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MarriagEquality

Here’s the little film that I directed. Please click through and rate it if you like it, it’s part of the Dublin Pride Film Shorts Awards, and on Sunday the highest rated gets a gold star or something. All nine films are here.

For more info on how we made the film, please take a look at the film’s blog. Thanks to everyone involved, it was fun. It’s showing in the Galway Film Fleadh on Saturday 11th July, at 10pm in Cinemobile, before the superb Identities.

Street corners: theatres, boulevards of chic,
hanging around, impressing the chicks, slagging each
other, slagging the chicks,
impressing each other

but why is it in dear old Ireland
men despise attention from other men?
Scowl, grit their teeth, a sneer

In no other country,
“Who are you lookin’ a’?”
Is a threat

Any time I look at a man on a street
my street, inner city dub,
a lad with a swagger, bandy legs and atti-chewed
I catch his eye, and he
automatically – instinctively –
hawks and spits

He hawks and spits.

Tough man. Don’t be looking at me or you’ll get a dig.

“The only honourable thing for us to do” he said, “is to acknowledge that it is our fault. We are sorry. It is our encouragement of the property sector, over the past ten years in particular, that created the catastrophic downturn we now face. Our foolish tax-cutting and abandonment of domestic rates, for populist reasons, has left us without enough income to cover even the bare essentials necessary to keep a civilized Western society functioning. We allowed the banks to gamble with our money to line their own pockets, and they failed in their primary purpose: to keep our money safe.

“We will immediately nationalize all Irish banks. Their sole purpose from now on will be to safeguard our savings and invest in indigenous businesses and education. All banks in Ireland are to become non-profit corporations. We no longer recognise banking to be an industry that requires any component of wild speculation, and with that in mind we are introducing new laws which curtail the services that banks can offer, to savings and loans, and prudential investments in businesses. No more can the hard-earned cash of our people be used to fund anything but the most sensible and careful investments. Any institution that wishes to engage in risky financial market speculation shall have the same status as betting shops and casinos, and shall not be permitted to accept deposits.”

“We are abandoning all mortgage tax relief. The European model is one we will adopt, where most people are happy to rent. Those who suffer because their mortgage relief has been abolished will benefit from a fund to enable owners (of one property only) to re-mortgage over a longer, interest free period. Property owners will be subject to strict regulation, imposing high standards in insulation and tenant protection. It is nonsense that taxpayer’s money should go to further the acquisition of private property. Those individuals or corporations that own more than three properties will be required to offer their tenants the opportunity to part-own their homes. Owning property in Ireland will no longer be the cash cow it used to be, it will come with heavy responsibilities. In particular, a new, fast-track transparent system of fair rent review will be introduced, where property owners will have to defend the rents they are charging and demonstrate how they are spending the rental income on the properties.”

“Social housing that is occupied by tenants whose earnings are above the average wage will be required to obtain a mortgage, partial or full, on their home. The money raised from these purchases will be invested in new housing for those in need.”

“We have decided to embark on a radical 5-year plan to invest in our children’s welfare, and to protect the vulnerable in our society. Those who are working and in good health will have to tighten our belts and pay for this. We envisage that, in five years, the world recession will be over, and by that time, we will have a new generation ready to enter the workplace who are well-educated and well-resourced, and ready to take on the challenges of ensuring that Ireland is self-sufficient and content with itself in the 21st Century”

“We are abolishing the notion of unemployment benefit. Those who do not work will, like everyone else, receive a minimum income that is not subject to tax. They will be expected to take part in a National Community Service programme to build schools, community centres, green power plants, and essential infrastructure projects, for the next five years. Those who wish to attend third-level education during this recession will benefit from interest-free loans from the banks. We firmly believe that the most effective way of riding out a recession is in college or apprenticeship. When our crisis is over, the government may choose to reinstate more traditional social welfare payment, but until that time, only those who are infirm or disabled or full-time carers will be exempt from the requirement to take part. No longer will unemployment be a grim sentence to months or years of idleness and despair. Instead, it will be a challenge, with the possibility of doing something valuable and meaningful for our society.”

