Category: Current Affairs (Page 4 of 6)

How does one react to the nonsensical gobshitery of a politician without resorting to cheap insults? Should one address one’s remarks to him? To his supporters? To people who already think he’s a nonsensical gobshite? I was unsure until I remembered the main aim of this blog is to explain me, to me. All else is incidental. If I’m angry and/or confused about something, I write about it, make sense of it and hopefully the anger dissipates.

Danny Healy Rae thinks there is no such thing as man-made Climate Change. He’s against a woman’s right to choose. He doesn’t think gay couples can raise children. He’s for shooting people who break into his house. Well actually I’m not angry or confused about that last one.

I care not one jot for the safety of someone who breaks into my house. I’m concerned that in America people who protect their house with guns frequently have those guns turned on them. I’m concerned about the siege mentality that exists in rural areas. Many people regard themselves as under attack from roving bands of bandits. Statistics don’t appear to bear out this incessant assault but the emotion exists, and it’s a useful vote getter. But as someone who has been burgled twice, I really don’t have any enlightened feelings towards criminals who trespass on my property. I’m probably as reactionary as your common or garden Healy-Rae on this topic.

As for Danny’s opinions on women and gay people, I find I can only shrug my shoulders. I was already well aware of his antediluvian views there. From reading The Kerryman’s letter pages I know there’s a large rump of bitter fucks who’ve never gotten over their defeat in the Marriage Equality referendum. There are a lot of votes in that box of lemons.

What gets me all self-righteous and angry is Danny doubling-down on his Climate Change denial. And the thing is I shouldn’t get that annoyed. I’m middle-aged and childless. When things fall apart I’ll either be dead or near enough to dead, that I’ll send a #toldyouso tweet before taking a final comforting hot bath, satisfied that at least the gobshites will suffer too.

Climate Change, or our attitude towards it, highlights frailties that have long existed in our species. We are awful at making sacrifices now for something that may happen in the future. We use feelings when we should use our heads. We love nothing more than being told what we want to hear. And we produce people who delight in exploiting those frailties.

When I’m unwell I go to a doctor. I trust that a doctor has gone through a rather intense training process before being allowed pronounce on my ailments and put potentially dangerous drugs into my body. But I’m not naïve enough to trust an individual doctor at all times. Neither do good doctors. I will get a second opinion if I think it necessary, look for a referral to a consultant, I might even have a peek at the internet. Ultimately I am trusting a process, the scientific method.

It’s not perfect but I have neither the time nor the inclination to do the research myself. If I don’t feel 100%, an increasingly frequent occurrence as I look hard into my mid-forties, I trust in medical science to ameliorate the impact of getting older and any other incidental issues I may encounter. I’m not a big fan of being ignorant of so much about my own body. I don’t like putting my faith in the hands of others, but medicine is a specialisation of specialisations. To venture an opinion beyond misdiagnosing a cold as a flu, is unspeakably arrogant.

But there now exists an entire industry built upon the notion that charlatans and purveyors of snake-oil are a legitimate alternative to doctors and the scientific method. Billions of euro are being spent on this nonsense, because we want to be told that those scary and brusque doctors are wrong. Take this magic water and your asthma will clear right up.

So successful has this money making scheme been, that it has infected whole swathes of our population. We’ve dismissed the method that eliminated polio, put a man on the moon and split the atom, for people who think water has memory, that prodding your feet ‘in a special way’ can help your kidneys and that magic hands can heal. The more science has progressed our species, the dumber our species is getting.

97% of the scientists who study and research our Climate have determined that our species has changed it and that unless we do something now, our civilisation will collapse. Look at that sentence again. 97% of scientists who study the climate think there’s a problem. Opposed to them is a man who thinks the Ark myth is a true story. If 97 doctors tell me I have cancer, I am not going to refuse treatment because 3 doctors have access to a Burning Bush that says I’m grand.

But the people of Kerry, in fact most of the world are either unwilling to deal with what scientists are saying or are so scared and/or thick, they’ll believe the tiny minority who tell them want they want to hear. They will vote for anyone who promises them nothing is wrong and nothing has to change.

I don’t think I’m angry with Danny Healy-Rae. No one was forced to vote for him. No one is forced to take him seriously. And I bet he’ll increase his vote come the next election. People just love being told exactly what they want to hear. I don’t think I’m even angry with the cowardly eejits who vote for such obvious gobshitery. I think my anger is more with our entire species. We know what we are doing is going to end in disaster, but instead of doing something about it we’d prefer to have our bellies tickled by a poor man’s Trump.

