A little bit raucous – but not riotous – may not be a bad thing

I recently caught up with some back issues of The Irish Catholic and I was struck by a comment from Senator Ronan Mullen in his View from the Seanad on June 27th. In attempting to discern a Christian way to protest, he finds that ‘People have been too passive to date of the anti-culture that the Government and agents of the state are pushing at us. Perhaps, more than I used to, I welcome the raucous’.

I admit to enjoying that. Senator Mullen attempts to articulate the need to protest – and I sense he supports a protest that is quite loud – but within the boundaries of Christian standards of respect for others.

I dare say that this is an evolution for the Senator, and others, who are part of the establishment, but as voices that are now crying out from the wilderness. Ronan has been one of the most active, vocal, but also propositional, conservative – dare I say, common sense – voices in the Seanad. And he has found out repeatedly where this gets him. Nowhere, in the main.

Commentators

And it is the same for other commentators and activists who attempt to bring what were once mainstream views into discussion in established Ireland. There is little in the form of critical engagement with ideas or issues. There are no genuine attempts to engage with points made and points raised. The government view is what goes. The Seanad, like the Dail, is loaded and controlled by the whip. Debates are pointless. They have little to no impact unless it is in agreement with the Government agenda. Ministers responding to issues Senators raised don’t even bother to answer the questions. They feign outrage and offence.

That’s where we are going as a society as well. We are a Twitter society. We hear what we want hear. We talk at cross-purposes. We shout each other down. We are bunkered in our views and driven by agendas. We are protected by our echo chambers from having to critically engage with our ideas. Our opponents are not considered to be just wrong, they are considered to be evil, and their ideas making them sub-human. The nonsense slogans that ‘free speech has consequences’ (then it isn’t free), that ‘speech is violence’ are everywhere. Ronald Dworkin once claimed Rights are Trumps – but now offence is the trump card. Whoever claims to be most outraged or horrified holds the key card. And it can be used anywhere, anytime, no matter what the words are, or what the intention was. Micro-aggressions (and you never know what they are) are considered to be intolerable and sacking offences.

Depeche Mode once sang: ‘Words like violence. Break the silence. Come crashing in. Into my little world. Painful to me. Pierce right through me.’ Replace ‘silence’ with ‘echo-chamber’ and they are relevant today. Long-established Christian beliefs are increasingly considered to be ‘unsafe’ and can’t be uttered in the public square. Even in private they will soon be considered hate-speech. And politicians, as well as Christians, have been unable to withstand the primal scream of offence-taken.

Politicians are protected by following they what they feel is the respectable zeitgeist, the path of least resistance, and forming what they feel are centrist coalitions within an unanswerable system. Pre-election manifestos are meaningless as they are torn up to accommodate other parties, particularly smaller ones with policies and agenda that are supported by only the smallest of votes. The right policy, targeting a few niche, well-to-do, protected localities can make you the most powerful party in government.

Roderic O’Gorman of the minority party is determined to force his minority will for the betterment of the people the people of Ireland”

And for the rest of the population? Polite complaints and going through the motions of pretend government consultations are rendered meaningless. The pre-referendum family and care consultation was a farce, as discovered by GRIPT. The hate-speech legislation consultation was a farce. And continues to be so. Green Party leader Roderic O’Gorman of the minority party is determined to force his minority will for ‘the betterment’ of the people of Ireland. Micheal Martin and Simon Harris have the power to stop him, but they would have to sacrifice Minister for Justice Helen McEntee and the others who have publicly defended the indefensible.

It isn’t to say this form of governing is not new. Increasingly, it is the conservative positions that are sidelined. And these are most often also Catholic positions. It didn’t start in 2012 but the death and its subsequent shameless instrumentalisation, of Savita Hallapanavar ushered in an era of conservative views being dismissed and ignored in Oireachtas circles. The wind was blowing in one direction and has barely paused for breath since.

Lambasted

Who remembers Senator Jim Walshe being lambasted by the horrified for describing the realities of abortion? Senator Sharon Keoghan received the same form of adolescent response when describing the realities of surrogacy. Lucinda Creighton was forced out of Fine Gael for being the most articulate defender of the right to life in government in 2013 when the first legislation that led to the eventual removal of the 8th amendment to the Constitution was introduced – the Orwellian-titled ‘Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act.

