University
Express
Volume 24 | Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020
“Initiatives like the UCC Bystander Intervention Programme are tackling harmful behaviours such as image based sexual crime through education and empowerment.” - pg 6 -
UCCExpress.ie
“Like an old and trusted friend, the Holly Bough will always be there for you’ begins the 2020 message on their website, and this year more than most, the comfort of this Cork tradition’s continuance was felt.” - p18 -
“Online shopping in Ireland was at 51% the past month, overtaking in-person shopping, not surprising due to the Level Five lockdown” - p32 -
COUNTRY AND COLLEGES EXIT LEVEL 5 FOR CHRISTMAS
Writes Maeve McTaggart, News Editor After six weeks of Level 5 restrictions, the reopening process of retail, restaurants and other amenities began on December 1st as part of the government’s Safe Christmas Plan. The nation is now operating under Level 3 restrictions with the festive season allowing for a number of exceptions - much of these were against the advice of the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET). Galleries, museums and cinemas have opened in a departure from the original Level 3 restrictions, as have restaurants and gastro-pubs. Places of worship have reopened with a congregation of 50 peo-
ple allowed and inter-county travel will be permitted from 18th December for those travelling home for Christmas. From this date, gatherings between up to 3 households can occur in homes and gardens. The guidance on face masks has also been updated by the government with Taoiseach Micháel Martin announcing that in addition to wearing masks indoors, “people will be asked to also wear their masks outdoors on busy streets, within crowded indoor workplaces and in places of worship.” This first Christmas with Covid-19 will be different to any before it and the health advice is conscious of this, reminding people to celebrate safely. “Avoid hugs, kisses and handshakes as people arrive,” the guidelines read,
“don’t share items like crockery and very precarious position where we are glassware; avoid sharing food; wear a vulnerable to a sudden sharp increase mask when cooking and serving food.” in incidence.” Dr Holohan warned of the impact intergenerational mixIt is hoped that such advice will curb the ing during the Christmas period will spread of the virus as much as possible have on “our particularly vulnerable” during the Christmas season, as another health service due to an increase in bout of Level 5 restrictions is unlikely hospitalisations and ICU admittance. to achieve the public buy-in and enthusiasm it would need. Daily case num- Education remains a priority for both bers have been cut by 75 per cent since NPHET and the Irish government as early October, from a peak of around childcare, primary, and secondary 1,200 to under 300 daily cases - but this schools continue to operate in accorfalls short of the target public health dance with health guidelines until they officials had held of 50-100 cases a day. break for Christmas holidays. Further, higher and adult education inThe chief medical officer Dr Tony Ho- stitutions such as UCC remain remote lohan has written in a letter to the gov- during the modified Level 3 period. ernment that the relaxation of Level 3 restrictions will lead to a difficult scenario in January 2021: “Ireland is in a Cover Story Continued on Page 3....
Editorial
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Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Editorial Team
A Letter to the Reader
Editor-in-Chief – Fiona Keeley (Editor@UCCExpress.ie)
Writes Fiona Keeley, Editor-in-Chief Dear reader,
News Editor – Maeve McTaggart (News@UCCExpress.ie)
Thank you. You have heard me say this before but you are a huge part of the reason that we put effort into each issue we share with you. To tell stories, to start a conversation, and to lift spirits and bring some happiness and normality into your lives each fortnight. You have helped me to navigate through the maze of the last number of months and for that I will be forever grateful, thank you. This year has served to challenge us in many ways and as we approach the festive season it is imperative to acknowledge the unimaginable pain suffered by people, friends, and loved ones this year and to pay tribute to those that we have lost; those fabled rose-tinted glasses may not take effect for a while.
Designer – Fiona Cremins (Design@UCCExpress.ie) Features Editor – Elisha Carey (Features@UCCExpress.ie) Sports Editor – Liam Grainger (Sport@UCCExpress.ie) Opinion Editor – Rían Browne (Opinion@UCCExpress.ie) Eagarthóir Gaeilge – Édith De Faoite (Gaeilge@UCCExpress.ie)
To everyone who has contributed to these pages over the past few months, thank you. The quality of the articles I read for each issue serve as a testament to the spirit that lies behind students and student media here at UCC. It would be remiss of me not to acknowledge the extraordinary team that put so much time and energy into creating content for these pages. To borrow a quote from Aristotle, ‘the whole is greater than the sum of its parts’- a relatable quote to many scenarios in life. I have seen proof that their imagination knows no bounds, a quality that astonishes and inspires me. As I was finalising the pieces for this issue the question ‘what does University Express represent?’ fluttered through my mind. I’m going to give you the answer that occurred to me, it represents you. You, the living, breathing student body and despite our physical distance from each other in the past number of months, we are tied together in a more nuanced fashion; by goals, dreams, friendship and imagination. I am looking forward to the day when we can meet again under normal circumstances and when that day comes we can sit down in our favourite coffee shop and catch up on all that we have missed - instead of conversing through pages in a newspaper.
Online Editor – Edel Lonergan (Online@UCCExpress.ie)
The darkness this year has brought our lives may not leave in a hurry but for now let me wish you a peaceful and a hopeful Christmas and every good fortune in the New Year.
Marketing Executive – Fiona Keeley (Marketing@UCCExpress.ie)
Until 2021,
Webmaster – Jonathan Hanley (Webmaster@UCCExpress.ie)
Fiona Keeley editor@uccexpress.ie
Photographers – Caoimhe Leahy, Célem Deegan (Photographers@uccexpress.ie) Byline Editor – Fergal Smiddy (Byline@ UCCExpress.ie) (Deputy Editor) Food & Health – Maeve O’Keeffe (Food@UCCExpress.ie) Arts & Literature Editor – Imasha Costa (Arts@UCCExpress.ie) Gaming Editor – Hugo Blair (Gaming @UCCExpress.ie) Music Editor – Cathal Donovan O’Neill (Music@UCCExpress) Fashion Editor – Maeve O’Sullivan (fashion@uccexpress.ie) Film & Television Editor – Kyran Leahy (Screen@UCCExpress.ie) Sexpress Editor – Jack Wrixon (Sexpress@uccexpress.ie) Deputy Sports – Sam Curtin (Deputysports@uccexpress.ie) Deputy News – Maebh McCarthy (Deputynews@uccexpress.ie)
A Full Resolution Writes Maeve McTaggart, News Editor On March 12th I was sitting at one of those triangular tables in the Hub, attempting to conclude an assignment on a question I wasn’t sure I ever got around to answering, with the Taoiseach’s address playing in another tab. The announcement of a global pandemic is one of the most surreal - but also most hopeless - soundtracks to study to. I pressed ‘submit’ on Canvas, walked past the swelling Boole library… and that was it: my last day of normality, of life without needing or knowing the language of a pandemic. Nine months later, we have managed to fit our mouths around ‘social distancing,’ ‘cocooning,’ ‘contact tracing’, and get through two bouts of lockdown while becoming disconcertingly used to knowing and meeting people from the shoulders up, in a tiny box on Zoom. December begins the process of reflection before the New Year, but what was missed and lost this year hurts more than the usual abandoned resolution. Walking through campus, masked and pre-booked, feels bizarre: an uncomfortable mix of nostalgia and something I can’t really put a name to. It’s weird and sad thinking about “your twenties” and having a big chunk of memory-making missing. What did you learn about yourself, those around you, about what is important to you? Did you need a break, a reset, a full-on stop? Has 2020 changed your mind about what 2021 should look like? What are you grateful for? What kept you going? What tore you apart? What put you back together again? Kylie Jenner was a prophet premature in 2016: “this year is really about, like the year of just realising stuff. And everyone around me, we’re all just realising things.” Like, I get it. There are not many words for 2020, I am glad it’s over - but I am also glad to have learned from what it has shown us, what stuff we’ve had to realise... you know? I hope the Express rooted you to campus for the time you spent reading it this semester, and that you go easy on yourself as you reflect on the last 12 months - even the three before the world seemed to fall apart and after we all held it together.
Deputy Features – Eoghan O’Donnell (Deputyfeatures@uccexpress.ie) Staff Writer: Julie Landers
news@uccexpress.ie #uccexpress
Stay safe and keep realising stuff,
Maeve McTaggart
News
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Cover Story Continued... Certain campus services such as the library have remained open as essential to education during Level 5 restrictions, but the majority of teaching has continued to occur online as it has since the beginning of Semester 1. UCCSU President Naoise Crowley has welcomed “that UCC is one of the most active campuses in Ireland at present, as well as having the longest opening hours of any library in the country.” Boole Library currently opens from 8am-10.30pm throughout the week, with plans to extend opening hours from 8am1.30am for the majority of the week in Semester 2. The Students’ Union President has also detailed the SU plans to host a Christmas Market on campus and a new space called the UCC Garden to hold social events when national guidelines allow. The SU President has also, however, pressed the university on the need for clarification about Semester 2, and what it will look like for students.
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1 in 5 young women have experienced abusive relationships, Women’s Aid report finds Writes Maeve McTaggart, News Editor
On December 1st, Interim President John O’Halloran and Interim Registrar Stephen Byrne delivered such clarity in an update sent to all students: “In order to provide some degree of certainty for the New Year, we have made the decision that for now, the next semester will operate in a similar way to Semester 1.” “Our ambition is to increase in-person teaching and face-to-face activities on campus, should evolving public health guidelines permit it and, if this is the case, we will make every effort to do so.” Interim President and Registrar issued the news with an acknowledgement of the “potential disappointment” such plans may cause for students. The method of teaching planned for UCC in Semester 2 is aligned with hopes for on-campus, small-group teaching shared by the Irish Universities Association whose Director General Jim Miley said: “Our absolute priority is to try to do whatever possible to improve the student experience at this most difficult time.”
New research surveying young Irish people has revealed a sobering reality about the nature of their relationships: 20% of young people under the age of 25 have experienced physical, sexual, and online intimate partner abuse. The report, entitled ‘One in Five,’ was published by Women’s Aid in collaboration with Red C on the United Nations Day Opposing Violence Against Women and “reveals stark and disturbing findings,” according to Women’s Aid CEO Sarah Benson. Launched with President Michael D. Higgins and Minister for Justice Helen McEntee in attendance, the research showed that 51% of women who had experienced abuse in an intimate relationship were younger than 18 when the abuse began. Nine out of ten women who reported abuse detailed the experience of emotional abuse - behaviour which
functions to establish a power imbalance in the relationship, often with detrimental psychological effects more serious and long-term than physical violence. Over half of those women who reported intimate partner abuse detailed experiences of physical abuse, with 1 in 3 women experiencing severe forms of violence such as choking, punching, and burning at the hands of a current or former partner. The experiences recorded in the report contributes evidence to a trend revealed the recent leak of thousands of images of image-based sexual abuse on social media channels. Under investigation by the Garda Commissioner, the incident highlights the worrying prevalence of online abuse in young people’s lives and relationships. 1 in 2 women who have experienced intimate partner abuse have endured online abuse, the report found. Online abuse refers to harassment, the monitoring of
social media accounts by an abuser, stalking through an online platform, the taking or sharing of intimate images without consent, or the threat to share these images. Alongside detailing the devastating effect online abuse can have, CEO of Women’s Aid Sarah Benson discounts non-legal and non-culture changing methods of ending this form of abuse: “It [is not] a reasonable solution to ask a young person to ‘opt out’ or switch off their own social media presence, as this is so deeply integrated into their social lives. The victim should not suffer further for another person’s abusive actions.” The full report can be accessed at toointoyou.ie, Women’s Aid can be contacted at 1800 341 900 and by texting ACTION to 50300, you can donate €4 to support their work.
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News
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Consumers urged to shop locally, ethically and Irish in the run up to Christmas Writes Maebh McCarthy, Deputy News Editor Black Friday, which occurs on the day after the American holiday, Thanksgiving, has garnered huge popularity on an international scale in recent years; it is now seen as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. A popular explanation of the phrase is the point of the year when retailers begin to turn a profit, thus going from being ‘in the red’ to being ‘in the black.’ Black Friday is no longer recognised by shoppers as a one day phenomenon, the Monday immediately following Black Friday is known as Cyber Monday; which has now morphed into Cyber Week. Black Friday this year fell on Friday November 29th 2020. Due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, Ireland was still at Level 5 of the Government’s Framework. This meant that all non-essential retail was closed to the public. Instead, many businesses opted to offer online deals through their social media pages and websites. However, it was mainly international corporations, such as Amazon, who engaged with the ‘shopping holiday.’ Research from Adobe suggests that Irish consumers spend about 250 million euro on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, with 60% of Irish people shopping online in the sales. The environmental impact of Black Friday has come to the forefront this year. The US Postal Service estimates that it will deliver 900 million packages, the week after Black Friday and Cyber Monday. An Post are already delivering 2.5 million parcels per week in Ireland, with the figure set to rise as the Christmas period kicks in. Furthermore, 60% of the clothing produced by fast-fashion companies will end up in incinerators or landfills within the next year and when it comes to electronics, only 20% of materials can be recycled, leaving the rest to leak out toxins in a landfill. In addition to this, according to Which?, nearly nine in ten products on sale during Cyber week were found to be on offer previously, for the same price or cheaper. Many news outlets and representative groups for retailers urged con-
sumers to consider supporting Irish businesses this year, by promoting ‘Green Friday’ as a replacement to supporting the international market and conglomerates. Champion Green estimated that if consumers spend an extra 50 million euro with local businesses, it would give the economy a boost of 180 million euro. Retail Excellence, the largest representative body for the retail industry in Ireland, called on the public to support Irish businesses after the worst retail year in history. The retailer Debenhams went into liquidation after Covid-19 worsened the
difficulties faced by the store. However, in order to clear stock, the company is still running an online store and ran Black Friday deals. There have been calls from former Debenhams staff for people to boycott the department store’s website when they are purchasing presents this year. “Any money that’s made on Debenhams.ie is actually going to England” explained Valerie Condon, Mandate Trade Union shop steward at the Patrick Street store. Ms. Conlon urged consumers to support local businesses and buy Irish this Christmas. The workers have been locked in a dispute with the store’s liquidator, KPMG, over redun-
dancy terms. KPMG confirmed that 953 people lost their jobs when Debenhams Ireland became insolvent however Debenhams offered the statutory redundancy to its workers, irrespective of how long they worked at the firm. Thomas Gould, Cork North Central TD, questioned in the Dáil last week whether the liquidators were entering into negotiations in good faith. “They have been on strike for 230 days now. They deserve to be at home for Christmas with their families. The workers are willing to engage in these talks.”
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
News
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Mental Wellbeing put to the fore with launch of SilverCloud and Mental Health Awareness week Writes Maebh McCarthy, Deputy News Editor
UCC Students’ Union (UCCSU) President, Naoise Crowley informed all students earlier this week via email of their access to Silvercloud: a virtual mental health platform made available to users through Universities, GPs and certain healthcare plans by the company SilverCloud UK. It provides self-directed courses on mental health and well-being. Mr. Crowley described the project, which UCCSU have worked on “for quite some time” as “exciting.” The project is part of a collaboration with UCC Student Counselling and Development, and Graduate Attributes. When describing what the initiative entails, Mr. Crowley said it is “a clinically researched mental health platform which offers numerous programmes in a variety of areas from resilience and stress management to sleep hygiene and dealing with worry.” The most attractive part of this project is that it is free to all UCC students. Mr. Crowley thanked Tomar Trust for “some generous funding” that makes the platform free of charge to students.
