Today There Still Exists Tension Between Ireland And Great Britain. It Is Not Difficult To Find News About Some Skirmish Betwee

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Today there still exists tension between Ireland and Great Britain. It is not difficult to find news about some skirmish between the two. Some examples include car bombings, drive-by shootings and other forms of terrorism. Imagine a British citizen walking to his car and a car full of people drive by shooting at him. It is not a pretty thought. History tells us that most of these occurrences stem from adverse feelings from the Irish towards the British government extending as far back as the fourteenth century and the unification of Ireland with Great Britain. However, not all Irish protests are violent. Artists, musicians, and writers often protest without using violence. U2 and Sinead O’Connor are good examples of modern day protests, but none was more effective than Jonathan Swift. It is clear that Swift’s satire stemmed from the frustration he felt with the events that were happening around him at his time. Jonathan Swift’s political satire, “A Modest Proposal”, is a direct reflection of the British government’s cruelty and insensitivity towards the Irish that allowed the citizens of Ireland to self-destruct, live in poverty, and starve to death.
    The British government allowed Ireland to self-destruct. Ireland divided itself into two groups: the Northern Protestants and the Catholics. While Northern Ireland was content with the British rule, the rest of Ireland suffered and was not content. This is
because the British government seemed to favor Northern Ireland, who were considered loyal Protestants. This favoritism is displayed in the different acts that the British Parliament was passing. In 1695, several acts were passed that limited the rights of Catholics in not only arms bearing and horse owning, but education as well. In the same year, the Catholic clergy was banished. In 1704, Legislation restricted even more rights of Catholics in land holding and holding public offices (tests were required). “…all conspired to…reduce the Catholic land owning class to a mere fraction” (Curtis 291). These restrictions enraged the Catholics, who were the majority in Ireland. In addition, a Toleration Act was passed for Protestant dissenters in 1719. In The Oxford History of Ireland, R.F. Foster states that to be a Protestant or a Catholic in eighteenth-century Ireland indicated more than mere religious allegiance: it represented opposing political cultures, and conflicting views of history (136). Now that Ireland was divided, the Irish citizens quarreled among

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