Free Speech in Ireland
I’ve undertaken the task of surveying the state of free speech in the parts of Europe that haven’t been covered here previously.
This is the first of an occasional series on instances of official repression wielded to combat “racism”, “discrimination”, and “incitement to hatred” in European countries.
Islam O’Phobe is a regular reader and commenter from Ireland, and I asked him for information about the state of free speech in his country. Here’s what he had to say.
There was a significant controversy involving the Irish Independent columnist Kevin Myers a few months ago.
Before I delve into that I should first provide you with some context relating to the “bastard” controversy. Kevin Myers wrote an article in the Irish Times in 2005 criticising girls who bore children out of wedlock as conceiving “bastards”. He used the word “bastards” in the column repeatedly (about 20 times) which set off a firestorm of criticism.
The national outrage that ensued was not manufactured. All the radio talk-in shows were deluged non-stop with complaints — not just from the usual complainers but people from every aspect of life. It upset a lot of people. I heard anecdotally from my Aunt that someone scratched into his car “Who’s the Bastard Now?” The car-scratching incident never made it into the media as far as I know.
He lost his job at the Irish Times (technically speaking he resigned) and was subsequently scooped up by the Irish Independent, for which he now writes.
Fast forward three years later to 2008 and this article in which Myers criticises aid to Africa, the dismal wasteland that is African culture, and his fellow journalists for their dishonesty in not reporting the facts on the ground.
He was heavily criticised by the left-wing media such as the Irish Times and the Metro, a free daily staffed almost entirely by African immigrants and dedicated to promoting multiculturalism. Most Irish people either agreed with Myers or didn’t notice the fuss.
Myers was reported to the Press Council, who have the power to penalise journalists if it is decided that they are guilty of “incitement to hatred”.
Myers was exonerated of “incitement to hatred” but, as he explains in this article, he was misrepresented by the Irish Times legal correspondent when the verdict was reported.
The upshot is that, having won the case, he can more or less write whatever he wants. His article comparing mass immigration into Britain to the fall of Constantinople being a case in point. On the BNP website the commenters complain that the link to this article gets deleted from the Sun newspaper’s site.
So this debacle was the significant episode of Irish free-speech crackdown in recent years, and it happily resulted in an (unofficial) precedent of Danish-like levels of free expression. No doubt in my mind. However, that there will be other charges of “racism”/”hatred” to answer in the future.
I recall debating the creation of the Press Council several years ago. It was argued to me that in return for
stricter controls on offensiveness there would be a relaxation of libel laws. Talk about a bad trade!
In any case, I will keep you updated on any future inquisitions presided over by the Press Council. The equally odious Equality Authority has sadly been drained of funds lately due to the recent recession. What a pity.
Comments
By Denyse O'Leary on March 10th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Many people do not realize that having children out of wedlock often deprives the child of a father’s family as well as a mother’s family.
It is NOT just the father who is absent, it is his mother and his father and his sisters and brothers and friends and cousins and ….
Traditionally, everyone knew this. So it is NO surprise that unwed mothers are usually poor and dependent on public social resources.
I was – for some years – a sole support mother. (I had been married, but the marriage did not work out.)
However, my children had a large number of relatives and friends on BOTH sides of the family who enabled them to succeed in life despite that misfortune. (They understood what was happening re the marriage, and kicked in.)
Look, accidents happen. I am a pro-lifer. But I do say that a child deprived of an entire side of the family is like a child deprived of an arm.
Maybe we have the legal right to do that to a child. But why? Why not be more careful about how we live?
How can we have departed so far from our roots as to forget that?
By FP on August 14th, 2009 at 11:44 am
It’s quite surprising to see how little current material there is online concerning the suppression of free speech in Ireland, where it appears to be in the cultural DNA.
I think that, in addition to straightforward state censorship, the issue of chronic low-level censorship online is also going to grow. I’ve been posting in the rather non-political arena of the boards.ie ‘Soccer’ forum for quite some time now, but recently ran foul of intensely over-zealous moderation when I crossed someone’s line by posting a vaguely amusing YouTube clip on soccer moms.
On looking at the ‘rules’ of boards.ie, I discovered this little gem which says, essentially, look, we own the place, you only say what we let you say:
‘No freedom of speech.
This is a private website. There is no “right” to freedom of speech here. We, the Admins and moderators DO want to promote discussion but FREE un-moderated discussion online turns into a screaming match between children. We believe that rules of etiquette should be applied (see below). Shouting about how we have infringed your “freedom of speech” on a privately owned website is silly. You can use blogger.com to say what YOU like, what you aren’t entitled to is access to the community we have built here without abiding by the community’s rules, as decided and enforced by us.’
I’ve written my thoughts at http://wp.me/pkSyW-nH on why I’m not happy to live under that regime, whether to discuss politics or sport, and would be interested in what people who value free speech think of the balance between private ownership rights and the universal right to free speech.
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