Comments by "Taint ABird" (@taintabird23) on "Channel 4 News" channel.

  1.  @bellascott6478  Its true.
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  2.  @bellascott6478  Irish people are far more tolerant, secular, progressive and plural than they used to be, pet. If Paddy and Mary Murphy want to discuss a united Ireland, they don't need your permission to it, regardless of your opinion of it. The YouTube comment section is the online equivalent of the door of a public lavatory. If you are looking for serious debate, try elsewhere. Come south sometime, broaden your mind. Who knows, you might even like us a little if you let yourself. Happy 12th of July.
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  3.  @bellascott6478  There are also anti-Irish comments on here - I can see both, and most of the Irish comments are actually busy correcting ignorant unionist views of the republic, but I understand that it can been viewed as an insult in NI. I have unionist friends in Northern Ireland and we all get along, I have Protestant friends in the republic and we call get along. The Protestants in the republic are as aghast with Northern Irish Protestants ( the noisy ones) as Catholics are - they do not relate to them at all. Tensions are always high at this time of year, it is the time of year when Catholics clear out of NI with many of them coming south for a holiday. Sad really.
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  4. Not according to the OECD...
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  5.  @martinmckay3241  Oh gimme a break with the misty eyed bullshit. Kiddy fiddling existed in O'Connells time and has only been eliminated in recent years. He was a liberal in his day, but nobody can know what his stand on abortion might have been.
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  6. 'Do as you're told'...wtf.
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  7.  Teresa Watts  The UK is leaving the EU!
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  8.  @stevensmith686  Of course not. Only when opinions or facts change. What are you afraid of? Too much democracy?
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  9.  @stevensmith686  On the contrary, I am a democrat who understands that Scotland with its distinct identity and Northern Ireland where two conflicting identities were being blended through a shared EU identity and where there is an expectation of consent, are leaving the EU against their will. The lack of constitutional account for this does not concern you, but you are bothered by an alleged democratic deficit in the EU. I don't accept that 15.1 million English people with their identity crisis have the right to take 5 million Scots or nearly 2 millon NI out of the EU against their will, on the grounds that the EU is undemocratic. Its not like there is a strong British Demos these days, is there!
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  10.  @EamonnKee  Indeed, there are more people living in Leinster than there are in Northern Ireland.
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  11. 'The Civil Services as stated as a fact they are fully prepared for the inevitable leaving under WTO terms.' Yes, they will be prepared for food rationing ...sorry, the triaging of food etc...good. 'It's a fact that May's worst terms of leaving anything in recorded history will be rejected in parliament.' It certainly looks like that. 'This does not exclude or even delay negotiations on a trade deal, because they do not begin until our membership has ended.' The real fun only begins when you leave. First, you will be leaving without any deal with enormous consequences for your country. You will be joining the following countries who trade under WTO and have no other trade deals: Holy See, Mauritania, Monaco, Montenegro, Palau, Timor-Leste, Sao Tome and Principe, Serbia, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and last but not least.....Western Sahara. This is the complete list of the nations who trade only under WTO rules. Appropriate. A clear indication of BREXITEER's ambitions. Your country will require a Trade Deal with the EU, which of course will require the payment of £39 Billion just to open discussions. The humiliation begins for you all then.
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  12. Its our own fault. We deserve what's coming to us.
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  13.  @CarWhiz22 That's great, delighted for you if you believe that. If you're a Brexiter, you will base your politics on emotion, just like Biden, and on history. Two key ingredients: history/heritage and emotion You can deny it all you want.
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  14.  @ajaya5451  Nobody suggested that the UK should give up any part of its territory. It needs to uphold the WA and put the customs border in the Irish Sea.
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  15. @ Bob Smith Ireland is a free country and will not be joining the UK in leaving the EU. Look at what it is doing to YOUR country and you have not even left yet.
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  16.  Steven Hawkins  He's Irish and Catholic my ignorant friend.
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  17.  @1chish  To what TWO border polls are you referring? How do you know the desire of the Irish public in relation to Irish unity? How do you know Ireland cannot afford 'the deficit'?
