I would take it up with Wikipedia then.
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I’ve already explained that to you, they are not in any way comparable to the IRA (or actual proper loyalist terrorist groups like the UDA or the UVF), and their formal association with the DUP ended as soon as they were exposed as being involved in criminal activity.
Lol, yeah, I’m sure they were founded for fun, not for “criminal activity”. The hypocrisy is pretty staggering.
In the end it doesn’t really matter why they were founded, they were a non-entity compared to the other groups involved in the troubles, they never carried out any terrorist attacks and the sole illegal activity that we know they were involved in led to their disavowal by the DUP. There’s no hypocrisy here, I’m just sticking to the facts, maybe you should try doing the same?
right, ok, sure. Agree to disagree, let’s move on.
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Yes, their support for terrorists is all in the past … bygones! Now they express their hatred for Catholics in more peaceful ways, even though they themselves share the most misogynist and repressive values of the RCC. The Tories must be so proud, turning these right-wing religious crazies into power brokers.
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You obviously weren’t paying attention to anything I was saying. They didn’t have any support for terrorists in the past either. There’s no doubt they have plenty of bigotry and paranoia regarding Catholics, and many other groups. They have never supported nor engaged in terrorism though.
Ok, now I understand – it was all a fashion statement. Ian Paisley just marched with loyalist paramilitaries and attended their meetings in 1970s and 1980s because he liked balaclavas and kicky red berets.
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Again, you obviously weren’t paying attention to anything I’ve been saying because I’ve already covered that. We were talking about the DUP, most of Paisley’s support for and activity with paramilitary groups predated the founding of the DUP. The only paramilitary group associated with the DUP were Ulster Resistance, and as I’ve explained already they were not involved in any terrorist activity and the DUP disassociated from them (only a year after they came into being) when they were caught trying to get their hands on arms (they’re a joke basically, not even at the level of the Continuity IRA and other anti-GFA republicans).
Ok, if you want to believe that Paisley’s and the DUP’s past support for the Ulster Resistance was not support for violent thuggish terrorists, I’m not going to waste time arguing with you.
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Well if you want to claim that it was support violent thuggish terrorists you’ll want to provide some evidence that they were engaged in violent thuggish terrorism, and that will be quite difficult for you to do, because they weren’t. If they had supported the UDA or the UVF you’d have a point, but they didn’t.
I’ve heard both sides explain to me why their terrorist wings were nothing like the other side’s terrorist wings, and why the other side’s political wing is still involved in terrorism but theirs isn’t.
The difference? Sinn Féin is now a moderate political party and the DUP is a far right one. As one reporter commented last week, cover up the nationalism bit and most people would think Sinn Féin was mainstream and the DUP further fringe than UKIP.
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I don’t know which “side” you think I’m on here. For the record I’m Irish, from Dublin, of Catholic background (all of my grandparents, though neither of my parents were religious and I wasn’t brought up Catholic). I’m not much of a republican, although I’m vaguely in favor of a united Ireland, it makes sense for logistical reasons if nothing else, but fundamentally I believe the right to self determination is far more important than the righting of historical wrongs, so I don’t expect it to happen any time soon, and that’s fine by me (once a majority in the North are in favour of it then that’ll be great too).
If you think the sole paramilitary organisation that was linked with the DUP was in any way similar to the other terrorist groups (either republican or loyalist) then you just don’t know very much about what went on over there. My posts have said nothing about which “side” was worse (though for the record, while the loyalist groups killed fewer people than the republicans, they tended to target civilians to a far greater degree than the republicans, also, they were largely responsible for starting the troubles in the first place, so from a moral standpoint you might say they were worse).
Also, Sinn Fein are not a moderate party, though they are less far-left than they used to be (they were Marxist/Leninists until the late 70s/early 80s), they’d still be best categorised as democratic socialists, rather than social democrats. They’re euro skeptics surprisingly, mostly they’re kicking up a stink about brexit because of the impact it will have on the border, not because they’re wedded to the idea of the EU. They were also quite socially conservative up until very recently (only dropped their opposition to abortion a couple of years ago). And while I agree that the DUP are a horrible party who represent reactionary and bigoted policies of all kinds (though they have working class roots, so they’re not at all economically liberal, unlike the UUP - who are closer to the Tories), all I said was that they weren’t “actual terrorists”, as a previous poster called them.
I understand what you’re saying. I think our difference of opinion is one of the scales on which we interpret things. I don’t know how old you are but the definition of “far left” has changed beyond recognition over the years. I think I still apply the political categories of my North London upbringing, where I was taught by actual socialists and CP members. To me, the original Sinn Féin called themselves Marxist-Leninists, but that was just a bit of chest thumping (and to get support from actual revolutionaries).
I accept that you were not intending to whitewash (unfortunate term) the DUP. That was just how it came over to me.
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Ed Milliband on BoingBoing confirmed. 
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No. But he and I might agree on a lot of things.
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No, they were genuine, and it led to a split, when the die hards went and formed the Workers Party. After the split Sinn Fein became less and less Marxist over the years, today though they’re still far from the mainstream.
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