Seamus Heaney Irish poet dies.

Seamus Heaney

by Sean O'Torrain

Ireland's best known poet Seamus Heaney recently died. In my early days unless it was the transitional program set to music or rhyme I condemned it as garbage. Thankfully I grew out of that. I came to see the beauty of words and how they could be put together, came to respect wordsmith's. I think that Heaney was mainly a wordsmith. But a bit more-----a bit more because he could evoke images and emotions and truth in his works.

But what about the politics of his work?  I was and still remain unenthusiastic about him on this front. As far as I know he pretty much stood apart from the civil rights struggle which was consuming the best of the youth and workers and middle class in the late 1960's. And he lived in the middle of these people and was a Catholic peasant like many of them, so he did not have much excuse.  

I just re read his speech when he received the Nobel prize in1995. This worries me too. They did not give the Nobel to Joyce. But in his speech Heaney mentions Yeats again and again, a genius no doubt and also a recipient of the Nobel Prize. But how come he never mentioned Joyce. Not once. Not one single time. I believe it is in fact a great compliment to Joyce. Heaney could not reach the heights of Joyce, in my opinion the greatest writer so far. He could never even aspire to reach the heights of Joyce. He knew this but rather than mentioning Joyce in his speech and giving him his due he chose to ignore him. This diminishes Heaney significantly in my eyes.

I cannot get away from the feeling that Heaney lacks certain courage and this in turn results in the sharp harsh cutting edge of truth being missing in much of his work.

Why did he never mention Joyce in his Nobel acceptance speech? Joyce rises like a vertical cliff in

James Joyce

front of the poets and writers of his time and still does today. I feel that it is a test of writers and poets how they deal with Joyce. To ignore Joyce on that most important occasion of his career when he was accepting the Nobel prize as Heaney did in his speech seems to show a lack of courage, and a certain refusal to face up to the fact that he was not a Joyce, that the cliff was way to high and vertical for him and always would be. So better ignore him.

I am no Joyce expert and this is to put it mildly. But I am always surprised, unpleasantly, when I am back in Ireland and meet with writers and poets and they never mention Joyce. It is like they are afraid of him. It was either TS Eliot or Ezra Pound who said that he hated Joyce because nobody could ever write a novel or a piece of literature in the future without Joyce standing above them looking down. I think this is a factor which is very prevalent in Irish writers and writers in general. They will not acknowledge the top man so they chose in the main to ignore him. There are of course many, many exceptions to this rule and to these I apologize unconditionally. But I think this is a factor.

I am reading again The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I am homesick. It is the Modern Library publication. I am at pages 176 and 177 at the moment. What a brilliant exposition of the dialectic in all its splendor and glory and motion. That Joyce was the man.

There were a lot of dignitaries, that is bourgeois types, at Heaney’s funeral. This does not impress me. There were not too many at the funeral of Joyce. I think somebody from the British embassy, a few friends and a homeless man who kept asking who is being buried, who is being buried. Joyce would have like that one.

My Jack Russell is lying here looking up at me. His eyes tell me he wants to know what is going on, what I am thinking. I wish we could talk. Then we could hear the dialectic of the dog. It's bound to have the same principles, matter in motion, nothing moves in a straight line, movement through contradiction, everything has a beginning a middle and an end. No I have not been on the whiskey. I gave it up. The problem is I am still struggling to have the laugh on a regular basis.  

Sean.

Read More

Thoughts on the struggles in Northern Ireland

This description of Ireland below is very similar to the events that took place here in the US that led to the increase of the black middle and upper middle class. Meanwhile, the conditions for black workers and youth continue to worsen.

by Sean O'Torrain

I was back home in the North of Ireland a few months ago at a wedding. I was seated beside a middle class Catholic couple who has a relative who joined SF and has a local council position now. They played no role in the military campaign of the Provos. Only when it became a mass movement did they even get involved in the Civil Rights movement. They played no role in the 1969 Derry uprising. They made sure they kept their children well out of the firing line, the majority of whom got good educations and no longer live in the North. Middle class Catholics like these made some gains out of the last years .

These middle class people whispered to me in a soft voice that if it had not been for the Provos campaign they would have got nothing. This is the typical attitude of the middle class Catholic. They did get something out of the last 30 years war. They got access to more jobs and positions. For them the sacrifice made by a generation of Catholic working class youth was worth it. As an old man used to say to me back home they would fight to the last drop of another man's blood.

These middle class Catholics whom the Provisionals now represent ignore a few facts. Look at these. "According to the Multiple Deprivation Measure 2010 – which collates data on categories such as health, income, employment and education across 582 wards in the North – 14 of the 20 most deprived wards overall are predominantly Catholic. Sixteen of the 20 most deprived wards assessed on household income and employment are also mostly Catholic. A similar picture emerges from the Peace Monitoring Report 2012, which found “the proportion of people who are in low-income households is much higher among Catholics (26 per cent) than among Protestants (16 per cent).” The Provisional campaign did not end discrimination against the Catholic working class in the North.

The organizers of this blog have always opposed the Provisionals campaign. We have said it would not drive British imperialism out of the North, that it would increase sectarian division and that the working class as a whole in Northern Ireland would be further divided. This is correct.

The increased gains of the Catholic middle class and the Sinn Fein politicians have enraged the Protestant working class whom are still under the hammer of the attacks of capitalism in this period of crisis. They feel that some of the marginal privileges they had have been reduced and will be further reduced. They feel that the peace process has been at their expense. So we have the worst of both worlds. The Catholic working class are still exploited and more so than the Protestant working class and the Protestant working class while still having some small marginal privileges feel that they are losing these and under threat. Inevitably sectarianism will not go away.

The North is more segregated than ever before. More separate schools, more so called peace gates separating streets and areas in Belfast. The coming economic crises will see Imperialism and capitalism once again turning up the screws on divide and rule. The crisis of the North is not over. There is a real danger in the years ahead of new sectarian military conflict with the possibility of civil war and the repartition of the country.

Read More

Irish MP Clare Daly slams Obama the "hypocrite"

Facts For Working People shared Clare Daly's speech on our FB page and add it here on our blog. We commend Clare for her comments and for standing up for working people everywhere. The US Congress could do with a few politicians like Clare. She is an independent member of the Irish Parliament for Dublin North.

Read More

Ireland: Press Release from No 2CrokePark2

From Clare Daly TD

May 27, 2013 / Dáil Office /

Unions Must Oppose Draconian Legislation and Defend Trade Union Rights
ICTU Must Condemn The Finance Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Bill
Protest at Dail Eireann on Wed at 5pm.

In a statement today the NO2CrokePark2 Campaign called on all trade unionists to oppose The Finance Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Bill. The Bill, which is being rushed through the Dail and Seanad this week, is a fundamental attack on trade union rights and is being used to bully trade union members into accepting the Haddington Road Agreement.

The Campaign is calling on all those concerned about trade union and democratic rights to protest at the Dail next Wednesday at 5pm.

