RIP Brendan Hughes
national |
anti-capitalism |
news report 
Saturday February 16, 2008 22:39
by Celia S
RIP Brendan Hughes
Brendan Hughes, Irish Republican guerrilla fighter, passed away some twenty minutes ago
RIP comrade
Comments (36 of 36)
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CS
A true working class hero – sadly missed already
Brendan. a Chara.
I have known Brendan for many years. I would say it was a honour to have him as a comrade friend. a person who was committed. in oneof his interviews with Suzanne Breen. Sunday Tribune. he spoke about the way the president of Sinn Fein. Gerry Adams. spoke about him, been led astray.
asap put up information about funeral arrangements.
A great republican socialist, hope to see a hugh turnout at his funeral so he gets the farewell he deserves.
RIP
RIP Brenden Hughes.
Nothing will be more inappropriate than Gerry Adams giving a Gerryspeak oration over the open grave of his former friend and comrade Brendan Hughes. Brendan was a socialist and internationalist. PSF are neither. The best send off Hughes could possibly have is for all of his friends and comrades to tell the truth about his life and struggles and not give the Provos a chance to place Hughes in Gerry's narrative. Brendan Hughes never fought for closed hospitals, hand shakes with imperialist war criminals or the normalization of British rule. He fought for a 32 County Socialist Republic. If we want to honor Brendan we should commit ourselves to continuing that fight. Brenda Hughes, Presente!
R.I.P mo chara T.A.L
I doubt very much whether sinn fein will hijack his funeral . I couldnt see them being allowed
condolences to Brendan's family and comarades on the loss of a brave hearted man.
Rest in peace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brendan_Hughes
Trust Your Leaders?
If you love wealth better than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.
- Samuel Adams
Brendan Hughes • 8 April 2002
James Connolly, in 1915 wrote a sarcastic article titled 'Trust Your Leaders!' In it he claimed that 'in Ireland we have ever seized upon mediocrities and made them leaders'. He could just as easily have been writing about 2002 rather than 1915. How can you trust leaders who endlessly tell you one thing and do the opposite?
Taking the gun out of Irish politics is a joke. It is a sick joke because the only gun being taken out is the republican gun. Now that another bunch of weapons has been decommissioned I feel for all those poor people who never made it to the TV studios, who never graced foreign capitals, who lived in tiny homes with their door always open as we hid our guns in their cupboards, under their beds, in their drawers and beneath their floorboards. The anonymous poor, the real heroes and heroines of this struggle.
We are occupied and have more right to have weapons than those who occupy us. Yet the British demand that we and not they give up guns. Imagine England invaded by the Nazis and the appeasers advised the English people to 'destroy your weapons. The Nazis insist on it'. Would you? I am not comparing the English people to the Nazis but the point is that we in Ireland have been invaded by armed English soldiers intent on murdering, torturing and jailing a civilian population. Why should we - the victims in all of this - hand over or allow the weapons to be destroyed? Those weapons were used not to invade but to defend our communities and to obtain Irish freedom.
I can see what has happened today as nothing other than surrender. But not everybody surrenders. One thing holds true in all of this and that is Ireland is occupied by Britain and for as long as that remains there will always be Irish people who will resist that occupation. Handing over or destroying weapons in order to accept British rule in Ireland is neglecting our own responsibility and passing it on to another generation.
And what social conditions will a new generation face? Tony Blair has proclaimed New Labour. Republicans have proclaimed New Sinn Fein. All new waffle. There is not much that I can see that separates them. What then about something really new? What about new socialism? A socialism that would ignore the tripe talkers and their vanguard party nonsense? One thing that is not new is the working class. It is as old as capitalism itself. They are still being exploited, maltreated, forced to work for bad pay on unhealthy sites with poor safety regulations. Could someone please tell me where a worker's wage packet is fatter than a politician's? Or where oppression of the working class is not planned? It is not in Stormont, Leinster House or Westminster. They all love the workers alright as long as they can keep them working for buttons.
Take the gun out of Irish politics - maybe. But not at the command of those in the above three parliaments. As long as there is injustice the gun will always be there. And if we really want to take it out why not give it to the Palestinians? And who will have the cheek to tell us that they do not need it?
