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Were the Gordon Riots Justified?

Were the Gordon Riots Justified?

  • Historically and categorically yes.

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Historically yes, categorically no.

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Historically no, categorically yes.

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Historically and categorically no.

    Votes: 1 100.0%

  • Total voters
    1

XDU

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As an aside, Donald Trump was a Presbyterian before becoming an evangelical, and Justin Trudeau is a Roman Catholic.
 
Nobody actually cares what religion they are.
Religion was exactly what the Gordon Riots were about.

What's strange is how the riots happened despite how the Revolutionaries thought anti-Catholicism was patriotic. It's almost as if Gordon was a revolutionary himself.

Trump's faith resonates with that sense of patriotism today, and Trudeau's Catholicism is treated as a no-kidding point since his leftism is associated with the internationalist hierarchy of the Catholic Church.
 
Religion was exactly what the Gordon Riots were about.

What's strange is how the riots happened despite how the Revolutionaries thought anti-Catholicism was patriotic. It's almost as if Gordon was a revolutionary himself.

Trump's faith resonates with that sense of patriotism today, and Trudeau's Catholicism is treated as a no-kidding point since his leftism is associated with the internationalist hierarchy of the Catholic Church.

<---- look.

I don't care.
 
How am i suppose to judge the justification of a riot that was 200 years before i was born??
 
How am i suppose to judge the justification of a riot that was 200 years before i was born??

How else can he describe to you how everything in the world is based on Presbyterianism and Catholicism?

Right down to why little Timmy's goldfish died.
 
How am i suppose to judge the justification of a riot that was 200 years before i was born??
...by studying history and judging the riot on its own merits.

That's why the choices are split the way they are.
 
The only thing i know when it comes to dead goldfish is "burials in the bowl".

You're clearly some sort of Presbyterian. Catholics would do the matchbox in the back yard thing.
 
Any sort of violence directed at the catholic church is probably justified
 
Two cults fighting, oh boy...
Religion is ****ing lame.
 
Catholics and Protestants are equally full of shit, but the riots were borne out of idiotic fearmongering bigotry. Catholics only happened to be the target because they're a minority that you could scapegoat.
 
XDU:

No the riots were not justified. The Protestant mob was protesting the government's decision to grant relief to Roman Catholics from loss of rights and religious suppression in the name of combating "Popery" and ultramonainism. The mob couldn't wait to let the Parliament fully debate its petition delivered by Lord Gordon and ran amok. There is nothing justified in this shameful display of violent sectarianism. But I can understand why Americans would think this was yet another intolerable act as it was designed to encourage more Roman Catholics to join the British Army due to man-power shortages caused by fighting the American War of Independence. That last fact was completely lost on the 44,000 who rioted in St. Georges Field and surroundings in 1780. They just hated and were fearful of the Roman Catholics and the Church. Anglican zealotry and religious xenophobia (as Catholics were not viewed as real English/British/UK subjects). Totally unjustified riots.

Cheers and be well.
Pax Vobiscum.
Evilroddy.
 
Last edited:
Catholics and Protestants are equally full of shit, but the riots were borne out of idiotic fearmongering bigotry. Catholics only happened to be the target because they're a minority that you could scapegoat.
To be honest, the religious aspect of the riots is a distraction. I wanted to see if anyone was going to read about the details of the event and compare it to today's civil unrest.
 
XDU:

No the riots were not justified. The Protestant mob was protesting the government's decision to grant relief to Roman Catholics from loss of rights and religious suppression in the name of combating "Popery" and ultramonainism. The mob couldn't wait to let the Parliament fully debate its petition delivered by Lord Gordon and ran amok. There is nothing justified in this shameful display of violent sectarianism. But I can understand why Americans would think this was yet another intolerable act as it was designed to encourage more Roman Catholics to join the British Army due to man-power shortages caused by fighting the American War of Independence. That last fact was completely lost on the 44,000 who rioted in St. Georges Field and surroundings in 1780. They just hated and were fearful of the Roman Catholics and the Church. Anglican zealotry and religious xenophobia (as Catholics were not viewed as real English/British/UK subjects). Totally unjustified riots.

