I don't know about you but when I saw and heard Dr Ian and little Reg Empy whingeing over the re-routed Orange parade on Saturday past it reminded me of those heady days in the fields around Drumcree, when Orangemen, loyalist paramilitaries and thugs attempted to march past the Catholic homes on Garvaghy Road.
Do you remember how it went? Let us march past Catholic homes, as a celebration and expression of our culture. That's roughly translated as "we always got our own way and we still want to get own way and for good measure we will trample over the Catholics en-route".
So what was all of the violence about?
The explanation for the loyalist violence is simple.
- Loyalist rioters are bigots who can't get their heads around the fact that they have to share this land with Nationalists.
- They are bigots who can't live with the words equality and fairness.
- They are bigots who hate Catholics.
- They are bigots who can't get over the fact that while none of us actually govern the North – they certainly will never govern again on their own.
- They are bigots who blame everyone else but themselves.
- They are bigots who don't want things to change for the better of all.
- They are bigots who can't get over the fact that their politicians spent the past 70 years neglecting the needs of the community.
- They are bigots who are trying to imitate the Provos-you know, violence pays. The question is – are they attempting to achieve the same goals as the Provos?
They present as so thick they probably have not exactly yet to work out what they were up to in the first place. Secondly violence never paid.
I see it like this, the UVF and the UDA broke their ceasefires long before Saturday past. In fact they did so by attacking and murdering people on the streets of North Belfast and out across the North of Ireland.
The Orange Order's bluff has finally been called, as if we didn't already know. The ranks of this organisation are filled with thugs spewing hate and violence against the Catholic community and anybody who didn't stand with them, as witnessed on the Springfield Road.
We have known this for many, many years, it only amazes me that the wider community across these islands had to see Belfast burn before they would believe it.
The reality is that no-one else is to blame for the dire situation that the loyalist community finds itself in other than the loyalist community.
Over many years both Sinn Féin and the SDLP put aside their political differences to find common ground. What was that common ground? Working for the community lobbying for the community's interests in the North, in Dublin, London, Brussels and the USA.
While the Republican and Nationalist parties were doing this the loyalists just kept on killing, stealing and behaving in their traditional bully-boy ways. Their politicians were paranoid of anything that wasn't red, white and blue.
Unionists had "ostrich" syndrome – putting their heads in the sand while the nationalist community worked on.
Nationalists have asked and worked for nothing other than seeking to have a fair and equal place in this society. And that is the crux of the matter. Nationalists have gained significantly in the new emerging Ireland, but then that is legitimate and much needed and was done by ourselves alone.
To have called nationalists second class citizens was giving more credit to us than we actually had. As far as loyalists were concerned, and to a greater extent are still concerned, nationalists are nothing short of being sub-human.
That is what loyalists cannot stomach, that nationalists have spent the past number of years fending for themselves, when successive loyalist and British governments ignored their plight.
There is poverty across the political spectrum. That is wrong and should be addressed. The question is – are Loyalist/Unionist politicians capable of representing their constituents in the same manner and with the same quality of representation as the SDLP and Sinn Féin have done for the nationalist community both at home and abroad. Then again nationalist politicians have always held the door open to loyalists to learn and develop in the same manner as ourselves.
Unfortunately history has shown that they have routinely failed to grasp this olive branch.
Things have in many ways moved on for the people of the north. It is far from perfect, but it is better than it used to be.
Loyalist aggression whether in the guise of the Orange or gunmen or rioters has been seen around the world in recent days.
Their reputations, holier than thou attitudes as well as ceasefires are in the gutter. But it's not too late, Loyalists still have time to catch the community development bus, before it leaves them behind for the foreseeable future.
