#orange state

The revolution was defeated. Narrow, mean-minded, conservative, elitist, sectarian regimes were established north and south. In the north the unionist regime imposed decades of political and religious discrimination, repression and conservatism. In this state there was the horror of institutional abuse in the Magdalene laundries, in the Reformatory and Industrial Schools and in other institutions. Poverty, emigration and inequality were rampant. Censorship in the arts, culture and politics was pervasive. Some of our greatest writers were banned. The old, imperial administration was replaced by new, native political and economic elites. The reality is that when partition was imposed by London there were activists who rejected it. There were others who reluctantly accepted it as temporary and hoped that the new southern state would act as a stepping stone to full national freedom. But there were also those who saw it as an end in itself. And there are many in the establishment today who share that view. They, like the Taoiseach, believe that our sovereign nation stops at the border. They just don’t get 1916.