Brexit meets Northern Ireland Response

[Copernicus]

Sinn Féin is now the majority party in Northern Ireland. Although it won't happen anytime soon, the question of Northern Ireland doing a reverse Brexit is now becoming serious.

Irish nationalist Sinn Fein earns historic Northern Ireland election win​

Northern Ireland is on the cusp of having a nationalist leader for the first time in its history after Sinn Fein, once considered the political wing of the IRA, emerged as the largest party in regional elections.

Sinn Fein overtook the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) in voting for the province’s 90-member national Assembly, winning the most seats, 27, and securing the highest share of first preference votes. This compares with 24 seats for the DUP and 17 for the Alliance Party.

The counting of votes is still underway on Saturday, with 88 out of the 90 seats counted, according to the Electoral Office for Northern Ireland.

Sinn Fein is now in pole position to install a first minister for the first time. The party is opposed to Northern Ireland being part of the United Kingdom and is in favor of a united Ireland.

“The preparation for constitutional change in Ireland needs to begin now,” Sinn Fein president Mary Lou McDonald told CNN on Friday evening as results began to emerge. “We need to be alive to the fact that change is underway.

 

[bilby]

Whoever would have imagined that the DUP, with its unique blend of insane religious extremism, insane hyper nationalism (towards a nation that mostly doesn't care about them at all), and insane hyper nostalgia, coupled to nepotism and dominance by a tiny clique of half-wits, would take the first opportunity to use their control of the balance of power in Westminster to achieve an ultra-short term financial windfall at the bleeding obvious medium term cost of destroying everything they hold dear, including (but not limited to) their stranglehold on political power in the six counties?

I mean, apart from anyone who was paying attention, obviously.

Irish reunification as a single nation within the EU is an inevitable consequence of Brexit, and Blind Freddy could have told Arlene Foster that, back when she had the ability to block it. But she has nothing if not faith. Both in her nonexistent god, and in the very real, but utterly mendacious, British Conservative (and Unionist) Party.

Despite - perhaps even because of - the stereotype, Irish people in general are not stupid. Indeed, they strike me as far more politically informed, aware, and engaged than the English. The majority of residents in the six counties know that the EU is a far better long term option for prosperity than the UK, now that they have been forced to leave one or the other. And the (quite reasonable) fear of the Roman Catholic Church has faded, now that the Republic has finally had its long delayed enlightenment.

The religious sectarian division between Catholic and Protestant has steadily become less and less relevant, as both sides have increasingly rejected religion altogether.

Ireland got prosperous, on the back of independence from the UK, and her favourable status as a poor country in the EU. And prosperous and well educated people don't subscribe to blind obedience to religious authority.

Northern Ireland has long survived on the fear of being shackled to the poverty and religious extremism that rule from Dublin implied - and this was no empty fear. But now it's London that is poor, and the DUP have gone from being the less awful of two religious extremist options for who is to dominate the lives of Northern Irish Protestants, to being the sole religious extremist option, with the much more moderate Sinn Fein as the leading alternative.

"Moderate" is not an adjective I ever expected to associate with "Sinn Fein", but that just goes to show that political parties not only can, but must change with the times. The DUP hasn't had a change of policy, nor an original idea, since their founding in 1971. Sinn Fein has been forced to change, radically, by the changes in the Dublin political and religious environment, and by the ending of the armed struggle - being an oppressed minority is politically easy, when you can just shoot people and blow shit up, and call that a platform; A ceasefire forces the oppressed to seek the power of wide popularity, to replace the power of violence, which can be wielded by a much smaller group.

Asking the people of Northern Ireland to accept the re-imposition of a hard border on the island of Ireland is about as popular as asking the people of East Berlin to accept the rebuilding of the wall.

Brexit demands a customs border between the UK and the EU; The only question for Northern Ireland is whether they shackle themselves to the increasingly poverty stricken and irrelevant UK and recreate the hated and violence provoking land border; or whether they embrace prosperity and throw the border into the sea.

Sinn Fein knows that you don't need to put a gun to anyone's head to get them to make such a no-brainer choice.

