Orange Pricks want "OrangeFest" to last a week

[Andy]

who do they scummy bastards think they are? they want to close the streets of Glasgow City Centre for an entire week so they can walk up and down with there sash.

The Sunday Herald - Scotland's award-winning independent newspaper

Parades are out of order
McCHATTER Neil Mackay

AS AN ex-pat from Northern Ireland living in Glasgow, I was rudely awoken yesterday morning by a bunch of guys in bowler hats and sashes marching around with a flute and drum accompaniment and celebrating a conflict some 300 years and more old that still badly tarnishes my country, and doesn't do much for the reputation of Scotland either.

By the time I got into work, having navigated the city along with Saturday morning shoppers in a circuitous route to avoid the dreaded "crossing of the walk", a colleague of mine had interviewed a senior Orange Order official and discovered that the organisation wants to turn its annual Twelfth of July parade into a touchy-feely "OrangeFest" - a sort of Notting Hill carnival, but with added tension.

I don't wish to rain on the Orange Order's parade, as it were, but who do they think they are kidding? There is nothing touchy or feely about the Orange Order. Coming from a family where my dad is Protestant and my mum Catholic, I've got no prejudiced axe to grind; some of my relatives are even in the Orange Order. It's just that I loathe, from bitter experience, anything that fuels the sectarian divide that ripped my homeland apart for more than 30 years.

And I can't stand seeing the same hand-me-down hatreds played out on a smaller scale in the city I've lived in for more than a decade.


No matter what they say, the Orange Order, just like any Republican or Catholic organisation that wants to flaunt its own insular and bigoted view of the world, is all about separation and triumphalism.

As for tourists and families coming out to watch this ancient and pointless ritual, I'd advise them to stay at home.

As a reporter in Northern Ireland and Scotland I covered much of the Troubles from 1991 onwards and the intransigence and downright arrogance of the Orange Order did little to make Ulster a happier place when the guns were out; quite the reverse, in fact.

Frankly, my mouth hung open when I read that at least one MSP, the former culture secretary Frank McAveety no less, is supporting "OrangeFest" and that VisitScotland said it was interested in the possible tourism benefits. Sorry? Come again? I know we are supposed to be all for inclusion these days, but must we include those who have been in the vanguard of the exclusion of others for centuries?

Yet news has just broken that Martin McGuinness is off to Baghdad to promote peace, so I suppose anything is possible.

[BenedictineMonk]

FFS If it ever happens then I'm off from this country for good, canny see it though.

[Fancy Pants]

Sounds like a great way to waste my hard earned tax money on policing and patching up these morons for a full week

[cmilkbhoy]

that would be a farce, i can barely put up with it now never mind a week the city would break out in riots

[craigyjac]

Originally Posted by Andy

who do they scummy bastards think they are? they want to close the streets of Glasgow City Centre for an entire week so they can walk up and down with there sash.

The Sunday Herald - Scotland's award-winning independent newspaper

Parades are out of order
McCHATTER Neil Mackay


AS AN ex-pat from Northern Ireland living in Glasgow, I was rudely awoken yesterday morning by a bunch of guys in bowler hats and sashes marching around with a flute and drum accompaniment and celebrating a conflict some 300 years and more old that still badly tarnishes my country, and doesn't do much for the reputation of Scotland either.

By the time I got into work, having navigated the city along with Saturday morning shoppers in a circuitous route to avoid the dreaded "crossing of the walk", a colleague of mine had interviewed a senior Orange Order official and discovered that the organisation wants to turn its annual Twelfth of July parade into a touchy-feely "OrangeFest" - a sort of Notting Hill carnival, but with added tension.

I don't wish to rain on the Orange Order's parade, as it were, but who do they think they are kidding? There is nothing touchy or feely about the Orange Order. Coming from a family where my dad is Protestant and my mum Catholic, I've got no prejudiced axe to grind; some of my relatives are even in the Orange Order. It's just that I loathe, from bitter experience, anything that fuels the sectarian divide that ripped my homeland apart for more than 30 years.

And I can't stand seeing the same hand-me-down hatreds played out on a smaller scale in the city I've lived in for more than a decade.


No matter what they say, the Orange Order, just like any Republican or Catholic organisation that wants to flaunt its own insular and bigoted view of the world, is all about separation and triumphalism.

As for tourists and families coming out to watch this ancient and pointless ritual, I'd advise them to stay at home.

As a reporter in Northern Ireland and Scotland I covered much of the Troubles from 1991 onwards and the intransigence and downright arrogance of the Orange Order did little to make Ulster a happier place when the guns were out; quite the reverse, in fact.

Frankly, my mouth hung open when I read that at least one MSP, the former culture secretary Frank McAveety no less, is supporting "OrangeFest" and that VisitScotland said it was interested in the possible tourism benefits. Sorry? Come again? I know we are supposed to be all for inclusion these days, but must we include those who have been in the vanguard of the exclusion of others for centuries?

Yet news has just broken that Martin McGuinness is off to Baghdad to promote peace, so I suppose anything is possible.

i would have no problem with the walk if they kept it to predominately protestant areas,(apologies if any of you lads live in these areas) but everyone is subjected to it whether we want it or not, thats when our freedom of choice is overuled.and they are meant to stop playing as they go by chapels but they cant even show that respect.

[hoopymo]

"good for tourism" aye fuckin right legalisin weed is good for tourism no celebrating killing catholics

[BenedictineMonk]

"the former culture secretary Frank McAveety no less, is supporting "OrangeFest" and that VisitScotland said it was interested in the possible tourism benefits"

WTF surley a joke

[made in ireland]

it will never happen.

[zmcfc]

ffs.. orangefest.. Fuck the lot of them... Dirty Huns

[Andy]

They are having a laugh about tourism, they must be! An "OrangeFest" would damage our tourist industry beyond repair and tourism is our most important industry in Glasgow and Scotland.

[hoopymo]

there will be a huge backlash if it goes through

[smac1888]

orange bastards,celeberating their shite,they should go and fuck off

[adambhoy25]

What a fuckin joke!!this surely cant happen,riots will actually happen if it went ahead.

[-Marie-]

It's never going to happen, I'd stake every penny I had on that.

[celticdaftdan]

Arseholes these walks shouldnt even be allowed anymore dirty bastards.