Madam, - As a southern Protestant I reject Martin Mansergh's self-appointed role as spokesperson for the Protestant community in southern Ireland. I reject his servile defence of Fr Alec Reid's recent comments and I reject his reference to Roman Catholics who have a genuine interest in Protestant experiences in southern Ireland as "outsiders".
It is a shame that southern Protestants rely almost entirely on these "outsiders" to unearth and decode their experiences in Ireland. We seem to have surrendered all capacity for a reasoned historical analysis of our experiences on these shores to Mr Mansergh and his pseudo-republican fabrication of Irish Protestant history.
That we have allowed Dr Mansergh and other Protestant Fianna Fáil spear-carriers to dictate and portray such a narrow caricature of our culture says very little about us. Why haven't Dr Mansergh and senators Ross and Norris demanded a full historical accounting of Protestant life since Independence?
There is a much broader and more complex Protestant history than these Uncle Toms portray. It is full of contradictions, of loyalty to the crown and to the nation as a whole, of patriotism and exile. Even a tentative scratch at the surface of history reveals other hidden or buried memories; of servicemen coming home from France only to be shot as spies, of the big houses of Ireland in flames and the exodus of rural and working-class Protestants in a hostile, post-Independence Ireland. It is small-minded and self-serving that so-called spokesmen from this community find these memories unpalatable and seek to sanitise them.
As a southern Protestant I can attest to the fact that many from my community who portray themselves as mildly nationalist to their Catholic neighbours will give a very different opinion in private to their co-religionists. Sadly Mr Mansergh seems intent on perpetuating this attitude and even attacks Roman Catholic revisionists who have been trying to dig up the historical facts.
These "outsiders" who have been trying to make amends for the marginalisation of southern Protestants seem somehow to antagonise Dr Mansergh. Why is this? And why is it that so many Protestants who do not agree with Dr Mansergh remain silent? It is time more Irish Protestants owned up about a great many things before "outsiders" such as Eoghan Harris and Kevin Myers give up on us entirely. - Yours, etc,
IAN COX,
Courtown,
Co Wexford.