The Importance of the Irish Conservative Movement

Following on from Thomas's reference to the DUP I noticed that in the Euro election in Northern Ireland the only pro life social conservatives are DUP and two other unionist candidates. The SDLP has gone the way of Southern nationalist parties and is broadly pro choice. It is ironic that the community that put its' long term faith in pro-natalism during the dark days of unionist hegemony has now politically embraced pro abortion policies.

It has been pointed out by Maolsheachlann in other places Irish people are remarkably conservative when it comes to supporting party labels even when those parties abandon core beliefs. In fairness they abandon those beliefs if their focus groups tell them this might advantage them politically at the ballot box. Social conservatives are homeless. The liberal Fine Gael has also shown itself as useless in relation to providing housing and their core reputation for fiscal prudence also looks shaky at this stage.

A year on from the Repeal catastrophe I think we are in the middle of a liberal tidal wave which will last at least a generation. It would appear many social revolutions last one or two generations before a reaction sets in.
Ireland is now among the most extreme liberal leftist places on earth and is a cold place for traditional minded people.

It is important conservative voices don't let themselves be silenced. Free speech is useless if people don't exercise their right to question , to challenge and to offer alternatives. Politicly we are like tiny mustard seeds. Insignificant at the moment we may eventually have our day.

 



This cheers me. 

And I regret I feel too inarticulate to offer any more right now, except a resounding "amen" to the profound importance of this.







 

No problem at all, Roger. Thanks for asking.

This is what I meant: it's often said that the lesser things in life pale into insignificance when viewed against the perspective of mortality and bereavement. We come across statements like: "On your deathbed, you won't wish you'd spent more time at the office".

So it was theoretically possible that the experience of losing my father might have made me see my conservatism as being trivial, or a distraction from what is really important in life. It might have made me think: "Only PEOPLE matter, causes and ideas are nothing."

But it didn't make me feel like that at all. In fact, the experience of bereavement just reinforced to me the importance of tradition, heritage, nation, family, and all those things conservatives hold dear and seek to protect.

For instance: nationalism. My father was intensely patriotic. My family were all saddened that we didn't get to hold an Irish wake for him, that he reposed in a funeral home instead. (The logistics were just impossible.) But we were very grateful we could find an Irish-speaking priest to celebrate the funeral Mass (he wasn't an Irish speaker himself, but he actually helped set up the Irish language school I attended). The music at his funeral was all Irish music. At the reception afterwards, friends and family were singing Irish folk songs for hours. I didn't join in myself as I know few of them, to my shame-- it made me resolve to learn more.

The shortness of human life, which we experience most powerfully in bereavement, only makes more manifest our need to belong to a community of the living, the dead, and the unborn-- not something as general as "the human race", but a PARTICULAR tradition. A nation, in our case. Otherwise we are "the flies of a summer", as Burke put it.

Another example: family. When someone dies, it makes everybody realize the importance of family. In this case, I found myself talking to cousins and other relatives that I hadn't spoken to since my childhood, and meeting younger relatives I'd never actually met. Our way of life today puts enormous strain on the nuclear family, and even more on the extended family. At my father's funeral, there were many remarks (as I'm sure there are at many funerals) on the fact that we only see each other when somebody dies. And yet, it IS family that comes to funerals, including relatives you've never met. All the family stories and shared memories come out of mothballs. Resemblances are noted across generations. Christmas and Halloween parties of long ago are recalled and lingered over. So there were many resolutions that we would try to keep in better touch with each other and not drift even further apart (a particular danger now, as my father was something of a family patriarch).

I need hardly extend these reflections to religion. Even non-believers and agnostics seem to cherish the rituals of religion in the face of death. To believers, death and bereavement only confirm the supreme importance of faith.

So I guess what I'm saying is that losing my father didn't suddenly give me the perspective that only people are important, and that causes and ideas are trivial. To me, causes and ideas are important because people are important. Because tradition, heritage, family, nation, faith, reverence, etc. etc. are essential to a rich and flourishing human life, even though many of our contemporaries seem to think that these things are disposable, or even that they are shackles. And that arguing in favour of all these things is a way of loving our contemporaries, even when they think we are hate-filled killjoys trying to make everyone miserable.

I have been a bit pessimistic recently as to the standing of Irish conservatism.I do think it is important to not fall into a trap of simple negativity or resentment. We are weak politically and most people seem to be happy with social liberalism but core values of faith nation family and human dignity as mentioned above by Maolsheachlann above are of enduring value. They are also profoundly humanist in their fullest sense.

The Conservative revolutions in the USA
and the UK of the 1980s were unexpected but were the partial result of a battle for ideas in the political world long dominated by leftist liberalism. Minority views can become mainstream given the leadership and the circumstances.

Thanks so much for those kind words, Roger. I greatly appreciate them.

And congratulations on another successful video-- I'm learning from my own ventures into YouTube that it's not so easy!

Reasons to be cheerful?