Research

Research is a lot like driving to a destination in the middle of the night, you have an idea of where you are supposed to go but at every cross roads you meet you are presented with a bewildering choice of roads. Some roads look easier and you take them until you find they lead to the same winding hairpin turns getting infinitely harder to negotiate or find a place to pull a 3 point turn in. You’ve been on these roads, boreens where the next gate seems to be an eternity away and your exhaust scrapes noisily over the raised ridge in the middle of the road, avoiding the craters that are statistical analysis and potential confounds.

Another cross roads leads you in a seemingly straight direction but quickly descends into Silverstone; in the wet. I am not only in search of answers I am in search of a question. I feel the pull of discovery but am overwhelmed by the lifetimes of work already out there. When my supervisor asked me what I want in life I said I wanted to make things better, I wanted to help people. I said that the clinical was the route to that. She said I would fix small things and then throw them back into an unfair system. I couldn’t argue with that. She suggested that proof will cause change. Shaking an angry fist is not as useful as a fist full of proof. Ill get that fist full of proof, just as soon as I find the right road.

So here I go its its dark, I got a full tank, a pack of cigarettes and Im wearing shades.

To hell or to Carrickstown

I’m turning into a twitter addict, its like all the witty people I ever wanted to hang out with when sober distilled into my pocket. The only thing I despair of is the nightly discussions of shows on TV, for the most part I can slag along, because I know exactly who these people are, despite the fact that I have not seen any of these shows. It doesn’t take much talent, just a matter of recalling whoever was on RTE five, ten, fifteen years ago and making some witty comment. When I hear of the massive figures paid to Pat Kenny in RTE I don’t despair of missing whatever they have to offer me by way of entertainment. They cling to nostalgia like a favourite childhood toy, where is the hope of anything innovative, fresh or new coming to a TV screen near you, when the same old thing gets trotted out again and again?

I disconnected the Sky about 2 years ago, not bothered to revert to RTE. I do have a TV in the house, but watch no TV, I have alternatives that fulfil our entertainment needs, we don’t need 60 channels to watch what we want to watch, we don’t even need to tune the set. The Xbox and a USB is all I need to watch high definition, advert free programmes whenever I want. I’ve been online since 1993, I had my first webpage up within 3 months of starting Computer Applications in DCU that year. While I never had much grá for architecture or code, I did love the web; it was a playground. Things were different back then, everything was shared, the internet was a mess, but a wondrous mess, where you had to know or guess the location of stuff and sponsorship, smiley faces and cookies were a gleam in a programmers eye. I’ve played games since getting hooked on Doom in college and still feel a tingle when I hear the noises from Super Mario Bros. With 40% of US gamers now women, Im hapy to welcome the rest of the girls to the fun.

The early days of the internet were the birthplace of ideas, open source and these values continue today, albeit with increasing pressure from large multinationals to create a monetised internet where you get, but only if you pay for it. Anyone that has used Google images for the past number of years will note the decreasing ammount of images available. There are ways around this problem, like all other obstacles put in the way of users, hackers and geeks have refused to be bowed by barriers. As quickly as code to protect material can be written, somebody is working for FREE to break it. Where and how do these freedom fighters fit in with the Capitalist ethos that now threatens the internet? We, hackers, pirates and open source geeks are the new rebel scum for the interweb overlords to shake angry gloved fists at.

We share the shows we want to watch, with no ad breaks and sponsors messages. We are tuned in, but we have chosen another way of experiencing cultural artefacts. The TV goes on, the show is watched and the TV goes off, we are no longer slaves to the remote, because we have escaped, we have taken the blue pill. On the high seas of P2P, we share with others freely, we support the networked users, we are never leeches. The powers that be want this to be termed stealing but I don’t and wont see it that way, am I stealing if I go to a friends house to watch it on ‘the channels’ without making some sort of monetary donation to the host? The same tired rhetoric of ‘sharing is stealing’ gets trotted out time and time again. If I steal something then I have taken the original, if I copy it the original remains. There is a difference...

For those of you still struggling to get past Eircoms laughably weak attempt at censorship I say get thee to hidemyass.com or take my route to the stars straight through the Bays' own proxy server, because what you do on the internet is your business not IRMA's. https://www.ipredator.se/

Image above courtesy of http://morrigan-reborn.blogspot.com/2009/11/jack-o-connor-hurts-pat-kennys-feefees.html check her out!

