Dáithí Ó Sé is a matador
Posted on | August 25, 2010 | 37 Comments
There are things in this world which are unacceptable yet are tolerated simply because of ‘tradition’ or it being a custom.
Take bullfighting for example. In Spain it is outlawed in some regions, in others people flock to the Plaza de Toros where they cheer and applaud as a frightened animal is slowly, barbarically tortured to death.
This ‘entertainment’ is protected by those who claim it is tradition, part of their culture. Which, of course, it is. It doesn’t make it acceptable though, does it? Native Americans no longer scalp the white man while you’ll find a distinct lack of cannibals these days. Time moves on and regardless of what used to be, things which are essentially wrong are done away with.
So Spain has bullfighting, we have the Rose of Tralee. Those who defend it say it’s a harmless couple of nights of japery, a non-exploitative ‘lovely girls’ competition which is great for tourism, television viewing figures and it embraces the diaspora of which we’re so bizarrely proud.
But look at them, they are the bulls, the terrified, angry bulls all herded and waiting in the callejón and then brought out in front of the baying hoards. Smarmy presenter Dáithí Ó Sé is the matador, the television producers the picadores, lancing the befrocked, Max Factor-clad creatures before the cameramen, the banderillos, complete the job with their close ups and panning. This vile cuadrillo then tortures, on live television, this stricken, petrified animal and at the end the audience applauds, not at the performance of the bull, but in honour of the cowards who have inflicted the suffering on it.
Perhaps there’s no blood oozing from the wounds in their necks, no foam spewing from the nostrils of these poor beasts, but the trauma is undoubtedly the same. How long can we, as a supposedly civilised nation, allow this grotesque spectacle to continue? Those that would condemn the Spanish for their traditions happily endorse and take part in our own monstrous ceremony.
It shames us all.
Irish democracy
Posted on | August 24, 2010 | 68 Comments
Inspired, in part, by this Hugh Green post and this story in the Indo.
The idea people who use vehicles for their work might face prison for using the vehicle for non-commercial purposes is just impossibly ludicrous. It is yet another example of how democracy in Ireland is nothing of the sort. We get to elect people who then have almost free reign to dictate.
I play football with a chap with who uses his work van to drive to games. Under this new edict, unless he can prove he’s using his van for work purposes he could be fined or jailed. The other option is to pay a hugely increased motor tax rate.
And why? Well, because John Gormley has ‘ordered’ local authorities to introduce these rules to close a ‘loophole’. There’s no discussion, no warning, no thought as to the impact on people and not one ounce of common sense. The idea that you can only use your commerical vehicle for commercial purposes is beyond stupid and that yet again the Greens show scant regard for people who are struggling along like the rest of us.
Gormley once again demonstrates how little he knows about the people of Ireland how little he cares once he clings, desperately, to his bit of power as his political career heads towards its inevitable humiliating finale.
Another example: the way Dermot Ahern was able to force off-licences to close to at 10pm. It is 2010 and you cannot buy a bottle of wine or a six pack of beer after 10pm in the evening. We expect 24 hour service in countless industries yet make no allowances for people who have to work outside the 9-5. This legislation was dressed up to prevent teenagers from binge-drinking. I ask you.
The Vintners of Ireland are a powerful political lobby group. You can be quite sure it was under pressure from them that Dermot Ahern made these changes. It was completely arbitrary, the people who are affected have no say in the matter, and we’re expected to just go along with it.
I don’t want to go on about the banks but they have me very fucking cross at the moment, having been stung like a motherfucker in the last few days. I will make complaints, both to the bank and the financial regulator and whoever else I can complain to, but it won’t stop them wasting billions and billions of our money on Anglo Irish Bank.
Maybe we’ve got so used to the idea of this money being wasted that we don’t stop and think about what it does or what effect it has on our lives. This was in the Business Post last week – 100 ways we could spend the Anglo Irish money. Some of it frivolous, of course, but some of it maddening, because we’re being asked to pay for the reckless, fraudulent gambling of a few close friends of the government. And that’s not even counting the money we’ve put into AIB, BOI, Irish Nationwide etc etc etc.
