by Richard A » Sat Dec 02, 2023 8:27 am
McGowan was not the only Irish republican who was persuaded that only violence would bring better treatment for Northern Irish Catholics. Although I do appreciate Heid's point of view. It's traditional for football fans across Britain to sing abuse at opposing fans ("We'll turn White Hart Lane into a public lavatory!"), but republicans in Scotland took it to a new level, even having a particular term of abuse for Rangers fans, until the Scottish football authorities finally did something about it. And Heid has friends who lost people during the Troubles, whereas I don't.
But still, I was a fan of the Pogues - although I never understood how Fairytale in New York, with its lyrics, became such a fixture of Christmas revelling. Maybe those lifting their 5th pint only focus on the ever louder all-pub refrain of "And the boys of the NYPD choir were singing Galway Bay". And yes, some of McGowan's songs openly celebrated the excess that finally finished him off. "I'll go into a bar and drink 15 pints of beer" or even, from the same song, the prophetic "I'll go in on my feet but I'll leave there on my back. But he did also give a voice to those society often ignores. "The Old Main Drag" is not elegant, but it makes the point - and one not a lot of others were making.
So yes, a deeply flawed man, but RIP Shane McGowan.