Fergus Finlay tells his readers to believe him on the sole basis that he ‘knows what he is talking about’. It is a warning to all that they cannot rely on evidence, especially evidence which contradicts his pinion. Relying on solely on one’s credentials to lend truth to an argument, is a logical fallacy, its use has been unacceptable for decades and is taboo in the intellectual tradition.
In 218 Finlay retired as CEO of Barnardos, a children’s charity, the biggest beneficiary of taxpayer’s money, on a fat cat pension after years of drawing a salary ‘in excess of government guidelines’. Like the Tuam Children’s Home, Barnardos has been subjected to sensationalist reporting for burying 500 children in unmarked graves. Barnardos’ institutions, like all other such institutions, had a high infant mortality rates at a particular time in history.
Finlay tells us that there is ‘huge evidence’ for a range of claims which clearly Finlay believes to be true, but the commission have rubbished most of them.
He is evidently annoyed that the commission shared the blame with wider Irish society, and he wants to firmly lay it back on the Catholic Church, and to it alone. Accordingly, Finlay’s article shows clear and unequivocal evidence of anti-Catholic prejudice.
Prejudice is not founded on reason and therefore cannot be removed by reasoned argument. Moreover, prejudices are so highly resistant to rational influence that they will defend themselves no matter what the cost is to their keeper.
When genuine proof to underscore an opinion is unavailable, it is now common practice to call forth from the heavens, the avenging angels of ad-hominem. A practice where one attempts to give credibility to their argument, not by proving their point, but by casting a personal sneer at the opposition. Finlay wrote: ‘they produced a report that was so unworthy of the calibre of people involved’. A stylish sneer, but a sneer nonetheless.
‘I’m older than you minister’, declared Finlay. Patronisingly hinting that the Minister for Children was too young to understand the report findings, and if he was as old as him, he too would be as anti-Catholic as he. Get off yer ass sonny, and listen to me ‘cause I know what I’m talking about!
To add more power to his opinion, Finlay loaded his most fearsome weapon, his AK, with misogyny bullets and managed to squeeze off four rounds at the target of truth. He declares that misogyny is the only reason to apply a stigma to unmarried mothers. However, Finlay misses the elephant in the room, and fails miserably to factor in the cost to children. The entire system was instantiated by the church 1,700 years before, to protect children from infanticide. Misogyny bullets are made of a compound of ice and balderdash and melt before reaching the target of truth. It is too distant for many to see, but it is always worthy of making the effort to check the target, no damage, no score.
If Finlay had an ounce of impartial intent, he would no doubt have brought evidence such as this to public attention before casting such slurs.
The real attitude of the state was summed up in an infanticide case by Mr. Justice Kenny. K.C. in 1928
Infanticide has become a national industry in parts of this country the number of newly-born illegitimate children murdered is very great; their bodies are disposed of with a great deal of skill, so much so, that the people guilty are not often brought to justice. An illegitimate child is entitled to the protection of the law just, ns much as one born in lawful wedlock. It is in no extenuation of illegitimacy that 1 say that some of the most distinguished people who ever lived were illegitimate. I have no doubt that, young girl that you are, that your murder of this child was deliberate. It must be brought home to all girls in this country that they am amenable to the law and must suffer this crime. No doubt there is another person in each case who should suffer too, but he cannot be got. But somebody must pay the penalty —not the penalty for being immoral, but the penalty for taking human life. The life of this child might have been valuable: it was of some value at least, and that child was entitled to the protection of the law of this land. […] that their lives are just as sacred as the lives of any other children, and that the State is prepared and has always been prepared to support and maintain them until they reach an age when they can work for themselves.
‘It is fortunate that each generation does not comprehend its own ignorance. We are thus enabled to call our ancestors barbarous.’ – Charles Dudley Warner
Despite newspaper reports that Ireland was once a ‘deeply misogynistic’ society, the word makes only one appearance in the commission’s report. The commission do not use the word directly, instead they quote a feminist historian, Lindsey Earner-Byrne. However, Earner-Byrne’s opinion is not justified in the context of the debate.
On page 45 the report states:
Earner-Byrne states that the Minister for Justice, James Fitzgerald Kenney, who introduced the legislation ‘presented a disturbingly misogynistic approach to welfare’, presenting the unmarried mother as ‘temptress and blackmailer’.
It is clear from the debate that James Fitzgerald Kenney was not labelling all unmarried mothers as Earner-Byrne has described. He was referring to different types of people who might take advantage of the new law as it was then proposed.
The law in question was a philogynistic attempt to help unmarried mothers to get maintenance from the putative father. It required the unmarried mother to go to court and name the father who then would be issued with a court order for maintenance of the child. A debate took place on whether it was better to hold the cases with members of the public present, or with only the press present or completely in-camera.
