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What you want to say – 1st December 2021 December 1, 2021

Posted by guestposter in Uncategorized.
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As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.

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1. Tomboktu - December 1, 2021

Optician, softening the blow: “As we move from our 40s to our 50s…”

Me: “Move? I’m in my 50s long enough to get citizenship.”

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2. sonofstan - December 1, 2021

Groundhog day here: back on strike…
National media out in force, and plenty of students with us: apparently John McDonnell addressed the post-picket rally, but I’d gone looking for coffee by then.

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Fergal - December 1, 2021

Keep at it son!
Chin up and don’t let the bastards grind you down

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sonofstan - December 1, 2021

Meanwhile, not even surprised:

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3. crocodileshoes - December 1, 2021

At the risk of sounding like Jeremy Clarkson or someone:
I was on the Luas from Broombridge to town on Sat afternoon, with teenage niece. A group of about ten boys – all about 15 – got on in 2s and 3s in Cabra and Phibsboro. They were messing, standing in the doors to keep them open, no masks etc, but nothing major. Thing was, as niece pointed out, 7 of the 10 were wearing either Canada Goose or Moncler brand jackets. She showed them – the coats – to me on her phone. Both brands start at about 800 euro; two of the lads were wearing Moncler garments listed at 1800 euro. How do 15-year-olds from Cabra spend nearly two grand on an anorak?

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WorldbyStorm - December 1, 2021

Or from anywhere, Cabra, East Wall, Ranelagh? That’s crazy money.

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4. roddy - December 1, 2021

I don’t know. I was at a funeral this morning wearing a REAL anorak.(ie) one I bought at a market stall about 10 years ago for 25 quid!

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WorldbyStorm - December 1, 2021

Yeah, I’d tend to keep stuff in good nick across years.

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Klassenkampf Treehugger - December 1, 2021

Real anoraks start to leak at the seams after a few years in heavy rain, I find. That’s how you know they’re real.

One of the most effective pieces of raingear I ever possessed was a poncho I bought in South America after my real anorak got half-inched. It comprised a square of blue builder’s damp-course plastic glued together to allow the arms to pop out when needed, a hole for the head at the top, and big enough to get the rucksack underneath.

Indestructible and never let a drop of Tierra del Fuegan rain through. Doubled as a groundsheet in emergencies.

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EWI - December 1, 2021

Indestructible and never let a drop of Tierra del Fuegan rain through. Doubled as a groundsheet in emergencies.

The FCÁ issued high-quality green and brown ponchos to members by the thousand throughout the Nineties. Now, *that’s* indestructible rain gear that last decades.

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Klassenkampf Treehugger - December 1, 2021

Does the Free Clothing Association march on?

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EWI - December 1, 2021

Does the Free Clothing Association march on?

From what social media says, after Colm McCarthy and Shatter got though with shanking it a decade ago, now down to a few hundred active members left countrywide (at which point it can be killed off without upsetting Deppities). Was once a great Irish institution…

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5. Paul Culloty - December 1, 2021

After the Trumpesque Eric Zemmour declared in the race for the Élysee yesterday, the mainstream right party Les Républicains begin their primary today. Xavier Bertrand is favourite, ahead of newly hawkish Michel Barnier, but the biggest surprise is that they only have 140,000 members:

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WorldbyStorm - December 1, 2021

Wonder does Zemmour have a shot at it? Hope not.

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Paul Culloty - December 1, 2021

If anything, by splitting the far-right vote, he makes it more probable that the LR candidate reaches the runoff – only Bertrand of any candidate across the spectrum would beat Macron H2H.

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WorldbyStorm - December 1, 2021

Okay, so Macron’s likely to win if Bertrand isn’t the candidate.

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Paul Culloty - December 2, 2021

And the Republicans duly make themselves even more ridiculous by splitting virtually evenly four-ways, and eliminating Bertrand – Ciotti reportedly holds similar views to Zemmour, while Pécresse is slightly more moderate, but an anti-gay marriage identitarian:

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Klassenkampf Treehugger - December 1, 2021

It would great not to see Le Pen in the run-off; so split away Monsieur Zemmour.

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Paul Culloty - December 2, 2021

Slim pickings for any voter remotely left of Macron, and the runoff contenders make particularly grim reading:

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Bobd - December 1, 2021

French organisations tend to be composed of activists. Trade Union membership was always low compared to countries with mass-membership unions. They had, however, substantial support which used to manifest itself in strikes but is now mainly in workplace elections. The teachers union used to be the exception.