I’ve been trying to understand the decision of the UK electorate to leave the EU. I’m tempted to dismiss those 17 million people as stupid, mad and racist, but while I think they are, I know that there’s more to it than that.

I’m a Europhile. There was a time I’d imagined the EU expanding to include all of continental Europe, its islands, the Middle East and North Africa. The logic of union always seemed obvious to me. Surely in late 20^th and early 21^st century Europe, nationalism would be seen for what it is, ancestor worship mixed with racism.

I was wrong. Nationalism and racism remain the norm. But I can’t blame Brexit on this ideology alone. I wish I could. We must look at another ideology. Another destructive belief system, neoliberalism. A system so successful few even realise it exists, nor its impact on their lives.

Neoliberalism is an ideology of unrestrained capitalism, of a reduced State and the belief that the creation of wealth by a few, is enough in and of itself, to improve everyone’s lot. It hasn’t worked. There has certainly been more wealth created, but whole swathes of the US and the UK have become economic wastelands. But its influence can be seen in the move right by social democratic Europe.

I offer this criticism of neoliberalism not as a lifelong social democrat. Far from it. For most of my adult life I was a believer in neoliberalism. I even flirted with libertarianism and knocked on doors for candidates hoping to reduce the size of the Irish state.

Though I am working class, I’ve not been a victim of globalisation. I’ve never experienced poverty. I’m old enough to have received a free education, I’ve a good pension waiting for me, I’m protected by a strong labour Union and an ironclad contract of employment, I can afford private health insurance and my mortgage is manageable. I do not know desperation. I do not need someone to blame or hate or fear.

So I must admit I didn’t really engage with the Brexit debate. I’d assumed the Brexiters would fail. It hadn’t occurred to me that politicians in the UK would, like here, blame all domestic ills on the EU. Nor had it occurred to me that there were many in the UK, desperate enough to believe these lies.

The galling thing is that the diminution of borders and national sovereignty has been to the benefit of neoliberalism, which sees the world as a market and communities as customers. Yet this deepening Union has also made war impossible to imagine.

But because a European war is unimaginable a united Europe has lost its lustre. We could address this by teaching our children to form an emotional bond with the EU, much as we instil nationalism in them. The very idea of it makes me shudder. Loyalty is a dangerous animal. What I’d prefer is for the EU to earn only the respect of its citizens.

Respect isn’t a thing of flags or curriculums. It is the decades long, boring work of ensuring that every citizen enjoys a standard of living that makes desperation an unfamiliar paragraph in an unread history book. The EU remains one of the most fabulously wealthy entities that has ever existed. This should be reflected in the lot of those with the least. At present it isn’t.

The EU has ended war in Europe, to survive it now has to end desperation. And I have to stop dismissing all those Brexiters as stupid, mad and racist.

There was some suggestion that the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland football teams should join together. Though as both teams have reached the knock-out phase of the tournament in France, discussion of this possibility has been muted. There is nothing like success to make the status quo seem that bit more attractive.

It is however an interesting topic. On a purely logical level it makes a great deal of sense to unite the sides. Neither jurisdiction is blessed with an abundance of players or resources, so joining together will increase the pool of players that the team could call on. Then there are the administrative costs. Instead of two Associations, with all the resulting costs, there would be one all island body. The extra money could be ploughed into the grassroots game, generating even more players that may one day represent this island. And if there is one team there might as well be one domestic league, which might even help our clubs go that little bit further in Europe.

This all Ireland team would be able to call on the resources and support of over six million people. It still wouldn’t be a heavy weight in world football but qualification for tournaments might become a lot more common. The logic of a united team is inescapable.

Of course, logic and football are rarely on speaking terms. If I was logical I would’ve stopped supporting Liverpool about twenty years ago. A football team, be it domestic or international, is less about the brain and more, so much more, about the heart.

The colour of the jersey will be easy and we could probably get away with simply calling the team Ireland. After that it gets complicated. It would have to be decided if Ireland was absorbing Northern Ireland or if this was a genuine union of two associations. To get mathematical, this is either A+B=C or A+B=A.

If it is the latter and the IFA are content with this, then no problem, but a union on the other hand poses many difficulties. Well, three in fact, anthem, flag and quotas. If two sides are combining to form a third, then all the symbolism around an international team will have to be examined. Is it appropriate for either God Save the Queen or Amhrán na bhFiann to be this new team’s anthem or should both songs be played before every game? Or should a new song be chosen? The same applies to the flags. Tricolour, Red Hand or a new flag? And finally should there be a certain minimum number of players, from each jurisdiction, on the team, so that it is truly representative of this new entity?

