Monthly Archives: September 2016

Festival of Feminism – Ennis ‘Silence+Voice’

Posted on by
6
Festival of Feminism
 ‘Silence+Voice’
 8th and 9th of October
daly-family-photos

The Daly family from Limerick.  A family of women steeped in strength, true feminism, and republican tradition.  

  • Two days of key note speakers talking about Trauma, Silence and Voice
  • The speakers are Bríd Keenan, Belfast based expert on trauma
  • Siobhan Madden Social Researcher, Feminist Activist speaking about voice, silence, memory and knowledge
  •  Dr Micheline Sheehy Skeffington, speaking about her Grandparents and campaign for gender equality in third level institutions
  • Mary McDermott Radical Educator and Feminist Philosopher who will speak about the interaction betweeen social and personal change
  • These speakers and key themes are interwoven with music, poetry, drama song and dance, and most importantly conversation and tea….
  •  €25.00 per individual for the two days.. plus a light lunch, plus a creche, plus ISL interpreters and for those that cannot afford it we have a limited amount of free tickets….so it would be nice to entice those on the East Coast over to the West for two days.

  • https://www.eventbrite.ie/e/silence-voice-a-festival-of-feminisms-tickets-26309500424.

Bike Stuff n’ Gadgets awards

Posted on by
Reply

Five Smart Projects Receive Funding to Improve Cycling in Dublin

Dublin City Council and Enterprise Ireland announced the winners of the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) competition at The House of Lords, Bank of Ireland, College Green this evening.

The competition, which was launched by Smart Dublin last March, sought to find smart technology solutions to help improve and scale up cycling across Dublin. The challenge generated 98 expressions of interest, 23 proposals with 14 dragons den style pitches.

Five companies were selected to receive funding of up to €12,500 and supports from Dublin City Council to research and demonstrate the viability of their smart solution.

bicycle-keating

The chosen companies and their smart solutions are:

 

  • Ambie introducing BikeLook which monitors bicycle usage and deters and detects bicycle theft

 

  • Fluidedge introducing Liberty Bell, a bell that allows cyclists to record actual or perceived obstacles to aid safe cycling in Dublin

 

  • Hindnseek presents a low power device attached to a bicycle that generates real time data with can be integrated with other data sources

 

  • Limeforge Ltd. offers the See.Sense Tracker providing a ‘find your iphone’ like capability allowing cyclists to easily track their stolen bikes

 

  • M2C Smartcharge Ltd. introduces a tracking, logging and data harvesting system for use with bicycles in an urban area aiding the cyclist in predicting the ease of a journey, safety along the way and creating a secure parking facility and the end of the journey

 

Commenting at the announcement Dublin City Council’s Chief Executive, Owen Keegan said “A key aspect of our Smart Dublin initiative is to test new ways for the Dublin Local Authorities to pilot and understand the possibilities of using innovative technologies to solve city challenges.  We are genuinely impressed with the level of ideas that were presented through the SBIR process and look forward to working with these entrepreneurs to pilot and hopefully scale their products using Dublin as a test bed.”

Kevin Sherry, Divisional Manager, Enterprise Ireland commented “Enterprise Ireland is excited to work with Dublin City Council on this initiative, and we congratulate the phase one winners on their innovative solutions which will improve the cycling experience and safety of bicycle users in urban areas.”

David Timoney, Dublin Cycling Campaign who are supporting the initiative added “There are real opportunities to use these new low cost innovations to better understand cycling patterns and experiences.  This in turn will allow for more evidence based decisions by the City on cycling infrastructure. The data will hopefully strengthen the already strong arguments for increased transport spends on cycling.  Furthermore solutions to address cycle theft in Dublin through smart tracker devices have the potential to dramatically reduce bike theft levels currently estimated at a staggering €20,000 per annum in Dublin alone.”

The companies have three months to develop their solution to pre-prototype stage, after which some will be selected for further funding (up to €25,000 each) to complete their prototype solutions.

ENDS

 For further information contact:

Jamie Cudden, Smart City Programme Manager, Dublin City Council M 087 783 5411

Notes to the Editor:

Details of the successful proposals are:

Ambie: BikeLook is a smart city solution to monitor bicycle usage and to deter and detect bicycle theft. Using low power radio (Bluetooth Smart) to track bicycles in the city. Bluetooth trackers’ effectiveness is usually limited by the radio range between the sensor and a mobile phone, but through strategic location of listening posts at bicycle parking, junctions and on street sweepers, the opportunity exists to monitor the volume and direction of cycle traffic in the city.

