University Express - Vol. 24, Issue 8

University Volume 24 | Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021

The 2019 National Travel Survey on the Central Statistics Office website states that 0.2% of men between the ages of 18-24 owned an electric vehicle in comparison to 0.4% of women in the same age bracket - pg 6 -

The idea of conceptualising parts of our society as ‘foreign’, to exist outside the boundaries of our identity, also denies ownership or responsibility in its production.

- pg 12 -

Express UCCExpress.ie

Everyone knows everyone in Cork and knows everything that happens in Cork.

It is a county full of drama – perfect for a series.

- pg 18 -

UCC REFUGEE WEEK PROVIDES A PLATFORM FOR MIGRANTS, REFUGEES AND ASYLUM SEEKERS IN THE TIME OF COVID-19 tive insights into the children’s lives and exploring themes such as friends, family, the pandemic and their hopes for the future. The accompanying webinar ‘Art in Action’ explored the importance of creative activities to young people dealing with their troubled living situations and how exhibitions and projects can provide a platform to share their experiences in a supportive environment.

Since its inception in 2000, criticism surrounding the Direct Provision system and the treatment of refugees in Ireland has continued to mount, with a long-awaited Government White Paper on the replacement of the system published on Friday, February 26th.

The White Paper outlined the international protection process that will replace the Direct Provision system by the end of 2024. “The institutionalisation, which was very much an element of direct provision,” says MinisUCC student, Shaza Aldawamneh with one of the artworks created by children living in Drishane Castle Direct Provision Centre ter for Integration Roderic O’Gorman, Photo Credit: Clare Keogh “needs to end and we need to work Writes Maeve McTaggart, Gallery and a multitude of other exter- initial plan was to carry out the project towards integration from day one.”

News Editor nal organisations such as NASC, Every in person, bringing children from DP Child and Your Child, and Cork Migrant centres across Cork to UCC to take part Refugee Week at UCC engaged heavily UCC Refugee Week 2021, now an annual Centre. Interviews, art installations in art workshops, and hold an exhibi- with the conversation surrounding the event in the college calendar, marked its and workshops populated the schedule tion of their art is the gallery itself,” the Direct Provision system and its inadfourth year last week with events, work- throughout the week; the penultimate Chairperson of Fáilte Refugees, Méabh equacies, providing a platform for the shops and initiatives which explored the event being the Annual UCC Refugee Lonergan, tells University Express. voices and lived experiences of those who have lived in the Centres. On Tueslives of refugees in Ireland and abroad. Week Conference held on Saturday 26th.

From Monday 22nd to Saturday 27th “Unfortunately, with COVID restric- day, February 23rd, Fáilte Refugees February, an occasion usually celebrated While the online space argues greater tions we had to adapt, and so art supplies, Society and UCC Paediatrics Society with a strong campus presence migrated accessibility, organisers kept the link to worksheets and tutorial videos were hosted an event entitled ‘Children in online and seized the opportunity to ad- the UCC campus with an exhibition ex- sent out to children in Drishane Castle Direct Provision,’ exploring the social, dress and engage as many staff and stu- ploring the creativity and lives of chil- Accommodation Centre in Millstreet psychological and physical challenges dents as possible through the digital space. dren residing in Direct Provision (DP). and the finished art was posted back that refugee children face across Ireland.

‘Art in Action’, the twelve-month col- to us [to] be displayed across campus.” A common thread throughout the week, was a focus on the barriers to education The week was facilitated by the Univer- laborative project between UCC Fáilte sity’s Equality, Diversion and Inclusion Refugees and the Glucksman Gallery, The exhibition runs on the exterior of young people in Direct Provision face.

(EDI) Unit who worked in with UCC breached the digital space and became the Boole Library from 18th February Fáilte Refugees Society, the Glucksman part of an installation on campus. “The to 12th March 2021, offering imagina- Cover Story continued on page 3....

Editorial

2 Editorial Team Editor-in-Chief – Fiona Keeley (Editor@UCCExpress.ie) News Editor – Maeve McTaggart (News@UCCExpress.ie) 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) Online Editor – Edel Lonergan (Online@UCCExpress.ie) Marketing Executive – Fiona Keeley (Marketing@UCCExpress.ie) Webmaster – Jonathan Hanley (Webmaster@UCCExpress.ie) Photographers – Caoimhe Leahy (Photographers@uccexpress.ie)

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Passing Thoughts

writes Fiona Keeley, Editor-in-Chief I have been writing long into the evening these days, not for any particular reason but more to set my mind at ease during those twilight hours before I drift off to sleep. The blue glow of my phone screen as I scribble words onto my notepad stings my eyes most evenings, and many times I’m not even sure if what I am writing is coherent. They are more like passing thoughts on my way to slumber. The amusing part of this exercise is finding these notes at a later date and beginning the process of wondering what brought those thoughts to my mind that particular night, fruitless in terms of an answer at the best of times but it is the process itself that brings value. tell me why we eat or sleep i don’t know why a buffet of longing for friends, family and belonging so hard to satisfy considering the circumstances each one of us is struggling now, so i’m told, but how would i know i’m only an i an island that is two knots away from Atlantis, as it becomes more my sister each day as i sink below the waves chimes can be heard on the dusk evening today remember remember as we continue to look back to the past, never too far forward lest we scare ourselves - with hope ~written 29th January 2021 02:02

Fiona Keeley

editor@uccexpress.ie

“The End is Truly in Sight”

writes Maeve McTaggart, News Editor 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) Deputy Features – Eoghan O’Donnell (Deputyfeatures@uccexpress.ie) Staff Writer: Julie Landers

Once bitten, twice as shy... to hear the Taoiseach recently say “the end is truly in sight,” left me more hollow than hopeful - it’s been a year, it doesn’t surprise me. Quoting Wham! However - and one of my least favourite Christmas songs in March - definitely does surprise me (and perhaps says something... I’m just not sure what.) Resilience is exhausting, getting up every day to work, learn, rest and socialise from home and acting like it’s a choice is exhausting. To hear “the end is truly insight,” after almost a year of listening to it’s synonyms...is exhausting and frankly, difficult to believe in.

Moving back into March again is disconcerting; welcoming the weather and grand stretch in the evenings is nice, but realising it marks a whole year since we just lived without constantly calculating for COVID, it’s risks and regulations is dizzying.

I started this pandemic as I intended to go on: hyper-informed. Daily notifications of case, death and ICU numbers were on, I watched the news at nine o’clock and knew the names of the Health Correspondents; I think it did more harm than good. As News Editor, this is an embarrassing confession: I haven’t watched the news in full in weeks. And I deleted the Twitter app from my phone. Opting for articles allows me to control when I confront the bad news, without it hitting me when I am not ready, frazzling my brain and ruining my day.

While it may be a seemingly reasonable way to cope with uncertainty, stress and fear - by knowing everything you can about the pandemic, the virus and its variants - it is just a way to get caught in a loop. At the beginning of the first semester, I said something similar but I will say it again: it is okay to turn off the news.

It is not an excuse to be uninformed or to indifferently zone out of reality, but it’s a way to exert some sort of control over a life that seems, right now, very uncontrollable. You need to make space for yourself to rest so that you can keep going.

When Michéal Martin said, “the end is truly in sight,” it’s not that I didn’t want to believe it, just that I’m not sure how much energy I have to be attaching to random dates for The End of COVID. So, we’ll keep going, looking after ourselves and those around us in the process. Even if that sometimes includes watching Netflix while the news is on and catching up when your head feels it’s in the right space again. We’re getting through it, and this grand stretch in the evenings certainly can’t hurt.

news@uccexpress.ie #uccexpress

Maeve McTaggart

News

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Cover Story continued...

Due to difficult conditions in the law which make refugees and asylum seekers ineligible for grant schemes like SUSI and instead liable to pay expensive International Fees, Susan Mackey of NASC explained that young people in Direct Provision face profound barriers when accessing education.

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Love is in the Air at UCC Writes Maebh McCarthy, Deputy News Editor

Raphael Olympio, a music artist and a student of Occupational Therapy at UCC, told a webinar hosted

by The Glucksman and Fáilte Refugees of the anxiety of waiting for the legal requirements to align so he could enter UCC and fulfill his acceptance. “I was frustrated, I felt stagnant,” he said, “If I didn’t have my music my mental health would have deteriorated really badly,” he said, “music keeps me going.”

Limited access to educational supports—magnified by the virtual learning space of COVID-19—makes learning “so much harder for children in Direct Provision because of the environment they are in,” Donna Vuoma, a former resident of Direct Provision and mother to three children said, “these children need supports to access their education, so many of them are falling behind.”

Donna spoke of her mission to ensure that “these children have everything they need to go to school” as she outlined her work with everychildireland.org to ensure every child has access to a laptop or tablet so that they can learn.

When asked by University Express what the objective of Refugee Week is, UCC Fáilte Refugees Chairperson Méabh Lonergan said: “I hope that students and staff come away with not only greater knowledge of the massive social issues which face refugees in our community, but with some prejudices broken and some humanity felt.”

“We hope that this week will [show solidarity with], empower and champion the people who need it most, and continue to bring about a fairer and more equal UCC, Cork and Ireland for all.”

Valentine’s Day, which occurred on February 14th 2021 saw many couples taking to social media to share how University College Cork lent itself to forming the foundations for many relationships and love stories.

engaging with their students. They were brilliant and would always ask us questions and our thoughts on the class subject and, in that way, I got to meet more of Seamus and his thoughts and opinions on politics. Since we share [that] mutual interest, we’re never bored.”

On the UCC social media pages, the story of UCC graduates, Vanessa and Seamus was shared.

Originally from Ecuador, Vanessa was an international student who studied for her masters in International Public Policy and Diplomacy at UCC. Seamus did his masters in Government and Politics and therefore, the two students shared lectures in the O’Rahilly Building.

It has been over two years since Seamus and Vanessa finished their masters. Vanessa still works at UCC as a researcher on a “project to enhance the reputation of Cork as a smart region,” she explains. “I couldn’t be happier since I genuinely love Cork and its people.”

“It kind of became a ritual to go for a cup of coffee right before the lectures and then, during the lecturers Dr Liam Weeks and Dr Niall Duggan were always very

“While I am in a different building, when I have a chance, I take a few minutes to go to the Coffee Dock in the ORB to say “hi” to my former lecturers (now colleagues) and just to reminisce those happy days that led me to where I am now,” Vanessa added.

The alumni bridge, which links UCC to

its ceremonial gate, has been a central feature of UCC to generations of students. Catherine and Philip Ryan from Aghada, Co. Cork, met at UCC in the 1960s and they were photographed as a young couple by the Evening Echo. Fifty years later, they were part of the unveiling of the Alumni Bridge in 2019. They shared how their love story was crafted by the surroundings of UCC. Emily Gale, a lecturer in popular music studies at UCC was quoted by the Los Angeles Times recently in her analysis of the popular single ‘Driver’s Licence’ by Olivia Rodrigo in relation to modern love songs. Ms. Gale spoke of the popularity of ‘giving voice to the heightened emotions of late adolescence,’ which she says dates as far back as the 1840s. Founded in 1845, it is evident that finding love at UCC is just as long as a tradition.

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News

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Students turn to arts to rationalise pandemic Writes Maeve McTaggart, News Editor Covid-19 restrictions have removed students from UCC campus for what will be a year on March 12th, constraining college life to the virtual space of Microsoft Teams and Zoom calls. As the pandemic continues, what the long term effects will be on students and the population as a whole remains unknown. In an effort to capture the experience of living through unprecedented times, student societies have launched a number of initiatives to express and explore the reality of living and learning during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Campus Narrative, a publication launched by the Journalism Society to document “University Life in the Time of Covid-19” is currently taking submissions of diary entries, poetry, articles, fiction and artworks to create a body of work which allows the years of the pandemic to be recorded in students’ own words. “We hope that Campus Narrative will be a place for students to look back on their experience of student life during the pandemic,” says Mia Poland, society chairperson.

Across the university, students have been founding specialised publications to showcase and document their interests and experiences while at university. UCC Government and Politics society are currently developing the second issue of their student-run political journal Polity, aiming to offer a platform for students to express their views, opinions and analysis on major global issues through essays and academic articles. “Collectively, we are living through one of the most trying and politicised times in modern memory,” Polity Editor Rhian O’Sullivan says, “and we want to hear what [students] have got to say about it.”

In line with this trend, UCC Fashion Society’s recently published the impressive fashion magazine STÍL. “College is an experience that for many of us, sets the foundation of who we become next,” Maeve O’Sullivan says, “The purpose of STÍL was to have something to be enjoyed in the now but also something that students could carry forward with them.” The magazine relies heavily on the work of local artists to pop-

ulate the pages, unable to engage in photoshoots due to COVID-19 restrictions and repeated lockdown measures.

UCC Fáilte Refugees established Aistear, a publication to feature work from members of the Refugee, Migrant and Asylum Seeker communities. “As the Irish word for ‘journey’, we hope Aistear will give a place for people to share what they want to share, and say what they want to say - no brief, just an open platform,” Fáilte tells University Express.

Sonder, a literary zine created by UCC students, overcame the problems posed

by COVID-19 says editor Lara Ní Chuirrin: “The entire project was put on hold

when lock down happened in March 2020. However, [after lockdown] I think we were all ready to write again, and wanted to create something new amidst the tedium and strangeness of lockdown.”

The new publications join their older counterparts in the University Express, Motley Magazine and The Quarryman - a student-run literary journal published by UCC English Society. “I put my whole heart into it last year and I spent hours and hours working on it every single week,” Joy shares, “I was so proud of what we achieved.” The numbers of submissions to student publications such as The Quarryman continues to increase year on year, despite the impact of the pandemic.

Of recurring themes which appear in submissions from students, staff and alum, it is love and grief which appear most often to occupy the prose and poetry of The Quarryman.

While the pandemic will inevitably affect the practical considerations of publishing this year, it will also affect what people are drawn to write about and express. “Life does come at us with these impossible experiences and writing is a great way to deal with them… I think the theme this year will be a lot of love that has nowhere to go [and] is looking for a place,” Joy explains, hopeful that it will find and fill the page.

News

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

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Professor Sarah Culloty appointed as Head of SEFS College at UCC Writes Maebh McCarthy, Deputy News Editor

University College Cork recently announced the appointment of Professor Sarah Culloty as Head of the College of Science, Engineering and Food Science (SEFS.) This makes Professor Culloty the first female Head of College in STEM at UCC. Prof Sarah Culloty, who is originally from Kerry, has had a distinguished career to date which has seen her previously head up UCC’s School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences (BEES). She also served for a time as a Director of the Environmental Research Institute. In her new role, Prof Culloty will now head up a team of 600 academic and research staff, and over 5,000 students.

STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education and research in UCC covers a range of subject areas including: life and biological sciences, physics, chemistry, maths, engineering, architecture; and information and communications technology. In UCC, there are more than 1,200 graduates each year in the area of STEM.

Prof Culloty said she was “delighted” to be appointed UCC’s first female Head of College, and said that she has ambitious plans for the College going forward. “I believe that there has never been such an exciting time to study STEM,” she said. “Sustainability is at the heart of our programmes and our research. Together we are the scientists, the technologists, the engineers, and the mathematicians who are focused on creating and delivering a sustainable future for us all. We are developing innovative solutions to support a sustainable and environmentally responsible society.”

Prof Culloty added that STEM will play a pivotal role in the world’s economic recovery once we begin to return to post-pandemic normality. “It will provide significant career opportunities to those who opt to study a STEM discipline, and I am proud that our graduates have the skills and attributes to play their role in solving key societal challenges in the 21st century,” she said.

As the first female Head of College in STEM at UCC, Prof Culloty is committed to encouraging girls to study

STEM and is one of the role models for I Wish 2021. I Wish is a community led conference, which is targeted at female secondary school students interested in pursuing a career in STEM. Interim President of UCC, Professor John O’Halloran welcomed Prof Culloty’s appointment.

