The World-Historical Significance Of The Easter Rising

Liam Ó Ruairc situates the 1916 Rising in a historical and international context. Liam Ó Ruairc is a republican writer and former co-editor of The Blanket.

In less than six months, the one hundredth anniversary of the 24-29 April 1916 Easter Rising will be commemorated throughout Ireland.

What is striking about the so-called 'Decade of Commemorations' is how insular its outlook is. The 1912 Ulster Covenant, the 1916 Rising or the setting up of Northern Ireland are seen as a purely Irish phenomenon, divorced from global trends. As Edward W. Said once noted, while the Irish struggle was a 'model of twentieth-century wars of liberation',

it is an amazing thing that the problem of Irish liberation not only has continued longer than other comparable struggles, but is so often not regarded as being an imperial or nationalist issue ; instead it is comprehended as aberration within the British dominions. Yet the facts conclusively reveal otherwise. - (Edward W. Said (1993), Culture and Imperialism, London : Chatto & Windus, 284)

This article will argue that the significance of the 1916 Easter Rising lies less in its particular Irish context than in its world-historical impact. It will argue that its universal significance is to have hastened the end of the imperial and colonial age and made a significant contribution to the emancipation of colonial and racially subaltern groups globally. 

From an anti-imperialist perspective, the 1916 Easter Rising was not simply part of a series of Irish rebellions against British rule – "six times during the past three hundred years" as the Proclamation puts it- but part of a wave of challenges to imperialism globally. In 1916 Ireland represented the weakest point of the British Empire, the colony from which most pressure could be exerted.

From an internationalist anti-imperialist perspective, Easter 1916 was not so naive a proposition as it was subsequently represented. By 1916 many of the eastern European nations colonized by Russia were also at the point of insurrection, and many colonies of the European empires were already in open revolt – for example, the German Cameroons in 1914, Nyasaland in 1915, Dahomey, French Indochina and Niger in 1916, Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique) in 1917, as well as Chad, Egypt, India, the Ivory Coast, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, Tunisia, Uganda and, most successfully, Libya. The year before the Easter Rising, Indian Sikh soldiers mutinied in Singapore and successfully took control of the city. They hoped that, with German help, they would then be able to drive the British out of the Malay peninsula and eventually from the whole of the Far East. - (Robert J.C. Young (2001), Postcolonialism : An Historical Introduction, Oxford : Blackwell Publishing, 303-304)
The strategy behind the Singapore mutiny bears some similarity to that of the insurgents in Dublin.

But the importance of the Easter Rising from an anti-imperialist perspective is that compared to these other rebellions it took place in Europe and not in some distant colony. In his defense of the Irish insurrection, Lenin underlined its explosive political effects:

The struggle of the oppressed nations in Europe, a struggle capable of going to the length of insurrection and street fighting, of breaking down the iron discipline in the army and martial law will sharpen the revolutionary crisis in Europe infinitely more than a much more developed rebellion in a remote colony. A blow delivered against British imperialist bourgeois rule by a rebellion in Ireland is of a hundred times greater political significance than a blow of equal weight in Asia or in Africa. - (V.I. Lenin (1970), Lenin On Ireland, Dublin : New Books, 33-34)

The Rising was not simply a pivotal event in Irish history. It also signalled the beginning of a revolutionary wave in Europe that reached its highest point in Russia in 1917 – Lenin wrote that "the tragedy of the Irish" was that "they rose too soon". ; before the revolution had matured in other countries.

The 1916 Easter Rising had a very significant impact and influence on anti-imperialist movements worldwide, at the time particularly on those in India and Egypt. (see for example : Kate O’Malley (2006), Ireland, India and Empire: Indo-Irish separatist political links and perceived threats to the British Empire, in : Tadhg Foley & Maureen O’Connor (eds), Ireland and India : Colonies, Culture and Empire, Dublin : Irish Academic Press, 225-232) The Chittagong uprising in India for example was inspired and modelled on the 1916 Rising and therefore called the ‘Easter Rebellion in Bengal’. (Michael Silvestri (2000), ‘The Sinn Fein of India’ : Irish Nationalism and the Policing of Revolutionary Terrorism in Bengal, Journal of British Studies, 39 (4), 454-486) Ho Chi Minh was influenced by the Irish struggle. (Maurice Walsh (2015), Bitter Freedom : Ireland in a Revolutionary World 1918-23, London: Faber & Faber, 132-133).