As would be expected when formulating new laws, various types of scenarios were imagined and thrashed out. One concern was that unscrupulous persons might use the courts to blackmail innocent men, especially if the cases were heard in public or the names of individuals were published in the press. In this scenario, a man could find himself deliberately targeted by a ‘temptress’ whose primary motivation was money. It often happened, in Ireland and abroad, that well-to-do men were often targeted in such a way, and in many cases the child was not even his.
However, the point James Fitzgerald Kenney was articulating was that he believed that when a man was wrongly charged and the case dismissed by the court, the name of his accuser should be published as deterrent against false charges and that a wrongly accused man should have his good name vindicated in public.
The parliamentary record shows that James Fitzgerald Kenney was replying to a question about amending sub-section 6 (a) of the Act, which dealt with the naming of individuals in the case. In the end, the decision was to hold courts with no members of the public present, but press reporters were permitted to attend. Accordingly, the names of the plaintiff, defendant and court officials could appear in public, but they were prevented from publishing details of the proceedings, other than if significant points of law arose.
This acceptance of another person’s opinion without any check for its validity or truthfulness is a problem persistent throughout the commission’s report and has a significant malignant effect on the on many of the report’s conclusions.
Taking the word of academic historians as gospel, also points to significant failings within Irish academic history. Scholars are too frightened of feminist historians to challenge claims, even when they might appear to be totally incorrect.
The assumption of academic inerrancy is a failure of biblical proportions, and the commission’s report is peppered with false assumptions.
Politicians out to fool the people jumped at the chance to fabricate notions of murderous women, both protestant and catholic who were killing babies at mother and baby homes. They took the word marasmus, which appeared as a cause of death on a small number of death certificates as evidence of starvation. It was a lie, and that has been proven Final Report of Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation. Will they have the guts to do the right thing and apologise for misleading the people? As ever truth and politicians are seldom bedfellows.
5. Some commentators have concluded that infant deaths which occurred in mother and baby homes due to marasmus indicates that infants were neglected, not appropriately cared for, and/or wilfully starved to death in these institutions.
However, marasmus was a frequently cited cause of infant deaths in institutional, hospital and community settings in early twentieth-century Ireland. The Commission considers it unlikely that deaths in hospitals and family homes were due to wilful neglect and so cannot conclude that the term marasmus denotes wilful neglect in mother and baby homes. The more likely explanation is that marasmus as a cause of death was cited when an infant failed to thrive due to malabsorption of essential nutrients due to an underlying, undiagnosed medical condition.
In 1939, the Government’s Deputy Chief Medical Officer refuted damning public and health inspectorate concerns in regard to the standards of care at Bethany Home on the basis of a barbaric belief that it was normal for children of unmarried mothers to suffer from starvation. While no action was taken by the Government to protect the children in Bethany Home, which was a Protestant run home, the State did force the home to cease admitting Catholic mothers and babies. What does that say about the State, its orientation and actions?
Evidence in the public domain and records held by Departments tell us this, yet the Minister of State will table an amendment to the Sinn Féin motion that is beyond a distortion of the truth. She has underpinned her amendment with an argument set out in the same vein as that used by the State’s deputy chief medical adviser in the 1930s. He was of the view that children born outside of marriage were prone to starvation and, judging by the amendment before us, it appears the Government shares this view.
In 1939, the State’s Deputy Chief Medical Officer visited Bethany and attributed the ill health of children – rickets, scalding and purulent conjunctivitis – in the home to the fact that they were “illegitimate” and, therefore, “delicate” and prone to starvation. Are the Minister of State and the Government supporting that view in 2013?
The State colluded. In 1939, for example, the deputy chief medical adviser, Dr. Winslow Sterling Berry, dismissed public concerns and even the concerns of his own health inspectors, by claiming that it was “well known that illegitimate children are delicate and marasmic” – in other words, that they suffered from starvation.
Deputy Niall Collins (Fianna Fáil)
Records reveal that 54 of the children had died from convulsions, 41 from heart failure and 26 from marasmus, a form of malnutrition.
Sterling Berry, in 1939. In his report, Berry reported that it was well recognised that a large number of illegitimate children were delicate and marasmic, which means they were suffering the effects of starvation.I stress that this is from the report of an inspection of the home by the State. Was the State involved, was it indifferent to their plight and did the State fail them? The answer is obviously “Yes”.
Deputy Seán Crowe (Sinn Féin)
The big question that arises during this debate, when one steps back from the apology, is why it took the State so long to accept that it played a central and crucial part in supplying the women who were enslaved, starved, ill-treated, abused and treated with cold contempt.