“I’m delighted that Professor Culloty will lead the College of Science, Engineering and Food Science (SEFS) at this extraordinary time for humanity and our world,” he said.

“Perhaps for the first time in generations, science - be it climate change and mitigation, infectious diseases or food - is not only being considered inside the walls of our universities, but also in every home and every media outlet today. Much of the research conducted in SEFS, and being led by Professor Culloty, is the cutting edge, and generating new knowledge and opportunities for these global challenges.”

“We are very excited that Prof Culloty

will ignite new ideas and bring impact to our university and our society in this leadership role,” he added.

Interim President of UCC, Professor O’Halloran also expressed his joy at the appointment of Prof Culloty on Twitter, adding that he was proud to have Prof Culloty as “part of the leadership team at UCC.” Prof Culloty was also part of the University Steering Group when the University achieved its first Athena Swan bronze award, an accolade that recognises and celebrates good employment practices for women working in higher education.

The announcement of Prof Culloty’s appointment comes in time for International Women’s Day, which occurs on March 8th 2021. The international theme for this year is #ChooseToChallenge, which encourages people to challenge gender inequality, gender bias and norms.

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Features

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

The Eco-Gender Gap: Is Saving the Planet a Woman’s Job? Writes Elisha Carey, Features Editor

Speaking last week to the United Nations’ Security Council, Sir David Attenborough delivered a grim message to world leaders, “please make no mistake - climate change is the biggest threat to security that modern humans have ever faced.”

“There is no going back - no matter what we do now, it’s too late.”

Climate change is an issue affecting every single person on planet earth, which is why you might be baffled to hear that roughly 50% of earth’s population are lagging behind in their efforts to tackle it. In 2018, market research firm, Mintel, reported that 71% of women in the UK were making a conscious effort towards living more sustainably in comparison to just 59% of their male counterparts. Jack Duckett, Senior Analyst at Mintel dubbed the firm’s discovery as something of an “eco-gender gap” pointing to “men feeling that caring for the environment somehow undermines their masculinity” as the potential root of the problem.

public relations firm working solely with eco-conscious brands. Fiona tells us that 90% of her client base are female “in my experience the majority of Irish sustainable brands are women-led” she says, giving the examples of eco toy company, Jiminy.ie, minimal waste store, reuzi. ie, and reusable cups and bottles brand, Ecoset, which each have women at the helm. Sharon Keilthy, Founder and CEO, of Jiminy.ie tells University Express that “96% of our 11,000 Instagram followers are female” while most of the shops that Jiminy supplies are female-led, as are half of their toy-maker suppliers. Fiona Smiddy of Green Outlook, an Irish sustainable lifestyle shop, notes a similar trend as women also make up the majority of Green Outlook’s customer base.

Mintel’s 2018 report noted that women “still tend to take charge of the running of the household.” This is certainly true for Irish women who, according to a 2019 joint report by the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC) and the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), spend 10.5 hours more per week than men on housework and 11 In order to paint the Irish picture of hours more on care of both children and this issue, University Express got in older adults. Helen Russell, lead author contact with Fiona Donnellan, the of the joint report, observed that “In IreFounder of Sustainable PR, an Irish land we have the seventh highest gender

gap in hours of unpaid work per week.”

For reuzi.ie Founder, Pat Kane, it was her experience of motherhood which informed her choice to build a sustainable brand and promote minimal-waste living, she writes on her website: “After becoming a mom for the first time, I started to notice the amount of rubbish we were going through every day rising at an alarming rate – from plastic wraps and bottles, to random boxes and let’s not forget about the hundreds of nappies!”

Not only are women disproportionately responsible for the domestic sphere but this is coupled with the fact that eco-friendly products are, as Mintel observes, “largely aimed at female audiences.” Recent years have seen the popularising of plastic-free period products such as menstrual cups, reusable pads or even absorbent period underwear as well as cosmetic products in glass and metal packaging. The advertising for these products is borderline inescapable (within the last week alone I could count over 20 adverts for Garnier’s new sustainable shampoo bars on my Instagram feed.)

Donnellan speaks to a pressure she herself has felt to go green: “for me it’s hard to open a magazine or scroll through Instagram without seeing something about it brands urging you to buy less, buy bet-

ter, buy ethical, go vegan. Sustainability can’t land solely on our shoulders.”

As well as this, social media of late, has opened up young women to criticism for failing to engage in sustainable behaviours. “Sustainability shaming” has become popular on platforms like Instagram, Twitter and even TikTok, targeting anyone caught buying an item of fast fashion clothing, using harmful cleaning products, eating meat, or storing foods using plastic instead of glass.

Instagram, in particular, is a peculiar platform for “sustainability shaming” to be taking place, the app is wellknown for fuelling consumerism, the notion that women must always be “on trend”, avoiding outfit repeating at all costs, but then turns around and attacks those who fall victim to this trap, for their failing to avoid fast fashion. Many young women, myself included, have to carefully toe the line between being shamed for engaging in sustainable behaviours and being shamed for failing to. Sustainability journalist Sophia Li has said “I think there’s so much shaming and cancel culture that comes along with this (sustainability) space” but that, “everyone is on their own sus-

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express tainability journey.” It’s important to note that being able to afford sustainable items, particularly sustainable clothing, is a privilege not everyone has. Li says sustainability is a spectrum, on one end is Greta Thunberg, who, in 2019, made a double crossing of the Atlantic Ocean by boat to avoid contributing to the carbon emissions from air travel, and on the opposite end, are climate deniers like Steve Bannon. Not everyone can be a Greta.

On the question of why women are more eco-conscious than men, Smiddy contends that the sustainability movement appeals to “the maternal and caring nature of women” and indeed this hypothesis finds support in various studies from the ‘90s to the early ‘00s which point to women’s greater tendency to be prosocial, altruistic, empathetic and to assume a future-focused perspective.

The 2019 journal Sex Roles featured a study by Janet K. Swim et al. which found that both genders associated sustainable behaviours with female gender stereotypes. Swim’s research highlighted that certain pro-environmental behaviours such as buying clothes from a sustainable brand or using reusable shopping bags, were perceived by men as a threat to their masculinity. After being presented with a short case study of a man who recycled and used a reusable shopping bag, the male participants in the study unanimously agreed that these behaviours made them “uncertain

of his heterosexual identity.” Swim and her colleagues were able to conclude that men could therefore be disinclined to engage in these behaviours for fear of being perceived as effeminate or gay. The same concern has also been well-established as a factor in men’s reluctance to embrace vegan or vegetarian diets. Professor Laura Wright, author of The Vegan Studies Project explains that there is a strong link between white heterosexual masculinity and the consumption of meat. Similarly, A 2016 paper in the Journal of Consumer Research noted that “men may be motivated to avoid or even oppose green behaviours in order to safeguard their gender identity.” The paper claimed that brands had a responsibility to weaken the association between femininity and sustainability, explaining that this could be done “by using masculine rather than conventional green branding.”

So, it is clear that gender stereotyping and misogyny are forming barriers to men’s participation in sustainable behaviours, with disastrous consequences for the planet. In fact, misogyny has been proven as a factor in men’s climate change denial: a 2014 paper in the International Journal for Masculinity Studies stated, “for climate sceptics, it was not the environment that was threatened; it was a certain kind of modern industrial society built and dominated by their form of masculinity.” Well-known climate change denier and misogynist, former President Donald Trump’s environmental policies

Features saw the US pull-out of the Paris Climate Agreement, loosen regulations on toxic air pollution, roll back significant protections for endangered species’ and increase logging in public forests. Scientists are now claiming that these policies cost the country thousands of lives.

In an effort to offer up something of her own explanation of the eco-gender gap, Smiddy points out that while the majority of her customer base are women, there are more products available on Green Outlook that cater to them like “sustainable period products and skincare” and that “women are more conscious in general of the beauty products that they use and would put more research into their skin, hair and body care choices.”

In similar efforts, Keilthy of Jiminy.ie told University Express, “a male customer once mentioned to me, it’s hard to carry-around reusable water bottles and coffee cups if you don’t normally carry a bag. Women culturally more often carry a bag; men more often just put a wallet in their pocket.” This begs the question, whether men participate in sustainability in their own way. It is widely believed that men are more invested in electric cars than women, however, the 2019 National Travel Survey on the Central Statistics Office website states that 0.2% of men between the ages of 18-24 owned an electric vehicle in comparison to 0.4% of women in the same age bracket. When it comes to 35–44-yearolds, just 0.2% of men owned an electric vehicle compared to 1.6% of women.

However, it wouldn’t be fair to say that

7 men are entirely removed from the fight to protect the environment either. Donnellan draws attention to two Irish sustainable brands Bambooth and Crann, both run by men.

And while the most current major players in climate change advocacy, Greta Thunberg, Isra Hirsi and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are all women, we simply cannot discount the work of the likes of Sir David Attenborough and Al Gore for their respective roles in both raising awareness of the plight of our planet and putting in place effective climate policy.

Nike’s recent moves towards sustainability, the Biden Administration rejoining the Paris Climate Accord and the global decline in greenhouse gas emissions, as a result of the pandemic, signal hope for the future but climate change is here to stay, and it is everyone’s responsibility. The eco-gender gap is just another example of inequality between men and women and it’s about time we closed it. With women making sacrifices for the planet such as washing their own period blood off of reusable underwear and abstaining from their favourite clothing brands, it is only fair that men should make efforts to match. We must resist the gender stereotyping and misogyny which led men to opt out of sustainability. There is nothing inherently masculine or feminine about caring for the planet, it is simply the right thing to do, for all of us.

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Features

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

In a year marked by financial and social crisis, the SUSI grant scheme failed my sister Writes Siobhán McCallum For many, the Covid-19 crisis has propelled some of our most pressing global issues, including the availability of healthcare, wealth inequalities and racial discrimination, to the fore of public discourse. For me, this pandemic has made the shortcomings of the grant system in Ireland abundantly clear. Undeniably, SUSI has contributed greatly to the accessibility of third level education for many disadvantaged groups in this country. In my personal experience, my three sisters and I would probably never have received the opportunity to attend college had it not been for SUSI. However, I don’t think anybody familiar with the grant process in Ireland would state that it is without flaw, and this year these issues appear even more pronounced.

surance of financial stability from SUSI.

For the next few months everything proceeded like a dream. My sister started a course that she could fully engage with and that was preparing her for a career she could envisage herself embracing.

She was grateful that the professors and module coordinator were proficient at navigating the online sphere in which this course took place, allowing her to apply herself fully to her studies. On November 10th however, the worst happened. My sister received a letter from SUSI informing her that she was not eligible for funding. This news was devastating and seemed to contradict the confirmation she had received earlier in the year, so she immediately emailed the SUSI helpdesk. After some back and forth, she was informed that online learning was not covered by SUSI. This reasoning was almost amusing to her, in a year in which every student in the country was conducting their studies remotely, it turned out that SUSI didn’t cover that. Without hesitation, she appealed this decision, on the grounds that it simply defied logic to penalise online learning given the extenuating circumstances of this particular academic year.

Only a week later, she was informed that this appeal was unsuccessful, leaving her crushed and downhearted. Just as she began to accept her fate, myself and other family members rallied around her and decided to meticulously examine the regulations that were denying her funding. We discovered that the regulations quoted didn’t include the term ‘online’ at all, but instead mentioned ‘full-time attendance’ as a factor that determines course eligibility. Citing this lack of clarity, she officially continued with a second appeal. We are still awaiting the results of this appeal, hoping that the delayed response is a promising sign. Whatever the outcome, my sister’s experience this year has revealed major errors in the SUSI grant system that we desperately need to address.

As with many people’s experiences recently, this story begins with the first official lockdown of Ireland in March 2020. My sister intended to undertake a postgraduate degree at UCC for the 2020/2021 academic year, and had initially applied for an MA in Translation Studies. Without warning her plans for the following year were completely upended, and so she began to reconsider. She considered a potential career in social work, but first needed to achieve an HDip in Social Policy before going on to complete the masters in this field. After some research, she noticed that this HDip was also available online and, given the pandemic, it seemed the intelligent choice to opt for a program specifically designed for remote learning. Luckily on August 17th, after submitting a course change application to SUSI, she received confirmation that she was in receipt of a full grant which would cover her fees and provide her with monthly maintenance payments. My sister was lucky enough to have a job over the summer months when the Covid-19 cases were more under control within society, but decided to quit to focus on the academic year ahead, safe in the as- The first issue relates to the extremely

impersonal nature of SUSI’s correspondence with my sister. In the initial letter that stated her ineligibility for funding, there was no clear explanation as to why this decision had been made and no indication as to how this mistake in assessing her application occured. Moreover, in the subsequent emails she sent for clarification, the replies were less than satisfactory. She received mostly generic replies feeding her the same information that she was already aware of. It was evident in one email for example, based on font size and type, that the respondent had even copied and pasted information that had already been provided to her. She began to feel extremely isolated by SUSI, and experienced increased frustration at the lack of compassion and understanding being shown. In addition to this, she twice received reminder letters regarding repayments for maintenance money obtained earlier in the year, even as her appeals were still under consideration.

This only added to her stress and anxiety levels about her increasingly precarious financial situation. The only saving grace in these letters was the clear information provided regarding payment options available to her. It was when her first appeal came back unsuccessful, that I truly

noticed a shift in my sister’s attitude towards the situation. Initially angry, confused and impassioned she now became downhearted, disillusioned and defeated. Coupled with that, she grappled with looming essay deadlines, family health complications and a bereavement. It would have been extremely welcoming to have received more support from SUSI during this difficult time for my sister and our whole family. Indeed, the only semblance of an apology for the mistake made in processing her application, is the singular appearance of the word ‘regret’ in the very first letter she received notifying her of the decision back in early November.

Some may defend these interactions by arguing that this is simply how state systems work, they must operate objectively within exacting rules.

However, yet again in my sister’s case, the regulations used to deny her a grant were in no way clear or comprehensible. Notoriously, these stringent rules and regulations of state systems are not entirely accessible to

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

the layman. She was informed that according to Section 8 of the Student Support Act 2011 and Regulation 4 of the Student Support Regulations 2020, online courses are not covered

by SUSI. The only trouble with this is that nowhere, and I have read and reread these regulations several times, are the words ‘online’ or ‘in-person’ used. What the regulations do state is that attendance is required by the student on a full-time basis. Although far from explicit we came to the conclusion that the word ‘attendance’ was the issue. Regulations such as these are supposed to make the system work more efficiently, not to provide further confusion and lead to ridiculous circumstances such as the one my sister faced for not actually ‘attending’ her course. I am fully sympathetic to the need for institutions like SUSI to operate objectively and in line with government regulations, but what I don’t support is the sacrifice that certain individuals have to make when these regulations fail to provide sufficient guidelines.

This point leads me to the issue of the legitimacy of remote learning. The point of contention for SUSI in my sister’s case is in determining whether or not her ‘attendance’ counts if it’s completed online. Of course, in a year where we have all been forced into exactly this situation, I believe the answer to this is a resounding yes. Even if it was the case that attendance meant ‘in-person’ or ‘campus-based’, this would only serve to make a mockery of the hard work, study and research being conducted by every student in higher education this year. We are all now fully aware that online learners and workers should be taken as seriously as their in-person counterparts.

Governments of the world are all preparing for and arguably, encouraging, the formation of an entirely different world to the one we left behind before this pandemic occurred. It is expected that remote working will benefit many different areas of social, political and economic life, and could go a long way to ameliorating some of our most pressing problems including

the climate change and housing crises.

I hope I am not alone in the vision that online learning for third level education will become more accessible and routine in the lives of so many, particularly those who, because of extenuating circumstances, are often left behind with little to no hope of achieving academic success. This is the moment, as my sister’s case highlights, for SUSI to embrace online learning in all its unconventional glory, to increase its support to those who need it most in whatever environment they conduct their work.

