IT’S unanimous. The Portrush loyalist parade on the Saturday of the British Open was a huge success. The bands cut a colourful spectacle, the music was first-class and locals, tourists and curious golf aficianados alike all enjoyed the evening tremendously.

The trouble is... that’s the unanimous opinion of politial unionism. But it would be churlish of those of us not of the reformed faith and not fans of the band scene to deny that the event passed off rather more successfully than many had feared.

It falls to Squinter to point out that social media is replete with footage of bands and band followers doing the stuff that makes these parades anathema to Catholics – and to non-Catholics who think mocking and baiting Catholics should not be a central part of unionist and loyalist culture.

As usual this year, Squinter’s seen scores and scores of online examples of appalling behaviour. These include on the golf weekend the playing of grossly insulting sectarian tunes on the streets of Portrush and outside the local Orange Hall, to wit, The Billy Boys and No Pope of Rome; and the singing and playing of grossly insulting sectarian tunes and UVF ditties on the platform of Portrush railway station and inside the Belfast-bound trains.

The success/failure of the Portrush parade came as the 2025 Féile loomed and as unionist politicians in the absence of the Wolfe Tones studied the Féile programme for examples of republican perfidy with the kind of forensic eye that Squinter kind of wishes they had focused on the Brexit programme.

In the event they came up with a 20-year-old children’s GAA tournament named after Joe Cahill, but they fell on it with a distinct lack of conviction and they condemned it with the kind of lacklustre rhetoric that suggested they knew even their own voters weren’t buying it.

That’s one event in a doorstop of a programme covering countless events across two weeks. But it’s one event too many, and it’s one event that’s sufficient for the usual suspects to call for Féile’s funding to be reviewed or – if the speaker was sufficiently staunch – axed.

None of these estimable ladies and gentlemen had a single word to say all summer about the deluge of sectarian tunes, songs and chants that we hear at every marching season’s July zenith. We know that they believe a single objectionable event – be it the Wolfe Tones or a kids GAA blitz – is sufficient to condemn Féile as a whole and warrants a withdrawal or reduction of financial support. So how many renditions and displays of anti-Catholic, racist or intimidatory bile did we witness over the Eleventh and Twelfth? 100? 200? A thousand? Maybe somebody counted, Squinter certainly didn’t.

And it’s not as if the Keepers of the Loyal Flame didn’t see the same clips as the rest of us did, for they took the opportunity when said clips appeared not to condemn the behaviour or berate the perpetrators, but to hose around allegations of a plot against the Orange. 

•Crucifixion threats on a pissy mattress? The rebels are at their work again.
•Migrant mannequins burned in a boney boat? Why do they hate our art?

‘We’re up to our knees in Fenian blood’ in Bradbury Place? Why won’t they just leave us alone to get on with the hating?
•‘No Pope of Rome’ outside City Hall? They won’t even let us worship in our own unique way.

So, brethren, you’ve seen the clips that Squinter’s seen, don’t pretend you haven’t. You’ve made it clear that with the Wolfe Tones out of the way Féile is again holed below the moral water line this time by the Joe Cahill kids GAA tournament. 

By your own equation 1 GAA x Féile = -£. So what does bad behaviour times infinity mean for the marching season?
Total shutdown?
Skip a year?
Ban on fans?
Funding review?
Funding cut?

The truth is that not a single one – not one – of those claiming that one event invalidates Féile thinks the Eleventh/Twelfth is in any way devalued by a torrent of bigotry, sectarianism and racism. Local authority money must still flow to the Orange. Arts Council money must still be given to bands for instruments because The Billy Boys doesn’t play itself. Orangefest remains utterly unsullied by the appalling behaviours contained therein.

It’s traditional.