Motley - Volume XIV - Issue #5 - Sex

Volume 14. Issue 5 FEBRUARY 2021

UCC STUDENT SEX SURVEY

A CHAT WITH TIM CHADWICK

INTERVIEW WITH HOLLY CAIRNS T.D

SEX EDITION

ARTWORK BY MAEVE KAVANAGH

Masthead

Editorial Staff

MOLLY KAVANAGH Deputy Editor-in-Chief

HILARY BARRY Designer

ALANA DALY MULLIGAN Current Affairs

NIAMH BROWNE Features & Opinions

Molly is a recent UCC English graduate who is now doing an MSc in Government and Politics. She's also our former Deputy Current Affairs Editor, and is overseeing Motley's brand new Wellness Section!

Hilary Barry is currently a student of Music and English and co-host of the Break it Down Podcast. As the the new graphic designer she hopes to bring her love for design and illustrations to the pages of Motley.

Alana Daly Mulligan is an award-winning spoken-word “artivist” & filmmaker of Déise extraction. With work tackling social issues by playing with heartstrings, she hopes to apply her artistic formula to her role as Motley current affairs editor.

Prolific writer and notorious flirt, Niamh Browne is currently completing a BA in art history and philosophy and is this year's features and opinion editor for Motley Magazine. Winner of the HotPress outstanding achievement award in 2018, she has since been staff writer for Motley.

DEPUTY EDITORS Current Affairs Features & Opinions Entertainment Fashion

Stephen Moynihan Emer Walsh Rebeckah McCarthy Kaia Purcell

STAFF WRITERS Head Staff Writer Current Affairs Staff Writer Fashion Staff Writer Contributing Staff Writer

Jack Coleman John Hunter Emma Treacy Conor Daly

ONLINE TEAM Online Editor Social Media

Kevin Quane Erica Shelly

KANE GEARY O' KEEFE Entertainment Kane is in his final year of Film and Screen media with English in UCC. His passions are for all things film, music, video game, and literature related, which makes him a potent competitor for that one artsy round in the table quiz.

Kane is still waiting patiently for his emo phase to end.

GRACE CLARO Fashion Grace Claro has been a fashion photographer with Motley since 2018.

She is taking the MA in History this year.

Working with the magazine all began with a zealous email to the editor. This is something which she encourages everyone to do, as Motley is a wonderful platform to amplify student voices .and creativity.

PHOTOGRAPHERS Carly Fitzgerald Rebecca Dineen Diego Leon

CONTRIBUTORS Dr. Miranda Corcoran Sarah Kennelly Emily Osborn Caitlin Skillington Cliodhna Buckley Cian McDonnell Ellen Byrne

Conor Daly Ronan Waters Elliot Monroe Emma Barber Billy O'Connor Niamh Buckley Imasha Costa

This publication is made from 100% recycled paper. Motley welcomes letters from readers, emailed to editor@motley.ie. Motley is published by Motley Magazine, The Hub, UCC, Western Road, Cork. Printed by City Print Limited, Victoria Cross, Cork. Copyright 2021 Motley Magazine. All rights reserved.

Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is strictly prohibited. All efforts have been made to ensure that details and pricing are correct at time of print. Motley magazine does not take responsibility for any errors incurred. This magazine can be recycled either in your green bin kerbside collection or at a local recycling point. Images provided by Unsplash.com, Pexels.com, Pixabay.com.

Vectors provided by Vecteezy.com and Freepik.com

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from the

Editor's Desk

Matthew Moynihan

Editor In-Chief

SEXUAL REVOLUTION 2.0

U

ndoubtedly we are living through a second-wave sexual revolution. A revolution of thought, of action and of feeling. In recent years the #MeToo movement has dethroned the powerful and shattered the halls of silence that allowed predators to sadistically wield their arsenal of perversity unchallenged. Silence is both a symptom and an agonist of the problem. However, our society has a history littered with attempts to muzzle victims of the patriarchal and ecclesiastical structures that sustained it. Silence was never a choice, it was an implication, and a reality. As we step out from the shadows as a society, we have a litany of brave individuals to thank for the nation gradually revealing itself as more sociallyinclusive, compassionate and liberated. I think of Savita Halappanavar when I write this. I think of the victims of Terenure college. I think of Senator David Norris and Katherine Zappone. I think of my Mother, who was pregnant with me in Bessborough, where silence left her locked away from society.

All of these issues, the right to bodily autonomy, the right to protection from predators, the right to love who you want to love, regardless of their sex, and the right to be have a child outside of wedlock have one thing in common: sex, and Ireland’s archaic and often toxic relationship with the same. This was a society stained with decades of shame, sadism and social stigma attached to sexuality. I mention this because it shows how far we’ve come in so short a time, but how much further we have to go. Massive inequalities still stand in the way of the LGBTQ+ community, particularly for trans people, and we cannot afford to remain silent. The gender pay gap has still not been fully addressed and issues such as period poverty, affordable contraception and the glass ceiling persist. Today, because of the bravery of Irish people over the decades, I can write this without fear, it’s their bravery that gives us a voice today, and it is a voice we must use. The difference today is that on most of these issues silence is a choice, and we have the luxury to amplify social equality.

Motley is a vehicle for your voice, a canvas for your cognitions. Use it. I become more grateful by the day for the luxury I have in collating this magazine, with such diverse takes on every issue. This is why we’ve approached sex as a theme. Few things in life fully bind us together as individuals and sex is perhaps the most basic thing we all have in common. It is a crucial aspect of the human experience, and by extension, the student experience. Covid-19 has impacted the relationships and sex lives of young people in a way never seen before. We know that you’re probably feeling touch-starved and frustrated, which is why we’ve produced this issue.

They say that you should never kiss and tell.

Motley has gone a step further. We’ve decided to ride and write (of course, not in the middle of a pandemic, no need to get jealous). When we sat down for our editorial meeting for this month’s issue, I think we all felt a mixture of healthy trepidation, cautious excitement, and journalistic responsibility about challenging the theme. I know I did.

However, this “ménage à trois” of inventive values, through the process of our monthly cycle of production, ended in a collective cathartic climax. As we delved deeper into the psyche of the world’s contemporary kinks, we became looser in our thought-processes, and stiffer in our convictions. Our pens hardened, we rolled back the paper, and the cut and thrust of creativity gave way to a spasmodic journalistic petite mort, ink flowing and kleenex ready for the editing process.

Within these pages, you’ll find some jaw-dropping spreads, Motley’s massive sex survey, a plot review of Game of Bones (yes, Jack is that brave), and some excellent contributions in features and fashion.

In total honesty it’s a blessing this issue didn’t go to print, the cleanup after distribution is hard enough. We hope it’s the ideas of the magazine that stick this month, and not the pages.

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ISSUE No5 - FEBRUARY 2021 MOTLEY.IE

CURRENT AFFAIRS Touch Starvation – the Sex Lives of UCC Students During COVID-19

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FEATURES

ENTERTAINMENT

FASHION

Interview With Holly Cairns - The moralization of sex and the Mother and Baby Homes

Tim Chadwick on Identity and Self-Love in his New EP 'Timothy'

Zoom Photoshoot: A Covid Romance (featuring Katherine Veekman)

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Wellness

A STUDENT’S GUIDE TO SEXUAL HEALTH T hanks to Ireland’s most toxic couple, intergenerational religious trauma and deep-rooted misogyny, sexual health and safety is a topic that is seldom touched by the Irish secondaryschool curriculum. College is an environment where a lot of sexually repressed young adults are converging to experiment with their sexualities together, and it’s important that we compensate for our lack of comprehensive sexual education so we can protect ourselves, and our partners, from sexually transmitted infections or accidental pregnancies.

BY MOLLY KAVANAGH

CONDOMS AND CONTRACEPTIVE

Condoms are one of the most common forms of birth control, and can be purchased in your local corner shop or pharmacy. They’re a safer alternative to the pull-out method, in which a person forgoes the condom and instead withdraws their penis from the vagina before they ejaculate.

The effectiveness of this method is debated. An important factor to keep in mind is that prior to ejaculation, the penis releases a liquid called ‘pre-cum,’ which sometimes contains live sperm and can, in fact, get you pregnant. So don’t risk it like. The UCC Welfare Office operates a condom shop where you can purchase multiple condoms or receive three free of charge.

The UCC Student Health clinic also provides other forms of contraceptive, such as an IUD, NuvaRing, Implanon, or the pill at a reduced rate.

IUDs and NuvaRings are both inserted through the vagina. The difference is that NuvaRings are inserted deeply into the vagina, while IUDs are inserted into the uterus. NuvaRings last 21 days and can be inserted and removed at home, while IUDs last for up to three years or more, depending on the brand. IUDs need to be inserted and removed by a gynecologist. NuvaRings need to be removed and reinserted relatively frequently, while people with IUDs don’t need to consider replacing their implant until several years after it’s inserted. If you want a largely hassle free, long-term contraceptive, IUDs are highly effective and very popular.

Implanon is a small rod that is inserted under the skin of your upper arm, also known as the rod or the implant.

It lasts up to three years, and needs to be inserted and removed by a medical professional.

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WHAT IS CHEMSEX?

Chemsex is when two or more people engaging in sexual activity together do so under the influence of drugs such as methamphetamine, GHB/GBL, ketamine, or mephedrone in order to enhance their experience. This is typically done via injection using a shared syringe, hence why chemsex parties are considered ‘high-risk’ for HIV transmission. These drugs also lower your inhibitions and can potentially lead to you engaging in risky, unprotected sex.

Chemsex is frequently associated with the LGBT+ community and gay hook-up culture, and while mentions of chemsex are prevalent in some online gay communities and on gay hook-up apps such as Grindr, the practice is not exclusive to homosexual men and is by no means ‘the norm’ for LGBT+ people in Ireland. If you want to safely engage in chemsex, there are a number of harm reduction practices that you can adopt to ensure that you don’t put yourself at risk.

For example, avoid mixing drugs and instead take small doses of a singular drug to reduce your risk of an overdose. GHB, a popular chemsex drug, is particularly easy to overdose on, and there is a 0.5ml margin between how much it takes you to get high, and how much it takes to potentially kill you. It’s also important to remember that a lot of party drugs don’t kick in straight away - so if you take one dose and nothing happens, don’t take another one.

Additionally, don’t be afraid to call an ambulance if somebody you’re with is overdosing on a drug during chemsex.

If possible, only engage in chemsex with people you trust, always wear a condom, don’t share needles, look into getting a prescription for PEP or PrEP if you need it, and get yourself tested for STIs regularly.

PrEP

PrEP is a medication that is available for free through the HSE for HIV-negative people who are considered to be at high risk for contracting HIV through sexual activity. According to sexualwellbeing.ie, to qualify for PrEP through the HSE, you must test negative for HIV and meet one of the following criteria:

• You’re having unprotected sex with a partner who HIV-

positive but not on treatment, or an HIV-positive partner who is on treatment but is not virally suppressed (does not have an 'undetectable' viral load). An ‘undetectable viral load’ means that there are zero traces of HIV currently existing within the HIV-positive person’s bloodstream, meaning it’s impossible for them to transmit the disease.

• You are a man who has sex with men. This includes

transgender men who have sex with men or a transgender woman who has sex with men, who meets any one of the following: (a)Has had a sexually transmitted infection in the last year. (b)Has used HIV post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) in the last year. PEP is an emergency medication for people who believe they’ve recently been exposed to HIV. You must take the first dose of PEP within 72 hours of the potential exposure, and continue taking the medication for 28 days without missing any doses. It doesn’t, however, make you immune to contracting HIV in the future.

(C)Use recreational drugs for sex in the last six months (also known as ‘chemsex’).

• You are a heterosexual man or woman who is considered by a specialist STI doctor, to be at a large risk of contracting HIV through sex.

You shouldn’t take PrEP if you have tested positive for HIV, and you don’t need to start taking PrEP if you’re consistently using condoms and plan on continuing to do so, or if you’re having sex with HIV positive partners who are on treatment and have an undetectable viral load. If you don’t qualify for free PrEP through the HSE, you can choose to pay for it yourself and can obtain a prescription from your doctor, which can be filled in any community pharmacy.

Spunout.ie has a very comprehensive article about PrEP titled “PrEP: The HIV prevention drug,” which goes into more detail about how PrEP should be used, what to do if you miss a dose, and how to care for yourself when you’re taking PrEP.

EMERGENCY CONTRACEPTIVE AND UNPLANNED PREGNANCIES

Emergency contraceptive pills, or the Morning After Pill, are used to prevent pregnancy after you’ve had unprotected sex. It can be purchased without a prescription in your local pharmacy, or at the UCC Student Health clinic at a reduced cost of 15-25 euro (depending on the brand). Most brands of emergency contraceptive are effective up to 72 hours after you’ve had unprotected sex, but some are effective up to five days after.

If you, or somebody you know, is faced with an unplanned pregnancy, one of your options is to phone the HSE at 1800 828 010. They’ll walk you through your options and the supports available to you as you decide whether or not to terminate your pregnancy. If you do decide to terminate your pregnancy, abortions are now free of charge for women living in the Republic of Ireland. You can have an abortion if your pregnancy is no more than 12 weeks along, meaning 84 days since the first day of your last period. There’s a three day waiting period between when your GP ceritfies that you’re no more than 12 weeks pregnant, and the earliest date your abortion may be carried out on.

To work out how far along you are in your pregnancy, count the number of days from the first day of your last period. For example, according to the HSE website, being 9 weeks pregnant means that it has been 63 days since

STI SCREENING:

If you think you have a sexually transmitted infection, UCC Student Health runs a free STI clinic on Friday mornings- you just need to call them at (021) 490 2311. They also offer free, self-administered chlamydia and gonorrhea screenings for male and female students. South Infirmary Victoria Hospital in Cork also offers STI screenings and treatment, in addition to the Cork Sexual Health Centre.

STIs can be contracted through unprotected vaginal, anal, and oral sex. A lot of people with STIs don’t experience any symptoms, while others might experience unusual discharge, swelling or itching around the vagina or penis, or a burning sensation while urinating. Condoms and dental dams are the only forms of contraceptive that also prevent STIs, and you should get tested regularly if you have frequent unprotected sex (especially if you’re having sex with a stranger, or a person you don’t know well).

Dental dams are thin sheets of latex or plastic that can be placed over the vagina or anus during oral sex to prevent making direct contact with your mouth. STIs that are commonly associated with oral sex are ghonorrea, genital herpes, and syphilis. Chlamydia, HIV, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, genital warts, and pubic lice (crabs) are more commonly associated with unprotected vaginal sex, but you can contract them through oral sex as well.

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A Toxic Lockdown Love Affair HANNAH EMERSON DISCUSSES HOW LOCKDOWN HAS AFFECTED HER RELATIONSHIP WITH SOCIAL MEDIA AND HER PHONE.

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he pandemic complicated many relationships.

From newly courting pairs finding themselves in awkward romantic no man’s lands to already faltering romances entering a sort of relationship purgatory.

It even went as far being the final curtain call in numerous marriages – China, for one, having reported the highest annual amount of divorce applications this year. As we can see, the pandemic showed no mercy, not even for love.

I too had found myself in a complicated relationship. An already somewhat toxic love affair, exacerbated by the lengthy lockdown, it underwent its fair share of hardship in the forthcoming months.