SilverCloud is a completely confidential internet-based platform that delivers online therapeutic and psycho-education programs. A variety of programs aim to offer information and support for people experiencing problems related to mental health. By accessing the website, students can take a short 5-question multiple choice wellbeing quiz, to ‘find the right path’ for them. On the basis of this quiz, which is established with clinical methods, it suggests programmes most suitable for the user. The courses use Cognitive Behavioural therapy (CBT), which are designed to “help you improve and maintain your wellbeing” by learning and practicing for one hour per week. The programmes cover a vast array of issues and concerns, including money worries, positive body image, resilience, Covid-19, sleep, panic, stress and mindfulness. In addition to the support and guidance offered by Silvercloud, UCCSU Welfare Officer, Jamie Fraser along with UCCSU ‘Wellbeing crew’ also organised a mental health and wellbeing week in late November. The week incorporated
virtual events, as well as some on campus activity, with an ice cream truck on campus on Wednesday afternoon. Events ran throughout the week with external organisations such as Pieta House, Samaritans, Niteline, and Jigsaw. UCC Societies also got involved, with WiStem, Co-operative, Sámh, English Society and the Feminist Society all contributing to events which occurred via Zoom, amongst other platforms. International Men’s Mental Health Day, on November 19th 2020 was also marked by UCCSU and the Union of Students in Ireland (USI), under their campaign ‘don’t man up, speak up.’ UCCSU issued a post on social media to assure students that “mental health is something that we as a Union are passionate about. Whatever the issue, big or small, we are here for you, and we are here to listen.” The campaign from the USI focused on the stigma surrounding men’s mental health, citing that ‘31% of male students thought their problems weren’t bad enough to seek counselling’, with ‘one in four of male students reported having a mental illness.’ Furthermore, their study found that ‘64% of male students who
attended campus counselling found it helpful in improving their mental wellbeing.’ UCCSU signed off their post with the quote, matched with an accompanying hand-written sticky note quoting “You are loved, you are unique and you are so important.” As well as this, the UCC Movember campaign, which was previously covered in University Express, raised over €45,000 for the campaign which focuses on making changes in the areas of mental health and suicide prevention as well as prostate and testicular cancer. Silvercloud can be accessed through the following link: https://ucc. silvercloudhealth.com/signup/ If you are impacted by any of the issues discussed in this article, please reach out for support by texting ‘UCC’ to 50808. The Samaritans on 116123 and UCCSU Welfare Officer, Jamie Fraser on 086-184-2697.
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Features
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Tackling Image-Based Sexual Crime: “Refuse to Stay Quiet” Writes Elisha Carey, Features Editor This week marks the end of the United Nations’ 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence. 16 Days is an annual international campaign which kicked off on the 25th of November, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, and runs until the 10th of December, Human Rights Day. It was started by activists at the inaugural Women’s Global Leadership Institute in 1991 and continues to be coordinated each year by the Centre for Women’s Global Leadership.
16 Days has a more pronounced significance this year as the UN recently reported that the Covid-19 pandemic has seen all types of violence against women and girls, particularly domestic violence, intensified.
Earlier this month, it came to light that tens of thousands of private images of Irish women and girls were shared on the online messaging platform Discord without their consent.
Discord identified that approximately 500 men were involved in sharing the images, some of which were of girls who were underage. While the possession and sharing of intimate images of girls under the age of 18 is illegal under the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1998, it is not currently a crime in Ireland to post non-consensual intimate images of women aged 18 and over.
In response to the incident, the Minister for Justice Helen McEntee spoke out on Twitter saying: “I know the recent leak of tens of thousands of intimate images of Irish women has caused so much upset and anger.”
“I share that anger.” She added The Minister then went on to commit that anyone who shares intimate images without consent
“will face serious criminal sanctions.” The renewed attention surrounding the criminalisation of image based sexual abuse and cyberbullying can be credited The proposed legislation which will crim- to the tireless work of female activists, inalise this image based sexual abuse, The Megan Sims, and Jackie Fox, to name just Harassment, Harmful Communications two. Ms Sims launched her change.org and Related Offences Bill was brought petition ‘Make revenge porn a criminal before the Oireachtas Justice Commit- offence in Ireland’ in July and at the time tee in the Dáil last week and the govern- of writing it has amassed over 75,000 sigment is hopeful it will be passed into law natures, having recently gone viral. Ms before the end of the year. The Bill has Sims was a victim of image based sexual been in something of a legislative limbo abuse in 2016 when she was just 19 years for years now, having been first intro- old. In her petition, Ms Sims also referduced by Brendan Howlin in May 2017 ences Dara Quigley, a young Irish jourfollowing a 2016 Law Reform Commis- nalist who died by suicide in 2017 after a sion Report. It seeks to revolutionise member of An Garda Siochána shared inexisting harassment laws, to, as James timate footage of her online. The images Lawless put it during an interview on were viewed more than 100,000 times. Newstalk on December 1st, “move them into the Internet age.” As our lives move increasingly online, behaviour that Ms Fox has been campaigning for the makes the digital space unsafe for wom- introduction of criminal sanctions for en must be eradicated to ensure their ef- online bullying and harassment since fective participation in all facets of life. 2018 when her daughter Nicole Fox Fenlon took her own life after facing years of continuous online abuse. A pe-
tition presented by Ms Fox at the Dáil in September had over 33,000 signatures and at the time, Minister McEntee promised her that the Harmful Communications Bill or Coco’s Law, named after Nicole, would be in place by the end of year.
Women’s Aid held a seminar on the 25th of November marking the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Discussions surrounding image based sexual abuse or “revenge porn”, as it is known colloquially, formed a significant part of the day with calls made by the organisation for the introduction of both criminal and civil legislation targeting image based sexual abuse. Senator Ivana Bacik, speaking at the event, stressed the need that such legislation “match the reality that women and girls experience.”
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
The 2017 Bill can be commended on a lot of grounds. Not only does it criminalise the non-consensual sharing of intimate images, but also the taking of non-consensual images, known as upskirting and downblousing, as well as instances where a victim’s image is photoshopped onto a pornographic one, creating the illusion that said image is of the victim. Dr. Catherine O’Sullivan, lecturer in Criminology and Criminal Law in UCC writes in the Irish Examiner that, “another positive is that the bill classifies the wrongdoing as a sexual offence. It provides that anyone convicted of the offence and sentenced to a term of imprisonment will be subject to the provisions of the Sex Offender Act 2001.”
Glynn, the two leading experts in this area, point out that this proposed provision seems to require a specific reaction on the part of the victim, and that it is “a far more restrictive provision that is provided for in most other jurisdictions.” In Scotland for example, it is sufficient that the perpetrator merely intended to cause fear, alarm or distress. The provision also begs the question, how serious an interference is serious enough?
Dr. O’Sullivan, writing in the Irish Examiner points out that the requirement of victims “to provide evidence of the nature of the harm they suffered could make them reluctant to be involved in a prosecution.” It is hoped that the government will take advantage of the Committee Stage to strengthen Dr. O’ Sullivan also welcomes the cen- the existing proposals and make it as tral role of consent in the new offence, straightforward as possible for wom“by framing the offence around the vic- en to bring their abusers to justice. tim’s lack of consent, the offence seeks to foreclose victim-blaming by directing attention to the perpetrator” she Addressing the civil side of things will wrote. Adding to this, Dr. O’Sullivan be the Online Safety and Media Regunotes that the focus on consent “also lation Bill 2019. This Bill will provide recognises the right of the victim to non-criminal remedies for those who bodily autonomy and privacy”, a right have seen their images shared online which is guaranteed to each citizen un- without their consent. The Bill will reder Article 40.3 of the Constitution. quire platforms like Snapchat, Facebook and Twitter to take down intimate images posted without consent. While the fast-tracking of the 2017 Once enacted, the Bill will also create Bill through the Dáil is embraced the office of an Online Safety Commisand much needed, Professor Clare sioner which will oversee the regulaMcGlynn, during the Women’s Aid tion of the audiovisual sector, includevent, expressed concern that the ing social media platforms, in Ireland. core element of consent and indeed, non-consent, could be eclipsed by standards of proof under the legisla- Criminal and civil laws are just the betion, as it is currently proposed. The ginning, “we need a culture change”, offence requires that the taking/shar- Cork Sexual Violence Centre Founder ing of the image without consent “se- Mary Crilly told University Express. riously interferes with the peace and Even how we refer to image based sexprivacy of the other person or causes ual crimes can be problematic. Womalarm, distress or harm to the other en’s Aid has spoken out time and again, person.” Professors Rackley and Mc- against the use of the term “revenge
Features porn.” Addressing students at a recent UCC Law Society House Meeting, Women’s Aid CEO Sarah Benson explained that the term erroneously implies that the victim “did something for which they are somehow deserving of revenge”, and that these images are porn, which is also incorrect. The term diminishes what the experience actually is, abuse.
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such as this, then it is possible that he would not have progressed to the stage of distributing such images.”
“The only reason we know about these images is because someone, presumably a man, who received them and was supposed to stay quiet didn’t. He reported them to Discord. We need more men and women like Change is within our reach. Initiatives him and the Bystander programme like the UCC Bystander Intervention is a means of achieving this.” Programme are tackling harmful behaviours such as image based sexual crime through education and empow- “When more of us refuse to stay erment. First piloted in 2016, the pro- quiet, we begin to change society.” gramme covers the core concepts of consent, sexual assault, rape and abusive relationships and gives students the The past few years have seen a signecessary skills to safely intervene in a nificant transformation of the Irish variety of sexually abusive situations. legislative landscape surrounding Dr. Catherine O’Sullivan, who assisted Professor Louise Crowley in developing the Programme, spoke to University Express, explaining how the Programme can be used to tackle image-based sexual abuse, “Although the non-consensual sharing of images is a harm that is done to women and men, women are more frequently the target than men because women are more likely to be judged for their exercise of sexual autonomy and/or their sexual autonomy is secondary to the titillation of the male perpetrator/viewer” she said.
“The Bystander programme is very relevant to issues such as this because the non-consensual sharing of images is part of a continuum of a lack of respect for women’s sexual autonomy, and if the perpetrator had been called out by friends and family at earlier stages when he made inappropriate jokes about women or expressed approval for images
women’s rights, with a statutory definition of consent being provided for the first time ever in the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017, and the creation of the offence of coercive control under the Domestic Violence Act 2018, the first conviction under which took place this year. The enactment of the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill and the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill will make the physical world and digital realm a safer place for women but we need more than just laws to make real, tangible changes in society. Mary Crilly in a message to the students of UCC says:“Remember how strong you are and how powerful you are and you can do anything.” We cannot let complacency set it once these laws are enacted. The true work is just beginning. From our group chats to our lecture halls we must make clear what we do and do not stand for.
-Keep
the
conversation
going.
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Features
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Direct Provision: The need to dismantle it Writes Eoghan O’Donnell, Deputy Features Editor
Throughout Irish history, there has been a tendency by successive Irish governments to cover up shameful events and ignore many of the corruptions and injustices in this country. Over the course of the years, many of the wrong-doings in the country have been exposed to and scrutinised by the Irish people: the Magdalene laundries, the clerical abuse in the Catholic Church, and the case of the Tuam babies are all prime examples. When brought to the fore of Irish discourse, these were all major incidents in our history but remain only a select few of the injustices which so frequently occur on this island. As a country which prides itself on inclusivity and acceptance, the story of history can recount tales where what occurred within the chamber of Dáil Éireann did not echo the public mood. Members of the Dáil who campaigned for a ‘No’ vote during the marriage equality referendum and a ‘No’ vote during the referendum on the right to abortion speak about the change brought about by the respective referenda despite campaigning against them at the time. The people of Ireland have a voice, and although a small country, when we rally in droves, as regular citizens, we ensure our demands are heard. In the recent past, when the population has fought against outdated rulings in our Constitution, we often resolve them. Yet for those in the nation who have fallen prey to governmental wrongdoings, the courses of remedy are more frequently than not, many years too late. We hear of settlements occurring for victims of the mother and baby homes, and of clerical abuse scandals settled decades later in attempts to remedy traumas of the past. However, more frequently than not, these settlements are minuscule compared to original damages and only go so far in providing victims with relief. These events still raise questions: How did consecutive Irish governments ever let such affairs happen? The last few decades have seen immense change in the systematic functioning of Ireland, and we are now one of the most rapidly progressing
countries in the world. We have shaken off the chains of the Catholic Church and many of the marginalised communities in Ireland are finding a voice: social ostracisation for being “different” is no longer as common as it once was. Yet, seeing the country progress to focus solely on what’s been done right does not mean there are many things today which are not being done wrong. It is easy to believe that the Irish government could never let cruelties of the same extent as those in the past occur in this modern day. Unfortunately, this is a futile belief. Let me remind you of Ireland’s cruel answer to those seeking asylum from abroad: Direct Provision. Direct Provision was formed by the Irish government in 1999 in response to an increase in the number of asylum seekers arriving on the island of Ireland. Originally supposed to be
a temporary model to deal with unprecedented numbers fleeing their home-countries for safety abroad. Direct Provision, twenty years later, has seen no major reform in its structuring since its formation. When taken at face value, Direct Provision is what it says on the tin: immediate protection for those in need of safety and protection. Article 33 under the Geneva Convention states: “No contracting state shall expel or return a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.” As such, those arriving onto our shores who fall under any of these categories must be accommodated by the Irish government.
el has expanded exponentially since its formation: “as of the end of 2019, there are 5,963 people living in 47 Direct Provision centres, and a further 1,633 people living in 33 emergency overflow accommodation locations.” Interestingly, only seven of the Direct Provision centres are government-run, the remaining forty are run on a for-profit basis by private companies who are quick to hide their identities. Many of these companies also filter their profits to offshore bank accounts to avoid having their financial reports scrutinised by the Irish public. Again, this raises many questions: Why are companies making profit from catering to asylum seekers? Why are many of these companies adamant to remain anonymous?
Direct Provision, under the same mod- Let’s explore the technicalities
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express of the system of Direct Provision. Every Direct Provision Centre in Ireland is different: some are male or female For a country with citizens so well only while others are mixed and can known for migrating - over thir- host whole families. Living conditions ty-three million Americans claim are also different in each centre: inspecIrish descent - it comes as a surprise tions of centres currently only focus on to know that asylum seekers seek- health and safety issues but pay no heed ing protection in Ireland are treat- to the social and emotional needs of resed so poorly on the Island. Direct idents. Many in these centres are caught Provision sees those in its system in the waiting game of acceptance or caught in many vicious cycles: of rejection for Irish citizenship. In 2011, waiting, of uncertainty, of anxiety. the United Nations when investigating the process of Direct Provision, focused Direct Provision is a harsh and lonely on the uncertainty of the situations experience for those in it - primarily and endless waiting of those within the rejected from wider society and with- system. In their report on the process out much opportunity to merge into of Direct Provision they cited that “due their communities, isolation is one of to the inordinate delay of the processtheir primary struggles. In the major- ing of their applications, and the final ity of European countries, those seek- outcome of their appeals and reviews, ing international protection are given as well as poor living conditions, [those the means to join a country’s popula- in Direct Provision] can suffer health tion as their applications for citizen- and psychological problems that in cership are processed. Ireland drastically tain cases lead to serious mental illness.” differs from this: all asylum seekers are lumped into confined locations To further emphasise the cruelty of which can often be away from cities the system, the European Commisand towns and are forced to live in sion Against Racism and Intolerance a physically detached limbo await- claimed that nine out of ten of those in ing updates on citizen applications. Direct Provision fall prey to depression after as little as 6 months in the system. Human isolation is one of the many factors that leads to the malfunction- One of the many things Direct Proviing of a system such as Direct Provi- sion fails to accommodate for within sion. People longing for social status its system is the clash between culturin Ireland have to wait until their al and social backgrounds. Irish stanstatus can be reviewed by the system. dards are often different to mainland An Irish Government Economic and Europe’s and again are vastly different Evaluation Service Review found that from countries further afield. Those “60% of all occupants were in accom- from four or five different countries modation centres between 18 and 45 may have all to co-inhabit the same months”, meaning uncertainty is the cramped living space and often live in only certainty for those waiting. After shared bedrooms. If all of these asy45 months it is not uncommon for a lum-seekers are from different counperson in Direct Provision to be de- tries, differing standards of privacy and ported, after almost four years waiting social etiquette are bound to pose baron an updated review of their status. riers to individual comfortable living.