The gilets jaunes were a classic French political manifestation. Minimal organisation but a shared understanding of the political system in France

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6. Klassenkampf Treehugger - December 1, 2021

“A larger than life character.” Good piece of writing by Susan McKay.

Northern Ireland was well described as an “armed patriarchy” during the Troubles, but while the guns have long since been decommissioned, the mindsets of the patriarchs have not.

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EWI - December 1, 2021

Good piece of writing by Susan McKay.

She’s the sort of sensible voice that we need to hear a lot more often, and not just on the North.

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7. sonofstan - December 1, 2021

Listening to the Turner Prize ceremony on Radio 4 and a bit annoyed at Pauline Black saying the nominees came from ‘all over Britain’ given one of them, the Array Collective, are from Belfast (I’m sure she didn’t mean any offence, it’s just ‘UK’ and ‘Britain’ are interchangeable for many here). Delighted when they won and one of them – didn’t catch the name – gave the acceptance speech as gaeilge. Samira Ahmed had to ask for a ‘translation please’ in a slightly panicky voice. (the speech was entirely innocuous)

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sonofstan - December 3, 2021

Best twitt*r comment@ ‘there won’t be an oat milked in Belfast tonight!’

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Tomboktu - December 3, 2021

I heard the announcement and was amused with her rising anxiety at the Gaeilge. I could imagine the producer in her ear piece yelling at her to find out if he was abusing the Queen or calling for independence, and then when he accommodated her, it was innocuous, and generous to the other collectives.

The other thing I liked was the points the presenter made that the nominees were all collectives and that this had some art purists upping their noses at it.

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sonofstan - December 4, 2021

I was thinking that if the lot for Cardiff had won and spoken in Welsh, there’d be no such agitation!

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Tomboktu - December 4, 2021

Exactly. It would have an amusing eccentricity that the presenter would have humoured. But Irish? Isn’t that what they use to call for the queen to be beheaded?

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8. Michael Carley - December 3, 2021

Anyone reading Fintan O’Toole’s new book? I’m halfway through which is about the earliest events I remember.

Worth a read though I think there will plenty for people here to argue about.

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9. sonofstan - December 4, 2021

Any details about his political involvement while at UCD? I have a notion that he was briefly hooked up with the Browne/ Merrigan SLP for a while, but I could be completely wrong – there’s nothing online to support this.

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WorldbyStorm - December 4, 2021

I never heard of any, I thought he was slightly sympathetic to the WP at times but…

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sonofstan - December 4, 2021

Yeah, Hanley and Millar mention FO’T’s ‘warm response’ to Harris’s Necessity of Social Democracy paper in 1990.

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Michael Carley - December 4, 2021

Don’t know about his time at UCD but an SP comrade in the last century was occasionally reminded of his failure to recruit O’Toole.

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10. Brian Hanley - December 4, 2021

After Alan McSimóin passed away O’Toole mentioned that he had known him in the National Union of School Students in the early 70s. I think there was an Official republican connection with that body.
I know the Phoenix in particular has an obsession with claiming O’Toole was a WP member but we never heard/saw anything of that nature when we were writing the book. He was certainly close to their views on certain subjects, but not always, or consistently. (People should read his editorial in Magill c.1986 after the Evelyn Glenholmes extradition case for example, not the WP line on such things). He’s certainly less ‘warm’ about Harris in the last 20 years.

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WorldbyStorm - December 4, 2021

It’s like Roddy Doyle isn’t it, who was a member of the DSP or very very close but not at all of the WP. It’s almost like people wanted him to be (and similarly with O’Toole) because it suited certain narratives. I always wonder about O’Toole if he too wouldn’t be more in the DSP line, though as you say with some divergences over certain human rights aspects of the conflict?

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roddy - December 4, 2021

Doyle’s DSP membership would account for his neo Unionism.

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banjoagbeanjoe - December 5, 2021

“Doyle’s DSP membership would account for his neo Unionism.”

Link, Roddy? I don’t remember ever hearing or reading Doyle’s views on the national question. What did he say or write and when and where, please?

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roddy - December 5, 2021

I heard Doyle spouting anti SF bile on more than one occasion and his membership of Kemmy’s outfit is no surprise to me.Kemmy regarded me and hundreds of thousands like me as “non people” ,constantly referring to the wishes of “the people up there” when he really meant unionists.

