Originally Posted by Drogheda445

Perhaps not. But then if they want to burn nationalist symbols, burn symbols that are less representative of the Irish nation as a whole. The fact that they are burning our national flag for no better reason that it simply being a "nationalist symbol" is vile. I would imagine a British person would feel the same if a Union Jack was burnt simply because it is a loyalist symbol. It is incredibly insulting to many people.

Absolutely. Which is why the thought of burning their national flag is completely abhorrent to me. The mentality of the unionist people is truly shocking. Time for the Commons to start enacting hate crime legislation to put a stop to this. Anyone found burning a flag in a hateful manner should be imprisoned. After all two lads from Coleraine were arrested for burning a poppy FFS! Burn a flag - it's their culture init. Burn a poppy - imprisoned and subjected to loyalist death threats.

There is no equality in our relation with the British. Unionists get away with anything they want. British culture is accepted and glorified. But Irish culture is denigrated and attacked at every opportunity. Time for the Irish people to start standing up to these thugs.

Originally Posted by Drogheda445

It really fills me with rage and disgust, seeing the flag of another country being descecrated just because "dem feenyuns" are flying the flag. If they need to burn a flag, perhaps a starry plough or the like, but not our flag FFS. It represents much more than the IRA, it represents the Irish state and it's people.

Little sc*mbuckets.

Haha well your friends over on the NI forum think that its perfectly acceptable.

Originally Posted by Ren84

Absolutely. Which is why the thought of burning their national flag is completely abhorrent to me. The mentality of the unionist people is truly shocking. Time for the Commons to start enacting hate crime legislation to put a stop to this. Anyone found burning a flag in a hateful manner should be imprisoned. After all two lads from Coleraine were arrested for burning a poppy FFS! Burn a flag - it's their culture init. Burn a poppy - imprisoned and subjected to loyalist death threats.

There is no equality in our relation with the British. Unionists get away with anything they want. British culture is accepted and glorified. But Irish culture is denigrated and attacked at every opportunity. Time for the Irish people to start standing up to these thugs.

Don't tar Unionists with Loyalists. Alot of Unionists think the 12th is silly. Me and my sister where out for a walk yesterday and alot of people didn't bother going to the parades.

Originally Posted by Drogheda445

The bigotry in this is absolutely mind-blowing. You clearly have no respect for democracy of any kind.

Northern Ireland was created because nationalists and unionists could not reconcile. Unionism was antagonised by the sectarian politics of De Valera and the likes, hence why they turned to Britain to protect their interests. Had nationalism been more of a broad, pluralist ideology, like that of Tone and Grattan, it might have prevailed. But as a result of the divided politics of Ireland, the Protestant population of Ireland (which was concentrated in, but not located entirely in Ulster), decided to opt out. Many unionist leaders like Carson were opposed to partition, as they saw it as a sell-out from southern and western Irish unionists. It was not a national problem like so many like to make out, it was a mainly religious and economic based issue.

The reckless nature of partition saw many Protestants and Catholics being located in the "wrong" state. Protestants, who made up 10% of the population in the South, were at times forced out. Likewise, in Northern Ireland, many Catholics and nationalists were forced from their homes. I accept the determination for Protestants in Ireland to have opted out, but the way partition was drawn out was clearly not given consideration, a bit like what happened in Korea or Vietnam at the end of WW2; instead of looking at demographics or politics, countries were simply divided by geographic reasoning.

There is no reason nationalism cannot exist in Northern Ireland. Unionism, despite its minimal size, exists in the Republic as well. Whilst I am opposed the reintegration of Ireland into the United Kingdom, as it proposes the destruction of my state, I support the right of people to hold it. I am certainly opposed to violent coercion, but neither am I supportive of persecuting them. If they engage in democratic politics, then I support their right to exist. This is what is known as democracy. Self-determination, on the other hand, was given to Northern Ireland and to the Republic. If the Republic of Ireland decided to support reintegration with the United Kingdom, it should be given the right to do so. It is democracy, the will of the people, not the select few to decide the future. You seem to consistently, and I suspect deliberately, forget that I support the right of the people of Northern Ireland to decide their future. Do you not understand this? If Northern Ireland wants to stay British for eternity, then they shall. It is my preference, and I am well within my right to have a preference, just as unionists in the South have a preference to join the UK, for a United Ireland. If you reject this, then you reject a fundamental right for me to have a political opinion or to express it. You also reject the fact that if (and it is a very big if) the people of NI decide to join the Republic, they should be allowed to do so. You therefore reject democracy in its simplest form.

If you reject this, I am well within my right to call you bigoted and narrowminded, because a bigot is someone who will only accept or listen to a belief held by themselves, which is the case with you. You have also declared that we in the South are run and governed by terrorist parties, that we are a jingoistic state, and that I am a "slow-learner". You have also:

- Tried to revise words to suit your agenda, or to use to insult others
- Tried to rewrite history to suit your political leaning, and to justify what discrimination against republicans in Northern Ireland

I will just finish with this. I am not a supporter of SF or the bloody campaign of the Provisionals. It was absolutely vile and disgraceful. If you are so narrowminded as to put EVERY nationalist and republican into the same category as the provisionals, then it just highlights your bigotry and narrowminded outlook.

You always know when you are dealing with an incoherent imbecele when the meaningless insults of "bigot" and "bigotry" are littered throughout his argument.

