Some time in the early 1980s word got around Omagh that The Undertones were coming to town. In a place which, like most of Northern Ireland throughout that decade, was a cultural wasteland this was big news. Around then The Undertones were bona fide pop stars by virtue of having just appeared on Top of the Pops and they were from just up the road in Derry. This was the big time and we were going to be part of it.

Disappointment, of course, was just around the corner. No one in my year at school was allowed to go on the basis that we were too young. In the weeks and months afterwards that concert entered into local teenage mythology and even years later it was spoken about in hushed, awed tones.

All the original members of The Undertones were interviewed for a documentary shown on local television here last week. Fergal Sharkey, a man who appears to retain little affection for either his former colleagues or the city that produced them, spoke eloquently and darkly about the environment that surrounded them in the early days of the band. Sharkey talked about the omnipresent threat of violence and the experience of being stopped and searched at British Army and RUC checkpoints every day going to and coming from school. The Undertones, according to Sharkey, were a reaction to all of that and a release from the grimness of day-to-day life.

The world of Derry in the 1970s and 1980s, as described by Sharkey, was replicated in towns and villages throughout Northern Ireland. Some of the footage of bomb explosions, rioting and armoured vehicles that accompanied the interviews in the documentary seemed to belong to another time and place but the culture that grew up around those things continues to influence the shape of society here today. To understand where we are, it is important to know where we have come from.

And the failure to address that is the most salient criticism that can be laid at the door of the ill-focused, meandering debate on Rule 21 that has rumbled on for the best part of three weeks. One of the few good things that can be said about the prospect of a vote on the issue at next Saturday's special congress of the GAA is that we will be spared all the empty cant of the past few weeks for the foreseeable future.

The common factor running through the contributions from those in favour of deletion of the rule has been a stubborn refusal even to consider the nature of the cultural experiences that fostered and nurtured those opposed to its removal. The desperate security situation and escalating violence which The Undertones were reacting to is the same set of circumstances which made the issue of policing such an emotive one to those now opposed to any moves on Rule 21. That collective memory does not disappear overnight and it is crass and insensitive to suggest otherwise.

The repeated mantra of those favouring movement on Rule 21 is that the political situation has been transformed by the Good Friday Agreement and its aftermath. There is no disputing that. The point is, however, that the collective memory of darker times takes a longer time to dissipate. The occupation of GAA property, the unnecessary police and army road blocks, the intimidation of GAA members are all indisputable facts and decades of that kind of history cannot be casually swept away.

One of the objections to Joe McDonagh's previous move on Rule 21 was the indecent haste with which he seemed to proceed. Three years on and another GAA president-inspired initiative later, that impression has not disappeared.

The atmosphere in which all of this has been taking place is at best unhelpful and at worst, downright antagonistic. Dissent to what appears to be the gathering consensus in favour of deletion to the rule has increasingly been portrayed as retrogressive and unnecessarily obstructive. One recent radio interview had a club official from south Armagh being asked to explain why the GAA had not taken sanctions against those involved in the bombing campaigns of the last 30 years and attempted to make the most tenuous of connections with Rule 21. His exasperated response spoke volumes.

Another line of thinking which appears to have gained some media currency is that the rule is another unacceptable example of what can happen when sport and politics are allowed to mix. In most societies the argument that sport and politics can exist separately is one which is hard to sustain. Here, the notion does not even get off the ground.

Politics and its associated baggage are the fabric of this place - the education system, the courts, policing - and it is nonsensical to imagine sport has some special status which ensures it remains untouched by the world around it. The parade of politicians in the Republic who have been more than willing to give interviews advocating change is an indication of the capital they see can be made. If the Rule 21 debate is to have any positive spin-off, perhaps the exploding of this particular myth would be a good place to start.

A third recurring theme has been that Northern opposition to reform of the rule connotes a refusal of GAA people here to embrace change and a determination to hold to the old ways regardless of what is happening around them. Nothing could be further from the truth and irrespective of how next weekend's vote goes, some official recognition of the contribution made by unsung GAA volunteers over that past 30 years is long overdue.

The GAA in the North provided social cohesion at a difficult time. There is strong anecdotal evidence from places like north and west Belfast, south Derry and Armagh that the sporting and cultural outlet which the GAA represented provided stability and a diversion for those who might otherwise have chosen a different path. A general anxiety in GAA circles to be seen to be doing the expected and respectable thing with Rule 21 should not be allowed to obscure that.

The clarion call that will gather momentum as the week progresses towards Saturday's vote will be that the entire debate should not be allowed to become divisive. This is another red herring in the shoal that surrounds Rule 21 because, with an issue as emotive as this, disagreements are inevitable. The big test of Seβn McCague's presidency will not be the vote itself, but how he handles the fall-out that will surely follow it.