Our FactCheck editor details the internet trends seen by a thirty-something-year-old man.
It Started With an image posted to a far-right Facebook page.
I spotted it while I was scrolling early on Saturday afternoon: a map of Ireland with six red dots in a ring outside Dublin, and a caption in block capitals that read “National fuel protest assembly points Tuesday 7am”.
Soon I saw others share the same map, or AI slop pictures of trucks with the same details about assembly points for Tuesday morning, almost exclusively on pages that usually share far-right and anti-immigrant content.
Plans for a protest had, of course, been building in the days beforehand, but the images were my first glimpse into this online callout for people to go to Dublin.
They appeared in my feed because of the types of pages I monitor for work, but their reach extended far beyond those spaces over the course of the weekend.
It’s never easy to tell how big these things will be from early on, though it quickly became clear from my social media feeds that the protest was underway virtually – even though roads and motorways were clear.
Continue @ The Journal.
Seems like every protest against the state is to be branded and tarnished as the work of ‘far right’ by pompous rags and journalists, who can all surely afford to absorb the fuel and energy costs with ease.
ReplyDeleteGowain, we are used to more thoughtful reflection from you. Whether they can afford to or not detracts not in the slightest from what is in front of our eyes.
DeleteIt would be ill advised to ignore the far right phenomenon at play in this.
Just as it would be foolish to ignore the very real grievance that the far right tries to exploit.
I have thought about it.
ReplyDeleteI agree there will be unsavory elements attracted to such things. That doesn’t mean it has to destroy the intent. But it is clear the main stream media will use ‘Far Right’ as a buzz word and sweeping statement to discredit totally. There is never any attempt to recognize or empathize with others involved and often on the periphery of society. I suppose the FF/FG coalition and heavy tactics of Gardai and Army are worthy of more support and sympathy than protestors. I don’t think so.
The far right are all over it with tactics straight out of the MAGA far right play book. There is no reason to believe that the intent of protestors and the intent of blockaders are necessarily synonymous. In the Journal article there is a clear understanding of what motivates many people - good intent. When the Garda clear Love Ulster mobs of the streets people don't complain much. Clearing the blockades seems much less heavy handed than imposing them. Why are Shannon airport, the Israeli and US embassies, Trump's golf course not blockaded? The Coalition, which I am very much opposed to over the Gaza issue, did not start this war which led to the fuel shortage and price hikes. The US and Israel did but they are getting a pass from the protestors and the blockaders.
DeleteRead a Previous article on here. Can the Left March to Victory while Losing the Working Class?
ReplyDeleteThe answer is No!
The Left is not going to march to victory any time soon. They will not do it if they leave the working class behind. But this is not a working class blockade. How many working class people have the money to own these vehicles? This more resembles a dispute between various strands of capital. My own hunch on the basis of data-short observation is that it is what the Marxists have long defined as a petty bourgeoisie putsch type thing. This stratum historically and sociologically is the birth canal of fascism. I would refrain, however from describing this situation as a fascist one. But we should resist any temptation to glamorise or romanticise it as a working class revolution. It is anything but.
DeleteStill, it is always good to have your input. You have long been a voice against injustice and have never defended the far right.
You are correct in so far the last thing I want to do is glorify it. Maybe I am going with gut instinct.
ReplyDeleteBut I will stand with any working man who is to lose the ability to run a business or to put food on the table or to pay his mortgage. Yes, by in large some of those at the coal face may own expensive machinery and have money involved, but this is what such work requires, and if you look at the numbers in terms of fuel expenditure per day at the current rate it doesn’t add up, they are being run into the ground.
Yet the protests were and are about so much more, it is about time FF/FG were held accountable. Frankly, the ends justify the means. Workers are workers at the end of the day, and if we can’t stand with the farmer then forget about solidarity with anyone else. Irrespective of the price of fuel a great many people in Ireland can’t afford to get a house, rent is through the roof, the price of food is getting to extortionate levels and the list goes on. If one looks beyond the haulage firms and farmers the strike resonated far beyond that to the frustrations of many others on the periphery of society. None more so than those living in rural Ireland who depend on reasonable fuel costs, let us consider the likes of the house painter or the small construction outfit with a van who won’t be getting any jobs when people are only fit to spend any money they have to put fuel and heating oil in the tank.
All things considered I think events for the last few days are a win and not a loss.
