Martin Sheen proud of uncle's IRA past

[MMI]

Sorry is this is further off topic for you Ian but MMI asked me some questions so I being submissive and all will attempt to answer them. My post before this one I hope will receive some clarification since I went back to the OP and re-read it to see if I somehow missed the boat.

It is not off-topic: it is just one of two or three themes.

Referring back to your last post, you claim that your position is neutral and that history must be viewed objectively. You also allow that people on each side of the problem have their own subjective opinions. However, throughout this thread you have challenged any attempt to put forward an objective justification – or even an explanation – of the English viewpoint. Did I say “challenged”? I meant “denied”: denied out-of-hand with nothing rational to support your rejection.

Then you accuse me of sophistry! At least sophists recognise facts.

I will accept the British have done bad things in Ireland; but you must accept the Irish have done worse, more often, and to their own countrymen. It is despicable to put the blame for their own low behaviour on the English, but innate in the Irish character.

You go on to ask,

Seriously is you were born and raised in Belfast and raised to believe that your father and mother and brothers etc were fighting for your independence from opression...how would you really feel?

Seriously, I still would believe there is a difference between acts of treachery (e.g., British citizens who kill other British citizens in the name of Irish Republicanism) and acts of resistance against a foreign invader (e.g., the French resistance).

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Further evidence of the Irish habit of subjugating their own was provided in BBC Radio 4’s “Woman’s Hour” last week when they discussed how mothers in Londonderry are forced to ensure their sons, who have been fingered by Republican Action Against Drugs (an IRA splinter group “policing” Republican areas of Londonderry) to keep an appointment for a shooting, because they will be shot anyway, but more seriously if they ignore the summons. Listen to it, then maybe you’ll understand a bit better:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18068691

MOTHER "I had to let him go"

INTERVIEWER "Why?

MOTHER "Because that's the way of it ..."

It must be remembered that drugs formed a significant proportion of the IRA’s income, and with that in mind, one wonders why RAAD is seeking to eliminate drug dealers in Londonderry, even though drug-dealing and drug-taking is still rife.