Solitaire No Longer Relevant - Leviathan Tries to Lay Pipes to Mayo and Falls Flat on Its Face!

by Chrissie Wed Sep 17, 2008 17:37

Quote: "This is of no concern to Shell/Irish State." - I fear that rather than not caring about Maura's life, Shell/Irish State would be rather pleased to be rid of a tireless and passionate Shell to Sea campaigner. But we in the campaign would be more than grieved to lose her, & the loss to her family would be more than I can imagine.
For Maura & her family's & friends' sake, everyone, please do what you can to send the Solitaire home.

by Ciaron O'Reilly - Dublin Catholic Worker/Ploughshares Thu Sep 18, 2008 11:42 Dublin, Ireland

...with deepest respect and concern for Maura, Rossport community and solidarity activists.
Many sympatheic people are asking why Maura is still on hunger strike?

There are a variety of reasons that the hunger strike now seems to be a death train that the campaign cannot get off....

-put yourself in the place of this specific hunger striker. She is indigineous to the area. She loves her place and her community. Over the last years, she has seen the arrival of Leviathan - Shell/Irishstate - in the same way in 1788 Autralian aboigines viewed the arrival of the "First Fleet", West Papuans view Indonesian/U. S. helicopter gunships descending into their rainforest today, or if the Martians touched down in O'Connel St. tomorrow. Something so big and slick and threatening to all she knows and loves.

-In recent year she has seen the movement and community consensus against this Leviathan (Shell/Irish state) split by threats and bribes. She has held her principaled position, that if this project goes ahead the gas should be processed offshore. Earlier this year, unilateral action was undertaken by politicians, priests and some campaigners to fly to Norway to make a deal/push a compromise departing from the unified demand of "Shell to sea" to "Shell to the next town down the road!". As Phil Berrigan would often say "Unilateral action is the death of community (solidarity/ the movement etc.)!" What was once unified is now torn usunder/split. ....think Ireland at the end of the War of Independence/ the start of the Civil War (or at least watch Laverty/Loach' s "The Wind that Shook the Barley"!)

-She has spent the last 9 daze in a car isolated from the big picture/broader context surrounded by overpaid/underworked cops trying their best to stress her out and deprive her of sleep. Each day the strike goes on it is increasingly difficult for her to listen/to speak to discuss options etc.

-When she started the hunger strike she had a very relevant direct demand "Solitaire leaves Irish Terrirorial Waters!" It was a good demand last week when the Solitaire was a threat, it is not a good demand this week when the Solitaire is an irrelevancy.

Why has the movement failed to intervene?

- "Shell to Sea" made the tactical error of moving the hunger strike rapidly to centre stage. For whatever reason, good or bad, chasing mainstream media attention or a sense of authentic solidarity for an authentic activist they love and respect - "Shell to Sea" have hooked their carriage a train they can't get off. Like Bush in Iraq they had no out plan when they entered this course of action, the only way thecan see to get out is victory (or death) for this tactic.

-"Shell to Sea" failed to DECLARE VICTORY (eg a timely press release would have sufficed, maybe it's not too late?) days ago when it became known that the Solitaire was broken, incapable of doing the job it was sent to Mayo to do. This was/ is an opportunity where Shell/Irish state would have lost face. The Irish state that can't can't run a competent health service, that can't deal with the massive clearly visible gridlock, that can't secure Shannon Airport from the miniscule/marginal Catholic Worker (3 actions/3 times security massively compromised/ 7 million euro expended over the last two years when no attempts were considered). Instead "loss of face" turned on Shell/Irish State now maybe one of the dynamics hampering consideration of concluding this hunger strike well.

Judging by my minimal interactions with them, "Shell to Sea" are in way over their heads. They are good people and mean well, but lack experience in this dramatic/life and death context. They are pretty stressed out after weeks of NVDA with Shell and now the hunger strike. Their emergency meeting in Dublin on Tuesday night, in this dramatic context, attracted only 7 people. This is not the fault of the 7 who showed up, but maybe an expression of broad ambiguity amongst those who have (like myself) suspended engagement in their campaign. People who are unwilling to cheerlead someone to their unnecessary death. Judging by my conversations, as long ago as Sarurday at the GPO demo, there must be by now broad ambiguity amongst people who are still turning up to demos that now must "support the hunger strike" as well as the campaign to stop Shell in Rossport.