“National Community Service will be operated on a local level. The skills in a particular community will be assessed and evaluated, and managers of these schemes will be chosen by local suffrage. Credit Unions may serve as a model for such projects. All such NCS schemes will devote a proportion of their talent and income into a national pool, which will be redistributed to poorer areas. These NCS schemes will prioritise education and healthcare above all others, as well as domestic insulation schemes and other sustainable development projects. Teachers will have classroom assistants drawn from this pool, and nurses will have care assistants, administrative help, and extra cleaners too. Elderly people in the local area will be assigned care-workers. Creches will be assigned extra staff. Pre-school parenting and support groups will be established for all. Everyone will receive the appropriate training. In particular this will free teachers and nurses to be more effective and productive in their work. Mentoring and apprenticeship schemes for adolescents will be sponsored, encouraging a transfer of skills and crafts from one generation to the next. Those who are addicted to drugs and/or alcohol will be offered counselling and support to enable them to participate in the NCS schemes. We recognize that neglecting them results in a disproportionate level of social exclusion and crime in our society.”

“As everyone knows, the black economy thrives during a recession. Any earnings above the minimum income will be taxed fairly, so as not to create a poverty trap. We will encourage the development of local bartering schemes or LETS, to be administered by each NCS council, in association with local Credit Unions and/or Post Offices. Subject to a reasonable upper limit, all benefit-in-kind generated by someone participating in such a scheme will not be taxed. This is to encourage a culture of vibrant local enterprise, in particular the areas of adult education, horticulture, agriculture, childcare, the arts, and care assistance for the elderly. If an individual does well out of such a scheme, they will be encouraged through low-interest loans to become one of the many SMEs that this country will need to thrive in the future.”

“All tax loopholes for the wealthy are to be abolished, without exception. Those who are very wealthy will have to accept that for five years they are going to carry a substantial tax burden.”

“We are imposing a severe carbon tax in urban areas, and the money raised from this tax will go towards the doubling of local transport services. In rural areas, carbon tax will be structured to encourage the acquisition of greener vehicles.”

“The only way we will survive this emergency is if we all pull together and sacrifice something, in the knowledge that Ireland in ten years’ time will be the richer for it, and be proud of what she has achieved. To this end, all donations to local NCS schemes will be subject to tax relief. This money is to be dedicated specifically to pay for the services of state-employed professional planners, accountants, architects, agriculturalists, educationalists, business people, doctors and social workers, who will guide each local area’s projects and provide appropriate training, in accordance with this government’s intentions. These professionals will take one day per week of unpaid leave to enable them to advise their local NCS scheme. The larger this NCS expertise fund is, the smaller the wage bill for the civil service. NCS fees won’t be as high as Civil Service wages, but each civil servant will have the satisfaction of engaging in a worthwhile local constructive project for one day a week. We want to ensure that all that effort and money over the next five years is used efficiently and with an eye to the future. All accounts and decisions are to be presented annually to the local community for scrutiny and approval, and each NCS scheme will be strictly monitored by an ombudsman, who will have the power to raise standards and ensure transparency in all its workings.”

“To those who question the notion of offering tax relief for such investments, the comparison has to be made: either we invest in the private ownership of bricks and mortar, or we invest in our people. The choice is yours.”

“We are reversing our decision to abolish the medical card for the over-seventies. However, in return, all those over seventy will be required to partake in a national health screening scheme, with regular compulsory checkups and tests. Prevention rather than cure will be the byword for care for the elderly. Anyone who wishes to avoid this intrusive regime of care may go private. GPs will be paid to keep their patients well, with bonuses paid to those surgeries that introduce health promotion schemes.”

“This government will establish a commission to study the possibility of inviting the UK’s National Health Service to take over the HSE, to improve efficiency and eliminate bureaucracy. This will result in an all-Ireland approach to healthcare on this island, allowing greater economies of scale. British consultant and GP contracts will be introduced as a result, and no longer will Irish health professionals enjoy some of the highest incomes in Europe, in a country that simply cannot afford them.”