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banjoagbeanjoe - December 5, 2021

WBS, I think you may need to correct the record here. Roddy Doyle was in college a couple of years ahead of me. I think he was close to, if not a member of, the SLP. That’s Noel Browne’s and Matt Merrigan snr’s and various far left groups’ Socialist Labour Party. Which was not the DSP of Jim Kemmy and BICO. The SLP’s line on the north was a fairly typical left nationalist one – a line I’m sure that Roddy CLR would approve of.
I know Roddy Doyle, not well, as our families were neighbours growing up. The only overtly political stuff I actually saw him involved in was when I saw him on one of the big PAYE or similar marches in Dublin, late seventies or very early eighties. I was only an observer of politics at the time but somehow I formed the impression that he was with a group of SLP members or supporters.

So Roddy CLR is now saying “Doyle’s DSP membership”, based on WBS’s assertion that Doyle was once close to the DSP. Unless anyone can show me otherwise, I think that’s just plain wrong. He wasn’t, afaik, ever a member or even a supporter of the DSP.

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WorldbyStorm - December 5, 2021

That’s odd – I was sure he and Paul Mercier who also taught in Greendale were DSP adjacent – I will go looking – you could well be right

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WorldbyStorm - December 5, 2021

Okay I have it on good authority he was in the SLP. But that his views would have tended in the DSP direction on matters like the North. That might account for the confusion. Certainly he’s no fan of Republicanism or nationalism but good for him for being in the SLP.

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banjoagbeanjoe - December 5, 2021

I’ll ask him about his politics if I ever bump into him again. Anyway.. good for him that he’s not too into Irish republicanism and nationalism. And we can forgive his membership of the 4 green fields SLP as an adolescent aberration.

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Colm B - December 4, 2021

When Harris was attempting his last remake of the WP in 1989/90, he was hawking his idiotic Necessity of Social Democracy document all over the place, trying to do what he had done 10 years earlier with the Irish Industrial Revolution, in effect change the party’s entire direction by stealth. Despite having his minions circulate it within the party ( in one case it was stuck under a member’s door during the night!), this time he failed to sway the membership (perhaps primarily because few knew who he even was). In desperation he began touting his masterpiece around the media and O Toole, out of naiveté, wrote a puff piece in the IT. To be fair, my memory is that he quickly realised his mistake and rowed back on his support, earning the wrath of Harris.

It’s worth remembering what that doc contained: amongst other things calling for the recognition of Israel, supporting “liberal” Afrikaners before apartheid had fallen and denouncing people on welfare etc etc.
I think O Toole saw the error of his ways because he’s a genuine social democrat (not my cup of tea but you could respect his consistent advocacy of centre-left, liberalish politics), unlike Harris and his gang who were/are just plain right-wingers.

BTW my understanding of his trajectory was that he was never a member (secret or otherwise) of the WP, but like other left-liberal journalists in the 1980s he sympathised with the WP because it reflected his own views on the North, civil liberties, welfare etc.

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banjoagbeanjoe - December 5, 2021

I remember an exchange in print between Harris and O’Toole, probably around that time. Harris had attacked O’Toole and accused him of ‘towing the party line’. O’Toole’s response was that he couldn’t be doing any such thing since “unlike Eoghan Harris I’ve never been a member of a party”.

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sonofstan - December 5, 2021

I watched the LLS encounter between O’Toole and the Wolfe Tones recently (it’s all up on YouTube) and it’s clear enough how deep his antipathy to SF/ PIRA is. It’s a fascinating reminder of how high the stakes were felt to be that it was felt that having the Tones on, doing an innocuous football song, required a full scale debate. Some bad faith too: when Pat Kenny invites questions and comments from the audience, two out of four are from journalists: Mick Clifford, with hair, and the appalling Ian O’Doherty whose contempt for the Tones audience is naked class hatred.

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Michael Carley - December 5, 2021

Reading his book, it is clear he hasn’t softened on the Provos.

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roddy - December 5, 2021

Thing is O’Tool picked a soft target in the Tones.Arguably Christy Moore produced far more stuff concerning the Northern troubles while a big majority of the Tones stuff was about the Tan war and other historical struggles. However O’Tool would have been at a disadvantage from the start had he tried to take on a “trendy” icon like Moore. .

