Newspaper's Letters Section
Does anyone else skip straight to the letters section in whatever newspaper they read? I used to turn to the sports section first, but unless there has been a big game or major transfer I generally skip to the letters and analysis page in the Irish Times and Guardian these days. I also read the morning metro's letters, but thats more of a guilty pleasure in the Joe Duffy stylee :D Personally I find the Guradian letters to be far and away inferior to the Irish Times section, where proper debate actually goes on and I generally feel that you get a broad sense of what that elusive man on the street thinks, and so I'm setting up a thread on these and other letter sections to see if it will open up these issues on here :)
The letter that caught my eye today is Terri Murray's in the Times, where she bemoans the hypocrisy of Irish government oppression of free speech whilst the Proclamation of Independence was being read aloud at the recent Easter Rising ceremony. I don't have an online Irish Times password so I can't link from their website, but if you have a copy of today's edition I'd recommend you look it up
Kindly supplied by a board member
Not sure what I am allowed post without a link, but here's a portion of this letter, if it's not allowed then I'll take it down
A barrier over six feet high and covered in black heavy plastic over steel fencing prevented most members of the public from seeing anything of the ceremonies.
The small number of people who did get through to the area near the GPO did so only by submitting to being searched by the gardaí at the entrance to a corral-type system of fencing.
I don't think this is what the aforementioned signatories had in mind somehow!
However, the ironies don't stop there. I went along to the commemorations and had a banner with me which called for the protection of the Tara/Skryne Valley.
I stood, like most other people, outside the cordon, on the Clerys side of O'Connell Street.
The cordon was a lot taller than I am, so I couldn't see anything, but I held the Tara banner over my head and it could be seen inside the cordon.
I was there only a short time when three gardaí and a plainclothes policeman came over to me, looked at the banner and demanded that I put it down.
I stated my objection that I wasn't doing anything unlawful but he continued insisting that I put down the banner or move along off O'Connell Street.
When I asked what would happen if I stayed holding the banner, I was told I would be forcibly removed ie, arrested. I could not believe this was happening. While this was occurring, the Proclamation was read out and the National Anthem sung from the podium.
It would be funny if it wasn't so frightening, undemocratic and farcical
