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The Magdaline laundries

  • 03-02-2013 12:21am
    #1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,619 ✭✭✭


    I wanted to watch a movie tonight and went to my dvd collection and picked out the magdaline sisters movie.

    I know it's only a movie but it's based on true events and it's probably not a patch of what went on in those laundries.
    Truly shocking

    After my movie, I browse online for a bit on my mobile and I stumble across a newspaper piece from the journal.ie, I think, about the magdaline laundries from two days ago.

    More shame is due to be brought upon Ireland again next week. On Tuesday the 5th feb, a tribunal report on the madgaline laundries will be issued. I didn't know this. Last laundry/work-house was closed in 1996. And it's taken 17 years for a report. And that's it. Just a report. Any compensation or justice for the poor women tortured in those laundries?

    Another disgrace for Ireland.


«13456

Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 14,380 ✭✭✭✭Banjo String


    ilovesleep wrote: »
    I wanted to watch a movie tonight and went to my dvd collection and picked out the magdaline sisters movie.

    I know it's only a movie but it's based on true events and it's probably not a patch of what went on in those laundries.
    Truly shocking

    After my movie, I browse online for a bit on my mobile and I stumble across a newspaper piece from the journal.ie, I think, about the magdaline laundries from two days ago.

    More shame is due to be brought upon Ireland again next week. On Tuesday the 5th feb, a tribunal report on the madgaline laundries will be issued. I didn't know this. Last laundry/work-house was closed in 1996. And it's taken 17 years for a report. And that's it. Just a report. Any compensation or justice for the poor women tortured in those laundries?

    Another disgrace for Ireland.

    Its not a fcukin chimney.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,632 ✭✭✭Aint Eazy Being Cheezy


    They'll be airing all their dirty laundry in public.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 46,938 ✭✭✭✭Nodin


    SamHall wrote: »
    Its not a fcukin chimney.

    ???


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,496 ✭✭✭Boombastic


    how much do they charge per wash? Have they any self service machines?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 305 ✭✭Kichote


    Where am i supposed to get my clothes washed now??


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,429 ✭✭✭branie


    You're not a man of God!


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 9,768 Mod ✭✭✭✭Manach


    Not as if nearly every single western country had done similar or a lot worse during that period - that will not stop does who seek to perpetually denigrating Ireland.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 12,456 ✭✭✭✭Mr Benevolent


    To be fair, they got the stains out of my clothes.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 284 ✭✭HTML5!


    ilovesleep wrote: »
    the magdaAnother disgrace for Ireland.

    It's not really another disgrace.

    I'm pretty sure it's been included in our current list of disgraces given that it was hightlighted when the film came out 10 years ago.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,972 ✭✭✭orestes


    Manach wrote: »
    Not as if nearly every single western country had done similar or a lot worse during that period - that will not stop does who seek to perpetually denigrating Ireland.

    Cool, can you give us some examples of other instances of state-sanctioned denial of women of their liberty and their human rights by a religious institution with no accountability based on its own twisted sense of morality leading to endemic physical, emotional, psychological and sexual abuse?

    You know, since it was apparently going on pretty much everywhere at the time.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,072 ✭✭✭Max Power


    ilovesleep wrote: »
    I wanted to watch a movie tonight and went to my dvd collection and picked out the magdaline sisters movie.

    I know it's only a movie but it's based on true events and it's probably not a patch of what went on in those laundries.
    Truly shocking

    After my movie, I browse online for a bit on my mobile and I stumble across a newspaper piece from the journal.ie, I think, about the magdaline laundries from two days ago.

    More shame is due to be brought upon Ireland again next week. On Tuesday the 5th feb, a tribunal report on the madgaline laundries will be issued. I didn't know this. Last laundry/work-house was closed in 1996. And it's taken 17 years for a report. And that's it. Just a report. Any compensation or justice for the poor women tortured in those laundries?

    Another disgrace for Ireland.

