Have you voted yet? In our house, it’s a familial activity, and we’ll head down to the local church hall sometime late this evening to cast our ballots. In this case, I understand, Mrs. McG and I are voting the same way on both proposals, but there have been times in the past when I wondered whether it was worth the bother of us both heading down there to cancel each other out. I think it is: Your vote is the only voice you have in this democracy of ours. The Government can ignore a letter to the editor, or a protest. It cannot ignore your vote, so make sure and use it.
Anyway, I confess I’ll be delighted when the referendum is over. The final week of campaigns – perfectly understandably – drive campaigners a little bit demented, and this week has mainly been spent explaining to people why we can’t actually publish yet another piece making the same six points about the referendums that have been made by other people on our pages. Also, some very angry readers were upset that we even covered the side of the argument opposite to their own, but we’ve a duty to do just that. We’re a media outlet with a particular editorial perspective, not campaigners ourselves. We’re not informing you if we don’t tell you what all sides are saying.
In any case, if you’re a campaigner on either side, put the feet up today: There’s nothing more you can do.
Now, to some other stories of the week:
A story that didn’t get nearly enough attention – or at least didn’t draw nearly enough anger and political outrage – this week, in my view, is the news that the “Grace” enquiry has been delayed yet again. For those of you with understandably short memories, the enquiry concerns the case of a young woman with “profound” intellectual disabilities who was left in a foster home for 20 years despite a series of exceptionally disturbing sexual abuse allegations. The case provoked one of the most powerful political speeches of recent times by Fianna Fáil TD John McGuinness – watching it again is worth your time – and political outrage. The enquiry was due to report in May 2019. Five years later, it’s been granted another six month extension. Nobody has ever been held to account for what happened to this young woman. Watch for the report, when it finally comes out, to blame “the system” rather than any individual, and recommend that some lessons be learned by the state. It’s a disgrace beyond measure.
An insight into the moral state of the country: Sinn Fein is trying to advance its bill which would make so-called “sex for rent” arrangements illegal. The nature of such arrangements is that it’s functionally impossible to quantify how widespread such arrangements are, or whether it’s just a few high-profile examples of the practice driving political outrage. Let readers be in no doubt that this writer believes the Sinn Fein bill is entirely overdue and should be supported, but it still leaves us with an intellectual quandary: Many of the voices supporting this bill are progressives who want to liberalise our laws around prostitution, arguing that consenting adults should not be penalised if they want to exchange sexual services for money. Morally, how is that different from sex for rent? In both cases, the participants are exchanging sexual services in return for financial benefit, and doing so consensually. If we’re going to set in law the principle that the victims of sex-for-rent arrangements are in fact victims, and have been coerced into those arrangements by need, shouldn’t that put the kibosh on any progressive dreams of liberalising the prostitution laws?
“Russia’s invasion will not stop at Ukraine and Europe must be defended, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said.” I presume that is an accurate quote, as reported by Shauna Bowers in the Irish Times. It raises an obvious question: Defended by whom? Not Ireland, obviously, we’re neutral. It seems a bit rich for Irish politicians to be lecturing the rest of Europe about the need for stronger defence when this country is entirely unwilling (as is our democratic right) to make any contribution at all to that defence. We might pay no heed to this stuff at home, but it’s one of the many attitudes of this Irish Government that – I can tell you for a fact – sets the teeth of many of our European “friends and partners” on edge.
JK Rowling has been reported to the police, the Daily Telegraph reports, for referring to the UK newsreader India Willoughby as “a man”. I really do wonder if transgender activists have the foggiest idea how conduct like this repels public support for their cause. Most people, I suspect, are perfectly happy to be polite to Willoughby and refer to him using female pronouns and so on, if that’s what he wishes. The great preponderance of people, though, know that he’s a man, for the simple reason that he spent years on television introducing himself as a man. If it’s a crime to state the obvious, well, lock me up as well. I think people are getting a little tired of progressives claiming to believe in science except, you know, for that stuff about chromosomes.
Turning to matters domestic at Gript, our friends at the Phoenix are baffled by the news that this outlet “donated” €18,000 to the European Conservatives and Reformists last year. I was as baffled by this news as anybody else, for the simple reason that we didn’t. As I told Channel Four News this week when they asked the same question, (funny how the same information ended up in the hands of multiple left wing outlets in the same week) the money was transferred to the ECR as part of a sponsorship arrangement for Gript’s participation in the conference on Agriculture and Farming that the ECR organised in Kilkenny last November. We’re always happy to help facilitate debate, especially in the case of the farmers who’ve found their concerns about incoming EU laws largely unanswered by the domestic Irish political scene. Staying on matters domestic, we welcomed a new reporter this week, in Jason Osbourne. We’ve robbed him from the Irish Catholic, and we’re looking forward very much to his contributions.
Finally, make sure and read Kevin Myers column on Donald Trump coming on Sunday. Kevin actually shares my well-known hostility to the Orange Man, but he nevertheless makes a case for his election so compelling that after reading it I’d nearly book my flights to Pennsylvania for October to don a garish red hat and knock on doors. A sneak preview: “Populist” is the journalistic term for a politician whose policies are loved by electorates and loathed by liberal newsrooms”. Quite so.
See you all Monday.