Since then, civilised Northern Ireland has stood back in a state of silent bewilderment. The swamp of suspicion, superstition, non-think and non-speak has been breath-taking; The Niagara of sentimentality, solipsism and self-pity mind-boggling.
In the face of the barbarism and nonsense-speak, civil society dare not criticise. The cult of respectability abides. "The brave [not so] new orthodoxy of whatever you say, say nothing" as Brian Walker called it, must be held. But civilised Northern Ireland needs to wake up and push back against the cult of violence and misinformation. And below is an outline of why you should and why you'd be right to do so.
Firstly, for those soft-bellied multiculturalists scared to say anything, here's why the Twaddle camp and associated protests are a nonsense. The political philosopher Edmund Burke was a pointed critic of the French Revolution, an event he characterised as mindless anarchy. For him, legitimate freedom was the freedom to do positive practical acts in society. It was not the liberty to enjoy freedom abstractly, obstructively or destructively. For Edmund Burke, the doctrine of abstract rights as advocated by French revolutionaries was folly.
Is marching and protesting wherever you want, whenever you want, for whatever reason you want constructive? Is the associated and farcical civil rights movement fighting for a non-cause, costing thousands of pounds a day to police, constructive?
Secondly, for the ever-indulgent middle-highbrows scared of expressing an opinion, here's why the marching debate is a farce. The freedom of association and of public procession is not an absolute right. Those who want to enjoy civil rights must discharge certain responsibilities. Elementary duties like civil behaviour, respect and inclusivity. The enjoyment of the right to procession also requires people to meet and accommodate the rights of other peoples.
As Ian Coulter of the CBI asked, "Where are the rights for the people trying to trade and build businesses?"
But evidently these people claim a special, exclusive and absolute right, and they claim it at the point of force and by violence. It's very much like hardline Muslims; think of the Muhammed cartoon, offend them and feel their wrath. This is exceptionally solipsistic and must be resisted.
Thirdly, to those who think the 12th of July has degenerated into a festival of drink-yer-f**king brains out, you'd be right. I'm saying the unsaid and so it needs said. So here it is: much of the parading isn't culture, for it’s neither open or tolerant, nor is it inclusive - not even for tourists and moderate unionists. This demands a serious critique. And here's the third party authority for my offensive observations.
The Belfast City Centre Management Report made a number of striking, but hardly surprising, observations on the state of the 12th:
One: "Visit Belfast received complaints from tourists who talked of "an intimidatory atmosphere" and "louts roaming around drunk"."
Two: "The condition of the public realm after the parades also remains a key issue."
Three: "50% of businesses reported an unfriendly family atmosphere and several cited rising tensions as being a turnoff for some consumers."
Four, a non-native resident commented on these findings:
"As someone who has lived here for quite a long time now, I can confirm that 12th July is absent a positive atmosphere. It's militaristic, nasty, sometimes vulgar, and not much fun."
In The Irish Times, Eamon McCann recalled the anecdote of the Protestant who called the Orange Order a "bunch of bigots quite undeserving of respect."
Fourthly, for those who think that loyalists represent everything that Britain stands against, you'd be right. For those who think that the dysfunction reaches top office, you'd also be right. Newton Emerson said that "it falls to unionist leaders to explain that the world has changed but not ended." But where Martin McGuinness calls out dissident republicans as "traitors to Ireland", people like deputy Lord Mayor Christopher Stalford and Junior Minister Jonathan bell prop up the brutality.
Unionism needs to do a McGuinness and reproach the boondocks and call them out for what they are: traitors to Britain. But if they cant do it they must take responsibility for not calling to book the jackboots on the ground. Otherwise political unionism will stand as apologists for thuggery and the real traitors to Britain.
Fifthly, if people think the campaign of self-pity, misinformation and exaggeration is sickening you'd be right. If we look at the facts, the situation and events have been grossly pulled and stretched out of proportions.
As Newton Emerson recently noted in The Sunday Times, unionist parades outnumber republican parades by fifteen to one. We also know that 550 parades were held on the 12th. Of those, only minor restrictions were made. To then say that civil rights have been curtailed is both grotesque and absurd.
To conclude. When you try to run communities on isolation, suspicion and a rejection of modernity, everything grinds to a halt.
When that happens, the failed community isn't going to blame the failure on itself. No. They'll say it's the neglect of others and a conspiracy against their culture. Then they’ll want to project violence and brutalism outward. But we can't be indifferent about that. We can't be indifferent about rogue communities and rogue ideas and rogue concepts.
All the burbling and babbling of police brutality and civil rights oppression is abject nonsense and an offence to modernity and the people who've brought us here. Loyalism is not the product of unemployment, but the creators of it. Loyalists are not the suppressed but the suppressors of modernity.
They hold us, the whole of normal Northern Ireland, hostage. Yet we don't say anything. We are in a fight with fanatics and you had better get used to it. As Alex Kane said, Northern Ireland is in big trouble. Our collective welfare is being attacked and undermined by a fanatical movement. You either stand up and show the nonsense for what it is, or you capitulate to the enemies of modernity and let all the good that has come to the north of Ireland unravel.