    You're a disgrace.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,801 ✭✭✭Ruudi_Mentari


    My stepfater was in one and he sure doesn't say much.. the bristles of his moustache probably have a lot in common with the iron bars that kept him in the laundries!!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 248 ✭✭GoldenLight


    ilovesleep wrote: »
    I wanted to watch a movie tonight and went to my dvd collection and picked out the magdaline sisters movie.

    I know it's only a movie but it's based on true events and it's probably not a patch of what went on in those laundries.
    Truly shocking

    After my movie, I browse online for a bit on my mobile and I stumble across a newspaper piece from the journal.ie, I think, about the magdaline laundries from two days ago.

    More shame is due to be brought upon Ireland again next week. On Tuesday the 5th feb, a tribunal report on the madgaline laundries will be issued. I didn't know this. Last laundry/work-house was closed in 1996. And it's taken 17 years for a report. And that's it. Just a report. Any compensation or justice for the poor women tortured in those laundries?

    Another disgrace for Ireland.


    Like yourself, I watch the movie, and thought this is just drama, for drama sake. But I have worked in a institutional care facility from 1986 to 1992 on and off, run by the eastern health board, and the number of women that where put in their because they just became pregnant out side of wedlock was just crazy.

    I'm looking forward to this report, because it was and is a huge disservice to the people who went through that toture. I know for a fact that within my a mediate family their has being at least 1 birth out of wedlock in the 40's, at least 2 (the first great grand children in the 70's) I come from a huge family. Why would anyone deny themselves family based on what society thought. (I know simplistic, in our live to day but what people did) thankfully it has changed now.

    But their is still people dealing with that nightmare.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,681 ✭✭✭ColeTrain


    It would make you sick thinking of the power the church held back then.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,458 ✭✭✭senorwipesalot


    You hardly expected the clergy to wash their own spunkstained underpants.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,619 ✭✭✭ilovesleep


    The last laundry closed in 1996 which if you think about it wasn't all that long ago.

    Nazi concentration camps closed in the mid 1940s.

    Nazi style concentration camps in the form of laundries for women, in Ireland and the last one closed 17 years ago. They should never have been allowed to stay open for so long.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,037 ✭✭✭✭PopePalpatine


    Manach wrote: »
    Not as if nearly every single western country had done similar or a lot worse during that period - that will not stop does who seek to perpetually denigrating Ireland.

    Oh, how predictable. Don't you think that the abuse of women by religious institutions, which was enabled by successive governments deserves condemnation? Oh wait, Church's reputation > human rights.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,458 ✭✭✭senorwipesalot


    ilovesleep wrote: »
    The last laundry closed in 1996 which if you think about it wasn't all that long ago.

    Nazi concentration camps closed in the mid 1940s.

    Nazi style concentration camps in the form of laundries for women, in Ireland and the last one closed 17 years ago. They should never have been allowed to stay open for so long.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika_Laundry


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,327 ✭✭✭Madam_X


    Manach wrote: »
    Not as if nearly every single western country had done similar or a lot worse during that period - that will not stop does who seek to perpetually denigrating Ireland.
    Seriously. I hate the "I'm ashamed to be Irish" stuff too (why would people who are not responsible apart from being born here feel ashamed?) but firstly, nearly every single western country did not do similar or worse during that period. And secondly, even though there were horrific atrocities carried out in other countries during that time period... so? Does that somehow lessen the seriousness of this system?
    ilovesleep wrote: »
    The last laundry closed in 1996 which if you think about it wasn't all that long ago.

    Nazi concentration camps closed in the mid 1940s.

    Nazi style concentration camps in the form of laundries for women, in Ireland and the last one closed 17 years ago. They should never have been allowed to stay open for so long.
    The laundries stayed open until 1996 as homes for the women who had been there most of, or all of, their lives and were institutionalised. The system of imprisoning pregnant girls there was long over by 1996.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    It is a disgrace but not an unexpected one. I dont know anyone that was in the laundries but then again I dont know anyone of african descent who was in south africa pre democracy. The shame is some of the nuns who are still alive are not in prison.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 248 ✭✭GoldenLight


    Madam_X wrote: »
    The laundries stayed open until 1996, as homes for the women who had been there most of, or all of, their lives and were institutionalised. The system of imprisoning pregnant girls there was long over by 1996.

