Dissident Veteran For Peace

In "Indians at home – Indians in Cornwall, Indians in Wales, Indians in Ireland" I wrote about how European settler-colonialism, particularly by the English, was first inflicted upon other European peoples in Europe well before it was exported to other continents. This should be obvious to anyone with more than a passing knowledge of European history. Alas, it appears this is not the case.

Below is an interesting quote that speaks once more to this subject. Of course, I do not endorse Leyburn's lessons allegedly "learned from hard experience".

This use of the Scots-Irish as shock troops in the New World was quite similar to how the English government had used Scots settlers in Ulster against the Irish:

They lived on land in both regions that had often been forcibly taken from the natives. ... When the natives, whether Irish or Indian, refused to accept either the legality or the settlement, preferring rather to fight back by whatever means they could devise, the settlers fought equally hard to retain the homes and farms they had made by their own labor. They learned from hard experience that one must fight for what one has; that turning the other cheek does not guarantee property rights; in short, that might makes right, at least in the matter of life and land ownership.

Source: Clayton E. Cramer, Concealed Weapon Laws of the Early Republic: Dueling, Southern Violence, and Moral Reform (Greenwood, 1999) pp. 30-31 quoting James G. Leyburn, The Scotch-Irish, 147-148.

Labels: Empire, history, identity, Indians, Ireland, quotations, United States, White folks

The Fund for Peace's 2017 Fragile States Index Map

shithole
noun
vulgar slang
     An extremely dirty, shabby, or otherwise unpleasant place.

Sen. Cory Booker is the among latest grandstanding asses to pontificate over Trump's alleged remarks reportedly disparaging Haiti, El Salvador, and unspecified African countries. The fact is that some of these countries are, indeed, "shitholes" of crime, corruption, human rights abuses, violence, disease, unemployment, poverty, etc. Of course, the polite and likely more informative terms are failed or fragile states but the main observation, however it is articulated, is not false.

In the context of a discussion of immigration policy Trump's alleged remarks—like much that emanates from his mouth or Twitter feed—were inflammatory, unproductive, and evinced ignorance. However, they could have served as an opening for a rational and illuminating discussion. That is, if anyone in politics or the mainstream media were interested in principled discourse instead of political point-scoring.

Instead, political and media pontificators, such as Booker, generally showed themselves to be the mirror image of Trump (also an ass) by stooping to renew ill-founded allegations of racism, White supremacism, etc.¹ Such is the shithole of American politics.

If Booker et al. were seriously interested in the truth and what's best for this country and for would-be immigrants they should have started out by conceding that, yes, some countries are failed states or in American vernacular, shitholes. That is one of the main reasons why so many people are eager or desperate to leave them for a better life in the US, Norway, and elsewhere. From a humanitarian perspective one might argue this is exactly why immigration from these countries should be permitted.

The abysmal situation in the countries at issue is thus a driver of immigration, legal and otherwise, and any comprehensive immigration policy would at least acknowledge that if not invoke it as a rationale to (re-)consider the implications of US foreign policy, including aid and military intervention.² In many cases, US foreign policy under Trump's predecessors—with the complicity of the mainstream media and politicians of all stripes—has contributed directly to the appalling state of affairs in places like Haiti and El Salvador as is well-documented.³

It also bears mentioning in any reasoned discussion on the subject that just because someone lives in or comes from a "shithole country" does not render them unworthy of life or regard. Nor does it make them unable to adjust or contribute to humanity or American society. In the 1800s when some of my ancestors fled Ireland that country was a shithole suffering under centuries of British colonial oppression. Yet, most Americans would probably agree the United States has benefited significantly from 19th century Irish immigration.