You need to face the reality that there are two different nations on this island and there always will be. We would not have centuries of differences nor any people prepared to spill blood if we were somehow one nation. As I keep saying, good fences make good neighbours - respect the other territory and stop trying to conceive ways to intrude and interfere in the affairs of the other territory and relations will improve.

What you are discussing is not "democracy" at all. Democracy concerns the day-to-day governance of a democratic jurisdiction - things like deciding on what day to collect the bins, or how much money to spend on schools etc. What you are in fact discussing is the complete and utter DESTRUCTION of a democracy - the destruction of Northern Ireland and annexation into a system from another nation altogether. Democratic outcomes are also decided by a majority, but a "majority" is not a simple definition, because here in Northern Ireland Irish Nationalists state that a simple majority (50%+1) is not acceptable for day-to-day governance.

As well as that, democratic jurisdictions are created by the peoples or "nations" they represent. A fundamental principle in determining such a jurisdiction is the right to self-determination. You decide which peoples deserve a territory of democratic jurisdiction (often by war) and implement democracy within that territory. What you are proposing here is to suggest that the blood spilt by one group who have already fought and won their right to self-determination with the UVF's blood on the Somme -- the British people of Ulster -- is not worth as much as the blood spilt by Irish Republicans in the Irish War of Independence in winning their right to self-determination. You want to eradicate the Ulster right to self-determination entirely, despite the fact that people here will always be prepared to fight to the death to maintain it. The territory of the Ulster British people -- Northern Ireland -- was determined at creation by a super-majority of greater than two thirds loyal to it based on elections alone. To adjust it you will need at least the same, and the best you can hope for is some border adjustment. If a simple majority is not good enough for Irish Nationalists for day-to-day decisions then it certainly isn't good enough for the complete destruction of a nation.

Furthermore, to continuously campaign for the DESTRUCTION of a democracy is not democratic at all. It simply distracts from the real democracy being enacted (i.e. day-to-day business). When you have been told for over a century that the DESTRUCTION of the democracy is not wanted and that people within that democracy are prepared to spill blood to maintain it, you do not continuously campaign for that democracy's destruction despite being endlessly told NO. It is OBNOXIOUS. It is TIME-WASTING. It is ANTI-DEMOCRATIC and it is TREASONOUS.

Originally Posted by Scaramouche

The people of Ireland voted for an end to English rule in our country in 1918.

The English Government and the Unionist didn't care about democracy when they forced partition on the indigenous people of Ireland.

If Irish people had democracy in their own country, there would be no English rule in Ireland.

There is no such thing as one single "people of Ireland". That has only ever been imposed from outside under British Imperialism. When the people of the island decided for themselves how many peoples there were they took up arms and decided that there are two nations on the island. This is the agreed outcome of the people of the island in the only time they have decided for themselves, and has been sealed directly with democratic endorsement in the ballot box. Power to the people!

Originally Posted by Frosty1

Haha well your friends over on the NI forum think that its perfectly acceptable.

Care to name a few? Do you not think that the burning of national flags, on either side, is an act of hateful sectarianism, regardless of the circumstances.

Originally Posted by Drogheda445

Care to name a few? Do you not think that the burning of national flags, on either side, is an act of hateful sectarianism, regardless of the circumstances.

I'm not going to name a few. But there are two that I can think of that goto those bonfires. And yes I do. They are stupid and rude. Its time they stopped. Hopefully there will be a crack down on them.

Originally Posted by Drogheda445

But then if they want to burn nationalist symbols, burn symbols that are less representative of the Irish nation as a whole... It is incredibly insulting to many people.

The problem is that this so-called "Irish Nation" is claiming to be a nation of more than its territory. It is claiming another nation and hence the desire to destroy that other nation. It also officially and intentionally names itself in such a way, and words its constitution to desire the destruction of that other nation. You can't have your cake and eat it too with such an irredentist state and then claim to be "insulted" when others dare to object to the jingoism of your nation.

Therefore think again about who is insulting who, and while you are at it pass me a match!!!

Originally Posted by oxterSniffer

You always know when you are dealing with an incoherent imbecele when the meaningless insults of "bigot" and "bigotry" are littered throughout his argument.

You need to face the reality that there are two different nations on this island and there always will be. We would not have centuries of differences nor any people prepared to spill blood if we were somehow one nation. As I keep saying, good fences make good neighbours - respect the other territory and stop trying to conceive ways to intrude and interfere in the affairs of the other territory and relations will improve.

I presume you would also concede that there are two different people in Norther Ireland, I presume a reasonable solution for you (although not for the vast majority of Nationalsits or Unionists) would be a sample repartition of Northern Ireland so That Unionist Majority Areas stay in the UK and Nationalist move to the republic. That would be respecting good borders.

Originally Posted by willoughby

I presume you would also concede that there are two different people in Norther Ireland, I presume a reasonable solution for you (although not for the vast majority of Nationalsits or Unionists) would be a sample repartition of Northern Ireland so That Unionist Majority Areas stay in the UK and Nationalist move to the republic. That would be respecting good borders.

No, I don't agree with this "two communities" mantra that is counter-productively repeated ad-nauseum by the Appeasement Process brigade and by the forced sectarian system of government, especially when currently over 90+% of the population are reasonably happy in Northern Ireland. I think you find that behind the scenes that a common local Ulster identity is much stronger than is given credit for by media types obsessed with the sensationalism of controversy and conflict over any "British"/"Irish" issue. Repartition is not a simple matter as there is no such clear delineation, and is something of absolute last resort and not something I can conceive circumstances ever being so that it would be necessary.