Legacy - Martin McGuinness

[FairytalesAreBullshit]

I was listening to Tony Blair and his thoughts on Martin McGuinness, who died yesterday after suffering from cancer I believe. Tony Blair focussed on the triumphs of the peace process, the hard work he put in for over 20 years to achieve peace, plus bringing people together.

Sky chose an alternative way to report his death, with the daughter of her 72 year old mother caught up in the Warrington bombings. The presenter wanted it to be as emotive as possible, they were a few steps away from saying he should burn in hell.

Others chose to show a gathering in West Belfast and other places, including Scotland, where people came out to pay their respects.

It's had me thinking all day, if a person does bad, then dedicates their life to doing good. What should their legacy be?

He worked until a few months before his death, which shows that he wanted to fight on right to the end. I know his departure prompted another election, as there were things that he felt were being ignored like using the Irish language to name one. (Sorry I'm a politics and economics geek)

I grew up during the time prior to the peace process, so know what happened from what was reported on TV and in papers. My parents were strict about where we could go in fear of us getting caught up in something.

He was a cold hearted killing machine, I believe.
Yes indeed, hands caked with blood. I felt sorry for the Queen having to shake those same hands. Can't have been easy for her.
The world is well rid of the scumbag.

No justice for them

No justice always for people that the IRA killed either.

Convoluted crap. Steak knife anyone? Adams and mcGuinness sellouts to their supposed cause. And as for bliar

For a large part of 'The Troubles' there was censoring of reporting, a government refusal to allow those they claimed 'terrorists' to be heard on British TV (the BBC did a lot to get round this attempt by the government to decide whose perspective we could listen to). In NI Trials were heard without juries and houses routinely raided under 'emergency powers' snatching people from their homes and torturing them for information - all outside the law, and all done with untried people. Then we had Bloody Sunday - unarmed civilians marching for civil rights shot down by British forces. For these murders, nobody has been brought to trial.

The IRA were not 'goodies' - the ruled with an iron rod, killed civilians as well as soldiers and police. They raised money by intimidation and dealing in drugs - amongst other things. However - the UDA and UVF did the same for their 'cause'. That doesn't make either of them right or their actions justifiable - but it does give some background.

NI segregation has a long history predating MMG and his ilk - some families pass on 'their truth' to the next generation and so it goes on. Many people refused to be drawn to see the solution in violent response, and some turned their back on violent response.

Tebbit's response is unsurprising, but Tebbit was part of Thatchers government who did nothing to even start a peace protest - she wouldn't even talk to home grown 'terrorists' while she was very happy to talk to terrorists elsewhere - General Pinochet being one.

Has there been any real condemnation of how badly the Irish were treated? I dont think there has, not in the British media (not that i have ever read anyway) and not by any British Government. I have read plenty condemnation of the IRA and it's actions though but nothing of the other side.

What about the innocent Irish men, women and children murdered by British soldiers - What should the legacy of Brits be who butchered unarmed civilians here in Ireland?

If you're going to incite hatred towards Irish Republicans on a Mumsnet thread then in the very least set out the facts as they are and not how you ignorantly perceive them to be!

Not inciting racial hatred towards Irish republicans, but commenting on the legacy of an individual about whom the thread is titled. I wouldn't comment on alleged atrocities by the British army as I've not seen evidence of it, other than them carrying out their duty in enforcing the law in what had become a very lawless situation. But I have seen and heard evidence on murders carried out by Mcguiness, and whether people like it or not, he was responsible in part for the deaths of thousands of innocent men, women and children, some of whom have never been given a proper burial because the scumbag never gave the grieving families details of where their bodies had been buried. I therefore refuse to applaud a man who had so much blood on his hands.

EmeraldScorn

Please don't talk about ignorance after the comment you have just made on anither thread about the policeman who has died today.

*another

Thank you WigglesRock should check chat more often.

JustNoWords - I know a bit of the background about how people were treated when landed gentries ruled areas. How we effectively stood by as millions died of hunger. Also read about Black and Tan's too, what they did. In my life time, I would like to hear about the later times, what happened on both sides, as it was presented as a one sided story. I know many people responded to Irish people with disdain. Many still hold views that aren't that pleasant. A bit like those who will see what happened in London today as being endemic of that one religion.

I'm sorry for anybodies losses.

I was going to post this earlier on, but I was feeling really rough. I wondered what people's views on his legacy are, I was rather surprised that Tony Blair sung his praises so highly, which is what prompted me to think is he seen as a redeemed person for his efforts in the peace process. It wasn't just via Twitter or maybe his personal homepage (I don't know if he has either) but on National Radio, where the demographics listening to what was being said, would be those who lived in the U.K. Whilst it was going on.

Thank you to everyone for their input. I think whilst we lived in fear, it could not be comparable to those who had this on their doorstep, day in, day out. I really do hope that going forward peace is maintained.

emeraldscorn

Did you really just refer to the Birmingham six as "British wrongdoing in Ireland?" You don't think the bigger issue was those killed and maimed in the bombings?