I’ve said it before, how there hasn’t been sustained violent reaction to this embezzlement of our money I’ll never know. We are, as a people, far too passive and entirely focussed on the wrong things. Political interests hijacked the protests to the point where they fizzled out almost before they began.
We’re told Brian Cowen is doing his best to fix things as if he had no part to play in the mess. You can say he inherited a mess, which he surely did, but as Minister for Finance during the Bertie Years – which I sincerely hope will live long as a lesson in how self-interest and hubris can damage a country – it was his policies which led to the never-ending quest for more without one solitary thought for the consequences.
And democracy means we let the same people who got us into this mess get us out of it? That’s not democracy. That’s self-harm. We have elections to choose who governs, but a government is supposed to be for the people, not for the government. It’s not a gravy train for the elected, expenses are not bonus payments, yet that pervailing culture and the total lack of accountability means nothing will change.
They make up the rules and we just have to accept it. The only thing democratic about this country is that we get to elect which bunch of cunts screws us.
Much ado about nothing
Posted on | August 23, 2010 | 72 Comments
So, all this controversy over building a mosque near ‘ground zero’ in New York. Have they stopped to think it’s probably a good idea?
After all, they’re about to build another huge big tower, having a nearby mosque means the (funda)mentalists are less likely to fly a plane into it in case they wipe out some of their fellow ‘slims. They should build one on each corner. And one on the 87th floor.
I know people like to shoehorn muslims into the ‘terrorist’ category, which is clearly nonsense. All religions have their nutters who would do harm in the name of their non-existent god. Let’s not forget homosexuals are the christian equivalent of infidels for many jesus freaks and while it’s wrong to stereotype people I’ll tell you one thing I know about muslims – they can’t drive very well.
If you’ve ever been around the mosque on the SCR when they all arrive for prayers and what have you, you’ll gather one thing very quicky – they are to driving what Brian Cowen is to Taoiseaching. The only thing worse than their driving is their parking. It’s mayhem every single time. I don’t know that many of them could possibly pass the driving test.
To be fair to them they’re not as bad as zoroastrians but then I think we all know it’d take something very special to beat them.
A true story
Posted on | August 20, 2010 | 47 Comments
I remember many years ago, as a young man, going somewhere on some day with an indeterminate number of friends. When we got there we were full of the usual youthful high jinks.
You know the kind. Doing something that you shouldn’t have. You know better but you do it anyway. As impressionable young men we egged each other on until eventually someone, or something, went too far.
At that point there loomed on the horizon the dreaded spectre of consequences. They might have been far reaching or we might, in fact, have pulled some other kind of prank to get away with it. If it were the latter then we might sit around as older men and reminisce about it, chuckling into our pints and doing that ‘aaahhhhh’ thing at the end when everyone’s just about stopped laughing.
If the former then I could write a blog post, a salutary tale of the impetuousness and foolishness of youth and how it has affected my life ever since. Perhaps it might serve as a warning for other groups of young men. Perhaps the consequences might have been hilarious resulting in one of the chaps having to sport a ribald nickname for the rest of his days.
I might look back wistfully on what happened or with huge pangs of regret. I could speak about how, if not for that day, all our lives might have taken different paths, better or worse I just don’t know.
Because that day never happened and I always knew how many friends I went around with.
Specious reasoning
Posted on | August 19, 2010 | 60 Comments
Like a few others I’ve just been spammed by a group called Forest Eireann. Their aim is to ‘Campaign against the denormalisation of smoking and the vilification of smokers by the tobacco control lobby’.
They have a spokesman called John Mallon from Cork. He says:
I’m no radical but I believe in the citizen’s right to oppose those things that seek to marginalise them. The outcome of the smoking ban, now in its sixth year in Ireland, suggests that it has been counter-productive. Smoking rates have increased while one pub a day closes due to the effects of the ban.
