You appear to have dismissed alleged assaults because you donāt like the protest group.
I said Iād take allegations of them with a pinch of salt. I donāt know for sure what happened. To be fair, even Art said they were alleged. What is undeniable though is that it is in the political interest of the protesting group to claim or exaggerate claims of assault.
Usually at those things there is a shit load of cameras (one of the reasons the Guards said that they wore balaclavas) so I presume any assaults were captured on camera, reported to the Guards and followed up? Did any charges result can you remember? (I canāt)
I think Iāve answered your questions fairly openly.
Hereās mine - do you have an issue that the law was being broken at that protest?
I don really recall much about it to be honest, I just thought your slant on alleged assaults seemed a bit odd.
I had forgotten about it too but saw something this morning about it and I just googled it there. Interestingly, there were arrests on the day but it was protestors arrested.
Let me remind you - Protesters occupied the building illegally and a court order was secured ordering them to leave. They ignored the court order and what appear to be private security had to evict them from the building. Garda attended to keep the peace.
The protest was illegal. There are many ways to legally and peacefully in the state as we see every week with protests outside the Dail, through Dublin etc but this was not one of those.
Now that Iāve reminded you that the protest was illegal - do you agree that it shouldnāt have taken place and that they should have chosen a legal way to protest?
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Sinn Fein definitely have a good few loose cannons in the parliamentary party. Thereās a sort of Matt Le Tissier vibe off some of them. Martin Browne in Tipperary, Reada Cronin in Kildare, Violet Anne Wynne and Carol Nolan before they left. Then again, Fine Gael have their share of Lozza Foxes in their ranks.
I think their strategy is savvy, and most of the people putting it into practice it are savvy, especially their online meme outlets like Dr. Harold and Irish Simpsons Fans Page or whatever itās called, yer man Tadhg Hickey, that Estebantz chap etc., and probably other people I havenāt even heard of.
They have a weird sort of cultural crossover type thing going on, a bit like New Labour did around 1995, when Britpop became a sort of cultural vehicle for Blairism, though the people endorsing them would be less well known because of the internet-driven fragmentation of culture. The likes of Damien Dempsey, the Rubberbandits, Emmett Kirwan, I think would be seen as broadly pro-SF. Thereās a rap group called Kneecap who are definitely pro-SF, one of them made a memorable quote on Channel 4 News a year or two back: āI have much more in common with someone of my age living in the Shankill than with Sebastian Cockworth in Blackrockā. The OāBroin tweet was an example of them making a conscious play towards people of an artistic bent, sort of āoutsider artā, I think @binkybarnes mentioned Banksy. Thatās it.
Sinn Feinās brand appeal to the young is āedginessā. Thatās the same brand appeal Trump went with, though in a different way. Sinn Feinās edginess is more Frankie Boyle, Trumpās edginess was more the Daily Stormer. SF mix that āedgyā brand with āhousingā, For older people, the brand is nationalism, pensions, public services, and a sort āeverybody else is corrupt, we are pureā Viktor Orban style offering.
I think Cosgrave is very good at generating publicity for himself - thatās what he is - a publicist - a glorified party planner - but heās a loose cannon liable to say incredibly stupid stuff. Then again, as long as heās still sort of operating in the shadows, that probably doesnāt matter that much.
I think what Sinn Fein are really gearing up for is what sort of strategy theyāll employ if they get into power. Itāll be a Viktor Orban strategy. Blame everybody else and be loud as hell about it. Use all the levers of power available to them to crank up pressure on institutions, public or private, they see as being in opposition to them. Use frivolous SLAPPS lawsuits, I think weāre already seeing that with the Mary Lou McDonald defamation case against RTE. Mick Wallace and Clare Daly also do this.
But SF may not necessarily get into power next time. Leo Varadkar is a populist at heart, and I donāt mean that in a complimentary sense. Fine Gael have now made a conscious decision to go for the anti-trans strategy. This is a ālook over thereā strategy that the right-wing internationally believe they can make serious capital from and in the process divide their opposition. FG believe that SF are weak here and they arenāt necessarily wrong in that belief. Youāll see this continue to be pushed front and centre by desperate right wing parties. The Tories will go big on it. Itās also a highly dangerous strategy which threatens to unleash extreme malign forces on society, this is a certainty when you target a small marginalised group within society as the problem. It never, ever, ever leads anywhere good.
The next election will be a battle between two groups of populists. You can sort of see the road to how liberal democracies get eroded beginning to lay out in front of us.
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Yes itās Paddy Cosgrave that tips the balance here.
They donāt recognise the name of the country, sure. Itās all part of the fairytale they told their hardcore mentallers. That lad from 1916 who āhanded overā custodianship of the Republic to the Army Council that they claim lineage of.
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The future of Ireland hedges on a national debate about transgenderismā¦ Of which there are about 5k transgender people in the country
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He canāt be expected to talk to the media until after the pubs open in Belfast and he gets the direction heās after.
SF have seized the memes of production
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Sinn Feinās strategy of referring to the state of Ireland as āthe 26 countiesā and to Northern Ireland as" the North" reminds me a bit of when I used to refer to the Northern Ireland association football team as āIrelandā and Ireland as āEireā.
Or how myself and @ChairmanDan still refer to The Dell, Burnden Park, Roker Park etc.
You knock a bit of craic out of it for a while but then you sort of pigeonhole yourself into having to keep it up, and it gets boring.
But at least itās only the INTERNET.
Sinn Fein are out there in real politics doing the equivalent of calling St. Maryās Stadium āThe Dellā.
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Thatās some backtrack.
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Explaining = losing
I canāt read the article but to answer your question I wouldnāt have much of an issue with occupying a vacant building to highlight the homelessness crisis.
But it isnāt a backtrack.
Itās a clarification. Sinn Fein have always loved the word āclarificationā.
OāBroin has got out front and both clarified and defended his position and neutralised the fake outrage, and itās convincing.
Iām not surprised by your answer.
Iām not sure itās a good basis for a functioning society though whereby citizens get to pick and choose which laws they deem appropriate.
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Generally with things like Apollo House or the protest in Frederick Street, people side with their sense of natural justice rather than the letter of the law, precisely because the protest is to highlight the absurdity of the letter of the law.
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Following that logic through would lead to the elimination of protest about any law