Cheers and be well.
Pax Vobiscum.
Evilroddy.
I'll get back to this in a little bit. Doing dinner now.
 
...so the thought I'm having is at the time, King George III came from the House of Hanover which was distinctly Lutheran. That created an interesting situation when considering how he ruled as the head of the Church of England since it suggested he was neither pro Anglo-Catholic High Church nor pro-Calvinist Low Church. His sense of religious self-determination wasn't individually based either, but nationally based as a follow-through of the Treaty of Westphalia following the 30 Years War. Furthermore, he supported the Quebec Act before the Revolution, so it's clear he wasn't anti-Catholic. Even stranger, Thomas Paine described King George as a Jesuit in Common Sense despite how the Jesuits were disbanded a few years before that was published. Even stranger than that is how John Caroll, the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence, maintained the Jesuit Order in the United States during the Revolution after the Order was disbanded.

(Sources:
https://brill.com/view/journals/rpjs/2/2/article-p1_1.xml?language=en )

Catholic Emancipation seems rather controversial in light of all this, especially since the main point at the time was to recruit more soldiers to fight in the army, primarily from Ireland. This is a bit of a slap in the face since so many Irish were compelled or forced to leave their homeland in the first place from the onset of the Protestant Ascendancy. People like to say the Irish were indentured servants, but they really weren't. They weren't allowed to own real estate in their homeland and were punished aggressively by Cromwell. The idea of them joining the army to fight against colonists who were opposing their oppressors which included the descendants of their brethren would seem self-destructive.

(Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/1971/03/06/archives/to-hell-or-to-connaught.html )

In turn, Gordon's Protestant Association seemed to be overreacting naively such that a double negative was at hand. Ordinarily, yes, the oppression of Catholics would be unjustified, but "liberating" Catholics just to fight a war they didn't belong in would be backwards. Plenty of rioters in addition to Gordon himself didn't support continuing the fight against the Revolution either, and the Revolution happened to afford the French and Indian War which was sparked from the Calvinist low church Lee Family from the Ohio Company of Virginia trying to settle the Ohio Valley in Catholic New France. If anything, Calvinists were opposing Catholics having to fight a war to enforce affording a war of Calvinists against Catholics.

What frustrates all of this is how Gordon lost his audience with King George and how Parliament dismissed his petition when his gathering confronted the House of Commons. Peaceful means were employed only to be rejected. The political situation seemed full of doublespeak as if Gordon was trying to appear flexible in order to restore his political career as a prior MP who criticized all sides in Parliament whether in government or opposition, but Parliament rallied against him.

Police weren't deployed, local Irish neighborhoods were attacked, and the army ultimately had to come out. The constitutional monarchy of Britain seemed jeopardized which ironically vilified the concern that Catholics would bring absolute monarchy back to Britain.

The conclusion I'd make is the riots seemed justified, but on accident, not on purpose.

(Reading more about the riots now here:
)
 
Religion was exactly what the Gordon Riots were about.

What's strange is how the riots happened despite how the Revolutionaries thought anti-Catholicism was patriotic. It's almost as if Gordon was a revolutionary himself.

Trump's faith resonates with that sense of patriotism today, and Trudeau's Catholicism is treated as a no-kidding point since his leftism is associated with the internationalist hierarchy of the Catholic Church.
Hmmm no. You’re thinking of the Comintern
 
Hmmm no. You’re thinking of the Comintern
I'm saying there are people who believe Catholicism and communism are no different.

I disagree with them, but I know where they're coming from.
 
