Only Grownups Can Have Peace

I was reading an article from an Israeli writer who was saying that the rest of the world needs to now finally learn from Israel on how to handle terrorists. They have been doing it on a daily basis and this writer thinks they know it all. He even praised Benjamin Netanyahu's plan on how to deal with Iran that was brushed aside by a know nothing Obama, yeah the writer was a little bias. 

If you went by how the Israeli's treat the Palestinians you'd see that they aren't just trying to keep themselves safe but that they really don't like them, it works both ways as many Palestinians hate Jews. This doesn't mean that they all hate each other, the angry ones always tend to have the louder voices and after a while just plain decency becomes harder to do. 

Israel was founded by people who were terrorists, the Stern gang and the Irgun being the main two. In 1946 the Irgun blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing of 91 people. 41 Arabs, 28 British and 17 Jews. Sounds like something the IRA would do. Sure the Arabs were carrying out acts of terror too but they weren't very well coordinated ....  much like our Loyalist paramilitaires. 

In March 1947, martial law was enforced when 16 Brits were killed. That year the Irgun claimed to have killed 347 Arabs and British. The Stern gang killed 28 servicemen when they blew up the Khantara to Haifa Express in 1948. From 1947 -1948 214 British servicemen were killed. The British soldiers did fear the Jews far more than the Arabs.  

My point is that the Israelis didn't have that far to fall in order to become as bad as their enemy, they were already there. 

In Northern Ireland we were having similar experiences to the Israelis but people either don't know or forget about this tiny backwards tagnut on the arse of Britain. Both our sides hated each other's very existence. As like in Palestine both had their terrorists, their supporters, the decent people and of course British, trying to enforce law and not always getting it right. 

Belfast city center had checkpoints at the main streets, you'd get patted down by a soldier or police officer, the females and children would have female police officers, your bags and strollers would all get checked too. Buses would have someone come on and walk through the bus to make sure there were no suspicious objects left behind. 
We had armed police and soldiers doing daily patrols. Funny how all of that including being evacuated for a bomb alert becomes normal. Bus or train delays because of suspect devices didn't strike fear into your heart, they became an annoyance. Did the terrorists not have anything better to do? 

Most buildings had bollards to prevent cars being driven into them, taxi depots which have always been a source of employment for terrorists and their supporters had bullet proof widows, buzzers to let you in and glass windows like you'd see in a bank. Bus drivers still sit in a little plastic glass cage. Bars and clubs had bouncers who would search you on the way in. 

     A normal world of cages and turnstiles. 

Is that what the rest of the world needs to be like? You don't notice half the stuff until it's gone and maybe it all did raise tensions just a bit as a subconscious reminder that you had to be alert. People become suspicious of everything and notice strangers very easily. Walking into a pub and having everyone turn their head gave you the knowledge that maybe you had to tread carefully in that place. 

 Soldiers and police had to be secretive, loose lips not only sunk ships but targeted your family. Unlike England and the US you wouldn't catch a soldier in uniform off duty and police always ate takeaway during their breaks. 

A haircut, your body language and even your clothes can be a give away to which side you are from. Knowing a person's name can tell you if they are Protestant or Catholic 98% of the time or a local just knows. 

The English soldiers hated civvies because they were all paddys to them and the civvies hated squaddies.    

I'm sure Israel is very similar to Northern Ireland during the Troubles. 

We prescribed to YOLO before it was even a thing, we worked hard and played hard and didn't let the daily news of death or the near misses in real life get to us, some really bad tragedies did give us pause to reflect as if it wasn't us who got the unlucky terrorist lottery it was someone we knew. 

Should the west really live like this? Can the west live like this? Before there were cell phones and Facebook people were mostly secretive about where or what they are doing but the younger generation that didn't have that worry posts their every move and who their friends are. They are even slack with their online security never mind who or what is about them.  

Here is a picture I took of the same place where the cage and the barriers would have been. Now it is all open, buses trundle through at speed, guys in red jackets look out for anyone who looks like a tourist to try to sell them a seat on a city tour bus where you can see our murals and where the Titanic was built. The road sweeper has to stop for a chat because hey, it beats working.

Ugly ass expensive sail like things stick out of the street for no reason but we haven't gone full soft, you can see the mast with a CCTV camera on it, we are always being watched. 