I suppose one could throw in location of Home games as well, Dublin or Belfast, or strict rotation? Probably less contentious than the other three as both cities are relatively close to each other.

I really don’t know how one addresses these issues, but I guess the reason no one seriously expects a united Irish team to happen is because no one else knows how to address them either. But it is interesting to think about on occasion.

A gorilla has died and the twitterverse has noticed. The details of his death are clear. In Cincinnati Zoo, a four year old child found his way into Harambe’s enclosure and the staff shot the 400 pound silverback to save the child.

The condemnation is lighting up social media. The zoo has been criticised. There are calls to prosecute the mother. The decision to kill rather than tranquillise Harambe is disputed. The child was rescued almost unscathed by the way.

The child is alive and yet this is a tragedy! I’m not saying that to condemn those who are enraged by Harambe’s slaying. I say it to remind myself that perhaps my priorities are a tad askew. My first thought on reading this story was a kind of grief, followed by anger. There was not a thought for the child or his family. Why is that? Why such callous disregard for the fate of a little boy doing what little boys do? Why do I mourn for a dangerous animal that could quite possibly have killed that little boy?

If the little boy had gotten into a crocodile enclosure or into a field with a bull or found himself within a country mile of poisonous spiders I wouldn’t have bothered reading one article on the event. But Harambe was a gorilla and for some reason that matters to me. I had to convince myself to be pleased that a little boy was saved. Read that sentence again, I had to convince myself to be pleased that a little boy was saved.

Why do I feel this? Perhaps not having any children of my own means my perspective is unrounded. But I doubt it is only the childless who are angry about Harambe. Am I one of those who view animals as being the equal of humans? I’m not. I’ve thought about it. I know that since I got a dog, lived with her, gotten to know her, I’ve begun to seriously contemplate vegetarianism and perhaps even veganism. But I enjoyed a slow roasted leg of lamb for my birthday a few weeks ago. I’m not there yet and perhaps I may never get there, but I know that Harambe isn’t worth more or even the same as a child. If it had been an adult, who had gotten into Harambe’s enclosure then perhaps this would be a different conversation.

If it had been chimpanzees I’d be less upset. I love chimps but those are some scaldy fuckers. They are our closest relations, they are being wiped out, they look so much like us, but the threat they would’ve posed is indisputable.

And I guess that’s where the anguish lies. I’m one of those ‘Gorillas in the Mist’ adoring, Attenborough loving, Discovery Channel watching breed of gorilla lovers who feel a connection to gorillas that is emotional rather than rational. We, or I, can’t escape the feeling that if left to his own devices, Harambe would never harm that little boy. Such a noble being, such a wondrous creature, from his paternal embrace, the little boy would certainly have been returned, unhurt, to his mother.

If someone like me had been in charge of Cincinnati Zoo we’d have found out what Harambe would’ve done. There would now, be no uncertainty. The child may have been killed or maimed but we’d know.

Due to human error there was a tragedy (and yes I think Harambe’s death a tragedy) but some tragedies are more tragic than others. A rare and wondrous creature is dead, that we should mourn, but a little boy is alive today who could easily have died. A mother isn’t mourning her child. That is an untrammelled and objective good.

It’s a year since we voted yes, for Marriage Equality. A mere year and what was once considered extraordinary is now ordinary. As the years pass, the pivotal importance of the Marriage Equality referendum will so fade from memory, children will see it in an exam, and get the year wrong. Even those children raised by LGBT parents or children who are themselves LGBT, will struggle to grasp how improbable it was for Marriage Equality to be so overwhelmingly endorsed by the people of Ireland. It’s been a year and I still don’t understand how it happened.

When some future historian sits down to write their thesis on this referendum, I hope they decide to concentrate on Kerry. Not because Kerry was exceptional, it wasn’t. All but one rural constituency voted yes. It merits further analysis because Kerry is geographically far-flung, has a population of approximately 145,000 and is considered to be very conservative. To this, Yes Equality Kerry brought less than a dozen regular canvassers, barely a handful of experienced activists, no trained media personnel, almost zero support from our elected representatives and very little money. Kerry said yes to the tune of 55%. I was there and I still don’t understand how this happened.

Perhaps I am being unfair on the politicians. They did put up posters in Kerry and apparently they canvassed enthusiastically in Dublin. I remember growing heartily sick of the hearing about the canvassing in Dublin. Teams of over fifty people at a time. Twice a day my wife and I would head to Listowel and more often than not, we’d be knocking on doors by ourselves. Every box from Listowel was tallied, every box was a yes. My ego is such that I would love to take credit for that. But I didn’t have to change that many minds and I didn’t endure that much abuse to allow me think anything other than I was pushing at an already open door. I still don’t understand why that was the case.