Features Problems with centre owners are often rife among those in Direct Provision: there are many reports of workers barging into rooms without warning and there have been reports of workers threatening those in the system when complaints about standards of living are raised. Residents in Direct Provision are given €38.80 per week to survive, and although meals are provided, they are not adequate for a fulfilling and healthy lifestyle. You may have seen images circulating online of those inside Direct Provision posting their dinner: two pieces of starchy white-slice-pan and a single slice of tomato. Or maybe you saw the image of plain spaghetti sloshed around with an unidentifiable meat. Neither are appetising or nutritionally substantial. Cultural struggles are also at the fore: imagine coming from a country where eating times are different, or things like sandwiches are not commonplace, and having these things forced upon you with little choice: eat or don’t survive is a common theme. This impact alone on personal development and personal perception can be immense: there have been reports in recent weeks of attempted suicides in St. Patrick’s Direct Provision Centre in Co. Monaghan. Primary factors for these attempts are people being met with deportation letters after months or years of waiting in limbo. Covid-19 had also caused major crises throughout the system: it is reported that 50% of those in Direct Provision cannot socially distance within the centres and 85% feel they have not been adequately informed about the deadly virus. This combined with other problems leads to feelings of frustration and hopelessness: a person inside Direct Provision stated, “We are powerless, just sitting ducks waiting to die.”
9 Those in Direct Provision are often singled out in communities. In 2018, an arson attack occurred on a Direct Provision centre a week before it was due to open in the coastal town of Moville, Co. Donegal. The one-hundred asylum seekers who were due to be allocated there could not move in and the idea of having a Direct Provision centre in the town has since been scrapped. There have been reports of those in Direct Provision being too terrified to leave the centres to enter local towns for fear of hate crimes. On top of this, the weekly budget of €38.80 - as well as the lack of organised public transport in Ireland - means that the same people cannot afford, or manage to go to bigger cities nearby, confining them even more to their centres. In the lead up to Christmas and the New Year, and with Covid-19 still lingering on our doorsteps, we as a nation must demand more for those seeking international protection on our shores. The inclination by some to treat these human beings as some ‘other’ problem is a cause for disparagement. With promises from the current government to change the system of Direct Provision but no action taken yet, we as a nation must demand better. Ireland needs to treat these human beings with the dignity and respect they desperately need. Donate to the Irish Refugee Council and visit websites such as https://doras.org to learn more information about what you can do on a local level. Demand dismantlement. Demand restructure. Act now so we won’t have to look back with shame on this period in our nation’s history.
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Features:Careers Corner
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
An interview with Max Darby on Post Graduate Study by Elisha Carey, Features Editor
The most recent Higher Education Authority figures show that there are over 10,000 students enrolled in full-time and part-time postgraduate research. The Irish Times reported recently on the uptake of postgraduate courses during the pandemic, saying “students are looking at their options for the next six-12 months – minimum – and a postgrad course is a perfect fit. It could be a chance to get that postgrad out the way quite seamlessly, and then you can hit the road running and pursue your career.”
In an increasingly fierce graduate job market, it is becoming more and more difficult to set yourself apart from the next undergraduate degree holder. Not only can a postgraduate degree give you a leg up in your chosen industry, but it also opens the door to a whole new world: a career in academia.
After finishing secondary school, UCC PhD student, Max Darby had no intention of going to university at all. He had spent a year tattooing when
UCC launched the BA Digital Humanities & Information Technology, a fresh marriage between the arts and computing. This was a game changer. The course spoke to him in ways his CAO list of mechanical engineering and physics courses simply hadn’t the year before. To Max, the degree offered him a chance to “explore the world through technology rather than just learning how to be technical.”
project subsequently didn’t take off, but Max describes how the UCC Career Services were able to get him back on track. “The job fell through on a Monday, I rang the Career Service and by Wednesday, I was doing an interview with Musgrave, who I then got a job with.”
“They [The Career Services] left me enough autonomy but then were there with a safety net the second it was needed.”
him, and another the year after that. He was kept on by Musgrave for the summer after his placement and parttime throughout his final year. He really enjoyed his time at Musgrave and knew that he wanted to apply for their Graduate Programme but felt strongly that he would miss the research and learning aspects of being a student.
“Having been out of college for a year on work placement, when I came back, I realised that certain parts of Darby was particularly grateful for my mind had essentially gone dead. I UCC Work Placement Manager, Amy was sitting in my philosophy modules McMullan, who he described as “crit- getting that burst of “oh my god this ical” in getting the job placement. is amazing” that I had gotten in first year. I had completely neglected that aspect of my life for an entire year.” Max was Musgrave’s first Digital Humanities intern, working as part of the team behind SuperValu’s online After this realisation, he approached shopping platform and developing his his supervisor for his final year own flair for Python and SQL. Since project and asked her about the his placement, Musgrave has become possibility of doing a Master’s and something of “a proponent for DigIn his third year, Max decided to organ- ital Humanities”, taking on another working at the same time. He came ise his own work placement with an engi- intern from the course the year after to an agreement with Musgrave where he would join their Graduate neering company based in Fermoy. The
Once in the Digital Humanities programme, Max picked up the computer science side of things with ease. “All of my schooling up until then had been very engineering based, it was very technical, and all my family are engineers.” Speaking on his decision to minor in philosophy he said “I always knew that I wanted to try and understand the world more deeply, but I never had a set of modules to be able to do it. I had that massive pang of ‘holy crap!’ this side of the world exists, and they have classes for it.”
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Programme and undertake his Research Master’s in the Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence part-time alongside it, teaching tutorials to cover his fees, “very quickly merging the two became very accessible.”
Explaining his choice of Master’s, Max told me about his fascination with how one “can use technology to embody philosophical concepts”, this is something he touched on in his FYP for Digital Humanities so he felt well set up for the kind of self-directed learning a Research Master’s demands. It was not without its challenges, however, juggling a daily 9-5 schedule with writing, readings and teaching meant Darby had to be remarkably disciplined.
Overall, though, he looks back on his Master’s/Graduate Programme experience with an incredible fondness and enthusiasm. “My Master’s really helped me overcome my fear of being independent and a fear of independent thinking.” He spoke towards a fear experienced by most, if not all students, that what they write, be it an assignment, a lab report or thesis won’t be perfect until they’ve read X more books or spoken to Y more lecturers. “It got me to overcome that fear of waiting for the perfect moment to put my opinion out there.”
a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Whereas, after some independent thinking and research, you start picking the right tool for the right thing.”
After completing his Master’s Thesis, it felt natural to Max that he’d stay involved in academia, “I found sitting at the intersection between industry and academia, not only beneficial but essential. It enabled me to apply the things I was researching in academia directly in industry.”
“I was able to research something on Monday and then go into work on Tuesday and make it happen.”
Features:Careers Corner aligned with their overall business objectives. They were happy to invest in research in the area of AI, so Musgrave and UCC came together to back Max’s continued study, something he describes as a “dream come true.”
“Not a lot of students are fortunate enough to get such a good crossover.”
Through pursuing postgraduate education, Max managed to achieve the best of both worlds: a career in industry as a data scientist and the opportunity to continue exploring his passion for AI.
“...My Master’s really helped me overcome a fear of independent thinking”
This had a knock-on effect on his performance at Musgrave, “I did a lot less waiting and waiting to be the person who made a decision in the company, thinking that I had to have Having one foot in academia and the achieved something to be that person.” other in industry really suited Darby, but he found it time-consuming enough to do the part-time Master’s while working full-time at Musgrave and felt “What became apparent to me was unsure as to how it would work with a that my undergrad really prepared PhD. “I wasn’t really looking forward to me for the workplace from the point the prospect of doing a part-time PhD of view of skillset, being able to presfor 8 years while working full-time.” ent, and knowing what I had to do when I went into a job. What the Master’s allowed me was to understand more deeply the things that I Luckily, the opportunity of an Emwas actually actively participating ployment-Based PhD Scholarship in and changing as I went along.” arose, and just in time too as Max was “thinking about packing in the academic side.” He brought the UCC initiative to his director in Musgrave, who had Neatly summing up the career benseen how well he had done by crossing efits of postgraduate research and over his Master’s and the Graduate Prostudy, Darby said “The postgrad gramme. She took it up the line to HR gives you a more research-based apwho had to make sure Max’s proposals proach to problem solving. If you’re
If you love what you’re doing, further study may be the right path for you. It is important that, just like Max, you choose to enter into a Master’s or PhD because it is your passion. Postgraduate study is a huge commitment, in time, money and energy, but if it’s something you’re passionate about, the payoff is unparalleled. A career in academia is immensely rewarding and postgrad students can earn a better salary and have stronger employment prospects if they wish to enter industry.
If you’d like to discuss your plans for after graduation with a Career Consultant, you can make an appointment at the link below: https://www.ucc.ie/en/careers/meet/
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Opinion
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
We Need To Talk About The Trans ‘Debate’ Writes Rían Browne, Opinion Editor In recent months the ‘trans debate’ has reigned the social media sphere. At the time of writing, the latest casualty of this debate has been an op-ed posted by former Guardian columnist Suzanne Moore on her departure from the publication due to, in her view, being ‘silenced’ in her attempts to address the ‘trans debate’. Moore has previously come under criticism for her views which many within the transgender community would describe as transphobic. Moore received a substantial amount of support from those who sympathise with her, including prominent Irish Times journalist Roisín Ingle who retweeted the article. Ingle has established herself over the years as an outspoken feminist who took a central role during the Repeal campaign which was predominantly centred on the bodily autonomy of pregnant people. To see Ingle then retweet the work of an individual who espouses arguments aimed at restricting the autonomy of trans people in living their lives authentically and without fear, was surprising. This is hardly a ‘new’ though. The UK has seen a substantial rise in anti-trans sentiment, often falling under the umbrella of gender ‘criticism’. Public figures such as Graham Linehan and J.K. Rowling have hit the headlines for their gender-critical commentary on the transgender community, particularly transgender women - and, with significant consequences. Following comments from Graham Linehan, UK children’s charity Mermaids (which works to support transgender children and their families) found themselves the target of a wave of vitriol that saw the legitimacy of their work called into question and their funding threatened. Similarly, following backlash for her viral letter, J.K. Rowling argued the criticism she received was akin to censorship and a restriction of her free speech, prompting a letter signed by many other creatives to the same sentiment. There have also been large expressions of support in solidarity with the trans community, a letter in response to JK’s saw a plethora of creatives reaffirm their support of the community.
It would be understandable for one to think that this is nothing more than a ‘debate’ in the cultural lexicon but it is so much more than that. These words have very real consequences for the people they’re centred on, who have often overwhelmingly been left out of the conversation altogether. But, where did this all come from? How can we understand the mechanisms at play propelling this ‘debate’ forward? A Philosophy of Transphobia ‘Cultural imperialism’ (a concept introduced by philosopher Iris M Young) refers to the experience where the dominant social group mischaracterizes or stereotypes another rendering that group’s perspective and identity invisible and instead establishes this new mischaracterization as the ‘norm’. The
group becomes ‘othered’ based upon these newly established norms which dominate society to such an extent they become difficult to contest or deny. The injustice, Young writes, lies in the oppressed groups own experience and interpretation of social life finding little space for expression within the dominant culture while that same culture imposes on the oppressed group this distorted interpretation of their experience and interpretation of life. In this case, the dominant social group could include those who are cisgender (folks who identify with the gender they were assigned at birth) as socially this is what is accepted as the ‘norm’ in contrast to those who are transgender (and do not identify with the gender they were assigned at birth) who become a social ‘other’. This phenomenon can be easily recognized in the current cultural ‘debate’
around trans identity particularly in terms of the expression of transphobia, or more specifically transmisogyny we’ve become familiar with via popular culture and social media. This mischaracterization of transgender identity has laid the groundwork for the oppression and social exclusion of the trans community within society. Although these transphobic stereotypes impact all corners of the transgender community, in recent years trans women and feminine aligned folks have become the go-to target for those who claim to be ‘gender critical’. Julia Serano (Whipping Girl, 2007) identifies the depiction of transgender women in popular culture as falling into two main archetypes ‘deceptive’ or ‘pathetic’. This particular stereotype has often been played up
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express in a comedic sense through depictions where oftentimes a character becomes attracted to a woman only to later express their shock and horror when their transgender identity is revealed. One such example is cult comedy ‘Ace Ventura: Pet Detective’ where it is discovered the police lieutenant Lois Einhorn is secretly Ray Finkle, in the movie’s final scenes this is revealed through Jim Carey’s character removing Einhorn’s clothing and remarking “She is suffering from the worst case of haemorrhoids I have ever seen” as to allude to the presence of genitalia that ‘shouldn’t’ be there and in turn ‘revealing’ Einhorn’s deception. These stereotypes only serve to undermine the legitimacy of transgender women’s experiences and expression of womanhood. Oftentimes these depictions of transgender women and the wider transgender community would be described as transphobic or in the specific case of trans women, transmisogynistic in nature. Transphobia refers to the expression of hate or discrimination toward transgender people because of their identity, transmisogyny (a term coined by Julia Serano) refers to the intersection of this ‘phobia’ with the unique experience of sexism experienced by transgender women and feminine aligned folks. The root of these stereotypes can often be traced back to a perceived fear or challenge to perpetrators’ interpretation of gender norms as established by society, which is then in turn expressed via transphobia. Politicising the Bathroom Stall In more recent times, this demonetisation has taken a more sinister turn through the popularisation of such mischaracterizations through social media. The proliferation of this cultural stereotype surrounding transgender women has been perpetuated further by those who describe themselves as ‘gender critical’ who suggest transgender women pose a threat to wider society, playing upon the idea of deception and positing that these women are merely ‘biological men’ adopting the ‘costume’ of a woman to pursue predatory motives. This new characterisation of what it ‘means’ to be a transgender woman removes autonomy from those with lived experience of this identity and creates a potentially harm-
ful narrative that can be utilized as a tool for oppression and discrimination. The ‘bathroom’ debate offers a perfect depiction of the discrimination that can occur when fuelled by the misrecognition of transgender identity in society. The debate initially stemmed from a bill proposed in Virginia which asked whether transgender individuals should be allowed to use bathroom facilities that aligned with their gender identity or if they should be obligated to use the restroom that corresponds to the gender they were assigned at birth. This ignited prompted a wider cultural conversation around the issue in the US and further afield via social media. The mischaracterisation of transgender identity began to manifest within the debate via arguments against the bill, the majority of which took on a transmisogynistic nature. The crux of many arguments against allowing transgender people to access bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity drew upon the transmisogynistic stereotype of transgender women as not being ‘real’ women but rather biological men ‘posing’ as women to engage predatory behaviour, such as sexual assault, in these venues. We can see this play in real-time on social media. Far too frequently there is either an article, tweet, comment or headline surrounding trans exclusionary radical feminism which refers to a minority of the feminist community who reject the idea that transgender women belong within the feminist community or women’s spaces in general. For those who speak out against this perspective, they often become subject to an onslaught of online abuse, with members of the transgender community receiving the brunt of the negativity. Consequences for the Transgender Community A strange (but not unsurprising) phenomena of this ‘debate’ is that for the most part transgender people are completely excluded from it. Why? W.E.B Du Bois describes the experience of ‘double consciousness’ where those living under cultural imperialism find themselves on the ‘outside’ looking in as these dominant cultural meanings arise from those who do not identify with them. As Du Bois explains this creates ‘double consciousness’ or the sense of always looking at oneself through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the
Opinion tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity as the subject of this mischaracterisation refuses to coincide themselves with these stereotypes. By virtue of our existence, transgender people live in opposition to our (western) interpretation of gender and the norms associated with it. In turn, there is a ‘price’ to pay when society tries to re-affirm those norms by mischaracterizing what it means to be transgender to justify social exclusion and discrimination rooted in transphobia. For many trans folks, we spend years questioning ourselves, the legitimacy of our experience, searching for the words to articulate the conflict with our sense of self and the world in which we exist. So, to then have to constantly live with having your humanity ‘debated’ can take a tremendous psychological toll. Navigating a society that oftentimes feels as if it resents your very existence requires an innumerable amount of emotional resilience. There is a responsibility then upon allies of the community, who aren’t directly implicated by these debates, who possess more ‘power’ in being a member of the dominant ‘group’. This is why, when we see hints of the gender-critical argument making its way from our neighbours across the water, many are concerned. Something as innocuous as a retweet, like Ingles, shouldn’t hold any weight here in theory. This can only be the case if allies who possess the social leverage use it to delegitimize these narratives used to attack, dehumanize and discriminate against the transgender community. This can only be achieved working in solidarity alongside the community that it ultimately affects, who possess the knowledge and lived experience to inform how best to do so in a way that does not disproportionately cause more harm. This is why expressing solidarity in the face of transphobic sentiment may not necessarily translate to arguing with Twitter profiles spewing transphobic nonsense. Expressing solidarity means taking action in a more substantial and meaningful way that is productive in ensuring safety and unequivocal social solidarity with the trans community in reclaiming the sense of identity and autonomy that has been stolen by those who fear difference itself.
