Yes. But No.

The shock result of the referendum - and we're only talking in preliminaries, so we can't leap to judgement - is that 40% of people don't like children, and  - quel surprise - many of them are working class. The shock result - and we can't leap to judgement - from the preliminary results is clear: knackers hate children.

Anyone who voted no obviously has contempt for the progenitors of ruined dinners out, pub floors sticky with Club Orange and King Crisps, for Star Wars' Jar Jar Binks and the scourge of Balamory. None of the no votes have anything to do with the government, side isues, a lack of understanding of the reasons for the amendment, moral, ethical or legal reasons; and absolutely nothing to do with the arch villain of the Yes campaign, Alan Shatter. Anyone who voted no gleefully slips notes under the doors of National Schools with the phrase 'There is no Santa' scrawled in crayon, and they genuflect when they hear the theme song to Jim'll Fix It.

I would instinctively have voted yes. Reading the proposed amendment, however, I noticed it did a passable impression of half baked adoption legislation being shoehorned into the constitution. The constitution, as I understand it, is a basic law upon which the legal and ethical principals of a state are based, not the day to day laws which emanate from it.  To me, the presence of specific sanctions regarding adoption lead to unease about voting yes. As I considered my vote, should I have taken a leap of faith that politicians will always do and say what is right, or should I demand greater intellectual rigour in creating the laws of the land?  

Could this issue have been dealt with in legislation? Were all avenues exhausted in dealing with the nuts and bolts details of adoption legislation, of child welfare legislation, before taking the drastic and costly step of amending the constitution, a step that needs careful and intelligent judgement. 

Furthermore, given the comments of someone like Alan Shatter - who appears to gleefully wallow in his own perceived (and utterly misplaced) superiority over anyone who disagrees with him - a yes vote begins to wobble. What I had as misgivings about the amendment, has lead to one clear decision: following his masterclass in pomposity on Radio One this morning, I will never ever ever ever ever ever ever *breathes in* EVER vote as directed by Minister Shatter, without prior legal and psychiatric advice.
 
The local yahoos who spoiled their votes with tiresome slogans about Sean Quinn are in the extreme minority. And there is admittedly also a teeny weeny minority who will always be too stupid to vote even in the X-Factor. The right wing nutters who think the constitutional amendment would allow children to be taken away on the whim of the state were negligible in number, but they were noisy and disingenuous, and got airtime thanks to that annoying but necessary evil, the McKenna judgement. That's before any Supreme Court judgement makes the yes campaign look like they're trying to pull a fast one over the electorate, even if that appearance is entirely unfounded, giving the nutters unwelcome ammo.   

Not everyone who voted no, however, could possibly be extremist or stupid. Not everyone who voted no can have had a disregard for the rights of children or be susceptible to conspiracy theories.  And not everyone who voted no has contempt for the rights of children.

I didn't like the amendment, because it looked like Fisher Price legal practice attempting to address (ironically) very grown-up legal problems. Rather than poo poo the levels of the no vote and the low turn out, those in power need to examine how they deal with complex constitutional issues and how they choose to debate its (de-) merits. In a country that has failed children as spectacularly and as criminally as Ireland, in a society that connived either by action or by silence in the treatment of children, this referendum campaign did absolutely nothing to make amends. 

  

 

Christmas.Yes. Already.

I never new that we were the highest spenders per household in Europe for Christmas. Absolutely amazing. According to businessetc.ie, Irish households will spend "€965.80 with an average €499.60 spend on gifts". Brilliant - Whilst everyone else in the EU dines on water and a side order of misery, I'll be live-skyping myself devouring Turkey stuffed with pheaseant, stuffed with foiegras, chestnusts and some IOUs into the spartan dining rooms of Berlin and Athens.    

Another interesting fact from this report was that the average socializing spend this year will amount to €177.90. The average punter in 2006 would have taken that out as 'just in case money' going up and down Wexford Street, whilst Bertie smirked at us benevolently from every street corner. I once ordered a €6 pint of Guinness - it was not, as you'd imagine for the price, poured personally by Arthur Guinness, as the Rolling Stones did an acoustic set just for little me. It was in fact bought in a crowded city center boozer, where everyone was hammered and the music was awful. The only thing impressive was that it didn't kill me: It was the worst pint I ever drank and tiny Euro symbols got lodged in my windpipe. 

