PaddyirishMan writes:
This is from the reception area in the Department of Children and Youth Affairs [Mespil Road, Dublin 2]. Picture taken last week. Openly distributing [extreme Catholic paper] “Alive!”. No other papers available…
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Everything. As It Happens.
Just to remind us all what type of country we live in.
Did the photographer by any chance ask why these papers are there?
so do you have the same attitude to free speech as the jihad? agree with me or fupp off?
Alive are free to sell or hand out their papers.
Govt depts and offices however are not free to selectively offer one newspaper.
Yes, those two are the same thing.
Is it possible all the good papers had already been taken and those were what was left – like the coffee creams at the bottom of a tin of quality st?
Major Thrill.are you insane man/lady the coffee creams are the best! tis sarcrelige..
Clearly, you don’t know what you are on about. The coffee creams are very nice.
I don’t understand why we can’t have a referendum on this issue. It’s clearly dividing the nation.
Those newspapers are dropped in.
And they can be dropped slightly lower too…
Doh! There is a public sector magazine also present. Throughout the day I’m sure there are many different newspapers varying from the Irish Time to the Indo been read. Big deal it’s what is defined as democracy & free speech.
Democracy and Free Speech means our public services are entitled to distribute a hate speech now?
I mean I can’t call John Water’s a homophobe without being dragged into the courts, but the local clinic I pay tax for can hand out literature calling me a degenerate, a danger to children and arguing against my rights.
I wonder what your reaction would be if copies of GCN or Attitude were the only reading material available in your local social welfare office?
Free speech is a personal right, that personal right does not extend to co-opting the public realm we all own.
Don’t worry Aodhan O’Riordain your supporting buddy will soon legislate to deny religious institutions to distribute any literature. His definition of sacrilege, afterall didn’t he campaign against the right for Youth Defence to launch a billboard campaign. Apparently in the eyes of liberals the definition of free speech is expressing what they agree with. Rather reminiscent of the communists in the USSR. Or should O’Riordain re-introduce the penal laws?
Either you’re very dim or deeply irrational, but I am not arguing against Alive’s right to publish and distribute, I’m arguing for the independence and neutrality of the public realm.
Just FYI you’ve gone full Fox news there. Do they not teach critical thinking where you come from?
Doh! There is a public sector magazine also present. Throughout the day I’m sure there are many different newspapers varying from the Irish Times to the Indo been read. Big deal it’s what is defined as democracy & free speech.
No, Alive! publishing their “paper ” is free speech. No-one is required to give them a forum though. Chucking the paper in the bin, as I’ve done many times, is not limiting free speech.
this is clearly somebodies desk, doesn’t look like a public library section!
Even their swipe card is lying beside it!
Personal choice what people read, stop taking photos of peoples private area.
It was the reception area not a desk. There were no other publications apart from Public Sector Times which is, effectively, a staff magazine and so is quite different.
There’s a very good article on US drones on page 3 of that issue. Those drones have killed hundreds if not thousands of civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
difficult crossword though. i only got 14 down – sufferance and 3 across – cilice. if i watched more extreme bdsm p0rn i’d probably do better.
I can make a few suggestions in respect of primary texts to make sure you achieve the desired learning outcomes scottser
put this mask on and get into the box, you say?
Opus Dei operatives litter the Civil Service.
they do make a mess, don’t they. all that flagellation and they never clean up after themselves. tsk tsk etc..
I’m pretty sure this was left by a member of the public and is not a sign of a secret Vatican-backed government agenda. Why don’t you email their customer service? http://www.dcya.gov.ie/viewdoc.asp?fn=documents/Aboutus/contact.htm
Left by a member of the public and not thrown away by a public sector worker.
OMG there was one of those ALIVE! newspapers just lying on the floor in my hallway last week. What a scumbag I am.
Your hall is not a government service.
It’s a free newspaper, so chances are they asked if they could leave some copies there and were told it was ok. If the Irish Times etc wanted to do the same, I’m sure they’d be allowed.
