Ireland's political and cultural magazine
Posted in:
Did bats figure in your Hallowe’en? They neither relate much to the Bat Man super-paradigm nor to the spooky, ghoulish, symbols of death that Hallowe’en stories would have you believe. Instead they may hold the key to eternal youth. This was one of the topics discussed at the ninth Irish Bat Conference held in October. […]
I recently concluded a criminal case in the Crown Court in Manchester; a city I had not visited in over 20 years. Much has changed while I’ve been gone. It is a little less frenetic, with no Tony Wilson or Hacienda club, and a good deal more gentrified. Salford, the traditional working-class area, immortalised in […]
In September, Elisabeth Moss twice used the word “fuck” as she accepted the best-actress Emmy for her role in the TV series ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’. As it was a live broadcast, the network (CBS) was using a time delay and so was able to bleep out the offending words. There were many reports online and […]
The Government intends to hold seven referendums over the next two years, and the Citizens’ Convention is due to consider Ireland’s referendum practice before it winds up next spring. With a contentious abortion referendum looming up soon after that, this is a good time to consider how we run referendums. A code of good practice […]
In January 2017 the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry (HIAI) reported on the treatment of children in care in Northern Ireland. The Inquiry, chaired by Sir Anthony Hart, conducted its extensive task with considerable speed and reported on the day of President Donald Trump’s inauguration. The Inquiry shared something else with the then incumbent US president, […]
2016 was inevitably an outstanding year for the history industry as publishers, writers, and those elements of the intelligentsia that love a good commemoration got to work on the Easter Rebellion’s hundredth anniversary. The Irish people have an interesting relationship with their own history. It is, like their relationship to Catholicism, frequently the subject of […]
Posted in:
Irish observers of the Rohingya refugee crisis will find disturbing similarities between Myanmar’s mistreatment of the Rohingya and formative aspects of Ireland’s own history. Today the Rohingya are victims of a brutal Myanmar military crackdown that has led more than 600,000 to flee the country on foot since August. The UN High Commissioner for Human […]
The fact that the West’s European civilisation is ending need not prevent us from thinking constructively about problems that have concerned us and that linger on. Nothing more useful is left for us to do. The Northern Ireland problem is an instance. It became a problem when Irish nationalism and the Irish State opposed a […]
The Green movement was born when we looked back on our planet for the first time and realised the threat we posed to our own natural world. It was a child of the 1960s, embracing and promoting civil, racial, feminist, gay, and animal rights. It was into making love not war and thinking globally, while […]
Ivan Preston and Danske Bank In the first case, the North’s Police Ombudsman found police misconduct in the treatment of a Bangor businessman, Ivan Preston, who had his 2014 conviction for harassment overturned on appeal. Preston had sent 357 emails in a year to a senior Danske Bank official, querying the awarding of a contract […]
The crisis at the Kildare Wicklow Education and Training Board (KWETB) continues to deepen. The newly appointed investigator into alleged improper procurement and other practices at the agency recently heard claims concerning safety issues, potentially affecting hundreds of school children. As reported in Village in October, the former president of Sligo Institute of Technology, Richard […]
One of the intriguing characters in the story of ‘NAMA-land’, the title of the book I have written which has just been published by Gill Books, is the former general secretary of the Department of Finance, John Moran. The Limerick man was appointed to the second most senior position in the Irish civil service by […]
A CLEARER PICTURE is emerging of the state of the housing sector. A number of reports and newly-compiled statistics point to a heavily strained system, struggling to provide even modest levels of supply and affordability. Most households cannot afford a new home within reasonable commuting distance of Dublin, without first stumping up a significant deposit. […]
This March marked the 40th anniversary of Mary Boyle’s disappearance. Ever since she vanished on St. Patrick’s weekend in 1977, a veil of secrecy has shrouded the case of the Donegal schoolgirl who is Ireland’s longest and youngest missing person. There are few scandals that embarrass the establishment more, not least because of the sinister […]
The stolen life of Richard Kerr, including his account of how Ian Paisley strove to cover up child abuse
Do not destroy ordinary humanity: celebrate it.
Posted in:
Administrators, actors and particularly the media, are not taking their share of responsibility for the indulgence of predatory sexual monsters and bullies of all sorts.
We are disciplined and motivated, with a new ambition to become a mainstream political choice for people right across this island, and deliver a just transition, protecting our natural world and bringing a fairer economic model.
Posted in:
An pro-Brexit Irish economist writes to the British government, explaining Dublin’s position, and arguing for Ireland’s own departure from the EU.
The radical left has been out of office for a generation. When it gets power, it is important to exercise it carefully.