Tnihk slpeling's ipmorantt? Tnhik aiagn!

Jsut bcak form Mdriad. Will bolg auobt it soon. Maenwlihe waht's tihs?

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod gneeunily uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid. Aoccdrnig to reesarch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig or waht? And tehy awlyas tguaht us selpling was ipmorantt!

Aulaclty I cna’t vcuoh for the Cmabrgide Uinevrtisy sfutf, all I konw is sonmeoe snet me tihs as a biarn taeesr.

Luddites wanted - act against technology 'hurtful to commonality'

Luddites smashing machinery

King Ludd was a fictitious character invented by the Luddites to prevent any of their actual leaders being executed or deported.  Artisan cloth workers in the Midlands and North of England calling themselves Luddites claimed to be led by "King Ludd" (also known "Ned Ludd") and in 1811-12 rose up against factory owners who were imposing new machines and putting them out of work.

Since the 1950's (it says here – but only since the 1950’s??) the Luddites have been painted as fools opposed to all technology and progress, but in fact the Luddites were very selective in their attacks, breaking only machines they thought were 'hurtful to Commonality'.

Luddites 200 Organising Forum thinks the Luddites can teach us about the ongoing use of technology to replace workers’ jobs, as well as issues like GM food and nuclear power.  They denounce the myth that technology always brings progress.

Tomorrow night Wednesday June 8th, in London, on the anniversary of the first action against a GM crop site in Britain, they are organising a discussion of these issues.

I've left it a bit late to advertise this meeting but it’s an organisation I like the sound of.  Their questions are worth asking.

Wikipedia on Luddites.

Stonehenge - why?

Have been mulling over a visit to Stonehenge in April. Amazing that those neolithic farmers could devote such time and effort to something essentially pointless. But perhaps I've gone too far. So is a cathedral pointless, or the Parthenon. But we don’t ask why the ancient Greeks devoted time to building the Parthenon which was essentially pointless. We could do. But I don’t think we do. Though spookily we might possibly speculate on the ancient Egyptians building essentially pointless pyramids. So is there a double standard at work here - maybe we can see the mote in another’s eye so long as the other is sufficiently distant; yet we can't see the beam in our own eye.

The photos were taken between 8 and 9 am on Saturday 16th April on a Cork Astronomy Club outing. We were allowed to wander amongst the stones, something which is denied nowadays to most visitors. But you can gain access if you're an astronomy club. Or witches it seems, since we met some Dutch witches who were similarly privileged. Maybe the management misread our application. Category 3b: astrology, witchcraft, and sim.

pic 1 above: My figure helps gauge the size of these enormous stones. pic 2 below: a group photo, with (top left) a severely eroded tenon carved atop an upright stone. For mortise and tenon see pics 3 and 5.

So. About its purpose. No doubt Stonehenge served as a means of connecting Neolithic people to the universe. One answer to the perennial question of what it means to be human. It's been suggested it was an observatory. Never! Though the king who ordained it may have offered that as a pretext.

They would indeed have done astronomy. That’s for sure. They needed a calendar to know when to sow their seeds in the spring. (A calendar would be handy at harvest too, but I imagine it’s less important then, since you can inspect your crop to determine if it’s ready.) But my point is they would have done astronomy with wooden posts and instruments, not with 25-ton stones.

No. Stonehenge served as a means of controlling the population in the interests of an élite. The astronomy connection can be summed up in this way, that the astronomical alignments would have been a way for the priests to impress the peasants, in religious ceremonies. The most staggering fact about Stonehenge is the vast amount of labour which that society of Neolithic farmers 4,500 years ago was able to divert from tilling the soil, in order to hew these enormous stones out of the quarry, to trundle them 15 miles, and then to erect them in precise configuration. For all this to be done must have required a centralised state with the ability to command and organise squadrons of labour.

Stonehenge was erected about 2500 BC. For a detailed chronology see this Wikipedia article. A separate article covers the archaeoastronomy debate.

