Kevin Myers

Tribal confusion

The Anglophile Kevin Myers was being ever so earnest on the subject of racism in Ireland on RTÉ TV's Seoige & O'Shea afternoon chat show last week, denouncing Irish "tribalism" citing as evidence the tribalism of Fianna Fáil versus Fine Gael politics (aren't politics tribal in Britain and the US with Labour v Conservatives and Democrats v Republicans?).

Indeed, Mr Myers intoned haughtily, Sinn Féin even resorts occasionally to killing people because it's "tribalist".

Leaving aside Myers' sweeping generalisations, you would have thought that the usually astute Seoige or O'Shea would have pointed out that 'Major' Myers was proudly brandishing a Royal British Legion poppy - a tribute to the memory of those British Army soldiers who died overseas not just slogging through the Somme or nutting Nazis but also while trying to kill quite a few real tribes fighting for freedom in their own countries in the colonies of Myers' beloved British Empire (Kenya, Aden, Oman, et al).

You can't get more tribal than the age-old British tradition of wiping out the natives, can you, Kevin?

 

Snow storm over poppy

The poppy-wearing Channel 4 newsreader Jon Snow, unlike Kevin Myers, doesn't think that journalists should wear symbols on TV to make a political point.

Jon Snow wears his poppy when not on screen but he's hit out at what he calls "poppy fascism".

Almost every news anchor and panelist on a BBC and UTV show succumbed to "poppy fascism". As Snow said:

"There is a rather unpleasant breed of poppy fascism out there: 'He damned well must wear a poppy!'

"Well I do, in my private life, but I am not going to wear it or any other symbol on air."

One reader of Snow's trenchant defence of impartiality responded:

"You conform by wearing a shirt and tie to read the news - why not wear a poppy too?

"If you truly were an impartial and free spirit, you'd tell us the news sat there in a T-shirt and Bermuda shorts."

Could you imagine UTV's Ivan Little giving it large in his vest and trunks? Maybe we'd better not.

 

Poppy and peel

Some British Army veterans weren't so impressed with the support for the poppy appeal from one Birmingham business - a local strip joint.

The boss of The Rocket club slapped two of the local traders' association's Triffid-like, huge, 6-foot by 5-foot plastic poppies on the side of his Broad Street fleshpot. But this outward show of affection didn't warm the cockles of one old warhorse. Gerald Rose (77), of the National Service Veterans' Association, said: "It's bloody terrible. I didn't think anyone would stoop as low as this."

But the Broad Street strippers do more than their bit for all the soldiers, their manager, Alan Sartori, protested.

While they're stripping they're also selling "traditional poppies" for the grizzled old soldiers while bumping and grinding for the younger, still-serving soldiers of the queen.

"We get military service people here all the time."

 

Orange UDR veteran

One UDR veteran who fell in a foreign field very recently (on Halloween, 31 October in Iraq, in fact) and buried last Friday, was Rab McAllister, from Lisburn, County Down.

Ex-soldier McAllister was killed by a roadside bomb in Fallujah while working as a "security advisor" for the Armor Group 'private security' firm - in other words, he was a mercenary. He had previously operated in Afghanistan. His wife described him as "an adrenaline junkie".

Rab McAllister had more than 25 years' service in the UDR/RIR and was described by the Irish News as "a senior member of the Lisburn Orange Order, as his father-in-law, Cecil Coates". So at the same time he was rising through the ranks of the UDR, Rab McAllister was rising through the ranks of the Protestant supremacist Orange Order.

And still its defenders claim the UDR wasn't a sectarian, unionist militia.

 

This is business

Fianna Fáil TD Charlie O'Connor says a telephoned death threat from anti-social hoods isn't going to stop him going about his daily business.

A caller asked, "How are you, Charlie, you little rat?" before telling him he's going to be shot.

But the Dublin South-West Soldier of Destiny has a message of his own for his would-be assassins.

"Right now I have one thing to say to those who propose to shoot me: If you've a problem, why don't you ring me during working hours?"

Yes, Charlie would much rather get his death threats Monday to Friday, 9 to 5 (and not during lunch, please).

 

PSNI shown red card

Soccer hooliganism has led to the Peelers' entire soccer team receiving a three-year ban from a cup competition after a full-scale pitch brawl with the opposition and their supporters.

The punch-up came after a PSNI player from the PSNI Olympic team stood in as referee after the official ref didn't turn up and proceeded to give his PSNI team mates a penalty against the 79th Old Boys in a Junior Challenge Shield match at the Billy Neill Centre in Dundonald on October 21. The Old Boys were also banned and both teams fined.

Announcing the PSNI's ban, a Country Antrim FA spokesperson, Terry Pateman, said:

"Both sides were equally guilty. Basically, both sides were involved in a stand-up fight."

Makes you wonder why no one was arrested.