This particular relationship was between me – and my phone.

Living through this technological era, the majority of people can sympathise with the paradoxical relationship we foster with our phones.

A sort of love/hate saga between us and our device.

Somewhat like going back to that boy (or girl) that ruined your life, you know

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you shouldn’t, but well, you do anyway! I’m not alone in feeling like sometimes your thumbs are being controlled by a separate biological entity. As your brain wills them to stop scrolling, your thumbs prevail. Now, I’m sure we’re all too aware of the addictive elements of social media. Various “offline” advocates have harped on about these dangers and contingency measures we can all adopt to avoid this unhealthy habit, and they are right, of course. In an ideal world we all throw our smartphones into some sort of mass grave, vow to use Nokias from here on out, and (probably) live much happier lives, keeping socialising as a physical, authentic experience, where what you see is what you get. Bliss.

However, on March 12th when Ireland was thrown into lockdown, urging everyone to stay at home, online communication was the last remaining morsel of human connection we had left. Beggars could certainly not be choosers, when our only way of talking to our friends was through these addictive platforms such as snapchat and Instagram.

Alas, my vow to cut down

on my ‘online time’ was no more. At this point I believe there was a shift in mindset amongst the general public.

When before as a society we’d try to resist living life through our phones, we now accepted that these, dare I say, ‘unprecedented times’ meant living through these screens was unavoidable.

People, including myself, were happy to scroll the day away for the time being until the virus was no more (…. still waiting). That general acceptance of circumstance, coupled with the multitude of online yoga classes, virtual workouts, the five kilometre running challenges, the raw egg-swallowing challenge (what was that about?) and endless other tasks for people to partake in, meant that online presence was greater that it had ever been before. Whether these various trends were in aid of worthy charities, a testament to one’s own fitness journey or even just as an activity to spice up the monotony that is a day in lockdown, I felt there was a notable community spirit on these social platforms.

I would even go as far to say it was a place to seek solace during a time of such uncertainty. However, it

was not long until it took a toll on my mental health.

Of course, there were vague feelings of inadequacy when my days were significantly less productive than those of whom I saw through the screen completing recordbreaking running times.

Yet, these feelings of envy and inadequacy after scrolling through Instagram were nothing new. Growing up during my teens in a newly online world meant I had grown accustomed to these feelings and had found ways to deal with them. What was a more notable beast during this time and more detrimental to my mental health, was the sheer volume of bad news.

This came in varying forms.

One being the pessimistic predicted trajectories of the virus, claiming that these unnamed “experts” predict that coronavirus will exponentially mutate into some form of killer mutant ninja turtles, continuing to take over the human race only to enslave us mere mortals forever (mild exaggeration but to that same effect). This bad news also came in the form of infographics depicting tragic events happening across the globe. As people were now spending more time than ever scrolling through their feeds, it was not long before

a surge of keyboard activism took hold.

While raising awareness for injustices is, by principle, a good thing, it is when it takes place at a mass scale that problems ensue. The flood of these awareness raising posts shared by a house-bound public meant that no corner of the global interspace remained devoid of these heart-breaking events. Before you write me off as an antiactivism…activist.? I can assure you I think activism is great.

Activism is essential, especially in the world we live in where the gap between winners and losers is being extorted from a mere crevice, to a cavernous cavity. Activism is one of few tools left we can use to try render this world a more equal place. While I am aware of all of this, and want to do my part in this rendering, the sheer volume of human suffering that we became exposed online over the past few months was exorbitant. I was regularly made hopeless by the world we live in as I saw the suffering that it housed. It’s a blessing and a curse that social media has made the word a smaller place. In one sense we should be witness to the happenings of the world, good or bad because it is in the end, reality.

However, in another sense we must pose the question, can our brains really internalise all this catastrophic content while at the same time, maintaining good mental health?

Despite knowing the feelings of despair that would ensue, I’d find myself compulsively searching world news, only to be bombarded with the latest heart-breaking happenings of the planet.

I understand it is a privilege to merely read about tragic events rather than be living them, but I think the human condition is unable to consume such misery at a mass, global level. I can’t be unique in feeling that the internet became a rather dark, hopeless place in the recent months.

But despite these headlines inducing feelings of sadness and fear, I could not look away. I think the term coined for this phenomenon is ‘doom-scrolling’ and a phenomenon that many of us lockdown-ers fell victim to in the recent months. Now, if you’re somebody who can read about various world injustices day in and day out and fight on their behalf, without it affecting your mental health, then hats off to you.

But if lockdown has taught me one thing, it’s that I am not one of those people. During lockdown being on my phone left me feeling dejected and hopeless by the news stories I’d read, yet I felt I HAD to read them. It was exhausting.

The complicated relationships we all have with our devices is rather fascinating. As I said, we foster a somewhat paradoxical relationship with our phones as while we seek sanctuary in them, we often are as equally desperate to escape from them.

If I could break up with my phone I would. But as we all know, it’s hard to leave something/someone you depend so much on, even if you know they’re bad for you.

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Current Affairs

ETHICAL PORN NARRATIVES NEEDED IN SCHOOLS THE HISTORY OF PORNOGRAPHY IS DEEPLY ENTWINED IN WITH THE COLLECTIVE HUMAN NARRATIVE SINCE CIVILISATION BEGAN. EMILY OSBORN TAKES A LOOK AT OUR RELATIONSHIPS WITH MODERN PORNOGRAPHY, AND HOW IT MIGHT BE CAUSING MORE HARM THAN GOOD.

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ince at least the early 70’s, pornography has dominated modern media. From Playboy magazine to society’s latest fling with OnlyFans, people love to consume porn. In 2018, PornHub.com reported just over 33.5 billion visits to its site, about 4 and a half times the earth’s population. Porn is great, don’t get me wrong. The porn industry provides employment to countless sex workers, and can be a way for people to explore their sexuality through masturbation. Most people who view porn regularly have a healthy relationship with this kind of media, however, more and more studies are popping up about the more unfortunate effects the porn industry can have on people’s ideas of sex, body image, and everything in between.

It’s no secret that children have unbridled access to the internet from younger ages than ever before, and because of this, internet pornography is often the first form of sex most kids ever see. While sex is a normal part of life, the pornography we see on our computer screens rarely depicts sex as it happens in the real world. Everything is airbrushed, the women ALWAYS cum, and consent or contraception is rarely ever discussed in any capacity. Sexual education in Ireland leaves a lot to be desired; and because of this, more young people are taking what they see on screen to be fact, rather than pure fantasy. This is echoed in international trends too: pornography has become a large contributing factor in sexual miseducation of school-aged children.

Generally, porn churned out en masse by industry giants isn’t tailored to depict the kind of relationships humans actually have. It’s easy to forget that the actors are paid to look like they’re enjoying sex. The reality is aspects of sex can cause discomfort and even pain for a lot of people.

But when all of this is conveniently cut out of porn, how are people who haven’t experienced sex supposed to know that

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it’s a case of practice makes perfect, and understand that not everyone enjoys the same thing? A particular study found that over 88.2% of top searches on porn websites contained terms like ‘gagging’, ‘choking’, and ‘submissive’. These more aggressive videos also leave out discussion of consent, and are filmed with a view to show rough sex as universally enjoyed.

While BDSM and all its sub-categories are extremely popular, it should be a priority to demonstrate that consent must play a key role in the bedroom and should definitely not be left out.

In a world striving for perfection, a culture that aestheticises products and people: porn combines the two. The men are hyper-masculine, the women are akin to models, and non-binary people are seldom represented at all. Growing up and viewing pornstars for the first time, I’m confident I wasn’t the only person thinking, ‘Why don’t mine look like that?’ Over the past number of years, the demand for procedures such as labiaplasties and breast augmentation has grown exponentially, with breast lifts remaining the most sought-after form of aesthetic surgery worldwide. I was convinced as a teen that I would not be desirable unless I looked a certain way, both with and without my clothes.

Apparently, this warped body image is attributable to the porn industry’s high standards for their performers, with many being encouraged to get different cosmetic procedures to maximise their attractiveness. We are not providing young people with the learning resources to understand that sex doesn’t look perfect, and it appears we’re too uncomfortable to admit how much of a mess it actually is.

The solution to these issues is simple - placing pornography as a subject on the curriculum and providing fact-based and consent-led reform of Ireland’s sex-education.

Unfortunately, such reforms have been continuously railroaded by conservative groups in Ireland, so I don’t think we’ll be breaking glass ceilings with this any time soon. In the meantime, we can all be more conscious of the porn we’re watching, and maybe before pressing play consider the implications that this major industry is having on the world around us.

THE TIME IS NOW

The Period Poverty Conversation SARAH KENNELLY TALKS ABOUT IRELAND’S SHAME AROUND PERIODS, AND GOVERNMENTAL AT TEMPTS TO INTRODUCE FREE PERIOD PRODUCTS FOR ALL MENSTRUATORS.

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eriods, for many, are a topic only discussed in hushed tones. We are raised to believe that menstruation is a subject that is much too offensive to bring up in casual conversation. Hiding tampons up your sleeve and getting your friends to discreetly check for leakage is a norm for menstruators from an early age. Cisgender men have especially reinforced this stigma by continuing to shame those who share their lived experiences of periods. Both little boys and grown men seem to have the same reaction of shock and disgust when period blood is even alluded to.

This response is mirrored in the Dáil which has historically comprised mostly of male TDs, 77.5% to be exact. Our male-dominated government has been too concerned with their internalised misogyny to adequately deal with period policy.

Deputy Marcella Corcoran Kennedy even made the shocking revelation that the word “menstruation” has only appeared 27 times in Oireachtas records. 27 times. How can something which affects such a large section of society be excluded from the conversation so consistently?

This has led to a crisis of period poverty in Ireland which is too often overlooked by the politicians it does not affect. Research by Plan International shockingly revealed that

50% of Irish women between the ages of 12-19 struggle to afford menstrual products. We have all been there, not having coins for the tampon machine and being forced to fashion our own makeshift pad out of toilet paper.

This is not only unhygienic but is inhumane. The situation is even worse for menstruators who are homeless or living in direct provision where period products are scarce. These humiliating moments are not experienced by cisgender men, whose natural bodily functions are accommodated for by the state. If we can have free soap and toilet paper in public bathrooms why not tampons?

This is precisely the argument that Labour Senator Rebecca Moynihan made last January when she introduced a bill that advocated for the government to provide free period products. She worked closely with Scottish officials who successfully led a free period products campaign, to build the most comprehensive and effective bill possible. The bill calls on the state to provide universally free, safe, and sustainable period products. It also demands that an objective menstrual education be provided to all children to combat period stigma.

Although the future of this bill seemed bright, Fianna Fáil decided to put forth their own bill which has been criticised for not going far enough.

The proposal is far less extensive than Labour’s approach and fails to outline measures that will provide all menstruators with access to free period products. It places weaker legal obligations on the government to provide these products and does not even define what “free” is, leaving that up to interpretation. It also fails to promote environmentally friendly products, which will have a negative effect on the already disastrous state of our climate. As Senator Moynihan said, the bill seems to “[pay] lip service to doing something without actually looking at the issue”. This is true where the bill fails to recognise the importance of a more complete menstrual education programme to help destigmatise periods. As a whole, Fianna Fáil’s plan will not adequately address the issue of period poverty or enact any meaningful change in the lives of menstruators who struggle to afford period products on a monthly basis.

The government still remains in talks about the issue, stating they need more research and data collection.

This delay only extends the suffering of individuals who are being denied the basic human right of a hygienic and safe menstrual cycle. The future of free period products in Ireland seems positive. However, it is unclear whether the government will make yet another hollow gesture to alleviate criticism or enact policy that will effectively eradicate period poverty.

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YOU CAN CUT SILENCE

The Secret Story of FGM in Ireland CAITLIN SKILLINGTON TALKS US THROUGH THE OFTEN SILENCED TOPIC OF FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION IN IRELAND AND WHAT CAN BE DONE TO SUPPORT WOMEN AND GIRLS WHO ARE SUBJECTED TO THIS HORRIFIC TREATMENT.

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he practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is defined by the partial or total removal of external female genitalia, typically carried out between birth and puberty, and as part of a cultural tradition for some groups. While cases of FGM are predominately found in the Middle East, Asia and Africa, the practice often has a blind eye turned to it in Ireland today.

The United Nations have ruled the procedure to be in violation of human rights and the rights of children and in Ireland the practice is outlawed by the Criminal Justice (FGM) Act of 2012. Under this act is also the process of removing someone from the state in order to have that procedure done to them. Yet still the procedure continues to take place in Ireland for many women, meaning that the circumstances in which FGM is practiced is not regulated or held to a specific health standard, making the process even more dangerous with the risk of infection increasing.

FGM has no health benefits, and is done with the belief that it improves purity, modesty and increases feminity, therefore making the individual more desirable to men. In many cultures, the act of refusing the procedure could lead to ostracisation from both family and society as they would be seen as rejecting their own traditions. Unfortunately in a lot of cases, the person is not old enough to understand what was about to happen to them, let alone to refuse.

According to the HSE since 2011, 3,780 people in Ireland have undergone this procedure. While due to the illegal nature and taboo surrounding the topic, not much is reported about FGM, there are reports that suggest the culture surrounding FGM is still prominent in Ireland. The Law Society of Ireland reports that as of 2019, almost 6,000 people have been affected by FGM in Ireland.

AKiDwA, a charity for migrant women, have been campaigning for the end of FGM in Ireland for nearly

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two decades, delivering training and providing materials to healthcare professionals, social workers, the Gardaí and other groups on how to compassionately communicate to people who have been affected by FGM. They believe that the practice of FGM alongside the health dangers has led to survivors feeling further ostracised from Irish society.

Although there are some figures for the amount of instances of FGM in Ireland, they are nearly impossible to accurately monitor as it is common for the practice to take place over school breaks where individuals could be brought to their family’s home country for the procedure.

In 2018, a campaign against FGM was launched in Dublin by Ifrah Ahmed, a survivor of the practice years prior and was launched with the support of the #MeToo movement. Activists and supporters were encouraged to use the hashtag #MeTooFGM to indicate their support and call for a zero-tolerance day for FGM.

Even with the criminalising of this practice and campaigns to end FGM, it still remains a reality for many in Ireland. There have been no prosecutions under the Female Genital Mutilation Act of 2012, due to the secrecy behind these procedures, a fear of backlash, or for the survivor to be expelled from their culture and family. But the lack of people talking about FGM means that the chances of the procedure being ended is far less likely.

If you would like to further educate yourself on the topic of FGM in Ireland here are some helpful starting points: AKiDwA: A network of migrant women living in Ireland who work to educate people on how to deal with victims of FGM and informing people about FGM in Ireland and globally.

HSE: The HSE offers information about FGM on their site, along with a free FGM treatment service in Dublin for those who have undergone FGM in their lifetime. www.ifrahfoundation.org: Irfrah Ahmed, who spearheaded the #metooFGM movement in Ireland, has an incredibly informative website on the topic and what can be done to help.

A Girl from Mogadishu - film following Ifrah Ahmed’s life and fight against FGM, released December 2020.

