It is not surprising that cultural and political theorists like influential Slovenian philosopher, Salvoj Žizek, are already mapping out the societal changes they believe, or hope, will follow the socio-economic devastation of successive lockdowns. It is clear that governments all over the world have bought time at a cost unprecedented in peacetime. There will be […]
It is indeed time to stand up against real bullies and real hate speech. Not the sort that merely offends but the sort that demonstrably endangers. Our culture has become obsessed with microaggressions, yet it often fails to challenge the kind of thuggish aggression, masked as righteous anger, that threatens the fundamental freedoms of others. […]
Josepha Madigan is on a linguistic crusade. Gendered language is the heresy that needs to be taken down. Where better to begin than with a newspaper with a ‘backward’ title from a part of the country liberal Dublin loves to sneer at? I would suspect The Kerryman newspaper’s readers won’t appreciate the crusading zeal of […]
The Vatican’s latest affirmation of marriage as the lifelong union of one man and one woman is presented as an unfeeling even judgmental rejection of the love of same sex couples. It is however just a re-iteration of the Church’s well considered understanding of what Scripture and Jesus have to say on the subject. The […]
Ross Douthat is a New York Times columnist who converted ‘willingly’ to Catholicism with his family as a teenager. He begins his book on the character and mission of Pope Francis by positioning himself as a Catholic who believes ‘the Church must stand firm or it’s nothing’. That noted, his tightly written book is a measured, balanced […]
It is an interesting thing that the family squabbles of the rich and well connected should be of such universal and compelling interest. When RTE, along with networks across the globe, screen a two hour long interview with two exiled royals on prime viewing time, it must say a lot about the extent of our interest […]
The issue of transgenderism has moved into the very centre of politics, culture, education and healthcare. It is the subject of much argument, activism and controversy. Historically, .01% of the population were affected by, what was then called, gender identity disorder and it predominantly affected males. In 70% of cases, the condition was temporary. Today, […]
If Mary Robinson was, let us say, Amy Coney Barett, or any other prominent conservative lawyer or human rights activist, and had no defence other than gullibility for being used by a multi-billionaire, patriarchal potentate to help him cover up the abduction and imprisonment of his adult daughters how would the media react? How would Ryan […]
Ask anyone what colour a robin’s breast is and they will answer ‘red’. Ask anyone to paint a robin and they will reach for the red tube. It is a perception, coloured you might say, by what we have been told, by the way the robin is portrayed in Christmas cards and children’s storybooks. And in nature […]
The Report of the Commission into Mother and Baby homes has opened boxes of memories right across the country and beyond. Pandora’s boxes perhaps. People who carry these painful memories are everywhere among us, silently re-living the sadness of their family stories, sometimes feeling their unique and individual experience is being appropriated by a grand narrative […]
Timmy Dooley, who signed off on the FF policy document on future funding of broadcasting, print and digital media, told me in conversation last week that taxpayer money would not be made available to “little organs of hate”. He would not be drawn on the Irish media outlets he had in mind. It raises a great […]
According to an RTE puff piece about its adult, animated satire series, Fantasy Ireland, we Irish ‘can laugh at ourselves’ and poke fun at ‘our sacred cows’. ‘No topic is off limits’. Yeah, right as we are wont to say down in Cork. The only thing that is the stuff of fantasy here is the […]