“After these difficult five years are over, we will be in the enviable position of having bright, modern school rooms for all our children, who have been well taught and supervised, mentored and apprenticed. Our homes will require much less energy from abroad, having been insulated properly. We will not have to pay anything under the Kyoto protocol. Local economies, based on LETS schemes, will be enjoying a new sense of productivity and self-esteem, instead of a sense of shame and deprivation. We will have fostered a new sense of community in those who have helped improve the primary and secondary educational and health facilities in their local area, helped in the care of the young, the infirm, and the elderly, as well as invested in their own third-level education. Local food production, in particular organic foods from allotments, will be at record levels. A new system of local food distribution will be established, which will keep costs low. Food available on LETS schemes will ensure that no one goes hungry, and insulated homes will mean that no one is cold in the winter.”

“To regain competitiveness in the world market, all companies that sell products or services abroad will avail of a new scheme. Instead of paying high wages and high taxes, these companies will be able to pay lower wages, but with their employees’ take-home pay being subject to a temporary lower rate of tax. In return, these companies will be obliged to take on people from the local NCS schemes and provide them with work experience and on-the-job training. The bigger the company, the more sophisticated the training is to be. This scheme will effectively be revenue-neutral, because these companies will pay the minimum income to those they employ from the NCS team. It is, in essence, privatising social welfare payments. But the advantage of it is that, after the five years, the investment in the local community will be producing social and material dividends, and the companies will be in better shape to compete on world markets, benefiting from employing a larger workforce for the same wage bill.”

“We have the imagination and the resources to change our society fundamentally, to bring back a sense of local involvement and community, to eliminate the despair that idleness and poverty brings, to care for our children and the elderly, to instigate a new culture of local entrepreneurship and enterprise, and to become more resourceful and self-sufficient as a people, so we will never again be so vulnerable to the hurricanes that can assail the world markets.”

When Mr Lenihan sat down, he was greeted with a stunned silence from the house.

In one sense, I didn’t learn anything new in the day, my inner geek is alive and well and not too out-of-date, although I’ve pulled back from daily blogging. But I began thinking about things in a different way, which is always exciting.

However much I enjoyed Charles Leadbeater’s presentation, opening the audience up to the vast possibilities of the internet and the new sociability that it brings, I was invigorated by Andrew Keen’s counter-argument, lamenting the cult of the amateur, and the erosion of authority. Not that I accepted it, but it did make me wonder about how, in the rush to embrace the new media, the not insignificant matter of valuing creativity might be lost. His insistence that we have to consider how to monetise it is directly relevant to artists, and not to be sneered at. He rightly points that those who succeed in the new media world are self-publicists, and that the “good old days”, when talent scouts and music label managers would find shy, naive but talented artists and groom them for success, are over.

And yet for every shy artist there is someone else who notices them and wants to help them – and isn’t it better that the route to publicity is so much easier now? (For example, someone came up to me afterwards and said that his wife was shy about promoting herself, how should he go about it? Within hours he had set up a Facebook profile, linked to me, pointed out Andreja Volenec’s MySpace page, I listened to it and loved the track there. I then emailed my lovely colleague Naomi who blogs Off Her Rocker at Hot Press, and said hey, this may not be your thing, but have you heard this?  That’s how it’s done.)

In the last session, Damien Mulley had a dig at David McKenna about why RTÉ wasn’t allowing archive material to be released to Youtube etc etc. The thing is, it isn’t his fault, and, to a tiny degree, it’s mine.  McKenna is perfectly right – it is a legal minefield, largely because of ancient contracts drawn up between Irish Actors’ Equity and RTÉ, protecting the rights of actors against exploitation. I was on the Executive Council of Equity for many years in the 1980s. (Although I don’t think that quite justifies the one line tweet from Mulley I spotted in the ether: “dermod=establishment”).