Since then, what have we had? Removal of the 8th where those fighting abortion were interrogated in a manner that supporters avoided. The introduction of gay marriage – and the same approach taken. More recently, there has been the Regulation of Assisted Human Reproduction that will allow for embryo testing and destruction and for surrogacy, rendering children commodities. No questioning of the Bill was entertained. Hardly any debate. The almost complete lack of respect for the seriousness of the issues at hand was laughable. If the current government has its way, euthanasia under the name of assisted dying will be introduced come hell or high water. A high quality Joint Oireachtas consultation over months was simply ignored in its content as the Committee members reverted to their pre-consultation positions. No one’s views were changed, which renders the question: why bother?

Argument and reason has no place in politics at the moment. This is why getting a little raucous is becoming necessary. Recent events have shown that this is the only course of action that gains any traction. Of course, this is not to advocate for rioting. It is about protesting and getting a little raucous in a Christian manner. Protests don’t always go this way. Often they are hijacked by a small number of people who want to see them turn violent and want to provoke a reaction.

The government has no confidence that consultation will yield any good fruits – or outcomes that it has pre-ordained in advance”

If there were no protests at all on immigration there would be no conversation. Irrespective of your views on the subject, the refusal of government to engage the public has forced the issue underground and manifest in peaceful protest that were co-opted for violence. This is the failing of government, not a failing of protestors.

I worked overseas on refugee programmes for many years in different places. And one important success factor was local consultation with host communities. This practice is good for Cameroon, good for Ethiopia, good for Sudan – but not good for Ireland? The government has no confidence that consultation will yield any good fruits – or outcomes that it has pre-ordained in advance. The government doesn’t believe it can engage local populations of its arguments, in its vague and non-specific talk of moral and international obligations. Hence, there is no consultation. This is a problem of government.

Without genuine consultation, the government is forced to take on authoritarian approaches. The issue of two-tier policing is a live one in the UK right now. It is an issue in the US. It is an issue across Europe. It should be an issue in Ireland as well because, if it is not a factual reality, it has the perception of reality.  But it isn’t just about two-tier policing. It is about establishment entities- governmental and non- with near-monopolies on ‘facts’ aligning with political perspectives and insulating government and the arms of State from criticism when it does not act impartially and treat protests from different sides of the track, differently.

Rejection

The rejection of the family and care referendums reminded the government that there are a lot of voices out there that they do not hear. In this instance they were a 75% minority. They chose not to hear them through their perfunctory consultation; they have insulated themselves via ‘Citizen’s Assemblies’ – letting 100 unelected and unrepresentative individuals make policy recommendations, the job they are elected to do.

But then the European and Local elections results have started to bear their fruits. The referenda are forgotten. ‘Progressive’ legislation is being pulled out of the bonfires now that fires have not been lit.

While the popular view is that the Tories in the UK were ejected from government because of the lack of seriousness that they took in the job for too long, the reality is that it is because they failed to prioritise the solving of problems, preferring to avoid facing-down issues that were building for years, until it was too late. Too few believed they had solutions that they simply didn’t implement.

In Ireland, Simon Harris has made some efforts to move beyond governing by virtue signalling and the promotion of luxury beliefs. The sleeves are up and the walk is fast. But, as in the UK, the problems are mounting and the solutions proffered are knee-jerk and reactionary. When they fail to satisfy, when they fail to deliver, the path of least resistance will be to distract by waving more progressive legislation and revert to form. Unless there is a genuine interest in moving from government by diktat and expenditure, to management and cleaning up the mess of past policy decisions instead of doubling down, the frustrations will continue to build.

As the policy and legislative arena continues to move further from any resemblance to Catholic teaching, when the public square is dominated by a secular outlook that treats minority rights as paramount but minority views – Christian views – as unworthy of consideration, there may be a need to be a little more raucous – within the bounds of Christan decency and respect, of course.

A little raucous might may be the only way. At least until we start – as Catholics – to vote for less of the same”

Catholics may have to accept we are a minority – a large one – but that does not mean that we can accept being ignored, and vilified while the tradition, legacy and great works that Catholics – both lay and ordained – have contributed to over the centuries be cast to the dustbin of the past and ridiculed in the process.

Politely asking the philistines to desist has not worked so far. Twitter hasn’t really worked. Contributing to government consultations hasn’t even worked. Voting hasn’t even worked when the PR-SVT system allows a minority party to call the tune. Being a Senator hasn’t even worked. Being a Government Minister didn’t even work. Pastoral Letters don’t work. A little raucous might may be the only way. At least until we start – as Catholics – to vote for less of the same.