And there's a brief history on the official website

pic 3 above: Eithne with a fallen cap stone, showing the severely eroded mortise into which the tenon (pic 2) fitted. pic 4 below: nesting crows

pic 5 : diagramme of mortise and tenon joint (mortise brown, tenon blue)

… and then … after hewing and transporting the stones, to chisel out the mortise in the cap-stone, the tenon on the upright, and drop the cap-stone on to two uprights, with each mortise and tenon pair matched up …

pic 6 : panorama of Stonehenge with dramatic cloud formation and bright sunlight throwing clear shadows (Wikipedia 2004)

In which Garret Fitzgerald invades a TV studio and debates feminism

Garret Fitzgerald as Taoiseach in the 1980’s

Much recent commentary about Garret Fitzgerald after he died during the queen’s visit (18 May). Here's an episode from his life that I hoped to learn more about, but which sadly attracted few mentions.

First a bit of context. On 14 April 1971 the Irish women’s liberation movement was launched at a packed meeting in Dublin’s Mansion House.  I strongly recommend this 28 minute episode of RTÉ radio’s History Show (1 May 2011) where these events are recalled by three of the movement’s founder members. (The link should open an mp3 file.) “We had no idea if anyone would turn up - we thought there might only be 20 women there in the Mansion House” says one. Another describes a woman taking the microphone and announcing “I am an unmarried mother”; and tells of the stamping of feet, the cheering, the tears, that greeted this statement.  Because up to that point in time no-one in Ireland had ever uttered the words “I am an unmarried mother”; the phrase was only ever whispered in hushed tones, and used about someone else.

Now we skip backwards five weeks to 6 March 1971. To a debate on the Late Late Show on RTÉ television presented by Gay Byrne. A group of feminists formed the panel promoting equal pay, equality before the law, contraception, as well as justice for deserted wives and unmarried mothers. This broadcast is credited with attracting publicity to the movement and making the Mansion House meeting a few weeks later the storming success that it was. 

Saturday 22 May 1971. Women at Dublin's Connolly Station ready to board the "Contraceptive Train" to Belfast. This was 6 weeks after the Mansion House meeting. Hear more on The History Show. This photo may have originally appeared in the Irish Times.

So what of Garret Fitzgerald?  At this time he was 45, a TD, but 10 years before being Taoiseach.  And he was there in the television studio.

But here's the point of the story : he wasn’t invited.

It seems the feminists’ appearance that night on the Late Late Show generated such heated argument that Fitzgerald left his fireside and took it upon himself to turn up in the studio to discuss the problems with the women on the panel. But in the words of one of them, June Levine, “a free-for-all screaming match followed between Garret Fitzgerald and various women in the audience”. (footnote 1)

Another, Mary Kenny, describes the event like this:

Gay Byrne host of Late Late Show 

“Halfway through the programme, Gay Byrne suddenly announced that Garret FitzGerald had been sitting watching the show at home and had felt so engaged by the subject that he asked if he could come and join us, and Gay had eagerly agreed.

"The announcement was greeted by a sustained, and entirely spontaneous, orchestra of booing from the assembled group of women, panel and audience. 'You're hijacking our show!' we cried. There was huge resentment, both of Gay and of Garret, that these two men couldn't have let the women have their say, uninterrupted, without trying to muscle in on the act. Garret, all innocence, protested that he was a male feminist. Oh, yeah? Maybe so, we all agreed afterwards, but he is also a politician. And a politician knows just when to jump on a bandwagon. Even if he was sincere - and he certainly was sincere - the prevailing feeling of the sisters was that men just won't let women speak without putting their oar in. It's the 'pasha complex': in a harem of women under the Ottomans, you had to have the male, the pasha, take charge.” (footnote 2)

I should dearly like to get hold of a recording of that Late Late Show but I've checked with the RTÉ archives, and none exists. Recollections differ. The three women on the recent History Show that I mentioned above, seem to recall the audience being rather quiet.

Just a few more comments about Garret Fitzgerald. To tell the truth, until he died I had him filed away in my head under miscellaneous conservative politicians. But all commentators seem to agree that he was special in some interesting ways.  He was a top intellectual in economics and statistics. (In reference to which Charlie Haughey - routinely described in the obits as “Garret’s nemesis” – made a habit of calling him “Dr Fitzgerald” as a put-down). To the end of his life he was extremely open to the ideas of young people.

As Fine Gael leader Fitzgerald launched a social reform programme aimed at secularising the Republic to make it more attractive to Protestants in the north. He championed reforms concerning divorce, contraception and abortion, and faced stern opposition from the Catholic church, and some within his own party.  He believed in being ahead of public opinion, not in focus group politics.  In office he lost on divorce (badly), lost on abortion, but won on contraception. But it’s generally accepted that divorce wouldn't have become legal as soon as it eventually did (1995) without Fitzgerald having blazed the trail. The consensus is that he laid the groundwork for social progress in Ireland.  He sounds to me like an all round good egg.

