Magdelene Laundries - Eugenics by another name?

metrovelvet

Dudess wrote: »

Frightening. In 2003 my friend fathered a child - casual fling. He saw his son pretty often and when the little boy was four, his mother and my friend got together (for the sake of their child - not a good idea ultimately, but that's a different thread) and it was only then that my friend felt brave enough to tell his parents that they had a grandson :eek:

His mother, extremely status-seeking as well as staunch catholic (that's another dimension to the horror of the institution system - there was shocking hatred of poor/working class people) didn't want to know. One wonders how she would have handled it had it been her daughter who broke the news she was becoming a parent...

My friend got divorced in 2004 in the US!!! and never told her grandparents, let them die never knowing.

K-9

Dudess wrote: »

Frightening. In 2003 my friend fathered a child - casual fling. He saw his son pretty often and when the little boy was four, his mother and my friend got together (for the sake of their child - not a good idea ultimately, but that's a different thread) and it was only then that my friend felt brave enough to tell his parents that they had a grandson :eek:

His mother, extremely status-seeking as well as staunch catholic (that's another dimension to the horror of the institution system - there was shocking hatred of poor/working class people) didn't want to know. One wonders how she would have handled it had it been her daughter who broke the news she was becoming a parent...

Yep, I was in fear of telling my mother about my son, his mother would have been 5/6 months pregnant by the time I told her.

She'd have been very Catholic and old fashioned but mainly it was shame at what would extended family think.

Because an extended family member was having a Christening at the same time as my baby, she wouldn't go into the chapel, the shame of an illegitimate child.

It took her a couple of years and some cold shouldering to cop on. Now she laughs at "young ones these days".

Strange thing is she'd have been very modern for her time, had her own hairdressing business in the late 50's, did her own thing, fierce independent streak which continued through marriage, had poor Dad tortured and raised sons to be self dependent.

Looking back it was the shame and what would the neighbours, community, family members think? that played a far bigger role than the Church, though it was an intrinsic part too.

It explains a lot of things in conservative Ireland and many cover ups.

My sisters adopted mother would have given birth in 1973 and unmarried, gave the child up for adoption. She was working in Dublin and never told her family down the country. Poor women.

KittyeeTrix

My mam was taken by the state in Dublin at the the age of one and a half and entered into an Industrial School down the country. She was "slow" as the term was used back then!!!

She was starved, beaten etc for many years and then set to work in the adjoining Magdalene Laundry from about the age of 11-12.
She was kept working in the laundry up until she began to continually run away at about the age of 21.
We were shocked to see that the Sisters of Mercy (oh, the irony:mad:) had doctored her records to make it seem that she had left them at the age of sixteen.

She had no family at all and so had no-one to look out for her and let her know that legally she could have left. She'd been there since she was a year and a half old and didn't know any different..... They kept her for another 5 years and paid her nothing giving her dogs abuse.............
Jesus, words cannot expresss the deep seated hatred I have for them:(

They had her down on paper as working outside of the Laundry as a domestic for a local family when this had never occurred, false signature and everything.

I wouldn't have believed how underhanded these orders were only for the fact that I have witnessed firsthand the evidence myself!!

Dudess

Jesus Christ Fluffy - how can you bear it?! It's actually criminal what those ***** did... :mad:

KittyeeTrix

Dudess wrote: »

Jesus Christ Fluffy - how can you bear it?! It's actually criminal what those ***** did... :mad:

I know.............
She actually found a sister only 4 years ago but her mom had died only a year before that!!

I started internet searching and discovered that she was in an industrial school after we had thought for years that she was in a convent, how innocent we were even at the time:(

We have met her sister numerous times as she only lives in Scotland and me and my new Aunty have a very close relationship.......partly cos' my mum is not empathetic and has issues forming close bonds (all due to her messed up childhood)........

We are headed to Belfast on Tuesday where we will meet my mothers Aunt who has travelled all the way from Canada so we are very excited. We also will be seeing the burial place of my mothers grandparents...

Has been a rollercoaster over the years but has definitely been worth it.