The 1916 Easter Rising also influenced movements working for the emancipation of subordinate racial groups. If Frederick Douglass and W.E. Du Bois were already very much interested in the Irish struggle, the 1916 rising provided the major ideological mainspring for Marcus Garvey’s radical political transformation. The Easter Rising had more impact on the Universal Negro Improvement Association than the struggles against imperialism in India, China and Egypt. (see : Negro Sinn Féiners and Black Fenians : 'Heroic Ireland' and the Black Nationalist Imagination, in : Bruce Nelson (2012), Irish Nationalists and the Making of the Irish Race, NJ : Princeton University Press, 181-211)

The Easter Rising also had a significant impact on imperial rule. Leading establishment figures saw Ireland as a vital link in the chain that bound the British Empire together, so to lose Ireland would mean to lose the Empire. "If we lose Ireland we have lost the Empire" declared Chief of the Imperial General Staff and Field-Marshal Sir Henry Wilson on 30 March 1921. (quoted by Deirdre McMahon (1999), Ireland and the Empire-Commonwealth 1900-1948, in Judith Brown & William Roger Lewis (eds), The Oxford History of the British Empire. Volume IV: The Twentieth Century, Oxford : Oxford University Press, 146)

After the 1916 Rising, Unionist leader Edward Carson warned the British government of the consequences of defeat in Ireland for the Empire:

If you tell your Empire in India, in Egypt, and all over the world that you do not got the men, the money, the pluck, the inclination and the backing to restore order in a country within twenty miles of your own shore, you may as well begin to abandon the attempt to make British rule prevail throughout the Empire at all.


In response to the Irish demand for independence, British Prime Minister David Lloyd George observed:

Suppose we gave it to them? It will lower the prestige and the dignity of this country and reduce British authority to a low point in Ireland itself. It will give the impression that we have lost grip, that the Empire has no further force and will have an effect on India and throughout Europe. (quoted by Mark Ryan (1994), War & Peace in Ireland: Britain and the IRA in the New World Order, London: Pluto Press, 22-23)

The British state's reaction to the Easter Rising is thus not to be understood purely in an Irish context; but in the overall context of its empire. On 29 May 1916, one month after the Easter Rising, British Prime Minister Lloyd George wrote to Unionist leader Edward Carson, "We must make it clear…that Ulster does not, whether she wills it or not, merge in the rest of Ireland."  (Liz Curtis (1994), The Cause of Ireland : From the United Irishmen to Partition, Belfast: Beyond The Pale, 284)

The British Empire’s determination to meet the challenge from Ireland as examplified by the Easter Rising led to the partition of the country. King George V had reminded Ulster MPs at the first opening of the Northern Ireland Parliament that "everything that touches Ireland find an echo in the remotest part of the Empire". (quoted by Donal Lowry (1996), Ulster Resistance and the Loyalist Rebellion in the Empire: in Keith Jeffery (ed), 'An Irish Empire’ ? Aspects of Ireland and the British Empire, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 197) An example of this is the IRA's Kilmichael ambush which is said to have "jerked the people of India to a new appraisal of their position. Egypt stood amazed. It ultimately pervaded darkest Africa." (Peter Hart (1998), The IRA and its Enemies: Violence and Community in Cork 1916-1923, Oxford : Oxford University Press, 22)

The partition of Ireland has thus to be seen in this imperial and colonial context and became a model for British imperialism. Thus according to Sir Ronald Storrs, the British governor of Jerusalem under the British mandate and brain behind Lawrence of Arabia, the purpose behind the Balfour Declaration and the partition of Palestine was for the British Empire to set up "a loyal Jewish Ulster in a sea of potential hostile Arabism". (Cfr. Moshé Machover (2012), Israelis and Palestinians: Conflict and Resolution, Chicago: Haymarket Books, 185 and 270 ; see also : Tom Segev (1999), One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs under the British Mandate, New York: Henry Holt, 91)

The project of creating another 'Ulster' was not limited to the Middle-East. When King George V met the Rhodesian self-government delegates in 1921 in London he told them they were "the Ulster of South Africa". (Donal Lowry (1996), op.cit.,196) The same way Irish republicans inspired other colonized people, Ulster unionists and loyalists were a major source of inspiration to colonial settlers in Kenya, Rhodesia and South African Natal defending their privileges against the 'natives'. After all, Lord Milner argued that the rationale behind the creation of Northern Ireland was to "rescue the white settler colony of Ulster from submersion in a sea of inferior Celts." (Fergal McCluskey (2014), The Irish Revolution: Tyrone 1912-23, Dublin: Four Courts Press, 134) This 'world-historical' significance of unionism and loyalism has not been emphasized for the 'decade of commemoration'.

