Letters

Could you imagine an Orange march going through other areas that suffered the anti-Catholic pogroms of 1969, most notably Bombay Street in West Belfast, let alone being facilitated by the local residents?

The attack on the Bogside in 1969 and more recent events on the Garvaghy Road are conclusive proof of the ideology of Orangism: the subjugation of Catholics. The Orange Order was founded by the British State for that purpose in 1795 following the massacre of Catholics in the Diamond, Co Armagh. Since then, Orangism has performed this vital role for the British State in Ireland.

Despite this fact and the Orange Order’s violent behaviour during July 1996 which led to the deaths of two nationalists and the serious injury of hundreds of others by pro-Orange gunmen in the UVF, RUC and British army, the faceless members of the Bogside Residents Group decided to support the invasion of our city by thousands of Orangemen. This I may add, was done without the full and proper consultation of the people of the Bogside.

It seems as if the same scenario will arise this year, given that another self-appointed Residents Group has committed itself to the Orange invasion of Dromore. The people of Derry must take a stand this year and prevent a repeat of events last year. The annual invasion of our city by thousands of bigots should not become a permanent feature of our lives.
NO BIGOTS HERE
Bogside
Derry
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This runt statelet was a creation of British violence. This, in effect, was a pseudo or ersatz Ulster as it did not contain three counties of that ancient province because too many Catholics lived there.

Two of the counties, Tyrone and Fermanagh, that are a part of pseudo or ersatz Ulster, contain Catholic/Nationalist majorities. Their wishes are never consulted when the democratic ethos is invoked to justify British occupation of Irish soil.

Protestants in British-occupied Ireland must learn to live as good citizens in a united, free, democratic and sovereign Ireland. Some day they will have to learn to do so without living as privileged members of an artificicially created runt statelet.
WILLIAM GARTLAND
Rio, WI, USA
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This year, the Committee had to be extra-vigilant. First, with those whinging gays trying to co-opt the parade, but the the committee had them cut off at the pass by New York’s finest. Why don’t they go back into the closet where they came from? With that taken care of, the Committee got word of a group that came over from Ireland calling themselves the Bloody Sunday Justice Committee. These people actually thought that they would march up Fifth avenue holding their banner, and carrying pictures of their loved ones who had been shot dead in Derry. What did they think, that this was some kind of Sinn Féin rally that we were holding on Fifth Avenue?

So the parade committee dispatched Martin Kearns, parade formation committee chairman, to put an end to this nonsense. These Derry ones might have fought against the British Army and the RUC back in Ireland, but they had never had to face the likes of Martin “Ban It” Kearns. Jim Dwyer, columnist for the New York Daily News, said that Martin Kearns, proudly thrusting his ignorance, said to the Bloody Sunday Committee: “ Anyway, what does 14 men killed in Belfast have to do with this parade?”

Now with all due respect Mr. Dwyer, Martin is the parade formation committee chairman, not a professor of Irish history or geography. Besides, they were already highlighting the 150th year since the famine. If it took the parade committee that long to recognize the famine, you surely could not expect them to do something about an event that occurred only 25 years ago — please.

Just when he had that fire put out, along came people on Fifth Avenue holding roses for Róisín McAliskey. Martin, having never faced this situation before, headed straight for the reviewing stand on 64th Street, to confer with the rest of the parade committee. The committee opened the bible of the parade, “What is Banned from the Parade” handbook, looking through it alphabetically, they started paging through it furiously. “B” Brendan Behan; “C” Cars; “F” Floats; “G” gays, “H” Hunger Strikers; “L” Leaflets; “P”, posters; “Q” Quill, Mike; but then to their shock and horror, when they got to the letter “R”, they discovered that roses weren’t banned (yet). What was the committee to do but hold an emergency meeting of the agricultural division, to search for a city ordinance that would ban vegetation on Fifth Avenue.Not finding any, the parade committee took the unilateral, unconditional decision to ban all roses, carnations, Easter lilies, four leaf clovers and shamrocks, including the one on the Aer Lingus logo. That will teach those supporters of Bernadette Devlin’s daughter not to mess with the parade committee.

So I salute the parade committee. Seig Heil.
John McDonagh
Bronx, New York
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