I loved being part of the campaign, but remain utterly convinced that its apparent necessity was hateful. I often tried to imagine what it would be like to be gay or bi and have to ask and beg strangers to please treat me as an equal. My wife is bi, I saw the toll canvassing took on her, but to this day I cannot approach the empathy required to fully experience the emotion of asking a stranger to vote for my equality. The arguments I heard against Marriage Equality ranged from the facile to the bigoted, yet they convinced 45% of Kerry people to reject equality. I still haven’t got my head round that.

I hope that future historian examines the role of the Roman Catholic Church during the campaign. Yes, it was implacably opposed to equality, but implacably wasn’t all that implacable. The institution may have lost a great deal of its influence for having sheltered so many paedophiles and rapists, but that still doesn’t explain how it mattered so little in the campaign. Attendance at Mass is still high. People still like to get married in churches. Parents go all out for First Communions and Confirmations. The schools remain almost exclusively Roman Catholic and there’s a crucifix in the Kerry County Council chambers. Perhaps too many individual priests, too used to meeting LGBT people, couldn’t bring themselves to go all out against members of their community? I’d like to know for sure.

Our local and national media merits a mention. Its cowardice is something I haven’t yet come to terms with. So lacking in any sense of its role as trumpeters of truth, it relegated itself to mere time keepers. It never sought to examine the veracity of the content spewed, only making sure that each side got equal coverage, equal time, an equal say. No matter what witless bullshit was spouted, it was treated as having merit because it was part of one side’s 50%. A week in, I stopped following the debates. How did one of the most important institutions of our civilisation become so reduced?

How did Kerry so change without me noticing? I suspect it still isn’t safe for two men to walk down a street in Tralee at night, holding hands. But now I believe it will eventually happen. I know Kerry didn’t suddenly become a paradise for the LGBT community, but they are now, for the first time in the history of this State, equal to me, before the law. I’d always thought I had a finger on the pulse, but then this glorious thing occurred a year ago and I still don’t know how it happened.

I have been trying to get my head around the concept of ‘consent.’ I don’t mean to imply it’s difficult to understand. More, I’m perturbed I’ve managed to get past 40 without having to give it much thought. I could probably go the rest of my life without thinking about it. But I live in the twitterverse, I like to read, I like to write and I like to reflect. Even then I might have avoided consent if my wife hadn’t made me read a book called ‘Asking For It’ by Louise O’Neill.

A man, on reading that book, has but two options. He can either get to his feet and declaim in a clear steady voice, ‘Not All Men.’ Or he can reflect on the almost improbably large gaps in his education. Gaps that are searingly addressed in this heartbreaking book.

I chose the latter simply because I am a middle-aged man who is gradually getting better at being wrong about a lot of things.

But I retain a certain empathy for the Not All Men merchants. Not sympathy, empathy. Ignorance is as much a special kind of not knowing as it is an almost impenetrable suit of armour. It is an armour I donned for large periods of my life. I wasn’t aware of it, of course, because it is a special kind of not knowing. When I was in college, at 19, I’m certain I’d have railed against compulsory consent classes. If the technology had been as prevalent would I have taken pictures and shared them too? I don’t know. Would I have called a friend on it?

I received next to no sex-education in school or at home, but I knew right from wrong. Rape was wrong, always wrong, it was an evil act. My parents and teachers at least got that part right. Don’t commit rape. In my day it was also don’t wear a condom and if you get pregnant there’s the door, but don’t rape was easy. Of course no one explained what rape meant, so one tended to assume rape was some degenerate dragging a woman down a dark alley and having his way with her. And no one explained consent.

I had begun to think myself some sort of antediluvian artefact, who had been thrust into the world, denied the most basic understanding of sex and the inherent role consent had in sex. No one had thought to explain sex as being at once exciting, overwhelming, joyous, possibly fraught but always an ongoing negotiation. And by the time I got to college sure I knew everything. Ignorance is a special kind of not knowing.

I could dismiss my ignorance as a sign of the times, but no matter how hard I try I can’t see the 80s and 90s as that long ago. And when I look back and try to excuse my parents and teachers for their neglect of my education, I find myself thinking, what the fuck, it wasn’t the bloody Dark Ages. But I also know, that not having it explained to me in primary school and then again in secondary school, meant it would have required an especially thick stick to beat that knowledge into my head once I’d arrived in college.

