s still pretty cool. When his mom asked him if he was interested in finding his father, he said no and, writing his book, he says that he didn’t identify with Ghana but identified strongly as Irish and was very interested in African-AMERICAN politics (he was reading books about Black Power like “The Autobiography of Malcolm X”) (when he meets his father later in the book, it’s in Ghana and he learns some about the country of his father). There's some stuff in his book indicating he's probably a socialist, and according to his Twitter page he IS.

When he was probably around 19 years old and raising money for SF by going around to bars with a tin for collecting loose change from people he had a pretty serious incident with a racist. At one bar one day, this guy asked what was he doing collecting for SF and used the N-word. A very brief and minor physical altercation develops. One or two days later two men (probably with the IRA) spoke with him about it and offered to have the racist shot. He said no. In the book, he writes: “if I decided to have everyone shot who ever made a racist remark to me, there would be a bloodbath. They were satisfied once they had made it clear to me that my back was covered. I knew this but it was good to have it reiterated.”

In 1990 he got a degree in Politics from Liverpool Polytechnic. Earlier he had also studied sociology and English literature. Although he had planned on enjoying a more diverse city than Belfast, he was housed with the other Irish students and became quite patriotic.

Shortly after he came home to Belfast he allowed the IRA to hide some weapons in a car in the driveway of his mom’s house. The security forces learned of this and he and his mom were taken to the notorious Castlereagh Interrogation Centre where you could be held for seven days without charge. He describes the interrogation efforts of the police. Also, as if there was some doubt, we get evidence of racism among the police- a police officer refers to him by using the n-word. He ends up admitting to hiding weapons and explosives in order to get his mom released.

The next two parts are very interesting. First he describes life in the Crumlin Road Jail, where he was on remand. It’s largely about the non-political aspects of life there, but also about tension between the republican prisoners (with whom he lived) and the loyalist prisoners. After about a year there, he was convicted and was moved to the Long Kesh H-Blocks, the large prison containing hundreds of sentenced republican POWs. Although he wasn't an IRA member, that didn’t stop the IRA from making him the leader of one of the H-Blocks. He describes the daily routine in Long Kesh, and touches on politics here and there. There were some racist comments during his 4-5 years in the prison. For example, one prisoner insisted that the republican struggle wasn’t Brannigan's fight, despite him explaining his background in the mid- Falls Road area and the sectarian and racial abuse he took from the British Army. On the other hand, he says that the prison was the least racist place he had ever been. Once when watching a football game on TV a fellow prisoner called a black player a mugger. After he said that and he noticed Branngan was there the racist then spent the entire game praising anything done by a black player. Brannigan writes: “that was as rough as it ever got.”

When he got out in 1995 he soon started a career as a journalist. That’s a good part of the story, but one I’m going to largely skip. He spent some time working at the Irish News and more recently he has been a free-lance journalist.

The second to last part is about the tragic decline of his mom’s health and then her death. It’s very moving in at least one way- he got to spend a lot of time with her before she died- he taking care of her and them just enjoying each other’s company.

The last part is about Brannigan connecting with some of his black half-siblings and eventually, with his father. He had promised his mom, not long before she died, that he would search for his father. During the search he also became more interested in where he came from on his father’s side. He does meet his father, but unfortunately, his father was kind of a jerk and at the end of the book, Brannigan is apparently no longer welcome in the lives of his father or his black half-siblings.

Although I’ve only touched on it a little, there is a lot of material about how other members of the nationalist community and the republican movement saw him, and how he identified strongly as Irish and as a republican- “a black Irish republican.”

There is a fair amount of humor in his book. One example is found while reading his description of his time at Castlereagh.  The police showed him the first two lines in his security file: “this man is a republican,” and “this man is black.” He writes in his book, “clearly they’d had their top men on the job.”

Unfortunately I think I have good reason to criticize one small bit of his story. He gives (as an example of the racial harassment he experienced) a description of an incident when he proudly wore a child’s toy American Indian headdress and held a rubber tomahawk while standing outside his home’s front door hoping to impress other children (I think he was around 8 years old). Older boys walking by called him “Geronimo” and “Sambo,” and made “war-cry” sounds they had heard in John Wayne movies and made him feel, as he frequently did while growing up, isolated, picked on, and angry. I like to think it’s apparent that I’m sensitive to what he has experienced at the hands of ignorant and racist people in the Nationalist community, and how that made him feel. But I have to say that his mom buying that headdress and tomahawk for him offends me as an ally of Native American people. It’s called cultural appropriation, taking something from a community of nations in this hemisphere that has already had so much taken from them. I think I have to kind of criticize him for wearing the headdress and holding the tomahawk, but I realize he was a young child and had no idea how offensive what he was doing was. As much as I love the book that I am reviewing, I am disappointed that he, while writing it as an adult, failed to say anything about how offensive this (his mom buying the headdress and tomahawk and him wearing it and holding the tomahawk in order to impress other children) was. If  he DID write something critical of it and his editor took it out I’ll edit this review to acknowledge that. To his credit, he DOES suggest that the Indians in John Wayne movies are not like real Indians.