As of writing, my sister’s second appeal is not yet resolved. We are hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst. My sister has even officially switched to the ‘campus-based’ version of her course as a backup plan, should this appeal fail.

However, I’m somewhat grateful for what happened to my sister this year.

As I’ve already stated, my sisters and I have all successfully received funding from SUSI in the past, with no issues surrounding our eligibility or the payments of our fees or grants. My sister’s struggle this year has been a necessary eye opener for me in confronting the obvious flaws of the grant system in this country. In these times, where so much change and adaptation has been made to our daily lives, I call for a major overhaul of grant funding for third level education in Ireland. We need dramatic and urgent action to assess, and hopefully, improve our grant system. Perhaps it would be worth considering an entirely new system, similar to the English and Australian models, whereby students are granted loans by the government which they only repay when their yearly salaries exceed a certain amount. However, I personally think the grant system in Ireland is salvageable, and given enough careful thought, deliberation and imaginative thinking the system could be improved to avoid technical mistakes, stringent regulations and bureaucratic tendencies, as were evident in my sister’s case this year. I am hopeful that as a society and nation that have wholeheartedly embraced the idea that education should be available to all, we can find solutions to the problems that this pandemic has exposed.

Features

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Features

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Memories - An accurate reflection of your past?

Or a trick-mirror of your experiences?

Writes Eoghan O’Donnell, Deputy Features Editor You are telling a story, a recollection of a moment important to you, detailing it to your extended family, only to have your sibling interrupt you saying, ‘that’s not right, it went like this …’, much to your frustration. Scenarios like this occur regularly, and memories that we rely upon to survive and form our personal identities often turn out to be inaccurate or biased in their representation of the truth.

Memory is reliant on the chemical and electrical workings inside your mind that withhold and later retrieve information for you to refer back to.

Memories are essential, they help us not only to survive on a basic physical level, but also to help us progress into more wisened people. Memories also provide us with a continuity of sorts to ensure we can piece together what is past into the present, and use this to help deal with the future.

Yet, memories are tricky. Think of the happiest moment of your life, or of a time quite stressful and traumatic.

You can likely recall these moments more vividly than a regular mundane Wednesday last October. Studies have shown that these so-called ‘Flashbulb Memories,’ the term used to coin these memories most striking for us, are often factually incorrect.

It is theorised, and generally accepted by most, that the further we move away from memory the more nebulous it becomes. Malcolm Gladwell (author of Talking to Strangers, Outliers among others) notes that the more we retrieve a memory, the more it opens itself up to change. When we discuss memories with people, and they interrupt to say something like ‘the green jacket you were wearing had a coffee stain on it,’ it is likely you’ll implement this detail into your memory, even if it may not be true. There is also the instance of us jumbling subsequent memories together into one, like that time you went on holidays and remembered eating in a restaurant, then going to a water park later that day, only to be informed you actually went to the water park the previous day.

Memory Contamination Things like this all prove that memory is pretty malleable, which also means it can be easily manipulated. Memory is never pristine, and cannot be recalled exactly - we give only rough estimations of what happened most of the time after an event has passed. Contamination occurs easily, causing distortion and alterations.

People who may have witnessed a crime are often interviewed afterward to give accounts of what occurred. Suppose the interviewer has a preconceived notion of what happened. In that case, a stressed person giving an account can sometimes be emotionally coerced into recalling something that may not have happened. People are especially vulnerable to confessing crimes they did not commit when under immense stress or acute forms of trauma. A famous example is the confession of Huwe Burton of New York City, a sixteen-year-old still in shock from discovering his mother’s murdered body in his family-apartment.

After a lengthy period of threatening and coaxing by New York City Police, he confessed to the murder. He later recanted his confession knowing he was inno- them. Michaela Coel explores her own cent and had been forced into thinking experience of sexual-assault through and confessing to committing the crime. her latest show “I May Destroy You.” An image that lingers in the protagoMemory Unlocking and Retrieval nist Arabella’s memory will prove key to False memories can sometimes be for- her unlocking the experience of sexual mulated when people are subjected to assault. It is only by closely examining mass-media coverage surrounding a this shred of memory and retracing her particular event: there are many ac- steps on the particular night of her atcounts of people, young and old, con- tack which enables her to unlock the envinced they saw the collapse of the tire memory and identify her assailant.

Twin Towers first-hand, only to realise later that they were at home watch- Alcohol and Memory ing the events unfold on television. Gladwell notes in his book that college students fall into the age group of those It is common for traumatic memo- who blackout most frequently from ries to be hidden away in the depths of drinking. The section of the brain reour consciousness for months or years sponsible for memory formation, called before they are remembered. Certain the hippocampus, is inhibited when a stimuli often trigger memories such person drinks alcohol too quickly, or as these, and something as innocuous consumes too much of it throughout the as a colour or smell can cause memo- course of a night. An ‘en bloc’ blackout ries to arise in our consciousness and refers to a total blackout, in which a peressentially be unlocked. These triggers son is incapable of recalling any informight make a person re-live a particu- mation. A ‘fragmentary blackout’ is the larly stressful situation from a previous term referred to that experience when time in their life, and cause the person you can remember certain, but not all, to lose track of what is going on around sections of a drinking experience (such

as only being able to remember that stumble home college road). When the hippocampus is suppressed from alcohol, a person can still function more or less normally (for a drunk person that is) and be able to have full conversations and order more drinks at the bar, but is likely to have little to no recollection of it the next day (cheers to The Fear). As a side note, blacking out makes a person quite vulnerable, so it is always important to ensure to look after your friends if you suspect this happening.

Our memory is an intrinsic part of who we are. It helps us to survive and creates our personalities.

It helps form our connections with others and relate to the collective human experience. However, our memory can sometimes be quite temperamental, which is why we must always exercise caution recalling potentially important events.

Be wary of your memories, they are as likely to betray you as a traitor.

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Features:Careers Corner

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Skills-Building for Students Writes Elisha Carey, Features Editor Times are truly a-changing: industries that didn’t even exist 20 years ago, now dominate the economic sphere and have redesigned our concept of the “typical worker.” Your parents’ advice of “just walk in with your CV and ask for the manager” is no longer cutting it and “proficiency in Word” is just assumed by most employers.

Brexit brings with it the need to diversify our export markets. Donohoe explains that “a lot of companies, especially smaller companies, did not see beyond the UK market, so language skills to connect us to other markets are important.”

He predicts a surge in demand for graduates with European languages (Spanish, French and German are The Irish Times has named ICT (In- much sought after) or Asian languagformation and Computer Technol- es, particularly Chinese and Japanese. ogy), Pharmaceuticals, Finance and Climate Change as the sectors most Business skills likely to grow in Ireland in the next Closely allied to language skills, the decade. This growth will demand new Irish Times predict that internationskills from the workforce like lan- al selling and market skills as well as guages, business skills and general supply chain management will retech-savviness. I don’t like the look of main important later in this decade. the competition, either. The World Economic Forum Future of Jobs Re- While these aren’t the most futuristic port 2018 predicted that by 2025, the of skills, business skills like marketmachine/human division of labour ing will remain essential as they canratio will have increased so much not be automated (for the time being, that over half of the world’s labour at least.) Humans are needed to make will be done by machines. Accord- decisions, steer advertising campaigns ingly, the WEF considers there will and close deals with other humans, be a decline in demand for manual So, robots may actually steal your job dexterity, endurance, memory, read- but it’s not too late! There are many ing and writing skills and a growth in ways to build up these skills (even demand for technology monitoring during these *unprecedented times.*) and control, critical thinking, problem-solving, innovation, emotional Work Experience intelligence, flexibility and creativity.

Engaging in a period of work experience is perhaps the most obvious way to pick up new skills.

Future Proof Skills Work experience comes in all shapes Information and Computer and sizes, from volunteering to unpaid Technology internships, to part-time jobs, that could “The past 10 years have seen the be remote or on location. Whatever the emergence of new specialisms such experience, the positive benefits are the as cloud computing, gaming, data same – moulding yourself into an attracanalytics and artificial intelli- tive and viable candidate to employers. gence,” says Bernadette Walsh, guidance counsellor at CareersPortal.ie.

- International Work Experience Tony Donohoe, the chairman of the Expert Group on Future Skills Needs Going global offers career and employechoes the sentiments of the World ment resources for jobs and internEconomic Forum in outlining the ships abroad. Their database features likely future demands of the Irish country and city career guides includeconomy: “The more people live in ing career guides for most cities in the the online world, the more data they US. Each career guide includes inforwill generate. The ability to interpret mation on employment and industry is a key core competence, but this will trends, NGOs and volunteer organialso lead to jobs in creative industries sations in that location, CV and cover and how to deploy new technologies.” letter-writing guidelines, work-permit and visa regulations, financial Languages considerations, cultural advice and

professional and social media groups.

Through Goinglobal you’ll have access to crucial employer contact information for employers in over 196 countries.

New Communities Partnership (NCP) is an independent national network of more than 150 immigrant-led groups comprising 65 nationalities with offices in Dublin and Cork with outreach to other cities and towns. It is a rich infor-Remote Work Experience mation resource and has also links Having been a massive success for many you to other voluntary agencies. companies over the summer it seems virtual work opportunities for students are here to stay! Many of the traditional Skills Courses work placement and summer internship routes are now being offered as exclu- Since the beginning of the pandemsively online experiences. Law firms, ic many universities both here in tech companies and financial institu- Ireland and further afield have betions among many others all took on stu- gun offering free online courses, dents for virtual work in recent months. some of which you can complete in This type of work experience will help a single day! There are hundreds of you gain invaluable skills for the fu- courses available online which are ture like flexibility and communication specifically designed to improve and all in a tech-facing environment. your IT capabilities, critical thinking and problem-solving skills as well as those in innovation and commercial acumen (take that robots!)

-Volunteering COVID-19 Volunteer opportunities are currently active nationwide, ranging from deliveries, to DIY, to house decoration for the elderly. Volunteer Ireland represents hundreds of organisations and you can register or explore their excellent search engine to find opportunities to match your interests and skills. Volunteer Ireland also has a Professional Skills Share option for companies and businesses to provide professional skills in areas such as IT, Social Media, Marketing, HR, Leadership, Management etc. If you have a level of competency that you can share, why not get in contact with them?

A lot of these free courses give you actual diplomas or certificates upon completion which you can add to your CV. These can form a topic of conversation during an interview. Remember a key new interview question will be “What did you do during the Covid-19 pandemic? Being able to tell employers that you used this time wisely shows resilience and innovation.

For more information on gaining experience and building new skills visit the UCC Career Services’ website at: https://www.ucc.ie/en/careers/

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Opinion

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Foreign Bodies Writes Rían Browne, Opinion Editor As a country we have an interesting relationship with the exportation of fragments of our society and culture. In most cases this is incredibly positive - the celebration of a rich tradition of art, music, and literature further afield comes to mind.

But, the same can also be said when it comes to the more troubling aspects of our history and culture, parts that are considered ‘problematic’, albeit in a more shameful light. We tend to employ this same approach as an act of avoidance to alleviate the cultural shame when confronted with the deeper wounds that contribute to the production of some of the deeper wounds that have contributed to the social inequalities that have plagued the state for generations.

We are fearful to address these issues due to the cost of the inevitable attention being brought to the vulnerabilities of that traditional Irish narrative we export to the international stage would be too high. But we are now more than ever acutely aware that the cost of not doing so, has proven to be far greater than we could have ever envisaged and as a consequence we are met at a crossroads, a reckoning with our sense of identity and the hurt and shame stemming from the foundations upon which it’s been built.

As a country we’ve acquired a talent for exporting our ‘problems’ or social ills. One of the first examples that springs to mind is the lonely and fraught journey many pregnant people have had to make to the UK and further afield to access reproductive healthcare, for fear of being criminalised at home. In a similar vein many transgender individuals are forced to travel abroad for gender affirming surgery and care due to the an inaccessible and substandard provision of care that pathologises their experiences. We are currently watching as numerous court cases against the national health service play out as women fight for justice surrounding the cervical check scandal, while simultaneously fighting their own battles with illness in the process. The recent mother and baby home scandal serves as another example of a state steeped in the

upholding the grip of the church in the face of empathy. Published last month the commission of investigation into the mother and baby homes comprised the 3,000 page findings of a five year long inquiry into the treatment of women and girls who were sent to the homes and their babies. The report read as a damning inditement of the stigma surrounding sex and relationships, upheld by the state and churches that ran these homes, that justified the subjection of many women to emotional and material deprivation in addition to rampent infant mortality rates. The women sent to these homes were shamed for their ‘sin’ with many children sent to the US/

UK for adoption to erase the ‘evidence’.

All of these examples are grounded in the control of bodily autonomy, historically disproportionately concerning women. We could argue that much of this may stem from the entwined relationship between church and state, which found its roots in the constitution wherein which Catholic ideals surrounding marriage, autonomy, the place of women in the home and the nuclear family in relation to the state were solidified into ‘traditional’ Irish values and attitudes. The constitutional drafts embarked upon in the early 1930’s were influenced by figures such as John

Charles McQuaid who held a strong commitment to the relationship between church and state which was reflected in his contributions to early drafts concerning personal rights, the family, marriage and catholic social principles. The constitution that would transpire, under De Valera’s leadership, would be nationalistic with a strong Catholic conservative influence present. These same influences have often later been identified as a source for social shame and stigma surrounding social inequalities and the mistreatment of vulnerable groups within our society.

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express In many cases the issue of contention is the body. The policing of autonomy or control over vulnerable bodies comes into conflict with our foundations of tradition as a nation, one grounded in Catholic conservatism. When we do meet instances of social progression and liberalisation (as we have in recent years following marriage equality and repeal) we invoke a language of tolerance, acceptance and compassion. And while this may be true for many of us, as a whole there is a continued tension between this ideal of progress and the ideals that continue to live on in our response to progress as we begin to engage in processes of societal introspection surrounding them.

This relationship between church and state, the catholic and conservative, is gradually becoming progressively more strained as we investigate their influence and historical legacy upon us as a country which has continually revealed a nation plagued by shame and scandal due to the mistreatment of the most vulnerable in our society.

We’ve seen this tension play out both in terms of the marriage equality referendum (2015) and the referendum to repeal the eight amendment (2017). In both cases traditional conceptions that were written into the body of the constitution surrounding the family, marriage and bodily autonomy were challenged and redefined to acknowledge the limitations and harm that these ideals may cause to the very citizens they were supposedly written to serve. This did not occur, however, without a very fought and often devise public debate that echoed previous moral-social referendums past concerning divorce and abortion, placing an emphasis on moral catastrophe that would result in the reasessment of the values that underpin Irish soicety despite the wishes of many acknowledging it was time to do just that.

Although there are literal examples aplenty in the exporting of our social shame, it is not always so literal. In looking at our conception of national identity, the cornerstones upon which it was built and the values and traditions we opt to include (and exclude) as part of it, Kathryn Conrad (2001) suggests the notion of distinguishing the ‘foreign’ when an identity (in her case homosexuality) comes into conflict with these values.

Those whose existence challenges or

contradicts the values and institutions that uphold them becomes viewed as a ‘threat’ to the national identity. When it comes to constricting the autonomy of women, queer folk, and children, whose actions come into conflict with traditonal Irish values upon which the state was founded, they too become ‘foreign’ bodies - both literally and figuratively.

The idea of conceptualising parts of our society as ‘foreign’, to exist outside the boundaries of our identity, also denies ownership or responsibility in it’s production. In witnessing the coverage of national scandal or shame many may hasten to add that ‘this is not us’, it is not afterall, representative of Ireland we are currently living in. And while this may be partially true, we are now having those difficult conversations that could not have been envisaged a generation ago, the tension between open conversation and habits past remains. When we can’t export or redefine we opt to sweep our problems under the proverbial rug.