What does A Stand for?

I've driven vans in the past, big powerful diesel monsters that taught me to value wing mirrors and curse small parking spaces.Nothing could have prepared me for the power trip that was buying and driving a Dodge GMC.Wanda III is pictured here, in all her 80's glory. Feeling 5.5 litres powering a V6 at the tap of a pedal, gears were for fools, this was not so much a van as a time machine, decorated with mirror ball and strip lights I was a king and this was my very, very fast castle. Me and Wanda III parted company last year, but the promise of an A Team movie featuring Wandas cousin had me come over all girly. The Dodge van was always the fifth member of the A Team for me.

The A Team holds a very special place in our hearts, it was a taste of the US that we Irish kids longed for, 4 guys against the world, and nobody got hurt. I always liked the improvisational nature of the teams exploits, seeing them transform a forklift into a battering ram struck a chord with a kid who never had the materials for Mary Kingstons Saturday morning art projects and always had to improvise.

The A Team movie should be a film I'm happy to bring my child to see, but this holds nothing new and nothing of interest.It only reminds us thirtysomethings of lost innocence. There are many elements that one could leave in the 80's and not loose the core of the story. Sexism would be one of the 80's leftovers that you hoped the film would abandon, I dare say that the team could even have been updated to include a female member, but that's just wishful thinking.

The film flounders through set pieces, the set up, the fall from grace and the struggle to regain their name, nothing that the TV show didint do week on week. If you have sat through the TV show of late then you know that uncomfortable feeling you get when you realise all the flaws, plot holes and silliness that you blissfully ignored as a child. You cannot however, in your 30's gleefully abandon reason. The plot treats the viewer like like they are still a prepubescent child and even includes explanations along the way in case you have forgotten the start of the film, twenty minutes ago. The team itself is right, they work well and are likable but the story is an insult to the viewer. When freight containers rain down on the team I found myself wishing they would squish them.

Another major problem is the distict lack of women, something hollywood continues to support with women as set dressing rather than characters in 'blockbuster' titles. Jessica Biel, who plays Capt. Charisa Sosa is the only female character in the movie, she is referred to as Babe, Hot or Sweetheart at every available opportunity. Her sole purpose seems to be to turn up looking 'hot' to explain the simple plot to the simple viewer, all this in 5 inch heels, army issue. I suppose she could never have driven the van in those heels.

They only hung me the right way up yesterday

I committed to the dread act of doing up a balancing statement for Annie Inc. And the prognosis is not good ,even if it was on the books at Anglo it couldn’t look good. Many people have the opinion that we have a generous social welfare system, I only availed of it when I returned to university, I have single mothers allowance for the first time since my son was 1 (he is now almost 14). When I returned to college I had part time work but that has dissolved into the ether that is Ireland post apocalypse last year and all efforts to find work since have been futile.

Incoming I have €225 per week, adding the children’s allowance I have a net of €1050 per month. Out of that comes my mortgage (€500)and loan(€200) ESB(€45) and phone (€50)which total €795, leaving me with a weekly disposable income of €65 euros. To feed and maintain me and my son.

I’ve just cancelled my phone contract so that will be nullified in the coming month, I really don’t know where else to cut a corner. I’ve sold everything I have that was worth anything, I really am seriously in need of ideas here. I cannot keep leaving the Turin shroud on my pillow at night.

Should I leave university, I have a 1:1 so far and really can see no hope in returning to growth this year unless I do. Doing a psychology degree means I have to go for a doctorate if I want to use my skills. I’ve been offered a research doctorate but that means 3 more years of borderline poverty and despite my hopes that I was tough and resourceful and clever, I cannot cut this cloth to fit the task. My grant will come in around the end of October or November, like the last two it will be swallowed whole by my overdraft and my mortgage arrears which have been stacking up for the last year month on month.

I have no more answers...perhaps you do?

