Establishment Voices

at

Irish times today (top) and yesterday (above)

This morning.

Professor Fiona de Londras tweetz:

I see the Irish Times’ opinion pages are replete with Sinn Féin bashing columns today. I do wonder what would happen if people engaged with Sinn Fein’s actual policies (especially economic and social) instead of taking swipes at them based on some (now outdated) sense of their ‘untouchability’.

It is not that I think Sinn Féin’s approach to the current sit in Venezuala isn’t problematic (it is). It’s that the only actions many prominent journalists seem to engage with are ones that allow them to denigrate Sinn Féin without engaging with their actual policies.

‘Establishment’ voices can keep on treating Sinn Fein as if they are toxic if they want, but the reality on the ground is that they connect meaningfully with many people’s everyday realities and hardships, and a lot of politics is about being and feeling heard. And that is about policy.”

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27 thoughts on “Establishment Voices

  1. Sham Bob

    Stephen Collins is the worst. The epitome of establishment bias in the media, treating politics like inter-county hurling rather than being about ideas that affect all of our lives.

  2. Liza Lu

    Playground monitor journalists telling us what we should think are endemic these days … not just re. Sinn Fein but about virtually everything.

    Spot on Fiona!

  3. Clampers Outside !

    I agree with the Prof that they’d be better off tackling SF policies and the ridiculousness of SF support of the Venezuela socialist authoritarian (dictator?) govt.
    But Is Whelan’s piece incorrect, no. Is Collins’ incorrect? …unfortunately I can’t read it as the zoom is crap on that piece… *shakes fist at BS admins*

    That said, I do get a good giggle from SF’s re-imaginings of history, and the alignments of historical figures. What’s the word for it.. oh yeah, propaganda.

  4. bisted

    ‘…We attained our independance through a combination of democratic parliamentary effort and violent revolutionary action.’

    …sort of like having an armalite in one hand and a ballot box in the other…eh Noel…

  5. Jake38

    Shinners, Marine Le Pen, AfD, UKIP, 5 star pizza, Orban, Trump, ……..all manifestations of the same malaise.

    Populist reactions to the great recession.

  6. Cian 2

    You want people to engage with SFs economic policies? Fantasy maths and boxes of fudge await whoever does. They’re paper-thin at best.

    1. RuilleBuille

      The usual shibboleth about SF economics. Remember the last general election when SF were the only political party to correctly read the tax take!

      “But it has now emerged that Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and Labour had all been miscalculating the fiscal space in recent weeks with the embarrassing result – for them – that only Sinn Féin has its numbers right.”

      https://www.thejournal.ie/fiscal-space-2586172-Feb2016/

  7. Scundered

    Maybe it’s because in the not so distant past they thought it was grand to bomb people, towns, villages etc. You know, stuff that most humans would think is a bit nuts.

    1. Kolmo

      The founders of all but the Green Party all involved themselves in the violent actions in the not so distant past..shooting, bombing and other unpleasantness nobody ever want to see again.

      1. Scundered

        What time in history are you meaning? In my case I can remember these acts, even witnessed a few, and the people involved in the party are still involved in politics. Big difference

  8. The Old Boy

    Sinn Féin supporters and sympathisers in not liking the editorial line in the Irish Times shocker.

    1. topsy

      Sorry Pat, what parties comprised the government when the country was actually bankrupted. Now go back and study your junior cert economics.

  9. Eoin

    In terms of foreign policy Prof, the Shinners have issued a handful of press releases in the past fortnight in support of Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the PKK, the group which is engaged in an armed struggle for an independent Kurd homeland which would be carved out of Turkey and bits of Syria and Iraq. Abdullah has been imprisoned by the Turks for two decades. Fair enough, some would say of the Shinners support, solidarity for struggles across the globe for people seeking self-determination echoes the Shinners own struggle in Ireland.

    But wait a second there, Mary Lou. In the heart of your Dublin Central constituency, a minute ago, a €15 wrap of heroin was sold around the corner from Gardiner Street. That heroin has come from Afghanistan, northern Iran, northern Iraq/Syria or eastern Turkey. It has either been produced by, or distributed by the PKK (Afghanistan exports through the Balkan route to western Europe come through the gatekeepers in Kurdish territory). How do we know this? Europol says so.

    Why is SF supporting a foreign movement (PKK) which is directly responsible for the destruction wrecked by heroin on our streets?

    1. Scundered

      It’s not as if they suddenly became moral people, paramilitaries have been selling drugs for decades and I for one do not believe for a second that they stopped that when good Friday agreement took place

  10. ollie

    Noel Whelan
    Who gives a poo what he thinks of anything.

    Funny how peed the establishmant are that the Shinners were responsible for the frst Dail, the RTE news report on the commemorations failed to mention the words Sinn Fein even once.
    I would not be a Sinn Fein voter but when you remove all those I won’t vote for Sinn Fein are all that remains

    1. Cian

      Is the Sinn Fein of 1919 the same as the Sinn Fein of 2019?
      Is the IRA of 1919 the same as the IRA of 2019?

      See also Ship of Theseus

  11. Eoin

    As for the Shinners economic and social policies, the jury is out. They’ve never struck me as either complete fools or inspired governors in their role in government in Northern Ireland. Pearse Doherty makes a lot of sense on financial and economic administration. They have a handful of impressive TDs. Would they be any worse than FG, FF or Labour?

  12. john f

    “The establishment” don’t really need to do a whole lot to rubbish or embarrass Sinn Fein. They are doing a fine job of that all by themselves.
    The party is at war with itself, long time rank-and-file members throughout the country to not like Marylou’s new “progressive” take on things. They would jump on any bandwagon to appear down with the kids, be it migration, climate change, taxation what ever. Forget Irish unity. What was until recent years, the most EU sceptic political party going is all of a sudden the most EUnionist. Sadly they stand for very little now days.
    Previously this type of flip-flopping was reserved for outfits on the far left like the AAA, but no longer it seems.
    One would imagine that there are poor presidential election results would encourage them to change direction. Rather, they have doubled down on the stupid.

  13. yupyup

    Markievicz was a Fianna Fáiler in so far as she was at the founding of the party. She passed away the following year. She was far more socialistic than FF are, were, or ever will be. I severely doubt she would have remained within FF under De Valera into the 50s and 60s had she lived that long. In fact, Mary Lou McDonald herself probably spent more time in FF than Markievicz. Does that make her a Fianna Fáiler too?

  14. Ian-O

    Who in God’s name outside of FFGLabour actually takes on board the like of these two come out with?

    Not a SF and never will be, but I dislike blatant favouritism.

    Whelan is just ape, a dull, moronic ape and Collins is pure and utter slime.

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