...so the thought I'm having is at the time, King George III came from the House of Hanover which was distinctly Lutheran. That created an interesting situation when considering how he ruled as the head of the Church of England since it suggested he was neither pro Anglo-Catholic High Church nor pro-Calvinist Low Church. His sense of religious self-determination wasn't individually based either, but nationally based as a follow-through of the Treaty of Westphalia following the 30 Years War. Furthermore, he supported the Quebec Act before the Revolution, so it's clear he wasn't anti-Catholic. Even stranger, Thomas Paine described King George as a Jesuit in Common Sense despite how the Jesuits were disbanded a few years before that was published. Even stranger than that is how John Caroll, the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence, maintained the Jesuit Order in the United States during the Revolution after the Order was disbanded.
...
In turn, Gordon's Protestant Association seemed to be overreacting naively such that a double negative was at hand. Ordinarily, yes, the oppression of Catholics would be unjustified, but "liberating" Catholics just to fight a war they didn't belong in would be backwards. Plenty of rioters in addition to Gordon himself didn't support continuing the fight against the Revolution either, and the Revolution happened to afford the French and Indian War which was sparked from the Calvinist low church Lee Family from the Ohio Company of Virginia trying to settle the Ohio Valley in Catholic New France. If anything, Calvinists were opposing Catholics having to fight a war to enforce affording a war of Calvinists against Catholics.

What frustrates all of this is how Gordon lost his audience with King George and how Parliament dismissed his petition when his gathering confronted the House of Commons. Peaceful means were employed only to be rejected. The political situation seemed full of doublespeak as if Gordon was trying to appear flexible in order to restore his political career as a prior MP who criticized all sides in Parliament whether in government or opposition, but Parliament rallied against him.

Police weren't deployed, local Irish neighborhoods were attacked, and the army ultimately had to come out. The constitutional monarchy of Britain seemed jeopardized which ironically vilified the concern that Catholics would bring absolute monarchy back to Britain.

The conclusion I'd make is the riots seemed justified, but on accident, not on purpose.

(Reading more about the riots now here:
)

XDU:

Quote edited for word count.

Wow. The level of detail you are using goes far beyond my fifty-years-old recollection of fourth and lower-fifth form history and general education. So I'll have to do some catch-up reading before I can come up to anywhere near your level of proficiency in this matter.

When, as a student, I studied this topic, there was much more emphasis on the secular reasons for the riots being so destructive and for the Army's response being so brutal. We focused on the savagery of the Georgian legal system and the profligate use of hanging even for minor offenses as triggers for the widespread violence, destruction and the savage suppression of the riots by the army. We saw the attacks on prisons like Newgate as a more nebulous version of the Bastille in 1789 France and speculated whether this might have been an abortive popular revolution as succeeded across the English Channel. While the religious sectarianism and the hate/fear of Catholicism was covered, it was not in the detail which you have offered in your post. So I have some homework to do before getting back to you. That may take a few days, at least!

Cheers and be well.
Evilroddy.
 
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XDU:

Quote edited for word count.

Wow. The level of detail you are using goes far beyond my fifty-years-old recollection of fourth and lower-fifth form history and general education. So I'll have to do some catch-up reading before I can come up to anywhere near your level of proficiency in this matter.

When, as a student, I studied this topic, there was much more emphasis on the secular reasons for the riots being so destructive and for the Army's response being so brutal. We focused on the savagery of the Georgian legal system and the profligate use of hanging even for minor offenses as triggers for the widespread violence, destruction and the savage suppression of the riots by the army. We saw the attacks on prisons like Newgate as a more nebulous version of the Bastille in 1789 France and speculated whether this might have been an abortive popular revolution as succeeded across the English Channel. While the religious sectarianism and the hate/fear of Catholicism was covered, it was not in the detail which you have offered in your post. So I have some homework to do before getting back to you. That may take a few days, at least!

Cheers and be well.
Evilroddy.
To be honest, I'm not familiar with Americans learning about the Gordon Riots at all.

It's one of those weird situations when people who don't learn about something normally end up going into extra detail and unusual angles than those who do learn about it normally.

Reading this atm:
 
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