THE INFLUENCE OF PERIODS The Struggle to Find ON ELITE FEMALE ATHLETES Accommodation ADVANCEMENTS IN AWARENESS AND SPORTS SCIENCE MEAN THAT PERFORMANCE AND WELFARE FOR FEMALE ATHLETES COULD BE ON THE RISE, TOGETHER. CURRENT AFFAIRS STAFF WRITER CONOR DALY LOOKS INTO THE DEVELOPMENTS LEVELLING THE PLAYING FIELD.

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he last couple of years have seen a real shift in the attitudes towards female athletes and, pre-COVID, attendance at sporting events were complementing this increase in interest. With this increase in awareness comes an effort by people to better understand the challenges that female athletes face. Particularly in the last year, there has been heightened public attention put on what many sports fans might deem to be a taboo issue: periods. With no knowledge or interest in female athletes, one might fail to recognise the influence this has on athletes at an elite level. For many, the problem is that there is no clear parallel with male athletes and therefore there is an unwillingness to care or understand. As elite sport has historically been an industry built around ideas of masculinity, the topic of menstrual cycles was not one that was widely associated with sportspeople.

Thankfully, these archaic mindsets are beginning to change. Female athletes are getting more coverage than ever before, and paychecks are slowly but surely starting to match this. But while financial debates are a well-documented facet of the challenges facing sportswomen, athlete performance and welfare are not as widely spoken about. Periods have a far greater impact on performance and

injury management than one would think.

The first real glimpse of this was an exclusive article from The Daily Telegraph last year in which there was an in-depth discussion on how Chelsea FC was taking into account the menstrual cycles of their players in relation to preparation and welfare.

Incorporating this as an aspect of sports science is helping to maximise performance while also, more importantly, doing as much as possible to prevent injuries. At Chelsea, training staff were tailoring sessions based on the menstrual cycles of their players to take into account fatigue, weight fluctuations and susceptibility to injury.

This is not, however, a one size fits all solution. Some experts such as Dawn Scott, who is a sports scientist working with the English women’s football team, is reluctant to comment on a direct link between periods and injuries. In an interview with The Guardian last year, she stated that having an emphasis on player recovery is vital, but that, “There also isn’t enough evidence, or enough injuries, to fully relate and link injuries specifically to menstrual cycle”.

An article by RTE in February of last year detailed a survey of the experiences of female athletes concerning their menstrual cycles and

the impact it has on them. There were a number of pretty startling statistics that jump off the page at you. They were as follows, “74% reported their menstrual cycle negatively affected their performance; 75% had never discussed their menstrual cycle with their coach (this rises to 82% in Ireland and the UK); 72% received no education regarding exercise and their menstrual cycle”. You don’t have to be an expert on gender studies to realise that something is not quite right here. At the very least, we should create a culture where female athletes feel like they can discuss their menstrual cycle with coaches if they so wish.

It would appear that there is no consensus in terms of building training plans around menstrual cycles but then again, uniformity is a rare thing when it comes to the preparation and training of elite athletes. One thing that is clear is that the attitudes of both those involved in sport and those watching on from the sidelines are vitally important in terms of the opportunities female athletes have to progress and giving them the recognition they deserve. Having a taboo around something so common seems extremely old-fashioned and yet here we are. But where we are does not and should not in any way reflect where we are going. One can hope that, in the not too distant future, female athletes receive the necessary support and resources to coalesce elite sporting achievement with athlete welfare.

CURRENT AFFAIRS | 13

LET'S TALK ABOUT SEX, BABY...

PLEASE? IRELAND’S REFUSAL TO ADDRESS ADEQUATE SEX EDUCATION THE WAY WE TALK ABOUT SEX, OR MORE TO THE POINT DON’T TALK ABOUT IT, CAN CREATE AN UNHEALTHY OR SHAMEFUL RELATIONSHIP WITH SEX THAT CAN BE DIFFICULT TO LET GO OF. CURRENT AFFAIRS STAFF WRITER CONOR DALY TALKS ABOUT SOME OF THE WAYS WE CAN START DIVERSIFYING OUR SEX EDUCATION.

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rowing up in Irish households, most of us can remember the awkward silence and darting eyes that accompanied the mention of sex at the dinner table.

Or when you were watching TV after the watershed and someone starts a conversation to drown out a particularly raunchy scene that nobody wants to watch as a family (like anyone who thought Bridgerton was Downton Abbey 2.0).

These situations are understandable, in so much as everyone tries to avoid awkward conversations or silences. But could these be in some way avoided or appeased if we had a more open dialogue surrounding sex? Granted, you probably don’t want to talk to an older relative about the ins and outs of your sex life, or theirs. But we should try to reach a stage where we can have the open conversation, without a wince or an attempt to run away at the first mention of sex or anything related to it.

Sex education in schools plays a big role in this, and the repressed nature of such can still be linked to the Catholic Church who were, in many cases, the founding organisation of these institutions. There are also stories of the outsourcing of sex education to Catholic groups who, among other things, taped students together at the wrists to highlight the consequences of having multiple sexual partners. The structure of how we teach our young people about sex has its foundations in a organisation who systematically oppressed women, abused children, and thus warped sexuality and intimacy for countless individuals. Without delving deeply into such topics, it is clear that changes are needed.

Ireland is, at face value at least, a rather liberal country. In 2015 gay marriage was made legal by referendum which created a more inclusive society for Irish citizens, and 2018’s abortion referendum highlighted the importance of bodily autonomy that was previously ignored by educators.

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It seems however that the way we teach sex education does not fully reflect this. There is still a strong sense of heteronormativity and shame attached to our classroom conversations on these subjects, and an approach to the stigma that remains around periods, sanitary products, and avoiding pregnancy at all costs which is equally as outdated.

Approximate statistics show that 1 in 25 people are gay, lesbian or bisexual but it would appear the tailoring of sex education to meet the needs of our LGBTQ+ youth is lagging behind. Secondary school can be a difficult time for people and being yourself is one of the toughest things about it. Having sex education classes that largely exclude LGBTQ+ students or includes them as an afterthought, is not where we should be in 2021. Not only can this make these students feel isolated, but this lack of education for their fellow students may mean that they will fail to fully understand or be respectful of an LGBTQ+ classmate who does decide to come out.

Reports as recently as 2018 show that while relationships and sexuality education (RSE) is compulsory in Irish schools, some fail to implement it properly or choose to do so in a conservative manner. One quote from a textbook which was used in a number of schools in the year this report was written (2018), stated that “Sex before marriage often causes guilt, shame, broken hearts, shattered dreams, bad self-esteem, lost innocence, bad reputations, family problems, feelings of being used, depression, regret for losing one’s virginity, embarrassment and humiliation”.

Sex does not have to be this solemn topic that people are afraid of, or one that makes sex-ed classes eerily silent and awkward. Understandably, people have their own preconceptions about sex based on personal factors.

However, having more objective knowledge on the topic is surely a good thing. Emotional intelligence is often overlooked in mainstream education, when in fact the relationship a person has with themself is the foundation for the way they treat every other person. Having open conversations about consent, sexuality, and the experiences of people of other genders and sexual orientations can help to educate a new generation to be more understanding and compassionate, something Ireland needs more than ever.

ASKING HARD QUESTIONS An Analysis of Ireland’s Relationship with Erectile Dysfunction

DEPUTY CURRENT AFFAIRS EDITOR STEPHEN MOYNIHAN DISCUSSES THE ROLL-OUT OF ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION MEDICATION IN MAINSTREAM CHEMISTS AND THE OPPORTUNITY TO CORRECT THE SOCIAL STIGMA ASSOCIATED WITH THE MEDICAL CONDITION.

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ews that pharmacy chain Boots will have the first over-the-counter erectile dysfunction medication available in Ireland raised much discussion after it became available on 28th January 2021. Erectile dysfunction is a condition experienced by people with penises, characterised by the inability to obtain or maintain an erection that is firm enough to facilitate sex. It is linked to a variety of physical and emotional conditions, use of some medications, and there is some evidence suggesting a link between erectile dysfunction and pornography consumption in young people. With Boots’ announcement, the remedy to what has long been seen as a taboo, or a source of shame for Irish men is now more freely available than ever, with no need for a supposedly ‘awkward’ chat with a GP needed to avail of such medication. With Twitter, Facebook and Tik Tok feeds chock-full of jokes, comments, and queries regarding the medication, and a long history of erectile dysfunction being made fun of in TV comedies such as Friends, The Royle Family and The Inbetweeners, it raises the question; why is a normal fact of life for just over one-in-seven Irish men (according to a 2012 study) such a topic of fascination?

Certainly one answer could be that a man afflicted with such ‘horror’ as a persistently soft penis is the greatest manifestation of emasculation according to the ideals of a patriarchal society which suggests that men should be virile, potent, and sex-obsessed at all times. This view would tell us that a man who needs help obtaining or maintaining an erection has something fundamentally wrong with him; he has failed to live up to the (unrealistic) standards set for him.

It’s fair to say that this fetishisation of the penis or sex drive as the primary measure of masculinity does not stand up to close scrutiny at least outside of the most chauvinistic of circles. Yet, still today the implicit attitudes of many people is that this is still a major part of being a ‘real’ man.

“Fine”, you could say. “Let these people have their notions of ‘real’ masculinity if they wish”, but what must be noted here is that such notions can never be taken in isolation; if they could, then there might not be a problem.

However, being surrounded by such a discourse through adolescence and into adulthood, men are conditioned to view themselves according to this framework. This is where things get messy. When men avoid seeking treatment for sexual problems because of the ideals they have internalised, or feel shame due to the fact that despite having broken free of societal pressures and spoken to a doctor about their problems, they still must live with the “artificiality” of the remedies, and corollarily, as an “artificial” man.

Perhaps this is where an over-the-counter solution can be of benefit; we all think going to the GP is a bit of an ordeal. There’s the ringing up for the appointment days in advance, the sitting in the waiting room, the anxiety associated with thinking of what you have to say… it’s just all a bit stressful. Going to a pharmacist can simplify the matter, and also make things feel a bit more “normal”, or less medical. Of course, the pharmacist will still ask you a couple of questions to make sure sildenafil is right for you, but it’s a whole lot simpler than going to your doctor. That being said, Boots still insist that a trip to the GP would be necessary within six months of taking viagra, just to check for any underlying conditions that might be bringing about the erectile dysfunction. With this in mind, over-the-counter viagra isn’t the silver bullet it may be made out to be, but it certainly can play a role in normalising and detabooising one of the more prevalent sexual issues affecting penis-owners across society.

CURRENT AFFAIRS | 15

THE MOTLEY CURRENT AFFAIRS TEAM HAVE COLLATED THE SEXIEST SURVEY EVER PERFORMED IN UCC BECAUSE WHO DOESN’T NEED SOME STATISTICAL SEXUAL VOYEURISM IN THEIR LIVES RIGHT NOW? WRITTEN & COMPILED BY JOHN HUNTER AND ALANA DALY MULLIGAN

FOREPLAY TO THE SURVEY This survey was carried out from the 10th February to the 18th February 2021. The survey received 177 responses from students across the four colleges in UCC. The survey was entirely anonymous although students were asked to give their year and degree programme.

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OVID-19 has impacted our lives in many ways: online learning, reduced travel, restricted gatherings, closed bars and restaurants, the list goes on. But an area that hasn’t gotten as much media coverage is those intimate moments we all enjoy: sharing in bed, or seedy back alleys, or supermarket toilets, or the front seats of a Fiat Punto because his bloody gear bag was in the back. Yes feeling, fondling, felating, fingering, felching, and fucking have all been affected by the pandemic. Naturally, we here at the Motley Current Affairs section being the sex symbols we are, thought it imperative to document how COVID crushed UCC student copulation patterns, so we sent out our ‘super sensual sexy survey’ to find out. These were the results.

SINGLE PEOPLE Beginning with the largest group, over half of respondents were single people, and thankfully it came to an even number of them so keep your eyes peeled because there is enough for everybody. Under half have been single for one year or less, potentially showing that many relationships may have ended due to the pandemic and lockdowns.

Unsurprisingly, single people’s romantic relationships have been negatively affected by the pandemic, with 36.4% of respondents saying that it has had a ‘very negative’ effect and 34% saying that it had a ‘fairly negative’ effect. Common reasons for this include

16 | FEBRUARY 2021

people being unable to meet and get to know new people, with some sharing that they were unable to connect with a person over the internet, showing the limitations of virtual communication.

Over half of respondents say that they don’t have casual sex, a perhaps surprising result given the, perhaps anecdotal, lessening cultural sigma surrounding casual sexual relationships, as well as the ease at which it can be obtained through hook-apps, and the availability of contraceptives. For those who do engage in casual sex, just over 60% say they haven’t done it during the pandemic.

PEOPLE IN RELATIONSHIPS complaints among this group were that many were unable to see or be intimate with their partner. Some couples that lived together believed that the lockdown had put a strain on their relationship due to them being unable to see other people, but others responded by saying that it had strengthened their bond and now have a stronger relationship.

Most respondents have sex regularly with their partners, with many going between the sheets multiple times a week. But unfortunately many have been unable to perform, not due to erectile dysfunction or because they had to attend a pulse-pounding pottery exhibit, but because, as one respondent put it, “the pandemic is cock-blocking us”.

MASTURBATION masturbating more during the pandemic.

While many feel satisfied and sexually confident afterward, a sizable number of respondents shared feelings of shame, guilt and disgust, with some saying they felt ‘body dysmorphic’. And while basically all coupled people said that their partner had no issues with them masturbating, following this just over 16% said that it had somehow affected their relationship, with some saying it caused arguments.

LGBTQ+ COMMUNITY

EXPLICIT-IMAGE SHARING

Looking at the LGBTQ+ community results we can see a common trend: predominantly positive results that show that attitudes have changed, but also results that show that there is still so much work to be done.

Over 75% of respondents said that their sexuality and gender identity is accepted at home, and 61.6% feel that they can fully express their sexuality and gender identity. While these numbers do show that most respondents are able to be who they are at home, it also reveals that for some an ‘accepting’ environment may not be enough for them to be comfortable to fully express who they are.

Nude culture is big in UCC, 62% of respondents share / have shared explicit images. While 67% of those who answered have received nudes, 55% reported receiving an unwanted nude. Worryingly, 1 in 10 respondents have had their explicit images shared without their permission and 1 in 100 admitted to sharing someone else’s nudes without someone’s consent.

These are of course only representative of those who were honest about sharing explicit images, the reality could indicate a much larger number of people participating in this despite the illegalities of such.

Relationship

Single 53.2%

DO YOU HAVE CASUAL SEX

Yes 46.8%

No 53.2%

HAVE YOU BEEN HAVING CASUAL SEX DURING THE PANDEMIC plic.

Not Ap 10.6%

Dropping our pants and getting down to the task in hand, the survey results showed that the vast majority of respondents have found themselves reaching for the Kleenex as 86.2% of singles and 76% of people in relationships say that they partake in that most sinful pursuit of bodily pleasure. If it’s true that Jesus weeps every time we do it, then his tears sure do come out of a strange place.

Among both groups, over a third of respondents say that they have been

r Othe 4.4%

Over 40% of respondents are in a relationship, with over 80% having been in their relationship for a year or more, which is another indicator that many relationships may not have made it through the lockdowns. Nearly a third are currently in long distance relationships, while the remainder either live with their partner or live within 5km of each other.