The Finance Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Bill is a serious threat to trade union and democratic rights. The bill, if passed, will cut wages and pensions. It also gives government power to unilaterally freeze increments and to change conditions of service including working hours in the public service.

It contains a coercive clause which threatens to freeze the increments due to workers in the public sector unless they sign up to the Haddington Road Agreement. It contains a provision “for a suspension of incremental progression for three years for all public servants unless they are covered by a collective agreement that modifies the terms of the incremental suspension and which has been registered with the Labour Relations Commission”. This means that unless a trade union signs up to the agreement, even if the pay of members is under €65,000, its members increments will be frozen for three years. This is a draconian measure far beyond anything contained in the original Croke Park2 proposals.

As stated by IFUT General Secretary this morning this is the first time that “the pay of a public servant is to be decided not by grade or position but by the particular union of which the person is a member.” In effect this Bill discriminates against those unions who decide to take a stand against cuts and austerity.

Campaign spokesperson Eddie Conlon said,

“The fundamental right of workers to vote on any proposal on the basis of its merit is being undermined completely. The right of a trade union to defend its members is being obliterated. A gun is being put to the head of public sector workers.

At present the government is attempting to intimidate workers into accepting the Haddington Road Agreement. This legislation changes the landscape in Ireland. It is remarkable that the leadership of the ICTU has been absolutely silent on the implications of the Bill. It is even more remarkable that the Bill is being introduced with the support of the Labour Party. We are calling on ICTU to immediately condemn the legislation and for Labour TDs to vote against it.

We believe it must be opposed by all trade unions and by everyone that cares for democratic principles. We are, therefore, issuing an open call to all trade union leaders and to TDs to immediately condemn the proposed legislation. To not do so is to stand against democracy and worker’s rights”.

Read More

The Death of Baroness Thatcher

The Death of Baroness Thatcher

after Patricia McGuigan and Alexander Pope

Her hair was a headmistress dreaming

of again being allowed to use the cane.

Her ambition was a brass door knocker

on what was once a council house.

Her brain was a conversation about money

Sir Keith Joseph had with himself.

Her back passage was Basil Fawlty

complaining about car strikes to the Major.

The look in her eyes was a shoot to kill policy

in Northern Ireland.

Her sentimentality was a spinster’s thimble

in which you could fit what’s left of the Tory Party

in Scotland, Liverpool, Manchester,

Leeds, Sheffield, Newcastle...

Her clenched fist was a skinhead

in nothing but Union Jack y-fronts.

She said the word ‘Europe’

like a woman coming down

from a severe overdose of Brussels Sprouts.

Her Christmases were dinner at Chequers

with a recently deceased sex offender.

Her ‘out’, ‘no’, ‘never’

were striking print workers

being given the cat of nine tails.

Her fingers and thumbs

were ten riot shields in a row.

Her final nightmare

was the silent, black eyed ghosts

of Joe Green and David Jones *

who did nothing but each offer her

a hand.

KEVIN HIGGINS

---

* David Gareth Jones, from Wakefield, died amid violent scenes outside Ollerton colliery in Nottinghamshire on 15 March 1984. On 15 June Joe Green was crushed to death by a lorry while picketing in Ferrybridge, West Yorkshire. 

Kevin Higgins is a poet in Galway Ireland

Read More

Ireland and women's health: Dublin Meeting for Abortion Rights

From Irish TD Clare Daly

Read More

Irish TD Clare Daly takes up abortion rights in the Irish parliament.

Followers of this blog are aware of the events that took place in Ireland around the death of Savita Happanavar, the Indian woman, a Dentist, who pleaded for authorities to terminate her pregnancy as she was having a miscarriage. Clare Daly, an Independent TD (Member of the Irish parliament)has been one of the most outspoken critics of Ireland's abortion laws and has campaigned for legalizing abortion when a mother's life is in danger. Ms Daly, along with three other TD's introduced such a bill in to parliament that was voted down.  She is here discussing the issue during a session in the parliament referred to as "leaders questions."

Read More

China, Genius, Joyce, small graveyard in Donegal.

James Joyce

I had to go down to the hospital very early today. On the way back I was exhausted and stopped in a coffee shop. And what do you know? My whole day was transformed. Somebody had left a copy of the New York Times behind, and there staring up at me from the front page was the man himself, wee Joyce. with his head and hat cocked in the famous pose. When my mother died she was buried in a small Donegal graveyard. Being an atheist I did not let the preacher speak for me. After he was finished I spoke of my mother's life and read two Joyce poems. Genius, which if it is genius, corresponds to reality, and Joyce's genius found its way into that small graveyard. Or to put it another way it is hard to keep a good man or woman down. So what was this article in the NEw York Times about? Well it seems that Finnegans Wake, the most complex of all his works has now been translated into Chinese, it did not say was it cantonese or the other Chinese language.

And what do you know the book is flying off the shelves. They have had to have a second print run already. MS. Dai the translator says: "It is beyond my expectations." It reached number two on the best sellers list. One reader said:" I am so desperate to know how it feels to read the most complicated book in the world." MS Dai deserves a medal. To translate Joyce's work she had to create new Chinese characters, a big step as the language already had tens of thousands of characters. Ms. Dai has not finished her translation completely. She says it will take another six years. Her husband who is gettiung very annoyed with Joyce because he hardly ever sees his wife. thinks it will take another 20 years. He is getting like Nora who got fed up with Joyce in her time and referred to Finnegans Wake as "That Chop Suey you're writing." HHHmmmmm, Choy Suey and a Chinese translation of Finnegans Wake. It gets more Joycean by the minute. Supporters of the book and of Joyce say his genius is that he pushes the limits of language. It is to be read as poetry say many.

A prominent Chinese writer says Finnegans Wake could inspire Chinese people to write. And maybe after they read it they will take literature seriously or even write." MS Dai, the vice Dean of the Department of Chinese Literature at Fundan University in Shanghai says:" The traditional writing style of Chinese literature needs to be changed after all these years.Someone needs to stand out and lead by his (or her) unique wriiting, like what James Joyce did in Western literature. Not bad from a boy from Dublin. Maybe change the literature of a country of over a billion. As I say they banned him in Ireland, they drove him out, then they had to retreat and put the bronze quotes from him on the Dublin streets and now he is penetrating the world and its most populous country.

I like the one about Blooms Day and the Joyce fans who were in Dublin from all over the world. A group of Japanese were outside one of the Joyce pubs with some sheets of Finnegans Wake translated into Japanese. A couple of Dublin wits were standing dragging on two butts hoping there might be a drink going. Maybe these Japanese would want to meet some real Jocyean Dubliners. They thought to themselves - no better men. But in spite of themselves they got caught up in the Japanese reading Finnegans Wake in their own language. After a while one turned to the other and said:" Bay Jaysus, I can understand it better in the Japanese." Joyce would have been proud.