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Brian Hanley - December 5, 2021

I think this might have been discussed here before, but there’s really no comparison between Christy Moore and the Wolfe Tones. Moore gave numerous interviews in the 1980s where he openly declared he was a supporter of the IRA. The Wolfe Tones never gave a straight answer to that question in all the interviews I’ve seen with them throughout the 70s and 80s. In fact in several interviews they denied having any politics at all, except for being ‘Irish.’ And when Christy Moore changed his mind, he explained why he changed his mind and has done so again in documentaries etc since. And he was not given a free ride because he was ‘trendy’; he got hostile interviews on the Late Late Show as well, was called a ‘provo’, had records not played on RTE and so on. But he was honest enough to fight his corner, which the Tones weren’t. They wanted to be all things to all men, which they were to some extent- their biggest hit in the 80’s was about the NYPD. Maybe that was why Gerry Adams said ‘the problem with the Wolfe Tones is that they very rarely come to places like Belfast, and they make an awful lot of money singing about places like Belfast.’ (Hot Press, 27 May 1983).

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sonofstan - December 5, 2021

Yeah, on that LLS so interview, they equivocate all over the place. Funniest bit is where O’Toole (or Kenny?) suggest that they started a show in Waterford by asking ‘is anyone here from England? if so, can they fuck off?’. Brian Warfield is offended because he says he’s never used bad language on stage…

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pettyburgess - December 5, 2021

Is the necessity for social democracy online?

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pettyburgess - December 5, 2021

Should have checked the ILA first. Of course it is: https://www.leftarchive.ie/document/299/

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pettyburgess - December 6, 2021

Finally got to read the Necessity of Social Democracy and it really is an incoherent mess. Some of that presumably is because of the shock of the fall of Stalinism, some of it is presumably because he is trying to bring the WP along with him and so is trying to reassure readers that what he’s proposing still has sone continuities with their existing politics… but there is very definitely a strong element of deep personal confusion involved. There’s a section towards the end, after page after page of arguments for the views of the right wing of social democracy where he claims that the ultimate aim is still communism.

It is not surprising really, given the people involved, that the sudden repudiation of Stalin and Stalinism also involved the repudiation of socialism in general. There’s a long history of that among Stalinists who abruptly discover the failings of God. That they were wrong all along in no way vindicates others on the left who said that they were wrong all along. In fact , funnily enough it turns out that all of the people Harris hated as a Stalinist (Trots, Provos, Labour leftists) are still the main enemies of his new project.

The right wing cliches he adopts are deeply boring – softness on Afrikaaner “liberalism”, scorn for “the underclass”, a hostility to seeing crime in a social context, dull twitterings about genetics and the imperfectability of man. There’s no innovative thinking involved in any of this, just the contents of a particularly uninspired issue of the Spectator.

My two favourite details are firstly the hilarious brown nosing of De Rossa. The retrospective knowledge that De Rossa was just about to stick the knife in makes it all the funnier. And secondly his reliance on Hal Draper as his authority for Marx’s theory of revolution. I wonder was Eoghan aware that he was imbibing at the Trotskyist well?

The central thesis – that the era of social democracy was dawning – does not appear to have stood up well.

On a related note, I never met the man so I can’t be sure, but is it cynical to suggest that Smullen gets remembered with more fondness than any of his factional allies largely because he died before he could really embitter his old comrades?

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WorldbyStorm - December 6, 2021

Can’t speak for that last, I always got the impression he was well thought of, even if the connection with EH didn’t do him any great justice. It’s sort of strange how he and some others bought into all the EH twists and turns – as you say, so much of what EH articulates are sort of empty right wing tropes of that period (and after).

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11. tomasoflatharta - December 4, 2021

https://www.rte.ie/news/us/2021/1204/1264774-tarlach-mac-niallais/
In the 1980’s Tarlach Mac Niallais was a member of People’s Democracy in Belfast. A street has been named after Tarlach in New York City.

Tarlach was an LGBT Rights campaigner famously associated with the ingenious slogan “Save Sodomy from Ulster”. He moved to the USA, continuing his political activism. Tarlach was an active supporter of the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organisation in New York, campaigning for years against the exclusion of ILGO from the NY St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

https://www.rte.ie/news/us/2021/1204/1264774-tarlach-mac-niallais/

“A street in New York has been named after Irish LGBT rights campaigner Tarlach Mac Niallais.

Mr Mac Niallais, who was originally from Belfast, died in April last year from a Covid-related illness.

At a ceremony last night, ‘Tarlach MacNiallais Way’ was unveiled as the new official name of the junction of 49th Street and 43rd Avenue in Queens, New York.

Mr MacNiallais moved to the US in the mid-1980s and became involved in the gay rights movement in New York.

He also managed a project in Queens for people with learning difficulties.