The moment of truth

All relationships must have a fulcrum,a centre from which they ebb and flow but must always return, mine seems adrift. I love a man, but I don't know where and when things are going to get better, we seem to only be getting by.
While I did not grow up wanting to be a princess and live in a castle, I knew the struggles of my own parents through overheard conversations. My earliest nightmares were about running out of money, I could not count but I knew what being poor meant and it scared the life outta me.
So here I am looking at 35 this year and I'm broke, he's broke, we are always broke. Being broke will break a relationship, being broke means no nights out, no days out, no holidays. Despite my best efforts to compartmentalise those things into the 'frivolities' section of my brain, they give you something to look forward to. I cannot look forward to 5 years from now.
I am adrift, in the three years that we have built together never once has he had disposable income, working 40 hours in retail a week and never had enough to buy clothes, join gym or bring me out. Being honest, hardworking and nice really does seem to bring you in last. I sound deeply unliberated when I mention him taking me out, but handing over your money for your man to get you a drink at the bar is humiliating, for him.

Broke is not a fun place, broke is not charming or character building or noble, broke is breaking me.

New Families

For the last week we have been beaten with the two parents good: 1 parent bad rhetoric once again, albeit this time its not the lovely Ed Wlashe (who is trotted out to talk on single parents at every opportunity) but the catholic undertow that have been up in arms over gay parenting. The civil partnership bill is a welcome addition to the rights of couples who cannot yet marry. I look forward to full equality being afforded to them, for somethings cannot be changed by simply waiting for society to catch up. If we had waited for people to stop smoking voluntarily we would still be eating our meals in smoky restaurants. Legislation can and does change society.

I cannot ignore the constant rhetoric that children do better in two parent families, its not just an attack on gay fmailies its an attack on mine also. My sons father died when he was a year and a half old, for years I would tear up when watching men play with their children, it was strange how it could hit you out of the blue, an advert, a passing car, a story book, all reminders of what you were not providing. I was strong enough to see that most of the time I was providing more than two parents could, we talked, we shared sleep, we worked together,because there was no-one else, just me and him. I learnt that it was love and not gender that defines your relationship with a child. He has my brother and father and my friends as male influences, people who loved him and valued him. Everything a married couple have I have, or have given him, he has wanted for nothing.

He has learnt that women are strong and capable, that we will use drills and rewire lights, that we change wheels and oil and build walls because there is no one that will do it for you. Single parents are forced to reevaluate gendered roles on a daily basis, we are mam AND dad.So when David Quinn makes statements to lessen my family structure as not in the best interests of the child I question his thinly veiled bigotry. My child deserves the best and he got it.

Smack or whack

The current poll of Irish adults overwhelmingly demonstrates our lack of consideration for children. Repeated efforts on children's rights seem entrenched in petty squabbles and lack of direction. A statement from TV3's Amanda Brunker notes "When the naughty step doesn't work,when the taking the toys away doesn't work I have smacked them hard enough to leave a visible mark. I don't do it often but at least I am honest. People try to be too PC." The smacking debate clearly demonstrates that what happens behind closed doors is not to be interfered with by government.
The Irish times poll indicates that 67% of its online readership consider smacking an acceptable part of raising a child. The comments are, for the most part in favour of smacking as an effective means of raising a child. A well adjusted and suitably chastised child who knows that love and not frustration is the well from which this practice springs.

Lets break down the argument
1: It didn't do me any harm.

Memory, its not as good a record as one imagines it were. It fades, it is notoriously open to interpretation, think back to any event in childhood and more than likely it has been 'polluted' by numerous intrusions, you have a vague recollection but not a crystal clear recall. I urge anyone to read Alice Isens' work on selective memory loss.What happens is that we remember large events but they tend to be 'fuzzy' they lack real clarity, objectiveness and in many cases any basis in reality. I have vivid memories of falling in a pond as a child because I was told about it, not because i remember it.
Think about the last time you fell over, the horrid feeling of loss of control and how frightening it was, you fell over a lot of times as a child but don't remember it so vividly, that is because our minds are designed to protect you from such feelings and they fade, we don't relive them time and time again because it is unpleasant and the nature of memory is use it or loose it. So when you say it did you no harm, it does not mean you remember the harm it did at the time, your just justifying it away.

