The Irish Independent Versus Sinn Fein; then and now 1916-2015 (Part 1)

                        

The editorial in the first issue of the Irish Independent after the uprising against British Rule in 1916, that included Michael Collins in its ranks, headlined with this: ‘Criminal Madness.’ It continued: “No terms of denunciation would be too strong to apply to those responsible for the criminal and insane rising of last week.”

                                             British soldiers coming to repel the rebellion

By the 9^th of May of that year, the British had already executed 13 leaders of the rising and James Connolly lay gravely wounded in his prison cell while waiting for his own execution, and where Sean Mc Diarmada was still a prisoner with him, the Irish Independent called for more blood to be spilled, Irish blood: 

“ If these men are treated with too much leniency they will take it as an indication of weakness on the part of the Government (A British one)…Let the worst of the ringleaders be singled out and dealt with as they deserve.”

                                     The Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) come to lend a hand

Getting ready for a few rebels

Two day later the Irish Independent wrote this: “A certain few of the leaders remain un-dealt with, and the part they played was worse than that of those who have paid the extreme penalty. Are they, because of an indiscriminate demand for clemency, to get off lightly, while others who were more prominent have been executed?

The next day the Irish Independent freedom of the press wishes were granted: James Connolly and Sean Mac Diarmada were shot the at the break of dawn. Michael Collins survived a little longer and murdered by fellow Irishmen some years later. The Irish Independent was still not sated.

Someone is about to die

The Irish Independent exhorted Irish youth to “atone for the crime” of rebellion by joining the British Army and “show the world that Ireland is still sound.” It seems that Irish blood was needed be sacrificed on the altar of madness that was world war 1, because of the fight for freedom that other Irish men fought and died for. 

And so the vilification of Sinn Fein and indeed Jerry Adams continues to this day where a newspaper, now owned by a corrupt businessman, includes in its writers stable the following: one corrupt politician, one corrupt judge, one corrupt failed businessman that almost conned his way into the presidency, and two extreme right wing former writers of the Irish Catholic rag mag, that relate fiction as fact and where fact itself must never get in the way of a good story. Thankfully, the alternative media is overtaking them at last.

Barry Clifford