Cemetery records indicate that the causes of death included 54 from convulsions, 41 from heart failure, 26 from starvation and seven from pneumonia. [the death certs record marasmus not starvation]
Death and Burial of Children in Mother and Baby Homes: Motion (Resumed) [Private Members]
Deputy Seamus Healy (independent)
State inspection reports described children as being fragile, pot-bellied and emaciated. Cause of death was regularly recorded as starvation. [marasmus]
Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett (Solidarity–People Before Profit)
Children died of starvation or were used as guinea pigs, while families were ripped apart. It is an appalling stain on our history.
Deputy Ciara Conway (Labour Party)
Young women were forcibly separated first from their communities, then from any sense of pride or self worth and then from their babies. Their babies were neglected and starved, with illnesses untreated. They were seen as worthless and buried, ultimately, in unmarked graves, left in the end without even an identity.
Deputy Seán Crowe (Sinn Féin)
Women’s children were starved and disease, including TB, was rampant. The child mortality rate was massively higher in these institutions than among the general public and the State allowed this to go on.
…
Seanad Éireann debate – Tuesday, 27 Jan 2015 Vol. 237 No. 4 Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes: Motion
Senator Marie Moloney (Labour)
State inspection reports described children as being fragile, emaciated and pot-bellied. Cause of death was often recorded as starvation.[marasmus]
Dáil Éireann debate – Thursday, 9 Mar 2017 Vol. 942 No. 2 Commission of Investigation Announcement on Tuam Mother and Baby Home: Statements
Deputy Lisa Chambers (Fianna Fáil)
What was uncovered in Tuam is only the tip of the iceberg. We do not know exactly how these babies died and it seems likely they were left to starve or die in the cold, as the mortality rate is too high to suggest otherwise.
Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Sinn Féin)
In Sean Ross Abbey, the death register lists a total of 269 deaths between 1934 and 1967, but some of those buried in the plot there are not listed on the register. It is also deeply shocking and appalling to learn that the main cause of death in the case of some 20% of the deaths in Bessborough was marasmus or severe malnutrition – in other words, death by hunger was happening in the 1940s and 1950s in Cork. At a minimum, we need to expand drastically the terms of reference of the commission of investigation into mother and baby homes.
Deputy Mick Barry (Irish Solidarity–People Before Profit)
According to a former chief medical officer of the State, James Deeny, in his autobiography, To Cure and to Care, in one year alone, of the 180 children born in the home 100 died. One in five of those who died in the 1934 to 1953 period died of marasmus, that is, severe malnutrition.
Commission of Investigation Announcement on Tuam Mother and Baby Home: Statements
Senator Alice-Mary Higgins (Daughter of Michael D IND)
There were 472 deaths in 19 years in the Bessborough home. Some 80 of those children were suffering from marasmus, which means severe malnutrition, including babies who have in many cases been taken away from the arms of their mothers, who have not been allowed to breast-feed them. Children suffering from malnutrition – an issue which is easy to control, deal with and address – represent almost 20% of known deaths in a short period in the Bessborough home alone, as we heard in the story earlier.
Senator Catherine Noone (Fine Gael)
Women were starved, neglected and hidden from society. They suffered horrendous abuse. It is imperative that we now respond with sensitivity and respect to what has been unearthed.
We gave them up because of our perverse, in fact, morbid relationship with what is called respectability. Indeed, for a while it seemed as if in Ireland our women had the amazing capacity to self-impregnate. For their trouble, we took their babies and gifted them, sold them, trafficked them, starved them, neglected them or denied them to the point of their disappearance from our hearts, our sight, our country and, in the case of Tuam and possibly other places, from life itself.
Commission of Investigation Announcement on Tuam Mother and Baby Home: Statements (Resumed)
Deputy Seán Crowe
They have come up to me and started telling the story of what they went through – the starvation, abuse, malnutrition and the fact their spirit was broken. That is what we did. We stripped people and took their clothes away. We took their identity, beat them and starved them. This was all done for what was supposed to be the greater good of some individuals or idea.
Dáil Éireann debate – Thursday, 18 Jan 2018
Vol. 963 No. 7 Report of the Joint Committee on the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution: Statements (Resumed)
Deputy Kate O’Connell (Fine Gael)
We murdered them in their hundreds through neglect and hate, brutalised them in the name of salvation and enslaved them in the name of redemption.
Infants in 21st century England, who are born to unmarried mothers, are 30% more likely to die than those born to married parents. The Irish think that because infant morality rates were high in mother and baby homes that children were abused and murdered. Why are the English not accusing their unmarried mothers of abuse and murder of their children through interpreting statistics the same way as the Irish? The answer is simple, a high IMR is not evidence of poor quality care.
Illegitimate infants in past times are generally considered to have been among the most vulnerable population groups: in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, for example, children born out of wedlock were around twice as likely to have died before the age of one year than those born to an official union. The illegitimate penalty decreased as overall infant mortality rates fell in the twentieth century, yet today, in the early years of the twenty-first century, illegitimate infants in England and Wales are still 30 per cent more likely to die during their first year of life than legitimate infants. Even those reported to be illegitimate but registered by both parents living at the same address are 17 per cent more likely to die in infancy.
