Well Vincent really brought the house down last night, I was expecting the usual bland Tuesday night guests when to my amazement he introduced God as a guest explaining how he had just written this great book about statistics and how he really cared about our attitudes to things.
God came complete with white beard and saintly expression and he informed us that we were much better off in general now than we used to be with women taking their rightful place in society, and that our standards had improved so much since God last checked us out in 1989. However Vincent was only tolerating God in his generalisation of the state of our nation he was far more interested the plight of our travelling community and as he put it more than once, 'they really are the most discriminated people you know.'
Now I have great sympathy for God and am a sucker for statistics but to see my favourite Fianna Fail politician Éamon Ó Cuív lord it archangel like promoting travellers rights was a bit hard to take, as as recently as the last budget this guy wanted to reduce disability benefit and more recently in a snippet from one of those new breed of TV3 shows he explained that if we get the dole cheats we will basically clear the national debt. This man is in favour of travellers rights? Perhaps there may be some votes in this for him but if Vincent can find a more right wing voice from west of the Shannon please let me know.
God sort of faded a little in the discussion once we got the statistics out of the way, and we found ourselves in Vincent territory he is very good on statistics and also he can conjure the odd obscure and even deleted word that nobody in the pub ever uses and more to the point he probably doesn't use himself that often. Vincent spoke and the chap from the travellers group spoke very well and suddenly the Irish audience were not just faced with God but with an articulate traveller.
It all faded out without much of a sting and my friend Éamon reminded us much to Vincent's annoyance about Francis Barrett and the Olympic games, Vincent went on to read some texts and tweets which were offensive but not much more than you hear on the average bar stool, you know when the orator is absolutely sure you agree with him and you don't but are quiet for the sake of peace. Now to the issue of travellers in general, people are wary of the subject as it is one of the no win scenarios common in Irish society, and to my mind it is an issue for which political correctness will not contribute to a solution.
In the main people are people and if some people choose to live a life by the side of the road or moving from place to place well there isn't much I can do about it, and children in Ireland from all backgrounds can suffer, and many from poor and disadvantaged area's are discriminated against all their lives. I sometimes wonder about shows of this nature, the debate will hardly change what is a cultural issue, we are a people who are mortally wounded by chronic indifference this is a society which has lost it's moral soul. I was all set for my my bed when I remembered that God had said that he himself lived with the travellers for a while, then I was reminded of time in my first life when an traveller girl was fitted out for her confirmation by my mother, she called regularly to our door for clothes-and I see her now as a jolly polite girl who thanked my mother profusely for her kindness. She called on us many times but then it stopped abruptly and we never saw her again.
No comments:
Post a Comment