Author Archives: Giolla

The terrible tale of Tuam

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Continuing my usual practice of being late to press has the advantage of letting more details of a story emerge, being very late means that other people still cover the fuller picture before I do but I can cope. A little while back a tale of terrible cruelty from Ireland’s past emerged involving as always the Catholic church and cruelty to children. Stories about bad things the Catholic church is alleged to have done in the past, much like accusations against aging celebrities, causes even usually calm heads to discard their usual rigor and leap upon the most sensationalist headlines … Continue reading →

Halal and labeling

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There’s been quite a bit of talk about halal meat being served by popular fast food chains of late. Quite a few people have tried to frame this as a racist attack on Muslims (conflating as ever a religion with a race, or are Saudi Muslims, Pakistani Muslims and all other Muslims all the same race?). Other people have taken the view that it really doesn’t matter as long as the welfare of the animals are the same, and apparently some of the food vendors do tell you that they use halal meat if you go to their website and … Continue reading →

UKIP, UAF and reporting

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Yesterday UKIP had a rally in central London and the UAF protested it, as apparently they think that UKIP are a racist and fascist party. Normally I don’t go to part political meetings and in fact yesterday was the first one I’ve been to as an adult, so despite not being a UKIP supporter the prospect of UAF based amusement dragged me up into town. I’m not going to bother talking about what UKIP said, as that’s been badly covered by the mainstream media and besides it was the usual rally the troops sort of deal – so if you … Continue reading →