The SDLP and victims

A reader of my blog yesterday noted that I hadn’t included Alasdair McDonnell’s statement where he made clear he believed there was a hierarchy of victims, and that Paul Kavanagh was “well down the pecking order”.

My commenter was right, and on reflection I should have focused on the hierarchy point, because today the airwaves are hot and heavy with that matter. Is there or isn’t there a hierarchy of victims here? And does the SDLP hold that there is such a hierarchy, or has Alasdair once more spoken out of tune with the rest of his party?

Dolores Kelly was on The Nolan Show  a few minutes ago, and when asked if the SDLP believed there was a hierarchy of victims, she answered by saying there was no moral equivalence between a bomber killed by his own bomb and an innocent child killed by the same bomb.

Either there’s some very muddled thinking going on here, or people like Dolores are deliberately trying to stir the waters so what’s going on can’t be clearly seen. 

Do I think there should be a distinction made between victims of violence? Yes I do. But it’s not between the hypothetical bomber and the hypothetical child. It’s between the person who dies (who clearly is a victim) and the loved ones who are left to mourn them and carry the pain, sometimes for a lifetime. That’s the most important distinction in the matter. The living are the victims we should be talking about exclusively, and we should avoid all ambiguity about that. The dead are dead and can’t be affected one way or another by anything we say or do. The living can. And you may be sure the mother or sister of a paramilitary killed in violent activity feels the pain of loss just as much as the relatives of those who mourn the death of an innocent victim. 

The question is, how does society or a political party respond to the pain of those who have lost loved ones in the conflict? Do they say or act as though there was a hierarchy of victims, or do they concede that the pain of loss is as sharp for the relatives of  anyone killed?

The truth is, the SDLP do believe there is a hierarchy of victims. As they see it, republicans who joined the conflict freely chose to do so, and to put it bluntly, got what was coming to them, and if their relatives mourn, they know who to blame. Republicans argue for a wider view, noting the corrupt nature of the state at the time, the violent response of the authorities to those who sought civil rights, and how such factors helped propel young men and women to violence in which they would otherwise have had no involvement. 

But I’d stress  again and finally: let’s talk about victims as the living, not the dead. We can’t do anything for those who are dead. We can do something for those who are alive. By showing greater concern for one grieving victim over another shows not just a moral insensitivity but a limited understanding of what happened here over the last forty years. 

Alasdair McDonnell says sorry.

If you were asked to compare Ronnie Corbett with someone, it’s guessable that the last man you’d think of would be Alasdair McDonnell. But since Ronnie once starred in a TV series called Sorry  and Alasdair must have used the sorry word at least  ten times during a short interview on The Politics Show  this morning, the link established itself.  

What was Alasdair being sorry for? Actually nothing -  Alasdair doesn’t do apology. What he meant when he said “Sorry” to Mark Carruthers was “You haven’t a clue, here’s the truth of the matter, buster”.  Which was? I’m not sure. Apart from establishing that he was a doctor and that there was no difference of opinion within the SDLP, it wasn't that easy to arrive at what he was saying, which was maybe why Mark Carruthers kept asking him to clarify. But Alasdair did promise that tomorrow, despite pressure in Derry, all SDLP MLAs would march up to the plate and, um, abstain in the vote over Alasdair’s Law. If you started the interview with the belief that the SDLP were all over the place on this one, you ended with that conviction riveted in place. 

Meanwhile, one of the SDLP MLAs, Colm Eastwood, says that he’s got so many phone calls about his following the party line and abstaining, “it must be orchestrated”.  No, Virginia, that doesn’t mean  calls came with a musical background, it’s Colm’s way of saying the callers were being manipulated by an unnamed force.  You have to say something when you’ve received a lot of phone calls from constituents wondering why you're taking a stand that'll let a discriminatory bill  put forward by Jim Allister sail past you without  a peep. 

Will one of the SDLP MLAs  peel off and stymie the bill tomorrow? I doubt it. One of them has  said in so many words that talk of electoral retribution is twaddle because an election doesn't happen until 2016 and that's a long time from now.  So it is. But some things are easier to forget than others. 

Timing and shaping a story

A long time ago when your granny was a slip of a girl, there was a singer called Jimmy Jones who sang a song called “Good Timin’ “.  It had a nice beat but it had better lyrics:

If little, little David hadn't grabbed that stone
Alyin' there on the ground
Big Goliath might've stomped on him
Instead of the other way 'round

But he had timin'
A tick, a tick, a tick, good timin'
A tock, a tock, a tock, a tock
A timin' is the thing
It's true, good timin' brought me to you

I thought of it last night as I watched the BBC’s ‘The View’. Mark Carruthers was interviewing Victims’ Commissioner Kathryn Stone.  She made it clear that by no means all victims were in favour of the proposed Alasdair’s Law legislation forbidding ex-prisoners who’d been imprisoned for more than five years to serve as special advisers at Stormont. She added that some in fact saw it as a “political sideswipe”.

