Not content with creating Orangefest everyone’s least favourite festival is now taking an environmentalist turn. It’s what we’ll have to get used to calling “ecoloyalism” and history will record that this site’s visitor Jodley coined the word.
As if the old style bonfires were not scary enough with the UDA getting drunk and expressing strong views on transubstantiation there was always the risk that the whole damned thing would collapse in an avalanche of old pallets, tyres, bits of furniture, effigies of the pope and Irish tricolours.
One of the least enviable jobs in European local government must be that held by David Robinson. David is Belfast City Council’s Good Relations Officer and he’s been tasked with replacing the old style sectarian and environmentally detrimental bonfire with a more pro-planet version. It’s described as a “custom-built beacon – a pyramid-shaped metal-cage filled with willow wood-chips, and set on a base of sand to protect the ground below.”
Now my first thought looking at the picture is that they have left a big space into which you could put a couple of Roman Catholics or Romanians after beating them unconscious and that’s a well loved 12th tradition. The council does not seem to have though about that but they are trying to reduce the number of tyres incinerated and displays of loyalist regalia by offering £1500 to fund street parties for communities who want to tame things down. When asked “is this a form of community bribery?” John Howcroft, a community worker who is part of the Conflict Transformation Initiative in north Belfast said “absolutely not.” Either he had a huge smirk on his face when answering or he’s very stupid since “community organisations” tied to the loyalist gangster groups and the Provies are constantly having money chucked at them to buy them off.
Now as Socialist Resistance has discovered in its efforts to bring a bit of ecology into Marxism people aren’t always too keen to listen. Admittedly we aren’t in a position to offer £1500 to anyone who expresses an interest but Belfast Council has only found six communities willing to limit their carbon emissions while celebrating the 12th. Some lefties have said we are trying to cosy up to the Greens and some loyalists see the new style bonfire as an attack on loyalism’s right to build damned big fires. New ideas often scare people when they challenge the old certainties.
When rummaging around for more about this item I came across the headline in the Belfast Newsletter “Loyalists cite ‘green agenda’ for withdrawal”. It turns out that the UDA thinks the Police Service of Norn Iron is being too nice to Fenians. That’s what ‘green agenda’ means. You are left wondering what rabbit is going to be pulled out of the hat next year. Orangefest. Ecoloyalism. Maybe an alcohol free 12th? That might work.
Liam redux 
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