Kevin Myers
On Thursday, September 28.
In St Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick.
Kevin Myers will moderate a talk, entitled ‘How censorship stifles debate and undermines the tenets of free and democratic societies’.
Anne Sheridan, in the Limerick Leader, reports:
The talk will be given by Jodie Ginsberg, of the Index on Censorship, which publishes the work by censored writers and artists and campaigns for free expression worldwide…
David O’Brien, chief executive of Limerick Civic Trust, which has organised the series of talks, said he has not read Myers’ widely criticised article, entitled ‘Sorry, ladies – equal pay has to be earned’, but stressed their talks are about “encouraging debate and having opposing views”.
But Prof O’Connor [Prof Emeritus Pat O’Connor, of sociology and social policy, at University of Limerick] said her concern is that “with this platform, they are framing Kevin Myers as the defender of free speech by putting him in that position.
“I suspect that it is simply an attempt to drum up an audience by being controversial. In these sort of situations, the best thing one can do is to ignore.
“It’s not an acceptable position to say everyone is entitled to free speech if it stirs up hatred against any one group. It’s not an uncontested right,” said Prof O’Connor.
“I have no time for political correctness. I think if the heart is right, the lip can be forgiven. But it seems to be giving a platform to Kevin Myers, and legitimising opinions that many people found offensive.”
Prof O’Connor, a visiting Fellow at University College Dublin’s Geary Institute, said she won’t be attending the talk, as there were “too many crazy assumptions in his column”.
…“I have no time for political correctness. I think if the heart is right, the lip can be forgiven. But it seems to be giving a platform to Kevin Myers, and legitimising opinions that many people found offensive.”
…“He said men are more charismatic, and that is one of the reasons why they get ahead, but I’m afraid we all know an awful lot of boring men. Me thinks the lady doth protest too much. When there are as many mediocre women as mediocre men in the top jobs, we’ll have equality,” she said.
Yikes.
Previously: Listening To Kevin
I presume one of the topics will be laws banning holocaust denial?
Sure. Ask him – and the Irish Times AND the Phoenix – about his more than quarter of a century platform from the IT for his Airfix 1/72 soldiers view of the world and his tacit support for David Irving.
The suppression of Myer’s free speech must be brutal since I never heard from the guy for a decade and suddenly he’s friggin’ everywhere, being oppressed and having his free speech censored.
Indeed. I want to be an oul boo boo when I grow up – seems you’re never short of gigs.
Odd that, given the Irish Times is paying his pension. Still, they’re very generous enablers. Una Mullally enabled John Waters to retire to a nice gaff in Dalkey.
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/john-waters-apology-1.2965228
“Homophobia watchdog needed before marriage equality referendum”
Funny, the John Waters wrote seemed pretty homophobic.
For people like Myers suppression is that he is no longer paid to spout his BS.
For the rest of us suppression is getting sued or locked up.
He has no sense of perspective.
And seriously I’m tired of being judged by those creepy nostrils of his.
Myers and censorship. He never mentioned the censoring of political opponents by various governments between 1972 and 1994 under Section 31. But call him to task for his anti-semitism and he becomes a snowflake.
Since when was splattering people all over the road the action of a political opponent ?
I’d book him into Crock park and invite entire schools to his talks. It could be a single most valuable lesson for them.
The word “Crock” is where you’re most correct. The rest I’m not sure of.
Is local hero Ed Walshe of “No Degree for Biffo” fame gonna turn up and go into #Marian mode?
Gets popcorn.
I’m with Professor O’Connor on this. A transparent attempt to generate a bit of interest in their ‘debate ‘.
Where will all this invective end? The libtards seem to think it will end up with everyone being nicely polite to each other and tolerant and inclusive- cos that’s obviously working!
And yet, more Mullalys and Katie Hopkins are sent out as clickbait to further the fight, with both sides cheering as someone gets taken out. All fun and games till someone loses their job, drives a car through people or simply doesn’t know what gender they are. And please dont tell me its all ok and progressing the right way. Its lunatic and its so anti human as to be perverse.