Respondents in relationships generally feel that the pandemic has negatively affected their romantic relationships, but not to as extreme a degree as single people. The majority in this group believed that the pandemic had a ‘fairly negative’ effect on their romantic relationships, with the second most popular answer being that it was neutral or had little to no effect. Common

RELATIONSHIP STATUS

Yes 30.9%

No 58.5%

DO YOU WATCH PORN/ EROTIC MATERIALS

No 31.4% Yes 68.6%

WHAT GENDER IDENTITIES DO YOU MOST IDENTIFY WITH?

HOW DO YOU IDENTIFY YOUR SEXUALITY? STRAIGHT GAY LESBIAN

CIS (MAN) CIS (WOMAN) TRANS

BISEXUAL PANSEXUAL ASEXUAL DEMISEXUAL

TRANS-MAN TRANS-WOMAN

FLUID QUEER UNSURE POLYSEXUAL QUESTINING 90% STRAIGHT N/A

GENDER FLUID/ QUEER NON-BINARY ANDROGYNOUS INTERSEX STRAIGHT 0

25

50

75

100

0

25

50

75

ONLYFANS

OnlyFans is a phenomenon which has popped up in Ireland in the last few years. It offers users the chance to curate digital content and monetise it. Somewhat naturally, sexual content has become quite common on the platform. It recently has been embroiled in the Image Based Sexual Abuse scandal where explicit images sold by individuals on the site were leaked via a Discord server in December 2020. When respondents were asked if they used OnlyFans to share explicit content, 1.7% said they used the platform.

Those respondents had positive feedback about the site, saying that earnings made via the site helped supplement income and alleviate the stress of losing their jobs during the pandemic. They noted the empowerment found in the sex work community and the self-confidence they found through their bodies. However, they noted the high pressure in keeping their work a secret and the mental health impacts of such. It should be noted that Motley reached out to a number of students who use OnlyFans as a source of income for comment but all were worried about their privacy and safety, meaning that no such interviews ever took place.

When it came to what people thought of the platform, the results were more complicated. We assessed popular opinion via a series of multiple choice statements, balanced and based on different aspects of the arguments and opinions relating to the online platform. There was also a section where people could expand on their thoughts.

Many people were supportive of the platform and those who used it to sell explicit images. However, a number of concerns were raised around the culture that surrounds OnlyFans. Respondents demonstrated worry over the young age of many of the users, believing there needs to be more regulation to stop those who are under 18 from using and being used on the platform. Respondents also expressed concern over the glorification of sex work and the dangers of the platform being masked as a feminist exercise when individuals were making themselves the subject of objectification. Other commentators responded that the platform was allowing individuals to be empowered by capitalising on the patriarchal power structures which was a good thing.

When it comes to porn, nearly 70% of UCC students are tuning into porn sites, or turning their attention towards the victimless crime of fan-fiction erotica. 74% of respondents are visiting PornHub to get their content, but other sites include Bellisa, RedTube, XVideos, OnlyFans, and some brave soul is emptying the wank-tank via Wattpad, talk about a blast from the past. For 20% of masturbators, porn is a must in their self-love sessions, 55.7% of participants only use it sometimes, and just under 25% don’t wank and watch (or Wattpad).

The last year has not only seen a spike in COVID figures, but spikes beneath the sheets, 21.3% are watching more porn,

while 70% said their porn consumption remained about the same.

In response to the sliding scale question “porn makes me feel good about myself ” only 4.2% of students agreed wholly with the statement. Sitting on the other end, was 40.6% of students who did not think porn made them feel good about themselves. When it came to how useful porn was as an educational tool, the consensus was largely unsupportive of the medium, although 3.5% have attested to its usefulness.

PORN HABITS

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FINISHING

As we wrap up (and encourage you to do so too), there’s a lot to take in from this survey. On one hand, it tells the story of loving during a pandemic: others and ourselves. On the other hand, it shows us how lonely we’ve become, how difficult this experience has been on the student body’s students’ bodies: our sexual wellbeing, and by extension, mental wellbeing.

There is of course the insidious side: image-based sexual abuse is happening in our University, people are sending unwanted explicit images, among other issues. Then, there is the contentious subject of sex work and the opinion of

students who participate in it. As a community, we need to consider how damaging our attitudes are of those who do sex work, but also in equal measure, not be afraid to highlight the power imbalances of such. To take a quote from Charles Dickens’s Hard Times out of context for the sake of the book’s title, “Do the wise thing and the kind thing too, and make the best of us and not the worst”. It’s all we can do now in these difficult moments when we are feeling disconnected is try and do our best by our digital relationships, and our in person flirtations for all those lucky enough to have that right now.

CURRENT AFFAIRS | 19

Features & Opinions

The Moralization of Sex in Irish Society A CONVERSATION WITH HOLLY CAIRNS TD HOLLY CAIRNS HAS RISEN TO PROMINENCE IN RECENT MONTHS DUE TO A SERIES OF HIGH PROFILE, SCALPEL-SHARP SPEECHES IN THE DÁIL. THESE SPEECHES RESONATED WITH VOTERS FAR BEYOND HER CONSTITUENTS. THE PARTICULAR STAND OUT WAS HER DEVASTATING SPEECH CONDEMNING THE GOVERNMENT’S INACTION ON THE MOTHER AND BABY HOMES. MOTLEY’S NIAMH BROWNE GETS TO KNOW CAIRNS’ THOUGHTS ON THE HISTORY OF THE IRISH STATE’S TREATMENT OF WOMEN.

‘I never considered myself a political person’

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his is quite a disarming thing to hear a politician say - but Holly Cairns is nothing if not an atypical political force.

‘Although in hindsight I was engaged in political issues. But at the time I didn’t view them as that - I finished school in 2008, during the crash. I felt a resentment towards Irish politics. They had let us down. Another generation had to emigrate.’ As a generation of students graduating into the worst global economy since 2008, it’s easy to relate to the frustration of being a young person inheriting a broken system. ‘I was questioning the banks being bailed out.’

What marked a turning point for Irish society also marked a turning point in how Cairns viewed politics.

In 2016, Cairns came home to vote in the marriage equality referendum and decided to stay. She worked in her family business - seed production. ‘I got my masters in UCC in horticulture.’

Not long after, ‘The referendum to repeal the 8th came round. I trained as a canvas leader in west Cork for Reproductive rights for Together for Yes. It was this realisation - knocking

20 | FEBRUARY 2021

on doors, asking for votes; works.’ This was a lightbulb moment for Cairns.

‘When votes get put to the Irish public, we’re very progressive. We stand out in a global context in terms of voting on progressive policies. We don’t see this change in our politics and I thought - I have to get involved in this.’

Cairns makes it sound so easy, but a voice like hers is few and far between in Ireland’s Dail. After her controversial speech in the Dail criticising government subsidisation of the greyhound racing industry, she was called ‘an ignorant little girl’ by a member of a government board ’.

The bridge from layperson to elected representative is not an easy one to cross nor is it inviting either.

Clearly though, Cairns was not deterred. She shortly admonished the Irish state with a powerful phrase ‘for years it was public policy to outlaw sex outside of marriage, there was no sex education, a ban on contraception, no access to abortion and virtual immunity for rapists’. So what has Cairns to say about Ireland’s history of women? ‘It’s one of the sad realities of the Irish State - I don’t speak for all people when I say this, people were proud to be independent, we’re proud to be Irish but the reality is that it was very bad for Irish women.’

She further elaborates, ‘The Irish

State took over, and in very close connection with religious orders, brought about policy which really negatively impacted women. I don’t think we can underestimate its effect on our autonomy. I believe that Ireland actually incarcerated more women than any other country in the world per population.’ This fact is galling, and I can’t quite wrap my head around the horror of it. Cairns continues, ‘Pregnancies were inevitable, and when you got pregnant you were incarcerated, tortured, a lot of the time there were illegal vaccine trials carried out on your children, children were sold abroad for profit. When you talk about this on an international scale, these are the worst kind of human rights violations imaginable. It was a result of government policy.’ We are all aware of these tragedies, but to have an honest and unflinching conversation with Cairns is sobering.

Cairns continues, saying that these atrocities were no accident. ‘This was a result of government policy working in conjunction with the Church to run these institutions. The state went out to inspect them, local authorities ran them, CEOs from the local authorities decided who would move from these homes to the Magdalene laundries.

And still, the response has been almost nothing. When you think of a response

“

”

The government keeps trying to blame society. I think it’s safe to say that if Irish society had the pull and sway that the government says it does, they would be responding differently because all of Irish society wants justice for these victims

that is proportionate to the magnitude of the crimes committed, we should be seeing something very different going on.’ I pause, I consider the atrocities endured by Irish women and young children, the most vulnerable people in society. These were not the affluent, the footloose, those who had resources; these were the poor and the wretched and this was the social floor they were provided with - a social floor which acted more like a pit. A pit which was seemingly impossible to crawl out of. ‘We should see prosecutions for perpetrators of the crimes, finding out the fate of the disappeared babies none of that has happened.’

When we discuss sexual health, we automatically assume student union campaigns handing out free condoms. We never pause to consider the importance of how the morality of sex is viewed in relation to women, or indeed how women themselves are viewed. ‘We always see this, we saw it with cervical checks, men in positions of telling women what’s good for them.’ Cairns’ point is painfully true, she expands, ‘Survivors saying this is not what we want - this is not good enough. They are being completely ignored.’

‘This commission investigated 18 mother and baby homes, there were over 100 in the country. On top of that, there were the Magdalene laundries and the industrial schools - the scale

of abuse carried out by the church and facilitated by the state has not been dealt with’. The sheer magnitude of human suffering is unbearable, and difficult to process. These numbers are just that: numbers. No statistic can encompass the massive loss each person who interacted with these institutions felt. ‘I have people coming up to me,’ Cairns says, ‘who just want to find where their baby was buried so they can be buried with them’.

I ask Cairns, what can we do?

‘In October 2020, there was massive public disquiet over the so-called “sealing of the archives”. It was the first time the Dail server crashed from the amount of emails coming in opposition to this.’ The #repealtheseal campaign gained enormous momentum, largely through social media and digital campaigns. ‘It has transpired that the commission deleted the testimonies of survivors - the audio recordings, and they never took a transcript. The upset in October was that survivors wouldn’t be able to access their own testimonies - completely against European GDPR law. The Dail server crashed over it, and now it’s already been deleted? The data protection commission has asked the Mother and Baby for the legal basis for deleting those testimonies but the Mother and Baby Homes’ commission is set to dissolve on the 28th of February. It will be dissolved before anybody gets an answer. So nobody will

be held to account as usual.’

‘What we need to call for, is that we can’t let the commission disappear.

We need these archives. We need to find out the legal basis for them trying to delete them. But also, if the commission is extended, that the remaining archives still go to the minister as planned on the 28th. I don’t think anyone wants the commission to have any more control over these archives given the deletion.’ Being a college student, I feel disillusioned and despairing. But then Cairns says this: ‘Do you remember Golfgate?’ Cairns asks, - who could forget? A supreme court judge, a minister and an EU commissioner walk into a bar, except it’s a dinner dance with over 100 people in attendance during a pandemic. ‘The public rejection of that was so strong - a minister resigned, Phil Hogan resigned and there was a near on constitutional crisis over Seamus Woulfe. So if the public could respond to this issue in the same way - I think that’s how we would see a real change.’

‘The government keeps trying to blame society. I think it’s safe to say that if Irish society had the pull and sway that the government says it does, they would be responding differently because all of Irish society wants justice for these victims If this is what ignorant little girls are like, let’s elect more of them.

FEATURES & OPINIONS | 21

The Toxic Relationship Between Monogamy and Mortality ELLEN BYRNE, FINAL YEAR PHILOSOPHY AND POLITICS STUDENT CRITICALLY EXAMINES THE ‘TIL DEATH DO US PART TROPE’ AND WHY, SEX AND DEATH HAVE ALWAYS BEEN INTERLINKED.

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any of us place great value on being in monogamous relationships without questioning why we do so. I think it’s possible that our collective obsession with monogamy derives from an entirely different predicament: fear of death. Here’s why:

Reason #1: we struggle to live with ourselves. If lockdown has revealed one thing, it’s that spending prolonged periods of time by yourself can be gruelling. When forced into solitude, we become prone to pervasive thoughts, introspection and, worst of all, loneliness. The denial of physical touch, even just brushing off passers-by on public transport, magnifies our desolation. Hence the number of people who continue to live in shared accommodation at extortionate prices despite not having any classes or work to go to, or the number of people flocking home to live with their previously estranged families. We are social creatures; even the most introverted or independent of characters can become tormented by isolation.

While lockdown has highlighted the malaise we experience in our own company, it is this same sense of unease that determines how we spend much of our lives.

Whether it’s gorging on media or exhausting ourselves with work, we are constantly seeking diversion from our own thoughts for fear of the dark places they could lead us. The same goes for relationships: not only do we want to have someone with us when we die, we want someone to distract us until we do. Sure, there are plenty of people who have the good sense not to envision dying of old age alongside the randomer they just had a one-night-stand with, but once a sexual partner becomes the object of our love, we place an expectation of commitment both on them and on ourselves.

A commitment to love each other more than anyone else, and to do so exclusively.

This brings me to Reason #2- we are frightened by the thought of navigating the twilight of our existence without someone to comfort us. People often cite “I don’t want to die alone” as a reason for seeking a partner, and do so in a flippant way. I would argue that this levity is a thin veil in front of a cavernous anxiety. Death is often far from the minds of the young, but as we grow older it confronts us with decreasing mercy. That’s why we want someone to stare into the abyss with us, and hold our hand as we edge closer.

Finally, the third reason I find the most erroneous: We are led to believe that love in the form of a monogamous relationship is a necessary requisite for a meaningful life.

What is a meaningful life in the first place? I’ll spare you the philosophical pondering- but most of us can agree on this much: a meaningful life is one that does not feel wasted. Being loved by others is one of the most powerful affirmations that our existence is worthwhile. It can even be a security blanket that we wrap around our dreams so that if we fail in our pursuit of them, we have the comfort of knowing that we did not fail in being loved. When it comes to romantic relationships, it is often the exclusivity, and the devotion that this exclusivity implies, that makes love seem so fulfilling. However, we risk deceiving ourselves in this process; the desire for this assurance can prompt us to enter into relationships or commitments that are wrong for us.

Let me be clear. This is not a case against love, or relationships, or even monogamy. They can all be great things, but there is more to life. If we can live with ourselves, then sex, love, and commitment can become pleasures with which to supplement our lives, but without our sense of self-worth and personal fulfilment becoming contingent upon them.

There may be no antidote for our mortality, but love is a consoling medicine.

Bruce Nauman - Sex and Death

TW: CONTAINS THEMES OF ASSAULT AND ABUSE.

UCC CONFESSION

RECOVERY ROAD Every month, Motley publishes a spill-your-guts confession. This month, our second confession is a painful exploration of the bumpy road to recovery from sexual trauma.

I

cried—like, sobbed—the first time I had sex with my boyfriend; big, streaky tears as the playlist resorted to some disparate Ellie Goulding song and he grabbed me in a hug, asking if he had hurt me. He hadn’t, not even close. The overhead lamp flicked on and I felt embarrassed, betrayed by my body in his performance.