 Some homes still need protection.

We should protect ourselves but not in cages and behind bullet proof glass, that changes you, that makes you mean. What happens when the barriers come down? Then you realise all the little things you've missed that everyone else takes for granted, you become just a pleb, a person rather than a potential terrorist and that's nice. All that alertness you got so used to having is no longer needed and gets in the way of living. Being on full alert is tiring for normal people but is second nature to anyone who has lived with terrorism. 

When the cages come down you realise that you are more than just a target and those years of refusing to think about things end, and you can fully embrace your depression that you drank to forgot and your PTSD can be recognised, just like everyone else's.       

Israel needs to be more like us, not the other way round. We won with compromising and addressing the real grievances that the other side has and maybe by admitting that some of the shit we did wasn't cool. 

We accepted that hey maybe the enemy isn't a blood crazed fiend who takes orders from the Pope and just isn't like us .... except they are. We finally see that religion is just an excuse to be a dick and you could just as easily switch out religions for football teams and see it's all gang related and totally primitive and tribal. 

When both sides are at fault it's easy to get caught up in the tit for tat bickering that mirrors the tit for tat violence. 
Peace can only happen when those sides doing the fighting listen to how fed up the decent people are with it all. 
  
    

Ian Paisley Used His Words To Kill

Paisley walking away from the burning wreck known as Northern Ireland.

Sir James Galway the renowned classical flautist originally from Belfast but now lives the life in Switzerland returned to Northern Ireland for a concert and to tells us what our problem is. His werds about Loyalism and the late Rev Ian Paisley seem to have struck a few nerves and issues.  

"How many people do you think he was responsible for killing indirectly by planting the thoughts of violence and no surrender in the heads of people who had no more sense? I'm sure he was (responsible), because he wasn't exactly preaching 'let's all live together', was he?"

"I never admired Paisley, ever, because I think he was on paper a man of God but in reality I don't think he was. I mean, how could you justify setting one side against another?"

 

 He's quite good on the skin flute too.

Was Paisley even a minister of God? He called the Pope the anti-Christ, I'd call him a pedo enabling misogynist (any of them) but I don't think he even knew what an anti-Christ was. It's in the Bible somewhere, maybe ya should have read it ya bigoted cunt knocker. Doing a correspondence course from the open university of Nigeria doesn't make you a minister. Old Knudsen is a life minister because the Interwebs says so ... that shit is real unlike Paisley's dodgy credentials.  

Paisley called for action against everything Catholic, there have been UVF members who credit Paisley with encouraging them on the road to violence. Paisley was also very anti-ghey with the 'Save Ulster from Sodomy' campaign .... then he bent over, sold out and went into government with Sinn Fein. He licked the green shaft and swallowed the potato flavoured gravy.

Galway who was knighted in 2001 also complained about British rule in Northern Ireland and wants Ireland to be one .... Ok now he's talking shite. If Ireland was soo good then why is he living in richville Switerland rather than butt fuck Ireland? 

The Irish don't want us and can't afford us because we do nothing but drain resources. The British don't want us but they are stuck with us. Being a part of the UK is good for us so fuck away back to Switerland or Galway and hand back yer knighthood if Britain has been so bad for you.       

"Wouldn't you say it is immoral for one country to take over another country just because the other country is not so well armed?" he asked. "Wouldn't you think that was immoral? Well, let me put this to you - would you not think that 800 years ago what the British did was immoral and is still immoral?"

800 years ago? Firstly the Normans were invited to Ireland to help the ousted King of Leinster, you don't invite the devil to dinner and cry foul when he eats all the sides. 

The Normans or Anglo-Normans were a warlike people descended from Vikings, of course they are going to take over, it's what they did, they intermarried and built alliances and castles. Get the fuck over it Galway, all the true Irish fled north and over to Scotland because of the numerous other invasions from Gaul .... aye blame the British on everything. 

Blame St Patrick for killing the druids and turning the Celts into sandal wearing pussies. Keeping the heads of yer enemies is tradition for my people but oh no, St Patrick didn't like that .... so unhygienic this is what the Romans did blah blah garlic blah.  

