Poacher turned gamekeeper wrote:
Quote:
If you look at the photographs and videos from the protest at North Frederick Street where housing activists occupied and vacated an empty building, the obvious question is : whose side were the gardaí on?
Perhaps this is an unfair question, but it’s one plenty of people following the events online and on the streets will ask. After protestors marched to Store Street garda station, they stood outside chanting “Who do you protect? Who do you serve?”
Unidentified men men wearing balaclavas emerged from a van to enter and then seal the property on Tuesday. The photographs show them standing at a door with gardaí in the foreground. The garda were also wearing balaclavas. Garda sources say they are part of the Public Order Units protective uniforms and have have also said that the Garda involved would have been concerned about reprisals on foot of being identified on social media.
This may well be the case but if anyone was seeking images or an incident to stoke the embers of an incendiary mood in Dublin, they need look no further. For the gardaí to enter the fray in this manner, masked and brandishing batons, was brutish and foolish. The housing crisis is emotionally charged, and on North Frederick Street, the gardaí merely escalated the situation. Protestors were arrested, some ended up in hospital. What’s going on?
https://www.google.ie/amp/s/www.irishti ... mode%3DampInevitably Una seeks to hop on the bandwagon....surprisingly I happen to agree with some of what she says...
Unsurprisingly, a number of the activists involved in the occupation the other evening are veterans of the abortion referendum campaign where they proudly documented online their dismantling of pro life posters around Dublin. I was derided by a number of contributors to this site at that time for suggesting that many of the classically liberal minded supporters of that campaign would do well to take note of the broader objectives of a subsection of prominent repealers who viewed it as a means to advance an entryist hard left agenda of rather than simply a question of access to abortion services.
It's worth pointing out that 10 years ago, a referendum on the extinguishing of the rights of the unborn would have stood zero chance of passing in Ireland. If the likes of Una and her cohort are fully on board with this, and it comes to be appropriated as the next hot ticket after abortion by the trendy brigade, who's to say property rights couldn't go the same way ? Seems fantastical now but so did Brexit and trump....
FYI. There was in interesting reversal on the streets of Dublin between 1983 and 2018. Although on both occasions the Yes side canvassers / supporters greatly outnumbered the No side canvassers / supporters. Such is the vagaries of politics. What was very different between 1983 and 2018 was in 2018 the very much in the minority No canvassers were politely ignored on all occasions I saw them whereas I personally witnessed in 1983 the No canvassers of the time being verbally abused and personally threatened on several occasions on the streets in Central Dublin. One particularly nasty occasion on Kildare St comes to mind. As for removal of posters No posters may have been tampered with in 2018 but one thing I did not see in 2018 was No posters torn down and left for all to see. Which was a fairly common sight in Dublin in 1983. Thinking back I dont think I remember seeing a single No poster anywhere outside Dublin in the lead up to that referendum.
As for Frederick St, just the usual media attention whores deliberately creating high profile incidents so they can get attention and ultimately money for their own pet projects. A cynical stunt pure and simple. Got zero to do with the accommodation problem. Which Dublin has always had. Its always been an expensive place to rent, with terrible choice, low quality stock and mostly terrible landlords and essentially non existent tenants legal protection. Little has changed in the last forty odd years. Nothing new about any of this.
So some stupid media stunt will do nothing to change any of that.
Want a better functioning market with housing? Then for a start how about evicting the tens of thousands of people who defaulted on their mortgages knowing full well that the dysfunctional Irish legal system would not deal with them like in other countries. Or promptly evicting the cute hoor farmers in Meath and their ilk. Hundred of those scattered about the country. And how about a French style property tax on all empty properties. That should bring at least 80% of the 200K unused properties onto the rental / resale market. And as the planning / zoning system does not work in Ireland and never can given its political culture just abolish it completely. A simple engineering integrity / safety permitted process, nothing more. Then you will have large amounts of "affordable" housing built in short order.
But the people behind Fredrick St have no interest in any of these workable solutions because there is nothing in it for them. They are just another group of hucksters and hustlers in it for their own ends. Their own personal gain.
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