But I appear to not be a relic. It is increasingly apparent that I am, typical. Boy and girls, this century, are managing to get to college wholly unprepared for that ongoing negotiation that would temper their mad rush into each other’s beds and smartphones.

It appears many of us think it unnecessary to explain to a teenage boy why it is wrong to share nude pictures of someone they’ve been intimate with. So why wouldn’t a boy or indeed a man share a nude picture? Without parents and teachers explaining, in detail, over many years, why it’s akin to a sexual assault, we are left to hope he’ll work it out for himself. And some do. Yet we don’t allow children to work out for themselves where to piss, what to eat, how to brush their teeth or even to speak with their mouths full. But why a private intimate moment doesn’t imply consent to further intimacy or a right to broadcast pictures of that moment over the Internet, well that is something they’ll just have to work out for themselves.

And sure why wouldn’t a horny fella have sex with his passed out girlfriend, when he hasn’t been bored to tears by parents and teachers with increasingly complex discussions about consent, that include diagrams, piecharts, case studies and Louise O’Neill’s wonderful book?

I thought I was a relic. I ought to be a relic. I used to think the worst part of my inadequate education was a ‘Father Trendy’ type priest telling a class of sixteen year olds to never use condoms. In retrospect that was the least stupid thing about my time in school, because even then his special kind of not knowing was treated with the contempt it deserved. But we were also immersed in our own ignorance. I hadn’t realised how little has changed.

Ignorance is a suit of armour and a special kind of not knowing. Thus we have grown men, still boys in my eyes, but adults nonetheless, sharing pictures they should not be sharing or being insulted by the idea they have still so much to learn.

I feel sorry for them because words may no longer be enough. Hard consequences; permanent records and careers ruined before they’ve even begun, might have to be deployed to pierce the ignorance bestowed on them by their parents and teachers. Parents and teachers who neglected and who appear to be continuing to neglect their responsibility to understand consent enough to be able to teach it to a five year old.

Rape and sexual assault are rarely that degenerate dragging someone down a dark alley. But that is the only story told. Not all men are degenerate, but all men are subject to the values they’ve been imbued with and the understanding they’ve been taught. Not all men manage to escape causing harm if that education has been deficient.

What can I say about that latest controversy provoked by the French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo? Further comment seems futile. So many have spoken on the topic already. Nothing new or exceptional has been said. It has been a case of the usual suspects saying the usual things. Every ideologue has made their case entirely in keeping with their ideology.

I will not deviate from that pattern. I am (despite a recent wobble) a free-speech absolutist so I maintain the ideologue’s belief in Charlie Hebdo’s right to say whatever it wishes about whomever it wishes. I am not however in any position to say if that particular cartoon was racist or not. I’m a straight, white, European male. The only privilege I don’t have is the right to say if something is racist or not.

I did have a visceral reaction to the cartoon. I thought it brilliant, searing and piercing. Perhaps some context. I first saw the cartoon (with a translation) a few days after I had listened to Brenda Power speak on the radio about the threat to women’s rights that may be posed by the influx of so many refugees (Muslim men to be precise) from the Middle East.

The interview made me uncomfortable because I felt some sympathy for her argument. It’s a discomfort caused by a clash of principles. I am happy (well not happy, more prepared) to pay extra taxes to allow however many millions of refugees need asylum in Europe, to be allowed in. (And if you notice, in the previous paragraph I said influx. I cringe at it, being in a country that will only accept a pathetic few thousand refugees.) I justify this stance because I regard it as common human decency, to save the life of another.

Taking in five or ten million refugees should be our first action. Then we deal with all the problems that this will entail. And those troubles should not be downplayed. It will cause social tension, it will inspire a rise in the far-right, there will be incidents. This is inevitable. But lives will have been saved and in time, Europe will be all the richer for the experience.

Germany has taken in about a million refugees. It is now dealing with the consequences. If it mismanages this opportunity, then whatever remaining enthusiasm there exists in Europe for welcoming refugees will disappear entirely. And that is where the cartoon comes in.

European public opinion is disgustingly fickle. By purest chance, I was vaguely aware of the tragedy unfolding in the Mediterranean a few years ago. A particular blog I read, mentioned it, but it piqued my interest only peripherally. Then Pope Francis visited Lampedusa, a landing spot for many refugees and where the bodies of many of those who died on the trip are brought ashore. He managed to generate some publicity, but few people were moved. The walls of Fortress Europe remained standing, with the wholehearted support and/or indifference of public opinion. Then that little boy’s body washed ashore just where a camera was conveniently present. Everything changed. The wall was breached and we (some of us) cheered the refugees in.

