Head2Head:On Saturday next, the English rugby team plays Ireland in the Six Nations championship at Croke Park. For many, the playing of the British national anthem at a venue steeped in Irish nationalist history is an emotive issue. We ask: should God the Save the Queen be played at Croke Park?.
YES argues Fintan O'Toole, who believes it is long past time we got over our dated Anglophobia
There is, on the internet, a site that offers instant cures for phobias. I asked it for advice on Anglophobia. "Your fear of England, English culture etc," it told me, "can result in the following symptoms: dizziness, heart palpitations, inability to speak or think clearly, a fear of dying or losing control, a sensation of detachment from reality or a full-blown anxiety attack." Since these symptoms are all too recognisable to most of us, I was happy to learn that "There is a Way Out! Imagine what your life will be like when you know that you are not 'defective'. When you can be confident and at ease in situations where you used to feel Anglophobia."
My friends on the internet believe that this crippling condition can be cured by something called energy psychology and the application of a substantial dose of money. The second part of this is probably true enough: the infusion of money into Irish society in the last 15 years has certainly made us less prone to palpitations at the approach of all things English. Some of us are even out and proud.
We acknowledge that we shop in Tesco and Marks and Spencer, watch Coronation Street, follow Premier League clubs, read English newspapers and that most of us who grew up before the 1980s have first cousins with London, Manchester, or Birmingham accents. We happily claim luminaries born either in England of Irish parents (the playwright Martin McDonagh) or in Ireland of English parents (the painter Francis Bacon).
But we are in other ways still in recovery. The complex entanglement of resentment and admiration, of superiority and inferiority complexes, of the desire to distinguish ourselves from the English and the desire to ape them, still has a neurotic edge. The neurosis can manifest itself as much in excessive awe as in bitter fulmination.
How often do we assume that a book by an Irish author published in London must be better than one published in Dublin? How often does an Irish play or film suddenly look much more important when it wins a prize in England? Why do advertisers tend to assume that we are more likely to think a product is classy when it is being sold to us in a suave, authoritative English voice?
Some of this is of course rooted in a history of oppression, condescension and arrogance. The Irish inferiority complex is, in this regard, a mirror of an English superiority complex. Some of it is simply the inevitable chip on its shoulder that a small nation acquires from its proximity to a larger one. Some of it comes from the usefulness in a complex and contradictory culture like ours of an Other by which we can define ourselves. (The easiest, though least fruitful, way to define "Irish" is "not English".)
But all of it is tiresome and unnecessary. We are a sovereign nation with average per capita incomes above those of the UK. There are probably no two countries in the world whose governments work more closely together than the Irish and British governments now do. It is time we got over ourselves.
The great thing about the arrival of the English rugby team in Croke Park next Saturday is that it provides a precise, public, almost ritual occasion when we can, as my internet friends put it, be confident and at ease in situations where we used to feel Anglophobia. In all of the GAA's debates about the opening of Croke Park, the most potent rhetorical question asked by those who wanted to keep rugby and soccer out was "Do you really want to hear God Save the Queen played at Croke Park?"
The line was used so often because, as most polls on the issue have shown, it is effective. It evokes an emotional response from somewhere far below the radar of rationality. And it is precisely because it does so that we have to answer "Yes".
This issue has nothing to do with England or the English or God Save the Queen (for myself, I'd rather hear the Sex Pistols version.) It has to do with us.
What we are really asking when we ask whether it is permissible to petition the salvation of Mrs Windsor by the almighty within the walls of GAA headquarters is whether we are still so hung-up, so neurotic, so immature that we can't trust ourselves to listen in respectful silence to a traditional tune set down in the 18th century. (If it helps, the same tune also serves as the royal anthem of Norway, so diehard anglophobes can imagine themselves paying their respects to King Harald.)
We can think of it as a kind of therapeutic test, like a recovering alcoholic making a first visit to a pub to assure himself that he can resist the temptation to drink. If we pass the test, we can consider ourselves cured. If we don't, we will prove that we're still in thrall to England.
Fintan O'Tooleis an Irish Times columnist
NOargues Gerald Morgan, who wants both the Irish and the English to leave their anthems outside the stadium
Anthems stir the emotions and, as often as not, the same anthem can stir different emotions among different peoples on different occasions. In the midst of so much emotion there is little room for logic and rationality.
Each year the Six Nations Championship displays to the world the incoherences of the Anglo-Saxon and Celtic peoples. Only in the Stadio Flaminio in Rome or the Stade de France in Paris for matches between Italy and France do the anthems enrich the grand occasion in an uncomplicated way. Otherwise, contradictions abound. At Twickenham on February 3rd, we had the Scottish and British anthems played before the match between Great Britain (aka England) and Scotland. Surely, if the British anthem must be played at Twickenham for the Calcutta Cup, it ought to be played for both the British teams at the beginning, followed by a Scottish anthem for the away team and an English anthem for the home team.
This idea is too simple and logical for the British hierarchy to cope with. I am surprised that no one in these islands has thought this question through and I write here in an attempt at least to clarify the problem.
Donal Lenihan, with the typical courage of a second-row forward from UCC, has spoken in forthright terms recently of the "cringe-inducing" Ireland's Call. The unwelcome fact is that at Croke Park next Saturday, there are likely to be at least three and possibly four cringe-inducing anthems presented to different groups of spectators.