This is not a mistake, the authors reference the UK publication ‘Health Statistics Quarterly, 2004’, which I have checked and can confirm the accuracy of the statement. If this UK statistical gathering proves anything, it is that Irish social and medical research is disconcertingly deficient and the consequences are manifest through misinformed beliefs and assertions, which are nearly always expressed with oikophobic belligerence.
EJ
Ref:
Reid, Alice, Ros Davies, Eilidh Garrett, and Andrew Blaikie. ‘Vulnerability among illegitimate children in nineteenth century Scotland’. Annales de démographie historique 111, no. 1 (2006): 89–113.
Most sexual abuse of females is heterosexual in nature. Does that mean that there is a link between heterosexuality and abuse? Of course not. Most sexual abuse of males is homosexual in nature. Does that mean that homosexuality is the cause of abuse? Such a claim would be as daft as the extreme feminist assertion that ‘all men are rapists’. Yet mention the issue of homosexual abuse, particularly of children and one will become a victim of vile abuse perpetrated by the Twitter mob. They have become the self-appointed modern day version of the Committee on Evil Literature. They seek censor from public view any evidence which might show that homosexuals in particular, have the same human failings as the rest of the population, they have in effect become superhuman. This censorship has major implications not just for social research and researchers but for society in general. In this era of mass hysteria, the findings of research cannot be discussed openly and in a rational manner. Accordingly, efforts to protect the venerable in society are hampered through puerile abuse.
The vilification of social researchers in Ireland and elsewhere cannot be allowed to continue and the Twitter Mob has to grow up and face the facts as they are found, and be able to discuss findings and evidence in an open an erudite manner. Those who want to hide issues from public view are the supporters of abuse causing the prevention of social researchers from reporting the factors in all types of abuse which are vital to identify various opportunities for prevention.
Accordingly, here I will publish the evidence which is not available in Ireland but comes from an authoritative source. As unpalatable as it is for the LGBT community, this information needs to be in the public domain for the reasons already outlined. It is in their own interest even if the Twitter mob cannot see it.
The ‘Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’, better known as the CDC uses the motto ‘CDC24/7: Saving People, Protecting People’. As part of its mission it sees violence prevention as one of the ways of ‘protecting people’. It sets to achieve this by examining, quantifying and reporting data on instances of many types of violence. Furthermore, the CDC extrapolate for the data ‘risk and protective factors’ which are a combination of individual, relational, community, and societal factors that contribute to the risk of violence occurring. The objective is to understand the factors in order to help identify various opportunities for prevention. The CDC’s National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (NISVS) and is the only ongoing survey which examines the health impacts of violence on people.
The NISVS found for LGBT people:
44 percent of lesbians and 61 percent of bisexual women experience rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner, compared to 35 percent of straight women
26 percent of gay men and 37 percent of bisexual men experience rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner, compared to 29 percent of straight men
46 percent of bisexual women have been raped, compared to 17 percent of straight women and 13 percent of lesbians
22 percent of bisexual women have been raped by an intimate partner, compared to 9 percent of straight women
40 percent of gay men and 47 percent of bisexual men have experienced sexual violence other than rape, compared to 21 percent of straight men
Within the LGBTQ community, transgender people and bisexual women face the most alarming rates of sexual violence. Among both of these populations, sexual violence begins early, often during childhood.
The 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey found that 47% of transgender people are sexually assaulted at some point in their lifetime.
Among people of color, American Indian (65%), multiracial (59%), Middle Eastern (58%) and Black (53%) respondents of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey were most likely to have been sexually assaulted in their lifetime
Nearly half (48 percent) of bisexual women who are rape survivors experienced their first rape between ages 11 and 17.
National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey 2010 Summary Report
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Number and Sex of Perpetrators
Across all types of violence, the majority of both female and male victims reported experiencing violence from one perpetrator.
Across all types of violence, the majority of female victims reported that their perpetrators were male.
Male rape victims and male victims of non-contact unwanted sexual experiences reported predominantly male perpetrators. Nearly half of stalking victimizations against males were also perpetrated by males. Perpetrators of other forms of violence against males were mostly female.
Note: this CDC survey is about violence from intimate partners not about violence suffered by LGBT people within the wider community.
Does the Irish LGBT community care about violence and the health impacts of violence within their own community and want to reduce it? The answer I surmise would be a resounding yes. That can only happen if they are aware of the issues, and such issues do not continue to be swept under the carpet by the self-appointed Committee on Evil Literature.
Professor Chris Fitzpatrick’s article in the Irish Times published 13th October 2020 is chiefly remarkable, not so much for its all too common unbalanced interpretation historical events, but for his illusory superiority.
