Statement by Morrissey in Hot Press on Queen's visit to Ireland

The Very Existence of the Queen Is Against Any Notion of Democracy - Hot Press

16 May 2011

This is just one of a number of compelling charges set down by Morrissey in an article written for Hot Press, to coincide with the Queen's visit to Ireland

The Queen's visit to Ireland is part of a new Palace PR campaign to re-invent the Windsors. The message from the Queen will be the same as ever: who we are born to is more important than what we achieve in life.

It should be remembered by the Irish people that as recently as the turn of the 1980s the Queen supported Margaret Thatcher by not dismissing Thatcher as she allowed hunger strikers to die at the Maze Prison, most famously Bobby Sands, who was 27 years old. As Sands starved to death in protest at being tagged a 'criminal' and not a 'political prisoner' by the Thatcher government, the Queen sat in her Palace and said nothing. If the Queen had any human feelings for the Sands family or other hunger strikers then she did not express them.

The full meaning of the Monarchy is, like the Queen herself, a complete mystery to most people. It is protected from any investigations by ridiculous stories of trivia and wedding dresses and on-again-off-again soap-drama romances. The most revealing statement came from Commander Christine Jones of the Metropolitan Police last month, when she warned that any British people carrying anti-royal placards who are "seen in the vicinity of the royal wedding would be removed under the Public Order Act." This means that any political dissent in England is silenced in order to protect the royals, which in itself goes against every principle of democracy.

The very existence of the Queen and her now enormous family – all supported by the British taxpayer whether the British taxpayer likes it or not – is entirely against any notion of democracy, and is against freedom of speech. For a broad historical view of what the Queen is and how she "rules", examine Gaddafi or Mubarak, and see if you can spot any difference.

You won't be able to.

The Queen also has the power to give back the six counties to the Irish people, allowing Ireland to be a nation once again. The fact that she has not done so is Fascism in full flow. What else could it be? Name one other European country that is controlled by its neighbour?

MORRISSEY

May 2011

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Uncleskinny also sends the link:

Morrissey says the Queen should give six counties back to Ireland - Hot Press

Excerpt:

With the visit of Queen Elizabeth to Ireland due to begin tomorrow, Tuesday May 17, the Lancashire born singer, songwriter and performer Steven Patrick Morrissey has written an article for Hot Press, which challenges in trenchant terms the appropriateness of welcoming the British monarch to Ireland.

...The full article appears in the issue of Hot Press which hits the streets this Thursday, May 19.

 

[lastparty]

This front page is like the jeremy kyle show some days....

But why all the perma-rage?

Human beings you are meant to be.

I sincerely hope that the whole lot of you are NOT in any kind of position of authority, driving buses, lollipop men or women...I wouldn't trust you to take out my rubbish.

 

[Anonymous]

Brits are such obnoxious people, that when they stand against the worst dictator of the world, people might actually side with the dictator.
True story.

Your not making a blind bit of sense, Hitler was a lunatic who denied his austrian jewish ancestory, then again thats like 90% of americans claiming to be irish.

 

[Anonymous]

Whatever next, Obama will start toting the Irish Tricolour and dancing a Moneygall Jig.

 

[Anonymous]

Good lad Morrissey!!!! End the life of the sorry sectarian state of shame. Or at very least give Armagh, Tyrone, Fermanagh and the city of Derry back to where they want to belong. Britan can keep Belfast and all them horrible North Eastern parts.

 

[Anonymous]

You people really love your Queen.

 

[Anonymous]

You people really love your Queen.

they worship the ground she walks on

 

[Anonymous]

I believe Sweden has the highest or one of the highest suicide rates in the World.

I'm not usually one for advocating suicide but lets hope the Swedish IRA supporter does the world a favour!

And Bobby Sands wasn't nor are the IRA political prisoners. They're murderous terrorist thugs. End of.

