Fia Mór

Immigrants make us better ☘️🙂

Today, at the GPO, we gather to mark the anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising and remember those who lost their lives.

I am urging my fellow Gaels to take the same policy with regards Tommy as the IRA took to one of his beloved Brits, Lieutenant-Colonel Gerald Bryce Ferguson Smyth; "Colonel, were not your orders to shoot on sight? Well you are in sight now, so prepare."

𝐑𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐬: 𝐀 𝐅𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐓𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐈𝐧𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐲 The Easter Rising was a failed terrorist insurgency and it ought to be remembered as such. It was a futile and hopeless insurrection that resulted in disaster, destruction and death for so many involved.  Shamefully, Irish extremists have reinterpreted and exploited the “Rising” to inspire a legacy of Republican blood sacrifice and armed struggle which has plagued this island for over 100 years. The Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB), responsible for the “Rising,”were far from heroes, saints and role models. They were a small group of socialist elitist fanatics who sought to physically impose their radical ideology on Ireland despite the wishes of a moderate constitutional majority. An example of their marginal status is the fact that over 200,000 Irishmen voluntarily signed up to the British war effort, whereas less than 1,300 took part in the IRB’s infamous insurrection. Which do you think was a greater reflection of Irish society as whole? The “Rising” terrorists misjudged that more Irish men and women would support them in their military campaign as it unfolded. However, the dismal numbers that turned out on Easter Monday, which had originally meant to be Easter Sunday but for the confiscation of imported illegal arms and arrest of Roger Casement on Good Friday, meant that the entire mission was doomed to fail - and fail it did. Within a week the radicals had surrendered and they were imprisoned awaiting trial. The swift, abrupt and fierce response by the British Army generated support for the weaker and amateur insurrectionists. So too did the hasty trial and execution of the main plotters. But ultimately, the “Rising” would sew the seeds for future conflicts in Ireland, including the War of Independence, the Irish Civil War and even the modern Troubles. The truth of the Easter Rising is now substituted for Republican legend and romanticism. The failed insurrectionists are elevated into Irish folklore and memorialised in such a way that reinterprets their radical terrorism as something to be inspired by. Terrorists are now viewed as founding fathers of the state even though an independent Republic would not be realised for over 40 years after the “Rising,” and when it came to pass it would look nothing like the socialist state James Connolly and Patrick Pearse envisaged. Every year at Easter, aspects of Irish society revisit the outdated and irrelevant victim-story which wrongly asserts the British as evil oppressors, while at the same time proclaiming extremists as saint-like revolutionaries.  In a baptism of anti-British hate, new generations are indoctrinated into a divisive, anti-British, victimhood mindset justifying the physical force tradition within Irish Republicanism and providing cover for the heinous, immoral and discriminatory killing sprees that Republican extremists have engaged in for over a century. The Easter Rising should be remembered, not for its success, but for its failure. Not for its romanticism but for its horror. It marks a major moment when the gun was first fired to answer the Irish question at the start of the 20th Century. Its legacy and impact on this island is not one to be proud of. The failed insurrection has been used to justify every IRA terrorist campaign since which have claimed the lives of so many innocent people.  Remember the Easter Rising but remember it for the right reasons.