Fitzpatrick declares that ‘in the annals of medical history, it’s rare to come across a medical student who sets out to kill another person.’ Fitzpatrick, as you might guess, is a professor of medicine not of history. It is an entirely false statement and is exemplar of the genre of Irish barstool history. A pseudohistory learned while sitting on or lying under a barstool while a drunken leprechaun spouts out his/her social climbing musings by denigrating others.
Fitzpatrick in this article sets out to denigrate Kevin Barry, a medical student who became involved in the Irish war of Independence. He was captured by the British, tortured and executed on the 1st of November 1920. He was only 18 years old and his hanging made headlines across the globe, his youth and his fight for freedom made him a hero. A song appeared shortly after his death and has been covered by many artists at home and abroad including the great Leonard Cohen.
Many medical students including Ernie O’Malley and James Ryan joined many other medical students and doctors in the fight for independence or as Fitzpatrick would have it, ‘set out to kill another person’. Both returned to and completed their medical studies, Dr James Ryan became the country’s first Minister for Health.
Internationally and throughout history many doctors have taken up arms, or have ‘set out to kill another person’. For example at the Nuremburg Trials seven doctors were executed, with a further ten sentenced to imprisonment. These figures do not account for those doctors and medical students who got away like the most sadistic of them all Josef Mengele. Che Guevara was another famous medic who took up arms and army medics across the world are provided with weapons and are not just medics, but trained soldiers.
Think about the many doctors who were serial killers like Dr. Michael Swango known as ‘The Poison Doctor’ or Dr Harold Shipman, serial killer with 236 victims and Marcel Petiot: ‘Doctor Satan’ admitted killing 60 people, guillotined in 1946. There are many more killer doctors in the historical record and these may be statistically disproportionate to other professions and the rest of the population. There is one thing that we can be certain of, and that is that medical students, medics and lofty professors are human like the rest of us. It is clear that gaining a degree in medicine does not validate sanctimonious claims or behaviours.
Fitzpatrick goes on to posit sanctimonious claim on top of sanctimonious claim repeating the much loved canard of the barstool leprechaun. The Christian Brothers taught him ‘jihad’, long before he ever heard of the word. The truth is that all schools taught a history curriculum which was set by the state authorities, they did not teach holy war. In reality, the catholic excommunicated every member of the republican side during the civil war. The undeniable truth is that the history of British rule in Ireland is one of brutality, sectarianism, economic vandalism and more. Anyone who is taught the real history of Ireland will not only not fail to be enamoured with the British, but may even become anti-British. For this very reason, the Irish government toned down the teaching of history in schools during the 1950s, fearing that it was driving recruitment for the IRA. However, there is no denying the savagery which the British government unlashed in Ireland and elsewhere but it is best forgotten but paradoxically, needs to be remembered to see how far society has progressed from the partial removal of an abusive superpower.
Many families and certain sections of Irish society have a long history of siding with the British, and over the centuries have used pseudohistory as a vehicle to aid their illusions of social standing. The corollary is that it is achieved through the denigrating of others and Fitzpatrick, despite what some might see as high position within the Irish social simply repeats the well-worn denigrations of the Seoníns and the Jackeens. These are derogatory teems given to Irish people who side with the British to attack their fellow country men and women. The first translates as little Georges and the latter is specifically aimed at Dublin people who have a love of the Union Jack.
Fitzpatrick brings nothing new to the Irish history but what is most noteworthy is his repeat of an ignorant diatribe which is emblematic of just how far the standards have fallen in Irish academia.
Btw and fyi Prof, The Troubles in the North of Ireland were started by the loyalists, that is those Irish people who consider themselves to be British. The first bombs of the troubles were detonated by the UVF, who attacked targets within the United Kingdom and outside it at places like the Garda detective bureau in Dublin, the RTÉ studios and the O’Connell Monument both in Dublin, the Wolf Tone monument at Bodenstown, Co Kildare and the Ballyshannon Power Station in Donegal. All took place in 1969 while loyalist mobs were attacking catholic homes and business, which resulted in the formation of the Provisional IRA in December 1969. The organisation’s genesis arose from the need to protect innocent civilians from loyalist and RUC attacks. The British army was sent to Northern Ireland with the very same mission to protect catholic areas. The Provisional IRA campaign aimed at ending British rule in Ireland did not get underway until 1971, by which time the loyalists paramilitaries had bombed more targets outside the United Kingdom, like a school class room in Donegal, an electricity substation at Tallagh, Co Dublin, a TV relay station near Raphoe in Donegal, the railway line at Baldoyle, Co Dublin. The attacks continued both inside and outside of the UK for the duration of The Troubles.