Given the recent 'flag protests' in the six counties, it is interesting to note that Ulster loyalists were the main source of inspiration for the protests of the Flag Vigilance Committee when in 1920 attempts were made to replace the Union Jack by a new South African flag. (Donal Lowry (1996), op.cit., 196 and 199-200) Colonial supremacism is the only 'world historical' significance of loyalism and unionism.

What ultimately gave the 1916 Easter Rising a global significance was that it represented a blow against the very idea of empire and imperialism:

The Dublin Rebellion was the beginning of the desintegration of Imperialism, the initiation of a pattern which was to repeat itself in India, Cyprus, Palestine and Egypt, Malaya, Kenya and Algeria.  (Ulick O'Connor (1975) A Terrible Beauty Is Born: The Irish Troubles 1912-1922, London: Hamish Hamilton, 90-91)


In 1965, Nicholas Mansergh, a leading Irish and Commonwealth historian summed up its effects when stating:

The contribution of Ireland was successively to weaken the will and undermine belief in empire. Beyond a certain point, it was not worth it. Stanley Baldwin summed it up when he said there must not be another Ireland in India. (Nicholas Mansergh, Notes for a debate on Ireland’s inflence on British politics in the Historical Society, Trinity College, 5 November 1965, reproduced in Martin Mansergh (2003) The Legacy of History, Cork: Mercier, 288-289)

Subjugated peoples everywhere found inspiration in the Easter Rising.

Its imaginative power hastened the end of the imperial and colonial age and, critically, its wider context as both cultural and political revolution created a template that changed the world. » (Tom McGurk (2006), "The Easter Rising: The Shots That Changed the World Forever", Sunday Business Post, 12 March).

For historian Eric Hobsbawm, decolonisation was one of the chief advances of the 'short twentieth century', and a key achievement of the struggle which began with the 1916 Easter Rising is to have accelerated this process. The world historical significance if the 1916 Easter Rising gives it much more weight than just some particular nationalist rebellion in Ireland. A page in the history of universal emancipation was written. In 1965, when Roger Casement's bones were exhumed from Pentonville prison to be returned to Ireland, this was expressed by Kwame Nkrumah, the President of Ghana (the first independent country in Africa) when he acknowledged the debt owned to Casement (in this writer's opinion the most interesting and globally significant leader of the Rising) by all "those who have fought for African freedom". (Angus Mitchell (2003), Casement, London: Haus Publishing, 37) C.L.R. James praised the 1916 Easter Rising. 

In his foreword to Frantz Fanon's book The Wretched of the Earth Jean-Paul Sartre noted:

Not so very long ago, the earth numbered two thousand million inhabitants: five hundred million men and women, and two thousand five hundred million natives. (Jean-Paul Sartre, Préface à Frantz Fanon (1961), Les Damnés de la Terre, Paris: François Maspero, 9)

The Easter Rising's lasting contribution is to hasten the process through which 'natives' became fully 'men and women'. It should remind us to concentrate on what is most universal and of world-historical significance within Irish republicanism.

33 comments:

  1. What a great post - it is a pity it will likely not be read by those who are seeking to marginalize the Rising and demean it as some sectarian or fanatical undertaking. Ireland should be proud of the outsized influence or symbolism that the Rising provided to other colonized peoples instead of seeking to diminish it or worse. It is a shame that the sacrifice of the men/women of '16 is being diminished by contemporary political panderings but isn't that always the case.

    BTW, thanks to the author, as I didn't realize Marcus Garvey was influenced by the Rising as I have always found him to be a fascinating character.

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  2. 13/16 of a loaf is not an amount of bread to be readily dismissed. Obsessive, fanatical adherence to all-or-nothing thinking rarely serves us well.

    I agree with Liam that setting out 1916 in a positive context of its international historical significance is worthy of remembrance and celebration.
    An honest evaluation of how realistic the goals laid out in the proclamation where to begin with rather than blind adherence to its rhetoric wouldn't go amiss either. Neither would a more benign review of the behaviour and actions, in the ceding of complete control, by the most powerful coloniser ever go awry.

    I am of the opinion that its only from more balanced and pragmatic evaluations that we can truly take ownership of our successes and short-comings. For as long as we allow ourselves to feel cheated or short-changed we see ourselves as victims. Victim-hood precludes effective agency and certainly stymies possibilities for real felt-sense celebration.

