Anthony McIntyre thinks Danny Morrison is a veteran errorist and wonders what lies behind his latest demonstration of being wrong.

After a period of subdued silence in relation to the Boston College oral history project Danny Morrison has found his mournful voice again. Causing him grief on this occasion is a new documentary around the life of the late Dolours Price. I Dolours is due to ''screen at this year’s HotDocs festival in Toronto – the largest documentary festival in North America''.

It is neither here nor there that I am one of those people who according to director Maurice Sweeney "definitely didn’t want to be interviewed" for the documentary. Suffice to say that my take on its provenance, among other things, led to my being resolutely opposed to it ever having been produced.

Ed Moloney, the project director for the Boston College oral history venture, is a co-producer of I Dolours. Employing the language of people used to handling spies and running agents of influence, Morrison referred to Moloney as a 'godfather' behind the Boston College oral history project. We may wonder how he learned to grow comfortable with that peculiar British term, contextually moulded as a weapon of smear for use against Irish republicans. In the prolonged republican battle against the British state policy of criminalisation, 'godfather' became the finger-word to poke republican legitimacy in the eye. There was a battle of wills and the British were up for using whatever discursive means at hand to force their opponents to blink first.

Morrison, ostensibly on the republican side, running point for republican PR, would be all too aware of this. To start using terms with a particular British state inflexion takes quite some leap for an authentic republican. But if the voice behind the words really had a British twang all along then the ground to cover is not all that great.

In his not altogether illogical piece, Morrison has claimed:

Anthony McIntyre said: “The Irish News journalist hardly covered herself in glory when she interviewed Dolours Price at a time when Price was undergoing psychiatric care at a Dublin hospital… As both a journalist and a human being, this was hardly an example of ethical behaviour.”

The one slight problem with that assertion is that it is demonstrably false. I simply did not say it.  It might be a genuine mistake on Morrison's part, but with Morrison there is so little genuine about him: so the instinct is to always go with your instinct and assume it was an incident of mislead rather than mistake.

I Dolours resonates in an Ancient Rome way, drawing on the famed I Claudius.  Much like Et Tu Danny would be a fitting title for a documentary about Morrison's role in the 1981 hunger strike.


Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.

Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre      






A Wrong Man Calls It Wrong ... Again

Anthony McIntyre thinks Danny Morrison is a veteran errorist and wonders what lies behind his latest demonstration of being wrong.

After a period of subdued silence in relation to the Boston College oral history project Danny Morrison has found his mournful voice again. Causing him grief on this occasion is a new documentary around the life of the late Dolours Price. I Dolours is due to ''screen at this year’s HotDocs festival in Toronto – the largest documentary festival in North America''.

It is neither here nor there that I am one of those people who according to director Maurice Sweeney "definitely didn’t want to be interviewed" for the documentary. Suffice to say that my take on its provenance, among other things, led to my being resolutely opposed to it ever having been produced.

Ed Moloney, the project director for the Boston College oral history venture, is a co-producer of I Dolours. Employing the language of people used to handling spies and running agents of influence, Morrison referred to Moloney as a 'godfather' behind the Boston College oral history project. We may wonder how he learned to grow comfortable with that peculiar British term, contextually moulded as a weapon of smear for use against Irish republicans. In the prolonged republican battle against the British state policy of criminalisation, 'godfather' became the finger-word to poke republican legitimacy in the eye. There was a battle of wills and the British were up for using whatever discursive means at hand to force their opponents to blink first.

Morrison, ostensibly on the republican side, running point for republican PR, would be all too aware of this. To start using terms with a particular British state inflexion takes quite some leap for an authentic republican. But if the voice behind the words really had a British twang all along then the ground to cover is not all that great.

In his not altogether illogical piece, Morrison has claimed:

Anthony McIntyre said: “The Irish News journalist hardly covered herself in glory when she interviewed Dolours Price at a time when Price was undergoing psychiatric care at a Dublin hospital… As both a journalist and a human being, this was hardly an example of ethical behaviour.”

The one slight problem with that assertion is that it is demonstrably false. I simply did not say it.  It might be a genuine mistake on Morrison's part, but with Morrison there is so little genuine about him: so the instinct is to always go with your instinct and assume it was an incident of mislead rather than mistake.

I Dolours resonates in an Ancient Rome way, drawing on the famed I Claudius.  Much like Et Tu Danny would be a fitting title for a documentary about Morrison's role in the 1981 hunger strike.


Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.

Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre      






9 comments:

  1. Could be an interesting documentary. Have yourself and Ed fallen out over it because of it's basis in the Boston College interviews?

    As for Morrison, he appeared in 'No Stone Unturned' talking briefly about Scap. His line is "Scappaticci, I was told, was head of the Internal Unit..." You were told? You knew that already. I'm sure a radio transmitter broadcasting the message "Thiepval calling Danny" was cut out of the film!

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  2. Hi Anthony ,

    You have it bang on the money about bangers as always , good piece.


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  3. Christopher , Bangers always refers to Scap even when the subject matter is not about Scap , I in fairness Scap put him away for a few years by all accounts and should a public hearing or criminal trial ever be held in relation to Scap then I'm sure Morrisson will make himself available to give testimony of a sort not to mention the fact he will write another book when it's all over and done with , it's the mere mortals who's voices should be heard though , the families of those who went to an early grave , those who faced years of verbal abuse and isolation in their communities because of the whole sordid business of playing God with the lives of their loved ones.

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  4. hes the one that needs to undergo psychiatric care to treat his pathological lying. and then some.

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  5. I wondered why you didn’t follow each other in Twitter , I don’t mean Morrison.

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  6. Thanks to all for the comments.

    Christopher,

    we have an irreconcilable difference of opinion over it.

    Staffenberg,

    the difference between Stakeknife and Snakeknife is for the most part academic.

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  7. It's the microphone....since they took it off him and gave it to multi-Storey he has been hankering after it ever since....his Precious....so when he sees one available he can't help himself....awful affliction.

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  8. For sure Anthony , I'm with you on that one......

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  9. Anthony , I have a friend who has spoken to the Kenova team in regard to Scap , have you any advice for them?

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