I have referred a couple of times to me thinking that the nationalist community of the 1970s and 1980s as described in the book was more racist than I had earlier estimated it was. I have some solid information for the recent period. The Northern Ireland Life and Times survey seems well respected. The following question was asked annually 2005-2014 with the exception of 2011: “How much do you agree or disagree with the statement, ‘In relation to colour and ethnicity, I prefer to stick with people of my own kind’”. The average answers for the Catholic population are: Strongly Agree 4%; Agree 18%; neither agree nor disagree 24%; disagree 35%; and strongly disagree 19%. For the Protestant community the numbers are: 9; 24; 28; 28; 10. In August of 2015 a crowd of young people in west Belfast spent three hours throwing bricks etc. at Brannigan’s house, an attack based on race considering the verbal abuse they also hurled at him. It did surprise me when I read about it. Because of his story I have made minor adjustments to about 5 paragraphs on this blog that are about racism in the nationalist community.

I recommend this book for anyone interested in studying race/racism/nationality/nationalism or The Troubles.

Gerry Adams and the n-word

Gerry Adams, President of SF, recently created a controversy with a tweet that many would describe as racist. He wrote: “Watching Django Unchained- A Ballymurphy N----r!” but he spelled out the n-word (Ballymurphy is part of west Belfast, and is a republican area Adams apparently lives in). Although I haven’t seen it yet, according to the BBC, it’s a movie “set before the American Civil War and focuses on racism, slavery, violence and murder.” Please read the BBC article for Adams’s response to the criticism of his tweet.

Although I of course believe that there are strong similarities between the oppression of Northern Catholics (referred to hereafter as "Catholics") and the oppression of American Blacks (referred to hereafter as "Blacks") in the last century, and I think an argument can be made that the former are not white, I think Adams was out of line with this statement (and if we're talking specifically about slavery in America, that's VERY different from what Adams has experienced as a Catholic, even if we look back to the Stormont era). Although he might not be white in the N. Ireland context, he’s not a person of color and to one degree or another, outside N. Ireland, he’s sort of white (crucially, in multi-racial yet (at least fairly) racist societies like America and the Republic  of Ireland (where he’s a TD (member of parliament))).

On the other hand, the ways Catholics have been treated since partition are similar to the ways Blacks have been treated since Reconstruction. I’m going to assume the reader, especially if they’re American, is familiar with how Blacks were/are treated and focus mostly on the Catholics part of this comparison. In N. Ireland (this is not an exhaustive list):

(the Stormont era refers to 1921-1972, when there was a devolved government there and The Troubles were roughly from 1969 until somewhere around 2005)

1. There were laws (during almost all of the Stormont era) about voting for local government which, without mentioning Catholics, were anti-Catholic and could be compared to poll taxes and literacy tests, etc. that were used to keep Blacks in the South away from the polls (for local, state, and federal elections). Also, certain kinds of businesspeople, who were disproportionately Northern Protestant, had MORE than one vote in local and regional elections.
2. Although it wasn’t formal, there was segregation in housing- crucially, Catholics in mixed areas were often intimidated out of their homes (Stormont era and The Troubles) (of course some things very similar happened (and might BE happening) to blacks).
3. There was clear evidence of widespread discrimination in employment during both periods (towards the beginning of The Troubles Catholics were 2 times more likely than Northern Protestants to be unemployed and in 1988 they were 2.5 times more likely to be unemployed) (in recent decades Blacks have experienced an unemployment rate consistently about twice what the white one is (see this))
4. There was clear evidence of discrimination in the allocation of public housing in the Stormont era (partly because of that it was incredibly common during the Stormont era for more than one Catholic family to be living in a small home and this may have continued to a small degree in the 70s and 80s, although apparently DISCRIMINATION stopped in the very early 70s) (there was and is also housing discrimination against Blacks).
5. The police were vastly disproportionately Northern Protestant and very bigoted (both Stormont and The Troubles) (there was and is also a similar problem in America with police racism). In The Troubles, the British Army also behaved violently towards Catholics or at least harrassed them.
6. There was sectarian murder of Catholics civilians (including murders by the British Army) even at times when there was little or no armed activity by republicans (most of the Stormont Era and the last 19 years) (not that such activity justified such murders). During The Troubles, it probably was (on a per-capita basis)  5-10 times worse than what Blacks experienced during the same time period (since the end of the Troubles it's probably worse in America (part of the difference during the Troubles was that the "rebellion" in America was a lot less militaristic and that appears to be a factor in terms of what kinds of repressive tools are used)). (UPDATE 2/18/20 although the asymmetric chronology of this comparison is starting to frustrate me, I should say that in the decades before the Troubles, with lynching in the American South, it was probably worse for blacks)
7. To be fair, the informally but VERY segregated nature of the education system in the North is something the Catholics actually welcomed, whereas, of course, in the American South it was formal and a huge part of the problem (third level education (i.e. universities) in N. Ireland haven't been segregated at all for decades now, but besides that there's a high degree of segregation).
8. I am almost certain that Catholics haven’t had anywhere near the same problem with mass incarceration that Blacks have had in America, but the use of internment, non-jury courts, etc. is kind of similar.
9. Considering the poverty and unemployment that Blacks disproportionately experience and the horrible health-care system we have, I have to point out that Catholics benefit from the UK's National Health Service.

