‘Pat The Picket’ Allen – A True Rebel

Pat Allen – one of the most formidable protestors in Cork – died earlier this week after a long battle with cancer. I knew Pat well and will miss not seeing him again on any protests in the city. Pat was always indignant about injustice and angry that more people were not out on the streets trying to put an end to what was wrong in society. He believed in taking action and letting people know what was wrong, and what should be done.  Not only a great character but an indignant one too!

One of my abiding memories of Pat was meeting him one day just off Patrick Street in Cork. He had a few posters with him and some paste.  But he complained bitterly to me that all the ESB poles along Patrick Street were already taken up with other posters and there was no room for his.  I pointed out to him that it was a good complaint to to be making and that it was a sign there was a good level of activity going on around the city.  But Pat could be single minded: he wanted to get his posters up and highlight his issue.  Pat had many issues on his mind and he spent a lot of time making it known that as a society we could a lot, lot better.  And he was right about that.

I took this photo of Pat  on the 2008 May Day celebration in Cork. Here Pat is in costume and he looked fabulous that day. He made his point too about the health cutbacks – what a scandal!  An interesting aside on Pat was the fact that his political prowess brought him into contact with the meaner elements of society – the Special Branch in particular.  Back in the 80s and 90s Pat suffered a considerable amount of harassment from the SB.  I think I had his character in mind (or someone like him) when I wrote ‘But Your Mother’.

An amazing person and a tremendous, defiant spirit.  A true rebel.  You will be missed Pat.

 

Related Posts:

• Pat Allen RIP

Bloodshed and ‘Togetherness’ in Afghanistan

Commander Fire Now and Apologise Later Growing Up

A brief post: the war in Afghanistan.  Only last week (Feb 14th) NATO slaughtered a slew of civilians in a mis-aimed missile attack.  Children, men and women were blown to bits as they traveled along a road going about their business.  On the RTE news I heard the atrocity reported as a ‘set back’.   This Orwellian description was rejoined by a brief sound-bite interview with the US commander there – whose name I can’t recall but let’s for the purpose of this post call him Commander Fire Now and Apologise Later.  Commander Fire Now and Apologise Later informed us that the NATO campaign was still on track despite the murderous mistake that had been made.

All just spin – let’s face it.  Because it has now emerged that in the past week at least 60 (yes, 60!) more civilians have been slaughtered in various mistakes made by NATO troops.   When these atrocities happen it often takes quite a while for the details to filter out – so it may well be in a number of months from now that we get the full facts on these war crimes.   But as an example of the sort of thing that is now happening as a routine, check out this news article on a murderous NATO attack in December.

Anyway the point I want to get to is this.  We are not hearing much about this brutal war that is being conducted in Afghanistan.  It has grown bigger and bigger and more and more Afghanis are suffering (in order to ‘free’ them, of course.)

But for an interesting look into what is going on and why, and how the media side of ‘spinning’ this war is being conducted, see the current, excellent article from Media Lens entitled “War As PR – Operation Moshtarak, Meaning “Together”.  Media Lens is a small dedicated media analysis organisation who have done sterling work over the last number of years examining and reporting on the bias of the corporate media.  At the end of the Media Lens article there are various suggestions on what you can do with regard to the way in which the Afghanistan war is being reported.  None of these actions in their own right are going to change a whole lot but nevertheless it is vital that we make ourselves aware of the lies and slant that are being used to justify and brush over these crimes.  Read the article – inoculate yourself.

Worse than Bernie Madoff – Shell’s Robbery in Ireland

More cutbacks in the public services are planned.   Already hospitals have been hit by ward closures, and procedures have been axed; in schools up and down the country, cuts are being made that will have long lasting effects on many young children and their families.  Why?  Supposedly to pay for the financial mess that successive governments have made of this country.

But consider this.  The Irish State has given to Shell Oil a vast volume of gas off Ireland’s west coast.  For free!   Shell walk off with a vast resources and meanwhile the general public suffer cut after cut.   Is this worse than “Bernie” Madoff.  For sure it is.

Take a look at the above satirical video – which goes through the murky business that is at the heart of this gas robbery.

There is ongoing resistance to what the Government and Shell are doing in Mayo.  Keep up with the latest info at the Shell 2 Sea site or at the WSM news page.

the hand of god …

Latest story on my web site ties in with the horrendous details revealed by the recently published Ryan Report.  I wrote the story back in the late 90s after meeting a friend of mine from school.  We both ended up taking about our school days and about the fear we felt.  I would go further now …  one of the important things about the release of the Ryan Report is that it allows us all to be more honest about that period and what we were subjected to.  It is not an easy place to go back to – that has to be said.  But what I would say now is that it was not fear that I felt but rather terror – I was scared out of my wits so much of the time.  So the story comes from that.

But now since publication of the report I think of how lucky I was.  I was in secondary school when I suffered at the hands at the Christian Brothers but at least I could get away at the end of the school day.  At least.  I shudder now to think of those who encountered the Christian Brothers and the nuns and were at their mercy 24/7.

Today so many have marched in Dublin in solidarity with those who have suffered.  It is great to see.  Something at least.

