That Loony Mooney Ruling

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Seamus Dooley, Irish Secretary of the National Union of Journalists (NUJ)

Finally.

The NUJ has responded to last week’s ruling by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland concerning an “imbalanced” item on same sex marriage on the Derek Mooney Drivetime show on RTE Radio One.

Better late than never.

Seamus Dooley of the NUJ sez:

“Our members, researchers, producers and presenters, are now put in a very difficult position in evaluating stories and, in particular, studio interviews. The BAI would appear to be singling out discussion on so called same-sex marriage, imposing restrictive conditions even before the government has provided wording on a possible referendum on civil marriage equality, never mind setting the date.

Every interviewee likely to expression an opinion in favour of civil marriage equality must automatically be confronted with the alternative viewpoint. Likewise a guest likely to oppose civil marriage equality cannot be interviewed without an advocate of civil marriage equality.

Given that the proposed referendum springs from the recommendations of the Constitutional Convention there is a compelling logic that the same rule should apply to any subject discussion by the convention which may in the future be the subject of a referendum
or even further debate.

This would include any discussion touching or likely to touch on reducing the Presidential term of office to five years and aligning it with the local and European elections; reducing the voting age to 17; the Dáil electoral system;; giving citizens resident outside the State the right to vote in Presidential elections at Irish embassies, or otherwise;; the role of women in the home and encouraging greater participation of women in public life;; increasing the participation of women in politics;; removal of the offence of blasphemy from the Constitution and any debate on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, as well as abortion and the establishment of a unified patent court.”

And your point is?

FIGHT!

 NUJ challenges Mooney programme ruling on same-sex marriages (NUJ)

(Photocall Ireland)

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14 thoughts on “That Loony Mooney Ruling

  1. DarDar

    Should we all now start lodging complaints about everything on the radio; in the interest of fairness and impartiality I mean.

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