Are you a bigot?

not sure it says that much to be honest eamonn. people in ireland and the north are coming from a very delicate and difficult position within the recent past, 15 to 20 years. these people have very strong beliefs and values about their nationality and who they are i mean that on ‘both sides’. there is still no small amount of fear in the north and i thin k rightly so as being in the wrong place at the wrong time could result in a serious injury, 20 years ago, possibly death or a serious injury. that there is an amount of goodwill and begrudgery in equal measure is not necessairly a bad thing, much better for there to be a well-meaning fair-play rather than a “I hate them f**king b**tards.” locally within soccer or GAA, there is a firerce rivarly between local neighbouring clubs and alot more than begrudgery, open hostility and quite often that is among people who are good friend and family. how does this view fit in amongst the allegiance people here have to different nations/nationalities and the rivalry between neighbouring nations

I don’t agree that it makes you a bigot if you go for one over the other… I do think the Team GB side is harder to access for NI Catholics. And, ironically perhaps, it is not made easier by the teams brand contraction to Great Britain without reference to NI…

That said, I don’t detect much disaffection from Team Ireland on the Unionist side, not least since there is a long tradition of unionist participation in the Irish Olympic teams… `Steve Martin for instance was a gold medal winning hockey player for GB…

The real issue for me is the under performance of Team Ireland at the closest to the home games we are ever likely to see in our life times… For which I think the Irish government holds some responsibility…

And to some extent so does our own Executive… The promises of 3 million for boxing somewhen coming soon (maybe) are political convenient (coming *after* Paddy confirmed his medal), unstrategic and most of all TOO DAMNED LATE!!!

Horse, stable door, bolted…

Eamonn – tonight at the Olympics I’ve been watching Team Jamaica and Team Kenya – watching in the words of Michael Johnson the two best athletes in the sport.
He was talking about sprinter Usain Bolt and 800 metres runner David Rudisha who bettered his own two-lap world record with a time of 1.40.91.
Anthems and flags were no part of the conversation or analysis. It was about performance and times.
Johnson also highlighted the Bolt influence on others. Jamaica took all three medals in the 200 metres.
I’m also keeping an eye to the golf and ‘Team Holywood’. Rory McIlroy is well placed on day one of the final Major of the year, and in his home town we are watching how he is influencing and inspiring others.
Rory Williamson has just become Ulster Boys Champion – and Jessica Carty Irish Girls Champion.
Success makes more success.
And this should be our focus – on performance, development, facilities, coaching, equipment, funding and all the other ingredients that help competitors across all sports reach their potential.
The rowing and boxing at the Olympics – the medals for Coleraine, Belfast and Dublin should all be celebrated, and those who are tasked to do so should be applying their collective thinking to how we build on this.
Athletes should be judged on performance – not on who they decide to compete for, and those who pick over the latter are usually people who couldn’t run the length of themselves.

Eammon as in most things I think you are mostly right. However I would like to point out a few things people might like to consider. Firstly the rowers – brilliant performance and I am very proud of them. That young lad Campbell nearly died so much did he push himself. What did his sport mean to lads from Clonard, Falls, Andersonstown and Ardoyne – well not much as rowing is not their sport and the nearest open water is too far away. They cannot associate with it and let’s face it rowing is labelled (rightly or wrongly) as a public school boy sport. Dressage and show jumping likewise. personally I love them but maybe I am an oddity.
Let us about turn. What does the sport of boxing mean to the middle class people of our society. In truth not much. It is a working class sport that is certainly not played at Oxford, Cambridge or Eton. Therefore a Catholic/Protestant divide is too simple and ignores the class factor.
I do concede that there is an element in Northern Ireland who frown at acknowledging anything Irish or British. This I refer to as ‘fear of dilution’. It comes from a fear factor driven by lack of confidence in ones own identity. That they might be contaminated if they spend time in the ‘other’s’ company or acknowledge the position of the ‘other side’.
Those who are confident in their own identity have no such problems acknowledging the other side, suffer no fear of dilution or subliminal contamination. But being confident in your own identity sadly is not a panacea for conditioned bigotory. We have as a people been programmed to view the world through a prism set out for us by years of enforced seperation. The enlightened among us know it is wrong and internally fight with it on a regular basis – we try to stretch ourselves towards the ‘other’. We deny the unwanted thought, we attempt to gain the middle ground in our mind with the hope that we can translate it into action. And still every Easter, 12th July, 9th August, Queen’s jubilee we are confronted once again by our demons. We are ashamed of the rioting – but at least we are not ashamed of the rowing and boxing. The problem lies not only with the description of whether it is British or Irish but rather if we can identify with the sport on class grounds or even on grounds of interest.
Those who deny a congratulations to their fellow countrymen and women on grounds of National affiliation in sport are actually afraid – in fear of contamination and cling to a model of the past that was simple – ‘us and them’. A model they had no choice in devising and were conditioned into by schooling, peer pressure, social seperation and political ‘othering’. They had as much control over this as they had over what class they were born into and what sports were navailable to them in their locality.
Therein lies the challenge. How do we undo years of internal and social programming. How do we inspire confidence in those with fragile identity and how do we address the class issue in Northern Ireland. Those who deny the class aspect should ask themselves why mostly only working class lads and lassies ended up in prison for political crimes.
In conclusion, I accept Eamonn Mallie’s concept that bigotory is ingrained in us all. Some of us have chosen to fight the demon internally when really it is a society issue. It is not as simple as ‘us and them’ as other factors such as class, fear of dilution, and conditioning come into play. And I for one am proud of all our sportsmen and women, whatever their class or creed. I hope I win my internal battle for which there is no gold medal – but for some of my fellow citizens there should be.