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  3. henry joylessness, you are a fanatical adherent to the sound of ur own keyboard, i am sick of reading fine articles and then finding the same patronising poncey pseudo bullshit quoting nietzche camus and other nerds. i wouldnt be one bit surprised if u are the lovechild of kevin myarse and ruth dudley edwarse. and i dont think ud know a real felt-sense celebration if it rode you. why dont u just get a job with the sunday independent. and finally, as this is practically ur site now, who the fuck are you anyway?

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  4. Seems Grouch that you have failed to notice, or perhaps comprehend, the quote that this site carries.

    "Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist." Frederick Douglass

    Continue your puerile jibes if you must but address the substance of my comments too if you can find time.

    H.J. (the man from god knows where).

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  5. 13/16 of a loaf is not an amount of bread to be readily dismissed. Obsessive, fanatical adherence to all-or-nothing thinking rarely serves us well.
    ===================================

    Dearest Henry..Since you don't use your loaf in anyway. Except to be some form of Brit apologist Even this fraction is lost on you.

    "Neither would a more benign review of the behaviour and actions, in the ceding of complete control, by the most powerful coloniser ever go awry..."
    =========

    Deepest Dearest Henry Mac Gombean.
    firstly.
    A) Are you aware that Winston Churchill AKa Former First Lord of the Admirality
    Aka One of the worst Cunts ever to put his arm into an overcoat.
    Wanted to send a battleship..Armed with 14 Inch Guns to engage Dublin in some Plunging artillery Fire?
    Were you aware of this whilst you were posting your most grovelling remarks, above?
    Really, the only reason why there isn't a Tapestry of Dublin in 1916 to hang up alongside Picasso's Guernica is due to the no small fact that the Brit-Scum have permanent seat at the UN.
    The poor Germans do not have.
    There is no defending the Brit Hun.
    And you are a fool to even try.
    Certainly nobody will ever accuse you of using your loaf.
    Or perhaps you remain grateful that the 14" Battleship never arrived The Brits prefering to Use HMS Helga instead.
    Henry..I do believe that If you were alive in 1916..You would have gleefully joined the Brits on the Gun plaform of HMS Helga.
    You Sir are a Kapo.
    A Quisling.
    And an all round bad egg.
    Educate yourself.
    There is no secondly.. I'm afraid I have been spent.
    Except... It is rather Strange that no Obiturary of Winston Churchill will refer to his idea of sending in a battleship to Dublin in 1916.
    Maybe like Bomber "Butcher " Harris the Wee Brit scum are ashamed of it all.
    Does the Former Tyrant do Shame?
    I remain to be convinced of that.

    P.s.

    The Norwegiens put the children born to German soldiers and Norwegien women into Mental Homes post WW2
    When the Tricolour flies over Belfast.. Let's hope that this shall not be necessary for Irish quislings and Kapos.
    And to think people have a real warm glow when Norway is mentioned.
    I don't see the Norwegiens engage in any hand wringing over this issue.
    Only Irish Kapos and quislings have this Self Loathing.. Hand wringing..Lilly Livered ... Weak ass sister approach to seeking freedom.
    Gombeans.

    Henry to complete your Transformation.
    I suggest you start a fundraising campaign.. to compensate the poor Brits for the ammunition they expended in Derry 1972. And to present David Camper-oonn with a nice novelty cheque and issue a full and frank apology for all those Irish who got in the way of the brit Bullets on that day.
    You may as well go the whole hog. And be kind to the tyrant.
    In case you haven't twiggged it.. Ya make me puke.

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  6. Ozzy

    there's not much I can add to my original post by way of reply save but to also note how easily those who perceive themselves as victims move into the role of persecutor.

    Yourself and Jihadi Jerome are both fine exemplars of Chesterton's ... Great Gaels of Ireland, (The men that god made mad).

    Woe betide anyone who'd challenge or disrespect your sacred idols or dogma!

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  7. frederick douglas would make an exception 4 u. whoever he was.

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  8. Yeah Jerome,

    and when you advocate for exceptions, then eventually if someone dissents from your theocracy or deviates from the mores of the herd you will make space for savage and barbaric events like the gruesome, depraved and torturous murder of Paul Quinn.