The first RUC man to die was shot dead by the loyalists, it was a blunder, the intended target was a catholic officer standing beside him. Blunder was never far away from the UVF. In 1971, a UVF squad was ordered to bomb an IRA run pub in Belfast but upon arrival thought that the target was too hard and so planted the bomb at a nearby bar. It exploded without warning killing 15 innocent people, the highest death toll for a single incident in Belfast of the troubles.
‘The Troubles’ did not start as a result of an IRA campaign and it is time the ignorant and drunken leprechauns who preach such pseudohistory were kicked out of the college bar.
EJ
A dunce’s corner was a form of punishment used by teachers of the past. Pupils who gave wrong answers to the teacher’s questions were labelled a dunce, a synonym of simpleton, and were made to go and stand in the corner of the classroom. Sometimes children were forced to wear a conical shaped hat called the dunce’s hat. If any teacher carried out such punishments today, it would be labelled child abuse.
The Commission of investigation set up to investigate the claims surrounding mother and baby homes has moved to cover-up all the evidence put before it, locking it away for 30 years. This will prevent historians and interested parties from checking out the basis for the claims it is about to make in its final report.
The commission has proven so far not to be immune from making emotional claims which have no basis in fact and accordingly are not based on evidence. However, some outlandish claims are in the public domain which can easily be proven false. It would appear that the commission, rather than put these claims to even the simplest test for veracity, are going to perpetuate the many lies and false histories which have so far been made.
However, there is more contradictory evidence out there which the commission is unaware of. I will be making that public after the report is issued and the now customary ensuing furore.
There is one thing upon which all sides are agreed, the testimonies given to the commission should be anonymised and made public. It is the only way to guarantee that they have made honest, erudite and evidence based decisions. We shall wait and see if our politicians acquiesce.
Róisín Ingle went off half-cocked recently in her article published in the Irish Times with the screaming headline ‘I’m menstruating as I write this. And I’m mad as all bloody hell’. What was the cause of her madness? The decision by the Advertising Standards Authority for Ireland (ASAI) to request the removal of a TV commercial demonstrating to women how to use tampons correctly. Róisín is a feminist and blames the withdrawal of the advert on the ‘controlling tricks played by the patriarchy’ to make women mortified of their menstruation periods. When we examine the truth behind the controversy there is no doubt that the bias evident in the article is the exemplar of the problems facing rational discourse in present-day Ireland.
A small piece of information is kept from the view of readers, which if were included, might drop a big hint that patriarchy is not to blame. The vast majority of the 84 complaints received by the ASAI about the ad, were from women. Some complained that the ad made out that women were too stupid to read the instructions on the packet. Róisín then bolsters this claim, writing that when she was 14 years old, she did not read or could not follow the instructions on a packet of tampons, and argues that TV ads are needed to instruct women and girls on how to use them.
The most interesting aspect is why Tampax chose to present the ad in the way it did. That is what caused offence and drew the complaints. Tampax and practically the whole range of feminine sanitary products have been advertised on Irish TV for decades and this is the first time in my memory that one has attracted so many complaints. I include the description of the advert below along with a link to the video.
Underpinning the advert was a research study which Tampax conducted with over 5,000 women in different countries (not including Ireland), which demonstrated that between 60 to 80% of women had not inserted their tampons correctly. That might not sit well with their market and rather than use rational fact-based advert, Tampax chose to use a chat show setting bearing the title ‘Tampons & Tea with comfort wright from Tampax’. The ASAI provide a transcript…
[If you feel discomfort] “You shouldn’t, it might mean your tampon is not in far enough.” At this point the following on-screen text appeared:
“*Always follow pack instructions for correct use”.
The host continued: “You gotta get ‘em up there girls”.
[At the end:] “So, get ‘em up there girls with Tampax. Do it for comfort”.
Why could the advert not say something like this…
If you are experiencing discomfort from your tampon, it is not inserted properly. Make sure that the applicator is inserted fully before you seat the tampon.
When we ask why Tampax choose to discount a rational format a more entertaining format it might indeed reveal what advertisers think appeals to the female psyche.
Róisín keen to draw big inferences from female sanitary product advertisements writes…
‘Blue liquid indicates clean and fresh as opposed to bright-crimson or darkly brooding blood, which by its omission from the ads was implicitly unclean. You watched these ads as a teenager and understood all of this subconsciously. Your menstrual reality was just too gross. Periods were gross. Women were gross.’
According to that logic, babies are gross too and there are many adverts for nappies/diapers which use blue liquid to demonstrate the absorbent capacity of such products. So if that makes babies out to be gross should we not ban the use of blue liquid and replace it a more natural yellow coloured liquid and perhaps use peanut butter to more accurately simulate baby function number two. May I suggest that when advertising adult incontinence pads the use of hazelnut chocolate spread would give a better representation of adult stools. Diluted Lucozade would be the ideal representation of amniotic fluid, another use for sanitary towels.