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  18. 'They don't even listen to him. Name one other person who would have handled Brexit and this virus in the UK any better.' Nicola Sturgeon.
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  19. Three counties of Ulster are already in the republic. Four Ulster counties in NI have Irish majorities. The demographics are against you.
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  20. One day, the English will grow a pair and become an ordinary independent nation like their neighbours. In the meantime, it will continue to hide behind the Celts...
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  21.  Nick Nack  Absolutely not. And why should he or any Irish politician? Explain why Ireland should take a neutral stance in the face of a British decision that is contrary to Irish national interests? I can't wait.
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  22. @ Eamon Ireland passed Masstricht. It rejected both Nice and Lisbon, and passed both the second time following amendments.
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  23. No earl, Ireland has never voted to leave the EU. Ireland rejected the Lisbon Treaty, negotiated amendments and passed it the second time. A poll released this week indicates that support for membership of the EU in the Republic is running at 92%, a 4% increase on last year.
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  24. @ Rich William The British legal system was unaffected by EU membership; membership of any EU Army is optional. Brexit is not happening because it is based on a pantomime script which people like you bought into: we English are superior, they need us more than we need them, we are exceptional and can have our cake and eat it. This was the aspiration. But there was no Plan A execute the fantasy.
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  25. What's 'Southern Ireland', Eric? Ireland is going well economically because it took measures to deal with the economic crisis more quickly than anyone else, and has a younger, very flexible and well educated workforce and trades with the world. It is not simply the corporation tax.
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  26. The Irish aren't attacking anyone, they're just point out something the British don't wish to see.
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  27. On the contrary, I don't believe that Ireland will become eurosceptic. It may well assert itself in relation to the bloc, but the EU is by any measure essential to small countries like Ireland. The New Hansiatic League has already replaced the UKs influential role within the EU. The key question will be at what point will the English realise the value of the EU, and the limitations of their new found 'sovereignty' in a world dominated in the years ahead by the USA, China, Russia, the African Union and MERCOSUR.
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  28.  @IrishFrank22  The bloc was never just an economic trading bloc, as the Treaty of Rome indicates. Look it up yourself, and ask, why do the English and yourself convince yourselves that the EEC ever 'only a trading a bloc'? Equally, there is no evidence that the EU will collapse or fall apart. The British have been predicting the end of the bloc since the 1950s, and Brexiters fetishise about it, but there is no actual evidence that it is likely to happen. The UK on the other hand.... I don't see the EU becoming a federal state, I think the EU is close to the limits of integration and the idea that you can get 27 different countries and economies to merge into a federation seems ridiculous. Nobody wants it, but the English love pretending that it is both inevitable in the future, AND that the EU will collapse once it leaves - two mutually opposing views.
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  29. Not really. Ireland is a culturally Catholic, but increasingly secular and socially liberal. Your problem will be social liberalism.
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  30. 1). The allegedly 'high postioned Israeli subversive' Alan Shatter lost his seat in the last election, and is associated with right-wing politics on this planet.2). Swedish culture is surviving fine despite the ridiculous levels of immigration there - it remains one of the most cohesive states in the EU. 3). Given the inability of the UK to close the Irish border during 'The Troubles', I wish you the best of luck with your wall!
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  31. ***** .  1) You originally claimed 'leftist Sweden government who have succeeded in obliterating the Swedish people and their rich culture'. You have failed to provided evidence for this alleged catastrophe.  While there are serious problems in Sweden, the system did not collapse and so my accurate claim that Sweden is one of the most cohesive states in the EU remains, despite the ridiculous levels of immigration.  2) Oh please, Ireland is a conservative country.  The left within Ireland, which was never strong, is the most conservative left in western Europe.  Shatter's party, Fine Gael, absorbed the 'Blueshirts' - Ireland's daliance with Fascism - in the 1930s.  It is Ireland's conservative party and your claim 'what constitutes right wing in the republic of Ireland is slightly to the right of the extreme left' is amusingly inaccurate. 
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  32. It is not for renegotiation. The problem is not the GFA, the problem is Brexit.