Notes
1. Trump may in fact be a racist but my point is that nothing he has uttered so far points definitively to that conclusion. Trump's remarks are more plausibly understood as a manifestation of recklessness and/or ignorance of or well-deserved contempt for the Liberal canons of acceptable thought/expression. The latter clearly resonates with his political base, whom many in the chattering classes have unjustly written off as irredeemably racist.
2. To be clear, US foreign aid has, by design, all too often been a tool to deliberately prop up corrupt, repressive regimes and keep the masses people of countries such as Haiti and El Salvador in subjugation and dependency. Of course, that need not be the case but it has been.
3. Two cases in point of media collusion are the selling of the transparently false stories of Iraqi WMDs and cooperation with al-Qaeda to justify the 2003 invasion of that country. Further back, there is the shameless betrayal and abandonment of Raymond Bonner after he broke the story of the 1981 El Mozote massacre in El Salvador by elite US-backed military forces. Thanks, in no small part, to US media collusion the US funded civil war there would continue another decade after the massacre was revealed.

See also: "On Propriety, Power, and Social Protest"

Labels: immigration, Iraq, Ireland, politics, race, Trump, United States

Lyrics:
OK, I want to talk about Ireland
Specifically I want to talk about the "famine"
About the fact that there never really was one
There was no "famine"
See Irish people were only allowed to eat potatoes
All of the other food
Meat fish vegetables
Were shipped out of the country under armed guard
To England while the Irish people starved
And then on the middle of all this
They gave us money not to teach our children Irish
And so we lost our history
And this is what I think is still hurting me
See we're like a child that's been battered
Has to drive itself out of it's head because it's frightened
Still feels all the painful feelings
But they lose contact with the memory
And this leads to massive self-destruction
alcoholism, drug adiction
All desperate attempts at running
And in it's worst form
Becomes actual killing
And if there ever is gonna be healing
There has to be remembering
And then grieving
So that there then can be forgiving
There has to be knowledge and understanding
All the lonely people
where do they all come from
An American army regulation Says you mustn't kill more than 10% of a nation
'Cos to do so causes permanent "psychological damage"
It's not permanent but they didn't know that
Anyway during the supposed "famine"
We lost a lot more than 10% of our nation
Through deaths on land or on ships of emigration
But what finally broke us was not starvation
but it's use in the controlling of our education
Schools go on about "Black 47"
On and on about "The terrible famine"
But what they don't say is in truth
There really never was one
(Excuse me)
All the lonely people
(I'm sorry, excuse me)
Where do they all come from
(that I can tell you in one word)
All the lonely people
where do they all belong
So let's take a look shall we
The highest statistics of child abuse in the EEC
And we say we're a Christian country
But we've lost contact with our history
See we used to worship God as a mother
We're sufferin from post traumatic stress disorder
Look at all our old men in the pubs
Look at all our young people on drugs
We used to worship God as a mother
Now look at what we're doing to each other
We've even made killers of ourselves
The most child-like trusting people in the Universe
And this is what's wrong with us
Our history books the parent figures lied to us
I see the Irish
As a race like a child
That got itself bashed in the face
And if there ever is gonna be healing
There has to be remembering
And then grieving
So that there then can be forgiving
There has to be knowledge and understanding
All the lonely people
Where do they all come from
All the lonely people
Where do they all come from

Labels: Empire, Ireland, music, video, White folks

Right: Choctaw Native Americans Gary and Dr Janie Whitedeer visit with students from Gaelscoil Cholmcille in Santry, Co Dublin.

In "Indians at home – Indians in Cornwall, Indians in Wales, Indians in Ireland," I talked about how the roots of Western colonialism are very old and how the techniques of colonialism were perfected centuries ago in Europe against Celtic people. Since I wrote that post last August, while going through my files, I found two noteworthy articles on the subject from Race & Class (Vol. 34 No. 4; 1993). They are "The training ground: Ireland, conquest and decolonisation" by Bill Rolston (pp. 13-24) and "Columbus in Ireland" by Milan Rai (pp. 25-34).

Rolston argues that as a consequence of Columbus' landfall in the Caribbean in 1492, Ireland experienced a "new era of imperialism with its expropriation of territory, racism and genocide" ("new" as in different from that of the last era). He says the "terrorist methods, derived and perfected in the conquest of Ireland, were then transported to the American colonies" along with "the ideology to justify confiscation and genocide." Even "the same personnel were involved in the conquest of Ireland and America." The second section of the article deals with the fate and role of Irish slaves shipped to the Caribbean. Rai covers much of the same ground but focuses more on tactics and outcomes in sections headed: "War by starvation," "Population decline," and "Settlement, dispossession and 'total war'."

