AS I am sitting at my kitchen table listening to another discussion on BBC Radio Ulster, it is really hard to put into words the thoughts that are running through my head.
I will start by saying our young brother, Paul Armstrong (18), was abducted, taken away in broad daylight by the UVF, brutally tortured and murdered on November 8, 1974.
Words are very important but, depending on who is uttering the words, they can be very hurtful and soul destroying.
I would like to pose a question? Do the powers that be, or indeed not be (as present we have no functioning government), ever sit and really think of the impact they have on families? In our case, for nearly five decades, we listen to remarks such as draw a line, forget the past, get on with your lives. Shame on them.
For 25 years, our family never openly spoke about our young brother Paul, as I have alluded to in the book I wrote: 'A Young Life Stolen'.
A Young Life Stolen by Gerry Armstrong
I thought long and hard before putting the family narrative out in the public domain, but I am content that I finally told the Armstrong family narrative about a family who were failed by too many over almost five decades.
We had Eames-Bradley several years ago, who decided to throw money at what they in their wisdom must have thought would solve the problem of a very troubled past that I am being constantly told to forget. Now we have this latest debacle, re compensation.
Please, make up your minds – you want our family to draw a line, yet for far too long the issue of legacy is talked about, debated on radio and television and reported in many press outlets on an almost daily basis.
I accept everyone has an opinion. My opinion, for what it is worth, about this toxic subject of legacy is that it should have been taken out of the hands of politicians, pundits and the many who have over too many years used insensitive and hurtful words; walk in our shoes for a while.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, which I suppose is their right. Here is mine: I refuse to let my brother Paul ever be forgotten.
Gerry Armstrong,
Belfast