Anyway I'm not sticking up for the way the British have behaved but quit this whataboutery - whatever the British did or didn't do McGuiness was a murderous cunt.

I've had conflicted thoughts about all this. But for me I think you can judge someone by their actions/words.

Whatever he did as a young man or during the peace process he was in a position to do something for him very small but for other people would have been huge.

He knew he was going to die soon, he quite literately knew where the bodies are buried. He took that knowledge to his grave.

The 'peace process' was supposed to be 'peace and reconciliation'.

Whether history decides he was good, bad, flawed, whatever, history will I hope show that the lasting legacy of peace n NI is the legacy of the people who live there now and their children.

I know at least on NI mumsnetter will never see a family member's killer punished and she counts that as the cost of peace. I know there would not be peace without the will of the 'ordinary people', horrible phrase but the people who just go about their normal lives in NI.

Livelove Google some of the lost above given by emerald and you might begin to understand the level of British corruption and war crimes in Ireland.
Read up about British state collusion. Rosemary Nelson, Martin o'hagan, the sean Graham bookmakers massacre in which a 15 year old boy was killed by loyalist paramilitaries aided by British forces! Open your eyes!!! You will get a chill in your spine.

All you on here who keep it
Black and white, calling mmg a murdering scum bag and a terrorist... how many of you loves through it in Northern Ireland???
How many of you really understand the position the catholic people were in by the end of the 1960's?
The Ira didn't just start murdering people one day, they responded to their peoples oppression under British occupation
If the brits hadn't been here in the first place there would have been no war

Self-determination and civil rights in your own country are both reasonable aspirations and Ireland's hopes for this were severely set back both by partition in the 1920s and the social apartheid that followed in the six partitioned counties, which led to multilateral sectarianism and violence.

The "Irish problem", which is a British problem, was always simplified and distorted in Britain. Unless you were Irish and already understood the issues it was impossible to discern from the media that more than one faction was in play. This was confusing in Ireland, which reported everything, including loyalist atrocities and the Dublin bombings.

Revulsion at the murders on all sides led to talks and hopes of a political settlement. Unbelievably, in the most enlightened decade of the 20th century, it came about.

Every participant in the peace process was heroic in delivering the people they represented to the process. I include Martin McGuinness and David Ervine, who had the hardest jobs.

Piglet The comment I made along the lines of the police officer not having done a very good job? Well yes that's a given surely, if as suggested by another poster that his job role was to "protect pedestrians from traffic".

The policeman was murdered in the line of duty.

What you said was disgusting, unnecessary and deliberately goady.

Grow up.

May you RIP PC Keith Palmer.

Norman Tebbit's response was "unsurprising??"
Maybe because his wife was left permanently disabled by an IRA bomb?

What is this canard about McGuinness 'literally' knowing where the bodies are buried? Is this in reference to the Disappeared? He called repeatedly for anyone with information as to the location of the bodies to come forward. And it's not likely that he had any direct knowledge of their location - he was far too senior for that.

i wonder if some people had the same reaction when Nelson Mandela died, he was also fighting for injustice and classed as a terrorist for years

I hated the IRA growing up and have had many heated arguments with republicans. However livelove, I was surprised how angry your comment made me, it's an absolute disgrace. Seen no evidence of "alleged" atrocities in NI by the British army? Bloody Sunday pass you by? Or did those unarmed civilians deserve it? And that's just the most high profile example. For gods sake if you're going to comment, at least pretend to have taken some small time to educate yourself independently,as I've learnt that the education provided in British schools is sorely lacking.

"was a cold hearted killing machine, I believe.
Yes indeed, hands caked with blood. I felt sorry for the Queen having to shake those same hands. Can't have been easy for her.
The world is well rid of the scumbag."

The same woman whose head of state of UK, whose army murdered plenty in the six counties- there's no shortage of blood on hands.

Really many of the posts here show an absolute lack of knowledge about conditions in the six counties, about civil rights, about the actions of the British army, about actions of loyalist terrorists. Apparently all that many have heard of is IRA actions. Someone upthread suggested educating yourselves, they weren't wrong.

Saoirse I'm following your comment I'm going to leave this thread now. The lack of awareness displayed here by people in the mainland is making me madder and madder!
You are right!
Not only did the brits murder our people and collude with loyalists to enable many an atrocity, they have clearly censored and cleansed their own media.
If it weren't for people like Martin then god knows where we would be!
My uncle was a first class baker. Famous in his circles, he had his own business... when he was put out of his premises because he was a catholic, he went to get a job in one of belfast's main bakeries he couldn't. Guess why? Because he was a catholic. We were treated like absolute dirt. We were an inconvenience the protestants who wanted all the jobs in the ship yard and shorts for themselves. We had to make do with what was left.
That is why there was a war
Because of British oppression
Mcguiness and his comrades were not terrorists, they were freedom fighters.

beepbeep - yes, that is why it's 'unsurprising'!

And beepbeep - if his response is 'unsurprising', it may give you an insight in to why some of those who turned to terrorism as a response to horrendous deaths by their innocent relatives is 'unsurprising'. This is not to excuse or justify - but perhaps to explain.