When people are addicted to drugs or alcohol or food, so that their life revolves around acquiring and consuming, we regard this as a mental illness.

Roughly 5,000 people, mostly from Central America’s violent and unstable “Northern Triangle” of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras are reportedly making their way through Mexico with the intention of claiming asylum at the U.S. border.

When I left Ireland in the 1980s, it was because, at that time, Ireland felt like being inside a bubble where everyone looked the same, spoke the same, dressed the same, acted the same, ate the same, and thought the same says Suzanne Harrington

Ireland has changed considerably in the past 30 years. We are in the middle of a global shift of ideas, values and politics. With a generational shift in politics clearly taking place in Ireland, what values will emerge from this country over the coming years?

Blackberry season is one of the few times of year when it’s clear that you can’t banish nature from the city, even though we try, writes Clodagh Finn.

There have been many occasions — and very many fine lives — when the absence of a credible, national honours system seems to have left a void in Irish life.

Antoinette Corbally is the latest bystander caught in the crossfire, says Caroline O'Doherty.

Selfie sticks, a breathalyser test and a copy of the Eighth Amendment are among the items that would help the people of the future understand today’s society, writes Clodagh Finn.

Nearly every flashpoint issue bedevilling our world is rooted in how wealth generated in a society is used or shared — or if should be shared at all — to benefit everyone in that society. The eternal stand-off between property rights and the common good remains unresolved and, if history is anything to go by, it is likely to remain so.

So what is happening in Sweden? In a terror non-attack, they are set to be a cashless society within a decade. India is going the same way but where does this leave the poor, stall owners, buskers and generous aunts and uncles, asks Clodagh Finn.

Campaign groups have claimed not enough is being done to tackle inequality and child poverty.

Beautiful.

The Irish Haemophilia Society says the eradication of the Hepatitis C among its members is a huge milestone.

A new UCC module encourages students to intervene in situations of social misconduct for the good of society, explains Louise Crowley

Sean Healy says that broken societies are bad for business and we now have a real chance of building a society in which everyone can live with dignity and fulfil their potential.

Vanessa’s Olorenshaw’s Liberating Motherhood  calls for a new feminism which supports mothers instead of trying to substitute them, writes Victoria White.

Over 60 groups with 1.5 million members have joined the Coalition to Repeal the 8th Amendment.

This year a group of self-proclaimed homophobic men were given the chance to prove that they are heterosexual.

The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) has recommended that a vote on whether to allow same sex marriage be delayed, but a spokesman for Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said no decision had been made.

The North will soon endorse same-sex marriage as public support and a parliamentary majority overwhelms barriers to change, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives predicted.

Turkey sought to assure its citizens and the outside world that there would be no return to the deep repression of the past, even as President Tayyip Erdogan imposed the first nationwide state of emergency since the 1980s.

Around 1,000 people gathered in Kiev for Ukraine’s first major gay pride march yesterday.

Take a walk down Abbey Street past the Jervis Center — itself a converted hospital — towards Heuston Station in Dublin.

Campaigners revise estimate of trafficking and debt bondage level.

Ian McKellen has criticised India’s use of a British colonial law to crack down on homosexuality, telling a newspaper in Mumbai that the country needs to “grow up”.

Cork’s 96FM has asked their listeners if they would give their seat to a pregnant woman.

Dealers of so-called legal highs in the UK could move to the ‘dark web’ as a blanket ban on the drugs comes into force later this week, a senior police officer has warned.

A Fine Gael TD and Pharmacist says access to the morning-after-pill shouldn't be restricted by its cost.

Have you ever wondered how you would cope without a phone?

Amnesty International has urged the new Northern Ireland Assembly to overturn the ban on same sex marriage.

These dolls explore themes of social injustice.

A bank-appointed receiver has secured a High Court injunction requiring anti-eviction activist Ben Gilroy and several others to vacate a commercial premises in Dublin.

Scientists have confirmed what contestants in Gareth Malone’s Naked Choir knew all along, that nothing compares with singing for bringing people together.