Swedish suicides being one of the highest in the world is a famous factoid. If you click on the link you will see the real statistics, it is in swedish but you can still understand the table. Sweden having the highest suicide rate comes from Sweden being the first, and for many years, the only country that recorded suicide statistics.

http://www.faktoider.nu/swedicides.html

Urban in Sweden

 

[Anonymous]

Your not making a blind bit of sense, Hitler was a lunatic who denied his austrian jewish ancestory, then again thats like 90% of americans claiming to be irish.

Hitler being part jewish is one of the worlds most famous factoids.

 

[Anonymous]

Don't be so hard on yourself, you can't help being such a racist prick, your swedish i presume.

Moz-elite, what a silly little twat you sound, maybe you should heed your own advice and piss off with Take That.

Still being swedish your used sharing your loyallties, look at every war throughout history.

Yes we're not fooked up here because of war like you lot and I guess that is why british kids all suffer from stress disorder because that is inherited. They are all so wild and crazy and it must come from the parents who inherited stress from past wars.
People in islands are just a bit weird.

Urban in Sweden

 

[Anonymous]

Will be wearing a Bobby Sands t-shirt this summer and swedish Moz fans will burn the union jack outside the venues at Moz gigs this summer.
I just suspect he is killing off his career and will cancel the tour altogether. He made all that dosh from fooling americans and mexicans that he loved them but all he did was ripping them off with crap music and dull lyrics.
About time he got involved in politics and writing books but the only thing I hold against him is that he never came out of the closet and supported gay rights.

 

[Anonymous]

Where are the moderators?

Rancid, brutally moronic, vicious nonsense like this should be taken down immediately.

One is used to obnoxiousness and malice on these boards, but the above is rank racism of the most deplorable, base order and needs to be removed.

Freedom of speech or do you not support it?
Maybe you are daft enough to believe only your views count?
Welcome to reality!

 

[Anonymous]

i live in the 'six counties' and am proud to be part of the united kingdom. Does morrissey really think that by just giving ulster over to eire that will be the end of it all?? Does he not think the protestant/unionist majority would not revolt against his beloved republic? A lazy outdated arguement from moz. If he lived in northern ireland he would realise how difficult uniting ireland would be,but he doesn't...

This.

 

[Anonymous]

If Morrissey has any sense he will not play Belfast or Glasgow. And as a Northern Ireland Unionist I don't think I'll be buying his new album or anything else from him again.

 

[Anonymous]

About time he got involved in politics and writing books but the only thing I hold against him is that he never came out of the closet and supported gay rights.

You've got to be kidding. He mows anybody over who does not support his homosexuality. You can give it a try and stand up for being heterosexual yourself who has no interest in homosexual sex practises. Shit will be boiling for you. Because you know, everbody is homosexual, even if they do not know yet, it is all the same anyway and blablablablub. Funny thing is however, apart from women who heavily support homosexual sex practises, he does not give any other women the time of the day. This is how "straight" or "bisexual" or "open" he is.

 

[Anonymous]

You've got to be kidding. He mows anybody over who does not support his homosexuality. You can give it a try and stand up for being heterosexual yourself who has no interest in homosexual sex practises. Shit will be boiling for you. Because you know, everbody is homosexual, even if they do not know yet, it is all the same anyway and blablablablub. Funny thing is however, apart from women who heavily support homosexual sex practises, he does not give any other women the time of the day. This is how "straight" or "bisexual" or "open" he is.

Well, I just immediatly felt sick as I posted, maybe it is not quite like this after all and my perception was slightly blurred.

 

[Anonymous]

If Morrissey has any sense he will not play Belfast or Glasgow. And as a Northern Ireland Unionist I don't think I'll be buying his new album or anything else from him again.

Just goes to prove how narrow minded and biggotted some unionists in Ireland still are.The majority of people in our country want a united Ireland. I am sure morrissey won't be too sad that people with such a limited form of commonsence will be boycotting his mechandise.

 

[Anonymous]

f*** off! And the majority of people want Northern Ireland in the United Kingdom as proved by recent assembly and council elections.

And it is Morrissey who is narrow-minded and bigoted. The majority of people are for the Queens visit as it's about improving relations. Morrissey has just shown himself up to be a Real IRA Dissident loving bastard. Even Martin McGuinness said there should be no protests at the Queen's visit.