Members of his family travelled from Ireland for last night’s ceremony, including his nephew Gary Nellis.”

See also : https://tomasoflatharta.com/category/biography/tarlach-mac-niallais/

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12. Tomboktu - December 5, 2021

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13. roddy - December 5, 2021

Brian,Christy Moore was recently present at the relaunch of the H block album in the Felons club.He performed a number of his songs and presented one of the original albums to SF MLA Fra McCann.The albums had originally been seized by the special branch in 80/81 but years later a Guard returned 2 of them to Christy.Moore also made the greatest tribute I ever saw at a funeral when he sang “the time has come” at the burial of Martin McGuinness with the iconic image of Adams ,Mary Lou and Michele O’Neill in a huddle listening on.Whatever about others calling Moore “a provo” on the LLS or whatever ,the point I am making is that O’Tool hadnt the balls to do .so.It would have taken away from his self cultivated image of “liberal intellectual” to be seen in a shouting match with an icon like Moore.

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Brian Hanley - December 5, 2021

You might be right Roddy, I don’t know. And the big Late Late row was from 2002, when the Wolfe Tones had a song for the World Cup out and it always struck me as a bit of a sham fight about things that were more relevant 20 years previously.

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14. Fergal - December 5, 2021

Haven’t read O’ Toole’s book but along with others, his critique of the country of yesteryear was that it was a washed-up theocracy… and reading between the lines you got the feeling that in some sense England and/or the USA were the Jerusalems on the hill…this being a reflection of O’Toole’s predominantly anglo world…
Once the country had approached Jerusalem-theocracy gone in practical terms but not fully… the US had elected Trump and Brexit was happening next door… this wasn’t supposed to happen… you get the feeling of almost personal betrayal with the British decision to leave the eu from Fintan…
Anyway, ‘the best little country in the world’ jettisoned archaic laws etc but doesn’t seem to have given up on the idea of a united Ireland…and O’Toole and others hadn’t seen this coming either… once the 26 counties went ‘modern’ the fourth green field would no longer matter…
But it was never about the 4th green field…and isn’t it telling that an essentially ‘economic’ decision by the uk has brought partition back on the table…?

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WorldbyStorm - December 5, 2021

I had that feeling too, that for him Brexit, Trump, was personal and I’ve seen it elsewhere, this idea was Ireland was antiquated and antediluvian and Britain was so far ahead we would never catch up. And for Britain to demonstrate that that wasn’t the reality has been a bitter pill to swallow. Wasn’t it EamonnCork here who mentioned the cringe at the invisible Englishman being a feature of a certain discourse amongst some Irish people, and – without in any sense being gleeful because it’s very tough on people in the UK having the Tories in power and the manner in which Brexit has worked out harder rather than softer etc, I can’t help but feel that this reality is no bad thing.Ireland was quietly catching up, slowly modernising but as you say the idea that support for a UI would simply vanish was unlikely in the context of the enormous convulsion of Brexit. As you say it exacerbated it because, and this is key and often seems to be forgotten by some who tut tut what has happened, it’s not just happened south of the BOrder but a tranche of soft unionists and others have been somewhat dislodged by this convulsion, not a massive number but some who feel perhaps throwing their lot in with a UI wouldn’t be the existential catastrophe previously presented.

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Michael Carley - December 5, 2021

Reading his book, I think there’s more to it than that: he’s strong on the way blind-eye-turning applied to the church’s abuses, which you would expected in a washed up theocracy, but also to the criminality of the banks, business generally, and politicians, and the media complicity that let it all continue.

It’s well worth a read.

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WorldbyStorm - December 5, 2021

That’s fair.

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Michael Carley - December 5, 2021

One thought I’ve had in the last few days is that the style of English politics at the moment, especially the blatant corruption and cronyism, would be of a piece with Haughey at his height.

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WorldbyStorm - December 5, 2021

Yes, very true. Blatant is the term that pins it down – it’s blatant, unashamed, almost performatively public.

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sonofstan - December 5, 2021

I’m a little bemused that O’Toole has managed two books on Brexit and taken on the role of key explainer of the whole thing to the NYRB etc. Nothing I’ve read of his output on the subject shows much understanding of the leave voter, and seems squarely in Guardian ‘how did these awful people betray us?’ territory. As you say, WbS, he’s an anglophile in love with an England that doesn’t exist anymore and never really did, and not particularly familiar with any actual England beyond North London.

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WorldbyStorm - December 5, 2021

This.

