Discriminating against the Irish - why were Sinn Fein referred to as the political wing of the IRA for so long?

While many of my views on politics may not be that well thought through and Id say I'm definately not what I'd class as well informed, I think there's a distinct possibility that I am right on a few occasions every now and again regarding a few relatively important issues: the naivity of the Labour Party Leader, Gordon Brown to state there was an end to boom and bust when the UK economy is so strongly linked to that of the US (theirs is intrisically linked to boom and bust because they class this as a freedom - bunch of thickos if you ask most brits), and the fact that there is perhaps a degree of racism in using the term terrorist when describing the IRA, the Irish Republican Army. I should, when point is made like this, discuss in quite a lot of detail the period that the term 'political wing of the IRA' was used by the BBC and other media bodies and the relationship between these and Thatcher's and Major's governments and those of Blair's and Brown's to elucidate exactly how media organisations have been influenced and whether or not this served a genuine purpose for the public in Northern Ireland or were just acts of injustice aimed at the final struggle to maintain an empire or commonwealth when there is no great drive to achieve this.

It is notable though that those governments for the period in our recent history been content to use the language of the politician who have dealt with operations of the IRA as acts of illegal criminal action rather than that of an army engaged in warfare. Was this act of aiming not to recognise the IRA as an army, but rather a reckless gang of criminals, just part of the game-playing involved in the British maltreatment of the Irish? Is ridicule and trivialisation of the Irish and their state part of a relationship that the British governments seem unable to break? This to me, seems to be an ongoing element of life in the UK taking varying forms rather than actually appearing to ever stop and there be a meaningful end to maltreatment of Ireland and the Irish.

Were there reasons for describing the IRA as terrorists which aimed only to undermine the legitimate political actions of Sinn Fein, who were frequently described by the BBC as 'the political wing of the IRA' - surely there is misrepresentation here - should we treat our own government equally and describe them as the political wing of the British forces, a formidable terrorist outfit if ever the was one, always profiting from the legal loopholes that acting as an army or defence force can offer. Should the political wing of the British forces be denied the oxygen of publicity that they require for survival - perhaps this is one of the reasons that Thatcher's medics told her not to speak publicly again - what a damn hypocrite. Is there some form of divine intervention here or am I imagining things?

On a slightly different matter, I had on a number of occasions asked the media through several points of contact to try to open up a number of issue areas in the press through background websites which offer an introduction to the main background issues - I never as a youth felt I'd get a handle on the complexity of issues in Beruit in the 1980's which seemed to get more complicated on almost a daily basis, so I am pleased to see the website pages the BBC have added on the background of the peace process in Northern Ireland (see: Northern Ireland background from the BBC) which does give quite a comprehensive background on the 'troubles'. At least this is happening, despite it being nothing to do with me personally, I imagine.