 

[Anonymous]

The majority of people in our country want a united Ireland.

Right.

And what about the people in NORTHERN Ireland?

Just like the English and the Welsh wouldn't get a vote on Scottish independence, it's a Scottish issue, the Republic of Ireland wouldn't get a choice on matters to do with "Norn Iron".

Northern Ireland does not overwhelmingly want to be Irish. To say otherwise is wrong.

Northern Ireland is not financially up the creek, for a start. Whereas the Republic...

 

[goinghome]

You may be right about the last time a monarch refused to approve a law, but unfortunately you're wrong about the lesbian issue. It's a myth I'm afraid, a very funny one at which many people have had a laugh at Queen Victoria's expense, but her law against homosexuality was meant to cover all same sex relationships; she knew very well that lesbians existed.

Unlike many on here I won't pretend to be an expert in UK politics or the monarchy, but I would like to stick up for Morrissey's knowledge on the subject and say that a cursory glance on directgov.co.uk revealed that "In international affairs, the Queen (as head of state) has the power to declare war and make peace, to recognise foreign states, to conclude treaties and to take over or give up territory." So actually, he's right, she can decide to give Northern Ireland back to the Irish. There'd be uproar and she'd never do it, but theoretically she could.

Yes, Morrissey was a bit naive to say name one other country controlled by it's neighbour, seeing as we have Scotland and Wales, but some posters on here should also check their facts, e.g. Palestine is not controlled by Israel, they each have their own goverments. Catalonia, Basque and other separatist areas of France and Spain, despite having their own flags and other concessions to independence, are not countries, they're regions.

We have slowly given separate parliamentary powers to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, with the advent of the Assemblies, but I can see Morrissey's point. Ireland is a separate territory, across a body of water, long in dispute and it seems positively bizarre to ordinary people that Ireland should not be one country. Really, given that this is the first visit of our monarchy since 1911 it also seems Queenie had forgotten the place existed.

However, I also concede that, like the dispute to come over independence in Scotland, there are Northern Irish people who don't wish to be part of Ireland. I suppose in this circumstance and given the Queen's visit reminding the Northern Irish people that they're still ruled over by us Brits, it would be sensible to call a referendum on the subject. Unlike the last referendum it shouldn't simply be on the symbolic unification of Ireland, it needs to be on unification and independence.

Having read the comments on here it does seem that many of you are just hell bent on slagging Morrissey off for his opinions. But he's entitled to those just as much as you are, and in a way (despite some innacuracies) he is right - we are not a true democracy until we get rid of the monarchy, or at least reduce their powers to zero; the laws passed by parliament still have to be approved by the Queen.

Neverthelss, I think the debate on here is a sad indictment of what we've become in our bland, celebrity obsessed culture. Twenty years ago Morrissey sold magazines and papers on the very fact that he was outspoken, controversial and his prose and pronouncements were a joy to read. I think they still are. Now it seems many music fans have been brainwashed by the Simon Cowell's of this world to believe that pop stars should simply pout, perform and pipe down. What a bland little world we've become.

Whether you agree with Morrissey or not on the monarchy, or the Irish issue, his piece does contain one truth. The existence of the monarchy says to everyone who remains a subject, that it doesn't matter what you achieve, birthright is everything. A message I think we can see very well in our own government with Dave, Nick and Gideon and their nice little inheritances, that bought them the power to deprive most ordinary people of two coppers to rub together. I for one can't stand the idea that we should all pay due deference to the monarchy as they pass, or that we ought to sit back and take the idea that we can't have a say in how our country is run, or that politicians can decide to spend £25million of our taxes on a royal wedding, or a state visit. Why don't we say to royalists that, if you want these things, you pay for them and anyone who couldn't care less can abstain and their share of the money can go towards a big anti-monarchy party. But, as Morrissey pointed out, the goverment and the police passed an extension to anti-terrorism laws to prevent dissent; so whilst we drop bombs on Libya to protect protestors, we take the same right to protest from our own citizens.

