In a landmark case about gender dysphoria and gender transition, a Family Court judge in Sydney has ruled that a 16-year-old boy should be allowed to transition to a girl over the objections of his mother. The parents of “Imogen”, the pseudonym used by the Court for a boy named Thomas, are divorced and at […]
Around the turn of the millennium, 1000 A.D., European civilization and all the rudiments of Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian knowledge and tradition were on the verge of being violently extinguished. Historian, Richard Erdoes, details how the common people of Europe fully believed their world was coming to an end. Small wars among feuding Christian barons were […]
The recent debate around assisted suicide has shown that many in public life, rather than choosing compassion, solidarity and care decide to choose the extreme and egotistic approach. As a society we have a responsibility to care for the sick, old and the young. They deserve to be treated with dignity, hence instead of pushing […]
The Grand Armee of the Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte entered Moscow and captured it on this day, September 14th, 1812. It was the culmination of the biggest – and ultimately fatal – mistake of Napoleon’s brilliant career. Napoleon’s invasion of Russia was a major miscalculation. At the time of the invasion, he dominated Europe, with only […]
I have a profoundly deaf child. My son is 11 years old and has bilateral cochlear implants, he received his first implant at age 4 and second at 5 and half. He was diagnosed late, even by the standards at the time, he was almost 2 and a half. Late diagnosis can have life long […]
A Private Members’ Bill seeking to permit assisted suicide will be debated in the Dáil soon. It is proposed by Solidarity-People Before Profit TD, Gino Kenny. The last time when this issue was discussed in Leinster House, three years ago, some of the strongest opposition came from the members of the medical profession and disability […]
My husband’s grandmother took her life yesterday in a Victorian nursing home. After 87 years of a life well-lived, she swallowed state-sanctioned poison to end her life. The “health” professionals here called it medication, but the aim of taking medicine is to improve one’s health, not destroy it. Use all the Orwellian double-speak you like […]
ON THIS DAY: 12TH SEPTEMBER 1919 Dáil Éireann was declared illegal by the British Parliament when Sinn Féin TDs refused to sit in Westminister and set up their own parliament in Dublin, Dáil Éireann The British authorities called it a ‘dangerous assembly, because of this the first Dáil had to meet in secret at different […]
On the 10th of September, in 1649, Oliver Cromwell sat encamped outside the city of Drogheda with his 12,000-strong army and 11 siege cannons. They had already opened two large breaches in the town’s walls, as they were thin medieval structures and not designed to withstand cannon fire. Poised to attack the city, Cromwell wrote […]
Music icon and animal rights activist Cher was ecstatic earlier this year when a Pakistani court ruled that an Asian elephant named Kaavan, held in solitary confinement at the Islamabad Zoo, should be released to a sanctuary. The animal was being mistreated at the zoo and missed his mate Saheli, who died in 2012. “We were […]
In MacHale Park in Castlebar last weekend, three GAA fans were escorted out of the grounds by Gardaí, during the semi final encounter of Breaffy and Westport. Three lone supporters standing in empty stands that could easily hold 25,000 people were a public health safety. Mayo Journalist Michael Commins, expressing the same frustration that Mayo […]
Newspapers report a potato blight has hit Ireland. High rents imposed by absentee landlords meant that most people could only afford to live on small tenant farms with inferior soil that only potatoes could grow on; but the potato crop was prone to disease and the farmers did not have extra land to rotate crops. […]