‘Terry McMahon
From ‘Terry McMahon’ It evaporated from my time line so I post it again from a saved version …. I usually save the good stuff folks.. and you should too… Just in case it goes ‘Poof’
Been put under public pressure to apologise for posting John Connors’ (since retracted) speech about how our children are being treated in this country. One particular person was pushing it hard, backed by several others, so I took some time away, looked into my conscience, and after being initially reluctant, I decided, they were right; an apology is necessary. So, with sincere humility, and no caveats, here it is.
Apologies to the children of gay parents who have to deal with real homophobia. Hating someone for who they love is as dumb as loving someone for who they hate.
Apologies to the children of beautiful, gay mothers and fathers who have had their private sexuality nurtured for public weaponization by people who really don’t give a damn about any children or any parents, regardless of sexuality. On both sides.
Apologies to the children of parents and grandparents who have experienced real fascism. To witness these toy soldiers in Ireland, draped in balaclavas and self-importance, proclaim themselves heroes of the revolution while they label anyone who questions their cancel culture censorship as ‘fascist’ must be, at best, bizarre, and, at worst, a staggering insult to victims of actual fascism. You are not anti-fascist, you fools, you’re anti-freedom.
Apologies to the children whose parents are dumb enough to believe that being Irish is based on the pigmentation of your skin and the amount of ancestors you buried in the ground.
Apologies to the children of parents whose love for their country and protection of their children is pounced on by political opportunists to label good people as, ‘racist,’ and, ‘homophobic.’
Apologies to the children who had the courage to contact heavily marketed counselling services, (that apparently now cost 1,146 euro per hour), only to discover an eighteen-month waiting list and zero accountability for the cash that was collected. Can you please kill yourself a year-and-a-half from now.
Apologies to the children who have had emergency surgeries cancelled so that private empty hospitals could prove that we are all in this together. We will never forget your sacrifice. Until about five seconds after you die.
Apologies to the children whose grandparents were shunted out of hospitals and left to die in care homes so the rest of us could feel a little safer watching Netflix, drinking wine and getting fat.
Apologies to the children who were trafficked to a country where no Minister has ever explained why this government has yet to secure a single conviction against child sex trafficking.
Apologies to the children who are part of proposed legislation under the new Minister, where, ‘a change will do you good,’ and vulnerable children will be championed by ideologically driven adults to secure a biological sex change, but raped children will not be able to change the paying adult predators who brutalise their tiny bodies.
(Too much for you? The US State Department just announced that, “Ireland does not meet the minimum standard for the elimination of sex trafficking,” so we were demoted to a ‘Tier 2’ watch list country, alongside Romania and Saudi Arabia. But, apparently, talking about that horror just means you are homophobic.)
Apologies to the children going to socio-economically deprived schools while profitable private schools secure infinite government grants. You are just as significant as those privately educated politician’s kids. If you work really hard, you can get into one of those private schools. As a janitor. Or working in the kitchen. Or, you know, as a woodwork teacher.
Apologies to the children of convicts who weren’t allowed to visit their mother or father, despite prison staff swanning around like they’re in Butlins Holiday Camp. (Before it became Direct Provision hell.) Don’t worry, you’ll see your father as soon as you’re old enough to have honest cops set you up for a fall. You might even get to share a cell with Netflix and homebrew wine. Unless you’re Terence Wheelock.
Apologies to the children in Direct Provision. Just because our new Minister for Children is part of a government that funds private companies to the tune of hundreds of millions for brutalising you and robbing you of your dignity and destroying your future, doesn’t mean you are not special. You are. No, really, you are. You’re just not special enough.
Apologies to the children burned to death in Carrickmines. At least the state cover-up proved you had a bellyful of chips and we all know you’re in Heaven, now. Even if you’re probably kept separate from the other kids up there, too.
Apologies to the children who believed another Minister when he swore you would be out of emergency accommodation by Christmas, four years ago. He got promoted and you got screwed and he’s now in power with the new Minister for Children. Defends him on Twitter. Bessie mates. We may have made a man who lies to homeless children our new moral guardian but stop complaining, little brats. And stay out of the hotel hallways, will you. Paying guests need their privacy. And their dignity. And their unimpeded walkway to the breakfast buffet.
Apologies to the children who are growing up in a country where the new Minister’s first formal statement was not about rescuing you from poverty, or rape, or homelessness, or Direct Provision, but, instead, it was about the necessity of implementing hate speech laws. Why would a new Minister for Children’s first thought be about censorship, and when did asking such a question make you a Far Right Nazi Fascist Homophobe?
Apologies to the children of parents who lost their livelihoods during this lockdown only to discover that their well-paid union leaders are spending all their work-time on social media intimidating and ridiculing people instead of maintaining the charade that they’re fighting for the rights of their union members.
Apologies to the children whose parents beat them during lockdown, and will do so again during the next one. And the one after. Child services do care about you. No, really, it does. It’s just a busy time right now.
Apologies to the children whose father was arrested for bringing his kids fishing only to watch his daughter be dragged away, screaming, by a platoon of cops. When the worm was on the hook, we queued up to bite down.
Apologies to the children of women treated like pieces of meat on the conveyer belt of medicalized births. The fact that inducement can be predicated on the private surgeon’s golf booking and a powdered milk company can sponsor a midwife award doesn’t mean you aren’t all equally special, even the ones screaming in fake-food-induced colic.
Apologies to the children whose brave mothers died of cervical cancer, while we give The Freedom of the City to the cowardly doctor who could have stopped it.
Apologies to the children whose parents and grandparents deaths were attributed to Covid so that their complex lives could amount to nothing more than an inflated government statistic.
Apologies to the children who were born Down Syndrome. Just because you have been deemed unworthy of living doesn’t mean you don’t matter. You do. Just, you now, not really enough, anymore.
Apologies to the children whose parents have zero issue with anybody’s gender, sexuality or race, but still can’t comprehend why any adult teacher of any gender or sexuality or race feels compelled to enter any classroom to teach any child about masturbation, or why the head of a British Organization ‘Educate and Celebrate’ would repeatedly instruct members of Irish National Teachers Organisation to conceal from Irish parents what they are teaching. When did transparency require such duplicity?
Apologies to the children who are about to experience first-hand the insane consequence of parents allowing a bunch of woke psychopaths to convince everyone that to be sick is to be healthy, to acquiesce is to be a rebel, and to be a real hero is to recognise that the only truth is to buy into the lie.
Apologies to the children whose parents have received constant proof of what a bunch of psychopaths these political animals are, yet, at their behest, we willingly turn on each other and allow this government to continue its established policies of selective and malicious dehumanization.
Apologies to the children whose parents are beginning to realise that some shiny new Minister for Children sharing a photograph with a questionable figure, or ‘liking’ an artistic homage to eating a child, or making some tasteless joke about ‘Map Porn,’ may in fact prove to be some of the least egregious acts in our deeply disturbing projected future.
So, there you have it. That’s twenty-something apologies. There really could be many more, and there should be, but, let’s face it, after a short time, talking about how badly we treat our children becomes kind of boring, doesn’t it.
Maybe we should just forget about the goddamned kids and move onto the next soap opera outrage. After all, children should be seen and not heard, shouldn’t they. Particularly when we’re content to allow them be killed on the quiet.
Oh, look, Netflix has a new show…is it too early for wine?