I thought it was a good interview and showed something of the different shades of opinion as well as pain among victims.  My question, though, is simple: why didn’t we hear from Kathryn Stone with this information about a week ago? Because while it’s true that Ann Travers didn’t say she spoke for all victims (and if I said she did I was wrong),  she did say that this law targeting ex-prisoners was “for all victims”. Kathryn Stone made it clear that Ms Travers’s campaign was not something that all victims wanted, and that there was an element of political party-bashing attached to  it, as some victims saw it. 

But if Kathryn Stone had said this a week ago it would have trimmed back Ann Travers’s campaign as being solely motivated by her love for her dead sister and her concern for all victims of violence. However, it was only this week we got to hear the bigger victim story, at a point where it didn't really matter, as another flip-flop from the SDLP might be terminal. 

Besides timing, of course,  the media give shape to political events through the kinds of questions they ask and who they ask them of. On  Good Morning Ulster  this morning (I wonder how many Ballyshannon listeners it gets), Karen Patterson asked special adviser to Martin McGuinness, Paul Kavanagh, if he ever thought of those killed through his actions when he was in the IRA. Kavanagh said he did. 

It could be classified as a fair question, since victims have been the topic of the week. But I tried thinking back  to a time when a BBC interviewer  - or an interviewer from any other channel - asked the same question of someones from the British armed forces who’d been in Afghanistan or some such place,  and had been involved in attacks and gun battles there. It may have happened but I can’t for the life of me remember any such. 

And so we come back to that old word: consistency.  If it’s a reasonable question to ask Paul Kavanagh if he ever thinks of those who died as as result of his actions, it’s equally valid to ask a British soldier or officer how he feels about people he’s killed on the far side of the world. But we don’t get that. Instead we get Help for Heroes, welcoming-home parades and medals issued to those most prominent in the distribution of death. 

The media hold our reality in the palm of their hand like a piece of plasticine, and they can shape it whatever way they want.  Or are told to.  

Ann Travers, equations and history

I had every intention of moving on to a new topic today, which is partly why I missed the Nolan Show  last night. But I’m listening to the radio version of the show now and Nolan is interviewing Ann Travers and the truth is that her argument is all over the place. 

She argues that special advisers are paid out of the public purse and that this is particularly hurtful to victims such as herself.  There is no doubt that this could well be the case. But then had one of my relatives  been killed on Bloody Sunday, I might feel it particularly hurtful that the person who killed my relative was being paid out of the public purse. If I were one of the Finucanes, I might feel it particularly hurtful that those in the British armed services who colluded in the death of my father was paid out of the public purse. And you can add many other names yourself, I expect. 

Ann Travers has just made it clear that she does not claim to speak for all victims - but she does say that this bill is for all victims. She may think so but a number of victims want no hand, act or part in this bill. They are firmly opposed to it. These tend to be people whose loved ones were killed by the British state.

The discussion has now moved on to a moving description of the incident that resulted in Mary Travers’s death. While this is moving it doesn’t  advance the argument for blocking ex-prisoners from serving as special advisers one way or another. 

What all it comes down to is the question of how you regard the Troubles. If you believe that it was something more than a mass outbreak of murder, involving thousands of people who prior to the Troubles were not involved in violence of any kind and who post- the Troubles have not been involved in any form of violence - in fact they’re working hard to make sure the peace we now have stays in place - you'll disagree with Ann Travers.  If on the other hand you believe that every death inflicted by the IRA was murder pure and simple, you’ll think Ann Travers is absolutely right. 

One of Pat Finucane’s sons,  John I think, has just come on. Before the line dropped out he was saying that it was notable the difference in reaction to those who died at the hands of the IRA and those who died at the hands of state forces. That is the third leg of the stool - British state killings. In a simple equation, the argument could be stated as

IRA killings = murder; state/loyalist killings = legitimate response 

Whether we like it or not, or know it or not, this is about more than the death of one young woman. Whether Ann Travers likes it or not or knows it or not, this is about how the history of the Troubles is to be written. 

PS  Mike Nesbitt is now on talking about how Ann Travers should have been called before Mary McArdle was appointed. But I thought I had to draw the line somewhere and I've just switched off. 