We see this now in relation to the hours of mother and baby home testimony that can no longer be retrieved. We also see this in our current handling of Direct Provision, many centres located in rural areas with limited infrastructure to support autonomous living. Those who have travelled here in search of a better life, to the island of a thousand welcomes are met with a punitive reception in response to their ‘foreign’ status.

We cannot vocalise our outrage as a generation’s recounting of hurt and trauma at the hands of the state is lost and simultaneously remain complicit in continued mistreatment of asylum seekers. As we grapple with our own legacy of social inequality we must not continue to perpetuate its fruits. Not only must we address these ideals that state institutions upheld in the perpetuation of shame and mistreatment it is imperative that we take ownership over the social inequalities and historical legacy that they produced as a result. Rather than alienating or exclusion we must allow for the examination of our historical wounds through frank and honest dialogue that can be truly learned from and internalised to prevent a cycle of shame, denial, and scandal that we have come to know as familiar. We are at an important juncture wherein we’ve been presented with the opportunity to reinvent the wheel, to challenge habits of the past as they inevitably rear their head again, until we do so meaningfully and with accountability this cycle may well continue.

Opinion

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BYLINE Vol. 6 Issue 9

"Everyone knows everyone"

Editorial

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Vaccines, Seanfhocail, things of that nature…

Writes Fergal Smiddy, Byline Editor

“Is glas iad na cnoc i bhfad uainn” - “Faraway hills are green”.

Something mad, kind of endearing, about seanfhocail, is that they always seem to possess this annoyingly stubborn core of truth that seems impossibly relevant. Now, for the gatekeeping-inclined Gaeilgeoir out there - of whom I hope and believe there are few - before you melt into yourself with the smug glee of someone possibly “not getting that that’s literally the point of seanfhocail”, indulge me for a paragraph or two.

I first began learning seanfhocail somewhere around 4th or 5th class of Primary School. Back then, it was a welcome switch up from the horrors of reciting briathra or trudging through Bun go Barr 6. The seanfhocail were accessible, easy to learn by heart, and offered the comfort of already being familiar to us in the form of their English translation.

I still feel to this day that the seanfhocail are massively under-utilised in Irish schools as a means to getting students invested in the language and cultural heritage of Ireland. Not only, like I’ve said, do they offer digestible little slices of Irish that go down smoother than warm báirín breac, but they also represent echoes of an old Irish culture - an old Irish character - that we’ll never recover from losing.

The seanfhocail I chose for the beginning of this editorial - Is glas iad na cnoc i bhfad uainn, a modern day equivalent being the grass is always greener - is one which, ironically, has had quite a bit of relevance to how things have been unfolding here over the past weeks and months. Agonisingly, we’ve been fixated on happenings across the pond, as a man who hasn’t yet mastered the distribution of buttons on his shirt cuffs has somehow orchestrated a vaccine rollout that’s the envy of all but Israel and the UAE. Meanwhile, somewhere in Dáil Éireann, Stephen Donnelly wrings his wrists having just sent a risky WhatsApp message: “any chance of a few spare vaccines Boris man? Staaate of Eu like what a death haha”. Micheál and Leo huddle with him around the phone screen in a disused Dáil cupboard as the response dings in: single thumbs down emoji.

Even in terms of the littler things, it’s such an odd human bias that faraway hills do in fact always seem greener. In the past week, I have been literally astounded by the speed and absolute conviction with which my mind - without a second’s hesitation - has gone from “it is so horrible outside, I’m literally trapped inside doing college work” to “it is so nice outside, and I’m stuck inside doing college work”. The point, I suppose, is that your brain will always be willing to perform some sort of rational gymnastics to get you that little head rush of feeling hard done by. The same advice goes for you as goes for Boris Johnson dressing himself, as goes for Stephen Donnelly crouching in a Dáil Eíreann broom cupboard: a little bit of self awareness goes a long way.

Fergal Smiddy

byline@uccexpress.ie

Gaeilge

Eagarthóir: Édith de Faoite

Fear nó Féar – Cén Difríocht?

Stádas an Síneadh Fada in Éirinn A Scríobhann Édith de Faoite, Eagarthóir Gaeilge

Tharla sé ar mo chéad lá sa mheánscoil. Dúirt an múinteoir Gaeilge linn nach raibh sí chun cur suas le dímheas i dtaobh an síneadh fada. Mheabhraigh sí dúinn go bhfuil difríocht ollmhór idir ‘fear’ agus ‘féar’. Ón lá ar sin ar aghaidh, bheartaigh mé liom féin go raibh mé chun a bheith cúramach maidir leis an síneadh fada agus gan neamhaird a thabhairt dó.

Rinne mé beart de réir mo bhriathair.

Mar dhuine le fada i m’ainm, ceapaim go bhfuil mé saghas goilliúnach faoi an síneadh fada mar, dar liomsa, is comhartha measa é ainm duine a rá agus a litriú i gceart. Le fada an lá, úsáidtear ainmneacha daoine mar slí chun easpa measa a léiriú, trí iad a rá mícheart agus iad a litriú mícheart freisin.

Léirmheas Leabhair: Thirty-Two Words for Field A Scríobhann Lauren Ní Fhloinn Fuaireas an leabhar “Thirty-Two Words for Field” le Manchán Magan don Nollaig (foilsithe ag Gill Books) agus bhíos ar bís chun é a léamh. Leabhar a phléann le saibhreas agus draíocht na teanga Ghaelainne atá ann, mar is léir ón teideal. Le clúdach crua faoi bhrat ealaíne Steve Doogan, is leabhar fíor mhealltach é, agus tá paisean ‘s gean an údair don teanga le brath i ngach uile líne, is ar gach uile leathanch. Is scríbheoir é Magan, a bhfuil na scórtha cláracha fáisnéise léirithe aige do TG4, RTÉ agus cainéalacha teilifíse eile. Tá roinnt mhaith leabhair foilsithe aige cheana féin, trí Bhéarla is trí Ghaeilge araon.

Scríofa trí Bhéarla, chinntigh Magan go mbeadh idir Ghaeilgeoirí is Bhéarlóirí in ann sult a bhaint as an leabhar. Sin ráite amhlaidh, bhí sé spéisiúil dom feiscint cé mhéad focal do “field” a bhí ar eolas agam (ní raibh ach cúig chinn luaite sa leabhar cloiste cheana féin agam!) Deis iontach í chun fairsingiú a dhéanamh ar do réimse foclóra.

Tá cló mór sa leabhar mar aon le pictiúirí áille ag tús na gcaibidilí éagsúla.

Ach ní leabhar foclóra amháin atá i gceist leis, i ndáiríre faightear samhail iltaobhaí den teanga. Tá caibidilí a dhéileálann leis na cosúlachtaí idir an Ghaeilainn agus teangacha eile an domhain, agus tá caibidilí eile inar pléitear stair na teanga agus ina taispeántar macalla na Sean Ghaeilge sa NuaGhaeilge. Bhraith mé féin, cé nach raibh cur amach ar bith agam ar an Sean Ghaeilge, faoi dhraíocht an teanga aisteach seo, a bhí chomh cosúil, ‘s ag an am céanna, chomh difriúil, do mo theanga fhéin. Tá rian láidir an bhéaloidis le feiceáil sa leabhar chomh maith, agus léirítear dúinn go bhfuil snáithín an seanchais ársa, amhra seo, fite fuaite sa Ghaeilge a labhraítear sa lá atá inniu ann. Le súil ghéar is féidir díchódú a dhéanamh ar rúin, stair ‘s scéalta na tíre, tríd an teanga. Tugann sé tuiscint níos fearr dúinn orainn féin, ar ár ndúchas, ar ár n oidhreacht agus ar ár sinsir.

Caithfidh mé árd-mholadh a thabhairt don leabhar seo. Cheapas go raibh saibhreas teanga faoi leith bainte amach agam sa Ghaelainn, gur thuig

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Gach uair a chuirim suíochán in áirithe ar Iarnród Éireann, líonaim m’ainm isteach sa bhosca cuí ar an suíomh idirlín agus, gach uair, gan teip, nuair a théim ar bord, bíonn iairiglifí doléite in áit an ‘é’ ag tús m’ainm. Níl mé chun a rá nach gcuireann sé isteach orm nuair a fheicim an manglam litreach sin thar mo shuíochán. Is comhlacht stáit é Iarnród Éireann agus tá dualgas ann chun freastal ar mhuintir na tíre agus is cuid lárnach de sin ná meas a thabhairt d’ainmneacha na ndaoine seo. Is liosta le háireamh na comhlachtaí nach dtugann deis do dhaoine a n-aimneacha cearta a úsáid. Tá an-chuid cáinte déanta ar an bhFeidhmeannacht Seirbhíse Sláinte, Banc na hÉireann agus go leor eile faoi an easpa measa léirithe d’ainmneacha Gaeilge.

Ceaptar nach mbeidh an nós seo á dhéanamh ag Rialtas na hÉireann toisc an troid fhada a bhí againn sa tír seo chun aitheantas cultúrtha agus aitheantas teanga a bhaint amach.

Ceaptar é sin, ach ní mar sin is atá sé.

Ag deireadh an lae, léiríonn na comhlachtaí dúinn rud atá soiléir do lucht na Gaeilge - níl meas ceart sa tír seo ar an nGaeilge. Mar a dúirt an Breitheamh Hardiman, tá drogall ar Éirinn í féin a iompar mar thír dhátheangach, cé gur tír dhátheangach sinn.

mé cárbh as dom agus cárbh as don teanga, ach tuigim anois go bhfuil anchuid fós le foghlaim agam, ní hamháin ó thaobh an fhoclóra de, ach ó thaobh fréamhacha deimhne na Gaeilge a sníonn siar trí stair na tíre seo ar

feadh na míllte blianta, ag cruthú nasc daingean, dobhriste idir sinne agus muintir na hÉireann sna hamanna atá imithe thart. Braithim níos ceangailte ná riamh leis an teanga, leis an talamh seo agus leis an bpobal Gaelainne.

INTERVIEW

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An Interview with the Directors of Jag – A Cork Anthology Web Series

By Kyran Leahy, Film & TV Editor

Ireland has had its fair share of representation in film and television recently.

The country has become the backdrop to several coming-of-age stories as of late that have achieved global attention.

You have the college romance story of Normal People, the portrayal of teenage life during the end of the Troubles with Derry Girls, and the utter chaos that some teenagers can get up to in the city with The Young Offenders. It came to my attention recently that there is an independent web series currently being developed that is based in Cork entitled Jag. I reached out to the directors of this upcoming series, Abbey and Arann Blake, to learn some more about this project, the amount of work that goes into creating a series and how it came into fruition. They were delighted to speak about everything from directing, to personal experiences, and sandwich making.

Abbey describes Jag as “an anthology style series following people in their twenties in Cork”. She felt “that the biggest conflict with people our age is usually relationships, so we just followed that thought and wanted to represent people our age - people just out of col-

lege or in their final year of college. It is a weird age that isn’t really represented well in the media, you know? So, we thought we’d write about that. You have these coming-of-age movies about secondary school students, you have the standard college movies, and then it jumps ahead to movies about people in their thirties. I think being in your final year of college or just coming out of it is one of the weirdest times in people’s lives. You just get the thought of ‘What am I actually supposed to do now?’ You’d feel guilty for still living the student life when you’re no longer a student.”

The idea of an anthology style web series was in the minds of the two for a while. Arann said that “We’ve been toying around with the ideas and stuff for nearly two years now I reckon. It was something that we always wanted to do. It was a big project, we worked on the script for ages, the first draft for the first episode was made two years ago and we just took it from there”. Abbey added that the idea of the series came from a script she previously thought of, “I really wanted to write this Queer story with two women, but make

it natural, with no mention that they are queer, or anyone talking about them being queer. I just wanted a real-world relationship that just happened to be between two women, something completely natural. I started writing the script in college and I brought it home to Arann, and we just worked from there.” Arann was a UCC Dramat student, while Abbey studied Film in St John’s Central College, so they had a lot of help from those around them in creating the series. “Me and Arann were lucky that we’re siblings, so we were locked down together last year and could develop the series together”.

As directors of the show, Abbey and Arann took inspiration from the directors they adore, as well as from their knowledge of Cork. Arann states “We worked on it in a naturalist style because it was something that we were both very interested in. You could say it was kind of American mumblecore style as well, early Greta Gerwig, Joe Swamberg style, that kind of thing.

They do this style that is natural and is always about people in relationships.

I think because of our resources, with

student actors and Cork as a backdrop, as much as we love other genres, we felt we could take inspiration from stories that we experienced ourselves, and stories of our friends dating around the districts from Cork.” Abbey added that “What I like about the idea of an anthology style series is that you can have one character appear for a bit in one episode and then they pop up a few episodes later out of nowhere - like that is literally Cork! We always seem to come across the same circles in Cork all the time and they all seem to be connected one way or another.” Everyone knows everyone in Cork and knows everything that happens in Cork. It is a county full of drama – perfect for a series.

One big problem with filming nowadays is making sure that everyone works within the restriction guidelines of the pandemic, an issue which Arann and Abbey took very seriously. “It was daunting to be fair. We got really lucky when we filmed it around August when restrictions had eased. We also were lucky with the weather. There was a lot of Googling on what we could do and what we could not do. We had Andy,

19 who was our COVID Officer, making us sign a statement of agreement to follow the rules – wear a mask, sanitise, the whole lot. Even for an independent production we just wanted it to be as safe as possible, because morally, if we broke guidelines, we would feel awful, so we had to be as careful as possible and reduce the risk. You want to film naturally but you have this invisible killer in the air like some form of Bogeyman. Thankfully, it worked out and we did not experience any problems. It was mostly outdoors, and it benefitted us as we got a lot of nice, natural lighted scenes because of it.”

The show is entirely independent, being funded from the staff’s own pockets and donations. There was only a small number of staff involved, and everyone played their part in ensuring the best outcome. “We were very well organised, thanks to everyone. Before filming a scene, I’d meet with the DOP to set up the scene, Andy would help with the lighting and Arann speak with the

actors. We were well bonded and could trust each other with our roles.” Obviously, since it was a small production, catering and other works had to be done by the staff. You would not see Steven Spielberg making a round of tea for his staff behind the scenes, but Arann and Abbey made sure to help in whatever way they could. Arann said “Everyone does everything. We don’t go into our trailers after filming, we carry props in and out of sight and help out. I was making lunch for people, and sadly not a lot of people liked my sandwiches because I had to make them with the surgical gloves. Anyway, you couldn’t lay back and just do your own job. No one is getting paid for this, so you go on with it and do your best for the sake of it.”

Balancing the work that came with developing a series with other work was a challenge for all involved with the show.

Arann and Abbey are also two thirds of the Art-Punk band Pretty Happy, and balancing their workloads proved to be quite the experience. “When we were

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Jag shooting, there were no gigs going on because of restrictions, but then the Kino reopened and asked if we wanted to play two gigs. So, we had Jag, then we had these two gigs. We also had Arann and Andy moving to London straight after. Trying to practice in the middle of a series was insane. You’d come home wrecked, properly shattered. It was hectic, but the good kind of hectic, when you’re tired but you feel accomplished. It was something that we both loved doing so it made it all worth it.” Abbey recounted. Arann was also working on a play for his theatre company Mint Productions at the time, and though he claims those few weeks to be “a complete blur” where he “felt like Jim Carrey’s Yes Man agreeing to all these things I barely had the time to do”, the results were rewarding and something that hopefully does not have to be experienced ever again.

There are three episodes of the series that are currently in post-production, and while there are many ideas for the future, Abbey and Arann would pre-

fer quality over quantity and are focusing on perfecting what they have.

“Post-production takes so much time, that’s nearly done. We just want it to look amazing and show how much effort went into it from all of us. Our crew was amazing with our AD’s, DOP, producers, our actors, everyone.” They are hoping for a release sometime this year but are prioritising a screening for those involved. “People love a premiere, we all do, so we’re not just going to throw it out there. We want a screening and will do it whenever we can because of the pandemic. We want to throw it in as many festivals as we can and not just whack it up on YouTube. Hopefully, we can throw it out to European and American festivals sometime, but our priority is letting our casting crew see it first, together”.