Really? It’s the smoking ban that’s forcing pubs to close? Here was I thinking it was the fact that drinking in pubs is now ridiculously expensive. We’re fleeced for beers, spirits, soft drinks, the whole lot.
Regulations mean pubs can’t have ‘happy hours’ to bring in customers and very few pubs are doing anything to attract customers, like, you know, lowering the price of drink, which is why people go to pubs. Not to smoke.
And Forest Eireann are dirty great spammers who probably smoke Johnny Blue. The cunts.
Newsweek and Brian Cowen
Posted on | August 19, 2010 | 60 Comments
Does anyone buy Newsweek? Like Time magazine it’s one of those things you only ever see in waiting rooms. And there’s never an up to date copy, they’re always, at least, a few months out of date.
The story yesterday about Brian Cowen being one of the top 10 leaders in the world is amusing though. We’ve had some right shifty bastards in charge of this country in the past – and they have certainly contributed to Cowen presiding over the current mess – but if he’s one of the top 10 in the world then the rest of the world is in a very precarious position.
It’s a dangerous article too in that it might make people think things are just as bad elsewhere and affect emigration. They might stay here and we need them to leave so there’s more money and jobs for the ones who stay. And unless there’s a outbreak of blight which affects Aldi frozen pizzas and Birds Eye ready meals we’re not going to get the numbers down quick enough.
Cowen in the top 10. Honestly. Whatever little credibility Newsweek had is now well and truly gone. The good thing is that it’ll be months before any reads it.
He might have burst by then.
Timetable
Posted on | August 18, 2010 | 74 Comments
12 noon - Leaving Cert results released
12.04 – First interview with brainoholic who got 9 As in honours subjects, reveals ambition to be a doctor. Or a jockey.
12.15 – Further interviews take place outside some southside Dublin girls’ school which will contain liberal uses of the phrases ‘Ohmigod’, ‘I was like’, ‘totally’ and ‘whatever’.
12.16 – Boys school interview much more muted. ‘Deadly’, ‘repeat’ and some wag in the background shouting ‘me hole’ the stock answers.
12.20 – Mobile phone networks collapse under weight of text messages. 98% of all students who passed honours English will use ‘dat’, ‘dem’ or ‘da’ in an sms.
12.30 – the first pints will be had.
16.15 – 45,000 mini-skirted, boob-tubed girls make their way into town via public transport. 1200 of them are sick on the top deck of the 46A after drinking Bacardi Breezers, Jaegermeister and dolly mixtures made up in Sodastream bottles.
16.16 – 45,000 horny young men lick their lips.
19.05 – the first arrests take place for public indecency, urinating in public, urinating in the public, projectile vomiting onto windows and mooning.
21.07 – Seperately, 451 young men decide it would be hilarious to unzip their trousers and walk around with their balls hanging out of their pants, like a pink teardrop. They’re right. It is hilarious.
22.10 – The first fight, probably in Temple Bar, nobody knows why it started, but there’s a lot of blood. ‘Deadly’, say onlookers.
23.17 – A tabloid photographer, paid by Joe Duffy, finally finds the money shot. A plump young girl being fingered outside a nightclub by a scaldy looking bloke who has dried sick down his front. Duffy gets the call, begins to practice for the next day’s edition of Liveline.
“Is dis what de yoot of today are like? Is dis what we can expect … no, dis is a disgrace de way de yoot of today behave. Did you see anyone gettin de finger? Talk to Joe”
00.04 – It’s pure mayhem. The Garda helicopter is no Blue Thunder. Loss of control imminent.
00.04 – 02.45 – All a blur. The streets run with with piss and poo and blood and jism and the future of this country makes its way home.
04.14 – Taxi drivers congregrate to discuss the night and compare ‘She wet herself in the back seat stories’. There’s solidarity, for once the white and black drivers live together in perfect harmony, side by side on their keyboards oh lord …
08.19 – The first reveller wakes up, mouth dry, head pounding, anus inexplicably sore. “That was, like, ohmigod, totally deadly”, they say.