To the story…

The Obama Lie

So, we must be over a month into the Barak Obama presidency.  A lot of hope and a lot of optimism, right?

Last night I watched Obama sign into law his new ‘stimulus’ package to revive the US economy.  Heady stuff – but I won’t go into that right now. Instead I am thinking about a different matter: a short news bulletin on Friday last which reported that a drone aircraft had dropped two missiles in a remote area of Afghanistan.  It seems that the missiles, according to reports carried by CNN and others, killed at leat twenty people.

By all accounts the targets of the attack were members of the Taliban AND it was claimed that two such ‘target’ Taliban members were actually killed in the attack. Well, I’m still okay at my mathematics, so that leaves how many? Let’s see now, two from twenty leaves eighteen – that’s right 18 – doesn’t it? That is, eighteen others, who were never targets, were also killed in the attack.  I have got that right, haven’t I?  Please get back to me if I did the calculation incorrect.

So, eighteen people murdered in cold blood, by two bombs dropped from pilot-less aircraft.   Is this the new era so?  The Obama era that was supposed to make such a difference.  And this is not to even get into the rights or wrongs of the state assassination of two suspected Taliban members.  You know old adage: who gives anyone the right to be judge, jury and executioner?

No, for the moment, I am just going to focus on the eighteen people that were killed.  Were they women, men, children?  Does anyone know?  Does Barak Obama know?  Or more to the point, did he know about this attack and about the possible collateral damage?  Well, what do you think?  Did Barak say it was okay to kill 18 people/ civilians as part of the operation to get the two Taliban activists.  And when you think about it, given that there is a strong chance that he did know, then what does it say about this new era?  I ask you?

Waterford Glass Workers’ Interview…

This excellent interview, published on Indymedia, was conducted by WSM members in Waterford today.  They went to the Waterford Glass plant at Kilbarry where an ongoing occupation by the workers has stopped the receiver, appointed by Waterford Wedgwood, in his tracks. This action by the Glassworkers is the first major act of resistance this year against the onslaught by the Government and media against workers wages and conditions.   The workers at the Glass have been treated disgracefully but they have a fine tradition of struggle and giving solidarity themselves.   Their occupation deserves widespread support and as the interview shows, they are indeed getting that…

Solidarity with the Glass workers!

Interview with Joe Kelly, Waterford Glass worker

We Bombed It And Bombed It …

‘We bombed it and bombed it and bombed it, and bueno, why not.’

This comment is attributed to an unnamed Franco staff officer and refers to the savage attack on the city of Guernica on April 26, 1937.   It is not clear how many died on that day during what was a watershed attack, regarded now by many as the first indiscriminate and purposeful aerial terror attack on a civilian population.  Estimates put the death toll at anywhere between 300 and 1650, with many more injured.

The quote comes to mind as we witness the brutal aerial and ground attack on the Gaza strip.  The overwhelming superiority of the Israeli forces and the military might they are able to bring to bear on what is a largely civilian population is in itself shocking.  The awful tragedy is our inability to do so little about it and to stop it.  We are unable to stop the aggressor in this case – since they are backed by the USA – and so the dreadful experience of Guernica is repeated.  My heart goes out to these peole at this time and what they must be going through…

I am reminded of the poem by Herbert Read called ‘Bombing Casualties in Spain’  and quote it here in solidarity with those suffering at this awful juncture in history:

Dolls’ faces were rosier but these were childrens

their eyes not glass but gleaming gristle

dark lenses in whose quicksilvery glances

the sunlight quivered.  These blench’d lips

were warm once and bright with blood

but blood

held in a moist bleb of flesh

not split and spatter’d in tousled hair.

Are Ye Trying To Fill The Graveyards Quicker?

I have been to a lot of protests over the years in Cork.  A few stand out and yesterday’s protest against the recently announced Government cuts in the Medical Card entitlements for the over 70s was one of them. It was an unexpectedly big march that got under way at 3 pm.  From the beginning there were lots of people on the march that hadn’t been on a protest for a long time.  And yet they were determined to be there.  It was great to see.  Once the march got under way, it received an ovation from the those standing on the pavements watching – Saturday afternoon shoppers; families in town for a stroll.   There was a really buoyant air of protest and anger to the march which grew and grew as it made its way along Patrick’s Street.  I was reminded of that tremendous march in Cork city centre against the Iraq War back in 2003 when the huge crowd was mesmerised by its own sheer size.  On that occasion a sit down protest followed and there was a feeling in the air of the power of people standing together and for something.  Something to see indeed! There was sometime similar in Cork on Saturday.  Maybe not as strong but there nonetheless – tremendous all and all.  I got to take some photos and a number of placards stood out: one said are “Are Ye Trying To Fill The Graveyards Quicker”.  Another was of a young   holding a placard saying leave my grannies Medical Card alone!

More protests are planned and there is every chance that this particularly cut will be reversed. That would be great.  People power is a wonder!  Nonetheless it doesn’t take from the fact that the Government has the ordinary person in their sights when it comes to finding someone to pay for the disaster that is this present economic crisis.  I suppose no surprise there.  Absolutly none at all.  There is more on march at http://www.wsm.ie/story/4646 and athttp://www.indymedia.ie/article/89514. If you get a chance get out on the street too!