No other papers? Alive isn’t exactly a ‘newspaper’, it’s a magazine with cheap paper. And there’s a magazine just above it.
Maybe the ‘Spaghetti Monster’ weekly was in the empty tray and they were all out….
Either way, calm down.
In fairness clampers read the main headline and tell me that’s an appropriate office for it to be displayed in.
I’d be more worried if Govt officials were in the business of deciding what was (or not) appropriate for its citizens to read.
The simple answer to that is – not to be seen to endorse any publication, and not having any of them available at official offices.
Correct – it’s a Government Department not a Spar shop.
All reading material to be banned from waiting areas in government offices lest their presence be taken as official endorsement? I was going to say maybe they could just have Ladybird books, but that might be taken as approval for phonics.
Bullshit. There are fascist newsletters less bile-filled and hateful than Alive, it’s not a newspaper, it’s a monthly diatribe against women, gays, anyone insufficiently devout, how children should be prepared to die for god on one occasion. If it was Jihad! and not Alive! there’d be uproar.
No problem with my local chipper distributing it, BIG problem with my local government office distributing it.
Well, it’s better that your objection is content-based rather than purely ideological, I suppose, but if your Jihad comment is supposed to draw a comparison between the editorial policies of Alive and radical hard-line muslims you’re going to need to be specific. You also need to make the case that any publication present in a government office waiting area constitutes some sort of official endorsement of the content of those publications which is hugely problematic even for mainstream newspapers. If I thought the government was affording any sort of official endorsement to, I dunno, Kevin Myers, I’d burn it down with a flame thrower, but I have no objection to them having a few copies of whatever rag it is he’s writing for now in their waiting rooms.
It was a clumsy analogy, but my point is this is a hard-line, extremist publication. Not a broad(ish) publication with a range of views like a newspaper or general magazine. If it was a Muslim or Jewish magazine publishing the exact same kind of radical, prejudiced rubbish it would be thrown out immediately, not put on display for kids to read.
The don’t have an anthology of Kevin Myers’ ouvre on display, so a newspaper isn’t a valid comparison.
I get that we’re going for multiculturalism as opposed to a secular society, but this isn’t The Irish Catholic, it’s a niche, fundamentalist magazine which actively condemns members of the community this office serves, single mothers, unmarried couples living together, gays, atheists – a huge chunk of the population and in the most hateful terms. It has no place in a space that’s meant for everyone and paid for by everyone.
If it’s as bad as you say, you may have a point, but I would still hope its presence would not indicate support or endorsement, and may even be the result of an opportunistic and diligent vendor dropping them off and nobody there really noticing or caring.
Pick up a copy when you see one, it’s an experience.
Their website only shows the most banal of their articles, the really heavy stuff is in there.
Here’s a taste;
https://www.broadsheet.ie/2012/08/18/a-lesson-there-for-us-all/
Holy shite and onions.
Seriously, this is turning into a reverse Harper Valley PTA.
That’s not Harper Valley’s #sexualorientation.
Excuse me i’ll have you know that Alive is one of the finest publications Ive ever used to soak up my dogs piss when she doesnt make it to the garden
Your poor dog. Do you leave her locked up all day you bastard?
I work in an office and these things come in if you want them there or not. If the person is on the desk is a temp or not normally on reception they could have mistaken them for a regular subscription service.
It’s truly mind boggling that there are so many comments about this.
A free ‘paper’ is distributed and isn’t immediately incinerated = NATIONAL PANIC
National Panic? Some hyperbole there, methinks.
It’s unlikely this is the first time that paper has been distributed there. The proper thing to do for a public office is to say ‘sorry we can’t accept your publication or any other publication not related to the function of the office’.
Yes because hyperbole is an unknown occurance round these parts.
I for one can’t wait to read the “New Series on The Wonder of Marriage!” Those high up in Catholicism would be the experts after all.