 

[Jayjay]

I wonder if Sinn Fein will change its position about not serving in the UK parliament, now that they seem to have a realistic shot at actually getting more seats there?

 

[bilby]

I wonder if Sinn Fein will change its position about not serving in the UK parliament, now that they seem to have a realistic shot at actually getting more seats there?

Probably not. There's not much benefit to them from taking their seats, unless they are able to hold the balance of power in a hung parliament; And even then, the unpopularity of such a move with their base would make it a poor choice.

Bear in mind that a lot of Sinn Fein TDs are elected by people who are strongly anti-British; Their popularity in the UK, (particularly in Great Britain) is of much less importance to them than their popularity in Ireland.

Taking their seats in Westminster would likely lose them seats in Dublin, for no particular gain.

 

[Copernicus]

I wonder if Sinn Fein will change its position about not serving in the UK parliament, now that they seem to have a realistic shot at actually getting more seats there?

That is an interesting question. I'm not sure that a Sinn Fein politician could serve in Parliament without swearing allegiance to the UK government. It would be awkward, but the UK did send a Brexiteer to represent them in the European Parliament.

 

[Patooka]

On a side note, it makes you wonder what Nicola Sturgeon's long term political plans are.

 

[Metaphor]

Whoever would have imagined that the DUP, with its unique blend of insane religious extremism, insane hyper nationalism (towards a nation that mostly doesn't care about them at all), and insane hyper nostalgia, coupled to nepotism and dominance by a tiny clique of half-wits, would take the first opportunity to use their control of the balance of power in Westminster to achieve an ultra-short term financial windfall at the bleeding obvious medium term cost of destroying everything they hold dear, including (but not limited to) their stranglehold on political power in the six counties?

I mean, apart from anyone who was paying attention, obviously.

Irish reunification as a single nation within the EU is an inevitable consequence of Brexit, and Blind Freddy could have told Arlene Foster that, back when she had the ability to block it. But she has nothing if not faith. Both in her nonexistent god, and in the very real, but utterly mendacious, British Conservative (and Unionist) Party.

Despite - perhaps even because of - the stereotype, Irish people in general are not stupid. Indeed, they strike me as far more politically informed, aware, and engaged than the English. The majority of residents in the six counties know that the EU is a far better long term option for prosperity than the UK, now that they have been forced to leave one or the other. And the (quite reasonable) fear of the Roman Catholic Church has faded, now that the Republic has finally had its long delayed enlightenment.

The religious sectarian division between Catholic and Protestant has steadily become less and less relevant, as both sides have increasingly rejected religion altogether.

Ireland got prosperous, on the back of independence from the UK, and her favourable status as a poor country in the EU. And prosperous and well educated people don't subscribe to blind obedience to religious authority.

Northern Ireland has long survived on the fear of being shackled to the poverty and religious extremism that rule from Dublin implied - and this was no empty fear. But now it's London that is poor, and the DUP have gone from being the less awful of two religious extremist options for who is to dominate the lives of Northern Irish Protestants, to being the sole religious extremist option, with the much more moderate Sinn Fein as the leading alternative.

"Moderate" is not an adjective I ever expected to associate with "Sinn Fein", but that just goes to show that political parties not only can, but must change with the times. The DUP hasn't had a change of policy, nor an original idea, since their founding in 1971. Sinn Fein has been forced to change, radically, by the changes in the Dublin political and religious environment, and by the ending of the armed struggle - being an oppressed minority is politically easy, when you can just shoot people and blow shit up, and call that a platform; A ceasefire forces the oppressed to seek the power of wide popularity, to replace the power of violence, which can be wielded by a much smaller group.

Asking the people of Northern Ireland to accept the re-imposition of a hard border on the island of Ireland is about as popular as asking the people of East Berlin to accept the rebuilding of the wall.

Brexit demands a customs border between the UK and the EU; The only question for Northern Ireland is whether they shackle themselves to the increasingly poverty stricken and irrelevant UK and recreate the hated and violence provoking land border; or whether they embrace prosperity and throw the border into the sea.