What’s in a name?
Posted on | August 17, 2010 | 58 Comments
At the weekend I was awaiting a doorologist to install a new door in my house. I had to keep an eye out because my doorbell does not work. This is really quite brilliant because I’m sure people call to my door, press the button and then toddle off thinking nobody’s home. I am completely unaware of their presence but I like to think I have avoided hundreds of unwelcome visitors.
So, I heard a bang on the door and thought it was Johnny Hinges looking to do his work. I opened the door and saw, at the gate, a young man standing with one of those weirdy scooters all the kids have these days. You kind of swivel your way about town on them. Then I noticed there were two scooters and looked down to see another little chap sitting on the step.
“Hello”, I said.
“He’s just sitting there because he’s sad”, said the boy at the gate.
“I see. Why is he sad?”
“I don’t know. He just said he was sad so he was going to sit there”.
“Does he think sitting on my step will stop him being sad?”
“I don’t know”.
The little fella got up. He was Chinese. About 5.
“Why are you sad?”, I asked him. He just shrugged and went over to his scooter.
“Do you know my name?”, he said, as he mounted his trusty steed.
“I do not”, I said. “What is it?”
He mumbled something.
“Wang?”, I tried.
“No”, he said and mumbled it again.
“Wong?”
His five year old shoulders slumped as he sighed at my witlessness.
“No, ya spa. It’s RYAN”.
He swiveled off down the road with his little friend. No wonder he’s sad if people keep getting his name wrong.
Viva Meheeko!
Posted on | August 15, 2010 | 94 Comments
Mexico is my favourite country in all the world with the letter X in it.
Gotta dig the way they don’t stand for any nonsense from their TV networks either. No señor. They explode stuff outside them. It’s easy to blame the drug cartels and the killing they get up to on a daily basis but I prefer to think it’s the work of the noble, common or garden Mexican who is just fucked off with the cunts on his telly.
And instead of doing the simple thing – switching over to another channel or reading a book or throwing a mule off a tower – he’s gone out and protested in the finest way humans know how … blowing stuff up.
I bring this to your attention merely out of personal interest and certainly not in the vain hope that a reader with some mental issues and a deep lying hatred of any Fianna Fail connected television stars might follow suit.
Worst. Boycott. Ever. Since Geoff, anyway.
Posted on | August 13, 2010 | 121 Comments
Israel v Palestine, one of the world’s great grudge matches. It’s hard to see a solution in our lifetime. Diplomatic efforts have always failed, there’s just too much hatred on both sides.
If only some well respected group of people would take a stand, perhaps that would fix things. What? They have? Yes, a group of Irish ‘creative and performing artists: novelists, playwrights, poets, actors, composers, singers, dancers, painters, sculptors and filmmakers‘ have announced their intention to engage in a cultural and academic boycott of Israel.
Singer and songwriter Damien Dempsey hoped the boycott would encourage young people in Israel who disagreed with the government to “speak out”.
Ah yes, one only has to question why it’s taken Damien Dempsey so long because surely that is all the encouragement disenfranchised Israeli youth are looking for.
“At last, Mordochai, a bloke from Donaghmede who plays guitar says it’s ok to rise up against our government”.
“Great news, Efraim! With the support of a bloke nobody’s heard of from a country 1000s of miles away we’re sure to be all right”.
The Palestinians will be bolstered by the news that Donal Lunny has expressed his solidarity towards them. Every side needs a little fillip, don’t you know. However, it’s bad news for those at the Israeli embassy who were hoping to book Lunny for their Hanukkah party this year.
More from the IT:
When asked about the boycott’s chances for success, Eoin Dillon, a performer with Irish and world music band Kila, said: “It worked in South Africa.”
And it’s at this point words fail me.
You won’t be surprised to know it’s the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign behind all this. Still, I’m sure the support of a few sculptors and tin whistlers will finally bring about a lasting peace in the middle-east.
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