You can follow updates on Jag on the Instagram page @jagseries. Thank you to Abbey and Arann for their time, and I for one will be very excited to watch the series when it comes out.

Food and Health

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Managing a Dietary Condition in College: UCC Students’ Perspectives Writes Maeve O’Keefe, Food & Health Editor

“Think of the standard, broke, college student’s diet, that’s made up of your beans on toast, pasta, sandwiches and chicken fillet rolls, pizza, cans of Heineken, Guinness… They all have gluten in them, so it’s a constant thing I need to be thinking about when eating or drinking,” Jamie, a second-year student in UCC tells me. Jamie is a coeliac, meaning he can’t consume gluten, something he says can be a hindrance while attending University.

In speaking to Jamie, and other UCC students who have special dietary requirements, I became aware of how much I take for granted in my totally unrestricted diet. Popping to the shop to pick up some study snacks for a day in the library, or a late-night pizza and beer with roommates to celebrate submitting an assignment, are small aspects of a student’s everyday life that might need to be reconsid-

ered if you’ve got a dietary condition, such as coeliac disease, diabetes, lactose intolerance, or a nut allergy.

Although following a special diet might be a little more awkward, expensive, or time consuming, all of the students I spoke to thankfully did not view their dietary requirements as a barrier to full participation in college life in any way when managed correctly. That said, it can be irritating when others are totally ignorant of their condition, as Matt, a third-year student with type 1 diabetes emphasised to me; “Sometimes people tell me that I don’t look like I have diabetes, which is just so frustrating, because they’re obviously making assumptions about what diabetes is, or why I have it.” With that in mind, whether you know someone who follows a special diet or not, it’s worthwhile understanding what it means to have

a dietary condition. I spoke to six UCC students with different dietary conditions about what it’s like to manage their special diet as a college student, and what tips they’d share with other students living with dietary conditions.

Coeliac Disease/ Gluten Intolerance: Gluten is a type of protein found in certain grains, such as wheat, barley, spelt, and rye. Unfortunately for coeliac Jamie, and gluten intolerant Claire, these grains are staples in the Irish diet, and gluten can be found in bread, pasta, cake, and beer, among other regularly consumed foods. For those with coeliac disease, the body treats gluten like a foreign invader, attacking it and damaging the lining of the gut, which can cause serious problems in digesting vital nutrients. When a coeliac eats a food containing gluten, they can expe-

rience extreme digestive discomfort, and deficiencies in other nutrients.

Gluten free alternatives to bread, cakes, and pasta are thankfully becoming more commonplace in mainstream supermarkets, usually found in the healthy eating aisle, but it can still be challenging to find anything more than a packet of chocolate coated rice cakes in your standard college convenience store. “If you want to get something gluten free for lunch or a snack, you just have to go a bit further afield. There is so much out there, it’s just a matter of finding the good stuff,” according to Jamie. His sentiments are mirrored by Claire, who although not coeliac, is gluten intolerant, and feels sick and bloated after consuming gluten. She tells me that pizzas after a night out are not an option for her, but that in a way, her avoidance of gluten “makes [her] eat healthier foods, and prevents

Editor: Maeve O’Keeffe unplanned junk food after nights out.”

Diabetes: When many people think of someone with diabetes, they immediately think of unhealthy people, who are diabetic because they eat too much junk or drink too many fizzy drinks. Yet as Matt, who was diagnosed with diabetes at age 14 reminds me, having type 1 diabetes is “just bad luck.” “It means my pancreas doesn’t produce insulin, which you need to process glucose in carbohydrates, so I have to give myself an injection of insulin before I eat anything with carbs in it,” he explains.

Although he managed his diabetes well in the strict routine of school, it took a little while for Matt to adjust to the less disciplined and more unpredictable lifestyle in college; “The nights out, drinking alcohol, more activity - It all affects your blood sugars, and being away from home, like where my family know how to help me if I have a hypo [low blood sugar], is hard to get used to.”

Matt recommends telling flatmates and friends about diabetes, to “just generally be honest about it and do the explaining early on.” It can be helpful for friends to know the signs of hypoglycaemia, or a drop in blood sugar levels, so that they can help out if Matt goes low. This is particularly important after nights out, due to alcohol’s effect on blood sugars; “Stuff like cider is really high in sugar, leading to a high immediately after drinking and possibly a low later

on in the night or the next day.” For this reason, diabetics should always keep a fast-acting energy drink or some glucose tablets with them, to counter the effects of low blood sugar.

As well as that, Matt advises keeping a stash of glucose separate from the communal living spaces in his accommodation; “Like if there’s people over, and they see a load of Lucozade in the fridge in the kitchen, they’re just going to drink it. It’s not worth getting in a row over, especially when so many people think that I have diabetes because I drink too many fizzy drinks, or that I can’t ever have anything with sugar because of my diabetes.” This confusion arises from people mistaking type 1 diabetes, which is an inability to produce insulin, with type 2 diabetes; a resistance to insulin, which can be treated by tablets or dietary changes as well as typical insulin injections.

tions can be difficult; “I suppose the food is more expensive if I want the dairy free option, and it’s harder to find, because only certain shops stock dairy free stuff.”

Rachel, who is in second year, finds that she is more conscious of her intolerance since the beginning of the pandemic, due to socially distanced coffee dates eclipsing other means of seeing people, because the commonly beloved “cappuccinos and lattes just make [her] stomach hurt.” Although many people with lactose intolerance can consume a little dairy without adverse effects, too much can result in bloating, abdominal cramps and diarrhoea. That said, lactose free milks are becoming more accessible in supermarkets and cafes, and though the temptation not to indulge in McFlurry ice-creams persists, managing lactose intolerance in college is far from impossible.

Lactose Intolerance:

Nut Allergy:

Lactose intolerance is one of the more common dietary requirements that affects college students in Ireland, and can vary in its impact on individuals. Lactose intolerance is caused by an inability to digest lactose, which is a sugar found in milk and dairy products. For Paul, a third-year student who is lactose intolerant, eating any food containing dairy, like cheese or yoghurt, can result in nausea as well as blemishes on the skin.

Despite the fact that roughly 5% of the Irish population are lactose intolerant, Paul tells me that sourcing dairy free op-

Nut allergies occur when the body’s immune system overreacts to the consumption of nuts such as peanuts, cashews, or hazelnuts, resulting in an inflammatory reaction and the release of a chemical called histamine. This allergic reaction can manifest itself in hives, swelling, difficulty breathing, and even the potentially fatal anaphylaxis. Despite the dangers of her severe nut allergy, first-year student Rosie maintains that her condition “honestly does not make a massive difference” in her life, as she is used to

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it. Like others with dietary conditions, she has discovered products that she can safely incorporate into her diet, like Cadbury’s chocolate spread as an alternative to Nutella.

It’s important for individuals with food allergies to double check the ingredients label on food they buy, and to be cautious when ordering food out in restaurants or cafes.

Adjusting to life in college with any condition or disability can be a challenge. Without the security and knowledge of family and friends at home, managing a dietary condition in college can feel overwhelming from time to time.

Remember to avail of support services to scaffold against the toll of living with a dietary condition in college if you need to, be it by discussing your condition with your GP, registering with UCC’s Disability Support Service, or approaching student counselling. Ultimately, making an effort to understand and not dismiss the specific dietary requirements of others can make a big difference. You could try picking up a few gluten free biscuits for your next catch up with a coeliac friend, keeping some jelly babies in your car when giving a lift to a diabetic friend in case their blood sugars drop, or simply not saying “Ah go on,” when your lactose intolerant friend tells you that they can’t enjoy an ice cream sundae with you when the weather picks up.

Film & T.V.

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The Everlasting Appeal of the Muppets Writes Kyran Leahy, Film & TV Editor

The 1970’s brought us some major figures that lit up the world during the decade and have remained in the spotlight in modern times. From the actors that have remained ever present on the screens like Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino to the music of Fleetwood Mac, ABBA, and Elton John that have continued to dominate radio stations all over the world. There are plenty of acts out there who were able to play the music and light the lights of their decade and continue to be a part of the lives of many generations afterwards, but there is also a group that has managed to achieve that without even being human – that being the Muppets, who are once again back in the spotlight after the iconic The Muppet Show was brought to Disney+ against all odds on February 19th.

The idea of The Muppet Show being brought to streaming services was highly unlikely just a few months ago.

The show not only had a multitude of song covers throughout its five year run, but several famous singers from Johnny Cash to Debbie Harry also appeared as special guests and sang songs of their own. There were several issues

securing music rights because of the large number of songs used, with these issues being the primary reason Disney refused to release the later seasons on DVD. Thankfully, those issues seem to be behind us, with only a few segments and a small number of episodes being cut due to music rights or controversy regarding the guest. The release of The Muppet Show on Disney+ has allowed the already popular puppets to gain new fans and allow the old fans to reminisce of the days when they were some of the biggest celebrities in the world.

The Muppets came from the genius mind of Jim Henson, also the creator of Sesame Street, Fraggle Rock, and Labyrinth, that weird 80’s movie where David Bowie struts around in an outfit only David Bowie would wear. The Muppet Show, which premiered in 1975, gave so much life to a bunch of puppets that we do not even think of them as puppets anymore. The show sparked several movies, spin-offs, merchandise, and tabloids became more invested in Kermit and Miss Piggy’s relationship than several other celebrities. When Jim Henson died in 1990,

the Muppets managed to live on, and despite a steady decline in popularity throughout the noughties, they found a new lease of life adapting to the times with viral internet videos and a successful reboot. For nearly fifty years the public has been invested in Fozzie’s jokes, Beaker’s misfortunes, and Miss Piggy’s long list of escapades, and they are showing no signs of slowing down.

If it was not painstakingly obvious, I grew up as a massive fan of the Muppets, and remain a fan of them today. It was one of the few shows that I grew up on that was also around on television when my parents were children, so it is fair to say that the Muppets appeared prominently in my upbringing. I had the VHS’s of The Muppet Show, along with probably every movie they released, The Muppets Take Manhattan being my favourite. I had plush toys, action figures, video games, the whole lot.

I saw the 2011 reboot movie The Muppets as soon as it came out. I have several cherished memories with them, and to see an entirely new generation get the chance to fall in love with them like I did is both exciting and heart-warm-

ing for me. They have been a part of peoples’ upbringing for nearly half a century, and the characters are instantly recognisable to the eyes of everyone.

The Muppets are timeless, and they will remain timeless and they have an advantage that we lack, they never age. As we get older, they will always be around looking and acting the same. Their finest work being widely available on one of the kingpins of streaming opens the doors to many possibilities for the future of the Muppets. Many are crying out for a return to the big screen in a style similar to their take on A Christmas Carol, where Michael Caine was the human Ebenezer Scrooge surrounded by Muppets. When the Muppets announced special news regarding The Muppets Show earlier in the month, the first idea that came to the minds of fans was their own version of The Great Gatsby, which, let’s be honest, we would all love to see at some point. The future is bright for the wide range of beloved characters, but for now, we can sit back and watch their finest moments with ease at long last.

Editor: Kyran leahy

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Video Game Movies: Past Disappointments and Future Optimism Writes Keith Strain The connection between the film and the video game industry has been established since 1993 when Super Mario Bros. jumped its way onto the big screen, but whether the relationship has been mutually beneficial for the two is up for debate. One would think translating an already established story and formula into another form of entertainment would be a sure-fire success. However, the only thing certain about cinema is that nothing is for sure. To be clear, I am looking at movies that are based on video games franchises, the topic of bad movies based on gaming – such as Ready Player One and Pixels – is its own ordeal.

We have gone long past the era of ‘90s cheese and its corny film quality. This time period gave us films like the aforementioned Super Mario Bros. and the Street Fighter movie starring action legend Jean Claude van Damme. These movies show us how out of touch with game concepts Hollywood was at the time, as one was set in a parallel universe where dinosaurs still existed and the other has a weird hostage plot which would make one believe the creators never played Street Fighter. Just a glimpse of the two movies would tell you what era they came from. However, there is one bright spot from this decade of video game movies – 1995’s Mortal Kombat. The film quality may be three decades old, but the story and the characters hold true to their video game counterparts, with some performances even adding more depth to some fighters while keeping the same concept. I do not think there are many that will say this is an amazing movie, but the fun that can be achieved with it is certainly a step in the right direction.

A step back is without a doubt the Uwe Boll video game movies of the 2000s.

The filmmaker managed to pull together three licenses with Far Cry, Postal, and Blood Rayne and managed to make all three of them terrible. Boll had a big part in creating a stigma of bad video game movies, but the decade’s roster of other movies did not help. You had the Tomb Raider movies that starred Angelina Jolie, as well as Max Payne, a movie that does hold true to the game but contains the same bad qualities

that you see in terrible movies. The big money movie – Doom, starring The Rock – was a loose adaptation of the original video game. Its best element was the BFG, but besides that it was just more rubbish. I think the only highlight of this decade is the Hitman movie, which had its moments such as the hotel set piece, but that was the only saving grace in a series of disappointments.

The 2000’s was not friendly to video game movies, and to start off the 2010’s, things got worse. A movie that I got to see in cinemas was Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Looking back, it was a movie that laid the groundwork for failures such as John Carter. It was bland and seemed to be devoid of any passion, but watching it as a kid, it was fine. After this, it took four years for a non-sequel video game movie, when

Need for Speed came onto the scene to try and grab the Fast and the Furious fans’ attention, starring Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul. The movie failed to create much positivity around it besides doing great commercially in China. We had three more stinkers straight after with another Hitman movie, a gigantic bore in Warcraft and technically another Prince of Persia movie, with Assassin’s Creed also coming to the big screen.

Two decades on from Super Mario Bros. and it still was not looking great for game movies. Then, we had a new Tomb Raider with Alicia Vikander, and Dwayne Johnson returning to the genre with Rampage, a fun ride which proved that movies with big monkeys will always be a success. An upside to video game movies was starting to show and with Detective Pikachu’s release it showed there can be good all-

around movies based on video games.

The movie held true to the spirit of Pokémon and managed to add its own fun elements to the foundation laid by the video games. With Sonic The Hedgehog following up its success it truly was a bright spot for the genre after a series of disappointments.

The future for video game movies is again not for certain, but there is room for cautious optimism with sequels lined up for Tomb Raider and Sonic, as well as exciting projects such as the Uncharted movie and The Last of Us going to television. A standout in the future is an animated Mario Bros. film that can right the wrong of how video game adaptations started on the big screen with its predecessor.

Music

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The High Cost of Music

By Julie Landers, Staff Writer

I didn’t enjoy writing this article, and you’re probably not going to enjoy reading it. Before deciding to write about the environmental impacts of music consumption, it was far easier to say ‘streaming good, vinyl bad’, and even then that wasn’t easy at all. I love the acts of collecting and listening to music, be that looking through Bandcamp Daily or scouring through stacks of vinyl to find something that stands out to me.

But I never quite took the time to consider how these acts had a wider impact.

Certainly, it is easy to point out the negative impacts of vinyl records. The granulate (which is melted down to make vinyl records) is based on heavy metal stabilisers, such as lead and cadmium.

The granulate itself is primarily made of Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), which contains carcinogenic chemicals and is,

according to Greenpeace, the most environmentally-damaging plastic. The plants where PVC is produced release huge amounts of toxic materials into the environment surrounding them.

Beyond the record itself, the amount of plastic packaging that is used, in addition to the impact of shipping vinyl across countries, results in significant levels of greenhouse gas emissions. As Kyle Devine, author of Decomposed: The Political Ecology of Music wrote for the Guardian last year, “During the U.S. sales peaks of the LP, cassette and CD, the U.S. recording industry was using almost 60m kilos of plastic a year. Using contemporary averages on greenhouse gas equivalent releases per pound of plastic production, as well as standard weight figures for each of the formats, that is equivalent to more than 140m kilos of greenhouse gas emissions each year, in the U.S. alone.