Syrian passports were discovered on some of the men who perpetuated the Paris massacre. On New Year’s Eve, in Cologne, several women were sexually assaulted.

I love that cartoon because in a single image, with a tiny amount of text, it perfectly encapsulates European public opinion. Thousands of people dying doesn’t matter. A pope pointing at the dying doesn’t matter. A good picture of a dead child, ooh let’s help. Oh no it’s complicated, fuck them.

And that’s probably the saddest thing about the cartoon. Those who are its target, people very much like me, mostly don’t realise they are its target. As brutal and accurate as the cartoon is, it has failed to penetrate the armour of ignorance most Europeans wear. I care not one jot for those who have chosen to be offended by the cartoon. I care only that the lumpen masses whose dimwitted opinions and feelings can be so easily manipulated are too stupid to realise they are being mocked.

And Ireland is patting itself on the back for taking a paltry few thousand people. I despair.

I’ve spent a long time getting my head around the incident involving Joan Burton in Jobstown last year. She and her staff were accosted by a large group of people who were protesting against the introduction of water charges. This culminated in her being trapped in her car for a considerable amount of time. One of the protesters was Paul Murphy TD. Charges have now been brought against Murphy and several other protestors.

Full disclosure, I’m a member of Fine Gael. I support water charges and have paid mine. Also, I have little time for the far left. On the other hand, I hope my party loses at least twenty seats because of how the introduction of the water charges was handled. Spectacular incompetence merits a spectacular punishment.  Further, I have little respect for Burton herself, who seems to relish appeasing the right wing of my party more than her own voters.

All that being said, my initial response to that incident was to name it an attack and hope the law would come down like a ton of bricks on those who attacked her. It was an emotional response and is revealing of who I am and what my values and prejudices are.

What are those values and prejudices?

-I dislike Paul Murphy intensely, but it is an emotion I don’t have for the far left in general. I have no illusions about my party being in the van of those tackling fascism if that disease ever infects this country. It’ll be the far left, kicking ass and taking names. And the far left do have a habit of pointing out that capitalism is absurd. It is important for those of us who defend capitalism to hear that, because capitalism is indeed absurd and cruel and wasteful. It is incumbent upon us then, to ameliorate that intrinsic absurdity and have good arguments for why this awful thing is better than the utopia promised by the far left.

-I dislike and fear mobs, whatever their ideology. I have certain ideas about what constitutes an appropriate protest. It should not have to resort to violence to make the point that pure numbers should. Yes, that might contradict my previous point and it opens me up to accusations of conservatism. Both are true, but only to a degree.

-If Big Phil Hogan had been in the car, and not Joan Burton, would my emotional response have been different? Unfortunately I think it would have. I fear I am not as free from sexism as I’d assumed I was. That’s something I have to own and work on.

-Then there’s my hypocrisy. Would I have cared as much if the person attacked was Gerry Adams or Nigel Farage. Almost certainly not. Well actually, no ‘almost’ about it. I would now be using the same euphemisms currently used by Murphy’s supporters; disruption, inconvenienced, blockade, sit-down protest etc.

-Fear and confusion. That attack scared me. I wasn’t even there and it scared me. And it confused me because a citizen should not be impeded by a mob, but the last thing I want to see is the Gardai wading into a situation with jolly abandon. Yes, I’m a woolly-headed liberal as well.

-And finally disgust at the government I voted for and support, being so incompetent and tone deaf regarding the introduction of water charges. I on the one hand, want this Fine Gael and Labour government reelected at the next election, but I want them also to pay a huge price for how poorly they’ve dealt with this issue.

That is the emotional part. It doesn’t even touch on my cynicism. I don’t want the protesters jailed purely because it might hurt FG and Labour electorally.

In the end, I fear this issue comes down to a clash of opinions. I can say what I like about what happened in Jobstown, but it won’t influence a single person. Because I suspect I am not alone in reacting emotionally to it. And then convinced ourselves that our emotional response is both rational and correct. So I’ve gotten my head around it, but the rest of me still isn’t sure.

I’m still trying to process yesterday’s massacre. It’s difficult to put considered words to my emotions. Usually one wouldn’t have to be considered. When something as awful as the murder of 12 people happens one shouldn’t have to watch what one says. But when a few extremists, from a minority, perpetrate an outrage, the responsible thing to do is moderate one’s reaction.

Muslims are in a vulnerable position in Europe. In an ideal world, these newcomers would be seeking to fit in, rather than to blend in. Part of fitting in, rather than blending in, is looking different. Be it because of skin colour or religious dress, European Muslims do generally stand out. This difference is extenuated by Muslims not feeling obliged to forget who they are, just to make us natives feel more comfortable with change. I like that.

