Left Behind?
When the Northern powder keg went off, the conflict was painted as an ethno-religious one, rather than as a clash of political principles. But what was really going on remains unfinished business...
Eamonn McCann, 23 Oct 2008
Things you still can’t say after 40 years: “Up against the wall, motherfuckers!”
I found this out when television folk came seeking wisdom on the origins of the Northern civil rights movement and then balked at my insistence on quoting the most popular slogan of the time.
“Up against the wall motherfuckers,” was the last item in the 10-point programme of the Black Panther Party, enunciated in rich, dark R’n’B tones in a propaganda film projected against Free Derry Wall in the small hours of a riotous night in 1968.
The erupting cheer signalled a deep-felt connection with black self-defenders under murderous assault by cops in America.
That year’s Civil Rights Association (CRA) conference fragmented into fractiousness at a proposal to send solidarity to the Panthers. The split replicated differences on strategy towards Stormont. Where we stood on global matters reflected the stance we took locally and vice versa.
To insist now on the relevance of global events is to venture onto ground little disturbed by the stomp of the standard-issue chroniclers who assume that Northern Ireland can be understood entirely and cannot be understood other than in terms of Orange versus Green. The hope of the Left had been we could paint destiny any colour we chose. We failed. But in the throes of the effort we had glimpse of a vividness that dappled and sparkled the future with joy. My dear friend Johnnie White, commander of the pre-split IRA in Derry, managed a smile in the last conversation we ever had: “Back then, McCann, that was the best.” And so it was.
Then, briefly, Northern Ireland fitted naturally enough into a thrilling narrative unfolding across the world. If fervour dimmed as the weary conflict which conservatives on all sides felt comfortable with resurged like a wave of sludge over the vision of freedom, well, so did conventional modes of thought reassert themselves elsewhere. In this, again, the North wasn’t as distinct to itself as it’s commonly made to seem.
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