By the way I'm not sure it’s technically possible for a man to be a feminist.

Footnotes

(1)    June Levine, Sisters: the personal story of an Irish feminist, Dublin, 1982, p.166.  She was one of the panellists that night

(2)   Mary Kenny, Irish Independent, 20 May 2011. Also on the panel.

Links (First is to The Irish Times, the rest are Wikipedia):-

IWLM : BROKEN LINK This is a personal account from Mary Maher, a journalist with The Irish Times, a founder member of the IWLM, and a platform speaker at the Mansion House meeting. Also includes report on the contraceptive train from the Irish Times archives

Divorce : GF was hammered two to one in the 1986 referendum, but it passed by narrow majority 9 years later.

Contraception : GF succeeded in a liberalising the law in 1985.

Abortion : in 1983 the constitution was amended to ban abortion. GF unsuccessfully campaigned against the ban. It remains banned under the constitution

Mismanaged banks? Less pay for shop workers! Sorted!

Minister Bruton: Isolated. Good job too.
Stick him on a desert island to encourage the others

The media here are reporting that Enterprise Minister Richard Bruton is looked “increasingly isolated”. Good job too. I'm getting hot under the collar.  Takes me back to the mother and father of a row on just this issue when I was a union convenor 10 years ago in York.  When’s the demo that’s what I want to know.  I've heard various union leaders on the radio in the last 24 hrs but can't find any campaigning material yet.  Soon I hope.

Ah yes, I forgot to mention what this whole thing’s about. Bruton is mounting an assault on premium Sunday and overtime pay rates for low-paid workers, and correspondents are reporting that Taoiseach Enda Kenny and cabinet colleagues are distancing themselves from him on the issue.

Kenny called Bruton’s proposals the “publication of a personal agenda". And an RTÉ correspondent reported on the radio an hour ago that Kenny gave Bruton bad body language in the Dáil today.  If the Labour Party who are in this coalition government allow this through … well lets hope not, they are making the right noises at the moment …

I don’t quite follow the technicalities, but it seems Bruton is intending to cut Sunday pay (and maybe other premium rates it’s not clear at present) by monkeying around with the terms of employment rights orders (ERO) or registered employment agreements (REA).  The sectors that will suffer include hotels, restaurants, hairdressing, contract cleaning, security, grocery, retail and tailoring.

EROs fix minimum pay and conditions in sectors based on the deliberations of a joint labour committee of union and employer representatives with an independent chairman. REAs are collective agreements between employers and unions which are registered with the Labour Court and are enforceable in law.

There's a Duffy-Walsh report, which recommends overhauling the basic framework of the existing joint labour committee/registered employment agreement system for setting wages. But Bruton has gone further than this and has announced his assault on premium pay rates.

Explainer in the Irish Times.

Mr. Gandhi what do you think of western civilisation?

I imagine we've all sent or received this postcard at some stage in our lives. But is it true?

Gandhi's famous reply to a reporter's question about western civilisation features in any compendium of Gandhi quotations, but none that I have seen supply the time and place where this encounter is supposed to have occurred.

I think it may be apocryphal. On the other hand, the question would be a perfectly sensible one for a reporter seeking a quote, and the answer is one which I'm sure Gandhi would have been delighted to have thought of, even if he didn’t.  It would have been quite in character, since he is credited with an impish sense of humour.

Western civilisation was a frequent theme in Gandhi’s writing and speeches. He did not hold it in high regard. For example, this from a speech to Young India, 8th September 1920. Speaking of the recently ended First World War he said:

“The last War however has shown, as nothing else has, the Satanic nature of the civilization that dominates Europe today.”

I wonder if the what-do-you-think-of-western-civilisation thing appeared in the 1982 Richard Attenborough film.  I doubt it.  Cliché. 

For language nerds, the joke relies on a sort of pun. It may have a special grammatical name, unknown to me. When the Reporter uses the word civilisation, he uses it as an abstract noun, meaning a society which is city-based. When Mr Gandhi uses the word (and I hope I have this right) he is using it as a gerund, that is a part of the verb "to civilise". So it means an action or process, which instils admirable, or acceptable, norms of behaviour.