‘Where will all this invective end? The libtards seem to think’
Hmmmm.
Keep your head in the sand boys. Blame the messenger. What did you do in the war daddy? Oh nothing son, just judged people.
Well, Milo, tell us – what did you do ‘in the war’? Because your comments smack strongly of judgement, and hypocrisy too.
Incidentally, is there a war being waged that we’re unaware of?
No Mildred, nothing to see. Not a thing. Everything is just dandy isn’t it? Privileged viewpoint indeed.
It would be a clever answer, if it didn’t reek of your own hypocrisy.
Not meaning to argue Mildred but I felt the tang was more of horse manure
:D
Thought it was just me getting a whiff.
If it”s a war your comment was a near-parodic effort at affecting objectivity while clearly attacking one. Tedious fake both-sideism enables the likes of Myers while blaming him on his critics.
Its not a war so Nigel. Just people plowing cars into crowds, hate being spewed all over the shop, people being driven from jobs- but don’t you worry. You just carry on making sure we all see how much you care. You are the echo and the empty chamber.
Award yourself a medal for your brave fight with the ‘libtards.’
He seems to be accusing Una Mulally of running over that woman in Charlottesville?
You sneer just like Myers actually. The same faux intellectual snobbery. The snobbish hautery, the self righteous loathing. The only thing is, Myers didn’t bother to pretend his hatred was caring :-)
I don’t have the nostrils for a proper Myers sneer, actually, but I am pretty sneery about equating criticising Myers with hitting someone with a car, that’s special.
Well using her death for a lame Mulally joke was pretty special.
More of a Milo joke, really.
The mask slips every now and then Nigel. Winning is even more important to you than caring. And we all know how much you care. Sleep easy.
Thanks for avoiding self-righteousness, hauteur, judgementalism, invective, loathing, hatred, and a pretence of caring. Your own mask slipped two words into the second sentence of your first comment.
Thanks Milo.
You can get help you know.
An awful lot of denial going on folks. And I dont understand why. But you are all winning the caring wars. Don’t worry about that. You’re way ahead. Bigly caring. No empathy for the poor people getting squashed by your battle for the high moral ground. Just as the right have no empathy for those who will be hurt as “they take things back”. And as long as you don’t realise that this is how you are viewed, you will be as damaging and divisive as the alt-right. You’re just two ends of the same intolerance. The two butt ends of narcissism.
I guess if false equivalence allows you to kerp attacking ‘libtards’ while Nazis and the KKK are on the March then that’s what you gotta do.
Seriously Milo. Thanks for the mad props.
Well the libtards aren’t exactly being effective are they? Their stifling intolerance, banning, shaming, no platforming, censoring and judgementalism certainly isn’t producing the caring society they claim to want. In fact their occupation of the mainstream is having the opposite effect with their tone and language policing. They are also tarring moderate liberals who actually mean well.
The Nazis and alt-right are total scum, but we know that. But they are a bit dumber and easier to spot and stop. They aren’t pretending they are not racist.
You’re right. We should be nicer to Nazis.
What age are you? 12? Straight to Godwin! Your way will just keep stirring and belittling and mocking, and then you wonder why terrible things happen. This is the real world, not a sociology workshop. Give me Antifa any day. At least they don’t hide some fake compassion to give them their superiority . They fight scum head on.
‘What age are you? 12? Straight to Godwin!’
What are you, a goldfish? You started this by drawing a moral equivalence between a misogynist and anti-semite getting fired and a woman getting run down by a Nazi. You wanna go fight Nazis in the streets, please, do so, with my blessing, and I say that with no trace of irony. Until then you’re just parroting Trump with this ‘both sides are as bad as each other’ crap. So far the intellectual thrust of everything you’ve said amounts to ‘stop being so mean libtards it’s all your fault!’
Hand-in-glove.
Radio Telefis Eireann in conjunction with the Irish Times presents: Kevin Myers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVhx6lRZ92w