My reaction had felt instinctive, tears coming before I was even able to think about it. I was in his bedroom with the badly-painted blue walls and messy windowsill—a place I had been before, countless times in the six months we had been together—yet it felt claustrophobic now, the shade of blue morphing into the heat-holding canvas of a festival tent in August. He eased a jumper over my head and whispered in shaky repetitions as my body shook off the panic: “It’s me… you’re okay, you’re safe, I promise.”

It was a flashback, I later learned. And a feature of how the body responds to trauma.

When you experience something traumatic, it gets stored in the brain and body. In order to protect itself, your mind might fragment the memory, erasing certain parts while preserving—seemingly needlessly—others. In this moment, the body may have entered a state of flight, fright or freeze, a primal reaction which overrides the part of your brain which processes and retrieves memory (the hippocampus) and over activates the emotional centre (the amygdala). It is a mechanism of evolution; to signal a threat that must be avoided, a method of self-preservation which may scramble the memory while keeping the sensory warning signs (such as sights, smells and sounds) as vivid, emotional reminders. These act like trip switches that, when triggered, can drag the body back to the initial moment of trauma, unable to discern what is past and present; there are no concrete memories for it to refer back to, to distinguish between then and now.

Sitting on my boyfriend’s bed, in tears on Valentine’s Day because the blinds cast the same shadow as figures swaying outside a tent and his hands on me felt too familiar to surmount, I realised my body was not healed yet, no matter how much I convinced my brain it

was. Second-hand smoke in the summer; the sound of inflatable mattresses; dimly-lit spaces; the sickly-sweet smell of cider; the dizzy drunkenness of day-drinking and walking through a crowd; my mind gathered a collection of triggers and lined them up like glass bottles waiting to fracture, rattling as worked out how to let them go.

The hardest part of healing was finding out where to begin, and I kept making false starts.

I went to a well-meaning counsellor first, who teared up when I told her I had been sexually assaulted.

She recommended mindfulness as I comforted her and commented on how calm I seemed “despite everything.”

I cancelled the rest of my appointments, deterred from seeking help again for fear of replicating the awkwardness.

A year on, I was having regular sex with my boyfriend (and enjoying it) but I was restless and angry that my first year of college had been blurred and distorted by flashbacks, panic attacks and dissociation while the person who caused it lived life normally. I gave counselling another try, walking through the purple door of the Sexual Violence Centre with the aim to put it all to rest, pull each finger from the trigger. I accessed support for working through post-traumatic stress disorder—or PTSD, a word I had to turn over on my tongue until it fit—and finally gained the language to articulate what was going on in my body.

The professional help did not fix me, or magically make me whole, or remove the burden of the trauma.

What it has done, is gotten me to a place where I can take all these jagged parts - and start to put myself together again. These past two years have felt like a series of first dates and heartbreaks, a freeing mess of learning my body like it’s someone else’s and a first time. My body is not an apology or battleground, ‘broken’ or ‘damaged’ - it’s mine, it belongs to me, but it is not all of me. Neither is what happened to it while drunk and unconsenting.

FEATURES & OPINIONS | 23

UCC CONFESSION Sexuality and the workplace

T

he summer before last, I got a job at a manufacturing company. I didn't have any specialised skills; I was packaging boxes filled with products. I just wanted to make some money over the summer, mainly to pay for a new computer.

As it was the first "real" job I had ever had, I was looking forward to getting started. If nothing else, it was something to do for a few months.

On my first day at work, I spent a few hours packing, then went into the break room. I was happy to see that nobody seemed to take themselves too seriously. There was a fairly relaxed atmosphere, and I felt at ease, at least as much as you can on your first day. People chatted about ordinary things, conversations that I was able to contribute to - Love Island, the Chernobyl TV Series, UFC, things like that.

There was one guy in particular, though, who was a bit too comfortable with the people around him. John told a lot of jokes, but most had an offensive twang to them. Normally I wouldn't mind too much if someone made an offhand comment once or twice, where they don’t really understand why it might be hurtful.

Nobody is perfect. But this guy seemed to be different.

If he wasn't comparing the skin colour of a Love Island contestant to a cocoa percentage of chocolate, he was probably trying to decide which of the girls in the admin office was the biggest ride. One comment that particularly stuck with me was that he saw one of the other guys coming out of the "gay" bathroom - apparently, the bathroom to your left as you come upstairs, rather than the one on the right. There were no other differences. One was just the "gay" bathroom, the other was the straight.

When I went home that day, I couldn't stop thinking about that simple sentence. It seemed like something a twelve-year-old would have said about someone else in school. But John was twenty-eight, a fully grown adult for many years. I couldn't understand what the point was of saying something like that, or why it was funny. I decided to just ignore it as I headed in for day two.

But that wasn't the only thing said in that break room that really made an impact on me.

Somehow, more comments like that one seemed to work their way into John’s conversation, almost by magic. When the talk moved to electric vehicles, he said that he wouldn't want to drive one of those "faggy cars". I was also there when he said he would hate to have a gay person working with him.

If only he knew.

I have known that I'm gay for many years. In that time, the vast majority of people that I've met have been supportive, or at least haven't suggested that there's anything wrong with being gay. Although my process of coming out to people wasn't simple, that

24 | FEBRUARY 2021

support made it a hundred times easier than it could have been. Looking back, I suppose that's why these things hit so hard. It was the first time that I really saw that, despite everything that has happened in the last few years in Ireland, there are still people who would prefer if homosexuality didn't exist.

John wasn't even the worst. While he didn't seem to think that gay people deserved respect, there were others in the company who showed outright hatred for the idea of homosexuality. One of these men, Bert, was older, in his forties. One day, as usual, we were talking about what happened on Love Island last night - who had recoupled with who, and who had kissed who. Your normal Love Island fare. Bert had something new to contribute to the conversation: "There's boys kissing on it now. Disgusting." He was talking about the fact that Curtis had given a quick peck on the lips to Tommy Fury on the show.

Sometimes people don't understand the effect that such a small phrase can have. I felt my blood pressure spike a little bit. I'm not sure whether it was out of fear or indignation. That wasn't an enjoyable lunch break.

Now, I don't go around shouting from the rooftops that I'm gay. It would be as ridiculous as going around telling everyone that you're straight; there's a time and place for these things. So before this, my sexuality had never felt like a big secret that I had to keep. But now that two of the people at the company had made their positions so clear, it felt like I had to tiptoe around them. And I knew that they weren’t the only ones who felt that way. Paradoxically, it’s never hard to keep a secret until it feels like a secret. I couldn’t stop thinking about it, increasing the chance that I’d eventually drop the facade. There were many moments where I wanted to say “I’m gay.

Do you not want me working here?” to John or Bert.

But I asked myself, "what would happen if they knew?"

They had seemed so normal when I first met them.

All in all, outing myself was too risky, and since I was only going to be there for two months, I decided that it wasn’t worth rocking the boat.

It may sound like my experience at the company was a bad one. For every ardent homophobe, though, there are also people who accept who you are. One day, a coworker (who was closer to my own age, but worked there permanently) asked me for my opinion on a girl he had seen that weekend (in terms of looks). For whatever reason, I let the truth slip out – a risk, but he had never said anything against gay people. Although he was a bit taken aback, he later said “We’re not all like him, OK?”, talking about John.

And just as John’s remarks had affected me deeply, that small comment, that little show of support, meant a lot to me too. It highlighted the difference that being supportive can make.

Motley's Monthly

HOROSCOPE THIS FEBRUARY - THE MONTH AND LOVE AND ROMANCE, MYSTIC MCDONNELL’S MAGICAL PREDICTIONS LET YOU IN ON THE HIGHS, BUT MOSTLY LOWS, ST. VALENTINE HAS IN STORE FOR YOU

@

@

Scorpio:

You will finally get a match on Tinder – one that actually responds when you start texting them! After a few days, you’ll be excited to meet them. Until they send you a bank transfer link to help them get their three million dollars in a foreign account. Love is a cruel mistress.

@

Libra:

Gemini:

Twinning is winning! Except when it comes to relationships.

This month you will realize that you’ve been dating two people the whole time – a pair of identical twins. I’ll leave it to the therapist to sort out your resulting trust issues.

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Taurus:

Like a real bull, you tend to have a short temper. This will become relevant this month, when you catch your partner cheating… in Monopoly! The horror. Several knocked-over hotels and a flipped board later, you will have to pick up the pieces. Of Monopoly, and of your relationship. Have fun!

@

Sagittarius:

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Aquarius:

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Cancer:

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Leo:

You tend to hate small talk and like to get straight to the point.

This will make it easy for you to spot all of the signs that your partner is cheating on you. Or maybe it won’t. Forget I said anything. If you can.

You have an innate sense of fairness and justice. This will make it all the more annoying when your partner tells you that they want half of everything in the divorce proceedings. After all, they’re the more successful one of the couple. Really, only wanting half is them being nice to you.

@

Aries:

Channeling the inner power of the ram, this month you’ll be fairly horny. It’s a pity that you’ll have no opportunities to put that power to good use. One of the subtle cruelties of life as a young adult.

Unlike everyone else, you won’t bother to listen to some random horoscope tell you about the future state of your love life. However much we try to assign meaning to the stars, in the end you can’t blame fate or destiny for all of your relationship issues. The truth is that you really are just a horrible person.

@

Virgo:

Virgo is the Latin word for “virgin”. This is why Virgos don’t tend to match with any other star signs on the compatibility charts.

So you may as well sit back and relax – even the stars agree that this will be another lonely Valentine’s Day for you. At least you’ll never have an STI!

@

Capricorn:

Venus leaves your sphere this month, and with it goes your relationship. It’s up to you whether it’s a quiet “we can stay friends” ending, or an explosive stormy catastrophe with lots of screaming and shouting.

The result is the same either way – you’re all alone again!

Happy Valentine’s.

The Sun moves into your constellation this month, highlighting a move to a brighter future. You probably won’t notice, though, because all of your days are spent inside. In front of a computer. Doing nothing of real significance. I’m definitely not projecting here.

Born under the sign of the crab, this month your star sign will come back to bite you, literally.

Crabs can cause all kinds of health issues, so be sure to get it checked quickly! Or don’t – it’s not like you’ll get the chance to pass it on to anyone else.

You have the heart of a lion, but the face of… well, something less majestic. Don’t lose hope! One day you’ll find the person who’s just right for you. They probably won’t be anything special either, but beggars can’t be choosers.

FEATURES & OPINIONS | 25

I LOVE SEX But My South Asian Culture Would Say Otherwise...

IMASHA COSTA - EDITOR OF ARTS AND LITERATURE FOR THE UCC EXPRESS, LETS US IN ON WHAT IT IS LIKE EXPLORING THE WORLD OF SEXUALITY AND MASTURBATION AS A YOUNG WOMAN IN A CULTURE THAT SAYS NO.

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his should get me berated by my own community, as I am technically not allowed to talk about it in public. When you grow up under an enforced traditional South Asian mindset, the topic of sex was always a hushed and dusted away topic that should not be mentioned, and should be kept under a tight lid at all times.

This lid is still there to this day, still present within the new generation of young communities -Millennials and Generation Z communities. You could say that there are those that have not been formed by these mindsets and that do have a different opinion when it comes to sex. That wouldn’t be untrue. But when it comes to the issues of sex, we are still haunted by the spectre of traditional conservative notions, no matter how modern we are. It’s not an easy thing to break down patriarchal dominance.

All casual sex and masturbation are big taboos within the community, and it is difficult to receive a proper sex education that allows us to understand what drives a woman’s body or anyone’s body. It took me years to finally understand my body and know that my clitoris was what actually gave me an orgasm. All that I remember growing up about the mention of sex, was ‘if you do it before marriage, you might get pregnant and then bring shame to the family name.’ I remember not asking further questions and resorting to keeping my thoughts to myself. I could not even bring up the word “female masturbation” because women were not allowed to get off by themselves, and they shouldn’t feel as much pleasure as a man would. Sex was something a man did, to a woman. Something that lingers within my own culture and community is the idea that men can get away with whatever they want; have casual sex, jerk off, etc, but the women, oh the women, had to remain as innocent virgins who did not rebel

26 | FEBRUARY 2021

against cultural traditions.

Having questions that I knew my mother could not answer because it would be wrong to talk about such things made me resort to learning about what sex was through blog posts, porn, and smut. These were my portals to understanding how sexuality worked. These various, sometimes contradictory, sometimes dangerous and sometimes informative sources were my teachers. I deserved better.

As an ‘opinionated’ South Asian woman, I have been told that I am more ‘westernized’ rather than belong to my own community. I remember when I first wrote about my own sexual experiences and how my community went after me for expressing how I felt when I was getting it on with a lad, I got so much hate towards my own being. People were asking, ‘who is this girl to bring shame to her family?’ Because clearly as a woman, I belong to my family, my community, my country, I cannot possibly exist independently from the ownership of others. I was not allowed to have my own choice, have my own saying in who I want to sleep with. It was absolutely ridiculous.

I am not exclusively shitting my culture - she has given me so much that I am grateful for. I will berate the patriarchy wherever I see it though, and there is a patriarchy that consumes it. I happen to want to have casual sex whenever I want to, and enjoy my morning masturbation. My body is mine and mine alone, and as long as I am not doing any harm between the four walls, I do not need to be judged about what happens in my own bedroom.

So to my South Asian women, screw the patriarchal dominance that still lingers with us, and has derogatory terms thrown at us for wanting to seek a good time. If you want to have casual sex, go for it; want to invest a vibrator, do it! You are not shaming your family’s name, and you are not rebelling against them. Instead, you are making your own choices.

Have fun and be safe!

Entertaiment

BLOOD

THIRSTY?

THE INTERNET’S DEADLY NEW LOVE AFFAIR WITH RESIDENT EVIL. KANE GEARY O ’ KEEFFE EXPLORES THE RECENT ONLINE OBSESSION WITH THE NEW ANTAGONIST OF THE ‘RESIDENT EVIL’ GAME SERIES.

K

icking off a new generation of horror gaming in style, Resident Evil: Village has been picking up much traction in the online gaming community in the lead up to its May 7 release date. The game promises to deviate even further from the series’ zombie horror roots than the soft series reboot that was 2017’s Resident Evil 7 by featuring new terrifying enemies for players to run from. However, one of these new enemies in particular seems to have drawn a lot of attention from the larger online community for something other than her scare factor. I am of course speaking about the internet’s new obsession with the “Tall Vampire Lady”, Lady Dimitrescu.

Standing at 9 feet 6 inches, Resident Evil’s new villainous matriarch has inspired what are perhaps the most unexpected instances of online thirst in some time.

The character has already inspired countless memes in which players have expressed their will to run towards the dangerous lady, rather than away from her. The will to be handled and violently murdered by the giant antagonist has also been vividly expressed by fans on apps such as TikTok and Instagram. Fans are clearly enamoured by Capcom’s latest creation, to the point at which many cosplays of the character have already made their way online. It’s also very clear that much of the infatuation with Lady Dimitrescu stems from the community’s unexpectedly sexual reception of her giant vampiric frame and 20’s inspired fashion sense.

