[Marxism] Orange Tradition

["James Daly" <james.irldaly@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Because it's traditional it doesn't make it right

(Brian Feeney, Irish News)

Let's get a few points clear. The Orange Order has been the cause of
civil disorder in Ireland since its foundation.

In 1813 Orangemen caused the first sectarian riot in Belfast.
Repeatedly in the 19th century Orangemen forcing their way through
Catholic districts resulted in scores of people killed, countless
injuries and damage to property, mostly Catholic.

The only reason these consequences of Orange violence didn't occur
continually in the 19th century is that the British government banned
Orange marches by the Party Processions Act between 1832 and 1844 and
1850 and1872.

A British government commission in 1857 concluded that Orange
festivals led to 'violence, outrage, religious animosities, hatred
between classes and, too often, bloodshed and loss of life'.

That's the Orange tradition.

This tradition was maintained and improved upon in the 20th century
when the north became an Orange state in 1921.

Orangemen instigated violent clashes in every decade – Belfast, Derry,
Dungiven, Coalisland, Annalong, Portadown and so on, endlessly.

It's important to make this point because Orangemen and their NIO
sympathisers have succeeded in peddling the lie that opposition to
Orange marches began with Sinn Féin conspiracies in the 1990s.

Rubbish. There were disturbances in Derry and Belfast and Portadown in
the 1970s.

There were huge confrontations in the 1970s on the Springfield Road at
Ainsworth Avenue, literally a stone's throw from where the Parades
Commission forced the Orangemen into the Catholic district last
Saturday.

The Public Order Order (sic) was brought in in 1987 as a result of
stand-offs in Portadown when Orangemen refused to abandon their
traditional route through the Catholic Tunnel to march along the
Garvaghy Road.

Yes folks, 20 years ago Orangemen were REFUSING to march along the
Garvaghy Road. They thought there were more Catholics to intimidate in
the Tunnel.

Given all this, it's truly sickening to hear Peter Hain say he hoped
"people can exercise their traditional and cultural rights".

The logic of that nonsense is that he would support cannibals boiling
someone alive in a pot or have widows in India burnt alive along with
their husband's body.

Well, it was traditional wasn't it? Doesn't make it right but suttee
was their culture.

This balderdash from our proconsul may show he disconnects his brain
from his mouth when he's talking about this place. It also shows how
successful Orange apologists have been in portraying their antics as
'cultural'.

The reality is anything but. They are the Ku Klux Klan marching
through Harlem, the National Front marching along Brick Lane in
London, or perhaps our proconsul would be more familiar with the
concept of the Broederbond marching through Soweto?

Would he support that?

Then again, he has performed so many somersaults in his diverse
political career that he might.

How could you predict which way he'll jump next?

He went so far as to regurgitate the NIO fodder he'd been fed that if
'both sides' were displeased, then the Parades Commission decision was
probably right.

Wrong. It's not a matter of conflicting rights, as the British
administration have sought to portray Orange marches.

Buried in the Good Friday Agreement is a little sentence guaranteeing
'the right to freedom from sectarian harassment'.

If sectarian harassment doesn't describe an Orange march in a Catholic
district, what does?

Here's where the Parades Commission, now devoid of any credibility
thanks to our proconsul's manipulation, confirms the cowardice of its
decisions.

They begin with the presumption of the right of Orangemen to march,
not the right of Catholics to live in peace and quiet, free from men
marching past their homes who revere loyalist killers.

The Parades Commission's aim, as the NIO gameplan said in 1997, is to
get 'Orange feet' on a Catholic street, in other words to keep the
Orange Order happy.

Tradition doesn't enter into it.

The Parades Commission is now licensing marches in parts of Stoneyford
where there have never been marches so that Orangemen can disturb the
peace of Catholics who have never seen an Orange march and moved out
to Stoneyford to get away from Belfast.

You can get away from Belfast, but thanks to the craven Parades
Commission you can't get away from Orange intimidation.

June 29, 2006
________________
This article appeared first in the June 28, 2006 edition of the Irish
News.

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