Irish Capital Punishment

I arrived in Dublin international airport at 7:00 am, found our program director at the airport breakfast place, and did the first thing I always do when entering a foreign country- pick up the fattest newspaper I could find. Leafing through it, I quickly found that news in the Emerald Isle would not afford a respite from American news. One of the lead stories was about the recent capture of Osama Bin Laden’s son in law and former Al-Queda spokesman, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith. I remarked to our Irish program director, Tony, that I was unsure what crime he could actually be charged with, to which Tony remarked, “Just execute him.” After a quizzical look, he clarified: “I am of course opposed to capital punishment, but sometimes I wish we could make an exception.”

           

 Ireland’s attitude towards capital punishment is a curious one. Before you meet them, you would suspect that hardened nationalists, veterans of the troubles, Sinn Fein representatives and former Irish Republican Army operatives, some of whom have been associated with actual executions, would have at least reconciled themselves to the concept. As it turns out, the opposite is true. Ireland abolished capital punishment in ­­1990, and the vast majority of its inhabitants remain steadfastly opposed to the idea.

             

In the north, this trend might be attributed to an institutional distrust of the state, and thus the legitimacy of state-conducted executions. But similar attitudes persist in the Irish Republic. It could also be part of the general European conception that the practice is outdated and barbaric. Talking to former members of the IRA as well as unionist paramilitary organizations about execution, you would think you were conversing with a representative from amnesty international. As it turns out, years of violence doesn’t seem to have hardened them to the idea of death. It has done the exact opposite. Witnessing unarmed friends or family being ‘executed’ unlawfully by IRA on one side, or by unionist groups and even British soldiers on the other, has evidently bred a deep contempt of the practice among those most closely associated with it. Perhaps men who know what it is to take a life are the least likely to want to do so arbitrarily.

Blood Sunday Tour

Before coming to Ireland Paul had us each write a memo. Since we were going to Derry, I decided to write about Bloody Sunday. Bloody Sunday took place in Derry on January 30, 1972. On that day,  a civil rights march, held to protest internment of suspected IRA members without trial, ended when British soldiers fired on unarmed civilians. 14 men were killed, half of whom minors. The Saville Inquiry, which investigated the events, released its findings in 2010. They found the British soldiers actions "unnecessary and unjustifiable."

To prep for my memo I researched, I watched a BBC documentary, and I read testimonies from that day. But nothing could have prepared me for Big John's tour.

Big John works on peace and reconciliation efforts in Ireland. Before this though Big John was a member of the IRA. At 6'6" Big John's nickname rings true. You'd think that his size and past would make him intimidating, but in person John exudes warmth.  He's quick to laugh and absolutely hysterical.

On Thursday, we met John and started our tour. He kept showing us pictures as he explained the events of that day. I think the pictures played dual role- they certainly helped set the scene and make it more real, but I couldn't help but think that he also used them as evidence. The events of Bloody Sunday were contested (who shot first and why) for almost 40 years. At one point in the tour, John showed us the exact spot where a teenager was shot in the middle of the street. The boy's father ran out to get him and was also shot. The father had just enough time to reach out and touch his son before he passed out. The father survived, but his son didn't.

Then we walked into an open plaza and John pulled out a picture of a boy running across that same plaza on Bloody Sunday. That boy was John. It hit me then that he wasn't just telling us stories- he was reliving that day. John told us that as he ran for cover, his friend and classmate was shot in the back and paralyzed. John crouched and watched as a British solider walked up to his friend and shot- killing him. So much for the "shooting armed men" defense. The solider then looked at John and shrugged his shoulders. I wasn't  surprised to  learn that the events of Bloody Sunday led to an upshot in IRA membership. 

John's tour made it clear that the events  of Bloody Sunday, and  really all the Troubles, are still incredibly raw.

Probably the Best Coffee in Dublin

Dublin along the River Liffey

The British are famous for their self-deprecatory humor -- everyone from Emma Thompson to Eddie Izzard consistently demure from taking any credit or praise. This, in contrast to the perceived American bravado, creates a pretty stark difference in humor and culture.

Dublin is certainly no England, but the Irish love to jokingly remind themselves of how “small a country” they are, as our final speaker tonight repeated more than once. An unlike every single café in cities in the US that boast “the best coffee in the world,” Dublin seems to set its sights a bit lower, if a bit more tongue-in-cheek as well.

I wish we had a picture, but near the center of the city, one café’s sign boasted “Probably the best coffee in Dublin.” This sat only a few blocks away from the (what must be aptly named) “Decent Cigar Shop.” When we spoke to one of the UN peacemakers that makes up Ireland’s only international military force, he constantly reminded us how small or in some way less Ireland was in comparison to the larger armies of it’s fellow EU and NATO brethren. However, at the same time, because he was able to point out his own countries faults, we could also listen with a certain level of trust when he gave his opinions of the other operations of the world. When he spoke of the actions of French troops in the Congo or the Italians in Lebanon, we heard both the strengths and the flaws of these countries—in part, yes, because he had already set his own nationalism aside with a few quips about how the Irish were nowhere near perfect.

A final moment occurred this morning at the Derry police department. One of our guides turned to us and asked, slight bewilderment in his voice, “Why are so many Americans so interested in being Irish?”

