‘Cowardly scum’

Mitchell McLaughlin’s characterisation of the people who attacked his home in Derry with a petrol bomb last night as “cowardly scum” is one with which few people would disagree. This is the third attack on the Sinn Féin MLA’s house. Thankfully, none of the McLaughlin family at home were injured physically – though one can only imagine how they feel at this point. It is only a matter of weeks since the last attack on McLaughlin and he remarked that that was part of political life here.

The attack highlights once again just how far the standards of civilised behaviour have fallen and how difficult it remains to convince some people that they have to win the political argument rather than simply visit violence on people with whom they disagree. In that regard, it was heartening to see Gerry Adams of SF, SDLP leader Mark Durkan, Ian Paisley of the DUP and political representatives from the Alliance Party and the UUP all stand together in the Assembly against this attack.

A lifetime ago in west Belfast, a school friend and I were arguing about the IRA: he was for them; I against. I mentioned some horrific brutality the IRA had committed to which my friend’s father said: “Scum people to do scum things.”

The father and his family were pro-IRA well before the Hunger Strikes. Indeed, the father had been interned by the British army (no pleasant experience) and the soldiers had smashed the house up in the course of the ‘arrest’. The family in question were (and are) lovely people by any standard and their acceptance of what the IRA did was total – if occasionally a little defensive when non-combatants were killed.

None the less, the father – a hard-working, honest, likeable man – was under no illusions as to what some republicans were called upon to do and were capable of doing. Scum people to do scum things. Almost 30 years on, the scum people who do scum things are still at work. They have no support; they have no intelligence; they have nothing to offer. Yet, still, they can terrify a family in such a vicious way – and all, supposedly, done in the name of Ireland.

Compare the petrol bombers with the real guardians of Irish culture. Yesterday hundreds of thousands of GAA supporters marked Lá na gClub. Clubs in Ulster were every bit as active as anywhere else in Ireland. You could not help but be impressed by the dedication of club activists and the way in which they have kept Gaelic games alive over 125 years. The day showed every thing that is best about Ireland and Irish culture: live for your club; live for your county; live for your country.