Tomás Ó Flatharta

Very often, like many others (in their millions), I walk into Dublin city centre, passing through Parnell Square. November 23 2023, shortly before 1.00pm seemed no different. That impression was soon shattered. I collected a monthly prescription from a chemist on Portland Row, off the North Circular Road. Proceeding into town past Mountjoy Square, I dropped into my former place of work – the FÓRSA Trade Union headquarters in Nerney’s Court off Gardiner Place – for a chat, a cup of coffee, and a visit to the jacks. The staff at reception were, as usual, very friendly. Then a woman in her 30’s entered, very shook. She told us about a big police cordon around Parnell Square and a horrible incident – news was spreading about a man who stabbed children and an adult outside an Irish language school. Rumours were circulating.

At this point I encourage readers to read and listen to a very good short Dáil speech of Paul Murphy delivered on November 28 2023. It explains a lot :

First, I send my thoughts and solidarity to the victims and the families of the victims of the stabbing attack. It is just horrifying and so nightmarish to think of children being attacked in such a way. In the response to that horror, we saw the very best of our city – Warren, Caio, Leo, Siobhán and others – people who were white Irish and immigrants coming together and putting their lives on the line to try to protect children.
Our city and country should have now been uniting around the families of the victims in solidarity with them. Instead, sickeningly and disgustingly, far-right, racist and fascist agitators said this was their chance to incite a riot and to spread hatred and division. We know who incited this riot and called for people to come out on the streets. These people did not hide themselves or issue the calls anonymously. At 2.16 p.m., a white supremacist, Mick O’Keefe, issued his first tweet. He followed that at 2.50 p.m., saying that a foreign man entered the school and stabbed five children and he said the kids were dead. Fergus Power tweeted at 2.55 p.m. that a five-year-old girl was alleged to have passed away and that “This better get people off their arses and out onto the streets”. Phillip Dwyer, a crèche creeper and dog kicker, streamed a video at 4.04 p.m. in which he said he would be in town at 6 p.m. Gavin Pepper, another far-right agitator, called people onto the streets for 7 p.m. in town. Derek Blighe had a video in which he said “We are at war,” echoing the words of Conor McGregor. We know who called people out. We also have to look at the role of some people in this Chamber. I will mention one. Deputy Mattie McGrath earlier called for a “reasonable debate” on migration. Fine, let us have the debate but a part of that will be Mattie’s connections with the far-right. He has been photographed with Gavin Pepper; photographed with Andy Heasman; a street meeting with many of the people who were involved in organising this. He has been laundering far-right conspiracy theories using his platform in this Dáil repeatedly and he is not the only one.

Paul Murphy TD (Dublin South-West), People Before Profit, Dáil Éireann, November 28 2023

Good on you Paul Murphy. pic.twitter.com/Et9tn4nYK5

— Dáithí K (@tvcritics) November 28, 2023

Back to the day itself. I walked from the FÓRSA HQ to the Garden of Remembrance corner of Parnell Square – the road to O’Connell Street was blocked by a Garda cordon. It was about 2.15pm. A few far-right activists were strutting around – one of them was randomly accusing people he targeted for allegedly claiming he was a “far-rightist”, walking up to them as close as possible in a menacing fashion. His struts took him to the police cordon where he was told to go away and mind his own business. I was already hearing false speculation about the incident. In conversation with a few people I suggested we wait for definite statements from reliable sources – we could listen to radio news reports, or visit reliable online news outlets. I had some routine jobs to do around the open side of Parnell Square and in Moore Street – nothing spectacular – supermarket shopping, looking for an electrical item in a Chinese fixit shop – that sort of thing.

After 4pm I made my way to the Teachers’ Club, The bar staff told me that far-right “scumbags” were spreading all sorts of hate online. I listened to a radio news report at 4.30pm – DriveTime, RTÉ Radio 1. The man attacked 3 children and a woman, a creche worker. The woman and 1 child are getting surgery, the 2 other kids are in hospital but do not have bad injuries. This report told us that passers-by intervened, attacked and disarmed the stabber. The rumours flew into the Teachers’ Club bar; a guy walked in, told a friend he heard two were dead. He was corrected. After saying something about travellers, he was again corrected, and wondered if this was a “domestic” incident. Meanwhile the radio news report continued in the background.

