If You Ask Me
by Malachi O'Doherty

Some people see the peace process as a long drawn out mating game in which nationalists and unionists will ultimately end up in each other's arms.

By this view, they are like birds of paradise, that flutter their colours before each other interminably, and seem never likely to conjoin, but of course, do in the end.

No. It is more like the reception at an arranged marriage, where partners must dance and pretend to be happy. Worse, it is a venomous waltz, between people who fear and detest each other, who consent to dance, only for the opportunity to kick and scratch each other.

But why does Paisley dance so much more cumbersomely?
He hasn't walked Gerry into any little trip wires or snake pits. He plods.
His only strategy is to demand commitment to policing and a testing period after. He doesn't see that when Gerry concedes a willingness to consider giving half of that - it is then his turn to impress us with a twirl or his own.

He now has to give up half of what he demands or appear curmudgeonly. And what can that be? Why - half a testing period. I suspect he has already given that, but since he didn't call it at the time, it doesn't count. New to this dance, are you Doctor?
And another thing Paisley gets wrong. He grunts - and that makes him look sullen and unyielding. Gerry smiles. The trick is to sound like you perfectly understand the problems on the other side.

Paisley does not know that you should always patronise those who attack you. Instead he snarls back like an old dog. If Adams had worked this out in 1979, you can imagine what response he would have given the Pope when he came here and begged on bended knee for an end to the violence. Gerry would have said: "yes I understand where the Pope is coming from, the will of God, the sanctity of life and all that, but he has to see that there's a larger context here".

Of course, Paisley has primarily to impress his own following and knows he will be forgiven in Ballymena if he ends up with the blame in his lap. Isn't that where it usually goes anyway?

But Gerry wants to impress the southern electorate too, and he must come out of this looking like a man who made an honest effort against thick and intransigent backwoods men. There will be a sympathy vote for the jilted suitor.

Well, it doesn't look as if Ian Paisley is going to make that too difficult for him.The dance proceeds. And the MC [Hain] holds the clock and insists - as he always does - that this deadline, unlike all the others - is a real one - though he said that about the others too.It seems the doorman [Blair] wants to get home on the late bus. Is it really midnight? Will the last waltz go on forever? Strangely, that is the fervent desire of the two dancers poisonously wedded to each other, cratching and biting and kicking each other, appalled at the prospect of the wedding bed. And who could blame them for shrinking from a marriage made in hell?

If You Ask Me Archive