Dublin 🌈 A Coat Of Many Colours

Anthony McIntyre ☠ Yesterday as I was travelling along O'Connell Street on a bus I saw a small contingent of people making its way up the street's centre in the direction of the Liffey.

By the time I reached the GPO - the obvious destination of the smaller contingent - it was awash in a sea of green, white and orange, creating the imagery of a Nuremburg rally only infinitesimally smaller. For now, such a gargantuan following is only a wet dream for Irish Nazis. I strained my neck to see if there was any sign of a main speaker, maybe Tommy Robinson or Nigel Farage, the friends of Irish fascists. The late Bill Craig of Ulster Vanguard, or the UDA's Johnny Adair, would not have been out of place on a podium in their midst, the flags no longer a minor irritant a la Coolock Says No at the fascist rally in Belfast. When the tricolour does loyalist bidding loyalism will not say no.

Those I had initially observed through a bus window seconds earlier as it passed the Gresham were hoisting tricolours and chanting something which sounded like Sieg Heil, but most likely wasn't. Ireland's foremost hatriots usually speak only English not German, and Gaeilge is treated much like a foreign language to them. I could make out the wording on a banner which said the Irish people will not be beaten. Which I found ironic given that Irish people are beaten frequently enough by the thugs associated with the far right, many of whom have court convictions for violence.

On the way back from Lucan hours later, they were still milling about the city's main street. As the bus proceeded to Upper O'Connell Street, the green, white and orange faded out, in its place a cosmopolitan mix of people. A coat of many colours was buttoned around the street as people in unusually large numbers waited for public transport, most of them gazing up at the supremacists who look down upon them. The thought might have crossed the mind of some that they were close to the spot where a Luas tram had been burnt almost a year ago during the hate riots that gripped the city centre after a call had gone out for fascists to assemble and kill any foreigner they could get their hands on. Which presumably meant the Brazilian man who had intervened to protect children from a vicious knife attack some hours earlier.

The bus took a circuitous route so by the time I disembarked we were back near the Liffey once again. Not wanting to set a personal record for the number of times I had crossed that river in one day, I jumped off when the driver opened the doors in response to an impatient but polite passenger, eager to get home. On my way into Talbot Street a plurality of colours and languages could be seen and heard each step of the way. None of this was menacing. I didn't feel I was going to be set upon and beaten, called a white Irish bastard. I would not have walked with such confidence had I by chance alighted from my bus in the midst of the hate mob.

Earlier on the way out to Lucan, I sat beside what I took to be a Muslim woman given her attire. She dozed off beside me and I nudged her just incase she missed her stop. Tired, she told me she was on her way to a job interview in Leixlip, where she hoped to pick up a cleaner post. The thought of her cleaning up after the hatriots, many of whom think a job is a disease, brought to mind the old joke about the far right skinhead sitting in his local beerhall.

A small guy walks up to him and asks: 'would you like a blowjob?'
The racist lifts the barstool he had been sitting on and knocks the man unconscious before kicking his victim around the head, being deterred only by customers who did not want to witness a murder.
Before cuffing him, An Garda (this time they actually did turn up) asks: 'what did he say so awful that you beat him with such ferocity?'
Racist says: 'dunno. Something about a job.'

On my way home that evening I passed a number of churches but no mobs with tricolours anywhere in sight. Odd, if the hatriots, as they so often claim, are really intent on protecting children from rape.

I thought I had ended the day by attending a fascinating event in Drogheda organised by the Death Cafe where an embalmer held court. Once over, I almost fell through the door ready for bed, just to discover my wife had RTE Investigates: Inside The Protests, ready to go. For me Studs Terkel might have got it wrong in claiming Hope Dies Last. The day that was in it suggested otherwise, that Hate Dies Last. I even went to bed with the toxic words of a fishwife filmed by the Investigation ringing in my ears, Nigger.

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