    As I stated in an earlier post it wasn't just the RC it was our govnerment as well, who put women into hell holes. Just go back and read my orginal post, those women are still being institutionalisation to this day.

    Either way all of it's horrific care on


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,775 ✭✭✭✭Gbear


    You're a disgrace.

    Your face is a disgrace!


    BOOM!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 248 ✭✭GoldenLight


    Gbear wrote: »
    Your face is a disgrace!


    BOOM!

    What do you mean??


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 886 ✭✭✭bb12


    a lot of countries have dirty little secrets...

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization

    was particularly shocked about this subject when i recently discovered sweden's involvement in it


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,678 ✭✭✭jjbrien


    As I stated in an earlier post it wasn't just the RC it was our govnerment as well, who put women into hell holes. Just go back and read my orginal post, those women are still being institutionalisation to this day.

    Either way all of it's horrific care on

    Sometimes i wonder if eamon de valera was a hero or a criminal it was his idea to give the church a special place in the constitution which in turn allowed the church to get up to all these sins

    If you also look at Song for a Raggy boy again another shocker but thats very mild at what the church did to young women and men


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,972 ✭✭✭orestes


    bb12 wrote: »
    a lot of countries have dirty little secrets...

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization

    was particularly shocked about this subject when i recently discovered sweden's involvement in it

    Did you really have to link to an article that states one of the most culturally progressive countries in the world once practiced systematic sterilization directed towards travellers and people considered to be a burden to the welfare state? AH is gonna bloody explode!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,327 ✭✭✭Madam_X


    orestes wrote: »
    Did you really have to link to an article that states one of the most culturally progressive countries in the world once practiced systematic sterilization directed towards travellers and people considered to be a burden to the welfare state? AH is gonna bloody explode!
    Sweden was a totally spearheading nation of eugenics.

    /stirs sh1t :pac:


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,655 ✭✭✭delw


    Kichote wrote: »
    Where am i supposed to get my clothes washed now??
    Jaysus, have you not got your clothes washed since 1996?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    As a victim of abuse I can safely say I'm not ashamed of the irish. It was Irish people who helped me back onto the road to recovery. When I told most of my mates about what happened to me they have went out of their way to help me. Irish people have nothing to be ashamed about, The individuals who commited these crimes do but they do not represent the Irish as a whole.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 27,944 ✭✭✭✭4zn76tysfajdxp


    bb12 wrote: »
    a lot of countries have dirty little secrets...

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization

    was particularly shocked about this subject when i recently discovered sweden's involvement in it

    Bloody Swedes.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,972 ✭✭✭orestes


    Madam_X wrote: »
    Sweden was a totally spearheading nation of eugenics.

    /stirs sh1t :pac:

    Sure, they got a country that is a modern utopia of civil rights populated by blonde haired, blue-eyed beautiful and happy people with an amazing standard of living and a thriving economy whilst also maintaining their cultural identity during the homogenisation of Europe, but does that make it right?

    Hang on, I think I've made a mess of this one...


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 10,076 ✭✭✭✭Czarcasm



    Bloody Swedes.


    The dirt was bound to turnip eventually.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,383 ✭✭✭✭gammygils


    SamHall wrote: »
    Its not a fcukin chimney.
    Nodin wrote: »
    ???
    It's a quote from the movie.
    When the van drivers assistant was looking under Bernadette's skirt he
    was smoking a cigarette. She says ''It's not a fcukin chimney''


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,930 ✭✭✭Jimoslimos


    It was awful shocking what went on in the laundries and elsewhere in Ireland. As a maturing nation we should take note and accept a degree of collective responsibility for what occurred and strive to ensure it doesn't happen again.

    However the desire for self-flagellation and self-hatred is overboard and dare I say it, a bit Catholic.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    Jimoslimos wrote: »
    It was awful shocking what went on in the laundries and elsewhere in Ireland. As a maturing nation we should take note and accept a degree of collective responsibility for what occurred and strive to ensure it doesn't happen again.

