Anthony McIntyre ✒ broke with habit and listened to a Gerry Adams podcast.

At one time I would avidly follow the outpourings of Gerry Adams. Not because I liked what he had to say or believed it, but simply in order to keep abreast of the Provisional Movement’s trajectory and where in the political discourse he was seeking to position himself. It was also a means to understand better how the Movement was being molded to dovetail with the needs of his political career.

That was when I had a keen interest in the party’s lurch away from the Provisional republican ethos that had guided its radical years as a social protest movement. With that journey long since completed and the IRA war machine quietly rusting in the Knackers Yard – in his day, only a possible destination that had so alarmed Bobby Sands - my interest has attenuated. The IRA campaign to coerce the British out of Ireland failed. The British strategy of coercing Sinn Fein into accepting the unity only by consent formula succeeded. I have long grown philosophical about it. These days, I rarely read Gerry Adams, even less listen to him on podcast. An incorrigible bullshitter, he proffers little that would interest me either in terms of insight or probity.

There is an exception to every rule and  I came across my wife listening to his podcast. My sole comment - “brave woman.” She suggested I too listen to it. I did largely because it was in the midst of the amnesty proposal brouhaha, but not with any great degree of attention. Just enough to faintly detect a slur in the Adams voice. He might of course have been sucking on a sweet while speaking which causes what in Belfast was once called the marley mouth (marbles in the mouth) effect. As I had come to the podcast late I missed most of the polemic against the British state statute of limitations proposal, vaguely heard something about a climb for unity, and then some cock and bull story about a Rooster having a go at his henry halls, as he put it.

Later this afternoon I was out for a walk. Unlike Adams I do not profess to be an animal lover, but I walked the dog anyway. Many years ago, I bumped into him when walking my dog through the Falls Park while he was with his. He offered advice about how to help the dog become a bit more serene. Nothing about bouncing naked with it on trampolines, something more sensible than that which has since been lost in the mists of time. The chance encounter came back to me as I ruminated on what I was listening to on the Leargas podcast while walking, something he seems to put out on a frequent basis.

Adams sought to eviscerate British reasoning around the intended halt to legacy inquests, judicial reviews, due process, prosecutions and legal civil cases involving British soldiers. He identified the British calculations quite adroitly and logically. He was nothing if not convincing, outlining how the Tory government is following a long line of colonial tradition of cover up and lies. He spoke of rank hypocrisy and duplicity, double standards, a hypocritical view of the world that accountability only applied to everyone else. His concluding comments expressed admiration for the courage of people to pursue truth.

It would have been a great analysis had it been made by, say, Colum Eastwood. The type of excoriation employed only works when the speaker has an unstained moral authority with which to carry it over the line. Gerry Adams does not have that. Unlike Eastwood he was a combatant, which although admirable in many ways, does not allow a free pass when it comes to speaking ethically on the injustice experienced by victims.

The upshot is that Adams with every utterance on legacy is reduced to calling on the British to be as honest about their past as he is about his own. And the British are only too eager to oblige in spades. He should take note of the title of a recent book in which he featured prominently and Say Nothing

⏩ Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

Better To Say Nothing

Anthony McIntyre ✒ broke with habit and listened to a Gerry Adams podcast.

At one time I would avidly follow the outpourings of Gerry Adams. Not because I liked what he had to say or believed it, but simply in order to keep abreast of the Provisional Movement’s trajectory and where in the political discourse he was seeking to position himself. It was also a means to understand better how the Movement was being molded to dovetail with the needs of his political career.

That was when I had a keen interest in the party’s lurch away from the Provisional republican ethos that had guided its radical years as a social protest movement. With that journey long since completed and the IRA war machine quietly rusting in the Knackers Yard – in his day, only a possible destination that had so alarmed Bobby Sands - my interest has attenuated. The IRA campaign to coerce the British out of Ireland failed. The British strategy of coercing Sinn Fein into accepting the unity only by consent formula succeeded. I have long grown philosophical about it. These days, I rarely read Gerry Adams, even less listen to him on podcast. An incorrigible bullshitter, he proffers little that would interest me either in terms of insight or probity.

There is an exception to every rule and  I came across my wife listening to his podcast. My sole comment - “brave woman.” She suggested I too listen to it. I did largely because it was in the midst of the amnesty proposal brouhaha, but not with any great degree of attention. Just enough to faintly detect a slur in the Adams voice. He might of course have been sucking on a sweet while speaking which causes what in Belfast was once called the marley mouth (marbles in the mouth) effect. As I had come to the podcast late I missed most of the polemic against the British state statute of limitations proposal, vaguely heard something about a climb for unity, and then some cock and bull story about a Rooster having a go at his henry halls, as he put it.

Later this afternoon I was out for a walk. Unlike Adams I do not profess to be an animal lover, but I walked the dog anyway. Many years ago, I bumped into him when walking my dog through the Falls Park while he was with his. He offered advice about how to help the dog become a bit more serene. Nothing about bouncing naked with it on trampolines, something more sensible than that which has since been lost in the mists of time. The chance encounter came back to me as I ruminated on what I was listening to on the Leargas podcast while walking, something he seems to put out on a frequent basis.

Adams sought to eviscerate British reasoning around the intended halt to legacy inquests, judicial reviews, due process, prosecutions and legal civil cases involving British soldiers. He identified the British calculations quite adroitly and logically. He was nothing if not convincing, outlining how the Tory government is following a long line of colonial tradition of cover up and lies. He spoke of rank hypocrisy and duplicity, double standards, a hypocritical view of the world that accountability only applied to everyone else. His concluding comments expressed admiration for the courage of people to pursue truth.

It would have been a great analysis had it been made by, say, Colum Eastwood. The type of excoriation employed only works when the speaker has an unstained moral authority with which to carry it over the line. Gerry Adams does not have that. Unlike Eastwood he was a combatant, which although admirable in many ways, does not allow a free pass when it comes to speaking ethically on the injustice experienced by victims.

The upshot is that Adams with every utterance on legacy is reduced to calling on the British to be as honest about their past as he is about his own. And the British are only too eager to oblige in spades. He should take note of the title of a recent book in which he featured prominently and Say Nothing

⏩ Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

7 comments:

  1. A point I would make at the same time I met him he was covering up his brothers paedophilia.
    "In January 1997, more than a decade after Gerry Adams knew his brother had raped his daughter, An Phoblacht – Sinn Féin's official newspaper – carried an advertisement for a pamphlet Liam Adams wrote entitled, 'Our children, drugs, alcohol and solvents'."
    http://tribune.ie/.../exclusive-adams-paedophile-brother.../

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  2. AM
    I knew you could'nt resist to listen to our greatest statesman of all time (according to himself) the last paragraph about honesty is brilliant

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  3. Good piece, those in glass houses shouldn't throw stones

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  4. But sure he was never in the IRA so how could he be a combatant Anthony?

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  5. Great article. Anthony Your way with words is a talent i could only wish to possess . Any memories or thoughts from 40 years ago on August 1 ST and 2 ND when news came through on the deaths of Kevin Lynch and Kieran Doherty. Apologies for drifting of from your subject .

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    1. thank you Lou - a generous comment.

      By the time Kevin and Kieran died the shock absorbers were robust. We had resigned ourselves to them dying but the stun effect that came with Bobby was the the same given that we had been in the brace position for quite some time.

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  6. Thank you for your response Anthony.

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