-There is always an element of emotional blackmail that goes with a hunger strike.... even with Gandhi (see my previous post on this thread) who employed it and his popularity on occasion to discipline his movement against killing Muslims.

In this case, the emotional blackmal element has led to the suspension of critical thought - or at least the expression of it. I had to think long and hard before I went public with my criticisms - and I expect to pay for doing so while I remain living in Ireland. I have acted because I love and respect Maura and and want her to live and continue to resist Shell/Irish state. Whatever payback I will encounter for this minimal effort will be little in comparison to the loss of Maura, her family's grief and the demoralisation of those who have risked much more than me in this movement.

The dynamic is in some ways similar to what happens in the U.S. when troops are deployed to unpopular wars. People are asked to "support the troops" to suspend criticism of the government's action. As though the only way to support the troops is to support them in the denial that they are off to kill and die for the wrong reasons. This has been very effective in the U.S. in getting over the "Vietnam Syndrome" that was such a restraint on deploying U.S. troops to unpopular wars post-Vietnam. It is a very powerful dynamic.

Such uncritical support, mobilised by "Shell to Sea" who have made the hunger strike their centrepiece (not merely putting it in equal context with the NVDA by the local fishermen, kayakers, arrested beach walkers who all still need our proactive solidarity as they face the courts and disruption to their lives/financial expense as consequence of their courageous actions) increasingly paints the hunger striker into a corner, minimising the potential for reconsideration, negotiation and movement around the original demand "Solitaire leave Irish Territorial Waters!" that is now (this week) an irrelvancy. It is an unfortunate dynamic, the more you support the hunger strike, the more likely she is likely to die.

- The last Irish hunger strike (H Block) is not even a distant memory for the young activists involved in this present struggle against power and injustice. For those of us old enough, there are memories of how the Brits tried to divide the movement and undermine the Hunger Strike and the general advice to keep your mouth shut and your doubts suppressed as a way of supporting and holding the line. This hunger strike is very different from the H Block one (see reasons outlined in my previous post on this thread).

The initiative has been surrendered to the Irish state (losing no sleep over the last 5 years while deeply complicit at Shannon in servicing the armed wing of transnational corporations such as Shell as they have killed one million people pursuing energy profits in Iraq ) and the Captain of the Solitaire (from a long first world misogenist seafaring culture renowned for every crime imaginable.. ...have you been to a third world port where such men are serviced by the child prostitutes and corrupt cops?). What is the death of one Mayo woman to such men? Who would put the life of such a woman in such men's hands? Who would surrender the initiative to such men?

As Phil Berrigan (and every decent football coach I ever had) would try to hammer into me, "as soon as you lose the initiative you have lost!"

Given such powerful dynamics at play, with every passing day, I (and many others) grow increasingly pessimistic that this will end well

by Kieran O'Sullivan - Personal Capacity Thu Sep 18, 2008 14:19

I have to agree with this article. Even if it means loosing to Shell I would still prefer to have Maura than to have victory.

If Maura dies then Shell will simply go ahead anyway.

There is an oppertunity with the financial crisis to put pressure on the governemnt to have the resources used for the benifit of Irish people.

Maura we need you alive.

by Ciaron - Dublin Catholic Worker/Ploughshares Thu Sep 18, 2008 17:03

The point is we won the victory (this battle not the war, metaphorically speaking!) a few daze ago.
The Catholic Worker declared victory at 3.40am Tuesday morning
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/89047#comment236109
..but hey no one listens to us!

What was/is needed is someone/some group with brand recognition (eg. "Shell to Sea"
Rossport community et. al.) to declare victory over the Solitare's attempts to lay pipes to Mayo.

Shell/Irish state have lost this battle, but of course are to smart to admit it. Bush has lost the war in Iraq,their flat our feeling secure in the Green Zone, but even he is too smart to admit that one.

One could spend a lifetime deconstructing why we, as a movement, have problems with
with embracing victories (even small ones like this one) and why we maintain a preference for glorious defeats!