2:It teaches them right from wrong

Bandura showed that social learning is a more powerful tool than Skinners stimulus:response mechanisms in the 1960's, research since then has proven that what you do is more powerful than what you say. Display it and its a normative behaviour that will be adopted by your children. And its the constant harking back to behaviourism that keeps this mentality alive, children will stop doing what you don't want them to if they associate that behaviour with a painful stimulus. And it has to induce some amount of pain...otherwise its not an effective stimulus, so justification on the basis that its only a 'gentle tap' not only demonstrates a gross misunderstanding of the facts and it shows that your probably lying, to yourself. Children learn more from what they are rewarded for than what they are rejected for, which leads nicely into -

3:I don't want my child to be wandering the streets, if only those kids had been shown some discipline.

Invariably the children wandering the streets were children where a smack and not a word or reward for good behaviour was ever dispensed. So the argument once again falls flat, if those children know that physical punishment will accompany bad behaviour and yet they continue to act in that way then surely the answers lie elsewhere as far as productive parenting.

4: I only do it when I'm calm

I would love to meet the parent who manages to put off punishment until such time as they are completely calm, the idea that one could feel completely in control of ones senses and lovingly smack a child is incomprehensible. When a friend or colleague acts in a way that displeases, you do you suppress all reactions until such a time as you are ready to apply a short sharp smack to their behinds? Why is OK to smack a child and not an adult. If its down to small children's inherent lack of understanding, then why do creche workers not have the 'right' to physically discipline children.?


Lastly I think we need to reassess the use of language, a smack is a hit, smack merely dresses the word up as something benign. Its a well known trick in court for defense council to refer to car crashes with terms like smack, graze and bump. This convinces people that the accident was not as dangerous, careless or serious as words like smash, crash and hit.

The only people that are convinced of carefree childhoods are the ones that have forgotten their own.

Why do Irish turkeys vote for Christmas

Lately Ive been pondering our peculiar and distinctive lack of collective action in opposition to events which unfold with increasing frequency, where some profit and others sink. Most social psychological research into political action focuses on the struggle between minority groups and authority to capture the hearts and minds of the silent majority. But Ireland currently presents with the opposite. The majority are angry, they are cheated, their belts are thrice wrapped round and yet they do nothing.

Begrudgery is a line that continues to pop into my head, and its begrudgery on a national scale that is quiet possibly keeping us in our place. A friend suggested a definition for begrudgery ‘its better that my neighbours horse dies than for me to have two horses’ which sums up some of the definitions I can find. But as I seek to understand this phenomenon in terms of our social selves I am drawn back to Tajfels minimal group studies of the 1970’s, where groups always seek to favour themselves over out-groups.

Consider how you would describe yourself to a stranger you begin with individual attributes then move to your group memberships, it defines part of who we are, and everyone wants those groups to be worthwhile. You are unlikely to associate strongly with groups that do not enhance your sence of self. We are inherently social animals activating various selves when placed in groups, the group norms and behaviours becoming activated depending on where and when you are, or who you identify with. As a supporter at a match its perfectly acceptable to shout at the referee but when the boss makes unwelcome decisions at work we don’t roar abuse at him (though we wish we could) the norms of different group behaviours become ‘active’ depending on the amount by which we immerse ourselves in the group. If you were dragged to the match, you are unlikely to shout because you do not identify with that group, and thus its norms.

Begrudgery seems to follow the Minimal group paradigm, whatever group you are in , you will always seek to maintain the sense that your group is distinct, better than or superior, usually at a cost to the outgroup. In numerous studies it has been proved that it’s not necessarily doing well, its doing better than the other group that matters. It’s all about what you have and more importantly its what the others don’t have. I hypothesise that our system of government based on clientlism and separate counties vying for what’s they see as rightfully theirs will keep us in this situation until such time as there is a complete overhaul of the political system. We protest for OUR hospital, OUR local school, OUR neighbourhood, we deeply identify with the locality and what politics can do for US, but we are impotent in the face of the great system.

When people from Clare or Sligo or Limerick or Carlow seeking to effect change in their neighbourhood know that it has to be brought about through protest at a national level. Perhaps then we will emerge from this young democracy where ‘not making a show of yourself’ might be a whisper and not a rule.

I’d very much like to hear YOUR version of begrudgery below, what do you think it is, please add to this debate.