We joked around the answer, perhaps mimicking our hosts in playing it a bit coy about our own nationality, but the bewilderment is funny. The Irish display so much pride in their history, their heritage and their heroes. They take their past and their present very seriously – much more seriously than their self-deprecatory humor lets on. It’s a bit of a surprise, and I think sometimes hard for Americans to understand, how a people can be at once so proud and so apologetic. It makes for a charming people and a relatively hilarious set of street signs, however.

By Caitlin Cummings

What did the movies get right?

To prepare for the Ireland trip, I did what any sensible American student would do: watch the popular films on Netflix based on the history of the area I was going to. I watched two films on the Irish War of Independence and Irish Civil War, covering the period of around 1916-1924. Michael Collins, a biopic featuring Liam Neeson as the eponymous Irish leader, covers the 1916 Easter Uprising, the development of the IRA as a guerilla force during the War of Independence, and the split between the Pro-Treaty Free Staters and Anti-Treaty IRA, led by Eamonn de Valera, portrayed by Alan Rickman. The Wind that Shakes the Barley tells the story of two fictional County Cork brothers who join the IRA and then find themselves on different sides after the treaty.
[Historical background tidbit: The Irish War of Independence was a conflict between the guerilla forces of the IRA and the British Army, fought in Ireland. It featured theft of weaponry, assassinations, and bombings, and ended with negotiated peace in 1921 with the Anglo-Irish Treaty. This treaty, which required the partitioning of Ireland and Northern Ireland, as well as an oath to the British Crown (with Ireland as a dominion of Britain, a la Canada). The forces of the IRA split on these terms, with the pro-treaty members becoming the Free State government forces, and the Anti-Treaty IRA splitting off. This division eventually escalated into the Irish Civil War, with subsequent assassinations and executions from 1922-1923.]
Throughout our time in Dublin, we saw a huge number of important locations for the events of these two integral conflicts in Irish history. The Four Courts, the Kilmainham Gaol (where many IRA leaders were held), and Dublin Castle, to name a few. We also took a trip to the Irish Military Museum at the Curragh military camp, with exhibits featuring the weaponry from each era, and even the armored Rolls Royce from the ambush that claimed Michael Collins' life.
While my understanding is that these two movies provide very accurate representations of the events of the time, there is something else entirely about seeing things in person. About standing in a jail cell that may have held major IRA leaders for months and years. For seeing the vantage point of Free State forces as they bombarded their former comrades holed up in the Four Courts. We can learn about policy, and the history of policy, but the importance of place cannot be overstated. While the movies can show you something, traveling can help you experience it.
(Pictures to be added upon return).

Famine memorial at night

Fire bad. Tree pretty.

Small remaining protestant community (photo taken from the city wall)

Bogside mural (taken from city wall)

Bogside mural (taken from city wall)

Bogside mural (taken from the side of the Bloody Sunday killings)

Mural and Bullet holes on right left from Bloody Sunday killings

Bogside mural (taken from city wall)

Famous Free Derry sign in the Bogside (taken from site of Bloody Sunday killings)

Big John (our guide and teacher) stands in the corner he stood during the shootings and  points to the site where his friend was killed in front of him.

From Istanbul to Christchurch

From Istanbul to Christchurch

American roads are wide, and this seems to only preconceived notion I had that was correct about the outside world.

I’ve always wanted to travel, and perhaps I can be forgiven, based upon my age and means growing up, for not following through before now. Caribbean trips and Montreal Model UN (yes, I was very cool in college) in the past few years taught me the wrong lessons about what I would find in Ireland and Turkey’s capital cities.  I expected a smaller America in Dublin, and instead I found that the most American of shops and people stood out in awkward contrast against the domestic culture. I’m not even sure what I expected to find in Istanbul, a place where you could probably find everything.

Istanbul from a ferry on the Bosphorous

Both cities are incredibly modern and yet invested in preserving their history. The people that live in Istanbul sit on street corners texting on iPhones and in the newest designer jeans while smoking hookah. While the gradient of their streets are San Franciscan, and the Palm Trees and red clay roofs recall something slightly more SoCal to mind, everything else about the place screams New York City. As it’s larger than NYC, that definitely doesn’t do the frenetic streets justice.

Downtown Istanbul, near the Hagia Sophia

Dublin’s main shopping streets could be found in any affluent European city, maybe in the West Village (is it obvious what US city I’m most comfortable with?) There’s a Disney store across from the “authentic Irish pubs,” and then, down a side street, there’s an authentic Irish pub with carvery, stew, and an amazing, affordable beer list. Next door, the bookstore holds first edition copies of Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake and Yeat’s collections of poetry. Forget ever buying one –- books like these cost upwards of €500, so I just enjoyed awkwardly thumbing through the pages and trying not to drop anything.

Dublin Downtown

Both cities have cobbled roads, but it evokes the same nostalgia that you get in restored old Boston, or, again, in Greenwich Village. This might be my naïve shortsightedness of course, since in Istanbul, road construction on a main artery was driving the entire city crazy, but these cities have embraced post-modernism with an aplomb that is sometimes missing in the states, and was certainly the last thing I expected to see in either.

While Dublin, because of size and language, soon began to feel comfortable, 22 hours in Istanbul didn’t take the edge off its foreignness, even as certain streets, residents and cars all reminded me of home. I don’t expect it ever could, with its size, and with the language barrier that would be hard to overcome. Of course, with my helplessness in Istanbul came a silver lining – I could stop trying to blend in or “pass” and just embrace being a tourist, fascinated by everything new.

by Caitlin Cummings