Northern Ireland is no longer the British-occupied part of Ireland as Galway still thinks, it's moved on and passed the point of being occupied to being what it is .... Northern Ireland.

Centuries of people being born here without a southern Irish identity and almost 100 years of British rule, we aren't Ireland and we aren't Britain, we are fucking special window lickers who can't come up with an identity of their own without a riot.    

Paisley did lead to deaths indirectly with his words and his hate filled sermons, he even tried to rewrite history shortly before his death and was called on his bullshit then. I have no respect for him, he got his and fucked us all. Galway is 100% there. 

Northern Ireland can no longer be a part of Ireland, time for some realism here. Just like how Scarlett Johansson is no longer as hot as she was, no it isn't because she had a baby or has gotten older, it's because she has fucked Sean Penn .... there is no coming back from that, now she is just normal hot.  

Try shagging her without thinking, 'Sean Penn was all over this' it's fucking difficult, believe me. 

Northern Ireland has fucked Britain and has its name tattooed on its neck, no one wants us, even the Game of thrones people think Belfast is boring as fuck, you never hear the people on the TV show Vikings complaining about being stuck down south in 'real' Ireland. 

Galway lived here during the Troubles so he can talk about Paisley but he gave up the right to talk about a united Ireland when he took a knighthood and when he moved away, like all those Boston Irish pining for the homeland but they aren't dumb enough to move there.  

Top 'O' the mornin, now fuck aff before I deck ya.

 

 

 

Old Knudsen Reviews 71

71 is a movie about the Troubles in Northern Ireland. To give you a brief understanding of the Troubles it was Protestant against Catholic, the Prods getting all the opportunities, education and more than one vote if you owned property while the Taigs were discriminated against with no chance of a future.

There have been riots and fighting for the past 100 years but in the 60's the Catholics got together to demand human rights, their various marches were attacked and when the police are Protestant friendly ... well you can guess where that goes. In 1969 the British government sent in troops to protect the Catholics from the mean Protestants but ended up getting attacked from both sides.  

The troops ended up siding with the Protestants and the police and so began the Troubles, 30 years of civil war and terrorism that continues in a milder form today.

  Give me back that rifle that is fitted with walnut furniture while mine has the Maranyl stock and grip. Two different models in one unit? The Maranyl wasn't even used then.

Young Gary Hook is an English soldier who rather than getting sent to Germany but got sent to Northern Ireland. His unit while in Belfast is briefed that East Belfast is Loyalist which is friendly and the west is Republican and is hostile. In reality both sides are hostile but Loyalists will work with the soldiers and police. Both sides have their terrorist gangs who are not big thinkers. 

They are told that the Divis flats are a Republican stronghold and to NEVER go near there. Yeah you guessed it he ends up there. 

 The Loyalist gang UDA out on patrol with their military spec bin lids .... lol!

The officer in charge of Hook's unit is a noob and his seasoned NCO's didn't take him to the side like they would have done in real life. While out harassing the Fenians Hook gets separated from his unit and goes on the run through the Catholic areas . 

The Troubles were a depressing time when many grew desensitized to suffering and accepted it as a way of life, much like Palestine and Israel, it's easier to demonize and hate the other side than live together in peace.

Not to spoil the movie 71, it was tense and dramatic but the characters were bleh just bodies to fill the purpose of the story. I had read that it was filmed in Scotland but no, it was shot in the north of England as they have depressing terrace houses that can double for Belfast. You can shoot Game of thrones in Northern Ireland but put a load of British soldiers onto the streets and people have flashbacks and complain. 

Jack O'Connell spends the whole movie looking confused and scared, can't blame him he's the unluckiest soldier ever! Welcome to Belfast.

The film covers the hostile tribal nature of the Troubles with a 10 year-old threatening grown ups because his uncle is a big mawn in the paramilitaries. The English soldiers are in a completely different world than what they are used to and the police are just heavy handed thugs. 

The over all theme is that Private Hook, like all the other soldiers and terrorists are just pawns that mean nothing which is why he nearly gets killed by all sides cos you cannot trust anyone and your life doesn't matter.

A 1971 L1A1 Self Loading Rifle as used right up to just before 1990. A fine powerful weapon.  