Music, like pretty much everything else, is caught up in petro-capitalism.”

Yet the digital is not totally devoid of problems either. Audio files take up physical space in data centres, which are specifically built to house computer systems and used for the remote storage, processing, and distribution of large amounts of data. This is data that we use and access daily through our phones, laptops and other devices.

There is an increasing number of data centres being constructed here in Ireland as multi-billion-euro investments.

According to Devine, streaming music relies on “infrastructures of data storage, processing and transmission that have potentially higher greenhouse gas emissions than the petrochemical plastics used in the production of more obviously physical formats such as LPs – to stream

music is to burn coal, uranium and gas.”

Indeed, the Irish Academy of Engineering has predicted that the development of data centres will contribute at least 1.5 million tonnes to Ireland’s carbon emissions by the year 2030.

There needs to be more pressure placed on corporations to guarantee that their data centres are powered completely with renewable energy. While many companies claim that their data centres are run on 100% renewable energy, according to the grassroots campaign group Not Here Not Anywhere, this energy is “largely sourced indirectly through Renewable Energy Certificates or Purchase Power Agreements, which means that the energy is sourced from the grid, which in Ireland is reliant on 69% powered by fossil fuels. If we allow companies to virtually purchase clean energy where it is cheapest to create, while actually using and increas-

Editor: CATHAL DONOVAN O’NEILL ing demand for dirty energy here in Ireland, we allow them to profit while our real emissions continue to rise.”

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Bandcamp Friday, one year on: HAUSU Records

By Cathal Donovan O’Neill, Music Editor

There are people out there who are working towards making the process of pressing records a more environmentally friendly practice too. Deepgrooves is a vinyl pressing plant in the Netherlands that prides itself on finding new ways of pressing records that are less detrimental to our health and to the planet. They use granulates based on calcium zinc stabilizers. Deepgrooves are also working on engineering more energy-efficient machinery with which to produce their records and packaging, and they state that all of their machinery is powered using green energy that is supplied locally.

Until there is significant change, we will always fall short in how we listen to music in a responsible way. This article is a proposition rather than a doctrine. If you’re going to buy vinyl, buy it locally from independent retailers.

Bring your own bag. If the cover is a little scuffed, it most likely does not affect the quality of the recording on the LP itself. Take proper care of your records and don’t even think about throwing them into the recycling bin if they get scratched or broken. They can neither be recycled or thrown into a landfill, so treat them carefully.

Truthfully there really is no ethical consumption under capitalism. There is, of course, a blurred line between where individual responsibility ends and the tremendous damage being done by major corporations begins.

This line is often enforced by corporations themselves and can be incredibly racist, ableist and classist in its distinctions. As an avid consumer of music, I am still trying to find ways to consolidate the ways in which I listen to music with the knowledge of the chemicals used in making records, and the energy consumption of data centres. What I will say is that in the more immediate moment, it will always be important to support the artist behind the music, especially independent artists.

That can look like buying their releases in the form of digital downloads on Bandcamp or in the form of a physical release on cassette or vinyl or CD. As consumers we deserve honesty and enough information to develop our thoughts around how we listen to music and, more importantly, how we can go on to listen to it better.

Back in March 2020, online music retail platform Bandcamp announced that on the first Friday of every month they would cut their cut on items sold from about 30% to nothing, leaving all funds to the artist. It was a great move on a marketing and moral basis, but a year on, how’re artists finding it? I sat down with Colm Cahallane, self-described ‘PR rat’ at Cork indie label HAUSU Records.

For Colm, Bandcamp Friday hasn’t really moved the needle for HAUSU’s back catalogue, although a charity compilation released early during the pandemic successfully raised €550 for the Movement of Asylum Seekers in Ireland. In an environment where everyone is releasing music on the same day, getting your name in front of people can be tough.

The platform’s advantage, however, is that it’s given the label an opportunity to release more obtuse projects. If an artist’s Spotify page is a professional-looking profile, Bandcamp provides a space to be more playful and experimental.

“Spotify is like the shelves [in] Golden Discs or whatever and Bandcamp is the couple of cassette tapes that are for sale at Plugd, you know, it’s a different vibe entirely,” says Colm. “Bandcamp, to us, feels a little closer to a local community.

“Like, the people who are buying our music on Bandcamp are the people who show up to our gigs, which is very different to Spotify where you get like a playlist placement and your music is suddenly big in Latvia, but these people will never actually stick around once that playlist spot is removed.”

What could Bandcamp do to pull ahead of Spotify? Real playlisting would be good, says Colm, allowing more curation of your music library and less being tied down to specific albums. The platform won’t be resting on their laurels – they can’t hang onto the record-shop recreation nostalgia that they currently have if they want to sink hooks into the current generation. There are steps in the right direction: Colm’s happy to see their recent vinyl pressing system which works like a Kickstarter, and hopes their journalism in written and podcast form can get more of a push. A Spotify for Artists system for submitting to Discovery curators would be useful. Most exciting, Colm says, is the potential for the app to disrupt the realm of live gigs:

“Ticketing would be amazing. If you could use Bandcamp for ticketing, it would honestly change the way the music industry works. Like, I like Eventbrite – I really do – but I think that something that allows you to – like, once you have your ticket app, look at the profiles of the artist you saw, look at their discography, dive in from there, I think that would be a very transformative way of doing the loop, instead of like just having to say like ‘Heyyy, check us out on Bandcamp!’ from the stage, being part of buying tickets in the first place.”

Stay tuned for the next issue, where we’ll be talking to Dan Walsh, the multi instrumentalist bandleader of class jazz act Fixity, about his experiences with Bandcamp and Patreon.

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Photos

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Cobh, County Cork

by Caoimhe Leahy University Express Photgrapher

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Photos

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SEXPRESS

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How to Have an Abortion in Ireland Writes Jack Wrixon, Sexpress Editor

On the 25th of May 2018, the people of Ireland voted with a 66% majority to repeal the Eighth Amendment of the Irish Constitution. This amendment saw the legalisation of abortions across the country, and put an end to the decades of neglect and suffering faced by the citizens of Ireland who previously had to seek help abroad or under dangerous circumstances. While this amendment was a massive step forward in a country that has a history of both ignoring and exporting its problems, there are still many problems surrounding the years of agony that were faced. No matter what the circumstances are, nobody should be forced to have an abortion or judged for their choices regarding what the situation is. Support, not judgement should be

offered as this experience can be quite a personal and often an upsetting one.

1. Making a decision to have an abortion Coming to a decision when dealing with an unplanned or unwanted pregnancy is not an easy one, but thankfully there are support systems available for those looking to explore their options of keeping the pregnancy or seeking termination. The HSE has an unbiased freephone line that offers both medical advice and counselling services and is available in an online WebChat format. The HSE also offers the option of having a translator present for someone who cannot speak English, as well as an option to use the service through

Irish Sign Language (ISL). Regardless of your choice, this service offers support if you choose to keep the pregnancy or terminate, and should it be necessary there is also support provided for partners of people in this situation.

The My Options phone number will be included at the end of this article, alongside other resources for those who are looking into these options and services but if you would like to know more, myoptions.ie is also available.

Another way to explore your options is to visit a GP or family planning clinic.

Very often, they will also be providing the services for those who need it, but it takes a bit more time before any actual process is performed. Similar to the phone line, your doctor will discuss

the options available to you in detail and will be able to refer you to the appropriate clinic if they themselves do not provide the service. Doctors and Physicians are bound to confidentiality, so – as long as you are over the age of 18 – what is discussed with them stays with them. Your doctor should provide unbiased services and information, so you should not feel like you are being influenced or shamed for your decision. Sometimes, the best option is to find another doctor. This may not always be an easy process, but given the time sensitive nature of the situation it may very well be essential.

Something important to remember is that the earlier an abortion is, the safer and easier it is on you and your body.

Editor: Jack WRIXON Abortions in Ireland can be freely carried out until 12 weeks, or 84 days since your last period. After the twelve weeks, abortions are only carried out in exceptional circumstances, such as when the continuation of the pregnancy puts your health and your life at risk, or there are developmental problems with the fetus.

2. Where can I go to have an abortion?

In Cork, the CUMH (Cork University Maternity Hospital) in Wilton is where abortions take place, but many other hospitals and clinics around the country also provide these services, namely the University Maternity Hospital Limerick, the National Maternity Hospital in Dublin 2 and University Hospital Galway. This is not a complete list of where these services are available and many other hospitals around the country offer legitimate and standard options and practices surrounding the procedure. With this in mind, it is important to verify the route you decide to take regarding having an abortion and to never seek aid from unlicensed or unregulated sources. Doing this puts you and your health at risk and can often have many serious consequences immediately after and down the line.

3. Having an abortion.

If you decide to terminate the pregnancy, there are a few steps to take before the procedure itself. The first step is to find out how far along you are, as the type of

procedure can vary depending on the developmental stage of the fetus. Generally, abortions are performed through a minor surgery or by ingesting a medication prescribed by your doctor or GP. But before any of this there is a threeday waiting period following the initial pre-abortion appointment. This is done in order to give you time to decide if the procedure is what you want, and so your doctor can certify that you are indeed within the time limit to have an abortion.

This can often take some time, which is why once again it is important to seek help as early as possible. While there are some hoops to jump through, abortions and abortive services in Ireland are free of charge, but there may be some general costs associated with visiting a clinic or GP for the initial appointment.

There are two ways the procedure can be carried out. The first one is by taking two different tablets, Mifepristone and Misoprostol. Both of these tablets are prescribed by a doctor and will impact how your body produces pregnancy hormones for the pregnancy in question, ultimately stopping it. The tablets are taken at different stages, and both often have side effects such as cramping, bleeding and nausea. Following this process, your doctor will proceed with aftercare once the abortion is successful.

This process has a 98% success rate, and if you do avail of this procedure your doctor will inform you in more detail of the intricacies of what will happen.

The second way an abortion can be car-

ried out is by having a minor day procedure in a hospital. The procedure for a surgical abortion in Ireland is called a Vaccum Aspiration, and following anesthesia and the insertion of a speculum, the pregnancy is suctioned out.

You will need to spend a few hours in the hospital after the surgery, and the hospital will provide both aftercare and advice on how to take care of yourself once you are released. It is also advised that you have a friend or family member collect you from the hospital, as depending on the type of anesthesia you have undergone, you may not be able to safely get yourself home.

Obviously, each type of procedure has its own risks associated with it, so it is important to know what may happen in rare cases before you go ahead with the procedure. Seeking an abortion through your doctor or GP, however, is always safer than looking for options online or in other places. Without proper regulation, abortions provided in unusual circumstances (for example, by purchasing the two pills mentioned earlier through online means) have much higher risks than can be accounted for.

Please, please choose the safer option if you find yourself in this situation, as the risks of something happening are much lower, and they have much higher successful termination rates.

After the treatment, there is the option to have a post-abortion follow up with the doctor who referred you or with your GP. While this is optional it is ad-

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vised that everyone who has a termination, avail of it in order to make sure you and your body are back to business as usual. The resources mentioned earlier (myoptions.ie for instance) also offer counselling and help services following the procedure, so if you would like to talk to someone about the termination, or have any questions, they are free to contact, and a list of resources will be provided at the end of this article.

It is important to remember that the choice to have an abortion is nobody’s but your own. Do not let anyone, family member or friend, influence your decision. Even if you decide to keep the pregnancy, it is ultimately down to you. This, however, does not mean that you are alone. Many, many people go through this process and so many of them are willing to talk and share their stories and experiences. It is also important to know that no matter what company you keep, someone out there will support you in your decision. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to reach out to me via email at sexpress@uccexpress.ie and I’ll do my best to help you.

Resources: MyOptions freephone: 1800 828 010 Irish Family Planning Association: 1850 49 50 51 Sexual Violence Center Cork: 1800 496 496

Gaming

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An Interview with Greene Rapture: A New Addition to the Irish Game Development Scene Writes Hugo Blair, Gaming Editor

Ireland is known internationally for many things: agriculture, red hair, the colour green... the list goes on. However, one area that our country is less notable for is our game development scene, but that is not to say it is absent.

While we may not host world leading developers like in the United States or Japan, the sector has seen rapid growth in recent years. Still, Ireland is the base of operations for several large video game companies such as Galway based Romero Games, and Havok, whose headquarters are located in Dublin. It comes as no surprise then that the capital is the hub of Irish game development; the city is home to a whole host of organisations based in IT. However, Galway is rapidly becoming a second-

ary centre for video game development in its own right, while other developers are cropping up in counties like Cork, Limerick, and Waterford.

One such game studio is Greene Rapture.

Based in Cork, the team is composed of Lead Developer & Art Director Neil O’Sullivan Greene, Sound Designer & Musician Mathew Xavier Corrigan, and Graphic Designer Bartek Gruba. Many may be familiar with the trio due to their work with Cork-based music collective Hausu. The studio entered the video game scene last November with their release of Knight of the Parking Lot onto Steam’s early access platform.

The team’s first formal release, the game centers around a young boy defending

a large tree from hordes of robots. The game has a beautiful art style, fantastic music, and fun, dynamic gameplay. I caught up with Neil, to ask him about the team’s journey so far, the reception to KOTPL, and his personal opinions on the Irish development scene.

Firstly, how did you get started in game development, was it something you had always wanted to do?

Yes, I always wanted to make games, but I didn’t have a clue how it was done. It really confused me just thinking about it, especially anything to do with coding or programming. For years I would study concept art and illustration as a way to get into the games industry, but at the start of lockdown I realised I re-

ally just wanted to make games, and the only way to learn was by trying! So, at the start of lockdown, with no prior coding experience and just some 3D modelling experience, I got Unreal Engine 4 and started watching tutorials online. It was really overwhelming at first but with enough hours put into it, it clicked! I completely engrossed myself in it since I found it so interesting. I would even watch tutorials on my lunch breaks or before I went to sleep.

Once you started learning to develop games, what led to you joining with Mathew and Bartek to create Greene Rapture?

So, while I was learning how to make games, I asked my good friends Matt and Bartek if they’d like to collaborate on my first game project called LOOMING. I had worked with Matt countless times before on projects for Ghostking Is Dead (Matt’s project within Hausu), or any other general work within Hausu. I had also collaborated with Bartek plenty of times before, whether it was for a college assignment or, again, on other projects in Hausu. So, for LOOMING, Matt created the music and sound effects, while Bartek designed the logo, UI graphics, and helped with the world-building by adding signage and other graphics. Once we finished that project, I had the idea for KOTPL and they were interested in working on it too, so forming Greene

Editor: HUGO BLAIR Rapture just made sense from there!

The Irish influences on Knight of the Parking Lot are clear – a hurley is the strongest weapon, so where exactly did the idea for the game stem from?

I had an idea in my head to make a small but polished looking game in a short amount of time. I really liked the combat mechanics from Souls-like games and wanted to put a wave-based spin on one, but I wasn’t really interested in doing another played out generic fantasy aesthetic. While I was exploring ideas, I remembered playing with friends when I was younger, fighting with sticks, pretending they were lightsabers.

From there, it fell together quite well.

Since you began work on the game, have you faced any major roadblocks? Especially given this all began in the middle of a global pandemic.

For sure! With game development, there’s always roadblocks. From nearly losing the entire file for the game due to corruption, or even not being able to work on it for weeks due to my PC being fried. In terms of Covid-19 though, we were pretty used to working with each other over Discord; sending stuff back and forth to each other, so we were pretty lucky in that regard. Although not being able to hang out together and chat about ideas in person definitely made it a bit harder, and not being able to celebrate with each other when it was released felt pretty unfair too.

So, the team released Knight of the Parking Lot in November onto Steam’s early access platform, what benefits do you think early access gives you?

