A – Armagh, site of controversial remembering
Early October and the word leaked out that Michael D Higgins would not be attending an inter denomination event in Armagh to mark the centenary of the establishment of Northern Ireland. Much breast-beating ensued. Should he stay or should he go? Polls suggested that somewhere between 68% and 80% of people agree with the president’s decision. One wag pointed out that Michael D’s popularity is such that if he had decided he would go the same volume of people would have agreed with that decision.
Sinn Féin made hay on the event, having spotted a little awakening of the nationalism which it espouses. Their own MLA in the North, Declan Carney had attended a similar function in Belfast in September so what was the difference? On RTÉ’s Late Debate, Sinn Féin TD Matt Carthy read out a quote which he mistakenly believed was the official description of the event Carney attended.
“That’s absolutely completely different from the event taking place in Armagh,” he said.
Except it was a description of the event taking place in Armagh. The prez stayed put. The event went ahead on October 21. The world kept on turning.
B – Blackmore, Rachael
On April 10, she became the first woman to win the Grand National. She rode to victory on Minella Times from a starting position of fourth favourite in the race. What with the Covid times there was no smothering of her with friends and family at the finish line or indeed spectators on the course, but none of that took from a famous victory for a jockey who is at the top of her game.
Speaking to TV after the race she dismissed the talk of her gender. “I don’t feel male or female right now,” she said. “I don’t even feel human. It’s unbelievable.”
C – Climate change
July was scorching. The sun beat down on a grateful nation and for a while, we could all pretend we lived in a country with distinct seasons. On July 20, the Valentia met station in South Kerry recorded Ireland’s first tropical night in 20 years, with the temperature staying about 25c all night. Nobody mentioned the war, that little conflict between nature and man that is known as climate change. Was this just one more example of where things were heading?
This was the year that climate change came dropping heavily on the developed world. Heavy flooding in Germany and Belgium also in July, with hundreds losing their lives. In Greece, where summer fires are not uncommon, the European Forest Fire Information System recorded almost twice as many forests had gone up in flames as was normal.
In California, they experienced the second-worst spate of fires in the state’s history. Meanwhile, places like India and Myanmar went through severe flooding and mudslides, while in Bangladesh, villages housing Rohingya refugees were flooded.
In November, COP26 took place in Glasgow. The outcome was more pledges but some of the biggest players like Russia and China were keeping their distance. Nobody is expecting any respite from climate change next year, but it remains to be seen whether flesh will be put on the rhetoric.
D – Direct provision
On February 26, the minister for integration announced the beginning of the end for direct provision, the system by which asylum seekers are housed. The system, in existence for two decades, has been condemned by national and international bodies as inhumane. O’Gorman’s party had pledged that they would bring the curtain down on it and to that end, he produced a white paper mapping out the way forward.
His proposals stated that
asylum seekers would get the keys to their own accommodation after four months and be allowed to work after six months. They will also have their own accommodation. This new system, however, will take four years to phase in, the proposal noted.
On December 3, the Minister for Justice Helen McEntee announced that there would be a proposed amnesty for up to 17,000 undocumented migrants, including asylum seekers, who had been “living in the shadows”.
The plan is for long-term undocumented migrants and their eligible dependants to be provided with immigration permission, access to work, and a signpost towards citizenship. At a time when much of the wealthy world is turning its back on the most desperate people on the planet, at least we have retained some perspective in this country.
E – Easttown, Mare of
Has to be a contender for the drama of the year. Mare Of Easttown debuted on Sky Atlantic in April and rarely has the brilliant Kate Winslet (pictured left) been as brilliant.
The story revolves around a murder mystery, but it is not like any other murder mystery seen on our screens.
This is a snapshot of modern America, where poverty has crept across the suburbs and fringes like the Eastown portrayed.
The American dream has gone on safari in these places, to be replaced by opioid addiction and all the attendant despair that it brings. If Mare of Eastown was a song it would be have been written and performed with passion by Bruce Springsteen.
F – Facebook
The company formerly known as. On October 28, one of the best-known brands on the planet officially disappeared. Facebook became Meta. The rebranding is an indication of how far the brand has fallen in recent years as its true nature became apparent.
Over 17 years, wunderkind Mark Zuckerberg (above) had built the brand into a global phenomenon, claiming that he just wants to teach the world to connect to each other.