10. UPDATE 6/1/21 When I first did this comparison, I left out one aspect of oppression. And that is what might be called pogroms (bigoted riots against minorities), in this case not against Jews but against Northern Catholics or Black Americans. I had almost no knowledge of that when it came to Blacks and I didn’t want to imply that it happened to Catholics but not Blacks. It did happen to Catholics, crucially in the first few years when N. Ireland was being established in the early 1920s and then again at the beginning of the Troubles in Aug. 1969. In July, Aug, and September 1969, and mostly during a period of 2-3 days, in Belfast, 1,505 Catholic families fled their homes (probably something like 18% of Belfast’s Catholic population, probably something like 1.8% of the North’s Catholic population). In one night alone 650 families were burnt or at least forced, out f their homes. There were some smaller-scale pogroms at other times in N. Ireland. In America, I’ve been aware for decades of the events illustrated in the movie 
“Rosewood.” And for at least a year now I have been aware of what happened in Tulsa OK in 1921. What prompted me to do this update is that CNN created a sort of interactive report on all the times there have been race riots in America. It’s here.

On a related note, there have been, historically, strong person-to-person and organization-to-organization contacts between the various Nationalist and/or Republican and/or anti-Unionist struggles in British occupied Ireland and the various struggles among Black people in America. I go into that more here.

Are Northern Catholics white in N. Ireland? There are two crucial ways in which they aren't:

1) You can sort of say they don’t have white privilege. IN NORTHERN IRLEAND (until the last 10 years or so when things improved for them) they had it worse than people of color IN NORTHERN IRELAND. I’m not sure of the exact history of the growth of that population, but in 2001 they were about .7% of the population and in 2011 they were about 2% (Chinese people were arriving in the 1960s and Vietnamese “boat people” were arriving in the 1970s). But on a per-capita basis there were more (or a LOT more) sectarian murders of Catholic civilians (by loyalist paramilitaries frequently with some degree of help from the security forces or by the security forces (including the British Army) than racist murders (as far as I can tell there wasn’t a single racist murder). As far as I can tell, unemployment among Catholics was also higher than that among people of color in N. Ireland. I found a table that touches on this, in a  book partly available on-line thanks to Google called “Divided Society: Ethnic Minorities and Racism in Northern Ireland,” by Paul Hainsworth. 21% of the general population, 2% of the Chinese population, 7% of the Pakistani population, and 3% of the Indian population “had no paid job within the last ten years” (p.195) (that was in 1992 (and back then Catholics would have been a lot more likely to be unemployed than the general population)). According to the same book (p. 7), in 1997 Baroness Denton said in the House of Lords, while a Northern Ireland minister, that employment “is not a current problem” for ethnic minorities in N. Ireland. In general, based on doing searches for two words in the book, and skimming through the pages available on the web and looking for the word “unemployment” or the word "unemployed" highlighted, unemployment was an absolutely tiny part of the book- and with one possible exception, none of the references to unemployment (or the unemployed) suggested that it is or was a problem among people of color there as seriously as it was a problem for Catholics.

Some people would say that the lack of racist murders is not because racism is less widespread and less deep there than sectarianism is, but because people of color stayed out of the conflict and would have been slaugtered if they hadn't. If they had suffered civilian deaths for standing with the Catholics, that would have been because they stood with the Catholics, not because of racism. If they had stood with the Protestants, civilian people of color would have been less likely to be killed by republicans than Protestant civilians were, and very few Protestant civilians were killed because they were Protestant (primarily because of what I write below and some stuff here, it should be accepted that republicans were incredibly anti-racist, IN N. IRELAND (I could also point to support from people of color in America and good relations with the ANC, but that is probably less convincing)). I'm not sure what effect involvement in the conflict would have done to unemployment among people of color. If they sided with the Protestants, it wouldn't have mattered since Catholics did not control a large part of the economy. If they sided with the Catholics, they probably would have been less prosperous (possible boycotts by Protestants, etc.).