The Dark's funeral will take place tomorrow (Tuesday) with Mass at 11o'clock in St Peters.
I never saw a man who looked,
with such a wistful eye,
upon that little tent of blue,
Which prisoners call the sky.
And at every drifting cloud,
that went,
With sails of silver by.
Slan Leat A Chara
Sam Adams was agitating against unelected leaders as far as the colonies were concerned – it is not a valid comparison to make for the here and now.
The comparison to the Nazis does not hold up either. For one thing the “invasion” goes back in the mists of time of a millennium. There is no comparison between the conduct of the British forces in Ireland with that of the nazi occupiers of Poland say. The Maze was not Auswhicth and the British army deployed in 1969 was not the Einsatzgruppen. The republican movement in recent years is actually more similar to the Nazis with their use of violence and their extreme nationalism along with paramilitary trappings.
Neither UK nor the Republic of Ireland are low wage economies which is why they attract so many workers from real low wage economies and the record of industrial safety is good also. Efforts to portray the situation as similar to what it was in the early days of the factory system won’t convince. Some workers are paid more than politicians eg in the ESB and Eircom to my knowledge and plumbers can earn very substantial sums especially if they are self-employed. Politicians pay is linked to senior public sector wages – arguably they should not be but in the days when politicians received no pay only wealthy people could serve.
“As long as there is injustice the gun will always be there.”
This is a cliché retailed by purveyors of violence. It depends on who has the guns. The IRA killed over a thousand people many of them like Tom Oliver singled out, abducted, tortured and shot - this was the most glaring injustice.
'So much sacrificed and so little gained....the futility of it all'- Brendan Hughes.
sympathies to the Hughes family gone but never forgotten tal
Brendan Hughes sacrificed so much of his life in the pursuit of ending the British occupation of the six counties. His health no doubt suffered greatly over the years as a result of his hunger strike for political status and years of imprisonment.
I hope he will get the funeral he deserves and that there will be a large turn-out for this committed and loyal authentic Republican soldier. He fought bravely and suffered greatly, both physically and emotionally as a result. I feel it is a great pity that more was not done to assist him by his former comrades in the movement, who were in a position to provide some assistance, when it was apparent from a recent published interview that he was in dire need of some assistance (although he never requested anyone’s assistance, it should have been offered to him anyway).
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam. Beannachtaí to his: family, friends, comrades in the Republican Movement, and my sincere condolences to ye all.
Repubicans should put away their differences and attend Brendans funeral. He earned and deserves the respect of all
Republicans
http://www.32csm.info/dark.html
RIP, a person who adhered to his principles, who risked his life in defence of his community.
On PSF, Gerry Adams is taking the same route as the sticks, decades later. The party is now is government and implementing neo-liberal policies. What an obscenity, what on earth did people die for?
Des
People died (and killed) and endured prison for nothing. What has been achieved was available 30 years ago. Anyone with eyes could see that compromise made sense. There was never any possibility of the methdos used by Brendan Highes having success. It was doomed from the get go. I hope others are not tempted to waste their lives in the futiule manner that unfortunately Hughes did. many in his generation wasted their lives - enough now, lets get on with life. It isn't that bad you know.
I was glad to see that so many had turned out to say farewell to the Dark the last of the Republican Leadership who had led from the front.
There were those of us who wanted to be there because we had great respect for the man and those who were there because they had to show their faces. In the most part those showing their faces wore smart suits and kept their distance from the rest of us. They were of little importance to us as we mixed among each other exchanging stories of the Blanket and asking about others we had not seen since those far of days when our Comradeship kept us going and our humour kept us sane.
They might have been wearing expensive suits but to me they might as well have been wearing Prison Grab because in the end they have conformed.
I agree very much with the above posters analysis of the day . Simpy from the attire on view it was easy to tell who was a local and who was just slumming it for the day . I also thought Adams cut a very lonely figure .
And that was some sermon by the preist .
was hounourd to attend your funeral,RIP
it was not so much the suits that struck me but the number of body guards that adams had round him the leader of S.F didt feel safe in the middle of the falls road ? for me that said it all
This is a question which has vexed myself and others for a long time.