Read More

Ireland: Working class history, Derry uprising 1969

Here is another part of the interview with John Throne that took place some 5 years ago. John is an author on this blog and was a participant in the Derry uprising. The first part is here

Read More

Working class history: The Derry Uprising 1969

We are sharing with our readers a bit of Irish working class history. It's an interview with John Throne also known as Sean O' Torrain, about the Derry uprising of 1969 of which he was a part. John is one of the three regular authors and founders of this blog. He is also the author of The Donegal Woman which you can see in the book page above and is presently writing his second book about his life as well as his contribution's here. Two more short interviews will follow.

Read More

Ireland: Trade Union meeting in Dublin

Report from Finn Geaney
Member of Teachers Union of Ireland and the Irish Labor Party

Sometimes we need the invigorating blasts of fresh air from an enlivened trade union movement, when the often dark and stuffy atmosphere of polemic is dissipated and doors are thrown open by surges of activity from outside.

Yesterday a meeting attended by around 250 union members was held in a Dublin hotel for the purpose of discussing a strategy to defeat the Government’s proposals for cuts in public service provision and the pay of public service workers. The meeting had been called by branches of the Teachers Union of Ireland, including my own branch where a number of discussions have already been held on this issue. On the platform were representatives of the four teaching unions, the nurses’ unions and the union representing management grades in the Irish police service (Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors). Similar meetings have been organised by other trade union groups in the recent past. This process represents a major fight by organised labour against the policies and plans of Ireland’s right-wing Government, a united front of trade unionists fighting the cuts and presenting an alternative. Furthermore what is now developing is a significant challenge to the union bureaucracy in Ireland.

The origins of the present situation are in attempts to savage the wages and conditions of public service workers that have been going on now for nearly five years. The most recent attacks are encapsulated in an agreement worked out between the Government and Irish Congress of Trade Union (ICTU) bureaucrats, one year before the terms of a deal done in 2010 deal were to run out. The Government sought one billion euro in cuts from the pay of workers in the public service and called in the national trade union bureaucrats from the Irish Congress of Trade Unions to assist them in this, which of course they promptly did. The Government got agreement on exactly what they wanted, one billion in pay cuts. This betrayal has become known as ‘Croke Park 2’, so-called because of the location of the talks between the Government and the union bureaucrats.

There can be few clearer illustrations of what Marx meant when in 1851 he wrote in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte that all facts and personages of great importance in world history occur twice, the first time as tragedy, the second as farce; of course a major point of difference in this regard is that this episode does not involve ‘great personages’ but rather petty bureaucrats. One of the speakers at the trade union rally in Dublin yesterday said that if ever he was to be kidnapped he did not want the ICTU to become involved in any negotiations about his release!

The outcome of the betrayal has yet to be voted upon by the members of the unions involved, over three hundred thousand workers. Already a number of National Executive Committees have recommended a ‘No’ vote. Following a discussion on its National Executive, where the vote was seventeen to one against, my own trade union, the Teachers Union of Ireland has recommended rejection of the ‘deal’. Other unions representing nurses, lower-paid civil servants, prison officers, police, firemen and craft workers have also called for rejection. If a majority of public service workers vote against ‘Croke Park 2’ this will represent a major defeat for the Government. More importantly it will restore confidence in the organised labour movement in this country and will be a significant kick in the teeth for the overpaid union officials who form a dense, infectious crust around organised labour.

Clearly there are major issues confronting organised labour in this country. Even those unions that vote ‘No’ can be over-ruled if a majority of public sector unions accept the terms. The Government have devoted much energy to creating divisions within the trade union movement: public sector workers versus those employed by private companies, higher-paid public servants versus lower-paid, ‘frontline’ public servants who rely on 24-hour, 7-day arrangements versus those on the traditional working day. And union bureaucrats, unable to provide any way forward, have colluded in fomenting these divisions.

There is a long and difficult battle ahead, firstly to secure rejection by union members of the new sell-out, and following that to prevent the bureaucrats from returning to talks in search of ‘sweeteners’ that they can then bring back to the members in an endeavour to secure acceptance a second time around. This happened before. In 2010 an agreement was made between the union bureaucracy and the previous government, which some unions rejected. After much to-ing and fro-ing a deal was accepted. As part of the campaign against the ‘Croke Park 1’ deal in 2010 I challenged the President of the Teachers Union of Ireland in an election. I won 20% of the vote of the members. The sitting President and the National Executive voted initially against the ‘Croke Park 1’ proposals in an endeavour to undermine my campaign. No sooner was the union election over that she and her bureaucrats went back into talks with the Government and, after much manoeuvring and trickery, eventually secured acceptance of a slightly amended set of proposals. She lost a lot of support then, and that lesson has not been lost on the current National Executive Committee of the TUI.

The Government have said that they will bring in legislation to cut the pay of all public service workers if this ‘deal’ is rejected. This is easier said than done; an attempt to cut pay through the mechanism of a vote in parliament after a majority of workers in the country have expressed opposition to such a measure would be vigorously resisted. And while the leaders of the Irish Labour Party in the Coalition Government have been making a lot of noise about how they support the proposals in ‘Croke Park 2’, and their readiness to introduce legislation to enforce pay cuts by law should they deem such to be necessary, in fact would be unable to proceed in the way that they threaten. For one, the major unions are affiliated to the Irish Labour Party and provide much of its funding and support at election time. This Government, already weakened by the economic crisis, and very unpopular because of its continuing attacks on living standards through cuts and unfair taxes, will not want to face a generalised strike movement.

Events have a habit of surprising revolutionaries. When revolution broke out over Europe in 1848 Marx and Engels were surprised at its suddenness and its rapid escalation. They had been urging support in a number of European countries for the ideas contained in the Communist Manifesto and were advocating the overthrow of the ancien régime. Starting in February in Palermo in Sicily where there was widespread economic distress, the revolutionary movement spread quickly to France, Denmark, Hungary, Austria, Saxony, Prussia, Czechoslovakia and much of Italy. In June of that year the workers of Paris, where revolutionary traditions had taken deep root, rose up against the Government but were subsequently slaughtered in huge numbers by the bourgeois republicans. By the time that Louis Bonaparte took power in 1851, balancing between the bourgeoisie and the workers, France was being ruled by what Engels called “a gang of political and financial adventurers”.

There will be further meetings of trade unionists like that in Dublin's Gresham Hotel yesterday, as organised workers attempt to hammer out a strategy to defeat the savage measures of this government. A group of supporters of the French rugby team were staying in the same hotel. Allez La France, they greeted. Unfortunately that game ended in a draw.

Read More

Ireland: Magdalene Laundries, rape and forced labor

We reprint the piece below from the Irish Journal as a compliment to the video above documenting the Magdalen laundries where young Irish girls and women were imprisoned and forced to do slave labor.  The tragic story of the woman in the piece who died there at the age of 49 and was raped while a prisoner there is not an isolated incident. The story is told by her child.  The Irish state and the Catholic Church are responsible for this atrocity and the crimes committed under their care.  Compensation is also due all the women whose unpaid labor brought considerable income to the Church coffers. The Irish government has still not apologized for its collusion with the Catholic Church in these slave labor schemes. If you haven't seen the Magdalen Sisters, it's a movie worth seeing.  

