Refreshing to have a bit of sanity and objectivity from the “other side” – welcome Speedbird.

Brilliant, isn’t it? My son sent me one at the weekend, but the hero was my grandson, not you, Flygirl!:D

But to someone who is 20 years old it is a game. The reality of the death and horror mean nothing because there is no personal involvement.
It is a stance, because of some strong Republican influence on a gullible subject, but it’s li;ll;re more than you learn at lectures.

Perhaps I am wrong but we have yet to hear that our friend has experienced personal suffering.

I, too am an atheist, and you have made my response for me.

Individuals with lopsided and tinted opinions and stubborn cases of tunnel vision are part of why the “Troubles” dragged on for so long. After all its easier to cling to those opinions, shout ‘NO’ loudly, then go out and blow up some civilians than actually sit down and thrash out a compromise.

And mirrored in exactly the same way in the Middle East where Israel and the Palestinians, and Arabs generally, are behaving in an identical manner. I am not attempting to deflect the thread from its original remit, just to make the comparison.

And as we see in Northen Ireland compromises are possible but only under duress and a degree of blackmail and therefore inherently unsatisfactory and unstable.

The bombs and rockets have ceased but not simmering resentment amongst extremists and localised violence continues, although the media, predictably, have lost interest.

EGPH you are 20 years old, so can have no first hand knowledge of the “Troubles”, unless your family were involved when you were young. So the majority of your experience has been reported by others of a particular bent.

I don’t say the students cannot have opinions, of course they must, but students should also use their intellects to engage in rational argument. I see little evidence of that here and trust that your essays are less lopsided and more tinted, than your monochrome view of the Ulster problems.

As a Christian surely you practice “turn the other cheek” from the Sermon on the Mount, whereas you seem to be espousing the old Testament ethos of “an eye for an eye”.

Sinn Fein was the political front for the IRA. To pretend otherwise is worse than naive – it is purblind.