2) Although I’m not very familiar with this sociological process, it could be said that many if not most Catholics are not socialized to identify as white. I’m not saying that message never gets through, or that there aren’t racist Catholics there. But a frequent message from many of their political leaders, many of their community organizations, and some of their schools is to identify with people of color throughout the world. For example, MANY of the numerous murals in republican areas stress anti-racism, celebrate African-American political figures, express solidarity with struggles in the “developing world,” or compare the experiences of Catholics with those of people of color elsewhere.

Lastly, I need to stress that Gerry Adams is not a racist. SF, under his leadership, has an impressive record (in IRELAND, and kind of in America) of opposing racism. I offer some examples of that here. (the America part is briefly discussed here).

The Irish, Slavery, and Racism Today

On the blog of the Southern Poverty Law Center there was a very prominent post where they interviewed an Irish scholar about a new racist meme on the Internet. For the most part I'll just encourage you to read it yourself. It's fascinating and could come up as something anti-racists have to deal with while doing our work.

This is fairly embarrassing, but earlier there were three posts on this blog that claimed that Cromwell sent 10s of thousands of Irish people to the Caribbean to work as slaves. First of all, I never said or even thought, not even briefly, any of the offensive claims about slavery attributed to racists in that article (that is, the following: "that “Irish slaves” were treated far worse than black slaves; that there were more “Irish slaves” than black slaves; that “Irish slaves” were worth less than black slaves, that enslaved Irish women were forced to breed with enslaved African men, and that the Irish were slaves for much longer than black slaves;" or, "overtly racist statements, e.g. 'yet, when is the last time you heard an Irishman bitching and moaning about how the world owes them a living?' ”). But after discussing it with three knowledgeable people, I know now I was wrong to refer to the Irish in the Caribbean as slaves who were treated the same as African slaves. I'm not sure where I got that from. They were more or less forced into indentured servitude, although they would have worked in slave-like conditions and many or MOST died before earning their freedom (they lasted about 3-7 years). Their children did not become slaves (I somehow got the idea that 1-2 generations would have been born slaves and then that practice would have died out somehow (I could see the British doing that for 1-2 generations and then a majority of decision-makers deciding that the Irish were white enough that their forced labour shouldn't be hereditary- that that would apply only for Africans)). In fact, a friend knowledgeable about this told me that some of the Irish, after earning their freedom, became overseers of the slaves or even slave owners themselves.

One of the three references to this issue on this blog was in a poem and it made the most sense for me to remove the issue from that poem. The other two I fixed a bit and left them there.

Tom

"The winner of Election 2016 is social democracy"

Last Friday the 26th there was a general election for the parliament in the South of Ireland. Below are the election results:

Fine Gael   50 seats. FG is economically moderate or conservative and socially moderate or liberal. They're descended from the pro-Teaty side of the Irish Civil War (which took place in the early 1920s).

Labour 7 seats. Centre-Left

Fianna Fail 44 seats. FF is economically moderate or conservative and socially moderate or conservative. They're descended from the anti-Treaty side of the Civil War (what you might call the side that wanted to continue fighting the Britsh).

Sinn Fein 23 seats

Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit 6 seats. Hard left.

Social Democrats 3 seats

Green Party 2 seats

Independent Alliance 6 seats. Progressives.

Independents 17 seats. I imagine mostly progressives.

The article I link to below says something I think I need to respond to now:  SF is not a right-wing party at all, although I have heard before that some of their voters in the south might vote right-wing if SF wasn't around (in America, where they visit, SF is less left-wing than they are in Ireland where they live and work, etc.). I explain why it's not accurate to call them right-wing here.

I used to be a member of the Irish Labour Party's American sister organization, the Democratic Socialists of America and my understanding of socialism and how to achieve it has not changed. My thoughts on the ILP and the meltdown of the ILP's vote (in the previous election they got 37 seats):

1) I have felt comfortable calling myself a supporter of both SF and the ILP because almost every election on that island involves Proportional Representation and/or the ability of voters to transfer their votes from one candidate to another (so IF I lived there I could more or less vote for both of them). 

2) I support SF a bit more  because they have a huge mandate from the nationalist community in the North. I would love to see the ILP running candidates in the North, where they have been organizing for around 10 years now.

3) It sucks that this happened to the ILP, but as far as I can tell, the gov't they were a part of pursued an agenda of austerity. I believe that is not what the ILP wanted to do (I am not real familiar with them but I have never heard anyone say they're Third Way (the politics of Tony Blair in seemingly socialist organizations)  and I heard something making me think they're as anti-Third Way as DSA is), but for decades now they have been kind of stuck with going into gov't with FG, and FG is, unfortunately, overall no better economically in my opinion than FF and even after their best elections, the ILP was not able to lead a gov't (something I blame on the fact that the conflict around the North hasn't been resolved yet). 

