[net.nlang.celts] Trishas Immigration Problem

jmm@bonnie.UUCP (Joe Mcghee) (08/22/84)

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Trisha says,

>   No, I have nothing against Catholics

	Gee, you could have fooled me! I guess the thing that gave me that
impression was your remark about being the "founding member of the society
to keep Papist influence out of Ulster." Then there was also the fact that
nobody on the net had mentioned religion up to that point. It just goes to
show you how wrong a guy can be :-).

> I became a member of the Church on Holy Saturday, 1951, made my First
> Communion six years later, and became a Soldier of Christ while in the third
> grade at St. Mary's Elementary School in downtown Albuquerque.      

	Now that you've said that I've got the warm fuzzies all over about
your motivations. This certainly qualifies you to be an instant expert on
anything relating to the Catholic Church or Ireland :-).

>   What I don't like is the interfamily relation between Church and
> State that exists in Eire today.

	The "interfamily relation between Church and State" is not as strong
in Ireland as it is in England where the reigning British monarch is also the
head of the Anglican Church. In effect Queen Elizabeth is the female pope of
the Anglican Church. She outranks the Archbishop of Canterbury in the Anglican
Church and her horse stud farms in America are untaxable because they are
considered property of the Anglican Church.
	The Church-state relationship in Ireland did not prevent Liam Cosgrave
(a protestant) from becoming the first President of Ireland in 1922 when he
was also the first man to officially raise the Irish flag over the new
government's offices.
	By the way, Ireland hasn't been called "Eire" for about three decades.
Some time ago the country renounced all ties of political dependency to England
and since that time it has officially been named the Republic of Ireland. I
think it was after that "communist" Eamon De Valera got into office. But
that's all right, Trisha, I know how the word "Republic" sticks in some
people's throats.

> Faced with the very real possibility of living in Dublin (especially if the
> INS doesn't act soon on approving my husband's residency status) I am
> distinctly uncomfortable with the idea of living in a country guided by the
> hand of Holy Mother Church.  

	I would have thought you'd want to live in Armagh, your ancestral home
in the north. May I suggest the town of Crossmaglen? I'm sure the folks up
there would really love to have you there :-). If that's no good, how about
Scotland or England? Surely they would take you in, wouldn't they?
	But as far as the INS is concerned you have no worries there. When my
father and his rather large family came here from Scotland it was 1929, the
beginning of the depression. His naturalization was speeded by his marriage
to my mother who is a native born American like yourself. Later my mother
even worked for the INS. Unless your husband is a criminal, insane, terribly
diseased or is a bigamist (no puns please) the situation is "no sweat".

> I have, therefore, great deal of sympathy for the Protestants of Northern
> Ireland, especially as the majority of that country's population favors
> the British Parliament to the Irish Dail.          

	Well, of course, the original boundaries of Northern Ireland were
drawn to enclose the largest area of land with a loyalist majority. But
things have slipped a little since then. It seems that the birth rate among
nationalist families is much higher than among loyalist families and there
are always more nationalist youths in the schools than loyalist youths. It
causes the government some terrific headaches trying to figure out more ways
to drive nationalist youths out of Northern Ireland.
	For 62 years they've tried unemployment, death threats, denial of
housing, arrests, murders, beatings, rape, imprisonment and mutilation. But
nothing seems to work completely. The nationalist population keeps on gaining.
The real population figures are a tightly guarded government secret. Some
loyalists are so alarmed that they've demanded a special law be passed that
would require a 75% nationalist majority to change the government. Not that
it would make any difference since there was an 80% nationalist majority
throughout Ireland who actually voted for independence in the general
elections shortly after the uprising of 1916.
	The British government simply declared all the nationalist
representatives to be outlaws and declared war on the nationalist people.
A simple solution to a complex problem.

					bonnie!jmm
					J. M. McGhee
					just another bloody wog

P.S.	By the way since you asked, Trisha, the word "wog" came about as
follows: During the reign of Queen Victoria, the British Army had a vast
array of nasty names for the people living in their colonies in Asia. This
offended or embarassed Queen Victoria to the point that she issued specific
instructions that her subjects in the Asian colonies should always be addressed
as "wise oriental gentlemen". With typical army efficiency they soon shortened
this phrase to "wog" and eventually applied it to practically all non-English
subjects of the Queen. For specific examples of the use of this term, see the
film "Lawrence of Arabia" (officers' club scene).