Slugger O'Toole

The time has come to unmask Korhomme…

Robert Campbell on July 29, 2020, 8:00 am18 Comments | Readers

Let me tell you a story. In July 2004 I flew from Belfast to Manchester on a day trip. I was formally dressed in lightweight clothes and carrying a briefcase. On arrival, I was stopped at the security check; the policeman wanted to see my passport. I showed him my Irish one, which made him suspicious. He asked the purpose of my visit, and I told him I had an appointment at the Swiss Consulate; this made him deeply suspicious. …

Wanting to win the argument in a viable long term is not talking down Nationalism

Gareth Brown on July 28, 2020, 1:45 pm237 Comments | Readers 1690

As David has noted on Slugger, the establishment of the shared island unit in the office of An Taoiseach has intensified the discussion about our constitutional future on the island of Ireland. There is little detail in what the work of this unit will look like and how it will approach the monumental task of restarting a conversation that caused a civil war and decades of violence North and South, but we shouldn’t be surprised. That’s how coalition governments work …

Alliance: Now (or never) is the time to move beyond sound bite success to real world delivery…

Ian Clarke on July 28, 2020, 9:37 am152 Comments | Readers 1668

In earlier articles I’ve written that as someone still fundamentally pro-union. To recap, I’ve felt electorally disenfranchised for quite a long time by two unionist parties that have refused to reflect my general social outlook. Apart from a vote for David Ervine in East Belfast in 1997, I voted UUP. They lost me post-Trimble. So, I’m politically homeless. Like many on either side of the community. The Alliance Party should fill that void. But it doesn’t. Not because it is …

Science and Coronavirus, key to NI success has been competence, public trust in devolved model of power, and some luck…

Mick Fealty on July 28, 2020, 8:21 am58 Comments | Readers 747

I broadly agree with Tom Kelly’s assessment (£) of the Executive’s performance during Covid, which is that it has broadly been good, but has at times suffered from the lack of a unified message. Tom argues that the science should be listened to… …professionals like Dr McBride and Professor Young have to provide advice based on the science as this unpredictable virus reveals itself. After much deliberation they presented their considered view that the wearing of face-coverings should be mandatory. …

The Forgotten Troubles 1920-1922: The Altnaveigh Massacre…

Patrick Concannon on July 28, 2020, 7:43 am57 Comments | Readers 1960

The violence which engulfed Northern Ireland in 1922 was possibly the most intense the region has ever seen. The massacre at Altnaveigh has become synonymous with the sectarian violence which occurred particularly in the first half of 1922. It has also become a symbol of Republican aggression in the border regions, for Unionists living along that area particularly. Altnaveigh elicits comparisons with the abhorrent Kingsmill massacre when ten Protestant workmen were taken from their bus by Republican paramilitaries and murdered …

A Song for a Shared Island…

Philip McGuinness on July 28, 2020, 7:32 am10 Comments | Readers 410

There are many conversations happening across the island about what a shared island might look like. Talking is vitally important but so, too, is singing. What might a shared island sound like? To be emotionally carried along by – and to sing along with – a beautiful song that appeals to the more noble, inclusive and generous parts of our common humanity is one of the greatest creative acts we can experience. Is there a song that encapsulates the desire …

Read more…A Song for a Shared Island…

John Hewitt Digital Festival of Literature and Ideas 2020

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on July 27, 2020, 4:03 pmLeave a comment | Readers 291

The John Hewitt Society have moved their Armagh summer school online with a series of free online talks and discussions. While we normally take Slugger TV out of the NvTv studio to record in front of the Armagh audience, we’re delighted to be opening this year’s festival with a discussion about “After lockdown, can the arts return to health without a vaccine?”. Read more about this and the rest of the programme …

Northern Ireland is lagging far behind Great Britain on the wearing of face masks

Peter Donaghy (Salmon of Data) on July 27, 2020, 3:56 pm75 Comments | Readers 1030

Over the last four months, the percentage of the population in Great Britain wearing face masks in public has steadily increased. However, data from YouGov suggests that the percentage of the population wearing masks in Northern Ireland has remained flat over the last few months, and as a result the percentage of the population wearing masks in Northern Ireland is now lagging significantly behind England, Scotland and Wales. The chart above shows how mask wearing rates by region in the …

Why the Shared Island unit doesn’t need to shy away from constitutional questions

David McCann on July 27, 2020, 3:44 pm34 Comments | Readers 1430

Interesting article by Aiden Corkery in yesterdays Sunday Business Post on the new Shared Island Unit to be established within the Department of the Taoiseach. In it he quotes the views of the former Fianna Fail TD and advisor, Martin Mansergh Martin Mansergh, the former Fianna Fáil TD and adviser to Bertie Ahern during the Good Friday Agreement, disagreed. He said he believed the new unit would be more focused on the more pragmatic details of north-south cooperation. These included …

‘A united Ireland that is socially liberally, tolerant, European and economically successful is attractive’

