Kicking extremism in the UK

I grew up in the south of Scotland in a pretty deprived area, certainly not as bad as parts of Glasgow in terms of unemployment but an area that had few job opportunities, and that remains the case today.

Northern Irish politics is part of where I'm from. Mainly Unionist / Loyalist but also some Nationalist / Republican. The boats that take Rangers and Celtic fans across from Belfast were often filled with die hard political activists - whether it be one side or the other.

When I was young, I travelled to Belfast wearing my green Hibernian strip, thinking nothing of it. I was called a "fenian" and a "taig", now at that age I had no idea what that meant but later my father explained it was a bad idea to wear blue or green when taking the ferry.

This incident lasted with me a long time. When I studied at University I became friendly with people from both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland (as well as locals from Aberdeen). 

What happened was I started to get bitter. Bitter about the sectarian singing I heard from Rangers fans in particular. Bitter too about Celtic fans singing songs during a Remembrance service. 

This is why I despise the old firm - they are "political" football clubs. How many Republican Rangers fans do you know? How many Loyalist Celtic fans do you know?

Their football team and upbringing dictates their politics and to be honest I was drawn into that spectre for a while too.

I started sympathising with the IRA. Not the Real IRA or Continuity IRA but the "struggle" of the provisional movement during the troubles.

It got to the point where I saw Unionists as the enemies: all of them, which was wrong. Don't get me wrong, I don't sympathise for the few who have spat at me when attending a game at Ibrox but generally speaking I've had no personal attacks.

So I moved back to moderate politics. I am Labour. Now a friend of mine (Celtic fan) will say that automatically makes me a "unionist, loyalist traitor".

No it doesn't: I agree with the Labour party's policies and I think we need a change of government in 2015.

So I have calmed down and kicked the extremism which blighted my life for 2 or 3 years and I wish others do the same.

God Bless,

A