Orange Order: Veto, Hypocrisy, and Historical Exposure

🚫 The Orange Order's Sectarian Veto

In July 2025, the Goldsprings of Comber Orange Lodge coerced North Down Cricket Club into cancelling a cross-community summer camp. Their objection? The inclusion of East Belfast GAA—a club known for peace-building and inclusion.

The Lodge cited vague "concerns" about the GAA's cultural affiliations and demanded that the GAA first become "fully inclusive and sensitive to the history and identity of the Protestant, Unionist and Loyalist (PUL) community."

This was not cultural concern. It was sectarian gatekeeping.

📌 The GAA Has Never Endorsed Paramilitary Activity

The GAA has never, at any point, endorsed paramilitary violence. British government documents from the Troubles confirm:

"There is no evidence to suggest a general involvement at any level by the GAA in terrorism or other paramilitary activity."

While some individual members may have held nationalist views, the organization itself has consistently promoted cultural pride through sport—not armed struggle.

🟢 The GAA's Inclusive Evolution

• Full-time Diversity & Inclusion Officer
• GAA for ALL: wheelchair hurling, intercultural camps, LGBTQI+ outreach
• Anti-racism campaigns and inclusive club initiatives
• Cross-community clubs like East Belfast GAA defy sectarian boundaries

The GAA has expanded its ethos—not diluted it. It is now a platform for shared identity and peace-building.

🔥 The Orange Order's Paramilitary Proximity

While the Orange Order has never officially endorsed paramilitary violence, it has harbored loyalist paramilitary elements:

• The Orange Volunteers (OV) drew members directly from the Order
• Weapons were stored in Orange Halls
• OV leader Bob Marno was a senior Orangeman and keyholder of a hall containing British military files

Despite these ties, the Order rarely condemned loyalist violence with the clarity it demands from others.

🧨 Bigotry, Hypocrisy, and Sectarian Control

The Orange Order's intervention reveals its true posture:

• Bigoted in intent
• Short-sighted in impact
• Hypocritical in historical context

They fear unity more than division. What terrifies them is children playing together—refusing to inherit the divisions their elders cling to.

"This isn't cultural leadership. It's cowardice."

🏛️ Symbolic Reversal: Stormont Hosts Unity

After the veto, organizers relocated the event to Stormont—the former headquarters of apartheid governance in Northern Ireland. Between 1921 and 1972, Stormont presided over:

• Housing and employment discrimination
• Gerrymandering and suppression of civil rights
• Internment without trial and violent policing

Now, Stormont hosts the very unity the Orange Order tried to suppress. The irony is surgical:

"The building that once codified exclusion now hosts the children it tried to divide."