Sinn Fein knows that you don't need to put a gun to anyone's head to get them to make such a no-brainer choice.

Isn't the possibility of a united island of Ireland a wonderful outcome?

 

[Metaphor]

On a side note, it makes you wonder what Nicola Sturgeon's long term political plans are.

Well she still has not convinced Scotland's people to want independence from the UK, though perhaps she should busy herself with reducing Scotland's reign as the drug death capital of Europe.

 

[Tigers!]

Sinn Fein knows that you don't need to put a gun to anyone's head to get them to make such a no-brainer choice.

Yes, but why did it take them so many decades to work that out?

 

[bilby]

Sinn Fein knows that you don't need to put a gun to anyone's head to get them to make such a no-brainer choice.

Yes, but why did it take them so many decades to work that out?

Because there was no suggestion of a border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain until Brexit.

There was a hard border (and I mean hard - Berlin Wall style hard) on the island of Ireland, and they were quite prepared to put a gun to people's heads to try to make them remove it.

As it turned out, this was a completely successful strategy; The Good Friday Agreement was a compromise solution in which the IRA agreed to disarm, in return for the dismantling of that hard border.

With both sides of the border inside the EU, this solution was sensible, reasonable and secure.

Then the UK Conservative Party decided to resolve a petty internal policy dispute by fucking their country over massively; And amongst the idiocies that make up the clusterfuck that is Brexit is a requirement for a customs and trade border between the UK and the EU - which implies either excising NI from the UK for customs and trade purposes; Or breaking the GFA by re-establishing a border on the island of Ireland.

The GFA is underwritten by the USA and the EU, both of whom are bound, as guarantors of the treaty, to prevent the establishment of such a border.

So the UK can have Brexit and lose Northern Ireland; Or they can keep Northern Ireland and drop Brexit. They've chosen the former. Or rather, they're still trying to pretend that there's no need to choose; But there is. The EU cannot tolerate a porous border with a non-EU nation, but are prepared to give NI special status, as long as a hard border is implemented in the Irish Sea.

That special status (known as The Northern Ireland Protocol, and agreed to by both Westminster and Brussels) makes NI a part of Ireland for trade, travel, and customs purposes; So little is left to distinguish one part of the island from another as to make it obvious to Blind Freddy that it's probably best to go the whole hog and reunify the island politically too.

British excuses for not having fully implemented the border between NI and GB range from the spectacularly dumb to the fully batshit crazy. They even tried to say that the Protocol isn't valid because they didn't read it before signing it.

Did I mention Brexit is a total clusterfuck?

 

[Tigers!]

Sinn Fein knows that you don't need to put a gun to anyone's head to get them to make such a no-brainer choice.

Yes, but why did it take them so many decades to work that out?

Because there was no suggestion of a border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain until Brexit.

There was a hard border (and I mean hard - Berlin Wall style hard) on the island of Ireland, and they were quite prepared to put a gun to people's heads to try to make them remove it.

As it turned out, this was a completely successful strategy; The Good Friday Agreement was a compromise solution in which the IRA agreed to disarm, in return for the dismantling of that hard border.

So if you kill enough people you get what you want?
Don't know why no other terrorist organisation thought of trying that?

 

[bilby]

Sinn Fein knows that you don't need to put a gun to anyone's head to get them to make such a no-brainer choice.

Yes, but why did it take them so many decades to work that out?

Because there was no suggestion of a border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain until Brexit.

There was a hard border (and I mean hard - Berlin Wall style hard) on the island of Ireland, and they were quite prepared to put a gun to people's heads to try to make them remove it.

As it turned out, this was a completely successful strategy; The Good Friday Agreement was a compromise solution in which the IRA agreed to disarm, in return for the dismantling of that hard border.

So if you kill enough people you get what you want?
Don't know why no other terrorist organisation thought of trying that?

What are you on about?

"If you kill enough people you get what you want" describes pretty much the entire history of the world. I am not sure how anyone can be unaware of this.

And you're only a terrorist until you win. Winning terrorists are "freedom fighters".

That might not be how it should be, but it's how it is.