A Magdalene daughter shares her story
   
‘Margaret died of her slave-related injuries’:

“Margaret was committed to industrial school in 1954. She was 2 yrs 4 mths old. She left 49 years later in a coffin.” HER FIRST TWEET simply said: “My mother was Magdalene No. 322. Real name Margaret.” It was met by a number of reactions, including disbelief that Magdalenes were given numbers. “Yes,” replied Samantha Long. “I was looking over her records today and thought I’d share that. Awful.” The Twitter user was talking about her late mother, Margaret Bullen, a woman taken into the Magdalene Laundries system when she was just two years old. Just days ahead of the publication of a report into the level of State involvement at the now-infamous institutions, Long decided to share her family’s story.

There had been a campaign to get the hashtag #justiceformagdalenesNOW trending on Twitter to raise awareness last night and the Dublin woman’s provocative, powerful and heartbreaking tweets achieved that aim. READ: ‘A life unlived’: Margaret Bullen’s story With her kind permission, we have reproduced her timeline here: My mother was Magdalene No. 322. Real name Margaret Margaret was committed to industrial school in 1954. She was 2 yrs 4 mths old. She left 49 years later in a coffin. By the age of 5, Margaret was preparing breakfast for 70 children including herself from 4am. Child labour Margaret was noted in her records as “nervous, timid, fretful, a bed-wetter”. No wonder, she was never toilet trained Margaret didn’t know where she was from or when her birthday was. We told her when she was 42 At age 13, Margaret had her IQ measured. She was “certified” as fit for work, unfit for education. Labour camps.

Margaret never lived in the outside world, although she lived just off O’Connell Street in our capital city Margaret didn’t know how to handle money. She had none, and no posessions Margaret never went on a date, Never had a boyfriend. Never fell in love. But she was impregnated in care Margaret’s twin daughters were taken from her 7 weeks after she gave birth.When she saw us again we were 23 When we reunited at the Gresham, Margaret was 42. Not that you’d think it At The Gresham in 1995, Margaret was excited. Not just to meet us,but it was the first time she ever tasted coffee When I became a mother in 2004, it was the first time I allowed myself to grieve for Margaret’s life unlived, denials Margaret and my family enjoyed each other for a few years, hard to recreate deep love after so long Margaret died in July 2003, one day before her 51st birthday.

She died of her slave related injuries Six months after her death, her first grandchild was born. She would have loved her four grandchildren I hope for justice for Margaret and her friends on Tuesday. Thank you all so much for the support. I think she knows I am astounded at the reaction to my tweets about Margaret.Impossible to reply to all.Thank you,I am humbled Goodnight all,finally. Míle buíochas #justiceformagdalenesNOW Senator Martin McAleese’s report has been sent to Justice Minister Alan Shatter, who will publish it in full on Tuesday afternoon, following a Cabinet meeting. The long-awaited report has been delayed multiple times since the inter-departmental committee was established in response to a recommendation from the United Nations Committee Against Torture (UNCAT). That body said it was “gravely concerned” at the failure of the State to protect girls and women who were involuntarily confined between 1922 and 1996. Advocacy groups have called for a full State apology, as well as a proper, transparent compensation scheme for survivors. About 30,000 women were incarcerated in Magdalene Laundries between 1922 and 1996. TheJournal.ie has previously told Margaret’s story and that piece can be found here. Samantha Long has also written about both her mothers in this touching blog post.

Read More

Ireland: a la carte Catholicism and the secular agenda

We are reprinting this commentary on the changing nature of religion in Ireland with our readers in the light of the huge crisis that is engulfing one of the world's major religions.

Flirting with the light of reason: how a la carte Catholicism contributes to the secular agenda
by Andrew D Rattigan

By Atheist Ireland | Published: February 10, 2013

In the first of a series of articles for Atheist Ireland, Andrew Devine-Rattigan remembers the set-menu Irish Catholics of recent decades, argues that they are being replaced by a new generation of a la carte Irish Catholics, and says that atheists and secularists should welcome this rejection of religious authority.

The current rumblings within the Catholic Church with regards the censure and attempted silencing of priests such as Fr. Tony Flannery is indicative of a coming schism within the organisation. In fact, it is well under way, it is just being confined within the church and has not yet led to a split.

The Association of Catholic Priests is an organisation of Catholic priests who believe the Catholic Church should be accountable to its members and open to change. Members of the ACP, such as Tony Flannery, question the hierarchy’s position on many social issues and take a liberal view on areas such as sexuality and human relationships that run at odds with the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

This questioning and challenging of the dogma and doctrines of the catholic faith within the clergy is merely indicative of the changes in wider Irish society and in particular the ongoing transformation of Irish people who call themselves Catholics but who are at odds with the official teachings and stance of the Catholic hierarchy on many social and doctrinal issues.

The old set-menu Irish Catholics
I remember a time only a few decades ago when elderly relatives of mine, now deceased, said the Angelus every day and talked of Protestants, even the ones they liked, as being damned to hell for not belonging to the ‘one true faith.’ There was nothing a la carte about their Catholicism. It was a set menu and there was no deviation from it. All courses were compulsory with no meat on Fridays.
Catholics of this generation reveled in the idea that they were no good sinners. They made grovelling supplications for mercy to their ostensibly loving god to spare them from the torments of hell, despite the fact that many of them were already living in one.

In between being consumed by guilt and shame simply for existing, these set menu Catholics of only a few decades ago, spent the rest of their time trying to placate  their all seeing, ever watching god by actually going to mass and fasting. They went to Lough Derg to walk around barefoot in the rain whilst sleeping on a bed of nails to curry favour with a compassionate god, who paradoxically had a penchant for the suffering of others.

In between work and religious observances they found time to conceive multiples of children through joyless shame filled sex whilst being watched over by large statues of a putative virgin and of her son and his glowing heart. This kind of iconography came at you around every corner and hung from the walls of most homes in an Ireland of only two decades ago.

Violent misogyny and submission
Whereas modern a la carte Irish Catholic women titillate themselves with the violent, sado-masochistic, submissive, misogynistic, socially accepted pornography of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’, their mothers and grandmothers actually had to live in a society where violent misogyny and submission to powerful men was a reality as opposed to a trashy novel.

This aggressive patriarchal dominance expressed itself in the form of the Magdalene Laundries, as well as in surgical procedures such as symphisiotomies, where women were butchered unknowingly so they could continue to conceive multitudes of children.

Catholic women in Ireland until the early sixties also had to endure the humiliating and servile ritual of being ‘churched.’ This was a blessing they received from a priest to purify them and that allowed them back in to the church after being tainted from both the sexual act and its consequences in the form of a conception.  I wish that more Irish women would reflect on the social history of this country before they applaud the abusive, patriarchal misogyny in the pages of the aforementioned novel.