Off I went to the bus stop for Cabra, a short walk from the Teacher’s Club. But, I could not get home using that method. I was drowned in freezing drizzle for more than 30 mins – the growing number of waiting bus passengers eventually discovered that racist scum had blocked the buses and all other traffic at the Parnell Monument. I heard openly racist shit chat behind me at the bus stop – “Muslims” had done it, two people, more, were dead – I had enough. I confronted the racist shit-chatters. Nobody was dead. How do you know the stabber was a Muslim? Even if he was, how dare you blame every other Muslim. A few days before this incident – in Clare – a white Irish man, in his 50’s – pillar of the local Catholic Church – murdered his wife and then committed suicide. The family and local community called this a “tragedy”. No racist mobs mobilised blaming all Irish white Catholic males. After turning away in disgust from the racist shit-chatters I saw that many of my fellow bus passengers were listening – and they were scared – they were not white Irish. At that point I went back to the Teachers’ Club, and struck up a conversation with a pissed off bus worker. We chatted about the racist shit-chat, which the bus staff have to put up with every day. It was time for a hot whiskey, and a cooling-down session.

On social media and the TV we watched the racist gangs expanding their attacks in the City Centre. There was no hope of getting a bus or taxi home. I walked most of the way home before getting a lift from a close friend. It was the same all over the city. I made a point of telling people at bus-stops along the way that waiting for buses, or hailing taxis, was pointless. I walked with two women (non white Irish) a lot of the way – many others did the same. It was a small gesture of solidarity.

After 11pm Dublin City Council workers were doing a fantastic job cleaning up the city centre. Everything was cleaned up by early morning the next day. Since then we have listened to useless inaccurate rants from right-wing politicians about the “unsafe” city centre. The truth is that the city is not perfect, it could be cleaner, but we must not allow the far-right to take away our streets. In the next couple of days I made a point of coming into the city centre, walking around various streets, visiting the usual haunts – all was normal. A vile media “consensus” is now peddled implying that poor people, homeless people, are a threat. They are not. They are however increasingly visible in the city centre, especially at a growing food shelter outside the GPO every evening in O’Connell Street. The organisation running the food shelter is the Muslim Sisters of Éire.

I finish with an account of a conversation with a taxi-driver. It happened more than a year ago. The driver was from Chechenia, and had lived in Moscow before moving to Ireland some years ago.

Sure life is hard for him here, but it is much better than Russia. We talked about walking from Capel Street (Romano’s Restaurant, Nealon’s Pub, the gay bar run by Panti Bliss) up to O’Connell Bridge and then left to the GPO. It is a short enjoyable walk – but if the Chechen taxi-driver had attempted the same walk in Moscow he would have been stopped by intimidatory police men every one or two minutes – stopped, harassed, asked for his papers, accused of some crime, roughed up. In Dublin he could make that walk completely unhindered. We discussed Putin’s reactionary genocidal war against Ukraine.

Dublin city centre must be reclaimed from the racists. As Imelda May says ; You Don’t Get to be Racist and Irish

John Meehan December 7 2023

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Imelda May : “You don’t get to be racist and Irish”

You don’t get to be racist and Irish

You don’t get to be proud of your heritage,

plights and fights for freedom

while kneeling on the neck of another!

You’re not entitled to sing songs

of heroes and martyrs

mothers and fathers who cried

as they starved in a famine

Or of brave hearted

soft spoken

poets and artists

lined up in a yard

blindfolded and bound

Waiting for Godot

and point blank to sound

We emigrated

We immigrated

We took refuge

So cannot refuse

When it’s our time

To return the favour

Land stolen

Spirits broken

Bodies crushed and swollen

unholy tokens of Christ, Nailed to a tree

(That) You hang around your neck

Like a noose of the free

Our colour pasty

Our accents thick

Hands like shovels

from mortar and bricklaying

foundation of cities

you now stand upon

Our suffering seeps from every stone

your opportunities arise from

Outstanding on the shoulders

of our forefathers and foremother’s

who bore your mother’s mother

Our music is for the righteous

Our joys have been earned

Well deserved and serve

to remind us to remember

More Blacks

More Dogs

More Irish.

Still labelled leprechauns, Micks, Paddy’s, louts

we’re shouting to tell you

our land, our laws

are progressively out there

We’re in a chrysalis

state of emerging into a new

and more beautiful Eire/era

40 Shades Better

Unanimous in our rainbow vote

we’ve found our stereotypical pot of gold

and my God it’s good.

So join us.. ’cause

You Don’t Get To Be Racist And Irish.