If you have been affected by the topics discussed, please visit www.teni.ie to access more support.
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BYLINE Vol. 6 Issue 7
Editorial
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Holding close what we know Writes Fergal Smiddy, Byline Editor
Another fleeting fortnight, another last-ditch scramble, and just like that - the final Byline of semester one is hot off the (digital) press. It’s truly, truly mad to think we’ve ploughed through seven of these - or six-and-a-half I suppose, thanks to the Freshers issue’s brevity - and found ourselves at the Christmas season already. The holidays, in any normal year, feel like the culmination of something. Thinking back on my last few Christmases, I arrived at them wrecked from the academic/working months gone by; In the nicest possible sense, Christmas carried the air of a destination. Another calendar year wound down, with the dizzy promise of firelit hedonism and pint-nursing nights to close us out. But what happens when an entire year takes on the formless disarray of that much loved Christmas Eve to New Year’s Day twilight zone? What does Christmas mean then? Preparing for this issue of Byline - our last before the big day, and so our Holiday issue by default - the above question was one I had to wrestle with. Had I become so jaded by our current circumstances that Christmas was now something which felt alien? Hardly - I’m an absolute fiend for this time of year, however you want to label it. The merest whiff of clove or spiced beef is enough to bust any assumed nonchalance; the slightest mention of Home Alone 2: Lost In New York (unequivocally the grand daddy of the series) casting any ounce of humbug right into the chestnut-roasting open fire. But things would be different now, surely? A year like 2020 couldn’t just be wrapped up with seasonal ribboning... could it? The answer to my question arrived in bundles, soon to be put on shelves across Cork in early November. Over the span of almost two lifetimes, the Holly Bough has been cogitated and laboured over each year, sewn together from threads of Cork spread like confetti across the globe. In this issue, I talk with John Dolan, who’s been Editor at the Bough for almost two decades now. Speaking with him, I got the comforting sense that despite living in times which demand novelty - in the ways we socialise, in the ways we work and in the ways we think - there is always space for tradition, as long we keep it. This Christmas, aside from making that extra effort to be a bit more pleasant and a bit more comforting to whoever’s alongside us on couches or barstools, I think it’s definitely worthwhile holding some space for the things we know. Whether it’s an after-dinner round of charades on the big day, a dip in the December sea, or a fireside flick through the Holly Bough - hold what you know close to you this Christmas; God knows we’ve had enough ‘strange times’ for one year.
Fergal Smiddy byline@uccexpress.ie
Gaeilge
Eagarthóir: Édith de Faoite
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Moltaí na Nollag - cad ba cheart duit ceannach? A scríobhann Édith de Faoite, Eagarthóir Gaeilge
Tá aimsir na Nollag ag druidi linn agus, faoi dheireadh, tá an bhliain ag teacht chun críche. Má tá sibhse cosúil liomsa, tá rud amháin ag dó na geirbe agaibh faoi láthair (cé is moite den obair choláiste) agus is é an rud sin ná bronntanais Nollag. Tá an t-ádh liom go bhfuil clann mhór agam, ach amháin nuair atá mé ag iarraidh bronntanais dheasa, oirúnacha a cheannach do chúigear deirfiúracha agus deartháir amháin. Nílim ag magadh. De bharr é seo tá taithí agam ar na háiteanna leis na bronntanais is deise agus saoire. Tá mé anseo chun lámh chúnta a thabhairt duit agus na bronntanais is deise a thaispeáint duit a bheadh oiriúnach do na Gaeilgóirí i do shaol. Fiú muna bhfuil ach cúpla focal acu, is deas tacú leis na gnólachtaí beaga ar an liosta seo, go háirithe i mbliana toisc go bhfuil siad ag streachailt níos mó ná riamh. 1. DeBúrca Designs Is ealaíontóir álainn í Orlaith de Búrca as Contae Luimnigh. Cé go bhfuil sí fós san ollscoil, tá suíomh iontach aici agus tá réimse leathan táirgí ar fáil ann - priontaí, fáinní eochracha, málaí, greamáin agus a lán eile is liosta le háireamh. Molaim na fáinní eochracha go láidir, tá
ceann agam le ‘is fearr Gaeilge bhriste na Béarla cliste’ scríte air. Chomh maith le sin, is osclóir buidéal é fresin, más rud é go bhfuil sé sin mealltach duit. 2. Enibas Is comhlacht beag é Enibas a dhéanann seodra. Bhunaigh bean as an nGearmáin, Sabine Lenz an gnó thart ar fiche bliain ó shin. Bunaithe i Scoil, in iarthar Corcaí, táirgeann siad seodra fhíneálta. Tá go leor réimse seodra acu, ach tá roinnt mhaith réimse acu bunaithe ar an nGaeilge. Is é an réimse is fearr liom ná an réimse ‘Croí Álainn’. Is féidir seodra de gach saghas leis an inscríbhinn dheas sin a fháil agus bheinn breá sástá más rud é go raibh sé sin faoin gcrann dom ar Lá Nollag. 3. Design Wright Is siopa ealaíne eile é seo a tharraingíonn m’aird go minic ar líne. Ealaíontóir ó Chontae Dhún na nGall í agus tá anchuid píosaí aici trí Ghaeilge. B’fhéidir go bhfuil aithne agaibh ar a cuid oibre de bharr an prionta a chuaigh timpeall na hidirlíne leis an Uachtarán Mícheál D. Ó hUigínn agus a madraí nuair a fuair Síoda bás (lá dorcha inár
saolta). Seachas an prionta sin tá neart eile le manaí as Gaeilge orthu. Bheinn, go pearsanta, sa tóir ar an gceann sícideileach le ‘good fadhbhs only’ air. Nó b’fhéidir an ceann le ‘go tobann’ air chun athchuimhne a thabhairt duit ar do ranganna Gaeilge sa mheánscoil? 4. Clodafoto Mar dhuine a chaitheann an iomarca ama ar Etsy, is féidir liom a rá go hionraic go bhfuil Clodafoto ar cheann de na leathanaigh Etsy is fearr liom. Más rud é go n-éisteann tú leis an bpodchraoladh ‘Motherfoclóir’, seans go bhfuil aithne ar Clodagh mar bíonn sí ag caint air go minic. Tháinig mé uirthi ar Twitter agus, ó sin, tháinig mé ar a siopa Etsy. Tá greamáin agus priontaí aici, agus tá siad go léir trí Ghaeilge. Mholfainn na priontaí le manaí ionspráideacha daoibh, is cinnte go bhfuil siad de dhíth orainn go léir i láthair na huaire. 5. A Ghost in the Throat Faoi dheireadh, táim chun moladh a thabhairt daoibh maidir leis na léitheoirí i do shaolta. Is é seo leabhar ó Dhoireann Ní Ghríofa a leanann
an t-údar agus bean eile darbh ainm Eibhlín Dubh Ní Chonaill. Más rud é go bhfuil tú i do léitheoir rialta ar an roinn Gaeilge, seans go bhfuil fhios agat go dtaitníonn scéal Eibhlín Dubh liom. Is leabhar iontach é agus tá an Ghaeilge fite fuaite tríd an leabhair. Is bronntanas iontach é d’éinne atá ag iarraidh an Ghaeilge a phiocadh suas nó d’éinne atá ag filleadh ar an teanga athuair. Tá súil agam go gcabhróidh na moltaí seo libh agus sibh ag dul i mbun siopadóireachta do chlann agus do do chairde. Mura mbeadh ann ach é sin, tá smaointí ag mo chlann faoi cad a cheart dóibh ceannach dom! Gan a bheith ró leamh, tuigim go mbeidh an Nollaig seo éagsúil dúinn go léir, ach beidh deis againn é a cheiliúradh i gceart an bhliain seo chugainn (le cúnamh Dé). Beidh mé fein ag iarraidh roinnt de na deasghnátha céanna a chleachtadh ionas go mbeidh sé mar an gcéanna i slite áirithe. Beannachtaí na Nollag oraibh go léir. Mar is ghnáth, go raibh míle as léamh mo chuid scríbhneoireachta agus má tá fonn ort obair liom, déan teangmháil ag gaeilge@uccexpress.ie
INTERVIEW
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‘Like an old and trusted friend’ – An Interview with Holly Bough Editor John Dolan By Fergal Smiddy, Byline Editor
As longtime Features Editor at the Echo and nearing two decades at the helm of the Holly Bough, there scarcely seems to be a Cork institution that John Dolan has not found himself at the heart of. Born in Warrington, a large town bisecting Liverpool and Manchester on the banks of the River Mersey, and spending his early professional days as a journalist in the north of England, it was a lengthy path that led John to Cork, and one lengthier still that landed him at the centre of an age-old Cork tradition such as the Holly Bough. “I came over here just at the turn of the millennium. I’m here twenty years in January, in Cork. My wife’s Irish, and I got a job at the Echo as Features Editor”. The pressure-steeped promotion to a post such as orchestrating the Holly Bough isn’t one that comes
easy, but for John, it came at a time when the annual Christmas omnibus was in need of some redecoration. “It was more run by the Examiner at the time. Our Chief Executive at the Echo, Dan Linehan, said he wouldn’t mind the Echo taking on the Holly Bough and seeing if we could maybe revamp it and breathe a bit of life into it”. And so they did, but not before a bit of groundwork was done on John’s part. “Because I was Features Editor, he asked me to edit the Holly Bough. I remember the conversation, and I hadn’t heard of it before. I didn’t know what he was talking about! So, obviously I kind of immersed myself in it”. A few lunch meetings with his late predecessor Walter McGrath illuminated things somewhat for Dolan, and a new era of the Holly Bough was soon upon us.
Since the turn of the millennium, the Holly Bough has continued to fly in the face of trends that otherwise cast print media as an industry in extremis. Sales of about 21,000 have since leapt ever closer to the 60,000 mark, facilitating a readership of 250k worldwide, not to mention the Bough itself expanding from sixty pages to one hundred and sixty four across the span of Dolan’s tenure. “The Holly Bough has just gone from strength to strength. I mean, It was always a great tradition in Cork anyway. I don’t think there was ever a time when it wasn’t, but I think what we’ve managed to do is really dedicate an awful lot of time and effort to it”. Time is one thing that no publication ever seems to have enough of. Deadlines, irrespective of their distance or your awareness of them, have an
ability to hold the element of surprise unless you’re putting in the legwork early. For John, with twenty-two years under his belt, an early start remains key. “I always say to people, it’s a Christmas publication, but to my eyes it’s an Easter to Halloween publication”. The editorial team starts “tipping away” early in the year, with the conceptual stages of organising the edition starting in the early Spring period of March-April. “It intensifies in the Summer. When it gets to July and especially August, that to me is the key time for the Holly Bough. It’s such a big product, you don’t want to leave it all for the last few weeks, scrambling around chasing copy. It’s very much a gradual thing”. By the start of October, the edition is “ninety to ninety-five percent done”. From there, it’s a matter of continuous reassessing and fine tuning until the edition goes to print on the Monday following the Jazz Weekend. With Springtime marking the Holly Bough’s starting point, coinciding this year with the onset of the pandemic, I ask John how the whole editorial process was affected. “We knew when we were setting up the Holly Bough around April that this year was going to be a very different year. It was hard to tell then how much Covid would affect us”. With an unpredictable year only just getting underway, the people of Cork were nonetheless determined that Christmas tradition would endure. “Back in late March, literally a few days into the lockdown, our Oliver Plunkett street office
19 for the Examiner and the Echo was still open. We still had someone manning the counter there, and I got a call saying two or three people had stuck their head in the door asking if there would be a Holly Bough this year. I just thought ‘my God, no pressure, you know?’” But the pressure was on more than ever before - and if anything stood a chance of dampening the annual’s consistent growth in sales, it was a global pandemic. I ask John if there’s been any indication as to how the 2020 edition has been doing sales-wise. “I was onto the distribution manager just a few days ago asking if he had any pointers, but it’s so hard to tell anyway normally. But this year particularly, it’s impossible”. Yet, with no solid idea of how uptake of the Holly Bough has been amid our first Christmas post-pandemic, John remains optimistic. “I think it’s going to be as big as it has been in previous years - it could even sell more because people are going to be spending Christmas in their own house instead of somewhere else. It may well be that there’s a bit of an uptake in sales just for that reason, but it’s been doing so well that I’d be happy to just keep it going as it’s been”. In a year sorely lacking the soothing comfort of constants, I point out to John how the Holly Bough’s arrival on shelves across Cork in early November provided just that. ‘Like an old and trusted friend, the Holly Bough will always be there for you’ begins the 2020 message on their website, and this year more than most, the comfort of this Cork tradition’s continuance was felt. “The first week of November, I’m the same as anyone else. If I see a
Christmas ad or a shop window with Christmas trees, I groan. But it’s funny, the Holly Bough gets a free pass. People forget that it’s early. The Toy Show’s not the first sign of Christmas in Cork. It’s the Holly Bough”. As for the annual’s unique prosperity in an industry often seen as toiling, John insists there’s no “magic formula” bar the enduring powers of habit and tradition. “Christmas is a funny time, because it’s the one time of year when young people don’t mind doing what their parents did. It’s that kind of carry-on tradition we’ve set into the Holly Bough which I think is probably the key to it”. Aside from that, it’s a festive helping of Cork pride which ensures the Bough continues to buck industry trends year after year. “[It’s] the pride that people have in Cork when they’re born here. They’ll move away to Australia like during the eighties when there was a recession, during the nineties and even in 2010 - people left Cork, but Cork never left them. [The Holly Bough’s] as much about Cork people living abroad as it is people living here now”. Curious as to what’s brought John back to his post at the Holly Bough every year for almost two decades, I finish by asking what he finds to be the single most rewarding aspect of editing the Holly Bough - he answers with an anecdote: “I had an email from somebody just the other day. She shared this story with me about her grandfather; he’d had a tough year. He’s eighty-nine, he’d had Covid - recovered, thankfully - and he’d also gone blind. One of the things she’d done was she brought the Holly Bough to him, and she read the stories
to him. She said he got such a lift out of that. The feeling that gives you, to make someone so happy - to make a family so happy - it’s off the scales. It’s so rewarding”. In a time defined by transience and adjustment, new normals and fleeting pasts, we need our traditions now more than ever. The Holly Bough has been Cork’s very own since 1897 - what’s one mad year to a spirit spanning centuries?
Print editions of the Holly Bough are available to purchase in booksellers and newsagents across the country, as well as through the Holly Bough website - hollybough.ie - where digital copies are also accessible.