By the autumn of this year, however, the latest revelations of Facebook culture emerged through whistleblower Frances Haugen. She testified before a US House committee and then set off around the world to warn of the odious nature of her former employer. Her message was simple.
Facebook will give a platform to anything it can get away with in order to make money. For weeks prior to making herself known, documents Ms Haugen had acquired from within the company were published by the Wall Street Journal.
“Anger and hate is the easiest way to grow on Facebook,” she told a parliamentary committee at Westminister.
“We are literally subsidising hate on these platforms (Facebook and Instagram). It is substantially cheaper to run an angry hateful divisive ad than it is to run a compassionate, empathetic ad.
“I am deeply worried that it may not be possible to make Instagram safe for 14-year-olds and I sincerely doubt it is possible to make it safe for a 10-year-old,” she said.
The damage the new revelations did was obvious in the remedial action taken by Zuckerberg. He just changed names. Time will tell whether Meta is Facebook in a fresh pair of socks or just the ching-ching in search of the easiest and most immoral way to turn a buck.
G – Gaslighting
This term completely lost the run of itself in 2021. You can’t turn on your phone or open a newspaper without
somebody accusing another of “gaslighting”. For many, the term is now used to describe somebody who doesn’t confirm one’s own beliefs. Get a life, people.
According to Robin Sterm, the founder of the Yale Centre for Emotional Intelligence an author of The Gaslight Effect (Not to be confused with a fine band, The Gaslight Anthem), the term is “the act of undermining another person reality by denying facts, the environment around them, or their feelings”.
Now it seems that all you people out there want to use it to hit out at somebody with whom you don’t agree. It sounds great and confers on the person using it the notion of being emotionally intelligent and knowing their onions. More often than not the purveyors of this nonsense will also manage to insert into their speech terms like “platforming” and “toxic masculinity”.
Fun fact: The term comes from a 1938 play called Gaslight in which the protagonist’s husband intentionally tries to make her believe she can no longer trust her own perception of reality.
One tactic he uses is to turn down the gas-powered lights in their home so they flicker throughout the house. When she asks why the lights are flickering he denies they’re flickering at all, and suggests it’s all in her head. So there.
H – Harrington, Kellie
A champion boxer and person.
Early in the morning of August 8, Kellie Harrington won a gold medal at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. The 32-year-old carried herself in victory with the grace everybody had come to know from her. As a teenager, she wasn’t into sport until she walked through the doors of the Corinthians Boxing club not far from her home in Dublin’s north inner city. At the time the club didn’t even have a female changing room.
She didn’t have an easy ride through life. She left school without any qualification and enrolled in the Youthreach programme which she credits with sending her on the path to her current station. Today, she lives with her partner of 12 years Mandy Loughlin and works as a cleaner in St Vincent’s psychiatric hospital in Fairview.
“They don’t like to call it a cleaner… a domestic,” she told the Irish Times’ Patrick Freyne.
“A lot of people were saying ‘ah you’ll be able to leave you job now’ and I don’t understand why people would say stuff like that. Did they think I’d won the bloody Lotto? And even if I’de won the Lotto, I wouldn’t leave. I love the ward that I work on. It’s very normal.”
As can be seen, fame has gone completely to her head.
I – Insurrection
On January 6, a mob of Donald Trump supporters attacked the seat of parliament in Washington, the Capitol, in an effort to prevent the ratification of Joe Biden’s election victory. It was a shocking moment for anybody who ever saw America as the shining city on the hill and one that must have brought joy to dictators the world over.
Five people died either directly before, during or immediately after the attack. One protestor was shot dead by the Capitol Police, another died of a drug overdose and three protestors died of natural causes.
The country died a little too. This was a manifestation of the split in US public, social and spiritual life, that has riven the country for decades and which saw Trump come to power. On a day of violence, there were some heroics from the men and women who stood up to the mob.
There was also a hero born in the form of one Donie O’Sullivan, a native of Caherciveen, Co Kerry, who reported the unfolding events to the world as those around him lost their heads.
Donie became an overnight celebrity in his own country and recognised as a brave reporter in his adopted one. Within weeks, the T-shirts had been printed and were spotted being worn by people emerging from the Centra shop in his native town. The legend read: ‘Donie for President’.