In fact, why don’t we use such simulations to advertise toilet paper? I am sure that many people cannot use it properly either. Would it not be a great idea to simulate nasal mucus or snot using lemon curd or rotten custard when advertising tissues or clotted cream to simulate semen in condom commercials. We could also show vomit and pus in pimple-popping commercials.
Róisín tells her readers that ‘everything to do with periods is still embarrassing or offensive or needs to be toned down.’
However that ignores reality, would you like to see accurate simulations of body fluids on your TV screen especially while you are about to consume a product which is now associated with defecation. It would be enough to turn most people’s stomachs but in recent years TV ads for feminine sanitary products have used blood-red liquid not just in pads but running down between a woman’s legs while in a shower.
My teenage daughters find the TV ads for sanitary products embarrassing and wonder why they have to go into such detail. Men and boys do not have to endure such embarrassments but the patriarchy, no doubt, enjoys all the closeup clips of women’s crouches in various poses which now feature in many sanitary product adverts.
Róisín says ‘You didn’t even live in a country where some women are not allowed take part in religious ceremonies while menstruating.’ She is a bit confused in this statement saying that the country allowed women full participation. However, I think she intended to say the opposite, thus positing a big hint without any clarification. Jews and Muslims are a minority today and back in the 80s when she was struggling to get a tampon seated correctly, were in an even smaller minority.
Róisín goes on to tell us about the difficulty she now has in calculating the number of tampons required time period, now that she is at the menopause and about the accident in her friend’s bed. I wonder if this is an argument in favour of TV ads advising middle-aged women of how to calculate the number of tampons or pads needed per hour. Maybe they are in the product instructions already but as non-user, I would have to look that up.
Róisín tells us another story which evinces that feminine disgust of menstruation may be innate and demonstrates the point I made using foodstuffs.
I think I am about the age my older relative was when, as a child on holiday in England, I noticed a patch of brownish red on her pale trousers and was disgusted that she was having her period so publicly.
Stained and shamed, she went to the bathroom, and I heard her say, pleadingly, noticing my appalled expression, “Sorry. I’m bleeding like a stuck pig.” And then my aunt muttered something about “the visitor coming early”, and I wanted to die on the floor of the cafe, and it put me off my scones with cream and all that bright-red, ruined for-me-now raspberry jam. It was all so “offensive” and “over-descriptive”. I wasn’t even a teenager yet, but I’d already got the message.
She blames the patriarchy for giving her ‘the message’ but she was disgusted as a child, a pre-teenage child, or lacking an adult understanding of the world, which might indicate that females have an innate revulsion for periods. All sanitary products ads feature females, not males and the use of the words like ‘sanitary’ relates to health, while ‘hygiene’ relates to cleanliness and deodorant pads and tampons indicate that bad smells are also associated with menstruation. Add in the cramps (dysmenorrhea) and crankiness which can be part of menstruation for many women it is not surprising that women react negatively to crass depictions of feminine sanitary products. Tampax has form, look at this advert which has a fish dangling from a fishing line. So you want everyone to know it smells fishy or be reminded every time you open a magazine or turn on the TV.
I found a TV commercial from 1980 o YouTube for Playtex tampons featuring Brenda Vaccaro who wanted to tell women about ‘the facts about tampons, to use them intelligently and to know what you are doing.’ That message has failed, as 40 years later Tampax has to repeat the same message, but with now using a simulated vagina (thumb and forefinger).
Clearly, for Irish feminists, men are to blame for all women’s problems but the Tampons with their tube in a tube applicator were invented by a man, Dr Earl Hass in 1931. Tthe following year he sold the patent to Gertrude Tenderich for $32,000 and she, in turn, founded Tampax. Dr Haas motivated by his observation of how uncomfortable, frustrated and embarrassed his patients and his wife felt when they had their period and set about inventing a device to try and help them. Such evidence exposes the nonsense about patriarchy and evinces that the Irish feminist agenda is founded on the twin pillars of self-victimisation and notoriety through the fabrication of androgynous falsehoods.
Dr Ciara Kelly is a radio presenter and a feminist and she too had a lot to say about the removal of the TV ad and put all the blame on men. In the webcam footage of the radio show, she fails to inform her audience that 83% of the complaints made to the ASAI were from women, and 17% were from men. Perhaps she had not taken the time to inform herself of such facts and so she too went off half-cocked and broadcast her anger to the nation…
I totally get that to men, a vagina is, and I am going to say that word so many times today because I’m a bit irked, is a sexual thing. Do you know what, to the body I live in and the body that 51% of the population live in, that is female, it is just a bit of our body and in fairness it does other things too.