Morag

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2011/0622/1224299385729.html

The Irish Times - Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Áras an Uachtaráin among users of Magdalene laundry

PATSY McGARRY, Religious Affairs Correspondent

A LEDGER for a Magdalene laundry in Dublin’s Drumcondra reveals that its regular customers included Áras an Uachtaráin, Government departments, Guinnesses, some of Dublin’s leading hotels and golf clubs, Clerys, the Gaiety theatre and Dr Steevens hospital in the city.

It was run by the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity who operated two in Dublin, one at High Park in Drumcondra and the other on Seán Mac Dermott Street, the last Magdalene laundry in Ireland which closed in 1996.

The ledger was found at the High Park laundry during the exhumation of Magdalene women’s remains there in 1993 when the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity sold off land to developers after losing money in an investment in Guinness Peat Aviation.

Permission was sought to exhume 133 bodies for cremation and interment in a mass grave in Glasnevin. In the exhumation process a further 22 bodies were found which the congregation could not account for.

The ledger, which covers October 20th 1980 to March 18th 1981, has since come into the hands of the Magdalene Survivors Together group, whose director Steven O’Riordan brought it to the attention of The Irish Times yesterday.

It discloses that, including those listed above, regular customers for the laundry, believed to be the one at High Park, included the Department of Justice, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Fisheries and CIÉ. Dublin hotels such as Buswells, the North Star, the Ormond, Skylon, the Sutton Castle, as well as Portmarnock and Clontarf Golf clubs. Included also are religious congregations in the city. Dublin airport, and the Bank of Ireland were also regular customers of the laundry.

An entry for Áras an Uachtaráin, dated March 2nd 1981, lists a bill of £10.84 while one for Guinnesses, dated March 23rd 1981, lists a bill of £10.89. The Department of Fisheries was billed £3.25 on March 16th 1981, while the Department of Agriculture was billed £6.92 on February 9th 1981. The Department of Justice was billed £20.28 on January 19th, 1981.

Some of the larger bills are for hotels with the Sutton Castle billed £88 on December 15th 1980 and Buswells £69, on the same date. Portmarnock Golf Club was billed £2.84 on December 2nd 1980 while that for Clontarf Golf Club on November 17th 1980 was £7.59. The Gaiety theatre was billed £4.65 on January 12th 1981.

I wonder did they know it was slave labour or if they thought they were doing charity, giving those women work and a place to live.

Acacia

I never really thought about the laundries/ industrial schools as a form of eugenics, but it's an interesting take on it. They've always seemed to me to more like concentration camps i.e. a place where an 'undesirable' group of people is contained. Even if you look at the uniforms, etc of the Magdalene women, they're kinda similar to those worn by women in the concentration camps of WW2. That is, they're designed to completely take away their femininity, if not their humanity.

I think the whole thing is a shameful, disgusting epsiode in Irish history. For all the faults of the Celtic Tiger, at least the country become cosmopolitan enough and dare I say, well off enough, to not need the good 'teaching and guidance' of the Catholic Church, and their bullsh1t was exposed for what it really was.

I often think of my parents and grandparents and wonder "Why didn't you do anything about this?" Maybe they didn't know what really went on, or couldn't have done anything even if they did. I remember my grandmother talking one day about a cousin or something of hers ( she was a bit rambly, and I couldn't really follow her) who got pregnant and was sent off to a laundry. I tried to find out more but my granny just didn't know. "Oh, she just went off to the nuns and we never saw her again." Heartbreakingly sad.

Teddy_Picker

Just having a little bit of a think on this again and just wondered...how could (in most cases) adult women be incarcerated,against their will, having broken no law(in some cases, victims of crime themselves)? I know the kind of grip that Catholicism had on the nation in the last century, but how was it that grown women could be treated like that?

I think I read somewhere that in order to be released a "reliable" relative who could vouch for them, (and met with the nuns' approval :rolleyes:) would have to approach the laundry...

Did false imprisonment not mean anything to anyone then?!

Dudess

People's minds were warped - I can see it in my grandmother today, the absolute terror religion has over her. I'd say she's afraid every second thing she does is a sin...