The struggle to stop artists being exploited is an ongoing one, and may explain why the arts community is so suspicious of the internet. In the polarized and often bitter relationship between TV/Film companies and the actors they employ, too often the actor gets paid off cheaply to give up their residual rights and, in perpetuity, their work is used over and over again, making lots of money for the company.

I once had a stinging email from a musician who spotted that I had recorded on a tiny little camera one song at a unique concert in which he took part, and posted it to my blog. He was furious and demanded I take it down, bitterly lumping me in with all the others who pay no attention to artists and performers. When I pointed out that I don’t make money from this blog, he softened and apologised, and then got the point – I was an enthusiast, marking something special, and adding to the reputation of all concerned. It could never have resulted in any loss of income for anyone involved, but only enhanced their reputation. But his response is typical of many people who have a creative talent and are trying to make a decent living from it.

John Kelly of The View asked me afterwards who did I think was missing from the panel. My response was that someone from the music industry would have been very useful – the subsidized arts community tends to think and network only among themselves, and not have much to do with other artforms such as popular music – and yet how musicians themselves are adapting to the internet (at the speed of light) has a lot to teach us about its strengths and weaknesses. Musicians are way ahead of the music industry in this regard. But on reflection I would also have asked Irish Actors’ Equity to sit on the panel because they have to be part of the solution to free up the archives as well as come up with new contracts that permit work to be released on the Net. YouTube pays royalties for every song that’s lipsynced in its catalogue, meaning that music royalties, in the UK at least, have increased since the advent of Youtube, instead of decreased. The same sort of arrangement could be made about other copyrighted material.

Andrew Taylor’s presentation was the most mind-expanding for me, and it is here. He was looking at the metaphors we manage by, and so it got me thinking, when it got to our session in the afternoon, sitting beside Siobhan Bourke (Saffron Pictures), Damien Mulley, Dermot McLaughlin (Chief Executive Temple Bar Properties), and Jessica Fuller (Still Point Productions). I went off on a flight of fancy about this new social media, the speed of it, and how artists and arts organisations could see their audience/customers like a flock of chattering birds, able to fly as fast and as collectively from one tree to another before they settle. Just watching a public Twitter feed explains what I mean – the continuous stream of consciousness, invisible before the internet, now visible.  Artists/Organisations need to start learning this language and start talking and chattering as much as they can to those online, enter into rapid dialogue, seek out those who mention them and link to them, respond to critics authentically and enthusiastically, and before you know it the critical mass of attention has turned your way, and the chattering crowd has landed on your tree. (Sadly, it appears the sound quality of our session’s podcast wasn’t good enough to put online.)

Organisations have to dialogue with those in social media. The old PR way was just to issue press releases, put up posters, send out fliers. Now, there has to be someone willing to talk, to respond, to defend. The funny thing is that the old way was expensive cashwise; the new way is expensive timewise. The new way suits a recession, don’t you think? In the US, one theatre, PS 112, hosts a bloggers’ night early on in the run of a show, giving away free tickets to bloggers, so that they can notch up the online chatter to Volume 11 for a day or two. (Whereas here, last week, the Abbey Theatre sent me a nice email asking me to put a video for their show up on my blog. I pointed out that they hadn’t replied to my letter of a year ago offering exactly such a space to them, in return for review tickets. I’ve heard nothing since. )

John Kelly was also mischievously asking whether anyone during the entire day had mentioned the phrase “vanity publishing”, referring to blogs? I replied that those of us who are in the vanguard of blogging are, indeed, all flaming narcissists, and find our world incredibly interesting, even if no one else does. But look at the tsunami that’s coming – when the Bebo teenagers grow up and leave home, everyone will be online, twittering away their thoughts, actions, GPS positions, live camera feeds, and most probably bowel movements. Privacy, in the future, will simply mean switching off your phone.

Lastly, enormous praise must go to the brilliant Annette Clancy, who was the organisational genius behind the whole gig, and to the Arts Council for facilitating such a fascinating and necessary meeting of minds.

