Talk:Alfie Byrne

message: I have discovered an article about Alfie Byrne. He is clearly the same person as Alfred Byrne so the two articles should be merged. The articles give different details about particular parts of his career. The Alfie article has more detail about his career in Dublin local government. 
The only inconsistency I see is when Byrne served in the Seanad. I took the details in Alfred from the Oireachtas website which confirms the dates of his service in the Dáil and Seanad. The Alfie article is mistaken about the dates of the Seanad service. --Gary J 23:00, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: Explaining my edits:
# The Guardian article that is cited says that The Dubliner magazine that White publisher was sued for libel, as does this Telegraph article. It does not say that White was sued. And none of this has anything to do with Alfred Byrne who died before Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren were born.
# spell out acronyms on first use per WP:ACRONYM
# "modelled" not "modeled" per Irish spelling
# I've linked Mussolini, Hitler and the Brownshirts as relevant links
# remove repeated links per WP:REPEATLINK
# copyedits to improve readability
Ground Zero | t 15:23, 9 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Edits

message: Was Byrne a Fascist or did he have Fascist sympathies? Was he a Fascist for all of his career or part of it? Did he give a Nazi salute (its unclear from the picture), or was he going all with the crowd, like the Queen salute controversy? Snappy (talk) 17:44, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I have removed or edited each of the above sentences singly, giving clear edit summaries in each case. If there is any attempt to re-instate any of them, it can be reverted on sight. The editors can be reported for edit-warring. The timing and similarity of the edits suggest that a sockpuppet investigation may be in order.  Scolaire (talk) 15:26, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually I want to comment specifically on the Getty Images photo. As a photographer of more than 25 years, I have very carefully reviewed the image and I do not see any arm raised that has a dark suited sleeve like Byrne that could possibly be his in the area he is standing. There is a gray jacket sleeve in front of his face and a light coloured shirt over his shoulder but it appears quite clear that Byrne is not raising his arm at all. There is a small portion of his right shoulder showing over the arm of the gray jacketed arm in front of him and seeing as he is standing somewhat forward of that man it is impossible for his complete arm to be obscured by that man raised arm. Something would be showing and so would some of his hand due to their juxtaposition. Also seeing as the lighting is coming from the upper right of the photo, about 1 or 2 o'clock, if his arm was raised in salute it would cause some shadow on his own face or shirt and there is none at all. To me it looks like he has his hands behind his back and he is not saluting. The most natural position for someone saluting is for this other arm to be at their side and quite obviously his left arm is behind him. There are all telltale signs that have not been analysed which have caused a false interpretation of this image. Look at it carefully and you will come to the same conclusion unless your only desire is to see him saluting. So all it proves is that he attended a meeting of the Blueshirts in Dublin, nothing more nothing less. ww2censor (talk) 16:39, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: That's not what I see. I'm assuming that Alfie Byrne is the man in the mayoral chain with the distinctive white moustache to the right of O'Duffy in the photograph (not to O'Duffy's right, as the caption says). Compare the images at Ricorso.net. I see his left shoulder (on the right of the photograph), under the (presumably) blue-shirted arm that is casting a shadow on his face. What looks like his left hand is lying open on his thigh. From his right shoulder there appears to be coming an arm in a dark sleeve with a white shirt cuff showing. I can't see anybody else whose arm it might be; to be obscured, the person would have to be even shorter than Alfie. Behind that arm is the arm of the gray jacketed man behind him. There is nobody in front of him.  He is inclined to his left, which would happen naturally if you raised your right arm, but not if your right arm was behind your back. All in all, the immediate impression the photograph gave me – and the impression it still gives me – is of Alfie with his arm raised. I don't have any particular "desire" to see him saluting; I just do.  Scolaire (talk) 17:18, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah Scolaire, I see what you are saying. The Getty Images caption is not entirely clear; Byrne is we presume, as you suggest, actually the man to O'Duffy's lefthand side so my observations are based on a wrong identity, so I have struck my comments. If you like you can delete them entirely. ww2censor (talk) 21:31, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: No problem. It's no harm to put on record that we have a consensus that the photograph shows what it is said to show.  Scolaire (talk) 21:34, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

text: I'm afraid we're getting away from the purpose of the talk page at this point. The talk page is not meant for information gathering for an exhibition – worthy though that may be – but for discussing improvements to the article. From the point of view of the article, the communications you say you have from various academics are original research. Any edits to the article have to be based on reliable published sources. While Getty Images do not describe the salute as a fascist salute, they do describe O'Duffy as the "Irish fascist leader". A good quality published source would be needed before you could say that it was not a fascist salute.  Scolaire (talk) 16:01, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fascist? 