Yeah, the eugenics angle resonated with me quite a bit more when I read Fluffyorganic's account above of what happened to her mother. The way she was removed from "normal" society as a toddler due to being "slow"? Chillingly like a system the nazis had. I remember reading an article (wished I hadn't read it and I remember actually having a good few drinks afterwards, it was that upsetting) about an institution under the nazi regime where children who weren't "normal" were sent - children who wet the bed, children who had cleft lips, children who were hyperactive, etc.

Inmates of the industrial schools here (not sure about the laundries but I've no doubt it was the same) were assigned a number each, and would be referred to by that, not by name. There's something terrifyingly brutal and inhumane about that I think. And again, chillingly nazi-esque... :-/

expectationlost

there that film sunshine and oranges about the hundred thousands kids taken from care and their parents and sent to australia from the uk up until the 1970's a eugenics of kind trying to get as many whites into australia to outdo the aborginis, im sure some irish went aswell

getz

expectationlost wrote: »

there that film sunshine and oranges about the hundred thousands kids taken from care and their parents and sent to australia from the uk up until the 1970's a eugenics of kind trying to get as many whites into australia to outdo the aborginis, im sure some irish went aswell

it was intended to give the orphans in the UK good homes with adopive parents,but like all things many of them ended up with parents who abused them,when in australia they were out of UK control and some were not looked after by the australian goverment as they should have been,but it should also be remembered that over 95% of the children were adopted well. from the late 1940s on the UK had many 1000s of orphans as many were left without parents who were killed or never came back from the war,ireland was far different the catholic church had complete control of the minds of its goverment and citizens,if the church said this or that,who was going to tell them they were wrong,who was the authorities going to believe ,you or the local priest ? the UK sent their children to australia with the best of intentions,i sailed on a ship called the captain cook in the early 60s as a seaman, which for the some of £10 families could travel and live a new life in australia, tens of thousands did and many also came back ,

expectationlost

getz wrote: »

it was intended to give the orphans in the UK good homes with adopive parents,but like all things many of them ended up with parents who abused them,when in australia they were out of UK control and some were not looked after by the australian goverment as they should have been,but it should also be remembered that over 95% of the children were adopted well. from the late 1940s on the UK had many 1000s of orphans as many were left without parents who were killed or never came back from the war,ireland was far different the catholic church had complete control of the minds of its goverment and citizens,if the church said this or that,who was going to tell them they were wrong,who was the authorities going to believe ,you or the local priest ? the UK sent their children to australia with the best of intentions,i sailed on a ship called the captain cook in the early 60s as a seaman, which for the some of £10 families could travel and live a new life in australia, tens of thousands did and many also came back ,

no they didn't they stole kids from their parents as part of plan.

Wibbs

Agreed. In the Australian Aboriginal kids cases it was a clear and admitted plane to "civilise" them. Even if the adoptive parents were good and kind ones(and many many were) that was the overall plan afoot.

getz

expectationlost wrote: »

no they didn't they stole kids from their parents as part of plan.

i think this is what you are looking for,those who suffered the harshest treatment were catholic boys who were sent to bindoon,a isolated institution north of perth ,the catholic christian brothers ran it,children built it,british children were forced to do hard labour until they were 16 years old,some of them had unimaginable abuse inflicted on them,the practice continued untill 1967,

CDfm

expectationlost wrote: »

no they didn't they stole kids from their parents as part of plan.

Agreed.

The organisations that did this were largely run and led by women.

Edit I am having a paralell discussion with Nhead in History

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=72934864&utm_source=notification&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=notify#post72934864

CDfm

getz wrote: »

i think this is what you are looking for,those who suffered the harshest treatment were catholic boys .........,the practice continued untill 1967,

I find this a very difficult subject as the practices by these may have copied those of the nuns as a "business plan".

getz

CDfm wrote: »

I find this a very difficult subject as the practices by these may have copied those of the nuns as a "business plan".

it was the children organisations in the UK who mainly sent these children they had in care overseas,some went to canada some to australia, a health department document drawn up for migrant families describes how a number of organisations including bernardos, the salvation army,the childrens society and some catholic groups were involved in sending children abroad, makes you think if any of them were bothered what happend to the kids once shipped out ,and did they get money out of it /

CDfm

I like the way the UN etc are tacking the Irish Government ,but, what I dont like is how individual civil/public servants etc who had a role in monitoring and reviewing and authorising payments to such organisations have not been held to account.