Also, in my earlier post, in the "See also" section, I had a link on Choctaw aid in 1847 to Irish famine victims. I should say the mere word "famine" does not do justice in describing the deliberate "policy of extermination"--to quote the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the Earl of Clarendon--pursued by the British. Any way, after talking with Peter L. yesterday about this subject, I learned from him that the Choctaw-Irish relationship is ongoing. Below are some links to articles on the subject.

• "Louisburgh welcomes Native American artists to lead Famine Walk." Mayo Advertiser (Ireland). 6/15/2007.
• "Remember the Famine? Gaelscoil pupils learn of Choctaw generosity." Independent (Ireland). 5/30/2007.
• Links to three other articles from the 1990s on the same subject here.

See also: Irish Holocaust

Labels: Empire, Indians, Ireland, solidarity, terrorism, White folks

A couple of weeks ago I received a message from a friend that included a quote from Malcolm X's February 14, 1965, speech "After the Bombing" (at bottom) and several excerpts from Gerry Gambill's 1968 speech "On the Art of Stealing Human Rights." The message also contained the following commentary:

After proven 'successful' (or so they think) in the stolen lands of America against the 'natives', the art of human rights stealing is now being applied 'internationally' to the rest of humanity -other 'natives'- by the so called 'international community'-- a mere code word for barbaric savage and RACIST western-European-American-Zionist powers that be-- through using and abusing their 'international' organisations...

This comment exemplifies the widespread and mistaken notion that colonialism was only used by Europeans against non-Europeans and that it always had a strong racist component. In fact, the techniques of colonialism and empire and their international application are very old and the racial element is comparatively new—no more than five or six hundred years old—and was largely a rationalization, not a motive for the exploitation of non-European people.

The English, for example, began their violent occupation of Ireland in 1171—more than eight hundred years ago--and they occupy a large part of the country to this very day. Millions of Irish died or were displaced during, or as a result of, the conquest. The campaigns of Oliver Cromwell were especially bloody. In 1652, Roger Williams—a prominent English Puritan minister and founder of Rhode Island—published The Hireling Ministry None of Christ's. In it, he wrote

If the holy Scripture ... and doleful experience may be judge, as an eminent person lately spake (upon occasion of a debate touching the conversion of the Indians), we have Indians at home—Indians in Cornwall, Indians in Wales, Indians in Ireland ...[1]

Williams was familiar with the exploits of Cromwell, a fellow Puritan, and even makes reference to him later in The Hireling Ministry[2]. So, the reference to Indians in Cornwall, Wales, and Ireland takes on a different meaning if we consider what was going in Ireland, for example. After the conclusion of the English Civil War, in 1649, Cromwell landed with 15,000 troops in English-occupied Dublin. The first major battle of campaign was the siege of Drogheda. Cromwell said in a letter: "It has pleased God to bless our endeavours at Drogheda … I believe we put to the sword the whole number of the defendants. I do not think thirty of the whole number escaped with their lives. Those that did, are in safe custody for the Barbadoes ..."

Cromwell repeated his exploits at Wexford, Waterford, and Limerick. When Cromwell was finished one quarter of the Catholic population was dead, the tiny Protestant minority controlled 75% of the cultivable land, and thousands had been forced into exile or slavery in the West Indies. [3] The period was commemorated by the Irish poet Yeats in his "The Curse Of Cromwell." Here's the first stanza:

You ask what - I have found, and far and wide I go: Nothing but Cromwell's house and Cromwell's murderous crew, The lovers and the dancers are beaten into the clay, And the tall men and the swordsmen and the horsemen, where are they? And there is an old beggar wandering in his pride - - His fathers served their fathers before Christ was crucified. O what of that, O what of that, What is there left to say?

Updates:

• Indians in Ireland—Take II
• Indians in Ireland—Take III

See also:

• "Errand in the Wilderness: Roger Williams and 'soul liberty,' " a chapter in Exemplar of Liberty: Native America and the Evolution of Democracy by Donald A. Grinde, Jr. and Bruce E. Johansen with a foreword by Vine Deloria, Jr.
• On Choctaw aid in 1847 to Irish famine victims: "Native Americans in Ireland" on the Native American History web site of Black Hawk Designs. Archived version here.
• Justine McCabe. "What Indians And Palestinians Share." Znet. May 31, 2005.
• Robert Robideau. " 'God Given Right:' Palestine and Native America." CounterPunch. February 1, 2006.