Food and Health
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The Taste of Christmas: Tradition and Time Together writes Maeve O’Keefe, Food & Health Editor
Last Christmas, my mother and I tore about Dunnes Stores back home in Kilkenny in search of TK Red Lemonade. We were frantic, returning to the soft drinks again and again with furrowed brows, until eventually, my mother boldly declared that she ‘didn’t care anymore, they’d just have to make do with white lemonade.’ By ‘they’ she meant my brothers and father, who would find the prospect of Christmas dinner without a big bottle of TK Red Lemonade almost blasphemous. Why? Well, because we always have a big bottle of TK Red Lemonade with our Christmas dinner. We never have it at any other time of year, and yet it is one of the threads of tradition that knits together our Christmas, and without it, it felt like Christmas might just unravel. It is in times of uncertainty that we cling to tradition the most. Christmas, it seems, is one of
those events in which every family has its own choreographed rituals and traditions, that are unique and possibly arbitrary, yet feel vital to the essence of Christmas within that particular household. Maybe it’s the annual debate over whether Heroes or Quality Street are better (let’s be real, Celebrations are the best of the lot), or the Christmas cake that is gifted to you every year by some benevolent friend or relative who is blissfully oblivious of the fact that not that many people actually enjoy Christmas cake at all. It might be a selection box from Granny, which you lament at being so much smaller and less bountiful than when you were a kid. Or maybe it’s a warm mince pie dusted in icing sugar, with fragrant mulled wine or hot porter after a long day at work. Whatever your Christmas traditions are, it’s very likely that food is at their core, from the obvious and almost universal turkey dinner, to the unique
quirks about what type of soft drinks to buy, and the variety of multipack Taytos to feast on after Christmas dinner. The beauty of food at Christmas time is that it facilitates the gathering of the family unit in a way that is sadly rare these days. Individually, it can feel difficult enough to spare the time it takes it to prepare a proper meal and eat it without glancing at the word count on your essay, flicking through emails or darting out the door for work. Too often can we feel torn between conflicting obligations at this stage in our lives, and when we combine this with equally frenzied family members, the thought of gathering together over the dinner table for a hearty meal might seem improbable without something as unifying as Christmas dinner. At the risk of sounding cheesy, Christmas dinner is a rare occasion in which we are obliged to enjoy each other’s presence;
to pull crackers full of magic fish and other gimmicks and accuse one another of cheating somehow, to wear flimsy paper crowns and tell stories about Christmases of the past. It can feel novel for some to participate in such a celebration of indulgence and relaxation, as dishes of brussels sprouts and roast carrots jostle with gravy boats and bowls of stuffing for space on the table. What separates Christmas from more mundane instances of gathering over food is, I feel, the symbolism of cooking for others. In gathering with family, the meal preparation is often a collaborative effort, with various family members offering to prepare certain components of the feast. I take control of dessert, while Dad manages the roasting of the far-too-big turkey. My mother will run the rest, monitored by my brother, who views it at his duty to ensure that the potatoes are
Editor: Maeve O’Keeffe just right. While it may just seem like the logistics of assembling such a big meal, I like to think that cooking for others is really an illustration of love; giving your time to nourish and celebrate with others in an opportunity you might not share at any other time of year. Even if you’re less inclined to get involved in the kitchen, there is a satisfaction to enjoying others’ hardwork, and knowing you are cared for, as you chomp down on some plum pudding or a slice of yule log, or root out the specific kind of sweet from the tin of Roses that your mother especially likes before she nestles in for the ‘Call the Midwife’ Christmas special. We cling to our Christmas traditions at the best of times, as evidenced by my hunt for red lemonade last year. I don’t really know what Christmas will look like this year, but the unfortunate likelihood is that we may be forced to part with some of our previous Christmas traditions, like the beloved 12 pubs of Christmas, or lining the streets of the city in anticipation of the lights being switched on, packed like sardines in a huddle of excitement. In stripping away the excess of our old traditions, however, we may find ourselves adopting new ones. Maybe you’ll send Christmas cards with a great recipe for cranberry and white chocolate cookies enclosed to friends or relatives you can’t see immediately, or enjoy more intimate gatherings over a selection of cheap Aldi wine and cheese and a viewing of your favourite Christmas film. You might just find that a Baileys hot chocolate with mince pies and a much smaller group of friends is a little more enjoyable than hearing the same Christmas songs repeated on a loop while freezing in the queue to a nightclub. And although your Christmas might be a little different compared to last year’s, the heart of your traditions, whatever they may be, need not change entirely. We can still enjoy the simple pleasures of lounging in our pyjamas eating selection boxes and watching TV before gathering together (either virtually or in-person) for a hearty Christmas dinner. That means that yes, more than likely, I’ll be back rummaging through the soft drinks to find jewel coloured TK Red Lemonade in the supermarket at the last minute, until I eventually locate a stray bottle next to the checkout. Because it’s a tradition.
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The Scent of Christmas – A Mulled Wine Recipe By Maeve O’Keefe, Food & Health Editor Smell is one of our most evocative senses. Imagine the smell of Crayola crayons and jelly babies, and you are transported to the Junior Infants classroom in your local primary school, or the odour of wet dog that will make you crave a 99 like you’re in the back of the car after a day at the beach. There’s a reason for this; our olfactory system, which processes smells, is unique in that it is directly linked to the limbic system, where emotions are created in the brain. This means that the link between scent and emotion is particularly strong. And there’s nothing more distinctive than the smells we associate with Christmas; cloves and clementine, cinnamon and ginger, wafting out from a warm kitchen in December. The scent of Christmas floods us with nostalgia, giving us that warm fuzzy feeling as you curl up on the couch in front of a good Christmas film. Although you can use a sickly-sweet candle to imitate these aromas, I prefer the real thing, be it in a bubbling saucepan of glossy mincemeat, or this gorgeous mulled wine, adapted from Nigel Slater’s Christmas Chronicles book. I encourage you to give it a go; most of the spices are easily found in the supermarket at this time of year, and the lingering fragrance in your kitchen will be well worth it. This recipe serves six people, but obviously can be adjusted for however many people are in your household. If you would prefer to make this non-alcoholic, simply omit the vodka, be a bit more generous with the lemon and orange juice and replace the red wine with a non-alcoholic grape juice alternative like Shloer.
Mulled Wine Ingredients: 200ml vodka 6 cloves 1 cinnamon stick 3 star anise 1 Orange 1 Lemon 750ml bottle of red wine 1 tbsp honey or sugar
Steps: 1. Put the ingredients into a large pot. You can juice the lemon and orange, or simply just add a slice or the peel. The choice is yours. 2. Heat the mixture slowly; do not allow to boil. 3. Leave heated on the hob until you want to serve it. You can then ladle it into cups or glasses, leaving in or omitting the spices and fruit as desired.
Film & T.V.
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A Retrospective View of Our Strange Year in Film and Television writes Kyran Leahy, Film & TV Editor
Finally, we have gotten to the homestretch of the year like no other. Congratulations to all of you that have managed to remain somewhat sane. There are no ifs or buts about it, this year has been the most unusual year of our time. The whole world was at a standstill as businesses were forced to temporarily close; restrictions were put up; and we all had to loiter around the house for a few weeks. We can now look ahead to the remainder of the year with cautious optimism in hope that next year will be better for all. The one thing that I actually liked about this year, however, was that we all did the same thing – watched movies and television shows at home. Thanks to the postponement or cancellation of a lot of productions throughout the year, and our increased availability to lie down on our beds with some shows flicked on, we were all probably watching the same things. These shows and movies have become a part of our year, some more than others, and I thought it would be
a fun idea to look back on this period as a whole and what we all sat around watching. From video game characters on the big screen, to the strange portrayal of a certain former Prime Minister, to tigers and killing husbands, it was certainly a mad twelve months. January: ‘Blockbuster after Blockbuster.’ Looking back at how normal January was is scary. We all just carried on with our lives and chilled out. The cinemas, like during every January, were booming. Blockbusters are perfect for January. They are action packed and entertaining, nothing too thought-provoking to take in after the Christmas period. We got nice, easy movies such as Dolittle or the long-awaited Bad Boys for Life to get our movie fix for the month, while we also got season two of Sex Education on Netflix. All in all, it was a basic month. February: ‘The Parasite craze hits Ireland.’ February delivered both on the big screen and the small screen. We got new episodes of the likes of Narco’s,
The Walking Dead, and Better Call Saul to keep us entertained for weeks. SEGA brought Sonic The Hedgehog to cinemas which was a nice nostalgia trip, while we also got the highly anticipated Harley Quinn movie Birds of Prey. Despite these releases, the one movie that was on everyone’s mind this month was Parasite. After months of discussion on social media, it finally came to Ireland on February 7th, and it did not disappoint one bit. If you missed that craze, it is available on Amazon Prime. Please, watch it. March: ‘Disney+ saves the day.’ March 12th, 2020. The day that will linger in the back of our heads for so long. The day the first set of precautions were announced, and they only got more drastic as the weeks went on. Cinemas were shut while production of many shows and movies was postponed. Colleges and schools were closed as well as some non-essential workplaces. How did we survive? Well, Disney+ came to Ireland on March 24th and for a lot of us, it brought the much-needed inno-
cence and happiness that we required. We were able to watch whatever childhood Disney shows or films that we grew up on to keep us in a bubble filled with nostalgia. It arrived at the perfect time. April: ‘The Tiger King Era.’ If there is one face that we will forever associate lockdown with, it is the face of Joe Exotic. The documentary Tiger King arrived on Netflix the previous month, but by the beginning of April everyone and their dogs had seen the tale of Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin for themselves. It was inescapable. For the entire month you had new people watching it, new discussions, and a special talk show on April 12th. Memes, TikTok dances, merchandise, everything. Joe’s antics will always remain a part of our memories when we look back at this year decades from now. May: ‘The World falls in love with Paul Mescal.’ Another show we will forever associate with lockdown is Normal People, a drama based on Sally Rooney’s novel that man-
Editor: Kyran leahy aged to convince people that Trinity College was a place of romance. Premiering in Ireland on April 28th and airing weekly throughout May, the show was the talk of the town for everyone as we all became invested in Marianne and Connell’s relationship. Paul Mescal catapulted into stardom as he went from being the fella from the Denny’s advert to Ireland’s heartthrob overnight. June: ‘Immeasurable Disappointment.’ Because we were at the peak of Summer, no one decided to release much quality this month, but surely, they could have given us more than 13 Reasons Why Season 4? How that show lasted for four whole seasons is beyond me. I enjoyed the first one, could not stomach any more of them. Alas, that was the only show on peoples’ minds this month, coming out on June 5th. We did get the rather enjoyable Eurovision movie The Story of Fire Saga, but we also got a movie called Becky, where Kevin James starred as a Neo-Nazi, so they cancel each other out. July: ‘Hamilton, the film on everyone’s screen.’ The movie that caused everyone to renew their Disney+ subscriptions, Hamilton, came to our screens on July 3rd and it was
unavoidable. This film was the most streamed out of any movie released in 2020. The Broadway musical was a smash hit that brought some newfound interest in Broadway amongst younger audiences. It was the real deal of the month, which is easy when your competition is The Kissing Booth 2. August: ‘The Cinema Strikes Back.’ After a long gruelling period, the cinemas made a triumphant return into our everyday lives and they did it with a bang. Although limited capacity, they made a real statement of intent releasing movies like Tenet, and Bill, and Ted Face the Music for our enjoyment. They could have rereleased The Emoji Movie and I probably would have seen it in cinemas. Although short lived, it was a welcome return that was well needed. September: ‘Dishonour to us All, for €22.’ One movie that haunted me for the month, and inspired my first ever University Express article, was the Mulan remake. While I was thankful that I did not have to pay the ludicrous fee to watch it, I was still massively let down. To remove iconic characters and the soundtrack to create “realism”, yet you have a witch roaming around and Mulan herself doing backflips casually? I could not believe what I was
seeing. Even the anticipated Ratched or Enola Holmes could not get the dire memory of that movie out of my head. October: ‘The Good, The Great, The Haunting.’ Possibly the most jam packed month of all, there were plenty of shows to discuss. We got the new The Mandalorian for more Baby Yoda action, Sir David Attenborough’s new documentary, A Life on Our Planet was released, and we also had Emily in Paris giving everyone an obsession with the ‘City of Love’ once again. The two main releases were perfect for Halloween, The Haunting of Bly Manor, which delved into a spooky place, Bly Manor, and then Borat 2, which also delved into a spooky place, redneck America. There was a lot to take in, but boy was it worth it. November: ‘The World falls in love with…Margaret Thatcher?’ As if the year could not have gotten any stranger, for some reason, people became attracted to Margaret Thatcher thanks to her appearances during season four of The Crown. Beloved Gillian Anderson took the role, and her rather flattering performance as Maggie led to everyone losing their minds and probably creating a glitch in the 2020 simulation. Thankfully, we finished the month with a heart-warming edition of The Late Late Toy Show,
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one of the best shows in recent years. December: ‘A Christmas Miracle.’ December has only just begun, but there is a lot to look forward to that can cap off the year in style. The bells will be ringing out for Christmas Day as we will finally get to watch Wonder Woman 1984 and Soul straight to streaming services. Releases do not matter much this month. All that is important is that we find the time to watch the likes of Home Alone and Elf for that Christmas spirit. It was a unique year to say the least. One that will linger in the memory for a long time and one that we will be glad to see the back of. It was a hard year for a lot of us but thankfully we had these programs and films to distract us for a few days. As it is now the final month, the “Season of Joy”, we are at a time where we can further distract ourselves with Christmas movies. Have a sit down with family and friends and watch a few Christmas classics together to help each other through this last month, whether in person, or from afar thanks to Teleparty or Zoom. I would like to wish everyone a safe and happy Christmas, and here’s to a better year.
Music
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2020: What music was like writes Cathal Donovan O’Neill, Julie Landers, Elle Kelleher, Fionn Kelleher
I was only dancing By Elle Kelleher
I rang in 2020 at a gig in the Kino. Surrounded, not just by my social bubble, but by strangers who would be my best friends by the end of the night, I danced until my clothes were stuck to me with a mix of sweat and drink. As I crushed to the bar and tried to be seen by the bartender in the crowd, the thought never once crossed my mind that billions of all sorts of everything were floating through the air. The only time I worried about bacteria was while queuing for the bathroom. The next morning someone sat next to me on the bus home. This was nothing more than a slight annoyance to my seedy, hungover self that wanted nothing more than to slump into the seat. Even then, I was planning my Christ-like return to the gigs of Cork City. I took everything for granted. We all did. The day I turned 21, the Taoiseach announced that the schools were set to close. Less than a week later, everything else followed suit. Weeks stretched into months of containment and anxiety as
we struggled to get to grips with the virus. I know I wasn’t the only person who found themselves giving a little more credit to 28 Days Later this last year. As the world opened up again, the live music industry remained shut down, seemingly indefinitely. In saying that, it would take an awful lot more than the plague to stop the musicians and promoters of Ireland, and what we’ve seen this year is proof that we have a beautiful and innovative industry worth supporting. Months later, I finally found myself back at the Kino. Fighting every impulse in my body, I sat and watched Pretty Happy, a band that calls for serious dancing. I waved at familiar faces, but I couldn’t leave my pre-booked table to approach. Still, it served as proof that the heart and soul of music in Cork is Covid-proof. I’m looking forward to dancing with you all again.
A soundtrack to relearn home to By Julie Landers
This year was intense. In just trying to survive, I lost some of the flexibility
I once had for listening to new music. I leaned back on a select few comfort listens amidst the chaos. Phoebe Bridgers released Punisher on the same day I started therapy which was serendipitous timing. I’ve had it on repeat for most of this semester. Two Sufjan Stevens albums, both very different and wholly transcendental, were highlights for sure. Taylor Swift’s folklore made me confront my internalised misogyny and embrace the fact that she is a brilliant songwriter. In terms of Irish music, this year has been phenomenal. There hasn’t been a single CMAT song that I haven’t liked, the woman is a national treasure. The Mary Wallopers’ live-streams kept the morale up during the first lockdown. Deadbog’s self-titled EP was a gorgeous exploratory shoegaze unit. And you cannot talk about Irish music without mentioning the queen Denise Chaila. Seeing her perform in the National Gallery as part of Other Voices was a euphoric experience. The arrival of Bandcamp Fridays pushed me to explore music that
would never have shown up on my Spotify algorithms. Katie Kim’s Charles/VV11 tethered me to somewhere beyond the rainy streets of Cork. She is one of the most intuitive and talented artists I have ever heard. We’re talking music, so I’ll take creative liberties and wedge in an anecdote. I talked myself into a band. Then, when we started rehearsing (between two lockdowns), I was petrified, acutely aware of how badly I felt I took up space and how shy I was. I asked the brains of the operation, Elle Kelleher, what to do. ‘Scream.’ I had never done that before in my adult life. Imagine taking up space like that! I was terrified. But, the beat kicked in and the guitars filled the room and beneath it all, I screamed. I followed that scream around my body, flailing as it shook on my bones, tensing as it strummed on my muscles. And for the first time, in a very very long time, I felt totally free. The pressure behind my eyes receded. The rigidity in my shoulders eased. I don’t know if that band still exists, but that freedom can-
Editor: CATHAL DONOVAN O’NEILL
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not be unfelt. The freedom that making music and following sounds allows.
