All Sinn Féin needs to do to succeed is stop being a Republican Party!

[hedzog]

Exactly what I said during the general election.
Adams and co are toxic, merely by their presence.
They and their ilk must be purged by the party for it to have a meaningful future.
The fact they don't see it is pretty damning evidence that they are not mature enough to progress, unfortunately.

and progression will be the o snotty and mary lou ? , hardly

[stakerwallace]

Do you know what, it hasn't made its mind up yet. It vaguely knows that it is as a 'movement' that its destiny lies, but is struggling to be born as such, with acceptability to the milieu of the new millennium.

The younger generation coming through, have seen the greed and hypocrisy of the 'landed' and 'settled' generations and they want a different kind of country to grow in and to love. But it make take a generation before the sulphurous tainted link with violence is broken, before SF could be deemed in any real way acceptable to more than 25% of people.

Your faith in the younger generation is admirable, particularly their alleged aversion to greed. Unfortunately, such hopes are rarely realised: France 1968 being a significant case. That particular generation which rebelled against its forefathers' greed and hypocrisy have become solid bourgeois by now and many have endorsed Chirac and Sarkozi in turn.

[Darren H]

No idea. Sorry if you were looking for a witticism or something to refute.

Eh? I was, as stated, just interested in your opinion on what SF needs to do to succeed, which did not come through in the OP. You ask questions, but seem reluctant to give your opinion.

In time, one of the principals of the republican movement since 1917 was abolished - the recognition of parliaments that fell far short of the 32-county Republic asserted in the Proclamation and beyond.

What about yourself?

Their past is a burden that they can't be elected with, and can't live without. They've jettisoned enough 'principals' for their core Northern support to stomach for the meantime, but the refusal to completely break with the past counts against them over the border.

I'm interested in SG's point "Personally I think anyone who actually believes in democratic secular civic republicanism has probably already left, but until there is a political voice and outlet for such people against the dead weight of gombeen conservatism then Ireland will never change."


Where have the secular, civic republicans gone then?

[SeamusNapoleon]

Eh? I was, as stated, just interested in your opinion on what SF needs to do to succeed, which did not come through in the OP. You ask questions, but seem reluctant to give your opinion.

I apologise for being curt. 'Reluctant' is the right word, though.
Despite wee Cruimh's ghosting of me, I ain't no shinner, but know a good many of them who would be solidly left-wing.
The party interests me much more than other parties, particularly in the south.

Their past is a burden that they can't be elected with, and can't live without. They've jettisoned enough 'principals' for their core Northern support to stomach for the meantime, but the refusal to completely break with the past counts against them over the border.

I'm interested in SG's point "Personally I think anyone who actually believes in democratic secular civic republicanism has probably already left, but until there is a political voice and outlet for such people against the dead weight of gombeen conservatism then Ireland will never change."


Where have the secular, civic republicans gone then?

I think it is the notion of 'civic' that has gone.

Threads on this range across the sub-fora; Political Reform, Culture & Community, History. Even something as innocuous as the issue of public toilets - way off topic here, I know - but I passed a set on the bus yesterday and was reminded of somebody writing on a thread about old Dublin where the toilets on College Green [?] were immaculately kept. Can you imagine that these days..?

I wouldn't disagree with your first paragraph either.

[SideysGhost]

Where have the secular, civic republicans gone then?

Anywhere in the world that would take them, basically. There's been little enough political space for people with those views back home, they tend to get disillusioned and just leave.

I know for a fact that such people still exist within SF, and to a much lesser extent even within FF/FG/Lab. But historically such views are unpopular and such people tend to leave...not active politics, but Ireland altogether. This has been the case for 90 years now! Conform to gombeenism or leave.

[Cruimh]

The Irish Times seem to be doing a bit of a special on Sinn Féin today.
A piece by Paul Cullen analyses the party [the Provisional's] past, and foretells a bright future for them. So long as they continue the jettisoning of their former principles.

Hard to disagree with much of this, in fairness:



The article isn't an attack on Sinn Féin, I must stress. It writes of their broad successes in February



The nub of the article, however, is about supplanting Fianna Fáil as 'a national political movement'. This put me in mind of something - overly simplistic, mind - written by Seán Swan on an earlier incarnation of Sinn Féin:



Just thought I'd start the thread before any potential flamers or outright party-lauders get in

We all know that SF are turning into nua FF - same corruption, same Leadership cult, same jobs for the boys ....

[pippakin]

SFs Provo leadership need to be dumped. I can think of a few bogs, no problem. The main thing they need to do is practice what they preach. Its no good making pious speeches about uniting Ireland and then employing murderers as SPADs very highly paid SPADs at that. I stopped supporting good ole Marty when he allowed the employment of Mary McArdle, and that is not going away anytime soon.

[statsman]

I apologise for being curt. 'Reluctant' is the right word, though.
Despite wee Cruimh's ghosting of me, I ain't no shinner, but know a good many of them who would be solidly left-wing.
The party interests me much more than other parties, particularly in the south.



I think it is the notion of 'civic' that has gone.

Threads on this range across the sub-fora; Political Reform, Culture & Community, History. Even something as innocuous as the issue of public toilets - way off topic here, I know - but I passed a set on the bus yesterday and was reminded of somebody writing on a thread about old Dublin where the toilets on College Green [?] were immaculately kept. Can you imagine that these days..?

I wouldn't disagree with your first paragraph either.

That may have been me; yes, we had more civic pride in those matters in my young youth, maybe we were more republican. My problem (one of my problems) with SF is their failure to make a clean break between Republicanism and Nationalism; that's the bit of their past they cannot leave behind.

[Levellers]

I've my own problems with some of the more "authoritarian-left" wings of SF but let's face it, their "problem" in "middle class" areas boils down to Front Parlourism and very little else.

I'd love to see SF really getting back to roots and trying to educate people in the principles, rights, and responsibilities of proper civic republicanism...as all ye old timers know I've always thought that the concepts of real republicanism run very shallow in Ireland and we're still mostly a feudal society - but this arguing for SF to seek the votes of those people who (erroneously in most cases) see themselves as "middle class" and on the inside track towards a nice safe gombeen position...which let's face it is really what most of the Irish "middle class" aspire to - is just silly.

Whether SF or a new party, we desperately need a party espousing and evangelising for democratic civic republican values, to really put up and contrast those values with gombeen shyster values....it'll be a long slog especially because older voters know nothing but gombeen populist shysterism, but it's the only long-term route out of this mess and the only long-term route towards making Ireland a country that people actually want to live in.

Personally I think anyone who actually believes in democratic secular civic republicanism has probably already left, but until there is a political voice and outlet for such people against the dead weight of gombeen conservatism then Ireland will never change. Could SF be that voice? Possibly, with a few changes.....and not what the feckin Irish Times would want to see. All I can say for sure is that such a party is necessary, and of the established political machines SF is the only one that could credibly go that route. Or a new party. You know, whatever gets the job done.

Good post.

What's wrong with the IT article is that abstentionism and policing boards are not core principles - they are political tactics.

[RepublicOfLuas]

who ever said this extreme nationalist reactionary out outfit was Republican. Bit like Nazis claiming to Socialists !

Poor Tomas. How you manage to remember to breath, let alone turn on a computer, is a mystery to me.