The Supreme Commander of the Ukrainian M... Sat Apr 20, 2024 01:38 | Anti-Empire
Ukraine Now Producing 10 Self-Propelled ... Fri Apr 19, 2024 06:15 | Anti-Empire
Russian Firms Rush to Buy Anti-Drone Def... Wed Apr 17, 2024 08:58 | Bloomberg
Ukraine Buys Huge Amounts of Russian Fue... Fri Jan 20, 2023 08:34 | Antonia Kotseva
Turkey Has Sent Ukraine Cluster Munition... Thu Jan 12, 2023 00:26 | Jack Detsch Anti-Empire >>
A Blog About Human Rights
UN human rights chief calls for priority action ahead of climate summit Sat Oct 30, 2021 17:18 | Human Rights
5 Year Anniversary Of Kem Ley?s Death Sun Jul 11, 2021 12:34 | Human Rights
Poor Living Conditions for Migrants in Southern Italy Mon Jan 18, 2021 10:14 | Human Rights
Right to Water Mon Aug 03, 2020 19:13 | Human Rights
Human Rights Fri Mar 20, 2020 16:33 | Human Rights Human Rights in Ireland >>
?As a Woman of Colour, Take it From Me: DEI is Just Woke Indoctrination? Sat Apr 20, 2024 11:00 | Will Jones DEI initiatives and woke ideology are not making workplaces friendlier but hostile to anyone not fully on board with them, writes Raquel Rosario Sánchez. "The pitfalls are not theoretical to me ? I?ve lived them."
The post “As a Woman of Colour, Take it From Me: DEI is Just Woke Indoctrination” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
The Government Shouldn?t Ban Me From Having a Smartphone Sat Apr 20, 2024 09:00 | Jack Watson The Government appears set to bring in restrictions on children's and teenagers' access to smartphones and social media. Jack Watson, who's 15, objects to this potential restriction on his freedom.
The post The Government Shouldn’t Ban Me From Having a Smartphone appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Even Orwell?s Thought Police Didn?t go as Far as Trudeau Sat Apr 20, 2024 07:00 | Toby Young Justin Trudeau to Humza Yousaf: "You think you can position yourself as the West?s most authoritarian 'liberal' political leader? Hold my Molson."
The post Even Orwell?s Thought Police Didn?t go as Far as Trudeau appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
News Round-Up Sat Apr 20, 2024 01:23 | Toby Young A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the virus and the vaccines, the ?climate emergency? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Fifty Ways to Leave the European Convention on Human Rights Fri Apr 19, 2024 17:28 | Dr David McGrogan Rishi Sunak has once again been dropping hints about leaving the European Convention on Human Rights. This is not credible, says Dr David McGrogan: such a feat would require a Government far more serious than this one.
The post Fifty Ways to Leave the European Convention on Human Rights appeared first on The Daily Sceptic. Lockdown Skeptics >>
Voltaire, international edition
The cost of war, by Manlio Dinucci Wed Apr 17, 2024 04:12 | en
Angela Merkel and François Hollande's crime against peace, by Thierry Meyssan Tue Apr 16, 2024 06:58 | en
Iranian response to attack on its consulate in Damascus could lead to wider warf... Fri Apr 12, 2024 13:36 | en
Is the possibility of a World War real?, by Serge Marchand , Thierry Meyssan Tue Apr 09, 2024 08:06 | en
Netanyahu's Masada syndrome and the UN report by Francesca Albanese, by Alfredo ... Sun Apr 07, 2024 07:53 | en Voltaire Network >>
|
RTE to ignore Our War - the war of Independence and the setting up of Dail Eireann
national |
history and heritage |
other press
Saturday December 06, 2008 12:10 by Jim Gibney - The Irish News 4 December 2008
Watershed events deserve RTE’s star treatment [Section 31 lives]
RTE is this country’s national broadcasting agency for both television and radio.
I doubt it very much if a columnist writing in a mainstream newspaper in Britain would feel the need to write, ‘The BBC is this country’s national broadcasting agency’.
My comment about RTE is as much a product of the partition of this country as it is a comment on the failure of RTE’s management, as I see it, to represent themselves to the people of this nation as a truly national medium.
This failure is not exclusively the fault of RTE’s management; it merely reflects the position of the political establishment who believe the Irish nation or ‘Republic’ stops at the border.
The notion that this nation consists of 26 counties and not 32 has dominated this country’s political discourse since partition in 1920 and probably took firmer hold after the declaration of a republic in 1948.
