Multiculturalism

When did Ireland become a multicultural country?  I think it was in the mid-nineties sometime, between the decriminalization of homosexuality and Jason Sherlock winning an All Ireland medal with Dublin. I don’t know, I wasn’t here.  I spent most of the nineties in Amsterdam, now there’s a multicultural city; Indonesian food, Moroccan rap, Afghan coats, sexual license and sexual licenses.  The Dutch will tolerate anything as long as there’s some bitterballen at the end.  Multiculturalism though has moved on from the wholly positive good it was perhaps regarded as in the eighties and nineties, to something a little more tarnished.  In Ireland it was embraced by some elements of society as part of a broader rejection of the incredibly dull and, as it emerged over the nineties, incredibly malign old Ireland.  All to the good, but when multiculturalism is used as a stick to beat people with, its not surprising that, rightly or wrongly, some people might come to resent the stick. In an Irish context some would therefore like to see this modern innovation called multiculturalism rowed back, abolished, handed over to the Dutch.  Except that multiculturalism is nothing new to any country, and certainly not to Ireland.  Just look at the arrival today of Queen Elizabeth, the first British monarch to visit Ireland since 1911.  The official line is that Britain is our neighbour, trading partner and friend and as such a state visit is entirely appropriate.  No argument with that, but it’s a fiction of course that Britain is just another country. The British identity is intermingled with our own.  It was trouble with the Irish (and the Scots) that necessitated the creation of Britain in the first place.  To create a purely Irish, Gaelic identity is possible of course but requires an incredible act of will and asceticism and leaves you with a fundamental contradiction, that an Irish person who doesn’t speak English or listen to British pop music or follow the Premier League is an Irish person who’s quite unlike the average Irish person.  There’s always been more than one culture here.  When the Queen alighted from her flight this afternoon, she seemed I thought genuinely happy to be here. Was it familiarity?  Did the Guard of Honour remind her of her mother’s favourite regiment, the Irish Guards, who carried her coffin to the grave and in whose uniform her grandson got married last month?  When she was shown around the gem of Georgian Dublin, Trinity College, did she think of all those Georges – her ancestors – who give their name to this architecture and in whose great empire the Irish capital was the second city? And what about her favourite sport? You know the one that consists of the British aristocracy, horses and Irishmen?  She may never have been to Ireland before, but who needs to if you go to Cheltenham every March.  Yes, the Queen and Philip are as comfortable with the Irish as most English people are.  And what about us?  We know them well of course, but is there any danger of the respect we intend to show the visiting Royal Family of our neighbours turning to affection, even – perish the thought – nostalgia?  Could we possibly be discovering out inner Brit?  Last week Peter Robinson – a hate figure in the republic twenty five years ago - was re-elected First Minister of Northern Ireland, a respected politician who dedicated his re-election to a murdered Gaelic Football playing Catholic policeman from Tyrone.  With the troubles over, we can in Ireland recognize that cranky, Low Church Ulster Unionist dissenter tradition Robinson comes from as being something which owes much of course to the Cromwellian revolution but which is also a type Irishness, just not the official one.  And maybe that will allow Peter Robinson to discover his inner Irishman.  With the ongoing thaw reinforced by this week’s visit perhaps the Irish and British identities can flow more freely between one another, interact and reveal one of Europe’s great secrets: that the Irish and the British actually get on with each other really well.  Now that’s multiculturalism.  Out of respect to those who are still pretty uncomfortable about today’s proceedings, I won’t label that a good thing, but it's certainly interesting.