 

Fluidedge: ‘Liberty Bell’ – A smart bicycle bell that allow citizens who cycle record actual or perceived obstacles to safe cycling in Dublin. Hotspots are highlighted in real-time and authorities are alerted to poor road conditions or poor behaviour by other road users.

 

Hidnseek: A low power device attached to a bicycle that has the ability to generate real time data which can be integrated with existing data sources and information to create an overall accurate picture of the cycling experience in Dublin. The device can measure GPS co-ordinates, speed and environmental conditions using the low cost sigfox network.

 

Limeforge Ltd – See.Sense: The See.Sense Tracker will provide a ‘find your iphone’ like capability using LPWA and GPS, allowing cyclists to easily track their stolen bike anywhere across the city. At the same time, our patent-pending use of sensor technology enables the crowd sourcing of real-time data about cyclist’s journeys over a wide range of variables. Two variants will be created – one for use on personal bikes and one for integration into city bikes alongside our ICON intelligent bike light.

 

M2C Smartcharge Ltd: A tracking, logging and data harvesting system for use with bicycles in a metropolitan area. The system will endeavour to aid the cyclist in predicting the ease of a journey (front end), safety along the way with geographic analysis (Journey Safety) and create a secure parking facility at the end of the journey (destination management)

_________________________________

 

Smart Dublin is an initiative of the four Dublin Local Authorities to engage with smart technology providers, researchers and citizens to solve city challenges and improve city life.

 

Enterprise Ireland is the government organisation responsible for the development and growth of Irish enterprises in world markets. It supports sustainable economic growth, regional development and secure employment.

 

Dublin Cycling Campaign The Dublin Cycling Campaign is an independent, voluntary cycling advocacy group that has been working to improve the city for all cyclists since 1993 www.dublincycling.ie

 

What is Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)? SBIR refers to the public procurement of research and development on new innovative solutions before they are commercially available. It involves different suppliers competing through different phases of development, while the risks and benefits are shared between the procurers and the suppliers under market conditions.

Things to see -Farcry Productions- Culture Night Dublin

Posted on by
3

If you are heading out into the heart of the city of Dublin tonight for Culture night do check out various sites by  Farcry Productions (www.farcryproductions.ie)

  •  Something to Live For

    Parliament Street/Cork St/Dame Street
  1. ThomasReadPoster.qxd

    Something to live for – window’s acknowledging the contribution made by individuals to the establishment of the Irish Republic. Originally installed 2006-2008

    somethingbynight

    Pidge Duggen, Ellen Walsh and other great citizens who made this country.

    There has been a special guest put up in one of the windows just for Culture night

    something-to-live-for

 

  • Close by the previous installation, you will find SOMEBODY’S CHILD, Essex Street, Temple Bar West.   This work lists the names of the children buried in a pit in Tuam, Bons Secours Mother and Baby home, Co Galway.

nora_somebody

somebodys-child-monday

Bon Secours Mother and Baby home, Tuam Co Galway
Bon Secours grounds where 800 babies were found

 

 

 

  • THANK YOU – GO RAIBH MAITH AGAT – Georges Street, opposite The George
Arabic translation of The Proclamation
Thank you -Go Raibh Maith Agat

Proclamation translated into Arabic, Chinese, Gaeilge, French, Polish and Russian.  To find the German translation you will have to walk to The Oak Pub on Dame Street and look up above the door!

thank-you3

 

  • CHILDREN TO YOUR FLAG, NEVER IN DARKNESS – Video installation, Dame Street (Stand at the bottom of Georges Street and look up)

A video installation on Dame Street – Georges street of 13 women who contributed greatly to Irish culture, heritage and the establishment of the Irish Republic.

see http://www.1916onehundred.ie/about.html

 

  • Also on the front of the Mercantile Pub, Dame Street you will come across the banners of 7 Women and 7 Men

 

 

 

Response to Lord Mayor Brendan Carr

Posted on by
Reply

September 15th 2016

Press Statement from Dublin Independent councillor Mannix Flynn

Mannix Flynn, an Independent councillor in Dublin City Council has today hit back at Dublin’s Lord Mayor over claims that his calls for the disbandment of the Artane School of Music are “upsetting the vast majority of Dubliners”.

