Iain Maciver writes …

Though I have not spoken to her for ages, I have always thought journalist Anna Smith was a class act. An inspiration when I did shifts years ago at the newspaper where she worked, she is a powerful writer and this piece in The Mirror a couple of weeks ago is another thought-provoking stormer.

The Irish don’t deserve our shameless bigotry

by Anna Smith

I’m wondering what fun football fans could have singing songs about the millions of Jews who perished in the Holocaust.

Or what about 80,000 Pakistanis who died in the earthquake? Or the generations of black people shackled into slavery?

And why stop there? Surely in these rancid, racist times, there must be some morons out there who could rustle up a few hilarious lines about the 7,000 Bosnian Muslim men massacred in Srebrenica.

Brutal isn’t it? When you see it put like that. But I’m trying to make a point here.

You can just imagine the public outcry if football fans had to sing about the most awful tragedy and destruction of human life.

So where are the voices in high places condemning the braindead Rangers fans for the shameful singing of The Famine Song? Where are the football bosses, political leaders and police chiefs when they are required to stand up and be counted?

You won’t find them anywhere in this country.

You won’t find anyone in the establishment telling it like it is, in this, the most bitter little country in the world.

Shame on every one of them. I have just read the despicable lyrics of The Famine Song, and I cannot believe that it is being passed off as tit-for-tat among daft football fans.

If this had been written about Muslims, there would have been riots across the world. But it’s about the Irish - so it’s OK.

I am incandescent that in the face of such blatant racism, no-one with any clout has uttered a word of condemnation.

Nothing but bland, insipid comments, from the First Minister to the Rangers Chief Executive.

This was Alex Salmond’s chance to stand up and publicly tackle the bigotry that runs like a festering sore through Scotland.

This was his chance to condemn out of hand the people behind the song that has led to a complaint from the Irish Embassy to Holyrood.

But his words are completely impotent: “We are tackling the problem within the Scottish Government’s One Scotland Campaign.”

Absolute bull, Alex. The truth is, you are tackling nothing. You are hedging your bets, because you don’t want to offend the broader Protestant community. A vote is a vote, whether it comes from a bigoted numpty on the Rangers terracing or a fan with a brain.

You have failed to pick up the baton and move on with the serious anti-bigotry groundwork done by Jack McConnell.

And from Rangers, it’s even more lily-livered. Chief executive Martin Bain failed to condemn outright the song, though he did say fans singing it would face arrest. Then he said Rangers fans were being singled out, while fans of other clubs sing “wholly unacceptable” songs about Rangers.

I’m the first to acknowledge that David Murray has tried to tackle the bigotry at Ibrox. But it’s never going to work unless the men at the top stand up with an emphatic statement that the singing of this vile song is an affront to decent fans by the thugs who bring disgrace to a great club. But Bain’s response makes you think that they’re tittering behind their hands in the board room.

Because every time an Irish Catholic in this country makes any complaint about bigotry as being racist, it is met with some mirth. I want to be clear about this. I utterly condemn the singing of IRA songs by the idiots who turn up at Celtic away games.

And the collecting of money for IRA coffers that used to go on blatantly at matches was an affront to decent Irish in Scotland and anywhere else.

Behaviour like that does not encourage anyone to examine the real issues.

Because the broad message is loud and clear. It is acceptable to be racist towards people of Irish descent, but you cannot be racist towards Indians, Chinese, Pakistani or African.

We are drowning in a sea of political correctness. You’ll end up in jail if you make fun of people in wheelchairs, or gays or the mentally ill.

But if you have Irish roots, it doesn’t count. You have no voice.

To be honest, I feel sorry for anyone bringing up a family in this country. It is not bitter to the core. It is bitter from the core. Because it is not only the Rangers bigots who have brought shame on Scotland.

It is the establishment, the politicians and the heads of industry, who refuse to condemn the racist slight on the Irish.

You know why? Because deep down, despite the success story of Irish immigrants in Scotland, there is still a feeling that they shouldn’t really have been here in the first place.

One look at the lyrics to the Famine Song tells you that this is not simply to wind up football fans.

Here’s the first verse:
I often wonder where they would have been
If we hadn’t have taken them in fed them and washed them
Thousands in Glasgow alone
From Ireland they came Brought us nothing but trouble and shame
Well the famine is over
Why don’t they go home?

Don’t tell me that’s not racist. Of course, I expect the usual barrage of bile from the lowbrows who tell me to p*** off back to Ireland.

But I want to deal with some facts here. More than a million Irish died of starvation in the potato famine in 1845-50. The famine changed the complexion of Ireland for all time.

When I look at the desolate landscape in the remote west, the ghosts of the famine are everywhere. A vast empty backcloth remains the legacy, because the millions who crossed the water to escape hunger never returned.

In any other country that would be a human tragedy. But not in Scotland.

I don’t know if any of my ancestors were famine victims, but I wouldn’t be surprised.

And I would be even less surprised if the ancestors of some of these racist clowns in Rangers shirts also have ancestors who died in the famine.

Because thousands of them are of Irish descent - it’s just mixed marriages that led to them being Protestant.

But the burning issue here is that this is being passed off as a funny song in response to the Celtic fans singing Irish songs.

Would they really say that if Rangers fans were singing about massacred Jews or Muslims?

The Irish who support Celtic and travel over for matches do so because of the worldwide family that is the Irish diaspora.

The same diaspora that Pakistanis, Chinese, Indians and Jamaicans are allowed to have without racist chants.

But not the Irish. They have to listen to this bile.

And that is Scotland’s shame. Not the bigots on the terracing. They’re too thick to think.

It is the establishment who run this country who should tackle it head on. But they won’t.

Because racism and bigotry is still at the very heart of this country.