If a lorry driver gets drunk or drives dangerously and causes damage they are held to account and prosecuted. If a doctor does she or he face disciplonary action.

This has not happened and should.

Ickle Magoo

CDfm wrote: »

Agreed.

The organisations that did this were largely run and led by women.

Well, the RCC is not run by women - and the bizarre attitudes they had towards sexuality, periods, sex and pregnancy was not shouted from the pulpits by women - but I get your point.

There have, unfortunately, been plenty of abuse scandals all over the world as the kind of people who think beating and abusing children is acceptable were drawn to the opportunities orphanages and laundries handed them but it's those who gave their kids over to these places that I really can't understand. Who was in charge of checking on these kids and establishments? Why haven't charges been brought against those involved as they have elsewhere?

CDfm

Ickle Magoo wrote: »

Well, the RCC is not run by women - and the bizarre attitudes they had towards sexuality, periods, sex and pregnancy was not shouted from the pulpits by women - but I get your point.

Thats not the way it works.

Religious orders are autonomous bodies in their own right who say the operate according to catholic principles. The RCC is not a unified or hierarchical structure very similar to how your local motor dealer is a member of SIMI http://www.simi.ie/

What is hierarchical is the diosecean structure -effectively -the Church of Rome who report to their bishop and here it is put simply

The college of bishops

<script src="http://adserver.adtechus.com/addyn/3.0/5308.1/1371284/0/170/ADTECH;target=_blank;grp=467;key=false;kvqsegs=D;kvtopicid=507284;kvchannel=HISTORY;misc=1308852974154"></script&gt; In Roman Catholicism the college of bishops is the successor to the college of the Apostles; the earliest mention of the office of bishop is found in the New Testament. Every Roman Catholic bishop is a bishop of a place—either a proper area, or jurisdiction, of which he is the ordinary (as he is called in church law), or a fictitious place, a see no longer existing, of which he is named titular bishop

A religious order like the Dominican Nuns have their own organisational structure and will have their own leader who is not a church official but selected by the order. The Christian Brothers the same.

So there is a huge difference between the RCC and Religious Orders.

Who was in charge of checking on these kids and establishments? Why haven't charges been brought against those involved as they have elsewhere?

+1

Ickle Magoo

What's not the way it works? You think the puritanical views were individually dreamt up? The influence the church had in this country was not directly proportional to how puritanical and acceptable such establishments were? I beg to differ.

CDfm wrote: »

So there is a huge difference between the RCC and Religious Orders.

That's as may be, my only experience of abuses in a care homes was at the hands of the RCC...

metrovelvet

Ickle Magoo wrote: »

Well, the RCC is not run by women - and the bizarre attitudes they had towards sexuality, periods, sex and pregnancy was not shouted from the pulpits by women - but I get your point.

There have, unfortunately, been plenty of abuse scandals all over the world as the kind of people who think beating and abusing children is acceptable were drawn to the opportunities orphanages and laundries handed them but it's those who gave their kids over to these places that I really can't understand. Who was in charge of checking on these kids and establishments? Why haven't charges been brought against those involved as they have elsewhere?

I think cdfm hs a good point and it's not often I agree with him. I brought this up earlier in this thread, the cruelty bestowed upon women by other women, and I brought it up becuse this topic was introduced as a gender issue.

The Christian brothers however are equally as culpable for what they did to boys. As were other denominations.

However, I am hesitant to say this is RCC policy as it seems specific to Ireland, if you look at the Magdalene Laundries, the sex abuse scandals, and the physical abuse. The other hot spots of scandals are Boston, Chicago and Australia, three spots of tremendous Irish exports and parish.

I dont believe Italy, France, or Spain, Portugal,other Catholic nations in recent history has such sadism in its legacy as Ireland does.

Ickle Magoo

While there may be concentrated media hotspots - there have been sex abuse cases/scandal in no less than 27 countries regarding one single religious denomination. Do you think that's purely co-incidental? There is nothing about how that denomination operates with regard to its clergy or its views on sex that could possibly be a link?

metrovelvet

Ickle Magoo wrote: »

While there may be concentrated media hotspots - there have been sex abuse cases in no less than 27 countries regarding one single religious denomination. Do you think that's purely co-incidental? There is nothing about how that denomination operates with regard to its clergy or its views on sex that could possibly be a link?

