Irish Magdalene Laundries report supports secularist view

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Tequila
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07 Feb 2013, 4:59 pm

An excellent opinion piece in the Independent today:

Quote:

The Magdalene Laundries report confirms the need to keep church and state matters separate in Ireland

Question: How do you get an apology from the Irish government?
Answer: With a crowbar.
Plus, below: hot news for dinosaur lovers

It takes an age to squeeze much remorse out of the Irish government, doesn’t it? In 1999, after decades of child abuse in Catholic-run organisations, it finally issued “a sincere and long-overdue apology” to the victims and set up a Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, which took nine years to present its findings.

Now the government has been told – by a report prompted two years ago by the UN Committee Against Torture – that the Irish state colluded in sending 30,000 women to the infamous Magdalene Laundries between 1922 and 1996.

The prime minister, Enda Kenny, didn’t apologise to the families of the women who’d been incarcerated in these hellish institutions despite committing no crime. He said: “The stigma [of] the branding together of all the residents… in the Magdalene Laundries needs to be removed.” No, it doesn’t. The stigma of the Laundries will survive as a reminder of how inhumanly innocent people can be treated by supposedly charitable institutions.

I'd like to post the whole thing, but I'd get a slap for it. Do read it all, though.

Also, The Magdalene Sisters is an awesome film, with a wonderful opening song. (I say that because I had a short dialogue with a friend of the singer of the version used in the film - PM me if anyone wants a clean copy of The Well Below the Valley, O as used in the film.)

thomas81
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07 Feb 2013, 6:16 pm

another irish thread from tequila in a perogitive context. A pattern forms

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Tequila
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07 Feb 2013, 6:25 pm

thomas81 wrote:

another irish thread from tequila in a perogitive context.

Have you been on the Guinness, my man?

I suggest that Ireland as an island benefits from secularism and not from insane state-backed religious bigotry, and you assume an ulterior motive again as always.

Do you support the Magdalene laundries?

Do you want to defend the record of the Magdalene laundries? Perhaps you can talk to the remaining survivors of that institution - most of whom will be Irish - and see how they feel about it.

thomas81
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07 Feb 2013, 6:37 pm

frankly i havent followed the story with a great deal of enthusiasm. Its not been a massive talking point this side of the border so its rather odd that someone on the other side of the irish sea would find it threadworthy. Just saying.

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Tequila
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07 Feb 2013, 6:55 pm

FYI, I found it on the National Secular Society website.

I've taken a (minor) interest in secularism in Ireland for a long time.

ModusPonens
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07 Feb 2013, 7:58 pm

As a non british and proud republican left winger, I have to say that this news bit brought by Tequila is quite shocking in its own right. So even if there are ulterior motives (I have no idea if there are), this is a valid discussion to have. It's about the participation of the state of Ireland in slavery until the 1990s. That's too big to be ignored on a basis of pride or nationalism.

Tequila
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07 Feb 2013, 8:01 pm

ModusPonens wrote:

This has been known about popularity for at least 15 years now and has been a very serious national scandal in Ireland that has run for years, sparking films, TV series, documentaries and all the rest of it.

The last Magdalene laundries in Ireland closed in Dublin in November 1996.

We in Britain had Magdalene laundries too, but we closed them for good much earlier than the Irish did.

Do watch The Magdalene Sisters though - it's a brilliant film, and produced by some of the most Roman Catholic and Irish nationalist people you could meet.

Oh, and I'm staunchly Unionist. I suppose you might already have guessed that.

ModusPonens
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07 Feb 2013, 9:29 pm

Unionist meaning that Ireland should belong to the UK?

Tequila
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08 Feb 2013, 4:09 am

ModusPonens wrote:

Unionist meaning that Ireland should belong to the UK?

I share the beliefs of the majority of people in Northern Ireland that the Province should remain within the UK. As for the Republic of Ireland (i.e. the rest of the island), I've no real desire (and wouldn't want them) to see them rejoin the UK.

ModusPonens
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08 Feb 2013, 10:43 am

If there's such a majority, I can't see why that would be a problem. Same thing with the Basque Country. However, was that majority formed before or after the IMF arrived at the Republic of Ireland?

Tequila
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08 Feb 2013, 10:47 am

ModusPonens wrote:

If there's such a majority, I can't see why that would be a problem.

There has always been a majority favouring that Northern Ireland should remain within the UK. Irish nationalists in Northern Ireland (usually Catholics) are against the state, saying that the island was 'gerrymandered' during partition in 1921 and that Northern Ireland had an in-built Protestant and unionist majority.

To be honest, it's very, very complicated. I recommend reading several books on the subject.

daydreamer84
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08 Feb 2013, 12:39 pm

disturbing.

Tequila
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08 Feb 2013, 12:47 pm

daydreamer84 wrote:

disturbing.

Agreed. The problem here isn't the Irish people, but their Government. The way they have handled this is shocking.

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