1981 Irish hunger strike

[No pasarán]

I'm not gonna have time to post a thread for each and every hungerstriker here, so I thought they deserved a thread at least.

Beidh an lá linn mo cairde!

Bobby Sands (MP), died 5th May.
Francis Hughes, died 12th May.
Ray McCreesh, died 21st May.
Patsy O'Hara, died 21st May.
Joe McDonnell, died 8th July.
Martin Hurson, died 13th July.
Kevin Lynch, died 1st August.
Kieran Doherty, died 2nd August.
Thomas McElwee, died 8th August.
Michael Devine, died 20th August.

They gave their lives to win recognition as prisoners of war, not to be treated as petty prisoners and to try to win freedom for the people of Ireland after years of suffering through the inhuman conditions they conducted the dirty protest in, there treatment by the guards and finally starved themselves to death as a final act of protest.

[Foldered]

I read a very interesting article about this by Begoña Aretxaga. It had a focus on gender, but it described the protest very well.

[No pasarán]

REMEMBER Ray McCreesh and Patsy O'Hara who both died 21st May.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_nSzGCliCs

I think you can see the depth of the emotion in their body language and eyes alone.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoJkEOwj5WE

RIP Oglach McCreesh

[gilhyle]

I do believe in commemoration and I understand that no suffering in history can be retrospectively justified, but must always be prospectively justified at the time. Yet, I cant help recalling Brendan Hughes sorrowfull remark "it wasnt worth it."

Nor can I easily forget the trajectory of the Adams clique which they leveraged off the Hunger Strike.

Then I must discipline my mind to delete the historical context in order to give these brave men their due in memory (and lets not forget the women POWs who conducted a parrallel struggle).

We are about to enter a decade 2012-2022 of commemorations of events in Ireland's history which will involve just such selective remembering in order to facilitate commemoration.

What is interesting is that I dont think this is a wrong thing to do - there does seem something right about creating heros in memory out of brave men and women by separating out the 'story' of their courage from the history of their period.

Funny that.

[Andropov]

I think it would be more insightfull to post the information behind the PIRA leaderships discussions with Thatcher and her crew and the quite telling allegations of the Provie leaderships rejection of the offers tabled in order for PSF to gain an electoral seat and set the course for their political conquest of electoral politics North and to a lesser extent South of the border.
Chuck sympathisers may fob this away but the fact that 2 INLA men died after these alleged offers were made an open and public inquiry is necessary.

[empiredestoryer]

they died for nothing ireland is still under the control of one of the most evil states in history england

[No pasarán]

I didn't post this thread to start a debate or sypmathise with a particular group, I just wanted to acknowldege their sacrifice. I'm well aware of many of the flaws of some of the republican movement but I'd rather have that debate elsewhere on the board.

[Andropov]

Just an interesting sidenote Mickey Devine was convicted for robbing a gun store.
He was robbing this gun store to get weapons for himself and other INLA volunteers to protect themselves from the provisionals campaign of intimidation in Derry.
This included beatings and knee cappings of INLA Volunteers and in such an incident Patsy O'Hara was badly beaten by members of the provies.
In the end Mc Guineass and his crew were only stopped when Johnny White put a gun to Mc Guineass's head.