Fan’s obsessions with the character have also taken the game’s designers by surprise. Resident Evil: Village’s lead art director, Tomonori Takano, recently commented on the overwhelming response to the character, saying "I don't think anyone [on the team] could have predicted how wonderfully fans have reacted to Lady Dimitrescu, [….] I was particularly struck by comments like, ‘I want to be chased by her”. Takano has also discussed the decisions which lead to the creation

of the character, describing the team’s desire to move away from the franchise’s more familiar elements in order to find newer, scarier enemy designs. Takano told gaming news outlet IGN that “If we want people to be scared, we need to think beyond the stereotypical zombies.” Takano has also sought inspiration for the character through figures such as the 16th century Hungarian serial killer Elizabeth Báthory, Anjelica Huston’s Morticia Addams, as well as Japanese urban legends such as that of the ghost Hasshaku-Sama. Regardless of this character’s inspirations however, the designers of Lady Dimitrescu and her towering frame could never have expected to capture the sexual imaginations of fans on such a grand scale.

But what is it that separates Lady Dimitrescu from other female antagonists in the Resident Evil series such as the disfigured Lisa Trevor? The character’s morbid sex appeal seems to be the definitive answer among the online meme community. Emily Gaudette, a popular relationship and pop culture columnist notes that “Like any good character that makes people horny, [Lady Demitrescu is] a combination of a bunch of different niche fetishes,”. She goes on to describe the novel excitement many people feel when presented with the idea of being physically overpowered by a woman, while also noting the sexual connotations of being drained and consumed by a vampire. Gaudette also addresses the many memes of the character, observing how “A lot of memes I see are riffing on this idea that a gamer might lose on purpose to get reamed out by the giant beautiful woman, and that’s the sort of fun sexual play that a sub/dom couple might get into”.

The internet’s obsession with the long running game series’ new resident (hey heyyy) vampire suggests that nothing is truly safe from the thirst of online fans. Lady Dimitrescu’s popularity has already brought the yet to be released game into the mainstream eye to an arguably much larger degree than would be expected for a Resident Evil title. It will be interesting to note if online interest with the looming villain shall translate into thirst driven sales once the game finally rolls around in May.

ENTERTAINMENT | 27

SEX AND CINEMA RONAN WATTERS EXPLORES THE HISTORY OF SEX AS DEPICTED IN MAINSTREAM CINEMA.

THE OUTLAW

Jane Russell was an actress and sex symbol in 40’s Hollywood, and film mogul Howard Hughes knew this when he signed her for a seven-picture contract. Her first film for him, The Outlaw, generated controversy due to the focus on Russell’s cleavage. One of the first films to focus on the sex appeal of the actress, the film ran in theatres but was censored due to the Hays Code.

1896 THE KISS

You have seen this 120 plus year old dirty film, haven’t you? As the title suggests, The Kiss was the film considered to contain cinema’s first sex scene, a scandalous kiss. While the film by today's standard is about as offensive as Mickey Mouse, it was considered an immoral abomination when first released. Film critics, audience members, religious figures, you name it, everyone back in 1896 was repulsed by this film. One critic even described the film as “absolutely disgusting”.

How far we have come.

1943

1969 BLUE MOVIE

While Deep Throat (1972) and Last Tango in Paris (1972) get more recognition as mainstream erotic films, Blue Movie by Andy Warhol was the first adult film to get a theatrical release all over the United States.

Widely considered a seminal film in the “Golden Age of Porn”, Blue Movie inspired every naughty film after it. Warhol himself claimed that Last Tango in Paris was inspired by Blue Movie.

WE LOVE SEX ON THE SCREEN. WHETHER IT IS THE LATEST ARTHOUSE OFFERING FROM CANNES OR THE COUNTLESS FREE “MOVIES” YOU CAN FIND ONLINE AT VARIOUS WEBSITES, THE ANSWER IS CLEAR, WE ARE OBSESSED AS A SPECIES WITH WATCHING OTHERS DOING THE ACT. THE CINEMA HAS QUITE AN INTERESTING HISTORY WHEN IT COMES TO HOW SEX HAS BEEN SHOWN ON THE SCREEN THROUGHOUT ITS EXISTENCE. I DECIDED TO LOOK AT THE ORIGINS OF SEX ON THE SCREEN AND HOW IT DEVELOPED OVER CINEMATIC TIME. THE TIMELINE THAT I AM ABOUT TO PRESENT TO YOU IS ONE THAT BECAME EVEN MORE INTERESTING TO ME AS I COMPILED IT. IT IS NOT AN ALL ENCOMPASSING TIMELINE, AS WE WOULD BE HERE FOREVER, BUT IT INCLUDES FILMS THAT I BELIEVE ARE

BASIC INSTINCT

While this erotic thriller is more famous for its “leg crossing scene” then anything else, Basic Instinct is seen as a groundbreaking film when it comes to showing sex in mainstream Hollywood cinema. Some scenes border on porn and it received criticism from gay rights groups who took issue with its homosexual characters and the portrayal of a bisexual woman as a killer. All in all, it was a bit of a naughty film.

1992

BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOUR

Another film that received controversy due to the way the director portrayed same-sex relationships, Blue Is the Warmest Colour nonetheless remains an engrossing film that also serves as a commentary on social class division.

It made history as the first film to have the Palme d’Or, the Cannes Film Festival’s highest honour, bestowed upon both the film’s director and the film’s actresses.

2006 BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN

While paving the way for LGBTQ+ acceptance on screen, Brokeback Mountain was the recipient of intense controversy. From discussions on the sexuality of its characters and its loss to Crash (2004) at the Oscars, to criticism from American conservative media, the film opened a dialogue and serves as an important moment for the portrayal of same-sex relationships in cinema. Another great film about a same sex relationship that I recommend is Happy Together (1997) from Wong Kar-wai.

2013

So Much Is In a Name

JUST AHEAD OF HIS EP RELEASE, ALANA DALY MULLIGAN TALKS WITH TIM CHADWICK ON HIS EVEREVOLVING SOUND, SOUL-EXPOSÉS, AND ROLE AS IRELAND’S FIRST SELF LOVE MUSICAL ICON.

I

n January 2019 under the flickering fluorescent lamps of Crane Lane, during a time when live events were tangible realities and not just cigarette smoke-infused memories, I met Tim Chadwick. Two years on, he is working with the same alchemic lyricism matched with a mix of revitalised nostalgic visuals and samples, high-pop production sounds, and as Tim put it to me during our chat, the unapologetic “Oh God, is he okay” sad bangers. The fruits of his labours is his upcoming eponymous EP Timothy. “Names are so important, and such key identifiers of who we feel we are or who we want to be”, Tim tells me on our call, and it’s this central concept of self-love and recognition that acts as the fulcrum for the Dubliner’s newest release.

Timothy was born from the artist getting uncomfortably-comfortably close with himself over lockdown. “I don't think any of the songs would have happened unless there was a pandemic. An EP was the furthest thing on my mind for the first four months...I just really concentrated on surviving”, he says. With a combination of work plans and gigs falling through as the world went into isolation-mode, along with personal heartache, the songs came in place of disappointment: “Everything was just spinning in my head, and then once the dust settled after the first months of the pandemic, I was ‘like okay, I've definitely got songs here that I love, and they need to go somewhere. I don't want them to just slide because who knows what could happen in the next year?’”

30 | FEBRUARY 2021

The ‘somewhere’ is a five-track journey produced under the watchful eye of Seán Behan. Timothy features Chadwick’s two most recent singles ‘Only Me and ‘If I Gotta Run’, the first, a self-love anthem, and the second, a cautious tip-toe back into the world of potential love after a period of introspection.

“I wanted the EP to feel cyclical, maybe we'll fall in and out of love with different people throughout our whole life, and maybe we'll fall in and out of love with ourselves our whole life. It just felt like there should be a need to constantly be growing and constantly, constantly finding yourself, because we're never the same.”

This growth from the isolation of the pandemic and being confined to the four walls of his home gave the artist the chance to reevaluate his happiness and put pen to paper: “I had to sit and look, literally look at myself for the first time in a really long time.

It wasn't that I wasn't looking after myself, I just wasn't thinking about myself maybe as much as I should’ve been. I definitely fell into a habit of needing someone to say that I was worth something and worth it, and I was like ‘that's not a good habit for someone in their late twenties, like, that's not that's not what I want.’ I wanted to be able to acknowledge it in myself, and that only came with being by myself and completely by myself.”

A recurring message that Tim conveys to me throughout our conversation is how the difference between being lonely and loneliness has

on Identity and Self-Love in his New EP Timothy fuelled the creative process: “Craving connection, missing my friends, and wanting genuine contact, meaningful contact. To me that's lonely, and I think loneliness is totally valid. I used to be embarrassed by feeling lonely and then the pandemic happened and all you could do was sort of be lonely, and I was like ‘this isn't that bad, because I'm sitting by myself and I'm really all that I've got’. I have amazing family and amazing friends but really no one's gonna look after me more than I do.”

But, “Only Me” champions these moments: the challenges of loneliness confronted by what feels like the most glorious of rolling-up-sleeves ode to ‘doing the werk’: “A part of me will always love you / It's not enough to lose me for you / So when I try to dive back in, I hope to God I've learned to swim” is part of the song’s bridge: not a single line is left unworked, and Chadwick’s dedication to the lyrics is evident with powerful messages of self-love, respect, and the portrait of a person learning to set boundaries for his own happiness: “All my songs have a weird tinge of the positives and negatives to being in love, I think that comes with a fear of growing up and seeing it go wrong every single time. There’s always a hesitancy. The only love song I’ve ever written that isn’t tinged with some sort of shame, or fear, or

@timtimyall on Instagram & Twitter Listen to the sounds that inspired Timothy on Spotify Follow Tim Chadwick on Spotify Pre-Save/Add Timothy

hesitation is ‘Only Me’ which is about me...I haven’t had a song that’s a pure love song, and I think that comes from the media, and the way that gay relationships have been portrayed...it’s always a car crash. So that’s trickled into how I’ve dealt with my own relationships in the past, and into the music I write. there’s always a sense of fight or flight in them, definitely the case in ‘If I Gotta Run’.

The second-single deals with a scenario many of us are likely missing the past few months: being at a house party, wanting to make a connection with someone in some of the non-HSE approved ways. The track veers away from the expected route of romance found on a night out, as the singer talks about protecting himself, unready to jump into heartache: “Don’t get me wrong, having amazing sexual relationships is great and it’s a part of growing up….I think we assign more weight to them as a social construct of success... for me, those relationships actually fill me with more anxiety... they made me feel like I wasn’t achieving anything and I was only trying to impress what people thought I should be doing.

There’s a healthy way and an unhealthy way of dealing with those relationships, and as I’ve grown up those relationships have become less important.” Ultimately, it’s the relationship we forge with ourselves and our identities as we grow up that shapes the way we interact with the world. In our chat, we discuss coming-out, queer representation in media, some of the musicians that helped fuel the creative process of bringing Timothy to life, and giving Tim a new lease of one: “I kind of just wanted to go back to Timothy for a bit you know...

So that's what you can expect in the EP. A lot of feelings.”

What’s the future looking like? Timothy is the most immediate: “I’m going to try, in my own way, find an enjoyable way for me to present the EP and for people to watch.” but he teases other unique aspects: merch, potential collaborations, visuals to go along with each track and future releases. “The thing that keeps me sane is music so that’s what I’m going to do” he finishes. Tim Chadwick is a rare breed in the Irish pop sound: combining charm, humility and heart-puppetry, His lyrics are clear messengers carrying the cautious hope of love and longing that we all hold within us, the want to connect, the desire to be seen for only himself, and all the good within that.

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DEFINING BAYONETTA More than another sex fantasy?

ELLIOT T MONROE EXPLORES THE SUBVERSIVE EMPLOYMENT OF FEMALE SEXUALITY IN THE ‘BAYONETTA’ VIDEO GAME SERIES.

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hile the topic of female representation in video games is one that is hotly debated (and, unfortunately, often controversial), many noteworthy female characters have rightfully cemented their place within the video game canon over the years.

But perhaps none has garnered quite the attention and controversy in recent times as Platinum Games’ Bayonetta, the titular Umbran Witch of the Bayonetta series.

This controversy is owed to her overtly sexual personality and behaviour—with notable YouTube critics such as Anita Sarkeesian of Feminist Frequency, going as far as to call the first game a “choose your own patriarchal adventure porno fantasy” in a scathing 2009 review. And while this perspective is undoubtedly valid on some level, I feel that it forgoes the nuance that lies beneath Bayonetta’s portrayal. As such, I hope to explore it further and offer a more empowering take on her character.

In a blog post on the Platinum Games website exploring the development of the first game, Bayonetta designer Mari Shimazaki (who is, notably, a woman herself) writes that director Hideki Kamiya specified only three traits for Bayonetta’s design: 1) 2) 3)

A Female Lead A Modern Witch She Uses Four Guns

Note that Shimazaki was not explicitly asked to make the character appear sexual, and, as such, most of Bayonetta’s visual elements were a product of her own imagination.

Speaking on her design process further, Shimazaki writes that “when a female character appears in an action game, her limbs often seem thin and short. That is why I tried to make [Bayonetta] more appealing... by adjusting her proportions and extending her limbs.” What this equates to is that, although Bayonetta’s proportions are certainly exaggerated, it is not in the manner we’re used to seeing; it is instead a

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woman’s vision of a feminine ideal: one where the character isn’t reduced to a pair of breasts or hips, but where her nature as a fighter is emphasised above all else.

And while the title of ‘witch’ has always carried connotations of female transgression, Bayonetta not only innovates on the trope’s conventions by pushing them to their aesthetic limits, but does so with a fervorous flair that’s hard not to be charmed by. Whether it’s in using spears as stripper-poles to destroy hordes of angels in the blink of an eye, opening portals with her hair to summon demons, or delivering her finishing climax attacks while posing in a manner lying somewhere between ‘high-fashion’ and ‘softcore pornography’; Bayonetta reappropriates these symbols of transgressive, ‘shameful’ femininity as the very sources of her power.

Crucially, Bayonetta is also aware of her sexiness, and she isn’t a character who would remain exactly the same were that sexuality to be taken away; it’s an intrinsic aspect of her identity, and not the desires of male figures being projected onto her. This notably separates her from the harmful, male-gaze induced model of ‘accidental temptress’ we’ve all shaken our heads at before. And though in some cutscenes it may seem that the camera is trying to dominate her in this way, it is important to note that Bayonetta is self-aware of her status as a fictional character—frequently looking into the camera to tease the player. Her sexualisation, then, can also be viewed as parodic: that she herself mocks the player’s expectations of her by performing those expectations in a freakish, hyperbolic manner. Through this, Bayonetta seems to remind her audience that she is the leading lady; this is her story, and it plays by her rules—said audience is just along for the ride.

In short, playing as Bayonetta serves as a refreshing power fantasy. By stepping into the fabulous, gun-wielding heels of this charming and unapologetically sexual character, players get to experience the male-dominated characteraction form from a new perspective. And with a Bayonetta 3 confirmed to be in development, as well as Bayonetta’s arrival into the Super Smash Bros. canon, it seems her proliferation of the gaming industry is still on the rise, and showing no signs of stopping any time soon.

XXX

PORN PARODIES JUST AREN'T THAT ACCURATE JACK COLEMAN REVIEWS THE CANONICAL DISCREPANCIES BETWEEN THE PORN PARODY ‘GAME OF BONES’ AND THE ‘A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE’ SERIES.