J – Journalism
Listen, it’s been a good year for de paper, so bear with a little indulgence. On December 2, the Newsbrand Ireland Journalism Awards were presented, with the biggest gong of the night, journalist of the year, going to the Irish Examiner’s Aoife Moore and Paul Hosford.
They won for their scoop last August 12 months that came to be known as Golfgate. This was the story about the gathering in Clifden of the Oireachtas Golf Society at a time when the rest of the country was hunkered down under pandemic restriction rules.
The newspaper also scooped awards for scoop of the year, in which the above journalists of the year did the scooping, campaigning journalism, best front page, digital news coverage, and investigative journalism.
K – Kennelly Brendan
On October 17, the Kerry-born Dublin-adopted poet and academic passed away at the age of 85. Fittingly, he spent his declining years back in his native county.
“As a poet, Brendan Kennelly had forged a special place in the affections of the Irish people,” President and fellow poet Michael D Higgins said.
“He brought so much resonance, insight and the revelation of the joy of intimacy to the performance of his poems and to gatherings in so many parts of Ireland. He did so with a special charm, wit, energy and passion.”
The passing of Kennelly, as autumn pulled leaves from the trees, occurred in a 10-day period in which other major figures in Irish culture also breathed their last. On October 7, Tony McMahon, the maestro of the squeezebox and so much more, died. Maire Mhac an tSaoi predeceased Kennelly by a day. She was a poet of some repute in her own right, particularly in Irish as well as being a scholar and academic.
She was also the daughter of Sean McEntee, veteran of the GPO in 1916, the War of Independence and a long career in politics in the early decades of the state.
And on October 12, Paddy Maloney, chieftain and all-round good guy, also passed. In the space of little over a week, four totem poles of Irish culture moved out of this world into the great mystery beyond, leaving us all that little bit poorer, yet grateful for their contribution.
L - Limerick, All Ireland hurling champions. Again
There was an advert on TV a few years back about hurling that pitched players as “not men, but giants”.
Rumour has it that a whole generation of Limerick kids were kidnapped at that time, taken in some jungle and emerged as giants. It’s unfair that these people pass themselves off as human beings. The dominance of Limerick was reflected in the All Star awards, of which the county won a record 12.
Vincent Browne, journalist and broadcaster and until recently long suffering Limerick hurling fan, has this to say about the haul: “It is an outrage that 12 Limerick hurlers got All Star Awards. All 15 should have got the awards”.
The rest of the hurling world waits to see whether feet of clay will emerge at some point this side of 2030.
M – Mother and Baby Home Report
The final report by the Mother and Baby Homes commission was published on January 12.
The report detailed how thousands of mothers and their babies had been treated in 18 institutions throughout most of the 20th century.
The report noted that in the years before 1960 “mother and baby homes did not save the lives of ‘illegitimate’ children; in fact they appear to have significantly reduced their prospects of survival”.
The report detailed how around 9,000 children — one in 10 of those born in the institutions covered by the terms of reference — died between 1922 and 1998, double the rate of infant mortality in the general population. Yet another stone from old Ireland is turned, providing a further glimpse of life for those who were adjudged to fall outside the warped parameters of what passed for society under the rule of the mitre.
N – Northern Ireland, the protocol. It went on and on
And then it went on some more again. For a while, it looked like the protocol might have got sorted as we approached the festive season. And then it went on some more.
For those not versed in the protocol it’s the party pooper for the
Brexiteers who thought the UK could just raise anchor and set sail on its own, free from the shackles of the EU. The story continues.
O – O’Brien, Denis
In May, the billionaire buisenssman sold his Communicorp business, which included a raft of Irish radio station, exiting the media in which he had been a major figure since 1989. Over the 33 years, Mr O’Brien went from owning a small Dublin radio station to being the majority shareholder in Independent News and Media and in the Newstalk radio station. €500m.
His exit from INM — as it was — in 2019 occurred as a major investigation by High Court appointed inspectors began examining a raft of allegations about the company. His investment in the newspaper group saw him accumulate an estimated loss of €500m.
Over his period as a media owner, Mr O’Brien was considered a controversial figure, not least because of his propensity to sue any media outlet whom he felt had trashed his good name. While he was perfectly entitled to do so, it was unusual for a media owner to be that litigious.
