Irish people in the north are Irish. Culturally, socially, psychologically, politically..
They’re Irish citizens, they’re Irish speakers, they’re Irish people. They’re Irish.
The beauty of the peace process saw to it that two different communities with different beliefs and different cultures could live in harmony. If you were in the six counties, you could still be part of Ireland if you wanted to. You could still live the life and have the identity that you wanted to no matter what borders or history were telling you.
Whatever side you were on, the peace process and the Good Friday Agreement ensured that everyone in the north could call it home – no matter what they wanted that home to be.
It’s important that isn’t lost in the rest of Ireland though because, when it is, a number of issues arise – even in the sporting world.
- Being from the north and supporting the Republic is not a choice. It’s who you are.
- Gibson and O’Kane were laughed at for not making the Irish Euro 2016 squad when they could’ve played for the north. But they’re Irish.
- Every time a Derry youngster ‘switches allegiance’, he takes serious abuse. The FAI are letting them all down by not picking them up quicker.
- Look at a typical GAA day in Clones and imagine what havoc a hard border would cause to Irish people on their GAA Sundays.
Listen, this whole thing is a pain in the arse for Northern Ireland football and all the brilliant time and excellence the coaches and staff invest in young players. They can only lose with how the system is at the moment but when a player is Irish, he’s going to want to play for his country.
Why Northern Ireland can only lose – @ConanDoherty speaks with Darron Gibson's Northern Ireland under-16 coach https://t.co/1LFXbdRnW7
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) February 24, 2017
After Eamon Dunphy’s Londonderry comments, there was a section who saw it as the joke that he meant it as and they too agreed with the RTÉ pundit – thank God men like Shane Duffy and James McClean didn’t play for the north.
The question back to them was very simple: Why the hell would they?
Geography might give them that option but their culture, their patriotism, their lives don’t leave them with any option. You have to realise that their decision to play for Ireland is as arbitrary as Roy Keane’s. They’re Irish and, if they get the call-up, that’s it – no discussion. If they don’t get the call-up, then they might choose to play for the north like so many other footballers play for countries they’re eligible to play for when their home country doesn’t give them the call.
But when someone like Dunphy on the state broadcaster makes McClean and Duffy out to be different, that seeps into a mindset all over the island. People start to see Irish people in the north different to Irish people in the south.
Niall Ó Donnghaile of Sinn Féin spoke to Seanad Éireann last week about partitionism and he demanded full and equal status for Irish citizens in the north. Part of his plea was to use the example of James McClean.
Responding to remarks by other efforts on reconciliation efforts, Ó Donnghaile said:
“Partitionism isn’t just mechanical. There is a psychology of partitionism which prevails.
“Whilst the Good Friday Agreement gave us citizenship and afforded us the right to be in and participate in the life of the Irish nation, it never said that the north was perpetually settled and done.
“Conán Doherty, an author writing for SportsJOE.ie said in reference to James McClean, and I’ll finish with this quote:
“‘It wasn’t a tactical decision by players to join Ireland because they couldn’t get onto the north’s side. It’s not a bloody decision. You’re either Irish or you’re not and that’s it. You don’t have to think about it.
“‘Whether it was just for a cheap laugh or not, these great servants of Ireland shouldn’t have swipes taken at them after doing what they did for their country in such an important battle. James McClean grew up with just as much love and fire and dreams for Ireland as David Meyler would’ve done. You see, Derry is just as Irish as Cork.’
“That’s the reality for many of us, minister. That’s the cultural, psychological, social and political reality. And if we are classed by the British government and unionism to respect our place as Irish citizens, as Irish people, as Irish speakers, then I think we need to have a serious conversation in the south, in this state, about how we reconcile people in the south with those of us who are Irish in the north and treat us with the equality status of citizenship that we are.”
Irish people in the north, Shane Duffy and James McClean, Republic of Ireland fans all over the country, they’re one. But it’s not fully realised.
Maybe when James McClean is done, they will.
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