Democracy day?

THERE is, of course, an organisation due to meet shortly which might possibly have the intellectual heft and diplomatic subtlety to make a decision on Rule 42.

It has centuries of intricate debate behind it and the members of its version of Central Council even resemble the GAA’s in age and outlook. However, given the choice between electing the spiritual leader of one billion Catholics and adjudicating on whether to open a sports stadium, the College of Cardinals seem to have taken the easy option.

The ancient Greeks, unsurprisingly, had a precise word for the situation we find ourselves in: aporia, a debate which ends in deadlock because neither side can offer an answer which is definitively correct, and frankly that sounds a fair summary of the Croke Park/Rule 42 issue. Of course, a smart alec could suggest going to Athens and see what happened to the modern Greeks’ stadium after the Olympics, but that’s a deadlock of a different colour.

The original meaning of “aporia” is the sense of being caught on a path, unable to go forward or back, which is an even sharper image for the entire debate. Many GAA members are a little unhappy that the focus of the argument is on this particular bumpy stretch of the track, rather than the relative smoothness a few hundred yards further back. They’re the people who point out that the GAA is being asked to bail out the local branches of two worldwide professional sports which, while supposedly flourishing in the country, haven’t developed a modern stadium between them for showpiece events ... and yet the GAA, which has a modern stadium, is getting all the negative publicity. Who’s responsible for the IRFU and FAI’s PR - Harry Houdini?

Still, we’re stuck where we are on this path. We can’t look too far forward until Rule 42 is put to bed, because opening up Croke Park is keeping far more significant problems at the back of the queue. Insurance, volunteerism, non-sporting distractions, discipline, player payment - these are the issues giving ordinary GAA members a headache. It’s likely, however, that informed debate on these issues won’t be the subject of moronic radio phone-ins, which should give the man in the street an indication, in reverse, of their importance.

When it comes to the discussion of Rule 42, GAA president, Sean Kelly said during the week that people had probably been surprised by the level of consultation on the issue in the GAA. That would have seemed an unnecessary comment until you saw what happened at the Cork County Board meeting.

It was shameful of the board to allow clubs to meet if it knew that there was no prospect of a mandate to change being given. It was an insult to allow the very people whose unglamorous work keeps a huge amateur effort going to labour under the illusion that they were involved in a consultative process. Members who forsook a night’s overtime in work or who missed out on an evening with their families in order to make it to their club’s Rule 42 meeting will get over it. They have to accommodate those little inconveniences every week if their club is to survive. What they may not get over so quickly is the feeling that this particular evening was all for nothing because the county board knew they were wasting their breath, and all that that implies.

Sean Kelly’s choice of ‘consultation’ rather than ‘debate’ was correct, too. Much of the Rule 42 talk was guff and bluster, people taking their prejudices out of the kennel and giving them a chance to run around and bark. Nothing wrong with that, but a debate involves the reasoned exchange of perspective and opinion with a view to changing people’s minds; if that applies to your most recent discussion of Rule 42 you’re moving in more elevated circles than us. Flann O’Brien used to say we had plenty of people who were willing to die for Ireland - was there no-one willing to live for Ireland? Similarly, everyone was willing to talk about Rule 42, but how many were prepared to listen? After all that talk, what we need now is a decision. If nothing else, we’ve learned that while it’s good to talk, it’d be great to decide.

And there can be only one decision. No matter how much smoke and mirrors is being deployed, it is beyond argument that the majority of GAA people would, at the very least, like Central Council to be empowered to lease out Croke Park and Croke Park alone for other sports while Lansdowne is being renovated.

Facts and figures? All of Leinster, all of Connacht with the possible exception of Mayo, all of Munster with the definite exception of Cork, even one-third of Ulster; they’re all for opening up. That looks like a majority to us no matter how you slice it.

The opposing minority - sizeable, but still a minority - will need to rethink their position. If they’re against change so be it, but they’ll need to work to implement a decision they disagree with personally, if that change is made by the majority. Just like the pro-change camp did when the decision went against them in the past.

The ancient Greeks had an idea about that kind of thing, too: democracy. It would be good to see it in action today.