4) There have been some instances of SF and the ILP getting along, but not many. One example would be that in the 2007 elections to the Irish Senate, they had a voting pact.
5) UPDATE 3/6/16 An Irish leftist friend of mine who seems non-hostile to the Socialist International, painted a far less rosy picture of Irish Labour for me. It also made me attach greater value to what the Irish Times opinion piece said about the governing coalition Labour was a part of. On the other hand, he did say that in opposition, Labour is good. I still think that if Labour were LEADING a coalition gov't and/or had a partner closer to them ideologically than FG is, they would probably act more like social-dems.

There's an opinion piece in the Irish Times (Ireland's largest paper) that I wanted to mention. To whatever degree it's head-line is accurate, and I think it largely is, that's great. I don't follow Southern politics as much as I follow stuff in the North, and RECENTLY I've only been reading an average of about 50 articles a week about that. But this article seems pretty accurate and I thought it was an important one to highlight. The article is written by the IT's literary editor.

Tom

3 New Poems: Irish Tet, We Are All Republicans, and Six Million Died

Below are three new poems. For an explanation of how I do these poems, see this. The last poem, "We Are All Republicans," is based on a non-political skinhead song by an anti-fascist skinhead band, so that's different than most of my poems.

1. Six Million Died. About Holocaust Denial.
2. Irish Tet. About the IRA
3. We Are All Republicans. About the IRA.

The rest of the poems can be found by clicking on the "lyrics" label at the bottom. There are about five pages worth so click on the "older posts" link at the bottom of each page.

“Six Million Died” based on “Six Million Lies” by No Remorse, original lyrics are here.

1. This is about the Holocaust. About six million Jews died.
2. With the last line of the first verse, I don’t mean to say there aren’t large differences between anti-Semitic extremism/violence and anti-fascist extremism/violence.
3. “Living Space” is English for a Nazi German term for what they wanted in central and eastern Europe- space for German settlers. I think this was largely but not totally separate from the Final Solution, since that part of Europe had a lot of Jewish people. I think it makes enough sense.
4. Zyklon B was the gas they used.
5. In EUROPE (and kind of in the Pacific), the Allies or at least the US, waged a fairly honorable war against the Axis.
**6. 60% of this version is me, 40% is the original.
7. I give this poem three stars out of five.
8. Occasionally I use words like"fight" and actually mean non-violent "fighting"; in this poem I was thinking of a response to to holocaust denial and fascism generally where the response is PROBABLY about 99% non-violent.
9. UPDATE 2/17/16 I replaced "in case" with "that" in the 5th line of the first verse.

Six million lies?
No, that’s how many died
Torture by the Nazis, we have the proof
Why did they try to cover up the truth?
Scared that they would all hang
yeah, their extremism and violence would boomerang

Chorus:
Six million of the human race
Partly to get more “living space”
Genocidal use of Zyklon B
By the fucking Nazis, of Germany

One of the worst genocides in history
They wanted Europe Jewish free
A cover-up is what nazis have tried
To hide the lies of their white pride
Well anti-fascism didn't die
The truth will break through all the Nazi lies

Chorus

So let's make the world Nazi free
We all want a diverse society
Nazism is rotten to the core
We’re fighting for truth and justice in this war
With honour and respect we'll surely win
Just like we did when we took on Berlin

*********

"Irish Tet" based on "Final Attack" by Final War, original lyrics are here.

1. In the 1980s the IRA had planned and partly armed themselves for what might be called an Irish version of the Tet offensive of the Vietnam War. Partly because some of their arms were lost or intercepted, they called it off. This poem is sort of a “what-if” about those plans.
2. I deleted the chorus and the last two lines of the last verse.
3. The BA is the British Army.
4. In such a situation I’m not sure if their mission would have been to maintain that level of activity until the British agreed to leave- it probably would have been to do that for as long as possible (and liberate as much territory as they could for as long as they could). Such a campaign would have contributed to a later agreement by the British to leave, especially as it would have drawn a LOT of global attention to their cause.
5. The 3rd line of the second verse is a reference to historical events centuries ago.
6. With the last line of the 3rd verse I probably greatly exaggerate how much revenge motivated them. But the British Army and the RUC did horrible things to the nationalist community.
7. The last line refers to the WWII (brown is the color of fascism). I just learned that apparently sometimes the French Resistance DID take and hold objectives for a short period of time. (this creates the necessary minimum conflict between my poem and the beliefs of the (AMERICAN and possibly Irish-American) authors of the original lyrics (more here))
**8. 58% of this version is me, 42% is the original.
9. I give this poem four stars out of five.
10. UPDATE 2/17/16  Based on what might be called a fairly scientific look, only about .2% of the IRA's operations intentionally resulted in civilian death.
11. UPDATE 7/5/16 I replaced "unleash" with "release."


The day is approaching, the day we release
All hell on the BA and the RUC police
gonna fight back, gonna knock em dead
Like fire the revolution will be spread

gonna use RPGs and heavy machine guns
won't stop till our mission is done
they invaded and took our land
now we’re gonna smash them with an iron hand

we've got our sights set on BA choppers and watch towers
corporate buildings, we’ll show them this country is ours
we're on a rampage, we just let loose
We’re gonna make them pay for all their abuse

we’re seizing mills, bridges and towns
We’re inspired by those French that fought against the brown


*************

“We Are All Republicans” based on “We’re The Oppressed” by The Oppressed original lyrics here.

