Culture
‘The Fallen’ by Louise Brangan, an Irish academic based in Edinburgh, was published earlier this year. In her introduction, the author tells us that she “wanted to write the history of the Magdalene Laundries from the perspective of the women and girls who had been subjected to it,” but she
Features
When 300,000 public sector workers went out on strike, the majority were women. The picket lines were living proof of how much our workforce has become feminised. The increase in the number of women in paid work here is relatively recent, and quite dramatic. According to the latest CSO
Features
A 16,000-square-foot fortress in County Waterford, overlooking the River Blackwater, Strancally Castle sits on top of a jagged river cliff historically known in Irish as Srón Chaillí—“The Hag’s Nose.” For centuries, local folklore whispered dark tales of a medieval trapdoor here, where unwary travellers were
Features
Manchester City is one of the richest football clubs in the world: the Abu Dhabi United Group, controlled by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a member of the ruling royal family of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), owns a majority stake. The club has won numerous trophies in recent
Features
There is something almost comical about being told, repeatedly, that history has ended. Capitalism has won. Democracy is in crisis. Fascism is back. The planet is burning. Artificial intelligence is coming for our jobs, our art, and possibly our remaining capacity to distinguish a human being from a customer-service
Culture
NAZA is the title of a documentary film that opened in Ireland on Friday last. It is attracting a great deal of international interest as its subject is the use of artificial intelligence and automated targeting by the Israeli military in its genocidal campaign in Gaza. Following a recent showing
Features
Can you imagine that Irish immigration officers are right now checking the military papers of Ukrainians who are claiming protection in Ireland? They are refusing the right of protection for those women and men who are unable to provide proof of exemption from Zelensky’s conscription. They are making them
Features
Sometimes socialists are tempted to see the ‘enemy of my enemy as my friend’. When the corporate media engages in blatant pro-Western propaganda, you want to go to the opposite extreme and support their opponent. When Assad was demonised, you felt it was better to turn a blind eye
Culture
Liam O’Flaherty missed the Easter Rising by a number of weeks. Claiming to have grown tired of waiting for revolution, he signed up in the Spring of 1916 to fight in the First World War. He was rewarded for his service with serious injury and a lifelong affliction of
Socialist news and opinion from Ireland and beyond.
At the opening of Derryhale Orange Hall, in July 1899, the Reverends Thacker and Austin made what the Portadown News described as being ‘important speeches’. The pair of preachers castigated Portadown Protestants who sold land to, employed, or consorted with ‘Papist rebels’. On February 28th 1900 the good citizens of
The rise of the Democratic Socialists of America from some 5,000 to 125,000 members in the past decade is one of the most significant signs of the long crisis of U.S. capitalism, the continued appeal of anti-capitalist politics, and the perpetual possibility of a larger working-
The clearest precedent for the recent Garvaghy Road events is not of sectarian battles in the distant past but of the struggle for civil rights in the 1960s and 1970s. Thousands of Protestant working-class people then supported and participated in the civil rights movement, most via their membership of
It’s an old adage but how do you know a government Minister is lying – their lips are moving! And so it is with Jack Chambers and Micheál Martin – both of whom are trying to justify the ongoing arrogance and ineptitude of this government. Government Lies Chambers thinks there isn’
At the end of the giant student and worker demonstration in Paris on Thursday, October 8th, a banner was hung across the July Column in the Place de la Bastille. The banner read “Revolution 2.0, Rendez-vous October 17th”. The banner reflects the sentiment of thousands of mostly young
At a Sunday service in June 1795, a Reverend George Maunsell, a magistrate and rector of Drumcree Church, called on his congregation ‘to celebrate the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne in the true spirit of the institution’, by attending a sermon to be given by a Rev. Devine
If trade unions are serious about changing the conditions workers live and work under, they cannot confine themselves to the workplace – they must organise, mobilise and fight on the political issues that shape workers’ lives. As Rosa Luxemburg wrote, “There are not two different class struggles of the working class,
Could you start by telling us something about Kilmeaden and how people feel? Kilmeaden is a small village about seven miles from Waterford city. The surrounding area is primarily agricultural, and there used to be a cheese plant in the village before it moved to Kilkenny. Two new housing estates
The Orange Order did not start as a gentry project but arose from clashes in Armagh between the mainly Catholic, Defenders, and Protestant Peep o’Day Boys, most famously in the battle of the Diamond in 1795. Around forty-eight Catholics were shot dead in this skirmish and many were
The clashes in Portadown between Orange marchers and nationalist residents have widely been reported as reflecting sharp and essentially irreconcilable differences between “the two communities”. This is, at best, a distortion designed to accommodate the notion that Catholics and Protestants are gripped by 17th century ideas which pitch them against
Last Sunday night, the Irish men’s football team played Israel. This was the first of two fixtures against Israel in the European Nations League, the least prestigious of the three regular international football tournaments Ireland participates in. Although it was an official home game for the Israeli team, the
Dolly Parton died on 25 August, at the age of 80, after a brief battle with cancer. It is genuinely hard to think of another figure in American popular culture who commanded such near-universal affection, cutting across almost every fault line in a bitterly polarised country – country music traditionalists