Confessing to hypocritical priests
For some variety in their religious adherence every few months they would sit in a darkened wooden box in the corner of a church and talk through a hatch to a variety of ostensibly celibate men. Some of these men actually kept by their vows,  many others succumbed to understandably human desires and emotions with women they were friends with, or who came to them for support.

As well as being a shoulder to cry on to, they offered arms to run in to, and sheets to get under, whilst they hypocritically preached from the pulpit about the evils of sex outside of wedlock. Yes, I am referring to you Father Michael Cleary, Bishop Eamon Casey and Bishop Len Brennan. Let us not forget of course the many others that should have been making their own confessions in police stations for the most heinous of crimes against the most innocent.

Blind faith at Lourdes and Knock
Instead of cheap weekends away to Barcelona with Ryanair, middle class set menu Catholics of a few decades ago, spent a small fortune heading to Lourdes to watch legions of people in wheelchairs being dipped in freezing cold water in the hope of a cure. The next day they returned to watch the same unfortunate wretches being dipped again, only this time they also needed to be cured of the pneumonia they caught the day before.

Poorer Catholics of a few decades ago who couldn’t afford the trip to Lourdes had to make do with Knock in County Mayo where they would queue to kiss what must be the most contagious wall in Ireland. It has been accepted by many Catholics that the Virgin Mary did a one night guest appearance here in the 1800s. It must have been an unappreciative audience as she hasn’t been back since.

Although a few hardcore orthodox Catholics did turn up in Knock only a few years ago, to stare in to the sun alongside a Dublin man who said the Virgin Mary had told him that it would be a good idea to do that kind of thing. Not surprisingly several of the faithful went blind, giving a whole new meaning to the term ‘blind faith’. Rumour has it they are organising a trip to Lourdes to be dipped head first in the grotto with the hope of restoring their sight. A restoration to sanity would seem to me to be more pressing.

Offering up suffering for salvation
Now and again the set menu Catholics became aware of the intensely unbearable burden living according to the Catholic faith was, but instead of ever questioning the religious indoctrination they received as children they instead just ‘offered it up’. This ‘offering up’ of their suffering in this life would shave a few years off their sentence in purgatory.

When is the last time you have heard anyone that you know who calls themselves Catholic use such an expression? Or tell you that they were waiting for the hairshirt they ordered on amazon to arrive as they were eager to get started on some penance over the weekend to make up for the lustful thoughts they indulged in the weekend before?

The modern a la carte menu of beliefs
In fact, in light of a recent Irish Times survey (30/11/12) that reads like a missing script from an episode of Father Ted, many Irish people who call themselves Catholics today would have been burned at the stakes a few hundred years ago for heresy. Only a few decades ago they would have been shunned by their families and communities for expressing such opinions.  The poll found that seven percent of people who called themselves Catholics don’t even believe in God, which is a bit like saying you are a cyclist despite the fact you cant cycle and don’t even own a bike. Another twenty percent of Catholics polled don’t even believe in the resurrection of Christ or that god created the Universe.

This kind of doublethink, that is the Orwellian concept that it is possible to hold two contradictory views and believe in them both fervently is a defining characteristic of the modern Irish a la carte Catholic. They want to be Catholics without the Catholicism, like being a Jew with an intact foreskin who enjoys a bacon sandwich.

Conscience versus Catechism
An overwhelming seventy eight percent of Catholics, according to the poll, follow their own conscience on moral issues as opposed to the diktats from the Vatican. However, using one’s personal conscience on moral matters or doctrinal matters is considered heresy according to the Vatican and the official teachings of the faith.

On the Vatican’s website you can read the Catechism of the Catholic church, which is basically a rule book for Catholics. According to the catechism, “heresy is the obstinate denial of some truth which must be believed, or it is likewise an obstinate doubt….schism is the refusal of submission to the Roman Pontiff.” Based on this passage alone one can conclude that many Catholics in Ireland would be considered heretics by the Vatican.

What are these truths that must be believed and who decides what the truth is? These truths are decided by the popes and the bishops that are consulted with before the pope issues an edict of faith. The pope acts on the authority of Christ, apparently, according to the catechism, but Jesus can’t be contacted to corroborate this claim. Whatever the pope decides is truth is the truth and an infallible one at that. According to the Catechism, “this infallibility extends to all those elements of doctrine including morals.”

A reading of the constitution of the Association of Catholic Priests reveals how so many clergy do not accept the Vatican and the Pope as an infallible source of moral guidance; in fact it is quite the opposite. Several polls in Ireland over the past few years reveal that although people call themselves Catholics, that in areas of morality and even doctrine, they are a very different kind of Catholic compared to only two generations ago.

Rejecting religious authority
What has any of this got to do with Atheism, Agnosticism or Secularism you might ask? Well, it is my contention that the exponential rise in the number of people who identify themselves as non-religious in the latest census is down to the fact that more and more Irish people are embracing thinking for themselves and have come to reject religious authority.

This trend has now become evident within the Catholic Church itself, as both the existence of the ACP and poll after poll of people who identify themselves as Catholic recite views complete at odds with the Vatican and Irish church hierarchy. Atheists and Agnostics should welcome this trend within the ranks of lay Catholics as once people start to shine the light of reason on to religious faith it can and has, in some cases, led to an embrace of at the very least agnosticism, if not outright atheism.
Perhaps, this is why the Catechism proclaims it a sin to even entertain doubts. They know it could logically lead to a complete rejection of faith or at the very least an embrace of secularism. This a process that to a large extent a la carte Catholics have already done by placing personal conscience as their moral guide as opposed to the diktats of the Vatican.

Read More

Ireland: Left wing Irish TD vindicated after police harrassment

We published the statement from Clare Daly, an independent socialist member of the Irish Parliament who was stopped by the Irish police (Garda) and booked on drunk driving.  She has received the result of the test and it is clear the behavior of the police and their treatment of her has to do with her politics and investigation of police activities. It is even possible she was followed although we have no evidence of that.  here is her statement since the test result were made public. Check out more on Facts For Working People FB page at: http://www.facebook.com/FactsForWorkingPeople

                                                 Statement from Clare Daly TD

Result of Test 30% below limit!

On Monday night 28th January, after meetings in the Dail, I attended a meeting in Swords and left at 9.30pm for another meeting requested by a family on the Southside of the city near the Canal. I arrived after 10pm and spent almost two hours discussing issues which I had raised in the Dail. Before I left I was offered a hot whiskey for a cold.

I left at midnight and not being familiar with the area found myself on the road to Ballyfermot at Kilmainham and took a right turn onto the South Circular Road trying to get back onto the North side - unfortunately there is No Right Turn at this junction and this was brought to my attention by Gardai in a car who stopped me.

I was breathalysed but the equipment didnt register a reading. I was arrested and handcuffed on the side of the road. I objected to being handcuffed and stated that I would willingly go to the Garda station. I was told by the arresting Garda that this was procedure.