On the sale of his radio interests this year, journalist Sam Smyth, who had worked for and clashed with, with Mr O’Brien told the Sunday Times: “I think he is materially better off without his Irish media interests and Irish media is healthier without Mr O’Brien’s influence and involvement in it.”
P – Pandemic
The first full year of the Covid pandemic was a sobering experience. The year began in full lockdown following a major miscalculation by the Government in ignoring Nphet advice to pursue “a meaningful Christmas”.
The year was largely an exercise in attempting to minimise death through restrictions, while simultaneously rolling out the vaccines. All restrictions had lifted by October, but within weeks a fourth wave of the pandemic was on our shores. Right now, the great fear is the Omicron variant and by now we have all realised that this thing is not going away anytime soon.
Q – Queen’s bereavement
On April 9, Prince Philip, who spent his public life trailing around after Her Nibs, died. He was a likeable old buffer, whose popularity in the years immediately preceding his death was probably enhanced by the portrayal of him in the Netflix series, The Crown.
He had a down-to-earth manner that was a bit alien to the royals, as he was able to engage with commoners with little awkwardness. During a visit to the White House in 1979, he engaged two butlers in conversation and poured them drinks.
He also, however, became entangled in a few dodgy incidents in which he betrayed a liking for stereotyping various minorities.
R – Rooney, Sally
On September 7, the publishing event of the year took place. It has been many a decade since literary fiction produced such an event but so it was for Beautiful World, Where Are You, with people queueing for the midnight release. The work was greeted with much praise and a dollop of critical analysis.
The plot revolved around a writer who has become rich and famous at a young age, her college friend and their respective attempts at forming romantic liaisons of one hue or another. The Guardian, to borrow a Dunphyesque phrase, felt it was good book but not a great book.
“Ultimately, it’s hard not to feel her greatest artistic challenge isn’t retooling the romcom for an era of political crisis, but the simpler, if not less tricky, task of just getting on with her work,” the review went.
Such weighty illusions did not form part of the reaction in Ms Rooney’s home country where it could generally be split into: “Sure, she’s one of us and isn’t she great” and “Who exactly does she think she is?”
She’s barely 30 and whatever way you look at it, a long way from the rest us normal people.
S – Susan O’Neill, and singing partner, Mick Flannery
One of the most accomplished Irish albums launched in 2021 was In The Game, a collaboration between these two singers of contrasting styles. This collection of songs revolve around a relationship break-up, so long fertile ground for musicians, from Bob Dylan’s Blood On The Tracks to Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours, all the way through to Adele and her album 30. Flannery and O’Neill are not romantically linked and their collaboration based on creative songwriting rather than shared emotional pain.
T - Tyrone, All-Ireland football champions
They came from nowhere and a Covid outbreak in the camp in August suggested they were on the road to nowhere, but in the end they beat all the odds.
Tyrone were crowned All-Ireland champions for the first time since 2008. These things happen. We
all have to move on. A new year dawns soon.
U - Unionism’s finest
Edwin Poots, a creationist of the old school, was elected as leader of the DUP and took up his new role on May 28.
He was regarded as a hardliner and probably elected on that basis. He quickly set about trying to get
the Northern Executive up and running again, installing his right hand man Paul Givan as First Minister.
This required him to cut a deal with Sinn Fein over the Irish language.
Except, Mr Poots didn’t consult the hardliners who elected him to be a hardliner and who now believed he’d gone all soft. Having served for a total of 21 days, Edwin Poots ran out the door on June 18 before a boot was applied to his rear end.
He had promised to be nearly as much fun as Boris, so all manner of observers and journalists were sorry to see him go. He was replaced by Jeffery Donaldson, who is still in the job at the time of writing.
V – Vax
Oxford Languages word of the year. Usage of the word “vaccine” more than doubled in frequency in the past year as vaccines against the Covid were rolled out. But within that vaccine’s abbreviated first cousin “vax” was the term that really hit the sweet spot.
It was occurring more than 72 times as frequently in September 2021 as it had twelves months previously. Vax first appeared in the general lexicon in the 1980s, but had only skulked around the margins of general vernacular until everybody wanted a piece of it this year.
“All these other vaccine words increased, but nothing like vax,” according to Fiona McPherson, a senior editor at Oxford Languages which publishes the Oxford English dictionary.