I suppose I could live-blog with a running commentary with photos, in an as-it-happens kind of way, but you know what? Life’s too short. The conversations will all be available on podcast here.

Homosexuality in Irish History: Terrible Queer Creatures by Brian Lacey is that rare beast: an instantly indispensable tome. A simply written, thorough and thoughtful book, it is the salve to the wound that, I believe, every gay person experiences at some stage of their lives, especially when coming out. It happens when it first dawns on us that a part of our identity, our sexuality, marks us out as cuckoos in the nest. For the vast majority of us, having grown up in heterosexual households, when we realise we are different to our family, in one crucial aspect, our natural urge is to research who else is like us, and who else has been like us in the past. Before this book, in Ireland, that search was always bitty, frustrating, and tantalising. From now on, every Irish gay teenager will be able to find in this volume something that satisfies that need, and more. Lacy has not outed anyone, everyone named in his book has been in the public domain before. He has simply, but painstakingly, put it all together, and when he is unsure, or there is conflicting evidence about someone’s sexuality, he says so. As in much of the rest of history, women’s lives over the centuries have not been recorded for posterity, and so Irish lesbians of old are hard to track down and name; in the main because so much of queer history is sourced in sexual, and often criminal scandals, and lesbians, in the main, escaped such media and legal attention.

We learn that early Celts were reportedly “much keener on their own sex”. From early Brehon Law, we learn that one category of woman entitled to divorce her husband was “A woman who is cheated of bed-rites so that her husband prefers to lie with the servant boys when it is not necessary for him to do so.” It’s a delightfully non-judgmental and tactfully phrased law, and I love the fact that, logically, a man could defend himself in such proceedings by claiming that it was absolutely necessary for him to lie with his servant boy. Necessity is, indeed, the mother of invention.

The role of bedfellow to the King was much prized in ancient Ireland, many poets considered it to be one of their chief prerogatives, and the life and works of a contemporary of Shakespeare’s, Ó hEoghusa, is explored, in particular the practice (or conceit) of a poet playing the role of “wife or lover” to his chieftain. The lives of many homosexual United Kingdom kings are discussed, including our very own William of Orange.

St Patrick himself, we learn, on his famous first trip to Ireland, fended off the salacious advances from the sailors, and refused to “suck their nipples on account of the fear of God”. It is of course Christianity that brought condemnation of homosexuality to Ireland, in the Irish Penitentials, introducing severe punishments for same-sex activity. The 1634 law that criminalized buggery in Ireland claimed, as its first victim, one of its architects, the Bishop of Waterford and Lismore, who had been notoriously severe on sexual offenders throughout his life. He was hanged for his trouble (and for his pleasure). In 1822 another Irish cleric, the Bishop of Clogher, was caught with his pants down – literally – in the manly embrace of a soldier, in the back of a London pub. (The pub later charged tourists to visit the backroom. Some things never change.)

Homosexuality towards the end of the last millennium in Ireland was seen as an imported English vice, and an 1881 scandal saw a savage witch-hunt against “a vile gang” in Dublin, “leagued together for the pursuit of unnatural depravity and vice”. The gay scene was alive and well, back then, it seems, as portrayed in a scurrilous publication of the time, subtitled “the recollections of a Mary Anne”. Missing, however, is reference to the Irish Catholic labourers’ “bachelor culture” of London, as documented in Houlbrook’s “Queer London”.

A motley crew is gathered here: various Irish policemen in the NYPD, the US Confederate Army General Cleburne. John Cardinal Newman, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Somerville and Ross, Eva Gore-Booth, George Moore, Hugh Lane, Francis Joseph Bigger, Padraig Pearse, MacLiammóir and Edwards, Danny La Rue, Francis Bacon, Brendan Behan, Joni Crone, David Norris. The roll call goes on and on. Naturally, Oscar Wilde and Roger Casement get chapters of their own. The history ends with decriminalization in 1993.