message: Further to my previous post:
Firstly, www2censor and Scolaire are, I think, correct. Byrne’s arm is outstretched in the photograph that purports to show him giving a ‘fascist’ salute. However, it may not be fair to describe it as a ‘fascist’ salute, as this entry currently claims. 
Professor Fearghal McGarry of Queen's University Belfast is the author of Eoin O’Duffy: A Self-Made Hero and Irish Politics and the Spanish Civil War. He is probably the leading authority on this subject. Earlier this month, Professor McGarry provided the following caption for the photo:
“Watched by the former president of the Executive Council, W.T. Cosgrave, and Lord Mayor Alfie Byrne, Fine Gael president Eoin O’Duffy takes the salute at a rally at the Mansion House (c. August 1934). Despite the shirt and raised-arm salute, few Blueshirts beyond a radical minority within the leadership embraced fascist ideas. Like many conservative Irish Catholics, Byrne supported both the pro-Franco Irish Christian Front and O’Duffy’s Irish Brigade but due to their militant and inept leadership, both movements were widely seen as embarrassing failures by late 1937.”
I also asked Professor Michael Cronin of Boston College to comment. Professor Cronin completed his D.Phil at Oxford on the history of the Blueshirt movement in Ireland before writing The Blueshirts and Irish Politics. 
“While Byrne was associated with the Blueshirts,” he said, “there is no evidence that he was an anti-semite. He supported the Christian Front and was evident in his backing of O’Duffy’s expedition to Spain, but again this fits into a general Catholic, even right wing, sense of Ireland at the time.”
Professor Cronin makes what is, I think, a key point here: 
“To conflate what we know of European fascism in the 1930s and apply this to anyone who was near the Blueshirts in the 1930s is bad history.”
Was Alfie Byrne a fascist? On the basis of the evidence that has emerged to date, that claim seems unfair. I am not even sure if it's fair to say that Byrne is giving a “fascist” salute in that photo. (Professor McGarry describes it as “a raised arm salute.” Elsewhere it is described as a Blueshirt salute.) Indeed to describe it as “a fascist salute” may well be “bad history.” Perhaps www2censor, Scolaire or other contributors have a view on this matter. 
As the curator of an exhibition about Byrne I want to ensure that pertinent evidence comes to light, so the exhibition can be amended if necessary. I urge anyone who has relevant information to share it here. And finally, anyone with an interest in the life of Alfie Byrne is welcome to inspect his personal archive in the Little Museum of Dublin.  Trevor White Dublin (talk) 15:12, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm afraid we're getting away from the purpose of the talk page at this point. The talk page is not meant for information gathering for an exhibition – worthy though that may be – but for discussing improvements to the article. From the point of view of the article, the communications you say you have from various academics are original research. Any edits to the article have to be based on reliable published sources. While Getty Images do not describe the salute as a fascist salute, they do describe O'Duffy as the "Irish fascist leader". A good quality published source would be needed before you could say that it was not a fascist salute.  Scolaire (talk) 16:01, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: More on the photograph

message: I think this article should be moved to . It is the name he was known by, and therefore WP:COMMONNAME applies. The Alfie Byrne article was actually the earlier one, but it was merged into this article within a few days of this one's creation. Notwithstanding the size of the above thread, this is a little-watched article, so there seems little point in opening a formal RM, which would likely just sit there for weeks before being closed as no consensus for want of input. If there are no objections I'll move it in a few days time.  Scolaire (talk) 14:48, 27 October 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree. Be WP:BOLD; I doubt anyone will object. ww2censor (talk) 17:02, 27 October 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with the proposed move. Snappy (talk) 17:14, 27 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Move to Alfie Byrne