It leads me to wonder about other numerical figures that came out today and what they say about Ireland; the pay of some IRBC executives tipping the half million mark being one, the greatest irony being that Fianna Fail's Michael McGrath asked the question to get the answer. FF as the 'bFF' of probity and prudence? I even spotted a Tamworth outside wearing a bomber jacket and goggles, reading a well-thumbed copy of 'Biggles'.  

Another startling stat was in education. 90% of the total secondary school population now goes to complete their schooling. Fifteen years ago it was just over 80%. The worst performing areas are Limerick and Dublin cities. In other news, bears seen sensationally walking towards forest with bumper pack of Charmin loo-roll to prove a point. So poor is the state of Irish education that the question has to be asked, how many students could actually spell 'Biggles' at a push? Answers on a postcard to Enda. He's not in the office today, so be patient.  

Ready for Take Off...

The fact that more kids are staying in school comes from the welcome realization that education is important, even with catastrophic stats in student retention, literacy and numeracy, science, languages and a child health and nutrition time-bomb ticking louder by the day; not to mention that we have the lowest rate of investment in education of any EU country. We're a country with fabulous petrol stations and shabby looking outhouses for kids to learn in.

All our problems, however, are about to be solved! We've got a referendum on children on Saturday. If the turnout's high enough for a No vote, then children will be abolished. We'll use the freed up cash to develop a time machine, so uncle Arthur can pull me a decent pint. Alternatively, though more realistically, we could plump up the IRBC's executive wage bill.

It's all about priorities.  


     

Satire: Death by a thousand writs

Anglo: the Musical sounds really promising. It appears to be a comedy about, but more importantly, a satire of our recent turmoil, thanks in huge part to the eponymous bad bank. Sadly, the main man in the whole sorry saga cannot, for legal reasons, be mentioned. His puppet is put back in its box, never to be seen again. And so it's now a comedy show with its of laughs and funny songs, but how much satire survives? Will it stand up with this last minute rewrit(e) or have the killjoys successfully come out to play?    

The response of the show's producers, as reported in the Indo, is like a face of bravery being slapped onto a freshly shot corpse. The law getting involved is no problem: they (the show's writers) "are writing a puppet based musical comedy. It is very funny and we are being responsible in making it." The troublesome 's-word' is missing from the copy. The job of a spokesman is sometimes utterly unenviable.

It's nice to know Anglo is funny and it's reassuring the show's makers have been 'responsible', I was worried about the possibility of 'irresponsible' satire. Anglo has been treated to an insidious and kafkaesque kind of censorship, namely censorship by reasoned legal advice. The intervention of the DPP and Seanie Fitz's lawyers, while legally justifiable, means an opportunity for creating satire may be lost, and satire is a rare and delicate thing in a cozy little country like Ireland - by extension, free speech, a property equally challenged in Ireland, will be just a little more eroded.

More disgusting than disquieting is complete absence of anger among the public. So blind are the regular folk of Ireland to the wrongness of the country's continuing struggle to mete out justice in the aftermath of our economic collapse.

Meanwhile, the most telling satire was found in real life, a mere mile from the Bord Gais Energy Theater, where TD Stephen Donnelly took on the head of Bank of Ireland, Richie Boucher. This one the lawyers couldn't kill, as Stephen repeatedly hectored Boucher to explain the definition and calculation of negative equity. Each time he received the same mumbled answer, straight from Planet Stonewall. Exasperated by the end, Donnelly, who excellently recapped Boucher's responses for the plain people of Ireland watching on YouTube, described the BOI boss's testimony witheringly as being "most illuminating". The Oireachtas Finance Committee Chair was, tellingly, was more deferential to Boucher in thanking him for his presence. Anthony Jay and Jonathan Lynn could not have scripted anything finer. In Ireland, however, we nix that at the outset, all satire is short lived or incidental. 

The real life heroes and villains have, inevitably, kept the best material for themselves. Between the actors in our little economic tragedy and the state's own lawyers, we can't successfully fight to get a platform to describe our ruined reality. Maybe we're not deserving of satire or the efforts of those who wish to produce it, or, indeed, of justice in the aftermath of our banking crisis. That would be "entirely our own fault".