1. This is basically about the IRA although some of it could apply to other mainstream republicans as well depending on how we define words like "fight" for this poem. It’s set sometime before the 1997 cease-fire, I guess at least about 4 years before.
2. Orange is the color of anti-Catholic bigotry in the Irish-British context.
3. The BA is the British Army.
4. They were forcing the British elite to move towards a united Ireland, and to some small degree they succeeded (my thoughts about the compromise of the Good Friday Agreement are here).
5. At some point in the past for at least a year or two and probably a decade or two, Sinn Fein called for a constitutional convention to be part of a future unification of Ireland. I think it’s a great idea that should be revived for two reasons: 1) it would probably shift Ireland towards the left and even more importantly, 2) it would give the northern Protestants a very big say in what kind of Ireland they’re being added to (they’d be on the same level as everyone else). (more of my thoughts on how to ease Protestants and unionists into a united Ireland are found here)
7. The second half of the first line of the second verse is a little strange, but that was already there and for the time being I have decided to keep it (and I wouldn’t be surprised if BA soldiers saw the Nationalist community as being the “other”).
**8. 79% of this version is me, 21% is the original.
9. I give this poem five stars out of five.
10. The second line of the last verse refers to the NORTHERN Catholic working-class.
11. Armalites are rifles, RPGs are Rocket Propelled Grenades.

Born to fight, born to win
We are all republicans.
Born into this sectarian Orange state
Fighting for Irish freedom, we won’t wait

The BA fears us, thinks we're strange
Armalites and RPGs, we fight for change
We will never, ever be beat
As we force the British elite

We are Volunteers, of the Irish masses
Fighting for the Catholic working-classes
Advancing freedom and revolution
A new Ireland and a new constitution

"They’d be killed if they were black"

There's an important article on the Salon web-site titled: "They’d be killed if they were black: The racial double standard at the heart of the new Bundy family standoff." It's here.

It's about the militia/Patriot take-over of a federal building in Oregon.

Tom

Black Lives Matter

There is an article on the BBC about Tamir Rice, one the several black people who were killed by police in a brief period of time about a year ago and whose deaths were held up as undeniable examples of racist police violence.

After reading the article above about Tamir, consider this- Ohio is an "Open Carry" state. Below are some notes from a comment I made elsewhere on the Web about this.


***

There’s a widely read progressive comic strip called “This Modern World,” at- http://thismodernworld.com/comic-archive . A recent one is at- http://images.dailykos.com/images/118035/lightbox/TMW2014-12-03color.png?1417371188 that you should read.

The last part refers to a recent initiative by gun-rights advocates called “Open Carry.” There is more info at- http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2014/0...n-for-the-nra/ (please note that in the end, the NRA was officially okay with open-carry Texas. One of the sites for the movement is at- http://www.opencarry.org/ .

As far as I can tell, it IS overwhelmingly about white people with a racist double standard.

Some quotes from the front page of http://www.opencarry.org/ :

“I have to admit, initially I was a bit nervous about … the [open carry] law,
[b]ut to my surprise, we have not had one single incident as it relates to open-carry.”
Vicksburg, MS P
Police Chief Walter Armstrong, September 16, 2014

“We don’t suggest that people panic,
because there hasn’t been a problem with open-carry demonstrations in other cities.”
Palo Alto, CA police Lt. Sandra Brown, Mercury News, March 5, 2010


An article on this theme is at- http://www.salon.com/2014/12/15/gun_...dment_crusade/


ANOTHER ITEM THAT I DIDN'T KNOW EARLIER: Tamir Rice and John Crawford were killed in Ohio. Ohio IS AN OPEN-CARRY STATE!!!!!!!!!!!!

British Fools: Three more poems

I have three new poems ready to publish, and might have another 2-3 ready in about a week.

For more about my poems, see this. For the rest of the poems, click the "lyrics" label at the bottom of this post- there are several pages worth, so use the "older posts" link at the bottom.

1. Fash Are Fools. About fascists in America.
2. Troops Out. About dissent among British soldiers in N. Ireland.
3. Hitler's A Fool. About WWII.

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

1. Brown is the color of fascism.
2. Partitioned basically means divided.
3. I give this poem 4 stars out of 5.
**4. 36% of this version is me, 64% is the original.
5. This is about the broad struggle against fascism and would be about 99% non-violent.
6. UPDATE 8/9/15 I made a HUGE mistake with the second line of the last verse but have now corrected it.

The struggle’s far from over, we’ve got a long, long way to go.
We haven’t won the fight yet, that's a fact that we all know.
Still too many people are supporting the brown lie,
but soon the truth will set 'em free and fascism will die.