The reality is, game development takes a long time, even for a smaller project like this. Early access gives us the flexibility to iterate and improve the game post-release, even if our schedules get hectic with everything else happening.

what to expect, especially when I’ve been looking at the project all day every day for months. People really liked fighting with the hurley too, so I definitely want to add more of that in the game!

The early access route has gotten a lot of negative press since its introduction, with many games never making it to release. Do you think some developers abuse the platform, cashing in without the intention to finish development?

Very rarely would a game release without the intention to finish development. There’s definitely a minority of developers who try to take advantage of that system, but they’re less prominent nowadays. I think there’s been a lot of cases where games haven’t been finished while in early access, but this is more often due to external or internal factors, never due to lack of trying.

Game development is tough, and unfortunately the majority of games in development never see the light of day; early access just gives people a better view of how it can happen to a game!

Oh – so, so many! I can’t even begin to describe all the cool stuff we wanted to do. Ideally, I would love to add a whole quest system where you can run around the estate and explore the world, and get into a lot more mischief. We have to be realistic though...

So how has reception been to the game since release?

Surprisingly good! Since it was our first commercial release, I really didn’t know

More hurley mechanics on the horizon, noted. Aside from that, are there any other features you wish you could add, but time/ scope limitations prevent?

Moving to game development in a national context, how do you personally view the Irish game development scene today?

The Irish game dev. scene is small but passionate, and lots of people are making amazing strides in making our country a more prominent player within the industry, but currently we still have a lot of progress to make. IMIRT (A representative organisation for Irish game developers) especially is doing lots of work. While Dublin and Galway have great game development communities, Cork is kind of lacking in that regard.

While the industry is growing, do you believe the sector currently receives enough support from the government/other funding agencies?

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Definitely not, but thanks to IMIRT, good progress has started on that!

As part of the 2021 budget, the Irish games industry will be presented with a tax break that’s aimed to be introduced in 2022, so progress has begun.

It’s clear that this industry is only going to be on an upward path in the years to come, so do you have any advice for those who wish to make a start in game development?

Oh, where do I begin! First of all, I would say you don’t need to be able to code. As someone with dyscalculia, this is really what turned me off of development for a long time. Unreal Engine 4 has visual blueprints which is what I use, and Unity also has an equivalent. Secondly, there are so many tutorials out there, Udemy has really good courses to get started, but if you can’t afford that then YouTube has plenty of really great quality tutorials for game development as well. That’s just on the technical side though, if you’re interested in more of the theory aspect of games, you need to watch GDC talks, they’re incredibly insightful and inspiring.

Lastly, and this one is important, when you make your first game, start small!

Don’t try to make the next greatest MMO, or Skyrim 2. The general rule I hear is when you come up with your idea for your game, cut it down by 75%. Then it’s the right scope/size.

Game jams are also a fantastic way to meet new people to make games with, as well as learning how much time it really takes to make something.

Fashion

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London Fashion Week AW21 writes Maeve O’Sullivan , Fashion Editor London Fashion week is upon us once again, only a far cry from the live runway shows twelve months ago. In true pandemic fashion, the British Fashion Council took to the digital format for the London showing of collections. I got a chance to sit back in bed with a trusty cup of tea and be engulfed in the remarkable collections.

Didn’t get a chance to watch? Never fear, I have put together my highlights from the week just for you.

Day One: Friday, February 19th set the bar high for all designers involved. Nicholas Daley shared his Spring/Summer 21 menswear collection, unusual for the traditional time frame. Notably, it was his approach to the casual and muted ‘70s tones that caught my eye. In his film, ‘Stepping Razor’, Daley explores the meeting of martial arts and reggae culture during the 1970s, digging deep into a unique cross-cultural connection felt across the black diaspora.

“Whether through the development of unique textiles with specialists in Japan and the UK, the music of reggae legend Peter Tosh or the unique story of black British karateka athletes told via World Champion Jordan Thomas – everything becomes interconnected and pushes my own creative journey, uniting fashion, music and culture” - Nicholas Daley Temperley London – designer Al-

ice Temperley created an AW21 collection engulfed with the spirit of the ‘60s and ‘70s. Alice moved the HQ to Somerset last year and this move definitely impacted her process. Once in the countryside, the designer suddenly found herself exposed to all the artisan producers.

This changed her production to include local produce such as Britain’s oldest lace, recycled nylon, essentially pushing the brand deeper into sustainability. The brand is notorious for the evening wear however, coming off the back of last season’s subtle transition to everyday, this season cements Temperley London’s place in the everyday collection.

The aim of the collection was for a ‘’better, brighter, bolder tomorrow” and that is certainly expressed.

ished. The AW21 collection was inspired by the pictorial language of the traditional Chinese landscape painting Pine trees and sika deer, blooming roses and fleeting clouds.

The designer devoted the collection to the study of women and nature. The diverse casting of women of all ages really expresses the emotive collection. A digital collection I recommend all to watch.

dard is known for her tulle and the introduction of knitwear in past seasons. The piano techno beat added the playful atmosphere of the schoolgirl dream of colour and clashing print. Goddard provided the mood we have all been deprived of this year and in doing so, gave us a true sense of comfortability in her brand and aesthetic. Additionally, this year the designer introduced handbags.

Molly Goddard transported me back to primary school with her collection. The visual show was subdued in mood, sticking with the traditional catwalk, yet the editing layered the digital audience’s experience. God-

Day Three Sunday, February 21st was a short day at LWF, however, most certainly an important one. Bianca Sanders took to the digital catwalk with her menswear collection in a sur-

Day Two: Yuhan Wang’s collection presented female relationships in such high regard. The seamless video left me feeling energised once fin-

realist gothic film. The evocative imagery had me holding my breath, afraid to breath. It was a risky film for the designer as much of the clothing is hidden, but the artistic expression is so beautiful I was dying to take a glimpse at the look book that would be released after.

Day Four Emilia Wickstead’s collection was contrasted against the fuchsia pink backdrop, constructed to appear like window displays. The col-

Editor: Maeve O’Sullivan lection encapsulated the form fitted, classical 1950s glamour that is sure to be a trend for the season.

While for the majority, the designer came through with modest pieces, the subtle cut out clothing, such as the back or high chest area added an extra layer of sexy femininity.

Roksanda ‘Friday in February’ AW21 collection has left me breathless. Was it the collection instead of the fact that Vanessa Redgrave led the mythical film with daughter Joely Richardson and granddaughter

How Karl Lagerfeld revived Chanel WRITES Selina Dufner I remember vividly how full of excitement I was when my best friend and I booked a trip to Paris in February 2019.

We wanted to be there around the same time as the fashion week was being held.

Little did we know that a mournful incident would overshadow our great anticipation: the passing of the legendary fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld on the 19th of February. Two weeks later, his last collection for Chanel was shown on the runway in the Grand Palais and we found ourselves in front of the magnificent building amidst photographers, models, influencers and socialites. While we, of course, didn’t have the opportunity to actually watch the show, we didn’t want to pass on the chance to breathe a little Chanel air and experience the ambience of an haute-couture fashion show. The very next day, we went to the Chanel store on 31 Rue Cambon and, even though I was barely able to afford it, I couldn’t resist treating myself to a pair of espadrilles.

Karl Lagerfeld presented his first collection in that very location on the 25th of January 1983 at 3pm. The audience was most likely completely unaware of the fact that they were witnesses of a monumental event, and probably asked themselves what Lagerfeld could possibly do for Chanel since the brand was considered to be dead:

Daisy Bevan, evoking my Call the Midwife superfan? Redgrave recalls Shakespeare Sonnet 73 while the tri-generational women perform on screen, captured on iPhone this month. The collection oozed simplicity and divinity. Richly diverse in structure and colour palette, the Autumn Winter 2021 Collection celebrates a vitality and optimism that is replicated throughout this season’s key shapes and silhouettes.

When reading the fabric list from the collection, I felt I too was uttering a Shakespeare sonnet for printed dupion silk, moiré taffeta, silk twill organza, washed silk satins, hammered silk satins, high gloss and bespoke striped natural cloth, Italian wool check, lightweight wool mohair, and Japanese starched gaberdine rolled from my tongue.

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“When I took over Chanel in ‘82, everybody said to me: “Don’t touch it, it’s dead,” and then, in fact, it was dead. But when I start a line, everything is completely new,” revealed Lagerfeld for the Netflix documentary 7 Days Out: World’s Biggest Events.

Although Coco Chanel’s store was very successful, the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the start of World War II left her no choice but to shut its doors in 1939. Chanel tried a comeback in the ‘50s, but she felt that she couldn’t keep up with the competition anymore, especially with Christian Dior.

As it turned out, Lagerfeld managed to do a lot for Chanel and actually revived it. He modernised, revolutionised and

expanded the brand while staying true to what it stands for, and keeping in mind what kind of a woman Coco was. Lagerfeld constantly reinterpreted classics such as the iconic tweed suit and gave them a modern touch. He always moved with the times and understood Coco as a revolutionary woman who wasn’t stuck in the past but rather looked to the future. He also understood the importance of logos, as they are a universal language everybody understands.

Thus, he loved using the now worldknown CC logo. You don’t have to speak a certain language to know what CC stands for and that’s the beauty of logos.

For a long time, Chanel was mostly known for its perfumes and accessories, but Lagerfeld also focused on the clothes themselves and made sure that they were worn by stars on the

red carpet of important events such as the Academy Awards. By doing this, he strengthened Chanel’s image as a high-end fashion label. He also carefully chose the models he used in his fashion shows or campaigns and was always on the lookout for the most promising new faces. As to the fashion shows, they were always a spectacle. Lagerfeld preferred to use eye-catching and extraordinary settings which were visually appealing to the audience – for instance, a rocket or a supermarket.

Also visually appealing are the short films he created to advertise his collections and to bring them to a broader range of potential customers. An example of that is the short film “The Tale of a Fairy” for the 2011/12 Cruise collection.

All of this contributed to the popularity of the brand.

Arts & Literature

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Reading Resolutions for 2021: If You Have Not Started Yet

Writes Claudia Schwarz

Most New Year’s resolutions never make it to February, but maybe a late one will last the distance.

Instead of simply setting yourself a quota of books to read per week, why not make it more entertaining.

I have listed a few fun challenges that could get the ball rolling!

Read a book you’ve lied about reading: We’ve all had to read novels for university or school. But, did you really read them? Or did you just read the first few chapters, give up, and memorise a summary of it online?

If so, now’s the time. Drag out that old, feared classic and you might be amazed. Not all of them are as cryptic as they may seem. Especially when you’re reading them for fun and don’t have to worry about analysing a character’s every move.

Re-read a book you did read in school: I was completely confused by Brave New World when I had to read it for school. Without the pressure of trying to memorise and deconstruct the plot, you will manage to see it in a completely different light. Reading a book for school really does take the fun out of it! So, go on, try and remember that book you had to read in secondary school, the one you thought was way too complicated and boring. Try to read it again.

I promise you; you’ll be surprised at how different the reading experience will be. Fahrenheit 451 or The Wasp Factory come to mind.

Read the book of a movie you love: Think back to your favourite movies.

Chances are, it is based on a book that might just knock your socks off. If the book is anything like the movie, then it’s definitely worth your time. Why not watch and read The Godfather, Hidden Figures, or even The Exorcist? The cinematic version often drastically cuts down the storyline of the book or even completely excludes an important character. Who knows, reading the ‘same’ story might just have a few surprises in store for you.

Read a non-fiction book: Autobiographies are something I have avoided like the plague.

Yet, one that has caught my attention is Becoming by Michelle Obama. If, like myself, you are not a huge fan of reading about someone else’s life, there is still a huge variety of other non-fiction texts to choose from. History and nature can make for fascinating subjects to read about, and that’s only naming a few. One gem of an autobiographical prose is They Can’t Kill Us All: The Story of Black Lives Matter by Wesley Lowery, an eye-opening, empowering book that I think everyone should read.

Read a book about mental health: We are in a strange and confusing time at the moment. Remember to mind yourself, and check in with yourself. Take a few breaks from staring at the screen and try to go for a walk, or even make yourself a nice cup of tea and breathe. Improving your mental wellbeing is important but sometimes it is difficult to know where you could start. I can highly recommend The Noonday Demon by Andrew

Solomon to those struggling with their mental health. The book First, We Make the Beast Beautiful by Sarah Wilson is a great addition to anyone’s bookshelf. She writes about “the beast” that is anxiety in a very engaging way.

Read an absurdly long book: Why not read In Search of Lost Time

by Marcel Proust, which is a stunning 4,215 pages long. We are challenging ourselves after all! If you are now saying to yourself “No one’s got the time for that”, well, I completely agree. How about a compromise? War and Peace with its 1,225 pages is much easier to read and, as an added bonus, you can cheat by watching it as a movie or film series.

Read a book situated in Cork: It is fascinating to read a book about a place you know or are living in.

The familiar streets and shops start manifesting themselves in your mind while reading. You can walk through town with the protagonist and recognize the different places. Here are two novels to get you started: The Glorious Heresies

by Lisa McInerney and To Keep a Bird Singing by Kevin Doyle.

Read a book that has been translated into English: Foreign authors, with their varied cultures, languages, and ways of life, definitely have something to teach us. One of my all-time favourites is a book I found in a hotel lobby in Spain. It is The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón.

I urge any thriller fans or lovers of literary mysteries to read it. By stumbling upon this book, I have seen Barcelona through a different perspective and learned quite a lot about the Spanish Civil War. If my mention of history made you curious, you might like to try The Infamous Rosalie by Evelyn Trouillot. Originally published in French, this haunting story of a Creole slave on board the slave ship Rosalie, will captivate you.

The ultimate challenge for bilinguals (and anyone else who dares to try) is to read a book in its original language. Afterwards, you can check if the translated version actually holds up to the original.

Editor: imasha costa

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Cork City Will Rise: The Ardú Street Art Initiative Writes Imasha Costa , Arts & Literature Editor When I first moved to Cork City, I was intrigued by its growing vibrant arts scene. The colours erupted alongside the already jovial streets of the city, the cobblestoned roads, coloured by different murals and the people allowed the streets to come alive. This past year has seen the decrease of life within the city, the streets getting noticeably quieter and narrower, but that changed when the city came alive once again with the Ardú Street Art Initiative – a street art project choreographed by seven of Ireland’s most respected and renowned street artists, who worked alongside key points of the city centre. As a response to the theme of the Burning of Cork City in 1920, names such as Aches, Maser, Peter Martine, Deidre Breen, James Earley, Garreth Joyce, and Shane O’Driscoll came together in late 2020 with their street art murals that brought life back into the city again.

Earlier this year, I was lucky to have a chat with one of the street artists, Shane O’Driscoll, where we spoke about the emergence of street art within Cork City. O’Driscoll is a visual artist from Cork who works mainly with print making and largescale murals with a background in graphic designing. He also mentions that he had only started painting murals within the last four to five years for a large scale, and it was not something he planned to end up doing, as

he had been a graphic designer and art director for nearly ten years which included gallery exhibitions as well.

According to O’Driscoll, street art is more commercial unlike the graffiti art which is very present within the city as well. The thing with street art is that it has to be as sensitive with the type of message that is portrayed, unlike the aggressive and raw style of graffiti tagging and art. One could say that street art is definitely the softer, more PG version. Over the past twelve months, a lot of artists have been taking their art onto the streets, which according to O’Driscoll could be daunting at

first, as you are moving from a small canvas onto a larger, more public and visible space, which is a big change but still a good challenge.

Cork city has always had a history of mural artwork before street art murals started to grow. O’Driscoll describes street art as more of a “modern day thing” and feels that over the last few years it has really exploded and has caught the people’s imagination and interest. He also states that “there is definitely a large connection for mural work within Cork City, and now it is more of a contemporary take that is taking place with the current projects”.

And so, the Ardú Street Art Initiative comes to us at a time when all of us are facing shared and personal struggles, each of the murals reflect a rallying cry for the city – a cry to remind the people that even through the most terrible times, the city and its people rose up, and we can do it again. Ardú – which is Irish for ‘rise’ bases itself on the theme of nostalgia and celebration. Cork City rose from its burning ashes 100 years ago, following the Burning of Cork City.