Arguing up-hill about Alasdair's bill

That great Englishman George Orwell believed there was a direct correlation between the use of words and the quality of thought they embodied. Where words were used awkwardly or in an ugly fashion, they reflected awkward and ugly thinking. I’m not sure about the ugly part but listening to Alex Attwood being interviewed on the Nolan Show  on BBC Raidio Uladh/Radio Ulster this morning felt as comfortable as the sound that dentists’ drills made circa 1957. Nolan played a clip of Dominic Bradley a little while back explaining why the SDLP would very likely vote against what has since become Alasdair’s Bill  (no, pace Jim Allister but it’s not Ann’s Bill - Alasdair was the man who made it happen). Nolan then asked Alex to explain the screeching hand-brake turn his party had made. Alex didn’t say it was less about victims and more about unionist votes in places like South Down, but you could tell something badly-oiled was clanking and grinding at the back of  his mind as he spoke. 

The Belfast Telegraph has devoted an editorial to the bill,  lamenting how badly the SDLP have handled the whole affair but arguing  it was vital that Alasdair’s bill be passed. Again the language has that slightly high-pitched, fake note. Hardly surprising, when you have the job of explaining that it’s OK to have ex-IRA people in government but it’s a grievous insult to victims to have ex-IRA people (who’ve served more than five years) acting as a special adviser: 

“They (ex-prisoners) are as entitled as anyone else to the vast majority of jobs, but it is uncaring and wounding to appoint people guilty of serious terrorist offences to positions at the very heart of the political administration. Quite rightly that will no longer be allowed when the bill becomes law.”

Mmm - ‘At the very heart of the political administration’. That sounds awfully like Martin McGuinness, Gerry Kelly and a few others you could probably add yourself. And yet the Bel Tel  strains every illogical fibre to argue that no, no, that’s different, that’s not a problem, it’s those pesky advisers.

Oh Orwell, thou should’st be living at this hour.

Alasdair and victims

As I watched Alasdair McDonnell declare on TV this evening “This is all about victims!”,   I thought of the Dean of St Columb’s College when I was a boarder there. He was a strange man, the Dean.  Some evenings he’d patrol the refectory smiling and talking quietly to himself, chuckling from time to time. Other evenings he’d walk up and down with a face like thunder, and God help you if you looked at him sideways. 

So how was he a soul-mate of Alasdair’s? Well, what would happen is this.  The Dean would catch you  (OK, me, me, not you) doing something forbidden - playing handball  against the wrong wall, reading a comic, smuggling a bottle of HP sauce into the refectory. Something bad like that. You’d be told to appear at his room at an appointed hour. He would then reach into his pocket, take out a strap and tell you to hold out first your right hand, then your left.   Four slaps if you were lucky, six if you were less lucky, ten if you were all outa luck. That strap hurt.

But there was a further sting on its way. Because on Saturday afternoons, we boarders would line up outside the Dean’s room and ask him if we could get out of the college for a couple of hours, into Derry, where we’d gorge ourselves on chips and sweets and smoke our heads off while watching Jane Russell being kissed by Gary Cooper on the silver screen. We’d form a long line and ask, and the lucky ones got a Yes. I can still feel the pang  of outrage when it came my turn, say two weeks after a leathering, and the Dean would listen to my request and then say “Would you run away out of my sight and don’t be bothering me”. Or put more succinctly - No. 

One crime, two punishments. In law it’s known as double jeopardy.  Some countries have protection from it built into their constitution. That’s because  there’s something inherently unjust about punishing someone twice for the same incident.  But not here. Thanks to Alasdair’s law, the spirit of our Dean will live on. 

That 92% in Creggan and Crossmaglen

There must have been more than one wry smile at the news that an Irish unity referendum has been held in the electoral wards of Creggan Upper Co Louth and Crossmaglen Co Armagh. And another when the results were announced: 92% of people voted for a united Ireland.  Had the referendum been held in the Shankill or East Belfast, it’s a safe bet a different result would have emerged.

But Sinn Féin tends not to do things for no reason. By holding this referendum, it’s sending a message to its supporters: we haven’t forgotten our core issue, national unity. It’s also showing that the idea of a united Ireland doesn’t have to remain at the level of theory, it can have a real-world existence, if only in two carefully-selected wards. 

Of course, Sinn Féin have been calling for a referendum on national unity for some time now. Arlene Foster has warned them to be careful what they wish for, they might get it. In other words, there’s no way a referendum on Irish unity would produce a majority in favour.  She believes the Shinners are simply posturing.

I think she’s wrong, for two reasons. One,  saying ‘I don’t want a united Ireland’ to someone with a Belfast Telegraph clip board is one thing; voting in the privacy of a polling booth could in many cases be a different matter. There’s also the fact that, even if it were to be defeated, a referendum would force politicians and people to examine what they mean by Irish unity and what they mean by union with Britain. What are the pluses, what the minuses in each case? So far, it’s been mainly flag-waving and sloganizing. A referendum, I’d hope, would get people to think about the position they support on the constitutional question and why they hold that position. Socrates believed that an unexamined life is not worth living. Equally, an unexamined unionist or republican position is not worth holding.