The swastika’s a symbol for division and hate
A worthless, sick, corrupt nation is their ideal state
Like Apartheid, they want the working-class partitioned
And like Hitler, want the Left  dead or imprisoned

We’ll never fly the swastika, no matter what they try
cause we all know that fash are fools, their ideology’s just a lie.
They hail the wrong ideals, a choice they will regret.
We’ll always keep on working till fascism is dead.

Nazism is genocidal, we’ve seen it once before.
The Jews were almost wiped out, a fact we can’t ignore.
Why are the Nazis still trying? They will never win
America belongs to the workers of all peoples, we are all each other’s kin


***********

“Troops Out” based on “Fools No More” by Skrewdriver, original lyrics are here.

1. The first 2-4 lines are about an IRA bmb attack at Narrow Water that resulted in 18 British soldiers being killed.
2. The red white and blue refers to the British flag.
3. One example of the lying to British soldiers is that  they were told while training for deployment to the Six-Counties that the IRA would attack Protestant funerals.
4. The reasons why it shouldn’t matter that there’s a pro-British majority are described towards the top of this post.
5. Another part is the question of imperialism. Along with what I refer to in #4, I would also add that in multiple ways, the population in the South has to one degree or another since partition claimed the north as politically part of the Irish nation. For example, two of the three most recent Presidential terms have been filled by a woman from the North- without changing her nationality or anything like that, she was voted in as President of Ireland.
6. The original first line of the 3rd verse actually says “always” instead of “rarely.” But I can imagine a LOT of chickenhawks (in general, not just in Britain) waving the flag and a lot of veterans being less enthusiastic about that.
7. I believe that one factor behind the British presence is that N. Ireland does offer a well-educated but low-paid and politically weak working-class which are more or less divided by sectarian bigotry (almost all of which is aimed at Catholics and those who identify as Irish). More evidence for this is found in the following facts taken from the book Northern Ireland: the Orange State by Michael Farrell:

“In 1974 45% of all firms in Northern Ireland employing 500 or more workers were controlled from Britain, as were 28 out of 51 firms employing between 250 and 500 workers” p. 326

(See the 4th note for the poem here)

*8. 58% of this version is me, 42% is the original. (after I changed the chorus)
9. I give this poem 3 out of 5 stars.
10. UPDATE 8/16/15 Skrewdriver were British and supporters of the British and unionist causes in N. Ireland.
10. UPDATE 3/20/20 I realized that the chorus was written in the first person, not the second person, so I almost completely changed it.
11. UPDATE 3/20/20 The Troops Out Movement was a British anti-Partition group.
12. UPDATE 3/29/20 When I say thousands, that's an estimate for people from Britian who were more or less in a military or paramilitary group, the last 220-250 years of the six-county area that is now N. Ireland, and it's probably about 1,200, no more, so maybe hundreds would have been more accurate, but not much more.


Fire fills the air, there’s smoke in the sky
you’re knocked down, and 18 die
You're looking around, with fear in your eyes
Looking for the enemy and you still wonder why
Obey all your orders, British pride aflame
But in truth you’re a pawn in their imperialistic game
And your leaders are not honest with you
they lie, as they fly, the red white and blue

(chorus)
Don't  be a fool anymore
Talk to the Troops Out Movement and learn the score

Thousands of Brits have died in this land
And it's never been for the good of the British working-woman or man
Many died for profit and political greed
But it's always the soldiers not the leaders who bleed
Without exception the tories are scum
Who lie to the people whilst they beat on their drums
And they claim it’s because there’s a Unionist majority
But it’s imperialism, capitalism, and just plain bigotry

(chorus)

It's rarely been those with the flags in their hands
Who have fought and have died in N. Ireland
Yeah, while the leaders stay home with their massive cigars
you were lucky if you were traveling in armored cars
They take all the fame, the businesses take all the pounds
By exploiting labor in British factories on Irish ground
And if you dare to object and ask them to cease
You'll get a visit from their political police

********

“Hitler’s A Fool” based on “Reds are Fools” by Kill, Baby Kill, original lyrics are here.

1. This is about the period shortly after D-Day in WWII.
2. Obviously it wasn’t the Nazis that committed genocide against the Indians, but what happened was roughly as genocidal as what the Nazis planned for (and almost succeeded at) in Eastern Europe. That rhyming couplet was inspired by the title of a hardcore punk song called “John Wayne was a Nazi.”
3. The second to last line of the last verse kind of exaggerates what the Allies were doing to stop the Holocaust.
3. I give this poem four stars out of five.
**4. 51% of this version is me, 49% is the original.
5. UPDATE 8/9/15 As I was preparing this for publication, I knew there was some explanation I was forgetting to make. I exaggerate some how aware the Allies were about the Final Solution and A LOT how concerned white Americans were about American Indians and I probably exaggerate a little how concerned the Allies were about European Jews. But, having acknowledged that, I think it is a good poem.
6. UPDATE 1/24/16 I know that probably no more than half of the US military in WWII could have been called anti-fascist, but at the same time, as I say in another WWII poem, "although the Allied leaders are not consistent/Defeating the fascist states is important."