It's a decent movie and was interesting to see the 70's again and besides using the wrong rifles (with the pebbled Maranyl grips) the army training was oh so familiar. The useless flak jackets remained useless with rubber blocks getting fitted up near to the shoulder, you made the vow to yerself that the jacket would be the first thing to come off if you got into a fire fight as it got in yer way to fire yer rifle. The SLR was a heavy powerful rifle and needed to be held properly unlike the 9mm sub machine gun which was a nice wee toy.  

Getting stoned (not in a cool way) while getting transported in the back of a 4-tonne truck was a usual occurrence, no wonder the Brits from England were nervous wreaks. Some parts of the military bases in Belfast you were advised not to walk as those angles could be seen by snipers on the outside. 

Old Knudsen served because it was stupid to hate someone for what they were (Protestant or Catholic) and saw people as good or bad guys no matter the side. So many wrongs were done before and during the Troubles and this movie shows a few.  

 

A Tribute To Ian Paisley

It's been a difficult week, first Ian Paisley dying at the young age of 88 (which is code for heil Hitler and he died on the 12th... did the Illuminati kill him?) and now Pope Benedict carking it too. Ian Paisley's legacy has been bandied about in the press as they try to say nice things about him, the Firebrand brimstone minister! which means he was a radical Christian fundamentalist, like calling someone a Hellraiser when in reality he drunks too much, gets into fights and is a bit of a dick.

The self-appointed champion of the loyal Protestant unionists, he was there at the beginning trying to get bridges named after his Protestant hero Edward Carson instead of calling it Queen's bridge ... aye, way too Fenian or was it way too ghey?

In the 50's he formed the loyalist vigilante group Ulster Protestant Action and baited Catholics into riots by attacking peaceful demonstrations.

According to Martin McGuiness the IRA’s Army Council never made an attempt on Paisley's life because he was more valuable alive. Sure the IRA would have thrived but with Paisley and his anti-Catholic hate speech that denied durty Fenians basic human rights, their membership and support soared.

On the other side in 1984 the UFF tried to shoot Gerry Adams but Loyalists are crap at killing and out of 20 shots they hit him three times in the neck, arm and shoulder. Worse than the LAPD. An off duty NCO in the Ulster Defence Regiment and an off duty policeman arrested the three suspects.    

 His favourite road sign was 'No entry' and he loved roundabouts.

Paisley fought a campaign against the legalising of homosexuality with his catchy "Save Ulster from sodomy!" slogan, it was made legal between consenting adults in 1982, we are ever so enlightened in Northern Ireland.

He was also not too fond of other things ..."Line dancing is as sinful as any other type of dancing, with its sexual gestures and touching. It is an incitement to lust" though his wife says that he was a fucking ninja between the sheets... it was as if he had something to prove.  

 Seen here rubbing bats together with his partner Martin McGuinness. 

Did Paisley protest too much about homosexuality? I mean he also said he'd never go into government with Sinn Féin "We are not going into government with Sinn Féin"  .... couldn't be any clearer and "I will never sit down with Gerry Adams... he'd sit with anyone. He'd sit down with the devil. In fact, Adams does sit down with the devil."

 Adams sitting with the devil.

Also "I am not going to sit down with bloodthirsty monsters who have been killing and terrifying my people" So yeah, Paisley probably got a little action on the doon low if you know what I mean .

Holding a big, hard hammer. 

In his last year of life Paisley tried to tell everyone that he was for peace all along and that Catholics were wronged and discriminated against..... um yeah, by you! His recollection grew a bit dodgy when anyone brought up him saying things like "They breed like rabbits and multiply like vermin" when talking about Catholics during a rally in 1969 .... I don't recall saying that. 

Tony Blair and Gerry Adams also have selective memories, it's like political alzheimer's . No one believed the shite that Paisley came out with at the end since this was the man to whom many UVF members devoted their lives to, and were driven to the murder of Catholics in the car of his speeches. 

Get it? driven to ..... ach never mind. 

Just like Adams who has also been called a peacemaker, half the trouble and problems would not have been there for these men to solve if they hadn't have created them. One thing you can say is that they do both get out of the way very quickly when the trouble starts.

So big Ian, for the trouble you've caused Northern Ireland which as been just as bad as what the IRA have done and the hatred you've incited I hope yer afterlife is one that you deserve.