WITH the annual Easter Rising commemorations having passed we are now that little bit nearer to the centenary — the big commemoration, 2016.
It will be both an historical lesson and a marriage of militarism and nationalism. It will also, of course, remind us that the 32 county Republic that 1916 and the torturous aftermath was all about is still as far away as it ever was.
It will also, in 2016, one hundred years after the Easter Rising, allow us to ask a very pertinent question. Does the idea of a 32-county Republic even matter anymore?
In terms of the modern conflict in the North and the events that gave rise to the Provisional IRA it is not a matter of dispute that the society in the North was then a deeply sectarian and bigoted one. It is not a matter of historical dispute that this bigotry and sectarianism helped to give birth to the Provisionals and created the ground that eventually gave birth to the decades of bloodshed and murder. None of that can be disputed.
Just as it cannot be disputed that the decades that came after the initial disturbances of 1969 were murderous and bloody and savage. Asking the question of whether a united Ireland matters anymore is not to deny the historical reality or even to downplay it, to in any way ignore the suffering and the sacrifice that individuals went through because of that ideal.
So in asking the question I am not saying the deaths of IRA hunger strikers no longer matter anymore than I am saying the deaths of people having a simple pint in a Birmingham pub no longer matter. I am not denying that bigotry, violence and prejudice caused the Provisional IRA anymore than I am denying that the Provisional IRA murdered and slaughtered people.
All I am now saying is does that idea matter anymore? Does a united Ireland matter? Is a 32-county Republic worth anything anymore?
With the centenary of 1916 approaching and with even the British Queen suggesting they’d like to take part in marking it I think the question is well worth asking.
With the nationalism that surrounds such events bound to be on display I think the question is well worth asking. And while there are still people on this island who believe that killing other people is worth it for the cause of a 32-county Republic I think the question is worth asking.
I also think it is worth asking because, one hundred years on, it is clear that Padraig Pearse’s belief in a blood sacrifice became something that ran through Ireland for the next 80 years. In this interpretation of Ireland it is not whether British or sectarian oppression and injustice exists that creates the obligation to spill blood for the cause, it is the cause itself.
In this way Irish Republicanism becomes something that is betrayed if the gun is laid down. It becomes something diminished if those following it prefer to speak to their opponents rather than shoot them. In this way, in fact, Irish Republicanism becomes something that has to be served with the blood of others rather than a specific aim for a specific future. In this way Irish Republicanism becomes a cult of death.
Not that I don’t think that some of the ideals within there aren’t worthy. The dream of a 32-county Republic that pays homage to its own intrinsically Irish culture isn’t a bad dream at all.
But much like the idea of a Gaelic Ireland, united, free and self-sustaining, I don’t think it is one that speaks to the years of 2014 or 2016. In essence there may well have been justification in picking up a republican gun in 1916 or 1969 but there isn’t in 2014 0r 2016. Ireland isn’t the same and the dream can’t be the same either.
I believe it was Conor Cruise O’Brien who said that a united Ireland wasn’t worth a broken leg.
Now I don’t think I would have agreed with him on much but I might just agree with him on that. After all that killing and all those deaths and all those bombs and all those utter innocents slaughtered for being in the way or as a deadly political tool to get at those you disagreed with, Irish Republicanism has claimed enough blood.
There might still be a noble cause in there somewhere but you would have to climb over a lot of corpses to get at it.