RTE’s primary responsibility as a public broadcaster is to promote and reflect the aspirations of the people of this nation.
In simple terms, irrespective of where you live on this island – north, south, east or west; whether you come from a rural or urban background, male or female, a new arrival or a native, an Irish or English speaker, a unionist or nationalist – when you tune into RTE there you must be able to see yourself, your hopes and dreams.
These are the thoughts that came into my head when I came across RTE’s impressive and expensive publication Our War: Ireland and the Great War.
The book is based on the 2008 Thomas Davis Lecture Series and is designed to mark the 90th anniversary of the First World War. It was 18 months in the making a lot of prior thought and preparation.
While I might quibble over the book’s title ‘Our War’ when it was nothing other than ‘their’ war, which is the imperialists of Britain and Germany, the book will make a contribution to the much-needed debate about the impact of the First World War on the people of Ireland.
What I am more concerned to establish is whether RTE intends to commemorate, in a similar or more expansive form, a far more significant 90th anniversary for the Irish nation.
In a few weeks time, December 14 to be precise, marks the 90th anniversary on which the people of Ireland voted in the privacy of the ballot box and expressed an overwhelming preference for Irish independence. And next month, January 21, marks the 90th anniversary of the First Dail, Ireland’s first and last national parliament.
The December 14 election was the last time the people of this island voted as a nation in an undivided country.
That election set off a train of events which continue to dominate Irish politics to this day.
Sinn Fein secured a landslide victory over the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP). Of the 105 seats contested Sinn Fein won 73, Unionists 26 and the IPP six.
Sinn Fein’s platform was for independence and an Irish parliament based in Dublin; the IPP stood for Home Rule within the United Kingdom and the Unionists opposed both.
On January 21 1919 the first dail met in Dublin, ratified the 1916 Proclamation, issued a declaration of independence, proclaimed itself the parliament of the Irish Republic and called on the “Free nations of the world to recognise Ireland’s independence” and the British to evacuate from Ireland.
On the same day the Irish Republican Army emerged from an operation carried out by the Irish Volunteers when they shot dead two RIC officers at Soloheadbeg. This action is considered the beginning of the War of Independence or the Tan War.
The British government banned meetings of the first Dail, imprisoned and shot dead those elected to it and imposed partition on this nation at the point of a gun, an action which led to the Civil War and the break up of the national movement for independence.
I might be wrong, I hope I am not, but I do not see any evidence that RTE intends to mark these watershed events in this nation’s struggle for national independence and democracy.
If they do not have any plans prepared now is the time to prepare them.
|
View Comments Titles Only
save preference
Comments (2 of 2)
Jump To Comment: 1 2Given the way RTE behaved in the "Coolacrease" affair, chances are, if you insist they do something to mark the 90th anniversary of this state, they will probably and reluctantly do so, but in a manner that subjects it to the critical microscope to ask "was it all really worth it?"
If RTE is indicative of what a people do with their freedom to mould themselves as they please, the answer then is "probably not". It's reminiscent of how the Israelites grumbled bitterly after their emancipation from Egypt. "Weren't we better off under the Egyptians?"
Thankfully there is more to this country than the current RTE
Viewers being passive before the eternal gogglebox is a continuing problem for our society. Most citizens don't use the tv for education; mostly they use it as a time-passer between evening meal and sometime after 11 p.m. when nature says it's time to go to bed. The Late Late earned a reputation in early days as a forum where ideas could be discussed in a lively popular way. That may have been the case then when our tv viewing habits were not set in their passive ways. As our tv viewing culture set into a groove we became chewing-gum-for-the-eyes manipulable advertising fodder as the Late Late deepened the entertainment side of its content and sandwiched 'serious' discussions between buttered slices of celeb and pop music bread. The serious discussions could be slanted by selective choice of invited participants anyway, so that the RTE-Dublin 4 view of national life could come out on top most times.
We need in the first instance intelligent and detailed tv reviewing in the newspapers, by reviewers who know the emotional impact of things like repetitive panning shots, facial reaction shots and background music in documentaries. The reviewers could point out these and other tricks in production and post-production of documentaries and other current affairs, educational, cultural and artistic shows and programmes.
We know there is a sophisticated way of watching movies. Movie criticism can be quite stimulating in the Irish Times and elsewhere. I'd like to see a matching sophistication in print media television criticism.