In an article in one of today’s newspapers, Brendan Carr, the Labour Lord Mayor, was quoted as lambasting Flynn over his motion: “[Flynn is] raising the issue over the way kids were treated years ago, but the impact he’s having on the kids in that band at the moment is something that any city councillor should be ashamed of”.

In a statement issued today, Flynn has called on Cllr Carr to withdraw his remarks and separate his opinions from that of the Lord Mayor’s office, a title which should remain impartial and unbiased.

“If Cllr Carr would take a moment to discuss the matter with me he would understand that the Artane School of Music, in its current form, has evolved out of misery and brutality forced upon innocent children who attended St Joseph’s Industrial School in Artane.

“It is not accurate for Cllr Carr to insinuate that I am out to cause hurt to any of the children involved in the current band. The debate is much deeper than that.

“While the Lord Mayor has every right to call on crowds to cheer on the band at Sunday’s All-Ireland final, he is quite wrong in congratulating the band’s 130-years of ‘proud association with the GAA and Croke Park’. Those who attended St Joseph’s School and who were in the band attest to the monstrosities they and other boys endured during their time there. The band was more often than not an escape from the degradation and neglect other boys suffered as they undertook menial chores on a day-to-day basis. Being in the band meant you could at least wash occasionally and couldn’t be beaten on the face, but it did not exempt you from the sordid sexual abuse that was rife in the school.

photo-artane-1969

1969 – Artane Boys Band travel to America to raise funds.  They are in blazers and not the usual uniform as the band room had been burned down.  Former band member Patrick Walsh (Irish SOCA) is in the front row aged 15 years.  The notorious Brother Joseph O Connor  (Joe Boy) took this photo, Shannon Airport.    

 

“I have come under criticism for raising this issue but if you were a child who endured any amount of time in an industrial school, you would be reminded of the horrors that took place every time the Artane band took to the pitch on match days.

“And I’m not alone. This week, members of Irish SOCA  (Survivors of Child Abuse) came out in support of my cause. Like me, these were men forced into industrial schools and some of those were even in the band in Artane and experienced first-hand the exploitation and manipulation of children by the religious.

“Will the Lord Mayor acknowledge that his apathy and indifference to their suffering is causing much hurt?”

ENDS

New Motion lodged on Monday 12th September to Dublin City Council:

That this monthly meeting of Dublin City Council, mindful of the shameful legacy of institutional abuse in industrial schools documented in the Commission of Inquiry into Child Abuse, call on the Artane School of Music to disband as a matter of human rights.

The School of Music is an establishment jointly run by the Christian Brothers and the GAA, yet encompasses the original and traditional insignia and uniforms that hark back to an age of chronic sexual and physical abuse at the hands of the religious.

The Artane Boys Band was used as a front to hide the gross inhumanity that took place at St Joseph’s School in Artane and other industrial schools run by the Christian Brothers at home and abroad. The harrowing memories of these institutions for abuse victims are regularly flaunted without care or recognition at national sporting events in Croke Park in the form of the present Artane band.

A disbandment of the trust would sever all ties with the former industrial school and its brutal history and in doing so, would acknowledge the ongoing collective suffering of so many.

An tAthair Pádraig Ó Fiannachta -Oidhreacht

Posted on by
Reply

Tonight celebrate Culture Night and those who make it.

I was privileged to know, and have some of my work translated by, the magnificent Irish scholar, priest, poet, publisher and sage Pádraig O Fiannachta.  His cultural breath still breathes on this great land of ours and its influence gives life throughout the cultural world.

The text below is a translation from our 2006 work ‘Letting Go of That which you most Ardently Desire’ an artwork that dealt with the issue of armed struggle in Irish history and our recent decommissioning process.

An tAthair O Fiannachta passed away in July of this year into the mythical.

                                                  Ní fheicimíd a leithéid arís ann

gunbutts                                      

 

  The Grip That Binds Us

As human beings we are constantly trying to deal and come to terms with internalised trauma.  Being unable or unwilling to resolve certain issues, we cling even tighter to them and, though we yearn for peace and rest and progress, we can’t seem to let go of that which threatens to destroy us.

What is it like to walk away from conflict, to put your weapons beyond use?  To dwell upon all the years committed to the never ending cycle of fright, fight, flight.  Resentment, hatred, fury and denial all form part of the energy field that has dominated us human beings for thousands of years.
Along with the hardware, these emotions need to be deactivated if the grip that has bound us for generations to armed conflict is to be loosened finally and permanently.

