Volf said:You might not have been Nazi's, but the same can't be said for the people who took part in Bloody Sunday(the 1920 and the 1972 one). Also the black and tans are far from innocent peopleNinjaDeathSlap said:Let me start off by saying that, while I'm fully aware that the British occupation of Eire was morally suspect at best, we were not the Nazi's.370999 said:I'm sorry what? This is like saying that the French Resistance in the Second World War was wrong Look sometimes you have to use armed resistance. Yes I do think in the long term that Ireland being independent was inevitable however armed struggle speed that up much quicker.NinjaDeathSlap said:If by "made a difference" you mean 'devalued the injustice imposed on the people they claimed to represent by bringing nothing but misery and destruction to innocents though their own misguided aggression and bigotry', then yes.Volf said:I realize that they are a former shell of what they once were, but they made a difference in the last century, wouldn't you agree?MiracleOfSound said:Why do people keep saying this, even in jest? I don't think people realize what the IRA actually is today...Volf said:So perhaps the Irish need to use the IRA again.Cloudwolf616 said:The Irish version of SOPA has just passed today and will be in effect soon ignoring a signed petition of 80,000 voters which is quite a big number of people over here.
Edit: OT: and we call ourselves the free world. SOPA and its ilk have just made it clear to me that democracy is just another form of dictatorship in its own way, except rather than governments oppressing the people, it's governments allowing greedy, self-interested individuals to oppress the people. Remember, in politics, principles can always be ignored when they become inconvenient.
I'm going to go cry in the corner now.
Look the IRA actions in the north after it became clear that it wasn't going to be part of the Republic were different, but in the South the struggle for Independence was IMHO a good and right thing and the IRA was the instrument through which it was carried out.
Second. Yes, the IRA's liberation of the South was justified. However, I am of the opinion that what they went on to become and the acts of terror they committed then undermined the credibility they had before. The moment you resort to terrorism to achieve your aims, you make a mockery of everything you stand for, in my opinion.
Stop it. I was wrong to bring up that allusion, I was more trying to point out pushing out an imperialist then someone similar to the Nazi's. The Black and tans were poor guys, who were desperate for a job int eh economic climate they were in, were sent to somewhere which was a bit of a shithole and were the population hated them and were not properly disciplined or controlled.
Yes they fucked up and did evil things but they aren't evil soulless monsters.