Send Bare Knuckle Travellers to Brussels

22nd Feb 2012

Sophisticated right thinking Corkonians will have turned their noses up at RTE’s documentary about bare knuckle fist fighting the other night.

This sort of uncivilised behaviour that happens north of our county bounds is up there with the rest of the carry-on that takes place outside Cork: Arthur’s Day in Temple Bar, riots for the Queen’s visit, GAA free-for-all’s in Port Laoise and most events in the North that involve more than three people.

'Vee haff decided to elect a new leader'.

In ‘Knuckle’ the Dublin station’s representative followed a number of camera-loving travellers who seem to spend a large portion of their lives getting excited about fighting each other and then pretending that they don’t actually want to be involved.  

Once a fight has taken place (or in their parlance, been ‘settled’) some other grievance is immediately concocted, drama that would put an evening at the Opera House to the test is applied and the blood cycle begins again.

The majority of this traveller-on-traveller violence seems to take place in order to allow groups of egotistical young men to appear on camera taunting their rivals – many clearly trying to imitate professional boxers at press conference as they desperately try to sell tickets and pay-per-views for otherwise drab heavy weight fights. You can’t but feel sorry for travellers who, like the rest of us, abhor this carry on.

The Irish negotiating team lies in wait

Anyone who has seen a bare knuckle fight in real life, on TV or on the internet knows that while beautifully toned big name boxers can often lose without getting badly hurt, in the world of travellers you lose a fight only when your face resembles a butcher’s table.

These fighters might be dog-rough but, to give them the only credit they deserve, they can fight like few else – one scrap in Sunday’s documentary went on for well over two hours.

The country is currently going through a prolonged self-examination where every facet of society and our economy is being audited for a competitive advantage over other states.

Long written off as uninterested in participating in greater Irish society perhaps a role for these terrifying Irishmen can be found among the ashes of the Celtic-Tiger.

The Dublin government’s deference to our European neighbours has been cringing. Weirdly, for a project that was originally based on equality between nations we now seem to have “leaders” in the French and German capitals who call the shots.

Pay this enormous debt you had nothing to do with please.

Why of course Monsieur!

It’s as if the Europeans are negotiating with Irish men who have never been in a fight in their lives. If Oli Rehn and the Troika were confronted with a bunch of these teak tough travellers acting on behalf of Ireland when they arrived into the Department of Finance things might not be so smooth for the European purse pinchers.

Enda wimps out: let's see Sarko try that move on a Quinn-Nevin

These boys wouldn’t sheep away and concede that “Ireland has its obligations”. No way boss. The travellers’ starting position for any negotiations would be that we didn’t do a thing wrong and if it’s ever mentioned again there’ll be serious trouble.

They would then boldy move the talks away from Irish debt and on to the amount of money the troika should be handing over to Ireland to guarantee their lives.

If the IMF refuse to come to Ireland to engage with our traveller friends then they’ll have a big surprise in store. The travellers can come to them. In fact, with bases all over northern Europe any negotiation team can have a duplicate set of cousins and uncles ready for action in any major European capital within hours.

They can go the long haul as well in case the IMF decide to tough it out because travellers are experts at the waiting game. If travellers got involved in politics they would make the Occupy Cork movement look like a one-night junior infants’ slumber party.  

Well used to setting up huge bases in fields and car parks in the blink of an eye, places like the Champs Elyseé could be rammed with caravans within hours of any hint of the words “Ireland” and “corporation tax” in the same speech from Paris.

They’d be regretting their no-borders trade policies and lamenting provocative talk about further austerity when travellers rock up to within metres of the Bundestag with truck loads of gates and tarmac ready for sale.

Want your drive done Frau Merkel?

Aside from the fact that they couldn’t do any worse than the elected stooges that messed up the economy in the first place, the most beneficial thing about giving these brutally tough men a go at managing the country’s finances would be the unequivocal straight talking nature of all speeches.

An' diss wans for Greece

With the current vagueness and uncertainty the markets would absolutely relish every threatening Youtube video posted from a dingy looking street in Longford.

If a bare knuckle fighting traveller says he is going to punch someone’s lights out or refuse to pay unsecure subordinated bond holders, you better take him at face value. If you’re a stock market trader and he says there’ll be no more austerity in Ireland then you better make plans for your investment portfolio before it becomes piebald poop.

If leaders don’t take heed then their countries will end up lying on the ground with Ireland’s new ambassadors standing over them offering to shake hands saying ‘no hard feelings there now, fair fight’.

We’ll see who’s in charge then. Boss.