Friday View 14/01
A Clonakilty photography exhibition to lift the spirits, Cork Nature Network launch new wild map of Cork city, a Dunmanway shop gazumps Minimum Unit Pricing laws for a brief 24 hour window, and more.
Our Friday View: Editorial
Ellie writes:
The killing of a young teacher who was out exercising at a canal-side walk in Tullamore, Co Offaly on Wednesday may be outside the normally local scope of these pages in one sense, but in another, it bears resonance for us all.
A series of vigils and memorials are being organised all over the country for tonight, Friday, and a walk in memory of Ashling Murphy, who died after she was assaulted while out running, will take place at Atlantic Pond in Cork city on Saturday.
The outpouring in response to the horrifying news is laden with both grief and outrage, with much of the response centred around safety for women engaged in everyday pursuits like exercising in public spaces.
Certainly, a statement by Gardaí that a man originally held in connection with the violent assault that ended Ms Murphy’s life was “well-known to them and suspected of being involved in previous violent incidents” would have come as deeply troubling news to many.
This man has now been released and Gardaí are pursuing other lines of inquiry.
Of course, justice must be served in this hideous case, and speculation as to Ms Murphy’s attacker is unhelpful and premature: there will come a day in court.
But in general, there are far, far too many incidents of women being maimed or killed by men with a past history of violence, and it’s an issue that has been highlighted by those who know again and again and again.
Cork expert on gender-based violence Mary Crilly of Cork Sexual Violence Centre has told me in the past, when I’ve interviewed her, about one of her roles, in accompanying survivors to court, and the sickeningly lenient sentences that have been handed down in many instances, for crimes that are red flags for future offences.
Mary and other experts have been raising their voices asking for proper sentencing for men who commit violent crimes, whether sexual assaults or not, against women and girls, for many, many years.
It’s time for these voices to be heard.
In other news
Dunmanway hit the national news this for its Rebel County spirit this week when convenience store Sam’s Gala contrived a creative solution to the controversial Minimum Unit Pricing for alcohol that was introduced in early January: the store posted this notice on their Facebook page…
Having been hailed as a “legend” and a “hero” for less than 24 hours, shop owner Colm O’Sullivan agreed to stop the deal at the request of the HSE on Wednesday, having sold just under 2,000 “plastic glasses” in the promotion.
Out and about
🏛 Exhibition: What I See in Clonakilty. Talented young street photographer Thady Trá is holding his first ever solo photography exhibition in his native Clonakilty from January 15 to January 29. Entitled What I See, the exhibition launch is on Saturday 15 at 5pm in Clonakilty Community Arts Centre.
From endearing portraits of his own family members - see the featured image for this Friday View - to some of the vast collection of images he’s taken on his wanders and at gigs and events, Thady’s work opens doors into his own inner world even as he documents and observes a wide variety of characters and scenes. Worth stopping by.
🎭 Play: Fight Night whizzes by The Everyman for one night only
It’s ten years since Fight Night, a one man show about the comeback of a failed amateur boxer, won audiences’ hearts and critical acclaim. Rise Productions have revived the hit play for a tour of the country and they’re stopping by Cork next Thursday.
There’s a nice synchronicity at play here: third generation boxer Dan Coyle Jr is again being played by third generation actor Aonghus Óg McAnally, who certainly threw himself into the role for this second innings, spending eight months in training to give his boxing the necessary punch, and losing six stone in the process.
Fight Night is at The Everyman for one night only on Thursday, January 20. Tickets and info here.
🌳 Outdoors: If you’re stuck in a rut with where you go for your rambles, Cork Nature Network has launched a new, council-funded Wild Walks Map of Cork city which is sure to rekindle your nature-loving spark and extend your repertoire of regular strolling spots. The map lists 16 urban walks and charts the wildlife found there, from the meadow grasshoppers of Vernon Mount to the shrews of Ballincollig Regional Park.
🧹For the common good: Both Ballyphehane Tidy Towns and the new informal group of cleaners recently established at Pophams Field in Farranree will be out tomorrow, Saturday 15, to clean up their respective areas. More info here:
This week on Tripe + Drisheen:
In response to Monday’s announcement that the Department of Health was to produce a paper on mandatory Covid vaccination, we decided to poll Cork city councillors to find out if they supported or opposed the idea of vaccine mandates. So we called each and every one of them.
The results were so emphatically one-sided that they surprised even us. You can read that news story here:
Subsequently, two of the remaining three councillors not originally contactable in time for the story got in touch: both said they were not in favour, so the graph we originally produced is now…
We think that polling councillors on a variety of issues and letting readers know the results might be one way that we can support local democracy: would you be interested in a regular poll of councillors, both city and county, on a variety of issues? Let us know if you’d like to see more work like this, either as a regular feature or sporadically in response to news events.
The Long Read comes with the Photo of the Week:
We love this image of Terence MacSwiney with his bicycle. We really love it very, very much.
JJ dropped by Cork Public Museum looking for cycling related artefacts for his long read this week, When all Cork cycled, which is about Kevin Long, a man who wants to write a book about the history of cycling in Cork. You can read the full Long Read here:
It’s a great idea to poll the politicians!
However, be careful of interpretation of the results: because someone is ‘not in favour’ of something, does not necessarily mean they are definitely ‘opposed to’.