Paul Gosling on July 27, 2020, 9:02 am783 Comments | Readers 6572

Irish unity could be an attractive option if the new nation is socially liberal, outward looking, multi-cultural, European and economically successfully, while respecting both the Irish and British cultures and traditions, believes Will Glendinning. To be economically successful it may need support from both the European Union and the United States, he adds. Will is a former chief executive of the Community Relations Council, has been an Alliance Party MLA for West Belfast and was also a member of the …

Vested interest means Boris has a fat chance of getting us thin…

Terry Maguire on July 26, 2020, 12:02 pm84 Comments | Readers 3704

I am still smarting from a recent suggestion by the highly competent technical boss of this erudite platform. He rightly chastened me for setting out in a post the vexed problems of addiction without offering any solutions. Fair point, I thought but Brian there is nothing new under the Sun only the prevailing ideologies that are neither right nor wrong just what society, at any given point in time, is willing to tolerate. With a lack of political will to …

Technology and me…

Lynda Tavakoli on July 26, 2020, 11:28 am68 Comments | Readers 968

I know that what I’m about to confess may shock a lot of you. I know because I’ve seen the look of horror on people’s faces for quite some time now, so here goes – I don’t use a mobile phone. The retorts of disbelief when I utter those magic words range from, you’re joking and I don’t believe you, to the more often accusatory, what’s wrong with you? as if I’m some sort of aberration. That’s okay – each …

#InConversation Podcast with Dr David Suitor – Dentistry and the challenges of Covid-19…

Brian O'Neill on July 25, 2020, 9:06 am27 Comments | Readers 679

Open wide! this week I chat with Dr David Suitor who has been a dentist in Belfast for over 17 years. We chat about the general state of dentistry in Nothern Ireland as well as the specific challenges of Covid-19. Normally dentists can see 4 or 5 patients per hour but Covid-19 precautions have dramatically reduced the number of patients they can see. This has repercussions for the ability of patients to get treated as well as the financial viability …

Using the positive power of networks is the only functional way to deal with trolls…

Mick Fealty on July 23, 2020, 4:02 pm463 Comments | Readers 3096

I take a slightly different view of the activities of the many folk on Twitter who think it is their job to harry and raid folks on behalf of their own political parties who have the impertinence to question or criticise them. It’s a form of cyberactivism as old as the Internet. Their job is create anger and dysfunction in our social cognition systems so that we cannot do anything but fall exhausted back into their unloving arms. I’ve called …

The Bridge to Scotland. A Unionist Umbilical Cord or A Link to a Celtic Union?

Brian O'Neill on July 23, 2020, 11:40 am220 Comments | Readers 5583

The proposed bridge from Northern Ireland is back in the news. Boris Bridge an utter waste of money when we should be investing in saving jobs & safeguarding public services rather than wasting time and money on this white elephant which is little more than a dead cat strategy attempt to distract from Brexit shambles https://t.co/TKhy9M9J57 — Andrew Muir MLA (@AndrewMuirNI) July 22, 2020 The idea is utterly bonkers. Very expensive, and a major engineering challenge. Not to mention the …

So, which room of change do you think Northern Ireland is in…?

Mick Fealty on July 23, 2020, 10:34 am32 Comments | Readers 1577

I came across this HR tool the other day, called the four rooms of change. It’s actually a proprietary product so if you want to know more, please contact them. The iterated version is recognisable to most of us whose core passion is Northern Irish politics. Before I ask for responses (and only responses, for the purposes of this exercise, all comments on the responses of others will be removed, positive or not), please note there’s no direct route from …

Academic working group launches public consultation on unification referendums on the island of Ireland.

Soapbox on July 22, 2020, 1:35 pm501 Comments | Readers 3917

The Working Group on Unification Referendums on the Island of Ireland is today launching a public consultation asking people for their views on the prospect of a referendum on Northern Ireland’s constitutional future. The group is neither for nor against such a referendum – it is simply seeking to clarify the process. This post introduces the group and sets out some of the key questions it is asking. You can access the survey by clicking here. What is the Working …

You can’t cure love

Soapbox on July 22, 2020, 11:04 am25 Comments | Readers 1087

Eoin Tennyson is an Alliance Councillor for the Lagan River DEA. It’s been more than two years since the UK Government published its LGBT Action plan which committed to end the practice of so-called ‘gay conversion’ or ‘reparative’ therapies – a range of denounced, discredited and dehumanising practices which seek to change a person’s sexual orientation or suppress their gender identity. In that time we’ve heard promises repeated by the Prime Minister, but seen little in the way of tangible …

#CargoOfBricks: From library assistant in Oldpark to Smash Hits boss in four years…

Mick Fealty on July 22, 2020, 7:02 am9 Comments | Readers 662

Talking to a retired nationalist politician recently he recounted how important it was for him to get out of Belfast in the early days of the troubles to UCD and a Dublin in which society and its operants (arts, commerce, science) outsized the politics of the day. #CargoOfBricks and Brian’s In Conversation podcast series draw from a wider circle of sources share insights and stories that perhaps can have a fresh bearing on our lives in-the-round, not always through the …