But the huge huge scandals have been in Ireland and its extended parishes, ie Boston and Chicago.

It even made southpark with some joke about Irish kiddie fiddler priests. Sorry cant find it now on youtube.

Magdalene Laundries open until 1997. Ireland.

I dont believe it has anything to do with its views on sex. It didnt happen anywhere else like it happenned here. I do believe it may have something to do with Irish views on sex, which are different from French and Italian and American views on sex, and you may have something there. I deeply suspect that a lot of the violence in this country, the sadism, the cruelty, illustrated brilliantly in JB KEAN's "THe Field" grows at the bitter roots of repressed eroticism.

Ickle Magoo

Where did irish people get their view on sex? Have they not just been huge, huge here because we live here? There have been plenty huge scandals in other countries that just caused smaller ripples here. I think much of the comedy material has come from the reticence to allow full investigation, full disclosure and the lengths some have gone to defend what went on or brush it under the carpet.

I'm not convinced its just an irish thing - as I say, my only experience of nuns abusing was in Scotland by a Scottish RC nun - who was later charged and prosecuted, it seems the only difference is accountability, tbh...

Dudess

getz wrote: »

i think this is what you are looking for,those who suffered the harshest treatment were catholic boys who were sent to bindoon,a isolated institution north of perth ,the catholic christian brothers ran it,children built it,british children were forced to do hard labour until they were 16 years old,some of them had unimaginable abuse inflicted on them,the practice continued untill 1967,

I saw a drama series called The Leaving of Liverpool about that - orphaned/"illegitimate", impoverished catholic children were sent to Australia as it was so under-populated. Horrific.

Women having a say despite the catholic church being patriarchal... it kinda reminds me of The Handmaid's Tale (love that book!) - a society, albeit evangelical christian, that is both matriarchal and misogynistic. Women did have a say all right, as long as they marched to the beat of a particular drum. My gran is a lovely, kind woman, but occasionally she'll say something pretty awful in relation to a woman or women - this is what she was reared to believe though.

metrovelvet

Ickle Magoo wrote: »

Where did irish people get their view on sex? Have they not just been huge, huge here because we live here? There have been plenty huge scandals in other countries that just caused smaller ripples here. I think much of the comedy material has come from the reticence to allow full investigation, full disclosure and the lengths some have gone to defend what went on or brush it under the carpet.

I'm not convinced its just an irish thing - as I say, my only experience of nuns abusing was in Scotland by a Scottish RC nun - who was later charged and prosecuted, it seems the only difference is accountability, tbh...

I don't know really where they got it from. My grandfather was both a scientist and an Irish historian and he would talk about the Jansensits coming to Ireland and how the influence contaminated the culture. I don't know much about it, I just remember him talking about it.

It also would seem to me that there is a lot Victorianism that still hung about, being post colonial that stuff sticks.

metrovelvet

Dudess wrote: »

I saw a drama series called The Leaving of Liverpool about that - orphaned/"illegitimate", impoverished catholic children were sent to Australia as it was so under-populated. Horrific.

Women having a say despite the catholic church being patriarchal... it kinda reminds me of The Handmaid's Tale (love that book!) - a society, albeit evangelical christian, that is both matriarchal and misogynistic. Women did have a say all right, as long as they marched to the beat of a particular drum. My gran is a lovely, kind woman, but occasionally she'll say something pretty awful in relation to a woman or women - this is what she was reared to believe though.

Its kind of like saying Muslim women have a choice about their burkha or niqab and they WANT to wear it. Yes that is partially true, but when you are so alienated from your own subjectivity and wants, you do what your told and the cleverest most insidious powers convince you that is what you want.

Dudess

If you're told attractive women are temptresses enough times from early childhood, you're gonna start believing it - whether you're male or female...

metrovelvet

Dudess wrote: »

If you're told attractive women are temptresses enough times from early childhood, you're gonna start believing it - whether you're male or female...

Well.... nothing wrong with that...nice to acknowledge and tap into the inner siren...