No, we're not a democracy at all, not at all.

Clear and considered thoughts are a breath of fresh air.

The points about the monarch being legally invested with decisive power, even though the evolution of the role has meant it's not practised separately from the say-so of the government, puts me in mind of the banks. Financial authorities have passed the buck, knowing full well that it wouldn't stop with anyone, while listing of regulatory duties became perfunctory. The recession has somehow managed to ensure that riches continue to trickle up.

As for Bobby Sands, the case has inspired ill-treated captives around the world since. An excellent article about where it fits into the history of hunger strikes - http://www.faqs.org/periodicals/201010/2169454721.html - is by Stefan Simanowitz. For example,:

"...A hunger strike is defined as the voluntary refusal of food and/or fluids. The length of time a hunger strike can last will depend on the faster's body fat, physical health and striking strategy. If the striker refuses fluids they will not survive for much more than a week. If they take fluids, sugar and/or salt, they can prolong their hunger strike for much longer. Bobby Sands, a fit 27-year-old survived for 66 days and Gandhi fasted for 21 days whilst in his 70s and with hardly any body fat. The longest recorded sugared-water hunger strike before death was 94 days by an Irish Republican in the 1920s. If the striker takes vitamins as well as sugar and salt like some of the recent prison hunger strikers in Turkey, death can take an agonising 300 days...."

"...But it was the Maze Prison strike of 1981, in which Bobby Sands along with nine other inmates fasted to death, that stands out in the memory.

Sands and the Blanketmen as they were known went on hunger strike after the British government had reneged on a deal to restore their political prisoner status. Rather than many prisoners striking at the same time, the strike was run on a rolling basis, each hunger striker starting his fast a week after the other in order to maximise publicity. Four days after Sands, the leader of the strike, had first refused food the local MP for Fermanagh & South Tyrone died forcing a by-election. Sinn Fein nominated Sands for the seat and his remarkable victory at the polls drew world-wide attention. Despite his death, Sands became a powerful symbolic figure in the struggle for a united Ireland and at the time the New York Times recorded that Sands had 'bested an implacable British Prime Minister [Margaret Thatcher]'..."

"...Both the Irish Republicans and Gandhi took much inspiration from the Suffragettes who, in the early twentieth century used hunger strikes as part of their struggle for female suffrage..."!!

However the situation in Northern Ireland isn't simple. The place is nothing like it used to be. Prince Charles toured Southern Ireland in 1995 and was booed, but he visited a Catholic Church in Northern Ireland this year, breaking a strict tradition started by Henry VIII. "Once the bedrock of Irish resistance to the advance of the English state in Ireland, the Plantation of Ulster by Scottish and English colonists resulted in Northern Ireland following a different economic, religious and cultural trajectory to the rest of the island." The Plantation of Protestants was enforced by the Royals from 1606 to oust local chieftains from their lands, religion and people - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plantation_of_Ulster

Obviously there's been a lot of assimilation since then, as well as assassination; unbearable claustropobia and paranoia on both sides far too often, and sometimes collaborations and friendships. With a rush and a push, negotiated peace seems like the only way to gradually placate the aggrieved ghosts of the past, by an elected government that will not be isolated or sectarian. Why can't it be now?!

 

[niamhdubh32]

f*** off! And the majority of people want Northern Ireland in the United Kingdom as proved by recent assembly and council elections.

And it is Morrissey who is narrow-minded and bigoted. The majority of people are for the Queens visit as it's about improving relations. Morrissey has just shown himself up to be a Real IRA Dissident loving bastard. Even Martin McGuinness said there should be no protests at the Queen's visit.

Why don't you check Sinn Fein's website @ sinnfein.ie as it will give you an itinary of peaceful protests against Liz Windsor's visit . While you are educating yourself at this website you can clue yourself up with statistics relating to Sinn Fein's ongoing advances in the 6 counties and maybe you will realise that the majority of people in Ireland want a United Ireland and it WILL happen.