BTF is an Irish diaspora collective that formed in 2024 around St. Patrick’s Day, during the call by the Irish people for politicians in Ireland to boycott the Biden Administration’s Paddy’s Day celebration and shamrock ceremony at the White House due to Genocide Joe’s principal role in the genocide of Gaza.
At that time, we noted the words of the longtime activist Diarmuid Breatnach, who observed that "pathetic Irish gombeen politicians think their diaspora gives them some kind of weight with the imperialists." So we had to ask: if the diaspora really has any power, shouldn’t we know about that? What, if anything, can ordinary people do?
Asking this question, we begin to see that there are blocks: metaphorical ‘firewalls’ that limit the stories we can hear, and the stories we tell. We know that stories have created this world where genocide can be streamed, but not yet stopped.
We have since aimed to break the firewalls that limit our power: whether between us in the diaspora and those on the island, within Irish transnational communities, or between us and those with whom we aspire to act in solidarity
Original art by a member of Breaking the Firewall.
Firewall: a filter that directs flows of information according to a predetermined set of rules. It is a border; a security theatre. But what is it enclosing, and what is being performed? What forms of safety and comfort are being safeguarded - and at the cost of what violence, and whose lives?
Our work has focused on the complicity of both states on the island with the genocide of Gaza. We are seeing that this complicity is structured by capitalism and mediated through United States military power as part of the long historical trajectory of Ireland as a colonial sacrifice zone.
This work has included film screenings, teach-ins, public actions and participation, divestment support, community care, and educational walks.In the process, we’ve started to unpack some comforting but distorted narratives about both Irish assimilation into whiteness, and Irish solidarity with those resisting oppression. We hope to sober ourselves with analyses that help us see things for what they are, and think more creatively and collaboratively about what we can do about it.
Currently, the primary internet home for our work is our Instagram feed and the associated Linktree. Over time, we’ll be building out this site, to become less dependent on Meta and big tech. Stay tuned!