I was brought in a patrol car to the Kilmainham Garda Station within 300 metres distance. At one point I was placed in a cell on my own. A doctor was called and I provided a urine sample. When I was released a female Garda told me to come back when you are sober.

I believe that the Gardai implementing road safety have a job to do and I support them. However, I object strongly to the arrest, handcuffing and release of information re the arrest on suspicion of drink driving to the tabloid press early on Tuesday. My legal advice is that none of this is procedure
.
I believe that this was a deliberate attempt to discredit a left-wing TD who has raised issues of malpractice within the Garda Siochana. This information could only have come from within the Gardai.

The Garda Ombudsman is investigating this matter, as a criminal investigation under Section 98 of the Garda Soichana Act 2005. This is a very serious issue. Every citizen is entitled to their good name and to have their privacy respected.

Garda whistle blowers who have quite correctly approached the designated Confidential Recipient and elected TDs, as they are lawfully entitled to do, have been threatened that they will be fully investigated in accordance with the Garda Siochana (Discipline) Regulations 2007 for speaking to a third party.

I now expect that the same enthusiasm will be taken in relation to those who have sought to damage me.

I have received the official result of the test on the urine sample provided and the result is 45 milligrammes per 100 millilitres of urine, which is 33% below the allowable limit - 67 milligrammes

Further information contact Rhona McCord 086 8958620

Oireachtas email policy and disclaimer. http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/about/oireachtasemailpolicyanddisclaimer/ Beartas ríomhphoist an Oireachtais agus séanadh. http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/ga/eolas/beartasriomhphoistanoireachtaisagusseanadh/ Oireachtas email policy and disclaimer. http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/about/oireachtasemailpolicyanddisclaimer/ Beartas ríomhphoist an Oireachtais agus séanadh. http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/ga/eolas/beartasriomhphoistanoireachtaisagusseanadh/

Read More

Ireland: Bankers shift debt on to backs of Irish workers and poor.

Joan Collins TD

Promissory note deal is a three card trick.

Joan Collins

Now you see it, now you don’t. Nobody should be fooled by the government spin on the deal negotiated with the ECB on the debts run up by Anglo Irish and Irish Nationwide. Not a cent of the almost €35 billion poured into these two insolvent banks has been written down. This deal seals the fact that these debts have been fully socialised, that is transferred as a burden onto the Irish people.

The government is claiming they have now closed Anglo and Nationwide. These banks closed for business years ago. They were being wound down under a special vehicle for that purpose, IRBC. This winding down will continue under NAMA and go on for several more years. The bondholders who have yet to be paid will be paid. Meanwhile some 850 bank workers are laid off overnight, most of them on moderate pay.

This is stroke politics at its worst. The debt will still be paid, but not by this government. The stroke means the government will not have to fork up €3.1 billion this March or in 2015 or 2016, if the government lasts that long. However there will be a €1 billion interest bill each year and whatever government is in power in 2038 will have to start paying off the principal.

We can now be certain that there will be no write down on the other €30 billion put into AIB, BOI, EBS and Irish Life and Permanent. A €64 billion bank bail-out has been placed squarely but certainly not fairly on the shoulders of the Irish people, and in particular on those who can least afford it.

€20.7 billion of that has come directly from the Pension Reserve Fund.  This is money that could have been used for job creation and infrastructural programmes to combat unemployment. Instead we have over 430,000 on the dole and emigration back to post famine levels. A further €12 billion for this bail-out came directly from the exchequer, almost half of the billions taken out of the economy through austerity in the last five years, targeting cruel cuts at the most disadvantaged.

This is a deal negotiated by the elite in Ireland with the elite in the EU, and solely in the interest of those elites..It will keep the markets (loan sharks and speculators) happy.  Despite their whinging Fianna Fail voted with the government in the ‘debate’ in the early hours of Thursday morning. Labour can be really proud of themselves. They have been part of the a huge transfer of wealth from the poorest to the richest.

Joan Collins is a member of the Irish Parliament, the People Before Profit TD for Dublin South Central.
"Like" the FFWP page on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/FactsForWorkingPeople

Read More

Ireland Meeting: Campaign Against Water and Household Taxes

Read More

Sweet Commerce: Mau Mau, Ireland and the British peasantry

by Richard Mellor

It is not easy to understand the processes that take place in society, not because it’s hard to understand but because the process are deliberately obscured. Why is there is so much strife, poverty, violence and war? “Human nature is just selfish, naturally greedy” is one explanation we hear all the time.  The pope in Rome and most other religious figures will claim it’s due to rejection of or failure to become closer to god; their god of course. We are sinners, Christians are even born bad.

As a young man in the 1960’s and 70’s during the troubles in Northern Ireland and subsequent bombings in England, the discussions in the workplaces and pubs were about how the Catholics and Protestants just couldn’t get along.  The same with Muslims and Jews in Israel/Palestine, “Jews and Muslims have been killing each other like this for centuries” one guy told me recently.  This is not so, and in certain circles among political people, the discussions may well be about the underlying causes of these conflicts, but I am talking about the propaganda in the mass media and how this shapes the views of millions of workers. The main thing is that religion, race and other social divisions are used to obscure the dominant antagonism in society, the class question-----the exploitation of those who sell their labor power to live by those that buy it.  This is particularly so in the US where there are no classes apparently and identity politics is rife.

Dedan Kimathi, Mau Mau fighter

I am thinking of this as I just finished a book about the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya that took place between 1952 and 1960, The Histories of the Hanged by David Anderson and I strongly recommend it.  It was a brutal and violent conflict.  As a child I recall it being portrayed as a violent assault on white settlers but very few whites died although some did die horrific deaths.  But hundreds of thousands of Kikuyu were displaced, thrown from their land and resettled or unable to find work in the cities.  Over 1000 were hanged and many more killed in the conflict with settlers and British troops.  It was the land question that lay behind the revolt, a revolt that was never termed a rebellion by the British because to do so would have given the “terrorists”rights under the rules of war.  The US refers to these people as “enemy combatants” for the same reason.

Toward the end of the conflict Anderson gives an account of the attitude of the colonial authorities to Mau Mau prisoners who they called Mickeys:

“….while we were waiting for the sub-inspector to come back I decided to question the Mickeys.  They wouldn’t say a thing of course and one of them, a tall coal-black bastard, kept grinning at me, real insolent. I slapped him hard, but he kept on grinning at me, so I kicked him in the balls as hard as I could ... When he finally got up on his feet he grinned at me again and I snapped. I really did. I stuck my revolver right in his grinning mouth ... And I pulled the trigger. His brains went all over the side of the police station. The other two (suspects) were standing there looking blank ... so I shot them both ... when the sub-inspector drove up, I told him the (suspects) tried to escape. He didn't believe me but all he said was 'bury them and see the wall is cleaned up'."   