Royal visit - I got it wrong

I retract my statement about the absence of interest in the queen’s visit. 

Queen Elizabeth lays a wreath at the Garden of Remembrance honouring those who fought against the British crown

It’s been huge news in Ireland. Today’s Irish Examiner leader says “It has probably been the most memorable and successful visit of any head of state since the visit of US President John F Kennedy in 1963” and I've spoken to people who strongly share that positive view. And moreover (to their own surprise) found themselves quite moved by it.

The Queen and President at Islandbridge where world war dead are buried

Principal comments I have heard are

• We’re so relieved she’s got back without a terrorist incident – it would have been the end of us if that had happened.  For many people this is the number one comment. 

• Pride in Ireland. We did it well.  Especial praise for President Mary McAleese. Her grace and dignity, her speech at Dublin Castle, and in particular her remarks on her pride in Irish nationalism, and that we meet the Queen as an equal (yes for some that does still need mentioning).

• The well-judged symmetry of the two wreath-laying ceremonies, one to honour those who fought Britain for Irish freedom, the other to honour those who had fought for Britain in two world wars (more on this theme below).

• The Queen bowed her head at the Garden of Remembrance. This is the shrine to those who have died fighting against the British for Irish freedom.

• She said that with the benefit of historical hindsight we can all think of things that should have been done differently or not at all.  This was at the state dinner at Dublin Castle on the 2nd day of the visit. (See video below.)

• She smiled a lot. The walkabout in Cork just before she went home was hugely appreciated, especially here in Cork.

• It was right that the GAA welcomed her at Croke Park; and the GAA President was right to refer to Bloody Sunday (more on this below).

• Frequent comments that Mary McAleese should be allowed to serve a third term (not allowed, to the regret of many, under the constitution).

A few more words on a couple of themes that have been prominent in the media these past few days. Firstly, the symmetry of the two wreath-laying ceremonies. The first of these was at the Garden of Remembrance (honouring those who have died fighting against the British) and the second was at Islandbridge, which is where the Irish fallen from two world wars are laid to rest.  It has been repeatedly commented that until recently the Irish dead from the First World War have been passed over in embarrassed silence. A bit like Vietnam veterans in America.  Fighting for the imperialist oppressor. Mary McAleese is credited with putting an end to this shameful amnesia and neglect. (This is a big subject which deserves as essay in itself.  RTÉ radio did an excellent series in 2008 called Our War, and you can listen to two episodes that touch on the amnesia theme here.

Great War Debate (79 mins)
Thomas Davis Lecture (25 mins)

Shameful amnesia and neglect is a tendentious term of course, and dedicated republicans might dispute it.   

Next,  about Croke Park, the national stadium of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). On 21st November 1920 at a Dublin-Tipperary football match, 14 people lost their lives when British forces entered the stadium and started shooting. Included in the dead were Michael Hogan, a player on the Tipperary team. The Hogan Stand is named in his honour. Also Thomas Ryan, shot on his knees whispering an act of contrition to Hogan. Full story on the GAA website.

In a dignified speech to welcome the Queen, the President of the GAA Christy Cooney referred to this event. The consensus is that the GAA was right to welcome her and that Christy Cooney was right to refer to Bloody Sunday. He didn't, in point of fact, name it. He referred to it oblquely, with the phrase "including those that died in this place".

However those who oppose the Queen’s visit find it particularly obnoxious that she should have been welcomed at Croke Park.

Forelock-tugging is another accusation that has been levelled in connection with the visit in general, for example a reader’s letter in yesterday's Examiner from Dominic Carroll, Ardfield, Co Cork. He derided “the forelock-tugging shoneens who this week bent the knee to Mrs Windsor of London” and especially the academic staff of Trinity College Dublin who “lined up like schoolchildren as they awaited a few words of condescension from the royal personage; it was stomach-turning” he says. 

There will be more letters like this in the next few days but in my neck of the woods my sense is that they are in a small minority of opinion. You may ask if the opinions I hear are taylored out of politeness to my English ears. I don’t think so.

Here are the videos and full text of the speeches at Dublin Castle on the Wednesday 18th.

Full text of President Mary McAleese's speech
Full text of speech by Queen Elizabeth II

The Queen video. Watch the first 3 minutes in particular. “Differently or not at all” comes at 2:24.

President Mary McAllese video.  Reflects on difficult centuries, 4:25. Deeply proud, 5:40