Sunday, February 27, 2011

Ireland in 2011

The General Election has happened in Ireland. The ruling parties have been decimated. The largest party in the state lost roughly three quarters of it's seats. The junior party lost all their seats. Ireland has elected a minority, right of centre European focused government. This government will for the most part be implementing the huge loans, implementing European policy which is to hijack the Irish and force them to pay for German bank foolishness. The State and it's people are being forced to pay bankers debts, while the bankers give themselves huge bonuses.
It's historic in that the largest party in the state for 80 years or more has been decimated. Finna Fail need to restructure, and perhaps get rid of the rich developers that have blighted Irish political life for the last years.
It's historic in that the oldest party in the state, Sinn Fein has doubled it's tally. I don't know if they will ever run the country.
Labour has increased it's vote, but I don't see many working class people in it's list of TDs.
In other news, my lecturer face book professor friend, finally got home from Tripoli, I haven't been able make contact. It was easier when she was in Libya.
Ireland beat Scotland in the Rugby just and it's not looking good for the world cup in the Summer time.
I am exploring Sweat lodges as done by native Americans. I can't say a lot about it as I don't know too much other than what I dream when I am in there. There is no doubt its an amazing experience and it's helping my thought process.
I have strange ideas of what it is to be Irish as I live in the south of France. What is it that makes a person define themselves they way they are? What is it that makes us define others? What is the need to belong to a collective that is not easily identifiable if you scratch beneath the surface?
Irish, celtic culture? Is it any different deep down that that of Australian Aboriginal culture? 

1 comment:

Oein DeBhairduin said...

What an interesting series of questions :)

They are the same ones that people through the ages have asked, from contemporary sociologists, fledgling psychologists, ancient philosophers and ageless mystics. The possibilities are many as are the theories and the ideals that support them. Perhaps too it is that we have descended from the primal apes, a species that forms social alliances with swift persuasion for self preservation, or that from the point of self reflection our sense of individuality is not always within the genesis of the I, but found in the readily available mirror of others and our connections to them.

What is the difference though? Time, experience and the echoes of others seems that the answer is never one thing or another, it is all things – just like us, the ever changing ripple of our ever evolving selves. Splash and we start all over again :)

Politicly things haven’t even begun to really settle down, far too much speculation and not enough direction. Perhaps that’s too harsh for a government in the pangs of its own birth but still... who knows, this revival may not only bring fresh prosperity but rally the people to a deeper sense of involvement with the world and the clogs that aid its sense of turning.