Originally Posted by owen10:
“How come your team are not playing the Northern Ireland anthem before games”
I dont wanna get controversial, but here goes. GSTQ is the official national anthem for Ulster. I am speaking for myself now, not as a Nationalist, but someone who sees us sharing an anthem with England, as being a little silly, as Ulster / Northern Ireland / Six Counties (take your pick) is a very different place from England. I know this, as I have lived in both regions.
What Ulster needs is an anthem which gets away from a potential source of conflict and unfortunately, GSTQ does provoke some strong emotions on both sides, and I think that Ulster needs to get away from these strong emotions as much as possible, because there is too much hatred over there.
Danny Boy / Londonderry Air has been proposed by a few people as being a choon which could stir Ulster people up, but in a way that does not divide them, and I think that it would be a great anthem for the little country. It may also encourage more Catholic people to support the NI team, as to be honest, NI is the country / province where they were born and Ulster Catholics have more in common with Ulster Protestants than they do with Republic of Ireland Catholics.
It is a sad fact that the NI football team is supported more by the Protestant people, whereas Catholic people tend to go with the Republic team. I would like to see this change.
I also think that the two religions should be educated together from as early an age, as possible, but we need to be aware that the Catholic church in Ulster prefers Catholic children to be educated in a catholic system.
As the other poster has said, at the moment, there is no appetite to change the football anthem away from GSTQ, but I, personally, would like to see it changed to one which can unite both religions to get behind the NI team.
Hopefully, this will change in the nearer, rather than the far future, for the good of NI as it stands.