The war’s far from over, we got a long, long way to go.
We haven’t won the fight yet, that's a fact that we all know.
Still too many German soldiers are supporting the brown lie,
but soon our armor will take them down and the Nazi state will die.

The hammer and the sickle is a symbol of our allies
They beat back the nazis on land and in the skies
With bullshit propaganda Hitler pushes Germans to fight.
Fascism has taken Europe into a long night

We’ll never give them quarter, unless the white flag they fly
cause we all know that fash are fools, that their ideas are just a lie.
They started this fucking war, a choice they will regret.
‘cause we’ll always keep on fighting till they’re no longer a threat

Nazism is genocidal, we’ve seen it once before.
The American Indians are still recovering, a fact we can’t ignore.
Why is the SS still trying? We’re gonna smash those anti-Semites
Europe belongs to free peoples, and their democracy, and their human rights

Irish History, Today's World, and Our Education System

Just a quick link to a great article on another blog. I had no idea our education system was so bad in this area. The article touches on part of a theory I have, that to whatever degree our educational system and our media ignore Irish history and the situation in N. Ireland, it's partly or very much because of the potential of such material to get some Irish-Americans (almost all of whom are white) to think more critically about how people of color are treated in this world and in this country.

Anyway, there's a great article here.

Tom

No Surrender!!

Below are two new poems (for more on my poetry see this). They're both based on the same original and are both about the same thing.

For the rest of the poems, click the "Lyrics" label at the bottom.

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

1. This is basically set in the 80s, or the late 70s. and is about the IRA (it could be about other mainstream republicans also but I prefer to limit it to the IRA).
2. The BA is the British Army.
3. Westmacott was the highest-ranking British officer killed by the IRA and was with the elite SAS.
4. I give this poem four stars out of five.
**5. 43% of this version is me, 57% is the original.
6. UPDATED 1/15/16 Based on what might be called a fairly scientific look, only about .2% of the IRA's operations intentionally resulted in civilian death.

No surrender!

No surrender to the BA
Those evil bastards had better not stay
We stand within the nationalist community
We show the scum they cannot act with impunity

chorus
No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the BA
No surrender, no surrender, no longer will they keep our freedom at bay
No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the the British Army
No surrender, no surrender, we will drive them into the sea

loyalist terror attacks are going on still
And London don't give a fuck who they maim and kill
Herbert Westmacott went bye bye
And all you SAS fuckers are gonna die

chorus

No surrender!

We will smash that imperialist scum
No time to lose cos the battle's begun
We are of the global working-class
We won't back down and we’ll always kick ass

***********

“No Surrender (to the British Army)” based on “No Surrender (to the IRA)” by Strikeforce UK, original lyrics are here. (that gets the first line of the second verse wrong- it's what I have below)

1. This is basically set in the 80s, or the late 70s. and is about the IRA. (it could be about other mainstream republicans also but I prefer to limit it to the IRA).
2. The Rand was and is the currency of of South Africa.
3. During that 1.3 decade period, they were definitely pursuing revolution (ignoring conflict with the British state, I think what they probably had in mind was almost totally bloodless compared to most revolutions).
4. The Dail is the Irish Parliament. The second one was the first after the War of Independence. During it’s life there was the split which lead to the civil war and for decades until recently most (or almost all) republicans looked to it‘s surviving republican members for legitimacy. (It was only gradually, considering the violence and bitterness of the civil war, that many and then most and now almost all republicans recognize(d) the legitimacy of the Parliament and Government in Dublin in the last seven decades). (I think that mainstream republicans were a little slow to mostly and now totally or almost totally recognize the legitimacy of the state in the South)
5. I give this poem 4 stars out of five.
**6. 32% of this version is me, 68% is the original.
7. UPDATED 1/15/16 Based on what might be called a fairly scientific look, only about .2% of the IRA's operations intentionally resulted in civilian death.
8. Che is Che Gueverra, who has been credited with developing rural guerrilla warfare.

No surrender!

No surrender to the BA
We battle those bastards in the spirit of Che
Inspired by those who fight against the rand
We show the British scum that it's our land

No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the BA
No surrender, no surrender, our revolution is underway
No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the Brits
No surrender, no surrender, hit them with the blitz

Their terrorist attacks are going on still
And they don’t give a fuck who they maim and kill
Margaret Thatcher better wave bye bye
Cos Brit imperialists are gonna die

chorus
No surrender!

We will smash that British scum
No time to lose as the battle’s begun
We're loyal,to the second dail
We won't back down and we will never run

chorus