He’s no sense of the dynamics of desperation that would part underpin certain mindsets that fed into Brexit. Worse he seems to me to be effectively a Remainer when Remain was lost the moment the vote passed.

And that’s it re an England that doesn’t exist any more. I’m sure all of us took a knock when the vote passed, but… it wasn’t difficult to contextualise it in something a bit more robust than Leavers were ‘awful people’ as against the ferocious media context there, the very real sense of alienation, etc, etc. Britain never needed a far right anti-immigrant party because in some ways the media has played that role feeding at the same well and putting out the same narratives. And simultaneously ignoring the very measures that would ameliorate that desperation.

And the metropolitan aspect has to be key too. And not just England to the North but England to the south coast.

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banjoagbeanjoe - December 6, 2021

Hmmm. I don’t know. They are awful people. Seeing stuff on the 1980s on tv recently. They elected Thatcher! And then re-elected her again and again!
They are awful people. They elected Boris and then they dumped Corbyn and now the alternative to Boris is Starmer. They are awful, dreadful, hateful people.
It’s up to them to redeem themselves but until they do, they shall remain awful people.

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sonofstan - December 6, 2021

@Joe, sorry, yes of course. I shall descend this instant from my tower and sneer at those wretches.

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banjoagbeanjoe - December 6, 2021

No need to take such a drastic step, Stan. Remain in your tower – you can sneer at the wretches quite comfortably from there.

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sonofstan - December 6, 2021

I used to be able to sneer from above Joe, but they’ve moved me to an office where all I can see is the air con.

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EWI - December 5, 2021

his critique of the country of yesteryear was that it was a washed-up theocracy… and reading between the lines you got the feeling that in some sense England and/or the USA were the Jerusalems on the hill…this being a reflection of O’Toole’s predominantly anglo world…

IT scribes are allergic to mentioning the long rapprochement between the English state, the RCC (and its overtly sectarian genuflectors of the likes of O’Connell, Redmond and Cosgrave).

Speaking of which, I saw in Easons the other days that the Jesuit publication Studies has published an issue titled COVID-19: Law & Human Rights’. The dogwhistle isn’t subtle.

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15. Fergal - December 5, 2021

I’ll more than likely read it, Michael, thanks for the tip.
The banks, business and politics criminality isn’t unique to this country… the theocracy in western Europe was… can we write was!?!

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16. Paul Culloty - December 6, 2021

Zemmour has labelled his new party “Reconquête”, deliberately evoking the Spanish Reconquista, and Charles Martel’s victory at the Battle of Poitiers – the irony being that Ferdinand and Isabella ultimately expelled the Jews as well as Muslims.

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Fergal - December 6, 2021

Many a slip between cup and lip… will Zemmour pull out before the 1st round?
Too soon to tell, campaign will only start in earnest in the new year

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17. Tomboktu - December 6, 2021

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18. EWI - December 6, 2021

the theocracy in western Europe was… can we write was!?!

I think it would be problematic to label it so. There was a lot of continuity both sides of 1922, North and South, for one thing. For another, the Free State never established a church like the rest of Europe had in those times (and some continue to have to this day).

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Tomboktu - December 7, 2021

A touchstone on theocracy in Ireland for me is the Chief Justice’s argument in the Norris case:

““The preamble to the Constitution proudly asserts the existence of God in the Most Holy Trinity and recites that the people of Ireland humbly acknowledge their obligation to ‘our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ.’ It cannot be doubted that the people, so asserting and acknowledging their obligations to our Divine Lord Jesus Christ, were proclaiming a deep religious conviction and faith and an intention to adopt a Constitution consistent with that conviction and faith and with Christian beliefs. Yet it is suggested that, in the very act of so doing, the people rendered inoperative laws which had existed for hundreds of years prohibiting unnatural sexual conduct which Christian teaching held to be gravely sinful. It would require very clear and express provisions in the Constitution itself to convince me that such took place. When one considers that the conduct in question had been condemned consistently in the name of Christ for almost two thousand years and, at the time of the enactment of the Constitution, was prohibited as criminal by the laws in force in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, the suggestion becomes more incomprehensible and difficult of acceptance.“

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WorldbyStorm - December 7, 2021

+1 …how theocratic was the ROI? Theocratic enough to immiserate many many people across many many years.

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19. Tomboktu - December 7, 2021

Is there a term for that momentary confusion that occurs when you’re following street view along a road to identify landmarks you’ll need and the point of view abruptly changes from a car traveling on one side to the other taken at a different time and with different weather?

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