The Nobel Peace Prize has gone to some less-than-deserving recipients over the years (understatement). But in honour of St Patrick's Day, here's some homework for you on two recipients who did, in fact, deserve the prize.
https://www.nobelpeaceprize.org/laureates/1998
You can read the entirety of the Good Friday Agreement online. For such an incredibly important document, it isn't that long.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-belfast-agreement
The Good Friday Agreement only came about through a heroic effort by so many people. A tremendous amount of forgiveness and forbearance was needed on both sides to even sit in the same room as each other after all that had been done to their people. But there they sat, eventually, and they talked, and they agreed.
Peace once seemed to be impossible in Northern Ireland. It wasn't. We've been at peace for 28 years now.
It wasn't easy. But it reminds you of what can be possible.
@astronomerritt fucking hell, I'm doing a quick read to educate myself a bit and have already stumbled across U2 song titles that I didn't know were historical events.
If anybody was wondering why America is the way it is, it's because our schooling is dogshit.
@dave America isn't alone in this. The English level of awareness of the Troubles is fucking GARBAGE and it literally HAPPENED TO THEM. Like, the IRA bombed English cities.
I was watching Irish comedian Patrick Kielty talk about working in England when the GFA referendum passed and everyone was like "oh... that's nice" and meanwhile he was crying his eyes out in his dressing room.
@astronomerritt @dave Not quite as bad, but there is/was a level of ignorance south of the border as well.
I was lucky enough to visit the North regularly during the Troubles because I had family there and I remember being quite shocked when I went to college and discovered how few of my contemporaries had been there, even those who lived quite close to the border.
That all began to change with the 1994 ceasefire but it wasn't until the GFA that it became normal to travel South to North.
@astronomerritt @dave I have no real horse in this race (other than also being a human and just wanting everyone to be cool to one another), but I was in Ireland for the first time during Christmas (not Northern Ireland, mind you) and I got an afternoon worth of history on The Troubles and the Good Friday Agreement from the most wonderfully talkative local (also wonderfully hospitable, having had a couple of complete strangers from across the pond over for Christmas dinner), and I left with a list of things to read and watch on the subject, and the strong desire to jump back over the Atlantic and see more Ireland.
I don't really have anything useful to add. It's just something of a subject of interest, even moreso since that experience. I do think these sorts of things are worth examining though, whether or not they happened directly to you. The western world appears to have forgotten a lot of the kind of history one might not wish to repeat, and it's disconcerting to feel like I'm living through a period that will one day show up in history textbooks, having grown up in relative ignorant bliss.
@gordoooo_z Come to the North next time!
And if you want to learn more, see if you can get hold of an excellent BBC documentary called Once Upon A Time In Northern Ireland, which explains the Troubles entirely through the stories of its survivors.
@astronomerritt Most definitely! Though I don't quite know when that might be—transatlantic flights aren't exactly cheap—but as soon as my finances are in a state resembling order, lol. Honestly the only reason we were even able to make this trip happen is with my S/O's parents' help. They flew us over so her sister could spend Christmas with some familiar faces (she's over there for school).
Anyway, appreciate the recommendation. I've got part 1 queued up right now.
@astronomerritt We're all a little biased. But I live in a fairly bland suburban hellscape with nothing but parking lots as far as the eye can see, so I'm inclined to take your word for it 😅
(don't get me wrong, as for as suburban hellscapes go, this one's half decent lol; we had a pretty cool mayor for a while: https://w.wiki/Jwio)
@astronomerritt Right!?
On another note, this is a very good documentary. I'm impressed with its neutral, let the people who were there tell it, point of view. I'm on part two now. Bloody Friday is definitely where things get real questionable for me. There are a couple of clips there that are pretty hard to take in.
I just realized it's 5 hours later and I'm an hour and a half in, but I've amassed quite a few tabs of further reading in the process. I'm going to finish this part and then I'd say noon is probably as good a time as any to start my work day lol
@astronomerritt Oh no don't even worry. I can do that just fine all by myself :p
I'm more productive in the afternoon anyway.
Steph (house move version)
Dave Alvarado
Hedders
Ciarán Ferrie
My name is Gordo