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  33.  @longdongsilver1255  They were told that by conservative commentators - the fact is they already meet most of the requirements by default of the UKs membership. Plus there is huge sympathy for Scotland across the EU, because it leaving against its will due to the democratic deficit in the UK. Nobody will oppose their application.
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  34. Outrageous. What does it take to make the English angry at their ruling class?
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  35. England carried the vote. Scotland and Northern Ireland voted to remain; while Wales voted to leave, Welsh speaking Wales voted overwhelmingly to remain (87%). Given that there is really no UK Demos anymore, it would be accurate to say that it was the English outside London who voted to Leave, and everyone else has to leave too. Brexit has little to do with the UK and everything to do with insecurities among the English.
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  36. 'Is it not possible for goods bound for the republic of Ireland to go by ship directly from Europe to Dublin, and so avoiding northern Ireland completely?' Of course, but that is not the issue. The issue is goods coming into Belfast from GB.
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  37. Many Irish people would choose the EU over a united Ireland.
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  38.  @erikblaas5826  Or less...
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  39. Not really. Everything about Brexit has been a shambles.
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  40.  @Unknown-pi5ll  Ireland has been a fiercely anti-Communist country throughout its history. How do you explain the bullshit you just posted?
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  41.  @bellascott6478  Am I? Which part?
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  42.  @bellascott6478  The animosity in your part of Ireland pre-dates the Troubles and is unique to this island. Many NI people who visit the republic at this time of year do get out because the feel uncomfortable, not because they necessarily want to - as you well know. Its a shame that St Patrick's Day is not celebrated by unionists anymore, St Patrick was the patron of Armagh, the ecclesiastical capital of the island and is buried in Downpatrick. I don't know what St Patrick's Day is like in NI, but in the republic it is a secular event celebrated by everybody: Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Jews and immigrants. It is celebrated all over the world, even in countries with zero links to Ireland. The Irish Guards regiment, which is full of NI Protestants with some members from the republic also, celebrates it, so I don't see why Protestants in NI don't even hold their own parades to mark the day. It appears to me that Protestants don't like sharing the national saint with Catholics. I'm not pretending for one minute that Catholics are entirely innocent. I'm well aware that NI can be antagonistic towards Protestants in Northern Ireland and I have no time for it, so no bubbles have been burst. I understand that rioting and general disorder is as much a source of fun for bored nationalists as they are for bored unionists on a long summer evening. Btw, what are the 'holy lands'? Is it a place or a slang word for something? Haven't heard that before. I have a couple of questions for you: 1) what is unionist/loyalist culture to you, and is there a difference between the two? 2) what would you fear from a united Ireland if there was a majority for it in the future?
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  43.  @bellascott6478  Thank you for your response, Bella. So apart from the bands, and the parades, the Orange Order, loyalty to the queen what other things make up Protestant culture in NI? There is football and rugby, though Catholics play those also...what else do you do that is different? And in your opinion why do Ulster Unionists feel the need to be culturally, politically and socially separate from other Irish people even now? It pre-dates the troubles and even partition. The Irish experience of British rule is quite different to the Unionist experience. Ireland was the only country in Europe where the majority were ruled by a minority who had a different language, customs, culture, from the majority. Wishing for things to remain the same is perfectly legitimate, but why do you think you would have to give up your identity in a united Ireland? Any united Ireland will have to be negotiated and Polish, Brazilian and other cultures in Ireland don't have to give up their identity - so why would the Unionists? The notion of multi-layered identities is already a value upon which the Irish state is run now, and it is not Irish policy that unionists or Ulster-Scots do not have a right to be in Ireland. There is already an Ulster-Scots population in the Republic and one of them is a government minister. We are about the same age, I suspect. During the Great War , one of my great grandfathers, a retired RIC man, served in a special constabulary established in Gretna where a huge munitions factory was built. He was Home Ruler, a follower of John Redmond - he was an Irish nationalist serving King and Country. His best friend, an RIC man, was killed by the IRA in an ambush on a train at Knocklong County Limerick in 1919. Another great Grandfather, a veteran of the Boer War, served at home training volunteers for the British Army during the Great War. He had a brother who was in the Royal Artillery in India when that war broke out and arrived in France in December 1914. I only found out that he was in Salonkia with the 10th Irish Division just last week. He survived and lived out his life in in Ireland, dying in 1973. He had another brother in the Royal Irish Regiment who survived the war, but was never right afterwards and he died in a mental home in 1980. He fought in one particular battle in 1915 and survived, but I discovered yet another relative from a different branch of the family was KIA in that same battle in the same Regiment, having only been at the front a few weeks. So we have something in common? Up to 2016, I didn't see a united Ireland as being likely or necessary. But since Brexit it would seem that the ground is shifting, not so much because of what is happening on the island of Ireland, but because of what is happening on the other island over which none of us having any control. It seems to me that unity is an issue that will not be going away anyway soon, and my fear is that London will try to dump NI in the future even though the GFA prevents them from doing so. What are your thoughts on that possibility? Don't be so defensive - I'm only trying to learn your point of view. Nobody is suggesting you should be ashamed of anything.
