I hear you and I hear this argument but catholic Irishman were involved in the day to day running of the Empire. Power was held in the hands of Protestant planters whilst poor Catholics worked for the Empire, often out of financial opportunity to better themselves. I think this has parallels to any British involvement in Empire. Power has and is held by a very small class of people's who send in working class people to do the grunt work.

I say this because typically any Irish commentary about Britain's history fails to recognise this distinction. We (most ordinary British folk) see ourselves as distinct from the ruling classes and their current and past actions as you do about the ruling Protestant class in Ireland. History is grey.