The last I seen of Owen Carron was about two years ago. He spoke at an unvailing Ceremony in Co Leitrim. The ceremony was the unvailing of a seat/bench in memory of the ten dead Hunger Strikers.
He was the main speaker at this event. I though he look like his heart was not in it. The passion/belief/conviction he used to have was gone. Sean McManus of Sligo was also there, he looked just as disillusioned. I heard he has since stepped down from his position.
Condolences to Brendans family. May he rest in peace.
Shortly after the surrender of republican principles began and long before provisional sinn fein lowered the bottom line for concessions, I had followed the words and thoughts of Brendan Hughes. How his ex-comrades deserted him and disowned him says all that has to be said about Adams and co. I was shocked yesterday to see a photograph of Adams with the coffin of Brendan on his shoulder, that hypocritical bastard, can any one present at the funeral explain how this was allowed to happen?
The funeral had seen thousands of citizens at it
The coffin was carried by different people along the short route of one street, by family members, friends, Socialists/Libertarians and Republicans etc, from across the political spectrum, including those Brendan had political differences with.
Not all those in attendance would have agreed with all of Brendan's beliefs, but all there I believe would have seen him either as a friend, relation, comrade, Irish Republican, Patriot, Revolutionary, Socialist, working class hero, or some or all such
Indeed I {in an individual capacity} had carried his coffin some of those final steps, in that very street as a child in the 70’s that I had went door to door selling Republican News/An Phoblacht.
Adams was pictured in a number of papers carrying his coffin, I seen myself on TV for the next 2 days carrying his coffin, I seen others from other political parties and none in other Newspapers and on TV carrying his coffin.
So, the media focuses in on who and what they want.
Whoever and whatever – Brendan’s legacy stands for itself and will be read and discussed, I believe for many a year to come
Link to some of his writings – http://www.phoblacht.net/BH0208.html
And on that,
Rest in peace Brendan
However I was wondering Why were the gates to the Garden of Remembrance closed during the Speeches? The rest of us seem to have been locked out.
Rest in Peace Dark.
I just read on the UTV website that Adam's decision to carry the Dark's Coffin was a clear sign that any rift had been healed.
So what in fact was happening was that Adams was undermining Brendan's criticism of Sinn Fein by simply carrying his coffin.
If this is the case then the man can stoop no lower.
The man lived his live to acheive a United Ireland May he rest in peace with all those who gave there lives in the cause of Irish Freedom
I first met the Dark when I found myself a victim of the ‘internment by remand’ system being operated by the British in the ‘70s. An involuntary guest of the British in Crumlin Road jail, I was undergoing a medical examination on entry when the doors of the cell were flung open and a wing full of republican prisoners made satirical remarks about my naked rear end. I later discovered that the men in white coats had been sent by Brendan and that my initiation was one of a whole series of activities designed to lift morale on the wing.
Full text at http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/RecentArticles/Recent....html
Did certain individuals attend Dark's funeral solely to undermine him?
There are some articles over on The Blanket which should leave you asking serious questions;
http://lark.phoblacht.net/AMDARK4.html
The part about the bugging of Dark's flat is particularly disturbing.
Hughes was in the U.S in the late '80s. He didn't think much of the yanks,-this was before the peace process, and the 'friends of Sinn Fein,' etc.
The following is from a piece in the Belfast Telegraph by Jim Dee of the Boston Herald.
-Hughes believed that most American supporters never grasped the republican movement's late-70s leftward shift. After being released from the Maze, he was sent on a fundraising trip to US in the late 1980s, where he said he was shocked at how conservative many supporters in groups like Irish Northern Aid (NORAID) were.
"I remember sitting in a hotel room with a bunch of these guys, and they were all pretty well-off," he said.
"There was a briefcase with the money in it on the table. And they were banging the table. This guy, what did he call himself - the 'OC of the Irish-American Republican Army' - was banging the table demanding that I shoot the Queen, that we shoot postmen, that we shoot anyone with the crown on their caps."
Hughes believed the peace process back home had involved similar republican efforts to court moderates and conservatives, and that that strategy had taken the movement into a cul-de-sac, and far from a united Ireland.-
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/features/daily-featur...4.ece
I went back and read all of his news articles and wept at the loss of his dream.
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