Ian Knox - Unionists aren't going to save the Union by shoving flags down people's throats

To mark the end of his December 2013 exhibition, 'Lifelines and Deadlines', Ian Knox spoke about his work and life with a local film maker. At the end (48m30s) Ian Knox shared a profound and deeply relevant insight about unionism and Northern Ireland's union with Great Britain. He said:

"As a political cartoonist, there's no defined criteria for what one does and what actually a political cartoon is. I think I tend to the school of dealing with realpolitik. That is the interests, the real motives of why people act. I always found it very strange as to why sections of unionism seem to perpetually want to shove the Union Jack down the throats of those who don't regard it as their flag. The big truth which unionism doesn't seem to want to talk about, let alone face up to, is the fact that when a border poll does come, it's going to be Catholic votes that decide on the constitutional position. Not Protestant ones. We know which way the prods are going to vote. But if the prods want a substantial number of, nationalists stroke Catholics, to vote to stay as part of Britain, they have to be nice to them; they're not going to do it by shoving flags down their throats."

Video in full here.

Other posts on Ian Knox. Slideshow of Ian Knox riding his Penny Farthing here. Ian Knox riding his Penny Farthing during the Giro 2014 here. Ian Knox and friends on their Penny Farthings for the Hume/Dunlop anniversary cycle here. Ian Knox speaking with the Detail here. Chatting with Michael Smiley here. My blog post on Ian Knox's cartoons of loyalists and republicans, here. Ian Knox and I drawing together in the Black Box, Belfast in 2013 here. Ian Knox and I drawing at McHugh's, Belfast here. My coverage of Ian Knox's December 2013 exhibition, 'Lifelines and Deadlines' here. A selection of photos of Ian Knox at work here. My article here on why an Ian Knox prize to encourage satire and political cartooning like the Herb Block foundation in America which rewards and encourages future talent. A notice about my joint exhibition with Ian Knox on Slugger O'Toole is here.

#WhitePaper - What's the case for a united Ireland?

@chrisadonnelly @brianjohnspencr nats. have the best of both worlds in the UK - SF in govt + UK exchequer + NHS + BBC - all lost in a UI
— Comrade Stalin (@TovarichBelfast) December 9, 2013

In the spirit of Whitepapers (i.e. Scotland's Future: Your guide to an independent Scotland) I'm asking: What's the case for a United Ireland? What would a United Ireland look like? This is a rolling "White Paper" series I'm kicking of right now. Why? Because nobody else is doing it. Because nobody - again I say nobody - is able to actually make a reasoned case, or actually tell me what a United Ireland would actually look like, save that partition is an abomination, the original sin and that unionists are illegitimate colonists. When Salmond et al. came out with his considered and thought out proposal which he has put to the people of Scotland, I muttered, jeez if I were a nationalist/republican I'd be writing a White Paper pronto.

Well I'm pre-empting that. Doing that with my "White Paper" blog series which will make the case for not having a United Ireland. I submit to you that this is timely development and I ask you to join me in this mission.

To get things moving I think it necessary to understand the current state of affairs in the Irish republic. The usual criticism is the €200m public debt. That's a bit cheap. I want to hear more. So, what's the story of the Republic of Ireland right now and in recent history?

Let's begin by looking at The Growing Up in Ireland study which began in 2008, the same year Fianna Fáil implemented their No Bondholders Left Behind policy. The nation-wide study is following a representative sample of 11,000 children as they grow up in the post-Celtic Tiger Ireland.

Ironically since 2008, a great many children in Ireland have been left behind. Fintan O'Toole outlined a few startling facts in The Irish Times here. His headline was that "The gap in health between the best-off and worst-off children has doubled in the three years after the bank guarantee." Here's his main points:

One:

"One child in every four is living in a home where nobody at all has a job (In 2010, 22 per cent of all Irish households were jobless; the next highest proportion in Europe – the UK – was 13 per cent)."