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  9. thats the dumbest, most ignorant and pathetic comment u have ever typed. you can read my comments on that young lads brutal murder here on the quill. u sick prick to bring his name into this banter in such a manner. unlike u i actually put it up to those sick cunts in south armagh. now i am finished permanently with this shite. u should be ashamed of urself. that is the most fukd up thing to write, how fukin dare you. and u call me a jihadi because i defend unborn children from being slaughtered and their body parts being sold to big business. just know this asshole, i will be defending ur right to life and to be the complete tosser you are when you go by your sell by date and are herded into the euthanasia ward. ul be fuckin glad im a mad gael then. jihadi, that is just like you to bring up that word in the week thats in it. if i ever meet you i will make you regret bringing that lads name into this. pathetic. u have no class mr. one more thing: heres a quote by me, frederick douglas grouch - liberty is meaningless where the right to life has ceased to exist and childrens body parts are sold to corporations.
    now go fuck urself.

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  10. Liam O Ruairc will be mighty pleased that he has started a good row!!

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  11. AM

    Its a bit an off topic row. I am not a fan of HJ but this Jerome G person came in foul mouthed and playing HJ and not the topic on this occassion. Then when HJ bites Jerome G gets even more fired up. He or she had the gall to complain about being "sick of reading fine articles" being ruined by people he doies not like -just a thought but maybe he wants his own special padded area on your blogg site for his special invited guests or friends.

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  12. Jerome

    The evolution of our species into a more enlightened, less violent one depends on the evolution of our minds. The evolution of our minds is the only way to move beyond our primitive responses.

    As Woodrow Wilson once advised "We should not only use the brains we have, but all that we can borrow."

    Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean Paul Sarte, or Albert Camus may not be the best starting point in that quest but there are other more readily accessible writers out there who could act as guide in the interim.

    Onwards and upwards,
    H.J.

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  13. Diplock,

    the thought did strike me when that comment came thru.

    But it made the author rather than the target look ridiculous. I imagine Henry Joy feels it was a job well done and that reason trumped irrationality.

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  14. Henry Joy.
    in all your wanderings about "enlightenment" You never seem to cover any of the positives that pop up around a UI.
    And Yet anything..no matter how slender that somehow you feel promotes your position.. You grab hold of.
    Most recent this was the BBC/ RTE poll

    We now today have a learned academic fellow from a prestigious Canadian University who claims a United Ireland would add 36 Billion Euro to Irish GDP.
    That's Billion with a "B"
    I do hope this dreadfully bad news will not leave you off colour for the weekend.

    The full document in *warning PDF * form is here.
    But the story runs in the Irish Times also

    http://www.klconsult.ca/irish-unification-modeling-.pdf

    Academics involved were Kurt Hübner from Berlin
    It's Golly nice that you are a self proclaimeds " Enlightened Fellow"
    So, enjoy this piece of light reading which is aimed squarely at defeatist Free Staters IMHO.

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  15. ur all a bunch of pseudos and gobshites. once again,what a prick u are h joy to bring Paul Quinn into this. i made a big mistake thinking this was a republican site, u are all a bunch of throwback nerds waffling on about camus and nietzche etc. actually its embarassing reading ur quote loaded polysyllabic bullshit. and mr diplock, people like me who stand up for unborn children, oppose euthanasia and all the other evils of the globalist agenda, will probably end up in cells, while trendy dead intellectual quoting ponces like u creeps will all be doing rather well. reason triumphs irrationality, is that right macintyre, its reasonable to kill children, thats fine so, im irrational and proud of it. u guys are the saddest bunch of pseudos on the internet.

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  16. you are free to leave - choice not compulsion draws you here so you can't find it all that bad. Moth to the flame syndrome?

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  17. Jerome G

    You say I am a "trendy dead intellectual quoting ponces like u creeps" if I'm trendy that must make you the ponce because you were the only one I quoted.

    I made no comment about babies at all. I just picked up on your foul and insulting language against HJ who actually did not say a word against you - he responded to you and then your water broke --you obviously still have anger issues about being aborted as a fetus. I know nothing about Paul Quinn other than he was savagely beaten to death by a bunch of thugs but whatever it means to you you should heed William Shakespear's Hamlet, wherein, "The lady doth protest too much, methinks"

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  18. ur as funny as a lump of cancer diplock. what a pathetic comment over anger issues, thats just sad bro, heres something that makes me angry - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjCs_gvImyw, go make an abortion joke now u sad bastard. and heres a bit of hamlet just for you - There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
    and finally, my favourite quote of all time for you nietzchian douchebags -
    "fred is dead" God, 25 august 1900.

