I've never thought of Joyce as a particularly 'gentle' soul - but you're right; it's unlikely he'd be participating in any kind of bloodshed and mayhem of that nature.

Yes, he was rebellious, but his rebelliousness was inseparable from the independence of his mind. He could not go along with the crowd, because he was too keenly aware of hypocrisy within the crowd. I get the impression that in the Dublin of his day, to hold a rebellious attitude toward England was not to be particularly rebellious in the context of your social milieu. It was in effect going along with the crowd - the same crowd that, to Joyce, had destroyed Parnell.