Letting go is always a process of loss, a process of grieving. The dawning realisation that you cannot retake what you’ve reconciled to let go of.  And the final, slow acceptance that it is no longer of service to you anyway.
The grip that binds us is a reflective process which offers participants a chance to engage with the emotional dynamics  that underlie letting go and the emergence of something new.

© Gerard Mannix Flynn

Glas-snaidhm orainn

Bímid, mar dhaoine daonna, de shíor ar gor ar chréachtaí inmheánaithe, agus ag iarraidh bheith réidh leo. Toisc nach féidir linn, nó nach toil linn, fadhbanna áirithe a réiteach, is daingne fós ár ngreim orthu; cé go mbímid ag tnúth le síocháin, le suaimhneas agus le dul chun cinn, ní bhíonn ar ár gcumas, de réir dealraimh, scaradh leis an rud seo a bhíonn á bhagairt sinn a scrios.

Conas a mhothaíonn sé cúl a thabhairt le coimhlint, d’airm a chur ó mhaith?
Bheith ag cuimhneamh gan stad ar na blianta gan áireamh gafa ag sceon agus comhrac, tóir agus teitheamh, teitheamh agus tóir.
Tá fuath agus fíoch, fearg agus faltanas i réim i ngarraí treafa polaitíochta Éireann leis na cianta cairbreacha.

Ní hiad na hairm chogaidh amháin atá le cur ó mhaith agus le scrios ach freisin na mothúcháin úd go léir a nasc sinn, glúin ar ghlúin, le cogaíocht an ghunna – táid le scaoileadh go deo faoi dheireadh thiar thall.

Is geall le cailliúint, le caoineadh, i gcónaí rud a scaoileadh uait. Tuigeann tú de réir a chéile nach féidir leat greim a fháil go deo arís ar an rud ar ar réitigh tú scaradh leis. Glacann tú leis de réir a chéile nach aon tairbhe duit é cibé scéal é.

An glas-snaidhm a cheanglaíonn sinn, is próiséas meabhrach é a thugann caoi dóibh siúd a bhíonn páirteach ann dul i ngleic leis na fórsaí mothaithe is bonn don scaoileadh ar shiúl agus do shaolú na nua-bhreithe.

© Gerard Mannix Flynn
Aistriúcháin – Fr. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta

 

 

Statement: Disband the Artane Band

Posted on by
4

September 12th 2016

Press Statement from Dublin Independent councillor Mannix Flynn

Mannix Flynn, an Independent councillor in Dublin City Council has today withdrawn a motion due for presentation at a South East Area Committee meeting for the Artane band to be renamed.

In its place, Cllr Flynn has submitted a new motion calling for the disbandment of the Artane School of Music, a venture jointly established by the Christian Brothers and the GAA, that continues the legacy of the Artane Boys Band.

Cllr Flynn is aware that those against his initial motion claim his endeavours have caused hurt to those presently involved with the band. However, Cllr Flynn, who himself attended industrial schools in Ireland said the Artane band’s continued use of original-style uniforms, insignia and associations to the school cause untold hurt for the many victims of childhood abuse at the hands of religious orders in Ireland.

Please find the new motion below, submitted today for October’s monthly meeting of all Dublin City Councillors.

NEW MOTION

That this monthly meeting of Dublin City Council, mindful of the shameful legacy of institutional abuse in industrial schools documented in the Commission of Inquiry into Child Abuse, call on the Artane School of Music to disband as a matter of human rights.

The School of Music is an establishment jointly run by the Christian Brothers and the GAA, yet encompasses the original and traditional insignia and uniforms that hark back to an age of chronic sexual and physical abuse at the hands of the religious.

The Artane Boys Band was used as a front to hide the gross inhumanity that took place at St Joseph’s School in Artane and other industrial schools run by the Christian Brothers at home and abroad. The harrowing memories of these institutions for abuse victims are regularly flaunted without care or recognition at national sporting events in Croke Park in the form of the present Artane band.

A disbandment of the trust would sever all ties with the former industrial school and its brutal history and in doing so, would acknowledge the ongoing collective suffering of so many.

ENDS

artane-boys-band

The Artane Boys band on route to America to raise funds for The Christian Brothers in 1962 the image was used later on the album that came out in 1969