Accordingly, listeners to the Ciara Kelly show will be left with the false impression that the advert was removed because men find that a vagina is ‘a sexual thing’. She is mistaken, but I doubt if she will withdraw any of claims and apologise for what seems to be a plethora of androgynous prejudices. Besides some men do not find vaginas a ‘sexual thing’ and in this age of diversity and equality, why are there no TV ads selling butt plugs to men using the slogan, “you gotta get ‘em up there boys”. Also neglected is the fact that some owners of vaginas also find vaginas ‘a sexual thing’, according to Kelly’s logic, it is only men and lesbians who complain about tampon ads. I think not. I would also surmise that the patriarchy would enjoy it immensely if Tampax showed their product being inserted into a real vagina, instead of a simulated vagina using a thumb and forefinger. Note the use of the word vagina seven… now eight times in this paragraph.
There is no mistake, Kelly is blaming males for complaining to the ASAI:
…and if that ad for putting a tampon in your vagina offends you, well half of us are doing it all the time. I am not wearing one at the moment lads but I wear one sometimes and I don’t care. And you can complain the BAI is where you complain about me too, not the ASAI but this is a nonsense.
Most women in Ireland belong to a cohort of people who are intelligent, competent and sensible. They are likely to complain when they encounter a TV advert which in their opinion is demeaning to women. The silent majority are kept quite due to a natural tendency to avoid the stench of cow manure and getting caught up in an unwinnable argument in a country which has been abandoned by the age of reason and enlightenment.
In Ireland in recent times, public opinion is guided and manipulated using apathy. Hardly any effort is required to base one’s opinions on assumptions, false history and prejudice. These three amigos have been allowed to take precedence over and above well researched, erudite and rational discourse. It is illustrative of how the race to the bottom was won. That is 21st century Ireland for you.
Why are stupid adverts continually aimed at women and what does that say about women who are receptive of such ads? Ireland’s feminists will not like the answer.
The television advertisement, set in a studio type setting for a chat show, featured a female host and a young girl sitting in a chair waiting to be interviewed. A background screen featured a teacup at the bottom with on-screen text which stated:
“Tampons & Tea with COMFORT WRIGHT FROM TAMPAX”
A small circular table appeared to the right of the screen. The table contained a cup turned upside down with a saucer on top. The saucer contained a box of Tampax Tampons Pearl Compak.
The advertisement opened with the word “TAMPAX” on-screen. The chat show host appeared alongside a young girl seated in her chair. The host engaged with her audience and spoke as follows:
“Welcome back. We have a great show for you today.”
The host sat down and continued to speak:
“So, tell me, how many of you ever feel your tampon?” The young girl raised her hand and nodded her head to demonstrate that she had.
The host continued:
“You shouldn’t, it might mean your tampon is not in far enough.” At this point the following on-screen text appeared:
“*Always follow pack instructions for correct use”.
The host continued:
“You gotta get ‘em up there girls”.
The host resumed accompanied by an on-screen demonstration of how to insert a tampon correctly. The demonstration featured a woman making a circle with her thumb and index finger on one hand as she held the tampon applicator in the other hand. She inserted the tampon applicator from one hand into the circle just created and released the tampon from its holder. While this demonstration was on-going the host spoke as follows:
“Exactly. Our special Tampax Pearl Compak grip design for your guide to comfort. Just pull it, lock it and put it in. Not just the tip, up to the grip”. The majority of this message also appeared as on-screen text with an additional footnote which stated:
“*When experiencing persistent discomfort not related to incorrect insertion of your tampon, consult your doctor”.
The host concluded the presentation with the following message:
“So, get ‘em up there girls with Tampax. Do it for comfort”.
In the end frame, the host winked at the camera, the young girl smiled and a pack of Tampax Pearl Compak appeared on screen.
This documentary financed by the Canadian government provides a good overview of the outcomes due to our cognitive biases combined with the democracy of the internet and social media. The one thing the documentary makers neglect to do is explain what a cognitive bias is. It is a systematic error in thinking that impacts one’s choices and judgments. In other words when it comes to information processing the human mind makes mistakes. Most of the mistakes are made in a such systematic way that they are predictable. There is only one big problem, most of us are unaware that we may be processing information which has no bases in reason. The upshot is that we now live in a democracy of the gullible, but we need to turn the tide of belief in conspiracy theories by teaching critical thinking skills in schools. Enjoy.
Coronavirus: Pictures emerge of temporary mass graves in New York as US Covid-19 death toll surpasses 16,500 (Irish independent April 10th 2020)
Classic sensationalism from the Irish Independent. Every day people are buried in mass graves on Hart Island in New York. These were once called pauper burials but are now known as public health burials. If a family cannot afford a funeral, the state will bury their relative free of charge but on the cheap. It happens all over the world and is nothing new and is certainly not a mass grave specifically for victims of Covid 19.
