Comment on Left TDs and Councillors call for vote for Seamus McDonagh in Meath-East By-Election by Joe

“The reality is that the establishment feared the Provos.”
The reality, in my view, was a lot more complicated than that.
Take the Phil Flynn case. The establishment feared the Provos so much that when a very senior Provo (Flynn had been Vice President of Sinn Féin for a number of years) became Vice President of ICTU, the establishment continued to deal with him in the same way they had always dealt with people in that position. So a little verbal song and dance and then carry on as normal.
Again, take Phil Flynn. General Secretary of a very large public sector clerical grade / managers’ trade union for a long number of years. At the same time he was Vice President of provisional Sinn Féin and at the same time the provisional IRA campaign was in full swing. The members of that union were pretty much all middle class – they were people with Leaving Cert at minimum, equivalent of white collar civil servants, bank officials etc. Yet they had no problem being represented by this very senior member of Provisional Sinn Féin. He negotiated with (and also represented! – it’s a funny old game) senior management in the local government and health sectors. Again, no problem to pretty much everyone involved.