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he internet is home to a LOT of pornographic material, as any teenager growing up with access to the web will be aware. There also exists, naturally, online communities relentlessly dedicated to sexualising everything we hold dear. This even extends to Spongebob SquarePants (seriously). In the spirit of Motley’s sex issue, I delved into Wood Rocket’s Game of Bones, a porn parody based on the mega-popular television series Game of Thrones and its source material A Song of Ice and Fire (ASOIAF). As the series is near and dear to my heart, I strived to root out plot inconsistencies to ensure that Game of Bones was a faithful adaptation.

Firstly, during a scene in which Robb Stark speaks with his wife Talisa, he remarks that he must visit Walder Frey to repair an alliance, because “he needs their armies”.

This is grossly negligent on the part of the writers as the primary reason for Robb agreeing to marry one of Walder Frey’s many descendants is so he can secure a safe crossing over the Green Fork via Frey’s castle, ‘The Twins’, and lift Jamie Lannister’s siege at Riverrun. Honestly, it’s like they didn’t even watch the show. The Freys were a powerful house in the Riverlands, having the ability to call 4,000 men to their banner. However, were the Freys to stay out of the war, Robb would still be in a fine position with the number of men already sworn to him. To suggest that the events of the Red Wedding were a result of manpower demands is reductive.

The strategic location of ‘The Twins’ on the Green Fork has always been the Frey’s greatest asset.

Another scene with a dubious plot involves Daenerys Targaryen convincing a rival leader to fight for her.

He is concerned that she is not the rightful heir to the Iron Throne, and needs convincing. The method she employs is unorthodox but the entire sequence is unnecessary. The exiled son and daughter of Aerys Targaryen are well-known

from The Arbor all the way across the Narrow Sea to Pentos.

Once word spreads from Lhazar of the first dragons in 145 years being born, Daenerys becomes even more renowned.

It’s nonsensical to suggest that she needs to prove her lineage or to suggest that her profile is low. Rookie mistakes, man.

During another scene with Daenerys Targaryen, she refers to Jon Snow as her “step-nephew”. Now, this is just not accurate. Rhaegar + Lyanna = Jon was all the rage on ASOIAF forums before its official confirmation, and suggesting something like that spits in the face of loyal theorists.

Targaryens generally follow the Faith of the Seven, the predominant religion in Westeros. Divorce is very uncommon in Westeros, so the idea of “step” parents doesn’t really exist.

That is irrelevant however as both Lyanna and Rhaegar died shortly after their marriage, making it impossible for either to remarry. Unfortunately for Dany, there is simply no way around Jon’s lineage.

A later scene involving Sansa Stark reveals her to be heavily-tattooed under her garments. This is just a simple casting error. A Highborn Westerosi lady would never be tattooed under any circumstances. The only example of tattoo culture in the known world is the use of slave brands used in some cities of Essos, especially Volantis. Tattoos are seen as “marks of evil” and therefore, a noble lady such as Sansa would be greatly ostracised from highborn culture were she to somehow acquire tattoos. I just feel like the basic research wasn’t done in this case, it makes the entire operation feel very inauthentic.

After a thorough review of this material, I cannot in good conscience recommend it to hardcore fans of A Song of Ice and Fire. At times, it makes downright unacceptable errors which greatly compromise the viewing experience.

If you crave more Game of Thrones content following the show’s conclusion, I suggest waiting for G.R.R Martin to finish The Winds of Winter (as if) or the upcoming prequel shows.

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In the Lonely Hour HOW HAS PORNOGRAPHY MET THE CHALLENGE OF A QUARANTINED AUDIENCE? KANE GEARY O ’ KEEFFE OBSERVES THE WAYS IN WHICH ONLINE PORNOGRAPHY SITES HAVE ADAPTED TO AUDIENCES SINCE THE OUTBREAK OF THE PANDEMIC.

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t’s no longer taboo to address the fact that online pornography is a mainstream staple of online entertainment (despite what your parents may think).

After a year-long flirtation with indoor boredom for many, the popularity of porn websites has skyrocketed since March of 2020. This rise in popularity has brought with it a wealth of research into the changing pornography landscape as it has adapted to meet the needs of a quarantined world.

These changes not only include structural reform for popular websites such as Pornhub, but an increased market for covid themed pornography as audiences prove that truly nothing is safe from the varied kinks of the internet.

Statistics from Pornhub show that online traffic increased by 26.9% in the UK at the beginning of April, as the notion of lockdown loomed over many modern nations.

While this coincided with the website offering free premium accounts to viewers in locked down countries in a bid to keep people indoors, the website still claims a 17.5% increase in traffic when compared to pre Covid years even after this offer finished. With this pandemic-inspired increase in traffic comes with it a rise in searches related to the zeitgeist. Alex Hawkins of porn site xHamster noted large increases in searches for public sex scenes since Spring 2020, along with scenes featuring kissing. The consensus being that porn viewers are looking for experiences that they crave but can’t currently access. This makes sense considering the touch starvation many of us have been feeling throughout the pandemic.

Other reasons for this pandemic inspired spike in porn traffic take a darker turn. With the rise of the global pandemic, the notion of mortality on an international scale has permeated every facet of society. This awareness of our mortality ties into what the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology calls ‘terror management theory”. The journal notes that “when we are reminded of our own mortality, “ALEX AND ANNA”

we subconsciously alter our attitudes and behaviors to help us cope with the ‘terrifying’ prospect of our eventual death.” Their research also observes that a fear of mortality prompts heightened sexual desire and sexual behaviour as a coping mechanism. This fear of mortality leads to a larger engagement with sexual entertainment such as online porn as a result.

These fears also lead into what may be the strangest (if unsurprising) additions to the porn landscape, the rise of covid themed porn. Pornhub reported 1.8 million coronavirus-themed searches by the end of March 2020.

Many of these searches relate to porn featuring masks, gloves, and hazmat suits. Tying this back to terror management theory, it's easy to see this rise in Covid porn as stemming from an eroticisation of fear as a coping mechanism. This trend has grown throughout the pandemic, even sprouting large budget Covid porn films such as Adult Time’s Future Darkly: Pandemic. This film features multiple steamy segments which relate to Covid-19, such as “Laura’s Delivery,” about a bored housewife caring for a Covid-19 patient who slips into bed with an Amazon deliveryman, and “Alex and Anna,” about a couple reuniting after lockdown (complete with PPE sex). There’s even a full, edited version of the film on Youtube, further accentuating pornography’s breach into mainstream online entertainment.

A positive side effect of such a large audience now engaging with online porn sites has been the restructuring of Pornhub’s uploading policy. In December of 2020, Pornhub purged over 9 million of the website's 13 million videos to combat the uploading of nonconsensual material. Pornhub removed any video not uploaded by a ‘verified’ partner of the website. This was also done in response to reports such as those conducted by the Internet Watch Foundation, which found 118 instances of child sexual abuse material on Pornhub in the last three years. With more eyes on online pornography than ever before as a result of the pandemic, it’s crucial that websites like Pornhub continue to ensure that the online porn landscape remains a safe one for everybody involved.

A REVIEW DEPUTY ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR show the “normie” side of the BDSM world, REBECKAH MCCARTHY OFFERS HER He tries his best with this niche culture but THOUGHTS ON NETFLIX’S DARKLY remains an outsider for the most part.

EROTIC COMEDY SERIES. The sex in BONDiNG is explicit and written for laughs. We see a man in a penguin suit ONDiNG is an American dark who was Peter's only client trying to get a comedy television series which kiss from him while Peter is also dressed in premiered on Netflix April 24th a penguin suit. We can see that Peter isn’t 2019. The sex themed dark comedy really made for this line of work but he does is reported to be loosely based on the it to grasp insights for his on stage persona personal experience of the show’s creator “Master Carter”. Peter is learning the tricks Rightor Doyle. of the trade and gradually becomes more

Without giving too much away, comfortable as he is exposed to other Zoe Levin plays Tiffany “Tiff ” Cheste, a people within the community. psychology student who is also working as

Overall the show itself is an a dominatrix. Tiff enlists the help of Pete easy watch and explores the personal Devin, (Brendan Scannell) her gay best lives of both Tiff and Peter while also friend whom with she went to high school, showing their exploration within the to be her assistant. Tiff and Peter reconnect BDSM community. There are also little in Manhattan where Pete is working as hints to their relationship which nobody a waiter and an aspiring comedian. Tiff will see coming. Their friendship is truly however struggles to balance her social life the epitome of a plot twist. Although the and school with her job. Pete’s exposure to episodes are short in duration at about sadomasochism and BDSM also helps him 15 minutes each, the plot works perfectly to become liberated in his own life. within those time frames. Will it be a series

Tiffany goes by the name that lasts? I’m not sure. BONDiNG feels “Mistress May” in the first season of like there’s little room for movement with BONDiNG. Tiff, AKA Mistress May, was a the plot, but the writers have created an college student and in the second season exceptional story which leaves you begging she goes back to domme school. As the for more. central character, Tiff deals with her

The two seasons of BONDiNG inability to love herself. During the show are available on Netflix and can be binge we observe as she tries to break free from watched within 4 hours. her own confines. However, I feel that Pete is under written and does not get enough attention during the show. He truly does

B

What’s the Point of Awards Ceremonies?

BY RONAN WAT TERS

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feel most people, including myself, watched the highlights of Ricky Gervais eviscerating the Hollywood elite on YouTube after the 2020 Golden Globes last year. The blunder involving Envelope-Gate at the 89th Academy Awards was more memorable than the actual ceremony itself.

I have asked around and most people seem to remember more of things like this than the actual awards and who wins them. Of course, there have been some memorable moments in awards history that can either signify the rise of an upcoming talent or solidify a creative person’s career after years of not winning. But, besides film students who stay up until all hours of the night betting on who will win, most people seem to not care anymore.

I am happy about some nominations for this year’s Golden Globes, mainly the Irish ones. I am glad to see Cartoon Saloon, based in my home county of Kilkenny, nominated for Best Animated Feature for their excellent film Wolfwalkers. Brendan Glesson received a nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Supporting Role for his portrayal of Donald Trump in The Comey Rule while Normal People was nominated for Best Limited Series or TV Film. Bar that, most of the nominations were either expected or surprising for all the wrong reasons.

First up was Hamilton, the film that came out in 2020 which was a recording of the 2015 Broadway show. Lin-Manuel Miranda was also nominated for a performance he gave nearly five years ago. Maybe we should nominate more films from years ago. James Corden was nominated for his performance in The Prom as a stereotype of a gay man. I do not have a problem with straight actors playing

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LGBTQ+ roles, but Corden’s performance is a caricature that lacked the nuance of other performances by straight actors playing gay roles, such as Tom Hanks in Philadelphia or Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain.

Corden's performance might have had more luck in 1996 but not now. There’s also Music, directed by Sia, which received two nominations for Best Actress and Best Musical Film but has received criticism from disability activists who have taken issue with Maddy Ziegler’s performance as a girl with autism, as Ziegler herself does not have autism.

I have seen the film and while Ziegler’s performance is problematic, the film is plain bad.

With these nominations and the outcry that I have heard, I began wondering if there is any point to these award ceremonies and if people are genuinely interested in the awards or the drama that can surround them. Viewership figures for the major award ceremonies in the entertainment industry have been steadily decreasing with each passing year with many becoming sick of the over saturation of live ceremonies. People seem to be more interested in the drama the next morning than the actual awards and who won. The ceremonies have also created this culture that seems to say that unless you have won an award, your career means nothing. Take Leonardo DiCaprio for instance, an actor who has given many great and iconic performances over his career. Before he won for The Revenant, he routinely appeared in every list of the best actors who have never won an Oscar. Why do we see an Oscar, or any award, become the most important thing in a creative person’s career? Of course, it's nice to be recognised by your peers, but when we start seeing awards as more important than the person's work, it's time to look at more important things.

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SEX

RELATIONSHIPS AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON FASHION.

BY BILLY O’CONNOR.

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ashion and sex make unsurprising bedfellows. As an expression of one’s inner self, fashion is used to create characters and alter egos, act as armor in defense of an oftentimes unforgiving world and bolster political statements. Throughout history, it has solidified iconic careers in the mainstream consciousness and, of course, caused scandal and controversy. Equally, fashion is a vehicle for sexual expression. We dress for ourselves, yes, but we also dress for others.

We’ve all seen countless romantic comedies where the female protagonist takes off her glasses and puts on a dress and is suddenly (gasp) desirable. Or how the ‘vixen’ trope has been put into effect through the use of simple stylistic choices like stilettos or an abbreviated hemline.

Seeing as the male gaze is so prevalent in Hollywood, these superficial changes are largely applicable to women, but we do often see male protagonists in perfectly tailored suits and designer brands in order to augment their sexual desirability to the audience. Ostensibly, we can see how these decisions can transform the entire aura and purpose of a character and this is clearly comparable to real life as we all are subject to the allure of ‘sexy’ styling.

I interviewed a handful of my friends for this piece and I asked them a range of questions regarding their style and fashion choices and how they may be influenced by a partner and/or feelings of sexual liberation. The response was varied but it was encouraging to receive a majority ‘No’, on whether or not a partner’s opinion has an influence on the way you dress, consciously at least. I say this because I think style is as sacred a concept as any, because of its ability to convey so much through clothing alone.

However, during my investigation, one sentiment seemed to reoccur consistently across all participants: their style noticeably shifts to a more comfortable demeanor when they are in a relationship. Comfort doesn’t necessarily mean a lack of effort, one of the

answers referred to her ability to embrace her true style which, she inferred, is more conservative. The prospect of sex can hugely influence one’s style, regardless of gender, and it is interesting to note the way sex and the possibility of it can be so obviously reflected through our clothing.

Most participants agreed that their state of sexual prowess did influence their style, when single, and they would be inclined to dress more provocatively in order to attract the attention of their desired sex. Sex is a powerful tool that is able to influence countless factors such as our mood. Another consistent response was the idea that clothing evokes confidence within oneself. The idea of clothing as an exploratory tool used to discover one’s inner expressions of sex and self is certainly an interesting concept.

I thought it important to ask whether or not my friends felt they had abandoned any influence their ex had on their style after they broke up. The general consensus seemed to be a resounding ‘No.’ Once they incorporate a certain aspect into their style it is theirs and theirs alone, regardless of where it derived from. I found these answers to be particularly potent as it speaks to what style in itself truly is: a collection of micro-experiences and thoughts and influences pulled from every facet of our lives whether it be social media or the pages of fashion magazines. Of course, while it is our own, it is important to acknowledge the influences we take from the world around us and how this is able to manifest into a patchworked result which is ultimately an expression of what and who we are as people.

I think if you take anything away from this piece, it should be the affirmation that sex and style are intrinsically linked and are both powerful tools of selfexpression. After all, our expression is integral to our freedom and our freedom is integral to our humanity.

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For The Love

OF FASHION

BY EMMA TREACY AND KAIA PURCELL

“The relationship between today’s society and the influencers of the fashion world is powerful, bordering obsessive, and certainly unrequited. So why is it that we feel the need to lean so heavily on both celebrities and influencers for fashion inspiration? Why is it that so many of us can’t decide for ourselves what style we want?”

