Irish Examiner view: The bigger picture regarding drugs

Although welcome, the seizure of a record haul of cocaine off Ireland's south coast will have little effect on the drugs menace unless drug users change their behaviour

Gardaí and deck hands on board the seized bulk cargo ship MV Matthew at Marino Point in Cork. Picture: Dan Linehan

As more details emerge from the seizure of the MV Matthew earlier this week off the Irish coast, it’s easy to get caught up in the operational minutiae. Enjoyable though it is to learn of frantic drug smugglers trying to burn their cargo of cocaine before the authorities get a chance to impound it, that is hardly the significant lesson to take from these events. 

It would be wise to reflect on what Further and Higher Education Minister Simon Harris said in the Dáil earlier this year about drug addiction.  In a response to a question from Fianna Fáil TD Brendan Smith, Mr Harris said:

There is a direct link between snorting a line or taking a pill and murder, assault, criminality, and misery. We need to get real about this. Drug use is not victimless, far from it. 

Mr Harris added that the growing acceptance of drug-taking as part of socialising was another worrying development.

This point can hardly be overstated and certainly cannot be contradicted. The extent to which drug taking has been normalised is worrying in itself, but also because it shows a disturbing ability to disregard the realities lurking behind those drugs.

Harris’s statement that buying drugs funds criminals who are killing people is an assertion of fact, yet those buying drugs can accommodate that truth for the sake of their own enjoyment.

The sheer amount of drugs seized off the coast this week is an illustration of the size of the problem, and the challenge involved in facing up to and combatting that problem directly. 

The first part of that challenge is one for individuals to undertake themselves. It is for people taking drugs to acknowledge the link between what they are consuming and the Irish soldiers who risked their lives to land on a ship in heavy seas a few days ago. 

It is proverbially difficult to change people’s thinking, but here the choice is stark. 

If individuals aren’t willing to make those changes in their behaviour then this week’s success will be an outlier — a brief headline with no long-term impact on a growing problem.

Holding social media firms to account 

The tragic death of a teenager in Co Clare recently should give all pause. Sarah Mescall, aged 14, a second-year pupil at Coláiste Muire in Ennis, fell ill on Friday and was transferred to Crumlin Children’s Hospital in Dublin, where she died on Monday. 

The local community has been shocked by the death of Sarah Mescall, a second-year student at Coláiste Muire in Ennis. It is believed she may have participated in a ‘challenge’ on the social media platform, Tiktok. Picture: rip.ie

It is believed she may have seen others doing a social media ‘challenge’, or been challenged herself to do so, on the platform Tiktok. Her passing has plunged her local community into shock and sadness.

It is worth noting that Tiktok has issued a statement on the death of Sarah Mescall, sympathising with the family and adding, in relation to this ‘challenge’:  “Content of this nature is prohibited on our platform and would be removed if found. We will continue to prioritise protecting and supporting our community, working with expert partners and providing safety resources to those who need them.”

Readers will note a stark difference between the social media company’s use of the term ‘community’ and its applicability in Clare this week, where the component parts of a real community, such as Sarah Mescall’s local school and sports club, have rallied around her family.

The behaviour of many social media companies needs to be examined closely, but their ability to distance themselves from incidents like this deserves particularly close scrutiny.

We are expected to believe an organisation such as Tiktok “prioritise(s) protecting and supporting our community, working with expert partners and providing safety resources” on one hand, while on the other we are aware of how poor its track record is in reality.

Just a few weeks ago, Tiktok was fined €345m, for instance. Why? For breaking EU data law in its handling of children’s accounts, including failing to shield underage users’ content from public view: the Data Protection Commission said that Tiktok had committed multiple breaches of GDPR rules.

Social media companies enjoy all the benefits of mass participation yet seem reluctant to assume any of the related responsibilities. When children are exploited and manipulated by such companies, holding them to account becomes a matter of urgency.

McIlroy gets the last word

Located a few miles outside Rome, the Marco Simone Golf and Country Club might seem a relatively unlikely venue
for the Ryder Cup, but then golf has been gathering strange bedfellows at a rate of knots lately.

The most obvious example is the LIV golf tour, funded by the Saudi Public Investment Fund and widely derided as the most obvious instance of sportswashing imaginable. The motivation for joining the highly lucrative LIV tour is understandable, despite some embarrassing ventures into geopolitical explication from golfers discussing Saudi Arabia.

To participate in the LIV Tour, golfers must resign their PGA Tour memberships and are thus not eligible to play in the Ryder Cup, which means several high profile players will be missing this weekend.

Ireland’s Rory McIlroy reminded those players recently of the results of their decision: “I think this week, of all weeks, it’s going to hit home with them that they are not here and I think they are going to miss being here more than we’re missing them.”

Of course, the proposed LIV-PGA merger may make such considerations moot in the near future, but until then McIlroy’s smooth dismissal remains the last word ahead of the competition. The best of luck to Europe, who carry the hopes of a continent into battle this weekend.