Every library in Ireland should stock this, with great big arrows pointing to it, to direct all curious adolescent cuckoos, seeking information and context, to this superlative resource.

Our Lives, Out Loud, by Katherine Zappone and Ann Louise Gilligan, is no doubt going to open Volume II of a history of Irish homosexuality, a hundred years from now. It’s an extraordinary book: a deeply personal autobiography by two lovers, a fiercely intelligent political  manifesto for community education and social change, a breathtaking challenge to the Catholic Church, and a meditation on love and relatedness.

Katherine Zappone and Ann Louise Gilligan

As one might expect from two radical theologians and educators, accused by some feminists of giving religion “a good name”, they articulate a vision of the world that is infused with spirit, yet lacking in dogma or preachiness. Despite their respect for each other’s “otherness” and their avowed dedication to respect each other’s differences, it is quite remarkable that the voice they express in this book is so much in harmony, and so believable. One gets a sense of their different personalities, but this single male outsider knows just how different human beings can be, and what is endearing about this book is that they freely admit that they have been lucky to have found each other, to have knitted together so well, and marvel at the serendipity that has blessed their lives. One notable omission, however, is mention of sex itself: not that I would demand that these two dignified doctors share their bedtime secrets with us, but it is curious to me that the union of two minds, hearts and spirits can be so joyously celebrated, but that between two bodies is left to the imagination. This is Ireland, after all. Still.

In 1982, they made a commitment of ‘life-partnership’ to each other. They knew it was forbidden territory, but that gave them a sense of great delight. They were Greenham Common women. They brought feminist theology to Ireland, to the apoplexy of many in the Church, which they eventually left. Katherine taught liberation theology in Trinity College, bringing students out to hostels for victims of domestic violence, to the district courts. “Why are things the way they are?” was her constant refrain. They visited a “family shelter” for homeless people, where people opened up their homes to those who were in need of one. In 1985, they found and founded one themselves. This was grassroots social activism at its best, educating women to empower themselves, they are pioneers of women’s community education in Ireland, with the emphasis of encouraging shifts away from guilt or victimhood. Since then they have built An Cosán, in Jobstown, the innovative community educational centre, now staffed by 35 people.

At times, in my envy, I might fall into the trap of thinking them smug: “The ‘most likely place’ for Katherine ‘to experience sacred essence is in her partnership with Ann Louise.’” But they have worked so hard for what they believe in, and touched the lives of so many people in Jobstown and West Tallaght, not to mention their students, that one can only salute them for not only talking the talk, but walking the walk.

Astonishing intellectual and emotional maturity is evident from this book. These women have thought through their lives and love for each other in a profound way. They forged their relationship, and their rich world-view, in the heady America of feminism, liberation theology, and gay liberation. Naturally, this radicalism was not welcome in certain circles back in Ireland: Ann Louise’s appointment as head of St Patrick’s Religious Department was vetoed by three archbishops in a row. Katherine’s many years in Trinity as a part-time but energetically creative tutor were not rewarded with a full-time position.

Katherine’s coming out letter to her parents, and the correspondence following it, is one of the most extraordinary series of letters to read; a model of deep, reflective thought and love between generations.

The starkness of the financial hardship they would face, were one of them to die living in Ireland, their marriage unrecognized, is graphically described, and the decision they made to challenge the tax laws is explained. The risk they take in doing so is extraordinary, however, on so many levels. They know that they have no option but to open their lives up to public scrutiny. But Ann Louise risks losing her job, by coming out like this, in the courts and in this book.

They are missionaries of a feminist spirituality, advocating that spiritual growth can rightfully happen outside the confines of religion. They quote David Hume: “a powerful imagination is required to turn  ideas into living impression”. In this book, as in their lives, they demonstrate this imagination in action, it is the epitome of praxis.

Buy it. Read it. Be inspired.