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ashion is an aspect of life that each individual involuntarily has a relationship with, and one which affects multiple parts of our daily lives. We all know that the fashion industry is synonymous with waste, being the second largest polluter to the environment. Yet it continues to maintain its prestigious position in the world market. The truth of the matter is that the one factor that is universal in the continuation and dominance of the sector is that it is driven forward by the consumer. Just what is it that makes us crave new season styles and continue to support the industry despite all that is wrong with the system? The simple answer for this is love.

Whether you are in a deep and passionate love affair which overpowers your everyday and is seen in all aspects of your life beyond just what you wear including what you read, what you watch, the social media accounts you engage with or how you spend your free time. You may also find yourself in the midst of a toxic relationship with fashion - perhaps you’re a self-confessed fashion-adversary, feeling anger and loath against the industry and choosing not to actively engage or participate. Otherwise, you may be in a totally indifferent relationship with fashion, perhaps partial to an idle flip through the odd copy

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of Marie-Claire in the hairdressers whilst otherwise having no real opinions or feelings towards the industry.

The reason that fashion holds so much prestige in the world is simply due to the love that we as human beings hold for something that provides us with the ability to express ourselves, to utilise apparel to our advantage and to create a sense of individualism, collectivism and simple joy. Having the power to reflect who we are in a totally overt way is evidently favoured. The love that we hold in our hearts for fashion is an age-old relationship that the most part of us love to flirt with occasionally, lust over obsessively or work towards finding our own balanced love-affair with.

The newest love trend between humans and fashion is akin to the real-life relationships we are seeing more predominantly in the world. Online dating and communication is rocketing in popularity and favoured by many, even if just for a dabble - similar to all of those who reach for whatever fashion magazine is closest while in the salon chair. The accessibility of fashion has changed dramatically, so much so that it is an almost inescapable aspect of life that can be seen everywhere we look, including our phone or laptop screens.

Today’s red-carpet stars,

from the likes of Kendall Jenner to Beyonce, to David Beckham and Justin Bieber, are merely following in the footsteps of their fashion ancestors to be the world’s leading style icons of our era. For centuries now, celebrities of this status have been in the spotlight not only for their musical talents or their careers, but merely for the garments they sport strutting down the red carpet, across the stage or in the media. It never takes too long to see evidence of this undying love for the trends of celebrities as similar clothing styles and pieces are seen on the streets on us not-so-influential fashion enthusiasts. With little effort, these celebrities have always played a paramount role in shaping the ongoing fashion trends of society across the world.

With the world becoming an increasingly digital sphere, and with the social media tidal wave that has taken over in recent times, our relationship with the clothing choices of celebrities has changed in various ways. It is now a far easier task to retrieve images and information on the superstars of our generation and generations gone, with the day to day lives of celebrities being documented as the new normality. The privacy of our generation is becoming less and less with the current social media frenzy, with celebrities leading the

way in showcasing their daily lives.

This, therefore, is surely increasing the influence they are having on us and our fashion patterns. It is no longer just the glamorous red-carpet outfits or the formal photoshoot attire that we see, our relationship has increased to a far higher strength, with the imitation of clothing such as specific socks or pyjamas now seen as a normal occurrence.

This substantial social media influence is altering our search for inspiration. It is lessening the hunt by providing us with endless content at our ease whenever we desire it. Along with the sheer awe us fashion lovers possess for our celebrity heroes; is the more current love affair we are having with fashion influencers. Instagram alone has become a catwalk of its own, providing endless opportunity for inspiration on the latest trends that we are only waiting to imitate at the drop of a hat. It is forcing us to betray celebrities as our primary source of inspiration, as we fool around with the world of Instagram influencers who don’t hold back when it comes to tempting us with all the freshest looks and trends. The relationship between today’s society and the influencers of the fashion world is powerful, bordering obsessive, and certainly unrequited.

So why is it that we feel the need to lean so heavily on both celebrities and influencers for fashion inspiration? Why is it that so many of us can’t decide for ourselves what style we want?

There is also the possibility that this inherent adoration and obsession links to many fashion lovers seeking to achieve a sense of higher status by wearing something that someone of intense popularity has worn recently. It is a way of being noticed, of having someone comment on your appearance positively, categorizing you for even just a moment, in the same field as that of someone who is seen to

be adored by so many. Our relationship with celebrities and influencers as many of our primary sources of inspiration is a significant aspect of the world of fashion. Imitation and mimicry are features of us as human beings that will always play an immense role in the way we live our lives, fashion included. While it is quite the one-sided relationship in many senses, social media influencers and celebrities would disappear without a fan base, and fashion plays a large role in maintaining this fan base for many of these stars.

Taking inspiration from celebrities and influencers is not a new phenomenon by any means however, as trends of days gone by such as the LBD took the fashion world by storm in the 60’s following on from Audrey Hepburn’s iconic attire in the opening titles for Breakfast at Tiffany’s in a a full length Givenchy black gown. The love and affiliation that we humans stems largely from the inspiration we acquire from others whom we aspire to be like - the Little Black Dress is testament to this power and the feeling that everyone has when they reach for that wardrobe staple.

The truth of the matter is that we love fashion. Whether we choose to engage directly and throw ourselves head first into a full-commitment relationship to nurture this love, or even if we don’t acknowledge this relationship in the slightest - we are completely exposed to the industry.

The reason is simple - the love for fashion is timeless, and our continued appreciation and requirement to persevere with this relationship is evident in the success and domineering of the industry through time.

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FROM TOPSHOP TO NO SHOP NIAMH BUCKLEY DISCUSSES THE RECENT ACQUISITION OF THE TOPSHOP BRAND BY PROLIFIC ONLINE RETAILER ASOS.

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SOS has taken over Topshop, absorbing it and other brands from the Arcadia group into its corporation. Considering the recent surge in online fashion retail, then this development does not come as a total shock. Personally, I stopped shopping in Topshop a while ago. The products no longer tickle my fancy. Nothing hit the mark quality, design, or pricewise. It was obvious that the one-time retail giant had faded from the high street into almost complete nullity.

It is strange to think that not so long ago, Topshop was considered to be the upper crust of high street shopping. Oh, how times have changed!

In my teens, Topshop was a place of worship. The Oxford Circus store in London was considered the epitome of high street fashion retail outlets. Girls in my school year would come back from their London city breaks and all they would tell tales of the megastore: “sixty stories high, with an instore cupcake concession and I actually saw Alexa Chung there!”

I cannot imagine that it was easy to identify her in a sea of mini wannabes!

Oxford Circus Topshop outlet had that British it-girl association with the likes of fashion icons Kate Moss and Alexa Chung regularly frequenting the store.

Living in Cork, we would go into town after school, picking out whatever abomination we would excitedly wear that weekend at the GAA disco. If you were really going for style, it had to be an item from Topshop. We all remember the MTV crop top, and who could forget the button-up denim miniskirt, you know the one! Items like these were the cornerstones of the teenage girl’s wardrobe- they were the essentials. How did this oracle of youth fashion fade away into irrelevancy?

Firstly, the price has always been extortionate for the quality of garment on offer. But then again, in our youth we were less interested in quality, oblivious to the harsh realities and dubious shortcomings of high street and fast fashion regarding sustainability and ethical production. We paid for the look, the style, clothing that represented the young, fresh and ‘cool’. As our styles evolved, we grew out of our American flag printed denim shorts, but Topshop failed to grow with us. The brand has tried to keep up with consumer tastes, but the issue lies with the shop’s inability to deliver a product that fits the consumer’s desires. Whenever I visited the store (pre-pandemic) nothing seemed to excite me in the way it used to. Add in the huge mark-up and

for me there is nothing that “sparks joy”.

Sustainability has been another big issue in the conversation on fast fashion. In the last decade, the ‘unsustainability’ of the high street has been exposed. Our generation has begun to turn away from fast fashion and has started to look into sustainably and ethically sourced clothing. Vintage and second-hand have become the norm thanks to apps such as Depop, eBay, Vestiaire Collective and ASOS Marketplace just to name a few.

The ease of use in these apps, and the variety available would convert anyone from high-street to sustainable shopping. While Topshop incorporated vintage concession stands into its stores, it was hardly a means of keeping afloat.

In spite of this, the brand may still prosper in finding its new online home at ASOS. Topshop has not been alone in its struggles against modern times, with other retail giants like Debenhams and Oasis closing their doors. In addition to the pandemic and the dire consequences it has had on the retail sector, customers are now in search of sustainably sourced fashion, curbing the demand for cheaply made fast fashion garments. It remains to be seen whether Topshop’s amalgamation into ASOS can restore some of the success that the brand once had.

The Professor's Pen DR. MIRANDA CORCORAN

I

sometimes think that growing up is a process of unlearning the bad, or unhealthy, messages about sex that we invariably absorb in our youth.

Obviously, there are the big failures of education and healthcare to be countered. In my final year of primary school, we were presented with an educational film whose description of sexual intercourse was so laughably bad that it now has close to 800,000 likes on YouTube, where it is listed as “1980's Irish Catholic Sex Education Video.” At seventeen, not long after meeting my first boyfriend, I made an appointment with my GP to discuss contraception.

She told me that I shouldn’t be having sex before marriage. It was 2004.

These were significant lapses on the part of institutions should have been educating young people about safe sex and equipping us to explore our sexuality in a healthy manner. However, there are other lessons I learned – from television, books, magazines, peers – that were equally harmful.

While they now appear

to me as misconceptions, myths or products of youthful ignorance, at the time they were vital, alive and almost tangible. I grew up, of course, before social media, when the internet was still in its post-Windows 98 infancy.

It was also a period – the late 1990s and early 2000s – dominated by postfeminist rhetoric, the belief that feminism had served its purpose and was no longer relevant.

“Feminism” was then a taboo word, discarded by a generation who viewed empowerment as linked to individual success and believed that all obstacles to that success had been dismantled. The turn of the millennium was also the post-Girl Power era. Female sexuality was accepted, even encouraged. However, those years were also the cradle of reality television, which in its worst forms encouraged a voyeurism that taught many young women to view themselves as sex objects, their bodies open for consumption by an implicitly male gaze, rather than sexual subjects, with their own needs and desires.

Worse still, the culture

of that time traded on a confusing, occasionally contradictory binary, that encouraged the objectification of certain female bodies, while also denigrating those same bodies. Girls who were “smart” learned to resent girls who were sexual. We were told that they were vacuous, empty shells.

When I was growing up you could be smart or beautiful, creative or sexy, intellectual or promiscuous. It was a simple binary – very much based on the Madonna-whore complex – and it not only neatly categorised women, it divided them. We weren’t entirely sexnegative, but we did learn that women who were overly flirtatious or too promiscuous were less intelligent, less worthy and somehow possessed of a less vibrant inner life.

That wasn’t all, though.

Here are some of the other bad sex lessons I learned growing up: SEX IS ALWAYS SEXY: The late 1990s and early 2000s were a peak time for teen dramas. I was particularly fond of the supernatural variety and in my early teens

was obsessed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TBH, I still love it). The relationship between smart-talking demonfighter Buffy Summers and her moody, tragic boyfriend Angel was one of the first fictional romances that I followed with any real interest.

When the pair finally consummated their love, it was intense, softly-lit and passionately scored.

As in all teen dramas of the period, they appeared to fall naturally and wordlessly into beautiful, rhythmic lovemaking. I think I must have spent a large portion of my early teens worrying about how I would ever force my own awkward, clumsy body to participate in the beautifully choreographed sex I saw on television and in the movies. It took me a long time to discover that sex is actually quite awkward, often clumsy and occasionally funny. You don’t need to fall into wordless rhythmic passion. You can talk to your partner, laugh with them, make “embarrassing” mistakes and missteps. In fact, talking with your partner both before, during and after sex is highly

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recommended. How else do you discuss consent, boundaries, likes and dislikes? It’s strange that this was rarely if ever represented in the sex scenes of my youth.

SEX IS A NECESSITY: As well as being the high point of angsty teen dramas, the late 1990s and early 2000s were also defined by an explosion of raunchy teen sex comedies. It was the era of American Pie, and sex was framed as vital, essential, a necessity.

In almost every film my friends and I rented from the local video shop, high school and college students were obsessed with sex, desperate to cast off their virginal status. In some ways, this is fine. The years during and after puberty are often characterised by hormonal turmoil and an increased sex drive.

The bad lesson I learned from these films was that sex was linked to social status, or at least that the correct amount of sex conferred a higher level of social status. To be a

46 | FEBRUARY 2021

virgin, asexual or to have a low sex drive was a sign of disfunction and a failure to mature. (Conversely, if a woman was too sexual, she was a slut. Queer sex, if it was ever mentioned, was treated only as a joke or a threat).

SEX IS SHAMEFUL: Although sex was ubiquitous during my teen years, it was also regularly framed as embarrassing.

Anything that deviated from the norm, anything other than the utmost proficiency, anything that referenced the corporeality of the body behind the act was treated as deeply humiliating. Teen magazines were filled with “Embarrassing Stories” pages where girls lamented their failure to expertly perform sex acts and regaled readers with stories of humiliating bodily functions. Sex was good as long as it was performed by perfect bodies in a perfect erotic dance. The shame of sex also extended to its consequences. I remember very few serious discussions of STIs. What

I do remember, though, is being constantly threatened with the humiliating, life-ending punishment of teen pregnancy. 16 and Pregnant was on MTV and the magazines marketed to adolescent girls were filled with tales of promising young women whose hopes had been dashed by an unexpected pregnancy.

Reproduction was a cudgel we were beaten with constantly. I’m old enough to remember when thirteen-year-old SarahLouise Platt’s pregnancy was the most shocking storyline on Coronation Street. I have a distinct recollection of discussing it with friends at a sleepover.

One of them told me that if she was ever in that position, her parents would throw her out of the house.

SEX INVOLVES A PENIS AND A VAGINA: The magazines and television programmes I consumed as a teen inculcated the notion that “real” sex involved penetration and required the presence of both a

penis and vagina. Because so much media at that time was deeply committed to heteronormativity, other sexual configurations were framed as lesser, lacking in legitimacy or seriousness.

You were certainly still a virgin if you had engaged in oral sex or anything involving digits. “Real” sex, it was believed, required a woman to be penetrated by a man. It was certainly liberating to discover that this particular myth is grounded very much in the social construction of virginity and exists primarily to bolster heteronormative, reproductive coupling.

If we’d been able to discuss queer sex or even female anatomy openly, I might have discovered much sooner that the marginalisation of other sexual practices is grounded in homophobia, misogyny and cisnormativity.

I think I am still unlearning some of the bad lessons of my youth. I hope that we all are.

It’s fast-paced, rewarding

and so much more than I imagined.

Graduate Area Manager Programme • €61,000 starting salary rising to €102,850 • Pension • Healthcare • BMW 3 series The Area Manager programme is fast paced. Not many employers would ask you to run a €multi-million business after 15 weeks.

But we trust you’ve got what it takes – confidence, humility and determination. And we trust that you want more, just like us. It’s how you’ll get the best out of yourself, and your teams. But you’ll have plenty of support along the way. With helpful colleagues and your own mentor, you’ll quickly learn everything there is to know and become a great leader. So with ongoing development from day one, a career with Aldi really can take you anywhere.

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