A Young friend of mine, a black guy from the Midwest was talking to me about racism and what that has meant for black people throughout US history, from the kidnappings that brought them here to the racist justice system that incarcerates them at alarming rates and everything in between.  He felt racial war would be more likely than genuine racial harmony. The US media tended to see the Mau Mau revolt as a race war at the time and I can hardly blame my young friend from drawing the conclusions he did although how strongly he held them I’m not sure. But I reminded him of the conclusions about social conflict that Malcolm X drew from his experiences when he said:

“I believe that there will be ultimately be a clash between the oppressed and those who do the oppressing….” he said, “….I believe that there will be a clash between those who want freedom, justice and equality for everyone and those who want to continue the system of exploitation. I believe that there will be that kind of clash, but I don't think it will be based on the color of the skin...”

While skin color, gender and religious affiliation can lead to conflict, and are also additional forms of social oppression that we have to address----I don’t feel discriminated against by the society in which I live due to the color of my skin for example----the motive force for driving colonial people’s off their land was not a hatred for their color or religion, it is driven by the need for free labor and the expansion of the capitalist mode of production throughout the world.  Wealth in capitalist society is created during the labor process so people that have a means of subsistence from the land have to be separated from it in order to drive them in to the hands of the capitalist class who will willingly pay them a wage for their labor time.

Before the British capitalist class liberated Kikuyu farmers from their means of subsistence, they freed the British peasants, white people, from theirs. The taking of common land that fed and clothed these peasants sped up after the English revolution becoming private land through legal decree (the peasants having no political voice of course) and violence. But the capitalist mode of production was not yet advanced enough to employ all this Labor power, these “free” laborers, so the possessors of it having lost their means of subsistence, were driven in to extreme poverty and were forced to beg, poach or steal to survive.  The punishment for such immoral behavior was death or if you were lucky, the workhouse. 

Marx described the removal of one entire community in Scotland to make way for capitalist agriculture in the six years between 1814 and 1820:

“From 1814 to 1820 these 15,000 inhabitants, about 3,000 families, were systematically hunted and rooted out. All their villages were destroyed and burnt, all their fields turned into pasturage. British soldiers enforced this eviction, and came to blows with the inhabitants. One old woman was burnt to death in the flames of the hut, which she refused to leave.

The perpetrator, the Duchess of Sutherland he points out; 

“…appropriated 794,000 acres of land that had from time immemorial belonged to the clan. She assigned to the expelled inhabitants about 6,000 acres on the sea-shore — 2 acres per family. The 6,000 acres had until this time lain waste, and brought in no income to their owners. The Duchess, in the nobility of her heart, actually went so far as to let these at an average rent of 2s. 6d. per acre to the clansmen, who for centuries had shed their blood for her family. The whole of the stolen clanland she divided into 29 great sheep farms, each inhabited by a single family, for the most part imported English farm-servants. In the year 1835 the 15,000 Gaels were already replaced by 131,000 sheep.”

The same situation began in Ireland long before capitalist expansion reached the shores of present day Kenya.  But my point here is that the capitalist class is not driven by race or religious hatred, it is the necessity for free labor that motivates their actions described here.  But a ruling class, feudal or capitalist, must justify its right to govern society and rule over others. It must demonize them, portray them as lesser beings. Why else would they be the rulers and the others ruled?  They must be more intelligent, more industrious, more motivated, otherwise why would they not be the conquered instead of the conquerors?

Throughout history there is resistance to this process which is what the Mau Mau rebellion was. It is met by direct violence and legislation to back it up and Irish history documents this well.  In England from the reign of Henry VIII beggars and the poor were whipped, branded, and executed for their crimes. Their land was taken from them along with their lives if they resisted; “Thus were the agricultural people, first forcibly expropriated from the soil, driven from their homes, turned into vagabonds, and then whipped, branded, tortured by laws grotesquely terrible, into the discipline necessary for the wage system.” writes Marx.

If we read of the colonizing of Mexico or any other land, the process is similar, the Yaquii were driven off their land for the same reason, private property in land is paramount. The capitalist class, “…compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilization into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image.”

The British ruling class and its intellectual warriors not only demonized its own working class, peasant or industrial worker, it portrayed other races as mere animals, but finds the necessity to convince its own working class that they are not so low and provide them with just a little more to prove it. Super exploitation of the foreigner could provide some extra loot for this task. Racism is the best tool for the justification of oppression and religion is a handy enabler, "How godly a deed it is to overthrow so wicked a race the world may judge: for my part I think there cannot be a greater sacrifice to God” wrote one British chronicler during a colonial expedition in to Ulster in Northern Ireland in 1574.

The Times of London wrote in the midst of the Irish famine as hundreds of thousands of them died: "They are going. They are going with a vengeance. Soon a Celt will be as rare in Ireland as a Red Indian on the streets of Manhattan...Law has ridden through, it has been taught with bayonets, and interpreted with ruin. Townships levelled to the ground, straggling columns of exiles, workhouses multiplied, and still crowded, express the determination of the Legislature to rescue Ireland from its slovenly old barbarism, and to plant there the institutions of this more civilized land."

James Froud was an English professor at Oxford, one of the historic training schools of the British and world bourgeois. He was a proponent of Anglo Saxon superiority and wrote of the Irish peasants at the time as "more like squalid apes than human beings.".

In the British press they were pictured as apes and were often described as “White Chimpanzees”, a step up from the “negro”. This had to be the case as the Irish have white skin, the same color as the British ruling class. Some said that the arrival of people of a different color in to Britain gave the Irish some breathing room.*

Racism has been a very useful tool in securing the aims of the capitalist class as they are forced by the laws of their system to seek new markets, raw material and Labor power and it is not the only tactic used to divide and weaken the working class, sexism and religious division is also useful to them. But it would be a mistake to attribute the motive for the exploitation by one nation of another to be a personal hatred of their culture, their color or their religion. Behind the racism and the violence and the expropriation of land and property is economics.

I was in Ireland recently and saw that there are efforts there to lay to rest in one place or commemorate the martyrs who died fighting for Irish freedom from British occupation.  Many of them that died at the hands of the occupying forces either in combat or through execution, were buried in unmarked graves or simply discarded. (For centuries, Irish revolutionists were sent to Australia as were the poor, political and religious dissidents).

In Kenya too there is an attempt to find the bones of those heroic Mau Mau buried in unmarked plots or simply discarded.  It is no accident that this took place in two different parts of the world.  The object is not to leave a people a place to visit their heroes; those that fought for their independence and freedom from colonial rule, all conquerors do it.  Bin Laden, though I would not place him in the same company as heroic figures like Che Guevara, Lumumba, and others, was dumped in the sea for the same reason.  The hatred of the occupier of one’s land of the ruling class that oppresses, is deep rooted and it is this hatred that must find no outlet, must not take organizational form or have any heroes.