“It’s a short, punchy, attention grabbing word. And speaking as a lexicographer, it’s also quite a productive one. You see it used in all sorts of combinations to make new words”.
The Word Of The Year is based on usage evidence drawn from more than 14.5bn words which are gathered from news sources across the world.
W – World Health Organization
It was another year in which the WHO led the fight against the pandemic and took a role in reminding the wealthy world of its obligations to poorer countries to ensure that vaccines are made available to everybody. That was Good WHO in action.
Bad WHO reared its ugly head during the year also when it became known that a whistleblower was hounded from his job after refusing to change a report he penned for the organisation.
Dr Francesco Zambon resigned after 13 years of service after the WHO refused to follow its own
whistleblower guidelines by ignoring his demands for a full investigation into claims of interference by senior officials.
Zambon’s report had highlighted shortcomings in Italy’s early response to the pandemic. A senior official in the WHO, who had previously worked for the Italian government, had parts of the report redacted. Thereafter, the apparent attitude was similar to that in many other organisations — bury the whistleblower rather than listen to him. Sometimes, even alleged angels like the WHO have dirty faces.
X – Xmas party that shouldn’t have been
Last Christmas, by all accounts, there was a party in 10 Downing Street against all the rules of lockdown that pertained at the time. Boris Johnson denied it. He lied about it. He tousled his hair and put on his “I’m perplexed at it all” mask and then he lied some more. The whole episode appears to have left its mark on the British people, many of whom had a soft spot for Boris because he only generally tells small or white lies.
John Bercow, the former speaker of the House of Commons, was asked for his opinion of Mr Johnson’s conduct and character during the controversy.
“A serial dissembler, a habitual liar, a person who has made his career thought ducking and diving and dissembling,” he told Good Morning Britain on TV.
“I’ve known twelve prime ministers in my lifetime and by a country mile Boris Johnson is the worst… this is way below the standard that the British public are entitled to expect. If there isn’t a basic level of trust in the most senior minister in the government it’s very difficult to operate a democratic polity at all,” he said.
Johnny boy, would you ever come off the fence? From this distance, the whole farrago was entertainment of a very high quality.
Y – YouTube’s most-watched of 2021
The video that was most uploaded in 2021 was from a chap who goes by the name of Mr Beast, and his video was entitled ‘I Spent 50 Hours Buried Alive’.
Mr Beast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, spent more than two days in a box underground for the benefit of his 84m YouTube subscribers. The result was that there were 151.7m views of him in the box (and counting). This doesn’t mean that 151.7m people viewed it because some people who look at this sort of thing do it more than once. “This was the most insane thing I’ve ever done,” Mr Beast captioned the video on YouTube.
This is modern culture. Get used to it.
Z – Zappone Katherine
Traditionally, since the advent of the A-Z of the year in this newspaper, back when Moses was in short trousers, the Z has often caused serious headaches. Not this year. There is one clear-cut winner, former government minister, Ms Zappone.
On July 26, Irish Examiner political editor Daniel McConnell broke the story of Ms Zappone’s appointment as a special envoy to the UN, which had been announced that that day’s Cabinet meeting.
“Taoiseach Micheal Martin was left ‘blindsided’ by Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney over the proposal to make former minister Katherine Zappone a government envoy,” Danny wrote.
“Ms Zappone has been appointed to the paid position of the Government’s special envoy on freedom of opinion and expression without any tendering process or competition.
“She will be paid a ‘middle management’ level on a pro-rata basis up to a maximum of 60 days a year and will also be entitled to engage in international travel as part of her role, all paid for by the taxpayer.”
So everybody thought when Mr McConnell was writing those words. The ink was hardly dry on the pages of the next day’s Examiner when all changed, changed utterly.
For many, this was a blatant example of cronyism, insiders and jobs for the boys and girls. The controversy persisted right through the dog days of August into September.
Ms Zappone sniffed the wind and resigned. Coveney, and to a lesser extent his party leader, came under severe pressure as a result of the affair. It all amounted to a major misstep by the government, tumbling opinion polls and a realisation that this kind of thing will no longer be tolerated.
Happy Christmas and let’s hope the new year is a good and safe one.
Unlimited access. Half the price.
Try unlimited access from only €1.50 a week
Already a subscriber? Sign in
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