I find it admirable that people will stand by a working person who is struggling economically. That person has a genuine grievance. But the legitimacy of a grievance does not transfer in unmediated fashion to the methods used to redress the grievance. If that were so it would be a licence to abuse.
DeleteIf you acknowledged the wealth and property of the blockaders then is seems a small step to take to avoid identifying the blockade as a working class protest as I think you said in your piece. Have you thought about the structural tendency of these property owners to push wages down at every opportunity in order to push profit up?
The government should be doing more to alleviate the situation. but we have been asserting this for years in relation to housing, Gaza, the Health service inter alia.
Long before the blockade people have been trying to hold the government to account. But the ends justify the means is a consequentialist argument that has been used by Israel, the US, the Soviets and every repressive regime in history. Process legitimises outcome, Gowain, not the other way round. Otherwise, you give the government you oppose the justification to clear the streets whatever way it can on the basis of ends justifying means. And they will just quote you right back at you.
There is no reason for workers to stand with farmers and ranchers who have got where they are on the backs of the labour of those they exploit. There is every reason to stand against them. Workers standing with the rural poor, who are exploited by these farmers and ranchers is something else entirely. But there is no reason for any of us who believe in justice to share the same space as those who call for money to be taken from IPAS centres and given to the blockaders, or who say they don't give a toss if Greta Thunberg is raped, or who are so wealthy they actually are able to accumulate a half million in unpaid taxes, or who wish to rant at Paul Murphy about the gender of his child, or who shout Fuck Palestine. Is Conor McGregor really concerned about the welfare of Irish mothers or is he more concerned with cultivating MAGA support? MIRA (Make Ireland Rape Again) he can stick where the sun don't shine.
We are all affected by the fuel crisis - prices will go up and we will feel the pinch. But deliberately targeting the innocent is what makes a difference between action being justified and crossing the line. We have rights but others have them too.
Morning. Sentiments expressed are taken and understood. But the polls taken during the protest were clear, support for protest was wide spread, with vast majority from voters from all opposition parties, left and right leaning. The protest clearly tapped into the frustrations of those who are more anti establishment than not. Yes it was hijacked by those wedded to the Far Right but sure what is new? To let that alone diminish from the protest is a mistake in my view. The polls show support was from across the political spectrum. Leaving a political mine field for SF and definitely PBP. But for me it is possible to disagree with people on issues but still stand in the same room and agree with them on another separate and well defined issue when it matters.
ReplyDeleteGowain - there is huge unhappiness with the situation and as you say enormous support for 'the protest.' But in a piece following your own on TPQ the author rightly drew a distinction between protesting and blockading. In my view wealthy people used the assets that their wealth has brought them to launch an assault not on the state but on society in general including the most vulnerable. I actually observed the wealthy tax dodger claim that the blockade was not inflicting disruption to people trying to make hospital appointments. I also observed a cancer sufferer outlining how it had. I know who I believe. The health service here is creaking, people are desperate to make their appointments, those without wealth depend on the public transport system - yet here we have the 'let them eat cake' types displaying a callous disregard for their victims. I would certainly stand with you - and I would stand with conservatives on single issues that are in themselves societally advantageous - but I would not stand with the hate vendors.
DeleteEven were the Left and trade unions leading the blockade I would still oppose it because of its failure to discriminate between the powerful and the powerless.
The far right was integral to the blockade and hijacked the protestors concerns for position not for principle.
And, yes, you properly pose the strategic question of alliance building which the Left so often can be deficient on but this has to be managed in a clear headed way that does not allow an attitude to settle in that our enemy's enemy is our friend. This is how the Tankies have ended up supporting right wing capitalist aggression in Ukraine.
I have just read that piece and am seriously impressed by it. But such facts were not known to me at the time, and then also surely not known to others who supported the protest for what they felt were genuine grievances. If such facts were known would I have felt differently about it. Probably. But I still would have sympathized with all other protestors. To a degree the protest / blockade worked as per government pledging 500m euro to alleviating fuel/energy costs. A vote of No Confidence is also to follow by opposition parties. So in spite of questionable tactics from blockaders, something has came from this. We will see how that pans out I suppose over the next few weeks.
ReplyDeleteI hope, like yourself, we all lack the hubris and have the humility to amend our position when presented with something different to the point that it is more persuasive.
DeleteSpace opening up is important but for whom it opens up is the strategic question that should be asked before prising it open with initiatives such as votes of confidence.