The Mau Mau were presented by British colonialism as insane psychopaths, monkeys and incapable of living in a modern world just like the Irish.  They recently won a major victory in a British court that allows the few remaining Mau Mau fighters to sue the British government for compensation for the torture and brutality they faced under British rule.  It’s not going to amount to much bet even so, the British government opposed it. 

They blamed the Kenyans.

*The quotes on Ireland come from a document from the Irish Famine Society.  To receive this in pdf form send an e mail to: we_know_whats_up@yahoo.com

"Like" the FFWP page on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/FactsForWorkingPeople

Read More

Ireland: ULA statement on SP leaving the Alliance

I Just returned from Ireland where I had the pleasure of spending some time with the comrades in the United Labor Alliance.  Along with that, a number of members of the ULA attended a meeting in Dublin of the Workers International Network where Roger Silverman spoke on our past, and the need for a new approach from the left in the changing world situation.  The meeting was sponsored by Clare Daly and Joan Collins, two members of the Irish parliament and the ULA

Some groups have left the ULA including the Socialist Party to which many ULA members once belonged.  The Socialist Party took the decision to leave the ULA when I was still in Ireland and the statement below is a response to that and is signed by three members of Parliament. Facts For Working People agrees with this statement.

**************

 "The United Left Alliance regrets the decision taken by Joe Higgins TD and the Socialist Party to leave the Alliance. We believe that they have made a serious mistake. The need for a new, broad and inclusive left, which will not on principle enter right wing governments with either Fine Gael or Fianna Fail is today more urgent than ever.
...
Faced with a massive attack on jobs, pay, pensions, working conditions, welfare payments and entitlements, health and education and other essential social services, working people need an independent and radical political movement which will seek to represent them, help organise them, and above all, fight on their behalf.

The ULA was formed with the intention to bring together existing left groups along with individual members to help lay the basis over time to enable a new party of the left to come into existence. It was inevitable that there would be difficulties in bringing together groups who have had a long period of independent activity and indeed rivalry.

We believe it is necessary to work to overcome such problems and to create the conditions in which the ULA can achieve its undoubted potential.

It is unfortunate that the Socialist Party feels it necessary to create or exaggerate political differences to justify their action in leaving the Alliance. In reality their decision reflects an inability to put the urgent task of building a broader movement to more effectively represent working people before the narrow interests of their own small grouping.

Richard Boyd Barrett TD. Clare Daly TD. Joan Collins TD."

Joan Collins

Clare Daly

Richard Boyd Barrett

Read More

Ireland: the Catholic Church's assault on women's rights

by Richard Mellor

I am in Dublin Ireland for one more day and wish I could have stayed a little longer.  I was unable to attend the pro-choice meeting on Merrion Street on Saturday which corresponded with a huge pro-life rally nearby.

But reading the papers this morning, what I find so infuriating are the speeches about the sanctity of human life and particularly a child’s life, from the mouths of men, often rich men and so-called men of the cloth. The Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin said on Saturday that that “Children are a sign of the Kingdom of God”(apparently Jesus told him this)  and that to protect children is to be pro-life, “..our attitude to children tells us a lot about our understanding of the Kingdom of God.” Martin said.

It’s incredible that a representative of an organization that has protected mass serial rapists and pedophiles within its ranks can make such statements in a public forum.  These people have no shame whatsoever.  The Catholic church not only covered for these serial rapists, officials actually sent them out of harms way and in to new pastures where they were able to continue their horrendous activities.  The Catholic church from the head man in the Vatican on down, chose to protect serial rapists and abandon the little ones.  It is an institution rotten to the core.

Politicians, men, and representatives of a misogynistic religious organization that has accompanied and still accompanies the imperialistic ambitions of nation states and global capitalism, lecture women and the rest of us about the sanctity of life.  They are very concerned about life before it emerges from the womb but care little about the lives and health of children beyond that.  Most of the dominant forces behind the pro-life movement in Dublin, or the US, remain silent about the deaths of Iraqi, Afghani or Pakistani children.  Where were the protests against US driven sanctions against Iraq that led to 500,000 deaths prior to invasion, mostly women and children?  Madeline Albright referred to these deaths as “worth it”.

Where is the Catholic Church, or any of them as Bangladeshi women working for nothing in the factories that supply the Wal-Marts and other retailers of this world battle cops and thugs on the streets as they fight for better working conditions and higher wages? Some family life they have.

There have been previous comments on this blog concerning women’s rights and in particular a woman’s right to control the reproductive process.  I have women friends who have had abortions and women friends who will not for one reason or another, including their religious views. But either way, choosing to have an abortion is surely not a simple thing; in many cases, economics is the driving force.

It is a complex issue and not every woman that chooses not to have an abortion is a right wing religious fanatic.  But it is also not a decision taken lightly either as some try to portray it. It is a woman’s body and it has to be her decision.

Socialists must demand that abortion must be legal and provided as part of a national health system and that birth control be an affordable and available service. It is working class women that suffer the most when such rights are denied women, the rich will always have this right one way or another.

But while we support the right of abortion on demand we must fight for the right of a woman to have a child and offer it a secure and healthy environment, a woman cannot rely on a man for the health and future of her child.  That means financial independence, a wage that provides a safe and secure existence, free education, health care, on-site child-care in the workplaces and institutions of education.  Society spends billions of dollars destroying the lives of children it can spend just as much providing an environment that nurtures life and allows it to flourish.

The demos in Ireland come in the wake of the death of Savita Halappanavar, the Indian woman who died because an Irish hospital refused to terminate her pregnancy reminding her that “This is a Catholic country”. Wendy Forest, another writer on this blog wrote of Savita:

“She was murdered. Her body, her mind, her emotions were in these hours before her death were dominated, manipulated, appropriated, controlled and ultimately put to death by a patriarchal state and an institution promoted by the same state. She is one of millions of women historically who have been murdered simply because they are female. Her death is a tragedy-but not an accident. The powerful weapon, shame, used throughout history against women will not be felt by the Catholic church or by the state of Ireland. Yes pressure from below will hopefully make them change the laws that oppress and violate women’s rights to control over their bodies and reproductive capacities. And yes that is what we want as way forward for women. But it goes much deeper and will not end until women understand the power of shame and are determined collectively to refuse to succumb to its paralyzing power.”

The pro-lifers are against legalizing abortion even when a woman’s life is in danger, this is being driven by men and the Catholic Church.  At the pro-choice rally, Clare Daly, a member of the Irish parliament called for “The immediate introduction of legislation for the right to a safe, legal abortion when a woman’s life is at risk, including from suicide.”

By any standard this is not a radical demand.  Sarah Malone of the Abortion Rights Campaign pointed out that 150,000 Irish women have sought the medical care they need in England since the 1980’s.  Banning abortion completely does not stop women from finding the needed medical care elsewhere.

You can read more about this issue and Savita Halappanavar by selecting the “Women” Label on the right.

"Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God’s children."

The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
May 1965 speech to the Negro American Labor Council. Quoted in Thomas F. Jackson, From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Struggle for Economic Justice. (2009) p. 230

Read More