I urge you to visit the walking tour of the Ardú Street Art Initiative and remember that with all we are facing together, we will rise.

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Sports

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Want to Join UCC Sport’s Best Kept Secret? Then Get Inline Writes Liam Grainger, Sports Editor Boasting over sixty individual sports clubs, UCC has well established itself as one of the top Irish universities in the number of extra-curricular activities it has on offer. A handful of these clubs require no introduction and are as old, and often as celebrated, as the university itself.

Some more youthful clubs, however, are just finding their feet in the UCC sporting area, and though they may not be getting as much of the media limelight, it should in no way detract from the immense value they bring to the student cohort on Western Road. One such example is UCC’s Inline Hockey Club who have gone from strength to strength since their early ‘90s inception and are growing each year with a steady stream of members with no sign of letting up. This year the club is being led by club captain Tom Quinlan, and though the past two semesters have proven extremely challenging for the club on numerous levels, they remain optimistic for the future.

But first, some background. Inline Hockey, or Roller Hockey, dates back to the early 1900s and at first involved players using field hockey sticks, a round ball, and of course, roller blades. Initially confined in popularity to the northern states bordering Canada, the sport gained popularity with the widespread diffusion of television sets after WW2, when the sport got commercial coverage for the first time. As the decades evolved, so too did the sport.

Quad skates turned to inline skates, the round ball changed to a puck, and international Inline Hockey organisations were set up globally. The rules are quite similar to hockey, with a few nuances. Inline Hockey Ireland’s website will tell you that instead of a rubber puck, the game is played with a non-bounce plastic puck with hard nubs to reduce friction and is lighter in weight than an ice puck. The game is played with 4 players and a goalie from each team on the surface at a given time. A professional game consists of two twenty-minute halves, with the clock only running when the puck is in play; the arena is usually the same dimensions as your standard

ice-hockey rink. As you’d expect, speed and agility are critical in this high-tempo game, and bodychecking or physicality of any sort is illegal. Domestically, Inline Hockey Ireland is the national governing body for the sport, and they’re affiliated with their European and World governing body counterparts. There are currently fifteen inline hockey clubs active in Ireland at present, spanning across 12 counties. The Cork Wolfpack are the rebel county representatives who train in Little Island and offer Inline Hockey action for younger players and all the way up to their Senior Elite team.

UCC’s Inline Hockey Club was founded in the early 1990s by a group of Cana-

dian students who were studying at the college; the sport was popular in the city at the time and an opportunity was spotted in opening a student-led team.

The club currently has 22 active members, but on top of that figure is a large cohort of international students who visit UCC each year and join in on the action. The club currently trains once a week on a Wednesday evening, but the hope is to ramp that schedule up to twice a week in the future. The lack of Inline Hockey clubs in other Irish colleges means intervarsity competitions aren’t an option for the club at present, but the current committee is hopeful that with the growing popularity of the game that this will change in the com-

ing years. Your typical Wednesday night training session will begin with some simple skating to warm-up, followed by various drills that focus on stick handling, puck control, passing and shooting. Training sessions take place in Capwell, at Críost Rí’s indoor hall, and each Inline outing always finishes with an internal game at the end. Sounds fun, right?

Tom Quinlan is the club’s current Captain, and he caught the Inline bug when he joined the club in first year.

Like many of the club’s recruits, he had never played before coming to UCC, but he hasn’t looked back since.

Having enjoyed roller blading from a

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express young age, Tom slowly began to supplement the skating with the various stick handling techniques and puck shots needed for Inline. The pace of the game was something that really attracted Tom to it, and this coupled with like-minded teammates who also had a passion for the game was the perfect combination. For club secretary Matthew Collins, the interest in hockey stretches all the way back to his early teens when he became hooked on the NHL. Despite being a talented soccer goalkeeper, he decided to devote more of his time to Inline, having only caught wind of the UCC club through a careers seminar he attended where the Inline Club were promoting the sport and enticing students to join. Echoing Tom’s sentiment, Matthew explains that the rapport between club members is one of the club’s most enjoyable aspects, and that the no-pressure environment is the perfect oasis for students to have fun away from the books.

The pandemic has hit the Inline Hockey club particularly hard. Despite being one of the few UCC clubs that train off-campus, they were unable to organise training sessions even though all necessary return-toplay guidelines had been completed.

So, when other clubs were given the chance to regroup albeit for a short period at the start of the academic year, the club was unable to offer its members any action despite complete cooperation with reduced capacity directives. The pandemic and the halting of play couldn’t have come at a worse time for the club, who were just beginning to gain momentum on campus. It’s difficult to replicate the sport to any degree in a virtual environment, and as a result the club has lost many of its usual members due to the club’s inactivity. Moreover, the international students who make up a substantial part of the club’s member base also didn’t travel in their usual numbers to the university. To add salt to the club’s wounds, they also had to postpone this year’s trip to Belfast where they had planned to take in an ice-hockey game while also getting some skating action in themselves while in Northern Ireland. The club did however manage to play its part in numerous charitable events that took place over the past six months, including the ‘Hike for Hope’ in aid of Pieta House.

So, what’s the sales pitch for people

who want a bit of the Inline action? Tom and Matthew tell me that they highly encourage all interested students to get involved as soon as the club gets their skates on again. They assure me that newcomers don’t even need skating experience to join their ranks, or any prior-knowledge of how to actually hold a hockey-stick. Whatever your skill level, the club is ready to welcome you and get you up to speed with one of UCC Sport’s most exciting clubs. What’s evident is that the club values the social aspect of the game as much as the Inline Hockey itself, and it seems the perfect place for incoming students to have their first taste of college sport, with a

Sports club that doesn’t take itself too seriously and puts great value on its members.

It’s been a tough year for all of UCC’s clubs. Almost all intervarsity competitions have been cancelled or postponed as the country deals with the third wave of the pandemic, with the Sigerson, Fitzgibbon, and AIL competitions all falling victim to the virus. The UCC Sport hiatus is expected to continue for the foreseeable future, with the earliest return to play date for the Inline Hockey club looking like next September. However, now is the perfect time to start planning your post-pandemic sporting renaissance; try something new,

37 something outside the status quo.

The Inline Hockey Club are always on the lookout for new members to join their ranks, and both Tom and Matthew repeatedly stressed that no prior experience of the sport is required to take part. Just like all other UCC Clubs, the comradery amongst members is one of the club’s biggest selling points, and the club’s committee assure me that they’ll be returning bigger and stronger than ever in the new academic year. So, if you’re still looking for the UCC Club that’s the right fit for you, and looking to try something a bit different, maybe it’s just a roller skate away.

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Sports

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express

Green Shoots for Irish Athletics Amid the Sport’s Uncertainty writes Sam Curtin, Deputy Sports Editor

There may not be a huge amount of positivity around at the moment, but Irish athletics is a notable exception. It has been a mixed year so far for the sport with Olympic uncertainty and the tragic passing of the legendary athlete, coach and pundit Jerry Kiernan who was taken far too soon in January of this year. On the track, a record 24 athletes make up the Irish contingent heading into next weekend’s European Indoor Championships in Torun, Poland.

Heading the team will be former medallists Mark English and Ciara Mageean, both of whom head to Poland in good form judging by the recent indoor meet held for elite athletes at Abbottstown last Saturday week. English ran a national indoor record in the 800m running 1:46 and looks set to be in contention for a third medal in the event. Mageean is coming off a fantastic couple of years winning bronze in the 1500m at the same event in Glasgow 2019 before making her first global final at senior level running a personal best in the fastest women’s 1500m final in history.

Although they along with Thomas Barr have been the stalwarts of Irish athletics in recent years, there is a plethora of promising talent coming

through. English will be joined in the 800m by 18-year-old Longford native Cian McPhillips who ran 1.46.13 which is the second fastest U20 time in European indoor 800m history and the sixth in world history. This is quite an astonishing feat considering McPhillips is sitting his Leaving Cert this year and previously said that the proposals for the exams positively impacted his running. Did I mention that 1500m is his favourite distance? While English will be expected to challenge for medals, McPhillips will be looking to gain valuable championship running experience where athletes have to race three times in three days.

Not to be outdone, there is a strong female contingent running in the 800m with the most positive thing being the unprecedented amount of depth in the discipline. 24-year-old Nadia Power ran a personal best and national indoor record in an international meet just a couple of days before Síofra Cléirigh-Buttner who ran 2:00.58 to break the record in America which moves her up to 4th in the European rankings with 4 Irish women in the top 20 world rankings despite only 3 allowed to compete in Poland.

The duo will be joined by Georgie Hartigan who won the Abbottstown meet.

Other athletes to watch out for is Cork’s Phil Healy who will compete in the

400m and is in the form of her life right now. If Healy can make her first senior final then she can take great momentum into the summer outdoor season where her quest for Olympic qualification will begin in earnest. Other athletes who will have eyes on a final include Leon Reid who goes in the 60m and the 3000m trio of John Travers, Darragh McElhinney and Seán Tobin who all have realistic chances of making the final.

Of course, amidst all the excitement about the dawn of a new era for Irish athletics, it begs the question of why are there so many records falling left, right and centre? It is part of a wider issue particularly with the advancement of shoe technology which has caused its fair share of controversy. Nike have been testing the waters with the Air Zoom Alphafly Next Gen which contains special foam and a carbon plate which has been proven to make runners a lot faster.

Why has this been so controversial?

Nike has been accused of “technical doping”. The vast majority of athletes using them ran personal bests including many sprinters reportedly taking 0.3 seconds off their 100m record. That would mean that a top-level sprinter who is still not on the same level as Usain Bolt, could feasibly break his world record of 9.59

which puts the entire integrity of the event into question. The most famous example however is Kenyan Eliod Kipchoge when he ran an unofficial marathon in under 2 hours back in October 2019 wearing the maligned show. This is more than 2 minutes quicker than his official world record.

This goes back to the recent success of Irish athletes where the shoes certainly played a part. One Irish Olympian upon receiving the shoes as a present said she “ felt like a fraud” when she took more than 20 seconds off her 5km PB but knew that it was the new shoe rather than her making improvements in training. Most athletes using the shoe have said that they are not as hard on the calves and are able to recover much quicker thus being able to train harder for longer which is what every athlete is trying to do.

This is just the latest controversy in a long PR battle for Nike who have not been helped by the fact that many athletes sponsored by the giant have been reluctant to publicly praise their sponsors due to the stigma attached to using the shoes but also the brand itself. The public release of the Air Zoom came just after the confirmation of a 4 year ban for Alberto Sala-

Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021 | University Express zar for doping some of his athletes who trained under him as part of the Nike Oregon Project. Many athletes described his training environment as “horrible” where athletes were routinely criticised for their weight and physical appearance. They were also intimidated into doing certain training practices and doping.

However, money talks as we are seeing more and more companies copying the Nike shoe with the likes of New Balance now using the same prototype as their rivals. Adidas have reportedly designed an extremely advanced shoe compared to other competitors and will be released just before the Tokyo Olympics.

All of this along with trying to find the new mainstream, global superstar which will propel athletics back into the mainstream media on a more regular basis, á la Usain Bolt.

The likes of 400m world record holder Wayde Van Niekerk have been touted as being the successor but the reality is, athletics is in the rebuilding phase to regain its credibility as a sport which the casual fans should invest time in. What happens at the Olympic Games will tell a lot about the direction of the sport where a landslide of new world records are expected in the near future.

Despite the ongoing challenges for athletics as its ongoing battle for relevancy and its reputation continue, there is a very real feeling of optimism and excitement that the production line is getting an awful lot more exciting on these shores.

Fancy shoes or not, nothing beats hard work and a little bit of talent, something of which we are going to see in spades by athletes donning the Irish singlet. Starting with potentially 2-3 medals this weekend.

Jerrywouldbeproud,andIamsureheis.

Ireland team: 60m: Leon Reid, Israel Olatunde, Dean Adams, Ciara Neville, Joan Healy, Molly Scott; 400m: Phil Healy, Sophie Becker, Sharlene Mawdsley; 800m: Mark English, Cian McPhillips, John Fitzsimons, Nadia Power, Síofra Cléirigh-Buttner, Georgie Hartigan; 1500m: Andrew Corcoran, Paul Robinson, Luke McCann, Ciara Mageean; 3,000m: John Travers, Seán Tobin, Darragh McElhinney, Michelle Finn; 60m hurdles: Sarah Lavin.

Sports

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University

Sports

UCCExpress.ie

Volume 24 | Issue 8 | Tuesday 2nd March 2021

Food for Thought: What Fuels our Athletes Writes Ronan Maloney The role of nutrition in sport has grown to become a diverse and fundamental conversation, with particular emphasis landing on the food market. With more consumers turning to food businesses in search of the newest and most on-trend products to help them to exceed in their given field, scientific and technological advancements are motivating the continuous flow of innovative goods. The market is bursting with supplements, fortified products and functional foods that can fuel a consumer’s competitive advantage in their game. As players operating in an array of segments across the market introduce health and wellness products, an integral concern that is surfacing is the degree of safety associated with such products. This concern is majorly tied to market trends that dominate the food industry. In this aspect, individuals are growing more health conscious towards organic and natural products that are minimally processed and can be trusted; this element is proven to be tied with foods that can boost a consumer’s immune system, with Covid-19 acting as a major catalyst of this demand. Furthermore, the proliferation of mindful consumers means that transparent products are growing in importance. Regardless of their reasons why, an attentiveness to safe food products is clearly coming into play.

Large-scale organisations must adopt the responsibility of supplying ethical and safe “health and wellness” products; although, the irony in many cases is that products that fall into this product category might be anything but. A category that initially comes to mind is fat burning supplements, which may be deceitful to the degree that consumers lose more money on these products than fat.

By speeding metabolism and reducing appetite, it’s easy to acknowledge how consumers would be inclined to support the theory behind fat burners. Although, generally compromising of ingredients that lack strenuous research, as well as a significant amount of caffeine, fat burners pose as an extremely unnatural means to lose fat with adverse

side effects. It therefore doesn’t come as a surprise that The Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) recently seized fat burning pills that were associated with fatal repercussions. Alternatively, discussion surrounding the safety of food products has particularly surfaced due to the prevalence of energy drinks in sport, that are progressively marketed by athletes and are sold in virtually every food retailer; a salient illustration of this point can be made via Lewis Hamilton’s collaboration with Monster Energy.

By resisting demands for “clean deck” products, which consist of between 3-10 recognisable ingredients by name, energy drinks continue to grow notorious.

In this way, the doses of sugar and caffeine packed into many energy drinks exposes the debate of whether this agglomeration of hazardous ingredients acts as the most functional pick-me-up.

Supplying consumers with safe food also goes beyond the actions of companies operating on a macro-level to incorporate the practices of food stalls in local sporting environments. The presence of food at sporting events has become tradition, turning food stalls that populate sportsgrounds into a key element of the match-day experience. Albeit stadiums being more or less deserted as a cause of the pandemic, the food safety aspects of these stalls is now a growing point of discussion, with an emphasis on foodborne illnesses - a point explained through an FSAI publication surrounding food stall legislation at sporting events. Further afield, ESPN, as a major sports channel in the US, undertook 16,000 food safety inspections of various sporting facilities across North America over the last number of years. The result of this was that 28% of the venues pos-

sessed food service outlets exercising high violations of foodborne illnesses.

Public health, food marketers, and policy makers alike have a considerable role to play in the governing of foods in sport. The importance of intervention is substantial to control the provenance of food, and motivate to incorporate the health claims in plain language to leverage product information and power back to the consumer. More food for thought is that education should be provided to consumers to enhance awareness of the issue at stake. Above all else, the power that companies operating in the “health” category retain should be congruent with their moral responsibility to society. It may just be worth athletes’ while to turn to natural sources to access safe and nutrient dense foods.