Art has supported us through one of the most difficult periods of our lives By Fionn Kelleher When I and the regular contributors to this section were given the task of writing a personal 2020 roundup, I admit my gut reaction was to worry: have I listened to much music released this year? Will I have to write excessive fillers --- such as this --- to offset my ignorance? Naturally, I’d like to take this opportunity to plug our own music scene here on the island of Ireland. We must support our own artists whose art has supported us through one of the most difficult periods of our lives. I know we at Byline veer towards not mentioning that global event, but the impact that art has on our lives has been especially realised this year. The calibre of music coming out of our community is something to celebrate and cherish, and I’d like to thank every creative in this country for making our world a better place. If you’re able, don’t forget to support Irish artists on Bandcamp when possible! Nealo’s latest project, All The Leaves Are Falling, is a must listen. Full of storytelling through rap and singing, groovy beats, and thoughtful collaborations, this is an album that deserves to be listened to intently from start to end. The ever-personable Denise Chaila released Go Bravely earlier this year, with ‘CHAILA’ being an instant hit. If you enjoyed the flare and flow of that single, the entire EP is worth
Damsel @ The Roundy checking out. For more funky tunes you can dance to, TheLastPoetZen’s 2020 release, NoNames, might be up your alley. Cork-based Zen creates music with afrobeat influence, so you might enjoy this record if you’re a fan of R&B and rap --- I especially love the percussive elements of this album. In the realm of electronic music, I couldn’t go without mentioning two of my favourite artists, Marcus Woods and Arvo Party, both of whom introduced new LPs into the world this year. Woods’ Self-Portrait is a must-listen for fans of ambient music, and Arvo Party’s Inheritance if you’re into a bit of everything. I’d like to thank those who’ve read my contributions this year, and I wish you all the best of health in the coming year.
Burying the lede (and the farts)
I started hiding hour-long fart samples to come up on his shuffle), but it was also a way of communicating at a time when I was spending more time in college and he was on the cusp of Leaving Cycle.
Even if you can’t produce it yourself, when you find the pieces that express something in your soul, sharing them with other people can be the most exciting thing in the world.
Now that we’ve spent about seven of the past nine months at home, we’ve been using it less. I can walk down the stairs if I want to recommend something to him, and I’m just upstairs if he wants to tell me it’s worse than invasive intestinal surgery. Playlist-communication isn’t needed as much right now, but I expect once our mates in Ringaskiddy serve up two vaccine juices on the rocks the D.O.N. playlist will be back in action.
Mixtapes evolve into playlists, and while the jump to digital has reduced the effort expended by physically recording on tapes or CDs, it’s still exciting to receive a selection of music somebody made just for you. Person-to-person recommendation has become one of the only ways I find new music - that human touch matters more to me now than ever.
It’s something that I’ve been thinking about over the past year. There’re lots of ways to think about music - cadence as maths, improv as magic - but at its heart it’s about expression of feelings, meanings, stories.
If you have a song that means the world to you but nobody to send it to this holiday season, shoot me an email (music@uccexpress.ie) or DM, I’ll listen to it. I’ll send a song back. Might be fun. Wear a mask, wash your hands, we’ll talk again in the new year.
By Cathal Donovan O’Neill On January 1st, 2019, my brother and I made our first group playlist. There were three rules: 1. You can only add songs you think the other person would like, not only songs you like. 2. You can delete any song you don’t like without needing to explain. 3. You don’t get mad at the other person for deleting your favourite song.
Julie Landers in the 98.3 studio
It was a fun new way of exchanging music (he went on to attempt to add several songs by The Strokes back; once the playlist got big enough to bury tracks,
Ghostking is Dead @ the Roundy, Feb 2020
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Photos
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Christmas in Cobh, County Cork by Caoimhe Leahy University Express Photgrapher
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Photos
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SEXPRESS
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Female Genital Mutilation - An informative guide writes Jack Wrixon, Sexpress Editor
This article features content regarding the practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). It is not intended to upset or harm any person, but simply to inform of this practice. I’m flagging this now in order for readers to prepare themselves, either to engage or disengage from reading the piece. Stay safe and look after yourself. According to the HSE, Female genital mutilation (FGM) is defined as the partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or any practice that purposely changes or injures the female genital organs for non-medical reasons. It can also be known as female circumcision or female genital cutting. FGM is a cultural tradition typically carried out on someone with a vagina between birth and the onset of puberty, although many reports show cases being carried out later on in life as a way to continue the work that was initially performed following certain changes to the body, such as childbirth. FGM is most commonly practiced in countries in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa with around 42% of cases occurring in four countries on the African Continent. The World Health Organisation (WHO) state that between 100 and 140 million people with vaginas
have undergone this procedure, and a total of 3 million people globally are at risk of this procedure each year. The United Nations has ruled FGM as both a violation of Human Rights and a violation of the Rights of a Child. FGM is believed to promote purity and modesty among those who have undergone the procedure, and those who haven’t face dishonour, both from family and from the community, alongside the belief that because it wasn’t done, they are “unclean”. Not having it performed means that they may also face exclusion from the community for not conforming and following tradition. It is believed that the process of FGM “demasculises” the person, making them more feminine, and therefore more desirable, in the eyes of the society. FGM has no medical benefits, making it different from
the process of circumcision, which has been proven to have many benefits to the sexual and physical health of someone who undergoes the procedure. In Ireland, performing the procedure of FGM and removing someone from the state in order to perform FGM is outlawed according to the Criminal Justice (Female Genital Mutilation) Act 2012. According to a report published by the European Institute of Gender Equality (EIGE) in 2015, there were then up to 1,632 people with vaginas under the age of 18 who were at high risk of FGM. However, since 2011, a total of 3,780 people with vaginas had been affected by FGM according to HSE reports. These figures may be skewed for many reasons, namely because they were reported nearly ten years ago, but further reports suggest that FGM and the culture of FGM still exists and occurs
frequently in Ireland. As the nature of these processes are illegal, this means those undergoing FGM are going into surgery under unregulated circumstances, possibly making this entire process even more dangerous and harmful.
The next section is quite graphic, so please think of yourself before reading it.
FGM can be performed in four main ways, each with their own subsections but the main focus of that surgical process remains the same. The following definitions were taken directly from
Editor: Jack WRIXON the WHO website, in order to get the most concise and accurate descriptions. The first type of FGM involves the partial or total removal of the clitoral glans (the external and visible part of the clitoris) and/or the prepuce/clitoral hood. Removal of the clitoris is medically referred to as a clitoridectomy, and in any circumstance it is considered a form of FGM. Type two is the partial or total removal of the clitoral glans and the labia minora (the inner folds of the vulva), with or without removal of the labia majora (the outer folds of skin of the vulva). Both type one and two are the most common types of FGM received according to a survey by UNICEF in 2013. The third type of FGM has been classified by the United Nations as the “sewn closed” category. It may also be referred to as infibulation, which is the narrowing of the vaginal opening through the creation of a covering seal. The seal is formed by cutting and repositioning the labia minora, or labia majora, sometimes through stitching, with or without removal of the clitoral prepuce/clitoral hood and glans. A small passage is left open in order for
the person to pass urine or menstrual fluid. Following the sewing, the person’s legs are usually bound together for as little as two weeks, or as long as six in order to help the tissue around the vaginal area to fuse and heal. In most cases, the vagina is reopened for intercourse later in life, usually when the person has married and usually by either a penis or by a midwife. According to a survey on FGM run by Edna Adan Ismail, a pioneer against FGM in Somalia, families of both partners may be present in order to check if the person who has been sewn shut is still a virgin. Childbirth also provides an occasion where a person’s wound must be opened, but they are usually cut further and sewn shut once again afterwards. Type four of FGM also moves in a different direction to type one and two. It is a broader category and encompasses anything performed unto a vagina for non-medical reasons. Very often this will include cauterisation, pricking and scarring the genitals, forcefully tightening the vagina, adding chemicals or other objects to the vagina to change the PH or make it drier, cutting the front or back of the vaginal cavity in order to make the birthing process easier later in life, removal of the hymen as a
child or the process of Labia Stretching for cultural or cosmetic reasons. As mentioned earlier, FGM has no health benefits for those it is performed upon. It does, however, lead to a plethora of complications following the procedure and throughout life. The procedure itself can often lead to the person haemorrhaging from their wounds, infection spreading to surrounding areas such as the anus or the urethra, with that leading to an increased risk of contracting UTIs. Tetanus, Gangrene and Septicaemia also have high contraction rates from the procedure. As there is often no regulation with how the procedure is performed, the spread of bloodborne viruses such as Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, and HIV can severely impact those receiving the procedure. Consequences later in life may include the formation of obstructive scar tissue or keloids on the area where the procedure was performed, obstruction of urine or periods leaving the body, leading to either extremely painful periods and/or recto or vesicovaginal holes being formed from the build-up of urine. Hematometra is also common, and this is when the vaginal cavity and the uterus begin to fill up with menstrual blood,
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which in turn will usually aid the formation of diseases like endometriosis. Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID) and extreme pain experienced during sex are also common. During pregnancy and labour, there is a higher risk of neonatal mortality to children of a parent who experienced FGM, often due to the damage from the procedure. Vaginal laceration, damage to the rectal sphincter and emergency caesarean sections are often required in order to save the child. All of these side effects have acute impacts to someone who has experienced FGM, and this curse does indeed follow them throughout their lifetime. If any part of this piece has upset you, please reach out to some of the following resources: Samaritans Cork: 116 123 Student Counselling and Development UCC: counselling@ucc.ie If you would like to know more about FGM, you can find out more from the following sources: World Health Organisation: The WHO have many resouces on FGM and are running a collaborative campaign with UNESCO, UNICEF, UNIFEM and many others on eliminating FGM in today’s world Akida.ie: A network of migrant women living in Ireland who do so much work alongside their commitment to informing people about FGM in Ireland and globally. HSE: The HSE offer resources about FGM on their website, alongside a free FGM treatment service in Dublin for those of any age who have experienced FGM in their lifetime. Glow West Podcast: In episode 30 of Dr Caroline West’s podcast she talks to Dr Caroline Munyi from Akida. ie about FGM and a more in depth look into what Akida.ie do in Ireland. Edna Adan Hospital: The Edna Adan Hospital is a nonprofit set up by Edna Adan (mentioned earlier) in order to combat FGM and other medical issues faced by women and children in both Somaliland and across Africa. They have many resources regarding FGM on their website.
Gaming
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The RPG Subgenre You’re Likely All Missing Out On writes Hugo Blair, Gaming Editor
One of the most popular genres of video games today is the RPG. They’re characterised by narrative-driven gameplay, in which the player controls a character or party in an immersive world, levelling up and gaining experience points, often fighting enemies, and acquiring treasure. Such games are one of the oldest forms of video game, and today can be subdivided into categories such as the JRPG, MMORPG, Tactical RPG, and Action RPG. However, each and every one of these games owes its roots to an even older gaming medium, one that is much less often in the public eye: The Tabletop RPG. Tabletop RPGs encompass a wide range of different styles and game systems, however there are common elements that unite them all. At their core, TTRPGs are a form of collaborative storytelling, in which friends get together to immerse themselves in a fictional world and carve out their path within it as they see fit. The games are generally
played pen and paper style, with everyone involved sitting around a table together, and often using a gridded battle map for combat. However, they are increasingly (especially given the state of the world today) played online, using the wealth of digital tools available. A ‘game master’ (GM) controls the overall flow of the game, describing a scenario to their players, who generally manage a single character (PC) each, and who then react to their liking. Participants roll dice to determine the outcome of various actions, and the GM is responsible for adjudicating the results of these actions. Tabletop RPGs have been around for many years, with the release of the first edition of Dungeons & Dragons in 1974 marking the start of this type of collaborative gaming medium in the commercial space. However, throughout their history, TTRPGs have never managed to achieve the same level of success as their digital descendants. There are many likely reasons for this. Firstly,
TTRPGs possibly require a greater buyin for the participant. Unlike RPG video games, which present a neatly packaged experience for the player to engage with and enjoy, TTRPGs require the players themselves to direct the flow of the game, improvising their own experience. This doesn’t come easy to many people and does require an amount of practice to become comfortable. A further aspect of TTRPGs that represents an obstacle to players is the forced cooperative nature of the medium. While the cooperation of an adventuring party is one of the greatest draws of the game, anyone who’s ever struggled to find a gaming group knows how difficult it can be to work with; and without that group, well, you’re on your own – both literally and figuratively. It’s also important to mention the effect that the Satanic Panic of the 1980s had on the popularity of TTRPGs, and especially on Dungeons and Dragons. During this time, individ-
uals campaigned against the game and spread misinformation, asserting that it was a satanic cult recruitment tool, and even induced youth suicide. Some campaigners went as far as to set up an organisation called B.A.D.D – Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons. I’ll give them credit for the catchy name at least. Of course, we know today that tabletop RPGs are innocuous sources of entertainment, and in fact, despite previously mentioned difficulties, have seen somewhat of a renaissance in recent years. The simplified approach of the Fifth Edition of Dungeons & Dragons, released in 2014, as well as the widespread appeal of live online TTRPG shows such as Critical Role, High Rollers, and Acquisitions Incorporated has led to a surge in popularity for the gaming medium. Shows like these have helped to destigmatise the game and demonstrate that it’s not some weird thing a bunch of sweaty guys do in their mother’s basement. In fact, I argue that any RPG fan – or fans of any
Editor: HUGO BLAIR type of video game for that matter – can find more similarities than they perhaps expect between the mediums, as well as benefits not seen in the digital space.
cal challenge presented by games like Fire Emblem or Final Fantasy – what does a story-driven RPG played with dice have to offer you? Lots, actually:
Let’s start with the similarities. You boot up a new RPG, play for an hour or two and voilà, you’ve finally finished creating your character! If this is something you love, then rest assured that it only gets better with pen and paper. Character customisation in video game RPGs can range from the simple – such as in the laid-back simulation RPG Stardew Valley – to the complex, as found in games like Divinity: Original Sin II. However, even these more intricate character creation systems can’t hold a candle to what is possible in most TTRPGs. The wealth of combinations of class, background, and race/ancestry, as well as stat distribution means there are almost limitless options for how your character takes shape – what your character is. And as for the who, the only limit is that of your creativity.
Depending on the game system, and the approach of the gaming group, the TTRPG can offer some of the best strategy-based gaming there is. The wide array of mechanically diverse character possibilities, as well as the myriad of spells, abilities, and items available provide ample opportunity for tactical genius. Enemies can be cut down in an instant with a single well-placed spell or strike, or alternatively could be reasoned with by a quick-talking member of the party. Whatever solution you can imagine, you can try. After all, there’s nothing greater than that feeling of triumphing over your enemy by sheer wit alone. In addition, the cooperative nature of the game also lends itself well to strategic play; as any tactician knows, the more units on the board, the greater the room for creative solutions.
So, you can create a more complex character, but say you’re a hardcore gamer, you like nothing more than the tacti-
Now you have a character, and you have the capability to defeat your adversaries by force or by wit, so lastly: what are you going to do, and where?