Notes:

1. Perry Miller. Roger Williams: His Contribution to the American Tradition. (New York: Atheneum, 1974). p. 200.
2. Ibid. p. 202.
3. Phil Evans and Eileen Pollock. Ireland for Beginners. (New York: Writer and Reader Pub., 1994.) pp. 15-18.

I might point out here that colonialism or imperialism, as the slave system of the West is called, is not something that is just confined to England or France or the United States. The interests in this country are in cahoots with the interests in France and the interests in Britain. It's one huge complex or combine, and it creates what's known not as the American power structure or the French power structure, but an international power structure. This international power structure is used to suppress the masses of dark-skinned people all over the world and exploit them of their natural resources.

—Malcolm X

Last revised: 07/17/2022

Labels: Empire, history, identity, Indians, Ireland, Malcolm X, quotations, race, United States, White folks

Excerpt from "Not Guilty. The Pitstop Ploughshares All Acquitted on All Charges" on Indymedia Ireland, July 25, 2006:

The verdict was given at aproximately 11.50 a.m. this morning at this significant trial in The Four Courts. Since their action on the 3rd February 2003 the five defendants have waited three years for todays verdict, under onerous bail conditions, with two other trials collapsing. In a statement released immediately after the verdict the Pitstop Ploughshares said:

"The jury is the conscience of the community chosen randomly from Irish society. The conscience of the community has spoken. The government has no popular mandate in providing the civilian Shannon airport to service the US war machine in it's illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.

"In 1996 in Liverpool the Jury acquittal of the four 'ploughshares' women contributed to the end of arms exports to the Suharto dictatorship in Indonesia and the independence of East Timor.

"The decision of this jury should be a message to London, Washington DC and the Dail that Ireland wants no part in waging war on the people of Iraq. Refuelling of US warplanes at Shannon Airport should cease immediately. " - Ciaron, Damien, Karen, Deirdre and Nuin.

Here's what they were on trial for:

In the early hours of Monday 3 February 2003, five members of the pacifist Catholic Worker Movement cut their way into Shannon Airport, Ireland. The peace activists poured human blood on the runway that has been servicing U.S. military flights, troop and munition deployments to U.S. military bases in Kuwait and Qatar.

They constructed a shrine on the runway to Iraqi children killed and threatened by U.S./British bombardment and sanctions. The shrine consisted of copies of the Bible and Quran, rosary and muslim prayer beads, flowers, photographs of Iraqi children and Brigid's crosses. They then began to take up the runway, working on its edge with a mallet.

The activists approached the hanger housing a US Navy plane under repair. They painted ''Pit stop of death'' on the hanger's roller door, and began the dismantling of the hanger. They then entered the hanger to disarm the repaired US warplane. The plane in question according to Ciaron was the same plane as Mary Kelly hit with a hatchet in the recent past. They then prayed together.

Here are the first four paragraphs of the July 27, 2006, article " 'We'll use people power to shut down Shannon' " by Mary Regan in the Irish Examiner:

ANTI-WAR protesters are plotting to trespass at Shannon Airport, occupy a runway and blockade American air craft carrying troops to Iraq.

The warning, to "demilitarise" or shut down the airport through non-violent measures, came yesterday.

One of the five activists, acquitted this week on charges of causing an estimated €2 million worth of damage to a United States Navy aircraft three years ago, said every effort would be made to close down the airport through "people power".

Ciaron O'Reilly, 46, said: "We're going to analyse how many people it will take to close down Shannon Airport until it's demilitarised. In doing that we'll be in discussion with student groups, human rights peace groups, environmental groups and community groups, to see — in the tradition of Martin Luther King and Ghandi — if we can initiate a process of non-violent direct action and close the airport down until it's demilitarised."

Labels: anti-war movement, Iraq, Ireland, Justice, resistance