Thus God Save The Queen is cringe-inducing for most, if not all, GAA supporters, whether in the stadium at Croke Park or watching on television. God Save The Queen is also cringe-inducing for English supporters who wish to affirm their Englishness on such occasions. Amhrán na bhFiann is cringe- inducing for the British players on the Irish team and for many of their British supporters from Northern Ireland. Ireland's Call is cringe-inducing for virtually all lovers of Irish rugby. And perhaps also Swing Low, Sweet Chariot is cringe-inducing in the context of English rugby.
Is there a solution to this conundrum? I think there is, but it is a radical solution and involves making a distinction between rugby anthems and British and Irish national anthems. I propose therefore that the English abandon the British anthem for the purpose of rugby matches and adopt an English anthem (preferably, in my opinion, Jerusalem). I propose that the Irish from Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland alike abandon for rugby matches both the British national anthem (used in the past for matches at Ravenhill) and the Irish national anthem (used in Dublin), except on occasions when the British queen or the Irish President is present, and also the execrable Ireland's Call.
Instead, I would suggest the use of There Is An Isle, the famous anthem of Shannon RFC, for Irish rugby as a whole. It would be a distinction that the Shannon club well deserves for its domination of Irish club rugby over the last 10 years. I have no idea how many people in England and Ireland would be open to such suggestions, but I do know that we are in urgent need of an open debate on the subject. Otherwise we are liable inadvertently to do more damage to Anglo- Irish relations next Saturday than Jade Goody has done to Anglo-Indian relations.
There is no necessity, then, for a British anthem to be played on behalf of an English team in Croker. Let that be reserved for a British occasion, such as a visit by the British queen to the 26 counties at some future date.
The great English poet Geoffrey Chaucer assures us in The Franklin's Tale that an act of generosity can and ought to give rise to reciprocating acts of generosity. The noble Breton knight, Arveragus, is willing to sacrifice his marriage to preserve the moral integrity of the wife he loves. This is an act of such profound love that many readers of the tale are simply unable to comprehend it.
Those who know little of the history of the GAA (most English rugby supporters) will not comprehend the depth of generosity shown in the decision to open up Croke Park to rugby and soccer, and above all to a visit by the English rugby team. As an Englishman it is my wish that the RFU will seek to emulate the example of Aurelius in responding to the generosity of Arveragus. In so doing, they would be following in the tradition of Dick Kingswell, the president of the RFU, who made sure that an English XV took the field at Lansdowne Road on February 10th, 1973. Only a great act of generosity can release the English and Irish alike from the tragedies that have threatened to submerge us in the past.
Gerald Morganteaches at the school of English in Trinity College Dublin
Last week we asked should illegal drugs be decriminalised? Many people joined the debate at www.ireland.com/ head2head and here we publish an edited selection of the contributions
YES:"My interest is in having so called 'illegal drugs' like marijuana make available to those of us with disabilities and for whom all other medication has failed to easy symptoms . . . I'm now addicted to prescription drugs and while they don't ease the symptoms of my disability, I am 'hooked' on them. I can't imagine any drugs with side effects as bad as those which I've been forced to become dependent on." - Paddy Doyle, Ireland
NO:"By law, any medicine has to be a pure single chemical substance so that its actions are predictable and controllable. Cannabis per se is a non-starter. It contains around 400 chemicals, rising to about 2,000 on burning . . . To advise someone to use cannabis for a medical condition is like saying, 'Take up smoking to reduce your weight, nicotine is an appetite suppressant'." - Mary Brett, United Kingdom
YES:"Over 40 years of drug prohibition has failed. Despite more intensive attempts to halt drug use, the number of people using drugs continues to increase. Education and decriminalisation can change this. The decrease in tobacco use displays education's role in reducing substance abuse, the decrease in cannabis usage per head of population in Holland since the 1970s displays decriminalisation's value." - Liam Ó Murchú, Ireland
NO:"Legalisation of drugs will, in addition to worsening the drug demand situation, also lead to an increase in the supply and availability of such dangerous substances. A lot of African countries are watching with keen interest as this debate plays itself out in one of the leading European countries (in terms of moral rectitude). Ireland cannot afford to miss this opportunity of maintaining its leadership position in global moral issues. A resounding NO to legalisation of illicit substances." - Eze Eluchie, Nigeria
YES:"Drug abuse does not equal drug use. It's time to stop trying to sweep drugs under the carpet, accept the fact they will always be around and start tackling drug abuse in a mature and sensible fashion." - Mike, Ireland
NO:"I have a daughter that became addicted to methamphetamine and remained addicted for over six years. Her health deteriorated to rotten teeth, blemished skin, and she looked at least 10 years older than her actual age. She lied, stole and behaved badly . . . She lost everything she owned except the clothes on her back, her children were under the protection of the court, and yet, she persisted with the drug abuse . . . People in support of legal drug-use have probably never felt this pain and I pray they never do. However, for those of us that have, leave the decisions regarding drug laws to those that are educated to the realities and consequences of drug use and addiction rather than attempt to gain support to justify what I feel is probably your own addiction or personal life choice. - Bob Moses, United States
YES:"I agree totally with the decriminalisation of illegal drugs, I am now being prescribed methadone tablets for my drug addiction which I have had for over 10 years. I now can have a fix before work so I am normal and be an active member of society. I don't have to do crime any more and I work six days a week . . . Why should I have to inject methadone tablets just to feel normal when they could just give me heroin injections?" - Craig, Australia
NO:"Switzerland liberalised drug policy. The result is a disaster. Tens of thousands of young people are in methadone and buprenorphine programs . . . There is no hope to escape from drugs, the majority live from social benefits. They are not able to work, to have normal family relations. These poor people are lost." - Hans Koeppel, Switzerland