The beauty of the tabletop RPG, as I hope I have conveyed so far, is that it is entirely up to you and your gaming group. While video game RPGs can be expansive and immersive, and offer choices and branching paths, the simple fact is that they are limited by what the developers thought to design into the game. Suppose you’re tasked with dethroning a violent and ruthless leader to restore peace to a region. You’d love to convince their jealous younger brother to offer help by leading a revolution rather than tackle the leader alone, but unfortunately the game has no such questline and you’re out of luck. When playing a TTRPG, you can simply just... do that. It’s then up to the GM to facilitate their players’ ideas and roll with the punches. To borrow a term from improv theatre, TTRPGs live off the idea of “Yes, and...”. Whatever the players come up with, provided it is reasonable within the context of the scenario, goes. Ultimately, the tabletop RPG is whatever its players desire it to be. To facilitate this, there are many game systems available today, each with a different focus. I have so far spoken mainly on Dungeons & Dragons, as it’s the system I am most
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familiar with, and is a great system to begin with due to its open-ended design – practically any style of campaign can be played using its rules, from high fantasy to horror. Though Pathfinder offers an alternative style of play in the fantasy genre, with perhaps even greater character creation tools. Starfinder is perfect for sci-fi adventures that span the galaxy, and Call of Cthulhu assists in running horror adventures of cosmic proportions. While D&D is the most well-known system, likely in no small part thanks to its presence in Stranger Things, and its longevity within the RPG space, there are hundreds of different thrilling TTRPGs to be explored. Whatever your tastes, be they mundane or weird, there’s an RPG for you. By now I hope to have convinced at least a portion of this readership to give pen and paper a try, even if only to experience the history of the precursor to video game RPGs. So, grab some friends (when safe), grab some dice, and venture forth on a role-playing adventure of your own design.
Fashion
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Black Friday, 99% off & ‘Throwaway Culture’ writes Maeve O’Sullivan, Fashion Editor November has always been famous for its mass consumerism. With the lead up to Christmas, Black Friday and Cyber Monday, it’s no wonder. Marketing teams go wild, playing into the minds of the consumer. In a pandemic, why should that be any different? Either it’s my new glasses prescription or I’m actually getting older and somewhat wiser, but this shopping habit has opened my eyes to a whole new issue. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have always been partial to a good bargain, I am a student after all. However, there comes a point when the sale becomes too much, and at what cost to someone else? Household names of the online fashion world such as Nasty Gal, Boohoo, and Pretty Little Thing (owned by the Boohoo Group PLC) are notorious for a sale. I don’t think I have ever seen a product on their sites that was ‘full price’. Why should Black Friday be any different? With this in mind, I decided to conduct a little experiment, taking on the knowledge awarded by my secondary school Home Economics lessons. In the early days of the month, I had challenged myself to complete No Buy November (which was an epic fail might I add). When it came to the urge to online shop, I would scroll the sites and ‘add to wish list’ over and over, not actually completing a purchase – It was enough for me (then…). When the Black Friday sale came around, I thought of my lingering wish list and the discount that would surely be. You can imagine my bewilderment when I discovered the 75% off sale had barely made a dent. In the case of some items, the price was in fact higher. A cardigan once claiming to cost €50 now with 75% off – a sure deal, no? I started to wonder if the reference prices ever were such, or was this just one big psychological scam? You can be sure, there was no ‘add to cart’ that night. According to the Consumer Association of Ireland, ‘’businesses cannot claim that goods have been sold at a higher price and are now on sale for a lower price unless the goods were actually on sale at the higher price for a ‘reasonable period’, which is generally understood to be 28 days in the three months before the price reduction”. The
Boohoo Group PLC is registered in Jersey, meaning the fool-proof laws of Ireland don’t apply. When consulting the Advertising Standards Authority Ltd. (trading as ASA) in the UK, I discovered there was no minimum date for reference prices. This means that the online site is fully in the right to toy with reference and sale prices frequently. What does this mean for the consumer? It means we can’t let our guard down. Online shopping in Ireland was at 51% the past month, overtaking in-person shopping, not surprising due to the Level Five lockdown. This increased shopping habit lets more and more consumers open for exploitation by money hungry companies. Oh, and the worst part, consumers are not the only ones being exploited by such companies. To add fuel to the fire, Pretty Little Thing launched a 99% sale on their site for Cyber Weekend, with items for sale for less than 30c. Earlier this year, the Boohoo Group PLC were found to be paying staff less than €3.90 per hour and expected the workers to
perform in ‘unsanitary’ conditions. A spokesperson for Pretty Little Thing said the 99% sale was because ‘’after a bleak 2020 for most of us, we wanted to offer something competitive and understand people may be spending less in what is usually peak shopping season”. While the thought may be of good will, one cannot but wonder if a company is selling an item so cheaply, how does the price break down? How much does the worker really get for their work? In line with the scary reality of seasonal sales, how much money was spent on unnecessary items due to them being deemed ‘too good a bargain’? How many new dresses for 15c have been bought during Cyber weekend, only to sit in a wardrobe, tags still on for months on end, until eventually binned and added to the world’s throwaway culture? According to Green is the New Black, the world is producing up to 100 billion new garments a year, 73% of which will end up in landfill or incinerators. The average person buys 60% more clothing and keeps it for about half as long as they did fifteen
years ago. The global apparel and footwear industry accounts for an estimated 6% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, 17-20% of all industrial water pollution and up to 20% of pesticide use. The sourcing of natural materials also damages fragile ecosystems and threatens biodiversity. Industry ‘greenwashing’ is doing more harm than good. In the United States in 2018, Black Friday generated $6.2 billion in online sales in the US alone – a growth of 23.6% from the previous year. China’s annual Singles Day generated a record $38 billion in sales, up 25% since the previous year. Yes, the influx of these sales may boost the economy, but what is the true cost? We foot the bill to our planet, send shopping invoices to our rivers, our trees and our icecaps. Increased pressure and destruction of our climate must outweigh the importance of economic growth. How many more ‘LIMITED TIME ONLY’, ‘75% OFF UNTIL MIDNIGHT’ emails must we receive before we unsubscribe from over consumption?
Editor: Maeve O’Sullivan
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Why Harry Styles’ Vogue cover is everything we needed to see in 2020 Writes Selina Dufner First of all, with this cover, Harry Styles became the first man to ever land a solo cover on Vogue, and while that achievement alone is simply groundbreaking, it doesn’t stop there. Styles teamed up with his good friend and creative director of Gucci Alessandro Michele, and a collaboration between them is always a guarantee that something absolutely extraordinary is bound to happen; whether it is the eye-catching outfits they wore to the Met Gala in 2019 or the design of a t-shirt to celebrate Styles’ Fine Line album and to support the Global Fund for Women by donating a fraction of the proceeds. Shooting for the December issue of Vogue was no exception. On the cover image, Styles wears a jacket, rings and –yes you heard it right – a dress designed by Michele. To those who are familiar with Styles’ fashion sense, the choice of clothing might not come as such a surprise. Earlier
this year, he attended the Brit Awards dressed in a brown suit and a black pair of Gucci Mary Janes – a perfect combination of masculinity and femininity. “You can never be overdressed. There’s no such thing” he explained in an interview for Vogue. “The people that I looked up to in music - Prince and David Bowie and Elvis and Freddie Mercury and Elton John - they’re such showmen. As a kid it was completely mind-blowing. Now I’ll put on something that feels really flamboyant, and I don’t feel crazy wearing it. I think if you get something that you feel amazing in, it’s like a superhero outfit. Clothes are there to have fun with and experiment with. What’s really exciting is that all of these lines are just kind of crumbling away. When you take away ‘There’s clothes for men and there’s clothes for women’, once you remove any barriers, obviously you open up the arena in which you can
play. I’ll go into shops sometimes, and I just find myself looking at the women’s clothes thinking they’re amazing. It’s like anything - anytime you’re putting barriers up in your own life, you’re just limiting yourself. There’s so much joy to be had in playing with clothes. I’ve never really thought too much about what it means - it just becomes this extended part of creating something”. You can definitely count on Harry Styles to break those barriers. That statement is a reminder that men wearing dresses has been done, and quite normally so, by many great rock heroes of the past. While Styles idolised the likes of Bowie and Mercury, there are surely many boys out there
who look up to Harry Styles, see that cover, and become more confident in wearing whatever they want to. It teaches them to stop worrying about whether their clothes are to other peoples’ tastes, or not ‘manly’ enough. It is also worth taking a look at the talented photographer behind the shoot, Tyler Mitchell. At 23, he shot the cover of Vogue’s September 2018 issue. He is not only the first African American, but one of the youngest photographers of all time to shoot a Vogue cover. Mitchell takes pictures for fashion campaigns and an example of that is the JW Anderson FW20 campaign. What else is there to add other than: Where is my copy?
Arts & Literature
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Discovering Ireland as an International Student writes Imasha Costa, Arts & Literature Editor When I first moved to Ireland, I was very adamant to immerse myself in the culture, the art, the music and get a hang of the slang and the ideas that were growing at the time. I was always a massive fan of reading (you could argue that I still am), and had a major passion for art, and loving art that others made. Moving to Cork had allowed me to be open to other peoples’ expressions as well as admire all the hard work and passion that they had put into it. However, it was not until very recently that I properly understood Irish culture, was able to immerse myself into it and learn it myself. As an international student, it is always, always terrifying wondering ‘how do I catch up with the culture around me that is growing vibrantly? How do I understand what they are saying? How do I grow, myself?’. I’ve decided to write up a few recommendations, a few things that sort of got me into Irish culture and made me get what was happening – most of the time, anyways. When it came to reading – and finally understanding ‘Wait, this is what happens in Irish colleges’ most of the time?’ – was when I finally started and finished reading Normal People by Sally Rooney. Yes, Paul Mescal in the TV show is absolutely gorgeous, but it got me thinking about other parts of Ireland, not just Cork. I saw a Tweet about the entire storyline of Normal People detailing that if Rooney had switched around the setting of the book from Trinity to UCC, then the story would have literally happened in the exact same way here in Cork. It gave me a perspective about Cork, I guess, and how it could differentiate the way you would think. But seriously though, Paul Mescal, gorgeous. One of the first things I did when I moved to Cork was explore the city and discover the murals that lined the streets – exquisite art that perfected everything around you. I fell in love with Cork City when I saw art that had been painted on power boxes and trash bins that lined the footpaths. I was in awe. Back home, no one would make the effort to make a dead desert come alive, but here in Cork, people did things to make the city beautiful and vibrant. Take a day to yourself, or maybe even two and walk alongside the river on one
side of the city, discover the art that is growing there, the colours that brighten your day until you make your way to the other side of the city. I promise, you will not regret it – I still take a day now and again to walk through the city to discover the art that has either been repainted or is brand new. And finally, attend a theatre production. They are absolutely class. Whether it is organised by one of our very
own UCC societies, or hosted by the Everyman, they are an amazing way to make friends and just have a laugh. Cork is a vibrant space for all its productions and concerts. I remember one of the first productions that I ever saw live was here in Cork and I was very glad that I made the effort to go watch it with one of my closest friends. It was the best thing that I had ever done. It might seem hard, trying to allow
yourself to embrace the culture that is growing around you, but it might just be the best thing that you could do for the years that you will continue living here. Being an international student is hard. Moving to a different country and trying to understand a new culture that is being sprung upon you could be hard, but art and literature always make it easy to find a centrality in the place that you are living in, and feel like you belong.
Editor: imasha costa
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Forgetting how to Read – The University student’s struggle to find pleasure in books. writes Claudia Schwarz
Everyone warned me, but I refused to believe them: studying literature could potentially destroy your love of reading. So here I am, desperately trying to take my mind off of my pile of assignments by getting lost in Philippa Gregory’s fiction. But I can’t. My mind keeps wandering and I have lost the irresistible, magical force of escapism. Losing your interest in literature as a result of your studies seems to affect quite a number of people. After almost three years of studying literature and linguistics I’m exhausted, and reading for fun, just for fun, is not possible anymore. Anyone else feel the same? I now disappear into YouTube and Netflix because books don’t give me the samesenseofrelaxationtheydidbefore. But why is that? A potential reason could be the sheer quantity of reading required of university students. No matter if you’re studying literature, law or economics, the reading list can keep you occupied for a lifetime. Law students seem to be especially affected by this. I suppose speed reading large volumes of dry case law will kill your desire to pick up any kind of book. As a literature student, reading a journal article about the psychological impact of the Irish Troubles or Chaucer’s use of the imperative form takes time. Being able to absorb and understand the arguments posed in
these articles probably means reading it more than once, and that’s the easy part. After that, it has to be dissected and integrated into your own work. Add those hours up for all your courses and you can wave goodbye to your social life. A few of my friends said that they haven’t read a whole novel since finishing school. Three years without books. I can’t say I’m much different. I try to read during the holidays, but that feels more like an obligation and it takes me a while to get into it. Lisa Matthews is an economics student and the definition of a bookworm. She started university the same year as me and the number of novels and terrible fanfiction she read drastically decreased as time went by: “I still read in my free time, but I don’t connect with the storyline as I used to. That ‘fire’ and excitement isn’t there anymore. I don’t identify with characters as frequently or intensely. Book characters were like friends to me. You laugh and cry with them, you learn from them and are sad once they’re gone. I do really miss that connection”. Does it ever get better? Writer Jonathan Firbank finished his degree in 2013 and mentioned that his passion for books did come back, but never to the level it was before he started university: “Reading feels like working out now, it’s some-
thing I do for self-improvement instead of enjoyment. Audiobooks were a neat trick to convince my brain it wasn’t working though, so I happily go through hundreds of hours of them every year.” Why are the words put in patterns miss? I thought stories were free? I thought stories could be absolutely anything they wanted to be? Because they are. Stop asking questions. Stay focused on the task. So I start again. R eh ah duh ing Ree add ing Reading is difficult for me. (Reading is difficult, by Julia Head) Reading can seem like a tedious task, but it is supposed to be relaxing, freeing even, as the speaker points out in Julia Head’s poem. It is something that teleports you into a different world and lets you be a different person. Of course, we do get distracted by the vast fascination and opportunities posed on the internet. That might be scrolling through Instagram, watching YouTube videos on a loop, or devouring your third series of the week on Netflix. Anna Battigelli, Plattsburgh State professor of English,
says that “our internet addiction interferes with the concentration and focus we need in order to read complex texts.” This makes sense from a scientific perspective, but not all novels are complex, and the internet isn’t all bad. Literature is more accessible now. Just think of e-books, kindles and even audio books. This way, the literary experience is diversified. If you’re sick of deciphering words and want an alternative sensory experience you can listen to the book instead of reading it. I am in a slump, literally speaking, and I’ve decided to do something about it, starting right now. I want to rekindle my love for reading and I’ll start easy with simple page turners and then work my way through. I need to forget the heavy stuff for a while, turn to fluff and hopefully manage to finally get lost again. If you are in the same boat as me, I encourage you to try it too. Or don’t, that’s fine as well. Don’t force yourself to pick up a book again, sometimes you just need a break. After all, absence makes the heart grow fonder. Hopefully.