Unfortunately, not everyone does. Even in the best of times there are those whose identities are so fragile or malformed that difference and change feels threatening. It’s a phenomenon that’s made worse in times of economic strife. Europe has obviously been experiencing an economic crisis so the backlash is getting better organised and most worryingly, better dressed.

It becomes more complex when religion is conflated with race. It gets yet more complex when a liberal wants to criticise Islam and finds that the far-right is making similar criticisms and the far-left is acting as an apologist for religious extremism.

So how do I emote responsibly? How do I give words to this fear and rage without descending into the language of hate?

I didn’t feel like this when Anders Breivik murdered dozens of children. Of course no one suggested that those children shouldn’t have provoked a deranged extremist by being members of Norway’s Labour Party. He represented such an insignificant strand of psychotic extremism that I did not feel threatened by his actions. Nor did I have to hedge my condemnation, for he was white and Christian.

I want to be free to attack Islam. I regard it as being as ludicrous a lifestyle choice as Roman Catholicism, but how do I ridicule and other it, without using words that an Anders Breivik would nod approvingly at?

How do I point out the supernatural nonsense, the homophobia and the misogyny? When I criticise Roman Catholicism, no one in Ireland will be worried about their churches being attached, job opportunities lost, their citizenship being withdrawn or their children attacked on the streets. It’s easy being a liberal in Ireland with a bone to pick with the Catholics.

Having a go at a minority, sets off, or should set off, alarm bells in the mind of a liberal. Yes, I could say, but they attacked free speech. They attacked a value as dear to me, as many people hold religion to themselves.

The problem is that I don’t live in a country that takes free speech seriously. I live in a country with blasphemy laws and that bans atheists from certain high offices. What right do I have to feel so offended by an attack on free speech in France, when a satirical cartoon, in an Irish newspaper, depicting Roman Catholic Priests was pulled due to the ‘offence’ some Roman Catholics chose to take?

Should I wait for Ireland to get its house in order before commenting on religious attacks on free speech in other countries? It’s an argument that can be made.

I think I feel defeated. How do I, with every privilege, being born a straight, white man, in Western Europe has gifted me, argue the case for untrammelled free speech? How do I make the case to a gay adult, who has survived all the bigotry this country has thrown at them, that the next generation of gay people must also endure the witless homophobia of the Roman Catholic Church?

I can attempt to explain that if we empower the State to silence Catholic bigotry, we’ve then empowered the State to ban gay ‘propaganda’ as Russia has done. I can attempt to say that the responsibility of people, of good conscious, is to drown out the noise of institutional bigotry. That we must argue for and model behaviour that inspires minorities, that so inculcates them from the hate, that the words and deeds of the tiny minded, becomes wholly irrelevant. I have to argue that free speech is worth suffering for?

Saying those things makes me feel like I am a middle aged man in 1914, urging and cheering the young men off the war, safe in the knowledge that I will never be called upon to suffer their fate.

Do I condemn the cowardice of the Irish mainstream media for not printing any of the cartoons that so offended the extremists? I wouldn’t be the one courting a violent death.

I had hoped that writing this would help me process my feelings and give me a renewed sense of purpose. But it hasn’t. I’m left with the feeling that expending any time, effort or passion on an ideal such as free speech, is merely to display my privilege in garish colours.

Perhaps that’s the point. Free speech does remain a privilege. A privilege, but not a priority?

First things first, a few disclaimers. I have a water meter and I signed up to pay the charges. Paying won’t be easy, but I will. I’m a member of Fine Gael and I also supported two of the previous three governments. Finally, I entirely agree with the concept of paying for the amount of water I use

So there are my cards on the table.

It’s also important to note that I think if this government falls because of the water charges controversy, they will have entirely earned that calamity. Even if I am knocking on doors, canvassing for a Fine Gael candidate, I won’t be pretending Fine Gael and Labour acted sensibly. Everything about the setting up of Irish Water smacks of arrogance, incompetence and noxious presumption. When a government fails to fear its electorate, then it’s time for that government to get a firm slap or go.

This blog post however isn’t about the prospects of an early general election. I want to write about who I think the protesters, who have thronged our streets, actually are. And for all of Fine Gael and Labour’s fault, they did finally provoke 100s of 1000s of people into protesting. A fitting epitaph, if one is soon required.

Obviously, as a member of Fine Gael, I am expected to rail against the ‘sinister elements’ that are piggy backing on public discontent to ferment anarchy and threaten our very existence. Pure bollox, but it’s a good lie because it resonates. It resonates with me, even though I know it’s bollox.

