View Post

#Strike4Repeal

In Blog, Highlightsby JamLeave a Comment

Thousands of marchers blocked O’Connell Bridge for a couple of hours on International Womens day in an impressive and well executed direct action at our archaic reproductive rights laws. Since we were on strike for the day in solidarity, here’s our belated rundown.

View Post

A Hundred Thousand Unwelcomes.

In Blog, Highlights, Politicsby rabbleLeave a Comment

Introduced as a six-month temporary solution 16 years ago, Ireland’s policy of effectively warehousing asylum seekers still exists today with figures showing that Ireland refuses asylum to 90% of applicants. Céad míle fáilte? This country is no stranger to emigration, at its highest point only three fifths of those born here stayed. The others left without skills and mostly from the poorest parts of the country. For every 100 migrants that left, … Read More

View Post

Dissenting Drogheda.

In Blog, Culture, Highlights, Music, Politicsby Martin LeenLeave a Comment

Nolan spent many months in Drogheda interviewing people who were involved in the punk community and gathering their stories of dissent including Paddy Dillon who disrupted Sunday mass in the early eighties by letting loose a clutch of hens.

This secret history is documented in the publication ‘Subvert All Power’ Drogheda’s Punk History, in the theatre space of the Droichead Arts Cent which will be launched on Saturday the 27th of August. To coincide with the launch there will be talks of feminist punk culture, 24 hour punk gigs and other goings on.
On Sunday 28th there will be a Parade of Dissent including banners, madzers and music through Drogheda and a punk picnic and a free punk concert.

View Post

Stop the Trams!

In #rabble12, Highlights, History, Politics, Print Editionby Donal FallonLeave a Comment

While Luas Cross City work continues apace in Dublin, there was a noticeable absence of Luas trams at times. The just settled industrial dispute between tram drivers and their employer grew proper bitter at times, yet as Donal Fallon finds it’s certainly not the first major strike involving Dublin’s tram drivers.

While much has changed in recent decades, some things haven’t – there was nothing new about some of the discourse around the recent Luas dispute, depicting workers as overfed and underworked.

If anything would surprise Dubliners of old about the current dispute, it is perhaps the fact there are tramlines at all. When the last Dublin United Tramways Company route closed in July 1949 (the No.8 to Dalkey, for any pub quiz aficionados) many believed they were waving goodbye to a form of public transport for ever.

In the Sunday Independent, one writer made it clear that “I am sorry for the demise of the trams, but as a motorist I just cannot weep for them. They had become an incorrigible block to modern traffic, holding always, as they did, the middle of the road…Yet, the trams are dead, and it is time for them to lie down.” By the 1940s, the tram seemed a relic of the past.

View Post

Imagine a Digital Media Safe Haven.

In #rabble12, Culture, Highlights, Interviews, Politics, Print Editionby Sean FinnanLeave a Comment

In 2009, WikiLeaks released a confidential document listing Iceland’s Kaupthing Bank’s exposure to mega loans. The bank had loaned billions to a golden circle of major shareholders and attempted to manipulate its share price. The state broadcaster, RUV, was gagged from reporting the WikiLeaks exposé. As a result a radical initiative called the International Modern Media Institute received unanimous support in parliament. Sean Finnan spoke to Smári McCarthy, one of … Read More

View Post

The Regime’s Ship Of Fools.

In #rabble12, Culture, Highlights, Politicsby Seamus L. Moore5 Comments

Most of us are familiar with RTÉ’s bias, be it through cosying up to government quarters, lambasting Sinn Fein, or constant under reporting of anti-water charge protests. Seamus L Moore takes a look at their role and service as the national public broadcaster and sets out to answer the age old question of why is RTÉ so shite?

View Post

A Taste Of The Future.

In Blog, Culture, Highlights, Politicsby Jamie Goldrick5 Comments

Deliveroo arrived to Dublin in May 2015. For those of you with your head firmly stuck in the 20th century it’s a service where you can order food from your favorite restaurant via the magic of the internet and have it land at your door. Jamie Goldrick caught up with some of their so called ‘delivery consultants’ who revealed a streak of hidden regressive labour practices. Deliveroo, founded in 2013, now … Read More

View Post

Tuam Babies.

In #rabble11, Highlights, History, Politics, Print Editionby Adrienne Corless3 Comments

When the case of the 796 Tuam babies became global news in Summer 2014, locals there found the then little-known burial ground of the former Mother and Baby home in the glare of the public eye. Adrienne Corless writes about the need to face difficult truths.   A Commission of Investigation, headed by Judge Yvonne Murphy, aims to acknowledge and reveal what was once covered up in the entire country’s … Read More