‘The beam in thine own eye’ – discrimination goes both ways
THAT SOUTHERN Ireland was “a cold house for Protestants” 1 has become something of a common refrain in recent years. However, there are two problems with the concept. First, the “cold house for Protestants” imagery is distorting. The earliest use of the phrase that this writer is aware of was by Judge Donal Barrington in May 2001.2 The phrase implies a peace-process-vintage symmetry. In his Nobel Lecture in 1998, David Trimble described Northern Ireland as historically being a “cold house for Catholics”.3 The mirror image was presented of Protestants in the south being on the receiving end of discriminatory practices.
* Full article available in printed copies.
Robbie Roulston
lectures on 20th century Irish history and Irish Protestants in independent Ireland in UCD’s School of History and Archives.