The attack on Joan Burton did shake me. I despise, with all my being, anyone who uses physical violence to make a political point. I am quite content to get all reactionary conservative on people who indulge in those kind of antics. It is not correct however to seek to understand the multitudes who are protesting, by referencing a fringe of a fringe.

I will not discount them entirely. But a tiny few organised thugs combined with some easily led (or eager to be led) young men, hungry for action, is in no way representative of so many people from all over the country. They are just not prevalent enough to tar such a huge movement.

So to my list of participants.

I will begin with those who actively (which does not equate to violently) seek to overthrow our system of government and uproot its foundation stones of democracy and capitalism. I’m talking about the Far Left and the even further left. Marxists, Trotskyites, communists, anarchists and various other labels I don’t understand, even after consulting Wikipedia. Fortunately, for this democrat and capitalist, they are few and far between. I’m glad they exist though. Capitalist democracy is far from perfect and is often guilty of missteps. If nothing else, a radical and explicable alternative, waiting to pounce if our democracy loses popular support, should help keep anyone with a vested interest in the status quo, honest.

The second group are the political opportunists. I would put Sinn Fein, various independents and shameless members of Fianna Fáil into this category.  I can’t criticise any of these groups for this. Water Charges are not some social or moral issue that must be supported by decent folk. It’s merely a money raising scheme, with some theoretical environmental and state finances benefits. If opposition politicians didn’t jump on this issue and use it to beat the government with, then this country would be in a worse state than it already is. Now, I’m not saying I’d trust anything these opportunists say, but if protests of this size had no politicians involved, then democracy, as I understand it, would be in serious trouble.

The third group are those who are taking a principled stand against what they understand to be a double taxation (triple if you throw in the Household Charge and quadruple if you include the USC). It’s difficult to argue against this. We’ve paid for water through general taxation since 1973. Now we are expected to pay for it again, but with no discernible decrease in income tax. The answer given, is that our water system has been so neglected, that we need extra money to fix it. It’s a compelling argument, unless one asks why has it been allowed to deteriorate so badly? Then politicians are forced to look at their feet and suddenly remember a pressing engagement elsewhere. It has been neglected for one reason and one reason only, there were no votes in it. The vast majority of us have been getting more or less drinkable water for decades, so why promise to spend money on something not yet in crisis? But now the crisis has arrived. And it’s arrived during an economic meltdown. Who’s going to pay for the decades of neglect, those politicians who prioritised elsewhere or the ordinary citizen? Exactly.

The fourth group are the people who simply can’t pay this new charge. If you need that explaining to you, then you probably stopped reading at the part where I didn’t give the leftists a bit of slipper.

The fifth group are the citizens who probably can pay, but have this feeling in the pit of their stomach that tightens when they think of the so many billions of euro that have already left Ireland to pay bank debts. Ordinary people, with reduced standards of living, people who got nothing from The Boom. The people who have lost family members to emigration, lost family members to suicide, lost their homes, face the prospect of losing their homes, have gone hungry to keep their homes, people who are forced into internships, the people who are losing hope that this iniquitous austerity will one day end. The response of Fine Gael and Labour to this, is a blind faith that more and more low-paid jobs, in a possibly improving economy, will cause enough people to forget that we’ve been royally and systematically screwed. And it’s a policy that may succeed. I’m hoping it does to be honest, but I wouldn’t put any money on it.

The sixth and final group are the ‘enough is enough’ people. This is pretty self-explanatory. Fine Gael and Labour promised all sorts of utopian nonsense at the last election. They won a huge majority, yet instead of radical change, the most they appear to be able to do is ‘the best small country in the world in which to do business.’ Has there ever been a rallying call so uninspiring? Worse, it is now virtually impossible to distinguish this government from the governments (the ones I supported don’t forget) who destroyed our country and condemned so many to poverty, immigration and despair. Enough should certainly be enough.

These groups are not discrete. They overlap in several places, but for the most part, they feel they have a genuine grievance with those elected to govern this country through an existential crisis. And they have enjoyed a certain degree of success. The government has already backed down once, quite considerably too. Unfortunately, it appears that this government thinks it has moved far enough. Almost a million households have signed up for the charges. This has all the appearance of overwhelming compliance, which the government presumes to mean satisfaction.

But I can’t help thinking they’ve misunderstood the multifaceted and complex motivations of the protesters. Or worse, they have understood and have decided to now only concentrate their efforts on appealing to their base. If that is the case, this government, which I wish to support, will end, being thought of as even worse than the previous one.