Category: Social & Cultural

Village magazine An edited version of this article appeared in the April-May 2013 edition of Village magazine. Born out of the ashes of Hibernia magazine and the Sunday Tribune Mark I, John Mulcahy’s Phoenix magazine celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. Modelled on Private Eye in the UK, the magazine produces a fortnightly diet of…

An edited version of this article appeared in the February-March edition of Village magazine. When Kevin O’Sullivan took over from Geraldine Kennedy on 23 June 2011, the 13th editor of the Irish Times, he knew the task he faced was no easy one. The Sunday Tribune and the Irish Star on Sunday closed their doors…

Irish Times “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on”, Winston Churchill apocryphally said. In modern times, information (and misinformation) spreads even faster. But although new technology advocates claim the internet allows the system to self-correct faster too, the saga of Magda shows the truth…

The Irish Times An edited version of this article was published in the Irish Times Sex sells. Especially on Valentines Day, and especially for a public relations company, or so an examination of Valentine-themed stories this week suggests, writes Gerard Cunningham. Before becoming famous for the phone-hacking investigation that led to the Leveson inquiry and…

Donegal Democrat He may not have realised it, but when Michael McDowell compared a Fine Gael TD to a Nazi, he was breaking one of the basic rules of debate. Put simply, Godwin’s Law (also known as Godwin’s Rule of Nazi Analogies) says that as time goes on, every argument will reach a point when…

Free Speech is meant to offend. I’m amazed that no one seems to get this. Time after time, I hear the argument that a particular piece should not have been published because it was too offensive. During the row over a series of cartoons of the prophet Mohammed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten for example,…

Donegal Democrat Gaeilgeoirs could be in for a lucrative new job – as proofreaders from the EU. Today is the closing date for applications for Irish speakers interested in earning up to €35,000 in the post. Last June, the Irish government successfully lobbied to have the Irish language added to the list of official and…

Donegal Democrat On a quick holiday trip abroad a few weeks ago, I stopped into a shop to buy a few nick-nacks. The assistant reached down to hand me a plastic bag, and almost by reflex I said “It’s ok, I don’t need it”, before I even had time to think. Funny how little time…

Donegal Democrat “If we die, we want people to accept it. We’re in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life.” – Gus Grissom, 1926-1967, killed when Apollo I exploded while waiting for take-off. Last…

Donegal Democrat So there’s myself, an Englishman, and a Scotsman, and we’re discussing the good old days. The Scotsman is relating how when he was a “bairn”, the teachers would give him a whack for speaking Scots Gaelic. Worse, having got the whack for speaking Gaelic, he then switched to the other language he knew.…