Time was the word "dissident" had tragic, dramatic and essentially foreign qualities. Dissidents were locked up for decades in psychiatric hospitals in the iciest wastes of the USSR. They circulated spiky commentary in home-printed copies, sometimes escaped to western acclaim, writes Fionnuala O Connor
Then the name re-emerged as a Northern phenomenon, a counterpoint to the "peace process". Dissident became the second-most used term of the new jargon. Neither got much in the way of textual analysis: in a remarkably short time both names set hard.
Republicans who opposed the IRA's ceasefires complained - with some justice - that it was the leadership of Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness who had moved away from true republicanism, not the newly christened dissidents. They were insulted all over again when the peaceniks were tagged "mainstream republicanism". They probably know they were honoured to be christened dissidents. Even in this slapdash, thoughtless application, the word retains more lustre than the rag-tag but sometimes lethal Continuity IRA, the Real IRA, the 32 County Sovereignty Committee and Republican Sinn Féin have ever generated.
But the inherited dignity of an inappropriate name was never going to disguise the empty negativity and strategy vacuum of bitter-enders. The republican dissidents have killed, destroyed, denounced. For 12 years they have failed to build even the first stage of a credible alternative to Sinn Féin's exit path from the Troubles, or to attract any sizeable support.
Like the DUP leader in his current guise as possible if procrastinating power-sharer, Sinn Féin is lucky in its opponents. By comparison with their weakness, the Adams-McGuinness leadership looks even stronger. Like the "mainstream" of old, republican dissidents have only two modes: violent or accusatory. Very little lurks behind windy statements, speeches and articles about lack of debate and mainstream repression.
They never quite spell out what it is that they recommend, beyond a cloudy coming together of the like-minded to keep on keeping on. One recent article decided the Adams leadership was "at the mercy of Paisley's whims" and advised them to admit defeat. There was no suggestion of alternatives in waiting, only a counsel of despair: "Leave it to the generations to come. You did wrong. Others will fix it."
Now that the crunch has finally arrived, it is hardly surprising to hear reports of threats as well as speeches about betrayal and "settling for salaries". The surprise is the new disaffected voices, people who put their faith in the Adams team until this point or at least until comparatively recently. How could anyone take this long to realise where the process was headed? Policing was always going to be the decider: no way around it, no way out.
Join the government, support the forces of the state. Earlier difficult passages contained wriggle room. There was elastic confusion about decommissioning, some of which might have been denial. But for a long time and at many levels there was optimism, perhaps understandably, that it might be possible to avoid what finally happened.
Senior police on both sides of the Border were in no hurry. Despite the republican bogey of "securocrat" machinations, it was police chiefs who went on making it clear that they recognised the desirability of going slow on decommissioning, to preserve the coherence and authority of the "mainstream" IRA and ensure the splinters stayed marginal. It was obvious that the two governments agreed.
Anything the mainstream leaders were not explicitly required to do, they avoided doing. For as long as the Blair-Ahern axis blinked at robberies and rackets, those continued.
Now showtime has arrived for refuseniks. Primitive firebombs in DIY stores inflicted considerable financial damage but in terms of building an alternative to the peace process, and even of republican mythology, firebombing has an almost medieval aura. The horror of the Omagh dead left the splinter groups reeling, harried from every direction. It seemed certain that they could never again use car-bombs: but there have been varied violent efforts, thwarted for the most part.
With bitter internal splits and police penetration to contend with and nothing political to offer that anyone is listening to, what are dissidents to do? There are no pikes in the thatch for the next generation. After initial sniffiness, police on both sides of the Border now seem to accept the Provo assessment that elements are toying with some mad anarchist "grand gesture" as a way to derail the entire process.
Unionists mock when leading republicans say they are under threat, but helping to govern the Northern state and supporting its police is the point of no return. The idea of signing up to make Ian Paisley first minister will be hard- fought on the doorsteps. It may suit the Adams team to emphasise their problems, but the last big decision was always going to hurt.
For some brooding rejectionist out there with neither following nor sense, attempted assassination could be a fitting last throw.