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Sports
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
Munster glory out of Cork’s reach writes David Andrews
Cork was the difference. Tipperary operated a running game and found their scoring forwards, something Cork were often found wanting for on the day. Micheal Quinlivan, Colin O’Riordan, and Liam Casey, the trio who would not have been available to David Power should this game had gone ahead in the summer, played pivotal roles in their team’s victory. As the bells of the Angelus from St. Anne’s Church knelled across the sombre city centre on the first Sunday of November, the people of Cork were watching anxiously, at home, as their valiant men battled the Kingdom’s finest for a place in the Munster Football Final. It needed a moment of leadership from Sigerson Cup winner Sean Powter, who was outstanding throughout, in the dying moments of normal time to win a crucial free bring the tie to extra time where Cork ran out winners thanks to an incredible last-gasp goal from Cork’s own prodigal son, Mark Keane. It was Cork’s first victory over Kerry since 2012 in the same tie played down the Páirc, Cork went on to claim Munster glory over Clare in the final that year. The Rebel County had its eyes set on reinstating themselves as the kingpins of Munster once again. Kerry’s dominance in this province eroded the sharpness in the rival-
ry between these two sides, but Cork has enjoyed a lot of buoyancy in recent times. Backboned with a comprehensive promotion out of Division 3 and All-Ireland glory in recent years in both U20 and minor - a change in the tide was certainly on the horizon. Cork looked to build on their stunning win over Kerry, what stood ahead of them was seen by many as a less-heralded Tipperary side. Across the two sides, there were a total of 22 players who once wore the skull and crossbones of UCC. These included both captains, Ian Maguire of Cork, and Conor Sweeney of Tipperary. A true sentiment which added extra spice to the affair. Tipperary went into the game honouring the memory of Tipperary native, Micheal Hogan who was one of the 14 killed by British forces during a challenge game of his local club, Grangemockler and Dublin. The Premier County wore replica white and green kits to mark the 100th year anniversary of Bloody Sunday. They featured the date of the tragedy and an image of Hogan, who was from Grangemockler, on the
sleeve. It must be said reaching a Munster final is no easy feat, along with the added motivational element of honouring those of Bloody Sunday - Tipperary was not going to give it easy to Cork. Tipperary honoured the memory of Micheal Hogan in style, running out eventual winners on a scoreline of 0-17 to 0-14, claiming the Premier County’s first Munster SFC title in 85 years. There was fear that the occasion might get the better of the Tipperary outfit. But there was little indication of that in the close to 80 minutes of football that was played in ideal conditions on Leeside. From the outset, they looked comfortable. The lead they fashioned in the 27th minute was never surrendered. It was an emotional performance from the Tipp side, who reminded the nation that they are not just a hurling county. Cork can look back at this with regrets, they looked nothing like the calm, structured side that haunted Kerry just a fortnight previous. Tipp stalwarts stepped up to the plate on the day and took the game to Cork. Freedom in the way Tipp attacked
Cork can look back with a long list of “what-ifs”, the biggest being the loss of their man of the match against Kerry, Sean Powter. But at the end of the day, Cork are just not there yet. As a Cork supporter, it can be easy to throw them under the bus after this defeat, what people do not see is the journey this group of players are embarking on. Before the Munster final defeat, Cork had won eight games on the trot. Cian O’Neill’s addition can be seen as a major plus for Cork. He is regarded as one of the best in what he does and I don’t think he or Ronan McCarthy will surrender their positions at the helms of this defeat. If anything it will be fuel to the fire to go one step further next season. Paul Kerrigan deserves an honourable mention for his service to Cork over the years. A true Cork legend who gave his all every time he put on the jersey. He leaves behind a reputable impact for the next generation of Cork players to aim to surpass. Exciting times ahead for the Rebel County.
Sports
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
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A History Of Dominant Teams writes Sam Curtin, Deputy Sports Editor Dublin’s recent dominance in the Leinster and All-Ireland football championships have opened up conversations on funding, viability of provincial structures and a potential split of the county to make the competition more competitive. Dublin, however, are not the first team to monopolise their sport. Compared to their professional counterparts across the world, it is actually relatively tame. This begs the question, who have been the most dominant teams in the history of sport?
What are the metrics for judging this? Teams who have had sustained/ unprecedented success over a period of time in a sport or league which is traditionally very competitive. Hence why teams such as Celtic and Rangers are not going to be included.
Boston Celtics 1957-69 The Boston Celtics were the original great NBA franchise winning 11 titles in 13 years including an 8 in a row between 1959-67. Although there were only 12 teams in the NBA at the time, this also meant that the best players were focused throughout the whole league with most teams having at least 3 top players in their side. Every great team needs to have an all time great player and Bill Russell was that marquee man. He was the Michael Jordan of his era winning 11 NBA titles in his career which is an NBA record.
All Blacks When it comes to rugby, no nation defines the sport other than the New Zealand All Blacks. They won the inaugural World Cup in 1987 and consecutive tournaments in 2011 and 2015. The Haka is a war dance performed before each match which strikes fear into the opposition and creates an aura of invincibility about them. What makes the All Blacks so unique is that unlike most teams, they have never experienced a dip in results and historically have always been the standard bearers for world rugby. They have a 77%-win record
in test rugby and are the only side in the sport to have a better win loss record against every team. In simple terms, there is no rugby without New Zealand, there is no New Zealand without rugby.
Real Madrid 1955-1969 The original Galacticos backed by Spanish Dictator Francisco Franco were the dominant team of the ‘50s and ‘60s winning five European Cups in a row between 1955 and 1960 along with 9 league titles, 2 domestic cups and an Intercontinental Cup (now Club World Cup). Even for the investment put into the team, it is quite a staggering achievement and made the club the powerhouse that they are today. Players like Puskas and Di Stefano were the Messi and Ronaldo of their era and brought the sport to new heights.
ilkenny Hurling Team 2006-2015: One could argue that it is only fair that GAA is included in some shape or form
in this piece. Kilkenny are the closest thing we have seen in hurling to Dublin’s current dominance in the big ball. Between 2006 and 2015 the cats under Brian Coady won 8 All Ireland’s in 10 years and were in the final in 2010 where their five in a row bid was thwarted by Tipperary. Their success coincided with some of the greatest players to ever grace Croke Park such as Henry Shefflin, Tommy Walsh, and Eoin Larkin just to name a few. They brought an intensity and skillset which had never been seen before and like all great teams, took the sport to a new level. Cody is still at the helm but for how much longer is anyone’s guess.
Cork Ladies Football: While Dublin have been the most dominant team in the men’s game, Cork’s success in the sport is unparalleled. The Rebelettes won five in a row between 2005 (first ever title) and 2009, coming up short in 2010 before doing a 6 in a row between 2011 and 2016. A truly phenomenal feat made even greater
by the fact that the team featured a number of duel players including Bridge Corkery and Rena Buckley who have an astonishing 36 All-Ireland medals between them. A special team who perhaps have not received the credit that they deserve.
Some honourable mentions must go to the New York Yankees teams of the 1940s and ‘50s who put baseball on the map for those outside of the US. The Kerry women’s gaelic football team who achieved 9 in a row between 1982-1990. There have been a couple of teams who have gone under the radar in soccer such as Sheriff Tiraspol who won the Moldovan league 10 times in a row from 2000 to 2010. Gibraltar side Lincoln Red Imps won 14 league titles in a row from 2002 to 2016. The main reason however that no football team besides United make the list is that none of them were able to repeat the success in Europe.
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Sports
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express
In Review: Highlights of a Sporting Year like No Other Writes Liam Grainger, Sports Editor
The Covid-19 pandemic has given us a sporting year like no other. When the initial introduction of public health restrictions began on March 13th this year, they paved the way for a very truncated, yet entertaining fixture calendar. There have of course been some major losses, the Olympics and Euro 2020 to name a few. The latter loss of particular note, considering Dublin would have played host to a number of groupgame fixtures. Moreover, Team Ireland had a record number of athletes competing in the 32nd Olympiad, and medal tallies were expected to exceed previous records. Sport at University level has been one of the biggest victims of the pandemic, and so we’ll have to wait till the new year
before some highlights can be taken from what has so far been an uneventful academic year on the playing field. The woes of the Irish men’s rugby team were one of the biggest talking points of 2020, and arguably for all the wrong reasons. The infamous fixture with Italy back in March is still scapegoated as a super-spreader event of the virus in Ireland, with the postponement call on the Six Nations fixture in Dublin not made soon enough to deter Italian fans from coming to the capital for the game. Things never seemed to get going with the squad upon the resumption of the campaign in October, despite an impressive beating of Italy. A lacklustre performance against France when the championship was still up for grabs set the tone
for a rather deflated campaign in the Autumn International series the following month. A beating by an impressive English outfit in Twickenham was followed by another poor outing against an average Georgian outfit that Ireland made tough work of, only managing a mere 13 point winning margin against a team 7 places below them in International rankings. Questions have been asked on Andy Farrell’s tenure in charge, but the English man can’t be blamed for recent losses, deeper issues are present. The national squad have had few highs since the heroics of Soldier Field in 2016, and much remains to be worked on ahead of France hosting the 2023 World Cup. On a not too distant frequency to the men’s rugby squad, our men’s foot-
ball team had a very disappointing 2020. Blighted by Covid-19 cases, and controversy surrounding the build-up to the November friendly with England, things never seemed to take off for Stephen Kenny, in a year in which so much was expected of the League of Ireland maestro. The goal drought continues for the Republic, but hope can be sourced from the exciting young talent that promises to break into the senior side in the coming year or two. The women’s team also had their own fair share of disappointment in 2020, and despite some impressive performances by Vera Pauw’s charges, they failed in their attempt to qualify for a first major championship after defeat to European wom-
Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020 | University Express en’s football juggernaut Germany. The GAA championships, at both club and intercounty level, have no doubt been one of the most exciting aspects of this condensed sporting year. Cork hurling and football fans were treated to the most enjoyable club championships in years, with the new fixture schedule providing some great battles. The club season this year benefitted from the decision by the GAA to operate a split-season between club and intercounty-level championships, with all club activity taking place uninterrupted between July and October. The success of this decision has been appreciated by the GAA and a decision will be made in December by the National Fixtures Committee as to whether the same set-up will be in place for 2021. The knockout nature of the Intercounty football championship has given viewers some mouthwatering ties, Cork’s defeat of Kerry in Round 1 of the Munster Football Championship and Cavan’s dethroning of Donegal in the Ulster Final have been some highlights. Few people back in January would have expected Tipperary’s progression to the All-Ireland Semi-Final after their first Munster-Final victory in 85 years, but in a historic year for the Premier County they will meet Mayo for a place in a pre-Christmas All-Ireland final. At the time of writing, Dublin, Mayo, Cavan, and Tipperary are the final four teams comprising this year’s Semi-Finals, and in the year that has given us many a shock,
is it any surprise the latter two counties make up the final four pairings? The rise of the Waterford hurling squad under Liam Cahill continues, and the Déise will meet Limerick in the first All-Ireland Final between the two counties in the history of the GAA. The GAA must be given credit for their decision to continue the intercounty championships this year in spite of Level 5 restrictions, for many the games have shortened the long winter months and reminded us that there’s life outside of Covid-19. Here’s hoping for a great set of finals in the two weeks leading up to Christmas, to cap off a great year of GAA action. It’s been a great year for Irish athletes on the global stage, as we continue to punch above our weight. After questions over whether the Tour de France would have to postpone its 2020 edition, a decision to shift the start date to August 29th was welcome news to Irish cycling enthusiasts. Sam Bennett, for his part, was one of the stars of this year’s race, as he ended the 31-year wait for an Irish cyclist to take the green jersey; UCC alumnus Sean Kelly the last. As the 2,000 mile race culminated down the Champs-Élysées in mid-September, Bennett made a break from the pack and became only the fifth green-jersey holder to win the final stage of the Tour de France. Dan Martin finished 41st, and Nicholas Roche 64th (his 10th Tour appearance), but the day belonged to Bennett, who will no doubt inspire a cycling revival amongst many young Irish men and women. Katie Taylor, for her part, reminded us again in 2020 why she is one of the country’s greatest
Sports sportspersons, after easily retaining her undisputed title against Miriam Gutierrez in November. The victory (100-89, 100-90, 99-91) meant Taylor remained undefeated in her 17th outing, and despite a 4th round knockdown, couldn’t end the duel prematurely via KO. A potential fight with MMA fighter Cris Cyborg is being rumoured by promoters at the moment, but for now we can just appreciate the quiet brilliance of Taylor. The plight of Cork City football club was much in line with the 2020 zeitgeist, with the Turner’s Cross outfit confirming their relegation to the League of Ireland First Division on the 24th October after a very unimpressive league campaign. City finished at the bottom of the Airtricity League Table with all but 11 points to their name from 18 outings. An opportunity to rebuild in a lower division in 2021, but for a team who took both League and Cup honours in 2017, this season has been incredibly disappointing. A number of UCC students make up the City squad, so here’s hoping things pick up in 2021. On the water, UCC students represented their country very successfully at European level. Ronan Byrne continues to dominate his class, as does fellow Quercus Sports Scholarship recipient Margaret Cremen who also took a podium place in this year’s European U23 Championships. Lydia Heaphy and Cliodhna Nolan also took Gold in the A Final of the BLW2. Things bode well for Cork and UCC representation in next year’s Olympic games in Tokyo, with a large chunk of Team Ire-
39 land’s squad hailing from the rebel county while also completing their studies on Western Road, or recent graduates. Here’s hoping they add to the success of UCC Alumnus Paul O’Donovan from the Rio Olympiad. In the area of intervarsity sport, there has been little to no movement with many of our clubs. Rugby, Soccer, and Hockey squads have all been granted permission to resume training, but many clubs are still awaiting the go-ahead to get back on the field. The Rugby club have had some impressive victories in both pre-season and All-Ireland League fixtures, and here’s hoping that more success awaits in 2021. Thankfully, the business end of many UCC Clubs takes place in the second semester of the Academic Year, and so all things going well, we should still hope to see some intervarsity silverware on Western Road. Freshers are being asked to monitor the social media channels of their Sports Club, as a number of fresher trials are expected to take place in the opening weeks of the semester. With positive news emerging regarding vaccines and lower virus transmission rates, it’s hoped that the majority of clubs can return to play, and that freshers can get the opportunity to represent their college, after a semester of remote learning and limited campus activity. Let’s hope 2021 sees the return of the skull & crossbones to the top table of intervarsity sport.
University
Volume 24 | Issue 6 | Tuesday 8th December 2020
Sports
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PAUW INSISTS IRISH FOOTBALL FUTURE IS BRIGHT DESPITE EURO FAILURE Writes Sam Curtin, Deputy Sports Editor Vera Pauw insists that the future of Irish women’s football is promising despite missing out on a place at the European Championships in 2022. Ireland were pipped to a playoff place by Ukraine after losing 3-1 to Germany in Tallaght last Tuesday.
It was a campaign that promised much particularly in the early stages where a win over Ukraine on the opening night set the tone for a possible assault on a first ever major championship appearance. The game which drew a record crowd of over 5,000 for a women’s international in Ireland combined with wins over Montenegro and Greece saw Ireland top the group after three games.
This is as good as it got for the girls in green however with a last-minute equaliser for the Greeks in the away fixture dealing a blow to their qualification hopes. These are the types of games the team needs to be able to grind out if they want to qualify for major tournaments. From here, Ireland made life more difficult for themselves despite defeating Montenegro. Ireland were outclassed in their first match against Germany while away and were defeated 3-0 thus setting up a do or die clash against Ukraine on the road.
Unfortunately, it would be a night of regrets and what if’s for Vera Pauw’s side who conceded a goal through a mistaken mix up between goalkeeper Courtney Brosnan and Aine O’Gorman. To rub salt into the wounds, captain Katie McCabe, missed a penalty after her effort hit the crossbar. The game pretty much summed up the entire campaign, a case of so near yet so far and huge missed opportunity.
It is important to point out that the results against Germany when the teams met for the second time had little bearing on this group. Like their male counterparts, they are a footballing powerhouse in the women’s game and are currently ranked at number 2 in the world. The penalty scored by Katie McCabe was the only goal conceded by the Germans throughout the whole campaign and finished with a 100% record and a +45 goal difference. The reality is the campaign was lost in Kyiv and Athens.
Although there are green shoots visible, this team needs to start performing when the stakes are high if they want to reach the next level. Moral victories are simply not good enough anymore for a squad full of players playing in the WSL, America and in top European leagues. There are mixed views on the domestic league, but it is in a rel-
atively healthy place with the likes of Peamount United performing well in Europe including reaching the knockout stages of the Champions League in 2012 and have been competitive since. A number of internationals have come through the league such as current players like Saoirse Noonan and captain Aine O’Gorman who play for Cork City and Peamount United respectively. Denise O’Sullivan also a Cork native is highly regarded in world football and is seen as one of the best midfielders in the world and was voted MVP for club North Carolina Courage (currently on loan at Brighton) in 2018 and 2019 to add to two consecutive league titles.
The manager who is over a year into the job is defiant that Ireland will appear at a major tournament sooner rather than later. “This team has a huge future and this team will be there in 2023.” Pauw’s own future is uncertain but says that
her “heart is here” and was clearly emotional in the post-match interview with RTÉ. The general consensus is that the side have made some progress under the Dutch coach particularly going forward while ball retention has also improved.
From a continuity point of view, Pauw looks best set to take the team forward into the World Cup qualifiers and build on this campaign instead of having to bring in a new manager who will take time to get their philosophy across. After a turbulent couple of years in Irish football, this is not an ideal scenario for the side.
There is great potential in the squad but as they say, it’s the hope that kills you. Hopefully, this will not be the case with Ireland and that at least a play-off place will be attained in the World Cup Qualifying campaign for New Zealand and Australia 2023.