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  44.  @bellascott6478  It was the same in the Republic. The IRA and SF did not recognise the legitimacy of the Irish Constitution and the Dublin Government until 1986, but it never stopped them availing of the benefits here either. They murdered members of the Irish security forces too. They were an embarrassment to us in the south, committing atrocities in our name and claiming 'ownership' of Irish nationalism. Until Jack Charlton took the Irish football team to success in the 1990s, it was not possible to display the tricolour from your house as you would immediately be suspected of being an IRA sympathiser - perhaps drawing the attention of the Garda Special Branch. I did not know about the Rathcoole situation, though I have heard of the estate. The Shinners, to give them their due, will relish the opportunity to represent them and to do their best for them in the hope that over time they will trust them. They would view social issues through the prism of class inequality rather than what church you go to or what flag you wave. Interestingly, I had heard many years ago that Catholics would go to Ian Paisley with their problems and despite all the horrific things he said about Catholics over the years, he never let them down. It is hard to believe, but it is apparently true. Northern Ireland is a funny old place. You're entitled to an Irish passport. Would you ever claim one?
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  45. I've noticed this too. None of them can spell 'border' - they spell it 'boarder'.
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  46.  john simmons  How will it 'bankrupt Ireland overnight'? The UK sells more to the Irish than the Irish sell to the UK - surely that means the Irish can say 'they need us more than we need them'?
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  47.  @samrowbotham8914  Because Sam, there is no truly 100% independent small countries in the world that are not dirt poor backward entities. The EU invites its members to share their sovereignty judiciously in order to amplify it. Coming together collectively in this way increases the prosperity of each nations population. I'm Irish, not only did I read the Lisbon Treaty - unlike you - but I voted on it twice. Once, against it because I was unhappy with that the minister in charge of the referendum claimed he never bothered to read it, and the second time because he did.
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  48.  @JohnSmith-gj3hg  You the very epitome of the Brexiter ignoramus. Scotland will NOT have pay 13 billion into the EU. They will pay 1.5% of GDP JUST LIKE EVERY OTHER MEMBER. I'm sure the Scots will be happy to pay for a border with England, but of course the nature of that border will depend on the relationship London has with Brussels. The Scots would have no bother creating their own Defence Forces. Any country can do it. The UK will be greatly weakened when it returns to Brussels seeking a trade deal. You only have to look at Ireland to see how the Scots inside the EU could have the whip hand over England in the decades ahead...
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  49.  @no-rj2ez  It's not the 19th century and you don't have a military that can hold Ireland. It would be another humiliation for you in afraid, and confirmation of the UK status as some sort of rogue state.
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  50.  @fridayscoldone4096  'Wish ILL on the normal people of England because of something terrible and shameful that our Government did all those years ago.' The normal people of England have been shafted by those to whom they doff their caps and tug their forelocks. It has always been that way and the Irish have learned to push back against these clowns. Your elite are your problem, not Ireland, not Irish-America.
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