Rant about the media
This week a man was shot dead in one of the infamous estates in Limerick. Since then it's been exceptionally tense in the area, with additional armed garda units there full time. On Thursday three families were driven out of the estate, and that night their houses burned down. I've just read that last night a man was shot, and is now critically ill, in a different estate, one that's just half a mile from my house.
Is any of this making the front pages of the papers, or the headlines of the news? Not really. It's quite far down the pecking order for the Irish Times and the Examiner. You'll struggle to find it on the Independent's website, where the leading story is the killing of a man in South Co. Dublin. When Shane Geoghegan, who was not involved with gang fueds and was from a nice home, was killed there was uproar and the media were all over it for a week. The killing of other gang members doesn't merit attention though, irrespective of the hell that the people living in those estates are going through. We'd much rather be concerned with out of the ordinary killings in respectable parts of cities.
Children in those estates this week have shootings, exceptionally high, armed garda presence as well as forensic teams, and houses being burned down around them. The council's created this problem through its design of social welfare housing (estates on the edges of a city, with just one entrance, very poor housing conditions, no amenities or facilities, and local schools that can't cope with the numbers) and its failure to provide adequate education, support and training for these people, yet we banish them as scum when they turn out to be criminals. No doubt the regeneration project will be descemated come budget April 7. The people living in these areas need help today and its not coming. With the funeral taking place this morning, there appears to be an expectation that a revenge killing is on the way, if that's not what happened near my house today. Despite years of efforts which seemed to be making a difference, Limerick could be on the brink of all that work being undone. We have jails a third full of fine defaulters and yet a member of a Limerick gang got just two month (of which he will serve one) for his 83rd conviction last week http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/0313/1224242796524.html
He's only 21!
Is any of this making the front pages of the papers, or the headlines of the news? Not really. It's quite far down the pecking order for the Irish Times and the Examiner. You'll struggle to find it on the Independent's website, where the leading story is the killing of a man in South Co. Dublin. When Shane Geoghegan, who was not involved with gang fueds and was from a nice home, was killed there was uproar and the media were all over it for a week. The killing of other gang members doesn't merit attention though, irrespective of the hell that the people living in those estates are going through. We'd much rather be concerned with out of the ordinary killings in respectable parts of cities.
Children in those estates this week have shootings, exceptionally high, armed garda presence as well as forensic teams, and houses being burned down around them. The council's created this problem through its design of social welfare housing (estates on the edges of a city, with just one entrance, very poor housing conditions, no amenities or facilities, and local schools that can't cope with the numbers) and its failure to provide adequate education, support and training for these people, yet we banish them as scum when they turn out to be criminals. No doubt the regeneration project will be descemated come budget April 7. The people living in these areas need help today and its not coming. With the funeral taking place this morning, there appears to be an expectation that a revenge killing is on the way, if that's not what happened near my house today. Despite years of efforts which seemed to be making a difference, Limerick could be on the brink of all that work being undone. We have jails a third full of fine defaulters and yet a member of a Limerick gang got just two month (of which he will serve one) for his 83rd conviction last week http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/0313/1224242796524.html
He's only 21!