When the System Does Not Provide Justice by Ann M. Gaughan Associate Editor, Northern Ireland Human Rights Review ********** I'm sick at heart. I've just returned from listening to three days of tales that would turn your stomach, tales of human misery suffered at the hands of an abusive and unjust system. I sat in room after room filled with survivors of terror, the terror of the state. Nobody knows or seems to care about the everyday pain these people suffer. For the most part, the attention of the world looks briefly at their lives only when one of their community explodes in rage and frustration. Then the 'respectable people' cluck their tongues, condemn violence and call for troops to be sent in. It suddenly occurred to me one day as I looked around the dining area at the Polytechnic of North London where the Northern Ireland Human Rights Assembly was being held that not one table in the hall had been spared the pain of violence and injustice meted out by government. British security forces killed Margaret Caraher's young husband, Dr. Sean McGovern's brother, Nial Farrell's sister, Tony Doherty's father and Jim McCabe's wife. At every table sat a person who had been beaten or strip searched or harassed or censored or prevented from moving about in peace or even speaking his or her own language. I travelled thousands of miles to hear about the awful, brutal beatings at the hands of the keepers of the peace, the guardians of the public security. In targeted areas, citizens are always at risk of being physically and psychologically assaulted by the agents of the state toward which they are then expected to demonstrate their loyalty. This treatment can come in the street, at home or in custody. At the moment, the interrogation centers like Castlereagh are under some scrutiny by international organizations like Amnesty International, Helsinki Watch and the United Nations. But ask anyone in the community, ask any solicitor who has tried to defend the citizens from the state, security force brutality in nothing new. It is part of life, especially for those perceived as the 'minority'. Ask anyone from the African-American community in Los Angeles (or Philadelphia, New York, Washington etc.) ask any civil rights attorney in the country if the Rodney King beating comes as a surprise. Ask the young African-American university students on local Philadelphia television the night after the King decision was announced if being hassled or harassed or even beaten because of who you are is an isolated event. In Northern Ireland or north Philadelphia, along with the enduring economic discrimination, this is the hidden violence that nobody condemns. At the Human RIghts Assembly, civil rights advocates discussed some possible correctives to the problems in Northern Ireland. Tape interviews at Castlereagh, they urged and bring back the jury trial. Yet in Simi Valley, there was a videotape and a trial by jury. Much as the Widgery Tribunal in the wake of Derry's 1972 Bloody Sunday massacre was moved to Coleraine, a location where many of the victimized nationalists feared to tread, the King trial was more to a conservative, predominantly white area. The jury selected was truly one not composed of the defendant's peers: no African-Americans, on one who could identify with the experience of the inner-city minority. The jury saw the video tape and said the policemen acted lawfully as they beat and kicked King. If the Royal Ulster Constabulary knew that the stark evidence of violence would bring such a rousing approval, they would be hanging the cameras tomorrow. Left unmolested, the system through its defenders who perceive themselves as dependent on its continued unchanged character will act to protect itself. And then the community explodes. In Belfast or in L.A. And the victims are once again victimized when the rage and frustration and anger and hurt have no focus and are turned inward on the community. The short-sighted and the opportunistic, some, as in Northern Ireland, within their own community, blame the 'terrorists' or the 'rioters' and condemn their violence. Solving the root problems, a process that will of necessity upset a corrupt status quo, is bypassed for a quick fix, a return to the 'acceptable level of violence.' There are some differences in the U.S. The generalized disapproval of the 'not guilty' verdict in the King case extends more broadly outside the directly afflicted community than it would do in Northern Ireland. As opposed to the finality of the result under U.K. law at the conclusion of a criminal proceeding of this sort, the United States government may now charge the officers who beat King with violations of federal civil rights laws. Maybe the four men will even be convicted of some offense. But at the end of the day, the system that permits the violence to continue is not being seriously challenged in either the United States or the United Kingdom. I acknowledge the criticism of friends and foes who point out that work on highlighting human rights and civil rights abuses in Ireland is a sort of hypocrisy when there is so much to be done right here in the U.S. But my response, as I continue to do what I feel must be done is simple: the issues are the same. By exposing the inherent abuses here and there we must focus attention on them. We must let the power structures know we know and care. We must convince them that restructuring is not only the right thing to do, it is absolutely key to any sort of continued survival for any of us. It is in the self-interest of the states, and this may be the only language they understand, to change and change radically. If not, the fire next time may be one beyond even the states' power to contain. taken from the April 1992 issue of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Review. The Review is available by subscription from P.O. Box 357 Gwynedd, PA 19436-0357 USA $20 per year.