Only two out of three Irish men say they agree with monogamous relationships.  But 7% have never had sex at all, and the vast majority of men have only had up to three sexual partners in their lives. Although half of men welcome the liberalization of attitudes towards sex as a good thing, for both men and women, six out of ten believe that young men are under too much pressure to have sex when they are young. The same proportion say that how others perceive them matters: a staggering 80% of them identify personal care (skin/hair) as being of importance to them, and of those, half of them say that fashion is “very” important to them in their everyday lives. To repeat: Four out of ten Irish men -  Fashion very important. I know. I don’t believe it myself.

8% of those under 35 admit to having had sex with other men, and again this must be seen as a conservative figure, although men are split 37% – 38% against gay marriage. (This compares starkly, and unfavourably, to the Lansdowne poll in March which indicates 58% of Irish people are in favour of gay marriage. I wasn’t aware the sexes had such different attitudes; or, perhaps, as in all opinion polls, the wording and context of those questions are too different to be comparable.)

Contrary to the positive gloss put on by the manager of the polling company, Ian McShane, who claimed that the figures supported the view that “mens’ wives/girlfriends/partners rank as being extremely important to them in their lives in general,” I see a different story. Of 22 life aspects rated, a man’s wife or partner came only fourth on the list of importance, after financial independence (the same as women in last year’s poll), being able to look after oneself (a no-brainer) and – get this – leisure time. You read it here, folks. Guys really do prioritise football, and pints with their mates, over their wives/girlfriends.

Almost 50% of all men believe that single men have a better life (rising to 69% of younger men), which supports my view that, in general, many men need to be persuaded/cajoled/invited/pressured/blackmailed into entering relationships; it isn’t necessarily the priority for men that women think it is. Although, of course, life takes its toll: by the time we get past 40, most of us concede that being single isn’t better. The majority of men will turn to their spouse or partner for comfort “when the chips are down”, with only one in eight turning to the Catholic church for solace.

But to put it in context, not to mention for the entertainment, John Waters’ column in the  Times is good value. Especially when it comes to understanding the dyspepsia of the modern Irish male, that particularly sour flavour of opinion that affects a large swathe of Irish journalism. Rather than viewing this poll of Irish male attitudes as a spontaneous snapshot of opinion, he says, it may be “more like a videotaped statement of a hostage with a knife to his Adam’s apple.” Ooer. Victim, much! “There is no such entity as ‘men’” he rants, at least “not in the sense that there is nowadays an entity called ‘women’ or perhaps ‘wimmin’. Women are the only gender. Men do not campaign for themselves, nor take the side of other men.”

In the sense that awareness of men’s needs and issues are not generally addressed in the media,
and acknowledging that “gender studies” courses in universities do tend to mean “women’s studies”, I take his point. But the politicization of women, over the past few decades in particular, and the changes they have made to society as a result, were necessary, because men were blind to the (mostly unconscious) collusion between them that excluded and disempowered women. The “personal is political” approach to societal change, that feminists pioneered and worked hard for, has brought about changes that men now approve of – for example, most men disagree with the statement that the man should be the main breadwinner in a household.

Feminists may be disappointed by the finding that most men believe that a woman should accept that her children are more important than her career; and yet compare that with last year’s poll: 53% of women believe it is better for children if their mother is a full-time home-maker. Men and women are not that far apart in their opinions.

Feminism is not the problem that Waters would have us believe, it brought about the beginning of social change that is welcomed by all men and women. Now that attention is being paid to men, in this poll, it is good to see that we are strongly in favour (74%) of workplace legislation to allow us to play more of a role in raising children, and 85% of men believe that single fathers should have exactly the same rights as single mothers. As surprising as that may be, given the lack of media attention to these opinions heretofore, men just have to follow the feminists and organize if they want to effect political change, and not complain bitterly about hard-done-by we are by wimmin.

Brothers, unite!

When Mozart was 12 he wrote an operetta called  Bastien & Bastienne. Opera Theatre Company offered a free performance as part of the Fringe Festival in the shadow of St Patrick’s Cathedral, and despite the rain and a dodgy radio mike, an enjoyable time was had by all.