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  19. Ozzy

    thanks for the link.

    I don't ever remember proclaiming myself an enlightened fellow. Yes, I spoke of the species evolving from a less violent to a more more enlightened one but I hope others will see through it if you choose to continue distorting my words.

    If you want to use the old militant republican vernacular then I suppose those that accept the democratic wish of 85% of the electorate, and I am among that cohort, we could all be called defeatist Free Staters.

    But what does all the name-calling achieve?
    I was once as committed to the Republican Movement as you so obviously still are but if a product can't do what it says on the tin eventually most sensible people loose confidence in it. Having lost confidence in it has the consumer not the right to challenge what he believes to be misleading or erroneous promotion of the product? Have I not the same right to challenge a positive review of the product as you have the right to challenge a negative one?

    People who call themselves republicans need to put forward a reasoned argument for their position when they can. If they can't they'd be best bite their tongue.
    If they can't tactically hold their fire one really has to wonder what's driving the invective. Its certainly not rational.

    Nor is it effective.

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  20. Jerome

    I think it might be useful if you could find a more comfortable way to navigate to and fro between the darkness and the light of the human soul.

    Some suggested reading for you or indeed anyone chained or bound to moral absolutism.

    The Cap: The Price Of A Life by Roman Frister.

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  21. which does not seem to be in Kindle format, unfortunately

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  22. local library €5 annual registration ^_^

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  23. I don't read hard unless I have a red pen and I can't do that with a library book. Kindle allows annotation very easily. Trying not to bring another hard copy book into the house given the sheer volume already here

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  24. Jerome G

    You are a prime example of why, when children are taught religion in school, it should be balanced to include the dangers of extremism and fanatics. For too long religious eductaion has been allowd to spew a one sided quint idea of religion. Girls should be taught that they will have to forfeit any gender equality rights in all dominent religions. Children should also be educated to the extreme consequences in some religions where they can be killed for their sexual orientation or apostacy. Or they can suffer a life of extreme sense of bitterness as you are displaying.

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  25. Diplockcourts,

    religion can sure fuck with people's minds. Without Grouch in mind, many of them go mad with rage if you don't believe in the god they believe in and seem to have difficulties coming to terms with the fact that we simply disbelieve in one more god than they disbelieve in. I think it has been worthwhile putting the effort in to protect my children from it. I take great pride in my ten year old discussing the history of the world, evolution, science, etc and watching all the scientific programmes. And I wonder about those religious types who would try if they had a chance to flood his mind with nonsense that the world was only created 6000 years ago or that the human race just appeared magically with no prior history of evolution. Religion is the last thing a child needs.

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  26. AM

    Good way of putting it: "we simply disbelieve in one more god than they disbelieve in." If people want to believe in something the rest of us should not be held to ransome for it. I think Article 9 of the European Convention should be amended from :
    1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.

    To:
    1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought and conscience; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.

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  27. Diplockcourts,

    it was not original on my part - think it is one Ricky Gervais once used. I agree with the proposed change. A religious opinion is no better or worse than a sporting opinion and the rules of the golf club can only apply to the club where the signed up agree. The golf club lot can't come out and stake a claim to be making rules for the rest of us who neither play golf or are in their club. When Michael McDowell rightly told one of the Cardinals that canon Law had no more application to society than the rules of a golf club the cardinal was perplexed.

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  28. Article 9 provides for clubs/religions to come together "in community with others" where I would say the term 'community' in this context means 'in agreement with others' which protects the rights of non-members not to be caught up in club buisness.

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  29. ur a bigger fool than hj, diplick, and thats impossible.

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  30. ur all talk about rights for this and that diplick, except the right to life.


    moths for anthony - http://www.livescience.com/21933-moth-week-facts.html

    padded cells for diplick - http://childabuserecovery.com/queen-elizabeth-guilty-in-missing-children-case-whistle-blowers-incarcerated-again/

    something special for henry joyless - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7oGx2dImE8

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  31. Jerome

    and how is any of that relevant to "The World-Historical Significance Of The Easter Rising" ?

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  32. cherish all the.................


    now go read ur oh so relevant nietzche.

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  33. I noticed the report cited by Ozzy as somebody had sent it to me. Then somebody else sent me
    this ones. Not being an economist I can’t properly evaluate other than in a very amateurish way but I guess the heavy lifting on this one will have to be done by those who think the initial report has merit.

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