Paul Rouse: Under layers of truth and history, Pauw's 'respect' should be lasting chorus

Manager said she didn't recognise song's significance 'because I am a foreigner'. But her response cut to core of complex issue

Fri, 14 Oct, 2022 - 08:26

Paul Rouse

Vera Pauw made history this week by leading the Irish women’s team to a first ever World Cup final. She followed this with a public history lesson that revealed once more her decency, her courage and her deep intelligence.

Her response to the video of Irish players singing “Ooh ah, up the 'Ra',” while celebrating their 1-0 win over Scotland, offers a way for Irish people to think about their recent history in a fashion that is almost entirely absent at the moment.

She did not indulge in excuses or in the disingenuousness of whataboutery. Instead, she was unequivocal in her apology for what she understood to be simply wrong. And in the apology, she set out a worldview that underlines the importance of respect.

She said: “Your freedom ends when you step into the freedom of somebody else, that is what we say to each other always. You can do whatever you want, but as soon as you hurt somebody it's wrong. And we're sorry for that and we want to offer our deepest apology to the people that we have offended.”

These comments were made as part of a series of answers: "We were made aware of a clip that has gone viral, out of the dressing-room. From the bottom of our heart, we are so sorry because there is no excuse for hurting people. It was unnecessary. I have spoken already with several players about it and the one who posted it is devastated, she is crying in her room. She is so, so sorry. But there is no excuse for it.

“If I would have been there, to be honest, I would not have recognised (the song's significance) because I am a foreigner, I don't know the song, I don't know what it means. We cannot hurt people. It was part of the moment but that is not an excuse. So it is an educational moment also. We need to take responsibility at any moment, in any time.”

"People said to me, 'If it was in private....' No, even in a private atmosphere you cannot do it because respect is something that carries you through everything, through your whole life and we have that value as the highest point.”

“I asked 'Did you know what you were singing?' And they said, 'Of course we know it but we didn't feel it. It was not meant to hurt anyone'. But that is no excuse. Deeply sorry. Even if it's in the emotions of the celebrations, it's as wrong as when it's planned. It shouldn't have happened.”

Manager Vera Pauw speaks to the media in Dublin the morning after the Republic of Ireland WNT qualify for the FIFA 2023 Women's World Cup. INPHO/Laszlo Geczo

It is exactly right to explain that the singing of “Ooh ah, up the 'Ra',” was “part of the moment”. It was instinctive, celebratory and no fair-thinking person would seriously argue that the women rejoicing a historic achievement in that dressing-room were making a political point. They were in the ecstasy of knowing they had just lived their dreams and in the process had created a genuinely historic achievement the importance of which travels far beyond sport.

The question is why was “Ooh ah, up the 'Ra',” sung in the dressingroom as “part of the moment”?

Partly, the answer is generational. None of the women who were singing and dancing can remember the war in the north, its brutality, its sectarian aspect, the abundant callous disregard for human life.

Having not lived through those decades, they know it as history. But as the bloodshed of the 1970s and 1980s recedes into the past, it is being recast. The story of these decades is being reworked by those who wish to take it and manipulate it into a political product in all its ahistorical inaccuracy.

They are facilitated in this by the obvious changes that are happening in Ireland and in Britain. The omnishambles in post-Brexit London where Tories find new ways, with stunning frequency, to undermine their own country has provided a context in which the idea of the United Kingdom no longer existing is increasingly plausible.

In Ireland, the demographic changes in the north and the uncertainty around the border after Brexit have created conditions which have allowed people to talk seriously about the prospect of a United Ireland.

These things – and much more – have conspired to foster once again the promulgation of a very ‘green’ history; this history which runs through popular culture is incredibly powerful.

It can be heard in the ballads belted out from barstools.

It can be seen in the vivid murals that stand on gable walls.

It can be read in posts on social media.

And it can be worn as the slogan on a t-shirt.

This is a normalisation which extends into a chant in a dressingroom, where singing “Ooh ah, up the 'Ra',” sits easily beside and indistinguishable from singing a Taylor Swift song.

In the longer run, what happened in the dressingroom will be essentially irrelevant beside the impact on Irish society of a women’s team qualifying for the World Cup. It both signifies the extent to which Ireland has changed over the past 50 years in terms of the place of women and signifies also the potential for further change created by the ambitions it will surely create in a generation of young girls. Basically, what happened on the field is what will endure; the players are a credit to themselves and their manager and their country.

But that does not mean that the chant in the dressingroom cannot itself also be of positive impact. In her comments, Vera Pauw talked about how this was “an educational moment also”. And she’s right in this.

International sport lends itself to banging tribal drums and reciting tribal chants. The paraphernalia of international sport are flag and anthem and emblem. This is particularly the case with soccer. The brilliant historian Eric Hobsbawm once wrote that “the imagined community of millions seems more real as a team of 11 named people.”

So, a few questions: In a United Ireland, an all-island team would obviously field as “Ireland”, in qualifying competitions to get to the World Cup or the European Championships. But what would the flag of that team look like, or the jersey, or the emblem? What will the anthem be? And what are the songs that will be sung in the dressingrooms and from the terraces? To whom will that team belong?

It is in the proposed answers to such questions – and countless others like them – that the reality of any commitment to, or desire for, unification will be properly revealed.

And it will be revealed in the way history is considered. It is easy to bathe in the warm and familiar waters of populist rhetoric, to strike a pose. It is, by contrast, much harder to engage with the cultural preferences, the history, and the traditions and identity choices of others.

When you go past slogans or chorus lines, layers of truth reveal themselves. These layers tell of a history that is exceptionally complicated in the reality of its shades of political belief and identity.

This history is something that is worthy of proper consideration and deserves more than simplification. And to use Vera Pauw’s word, it is something that can only truly be founded on “respect”.

Paul Rouse is professor of history at University College Dublin