Essex Street Site, Temple Bar Dublin -Above, a list of institutions under investigation in the Mother and Baby home inquiry
Nora at Exchange Street Lower, Temple Bar West
Names of infants buried at Tuam Mother and Baby home
Tuam Babies
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Tag Archives: Artane Boys Band
SNAP support Artane Band Disbandment
SNAP (SURVIVORS NETWORK OF THOSE ABUSED BY PRIESTS)
The group at the centre of the recent Oscar winning film, Spotlight have today issued a statement in support of our motion to have the Artane Band disbanded. www.snapnetwork.org/
Barbara Blaine, the founder and president of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), an international advocacy group for survivors of clerical sexual abuse, has come out in support of a campaign to have the Artane School of Music disbanded.
SNAP is supporting a motion by Dublin councillor Mannix Flynn for the disbandment of the music school, an establishment jointly run by the Christian Brothers and the GAA. The band in its current form wear the original and traditional insignia and uniforms worn by the band from when it started at a time when children attending St Joseph’s Industrial School in Artane were subjected to sexual and physical abuse at the hands of the religious.
Speaking from Chicago in support of councillor Flynn, Blaine said: “I believe that so much suffering and pain has been caused to those who lived through the horrors of the industrial school in Artane. They have been through enough. We should be doing all we can to prevent any further pain and suffering.”
Response to Lord Mayor Brendan Carr
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.
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.
Statement: Disband the Artane Band
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
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
Mannix Flynn 