For years I used to wear a Bobby Sands lapel pin.
I lost it a few years back.
Sometimes people would criticise me for it.
I used to look them in the eye and say 'Could you do it? What he did?'
Bobby Sands changed history. Bobby Sands did more in dieing, than he ever could have done by living.
Bobby Sands was a man, in the true sense of the word.
Bobby Sands made Ireland proud.
Bobby Sands determined to die.
Not a quick and easy death. Bobby Sands' death was not a threat. It was a promise.
It wasn't a case of 'Do this or I take my life'.
It was a case of 'Watch me die. Slowly. I have the will. I will carry on, day after day, week after week, month after month resisting you, until I die. Let's see how long that takes. And the longer it takes me to die, the more guilt lies on your head'.
Bobby Sands determined that he was going to stop carrying out those functions which sustain human life. And only resume them when and if the Thatcher government gave in.
Day in, day out, that battle continued.
Their decision was easy, just say no to Bobby Sands. Not hard.
His decision EVERY DAY, was harder. Say no to life.
He had to make that decision every day for three months.
But he did it.
Bobby Sands was first interned as a rookie volunteer.
His actual IRA service record wasn't impressive.
He earned his status- and his rank- inside.
His life wasn't that of a great guerilla or freedom fighter- just another internee.
But in death he etched his name upon the annals of the greatest martyrs of all time.
Captain Robert Sands 1954-1981, MP (Sinn Fein) Fermanagh and South Tyrone April-May 1981
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3 comments:
He was a patriot in the truest sense, not the modern, "I ratted on my neighbor down the way because he's suspicious and fits the profile of a terrorist" meaning of the word.
He gave up life to make a point.
The speech I type out right now is 'revolutionary' in the point of view of a modern patriot, but that's because the truth of what I say is dangerous to those who wish to safeguard the status quo.
So be it, I'm about to crash out, they know where to come find me if I need to be silenced.
so have you seen the film "hunger" thats out now about bobby sands
Eric- Yes, we get plenty of that over here, they're seemingly turning us into a nation of snitches. Though actually to be fair, I think most people stand up against it.
Yes, and I admire him for it. It does often annoy me a little when people blanketly use the word terrorist. One man's terrorist is, after all, another man's freedom fighter.
Anyone carrying a gun is a terrorist, in a way.
Sally- I haven't, but I want to. It's rare I miss a film about the Republican Movement. In guess that particular struggle kind of does touch my sentiments a lot.
The Wind that Shakes the Barley was one of the best films I've ever seen.
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