Ireland: Political murals of West Belfast
By Lauren Carrol Harris
November 9, 2009 -- Belfast -- Though Northern Ireland has slipped from the nightly news, "the troubles", including ongoing deep sectarian divisions and low-level violence, are a daily reality for Irish republicans. Just one reminder of the struggle for a united Ireland, and example of the Irish people's creative resistance, is the multitude of political murals that smother the walls of West Belfast, a republican stronghold. Many commemorate the activists and civilians whose lives were taken in the struggle. But the murals don't just discuss Irish politics -- on these walls are messages of international solidarity for other peoples' movements for change and self-determination. Above are just a few.
West Belfast murals
Is this the most naive post ever on a left website? The people who supervise these murals are members of a sectarian, capitalist and imperialist administration that continues British rule in the North. The murals are a form of playpen for tourists and for the remaining Sinn Feiners able to close their eyes to reality.
The plastic bullet mural is maintained by people who oversee a police force that continues the use of plastic bullets and have now adopted tazers. ypaint murals of solidarity with Palestine and then go there, recommended by Tony Blair, to advance a 'peace process' that has buried their own struggle and has been bleeding the Palestinians to death.