    However the desire for self-flagellation and self-hatred is overboard and dare I say it, a bit Catholic.

    Bang on the money.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,048 ✭✭✭Da Shins Kelly


    Jimoslimos wrote: »
    It was awful shocking what went on in the laundries and elsewhere in Ireland. As a maturing nation we should take note and accept a degree of collective responsibility for what occurred and strive to ensure it doesn't happen again.

    However the desire for self-flagellation and self-hatred is overboard and dare I say it, a bit Catholic.

    I often think of Germany when stuff like this is brought up. They've accepted what happened during the war, taken on the responsibility and have all kinds of memorials and such to commemorate those who died and make sure it's not forgotten and that everyone is educated on the matter without resorting to guilt-tripping and self-loathing. It's quite a positive and reverent attitude to the whole thing. It seems like so many Irish people just revel in guilt and shame though, and I actually think that is detrimental to progress and stops people from actually addressing the problems and moving on.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 159 ✭✭catchery


    The laundries stayed open until 1996 as homes for the women who had been there most of, or all of, their lives and were institutionalised. The system of imprisoning pregnant girls there was long over by 1996.[/QUOTE]

    this is untrue my friend was with 12 girls in one with older residents when she was pregnant in1992 she was 16! cannot and never has spoken of it


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,839 ✭✭✭✭padd b1975


    catchery wrote: »
    The laundries stayed open until 1996 as homes for the women who had been there most of, or all of, their lives and were institutionalised. The system of imprisoning pregnant girls there was long over by 1996.
    this is untrue my friend was with 12 girls in one with older residents when she was pregnant in1992 she was 16! cannot and never has spoken of it
    You really do have to blame the girls family in this case.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,619 ✭✭✭ilovesleep


    Jimoslimos wrote: »
    It was awful shocking what went on in the laundries and elsewhere in Ireland. As a maturing nation we should take note and accept a degree of collective responsibility for what occurred and strive to ensure it doesn't happen again.

    However the desire for self-flagellation and self-hatred is overboard and dare I say it, a bit Catholic.

    The upcoming report will highlight so much and ireland will turn a blind eye and brush it back in under the carpet where according to some here, it shouldn't have been swept up at all.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 58 ✭✭Mouldy Mary


    In my day girls behaved themselves because they didn't want to be sent to the Magdalen Laundry. There was no reeling around drunk and nearly naked in town at the weekend. Not every change is for the better.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 14,380 ✭✭✭✭Banjo String


    Nodin wrote: »
    ???


    Infamous line from the movie.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,472 ✭✭✭✭Grayson


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    As a victim of abuse I can safely say I'm not ashamed of the irish. It was Irish people who helped me back onto the road to recovery. When I told most of my mates about what happened to me they have went out of their way to help me. Irish people have nothing to be ashamed about, The individuals who commited these crimes do but they do not represent the Irish as a whole.

    I'd disagree. We do have something to be ashamed of because we allowed these institutions. The state supported them.

    The fact that other countries did horrible stuff doesn't lessen our guilt.

    I think that these facts should be widely known. They should be taught in school the way the holocaust is in germany. We, as a nation, behaved terribly. That doesn't mean that irish people can't be nice. There are plenty of germans both now and during the 30/40's that were nice. But we should, as a nation, realise that we are collectively responsable for letting it happen.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,472 ✭✭✭✭Grayson


    padd b1975 wrote: »
    You really do have to blame the girls family in this case.

    And the parish priest and the GP. They were probably both involved.

    Institutions like that never operate in the shadows. They need the acceptance of local people, including those with influence in the community, to operate.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 305 ✭✭Jimminy Mc Fukhead


    In my day girls behaved themselves because they didn't want to be sent to the Magdalen Laundry. There was no reeling around drunk and nearly naked in town at the weekend. Not every change is for the better.


    It's nice when people of their own free choice choose high standards for themselves.

    Virtue at the end of a barrel of a gun isn't worth a whole lot.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 12,395 ✭✭✭✭mikemac1


    jjbrien wrote: »
    Sometimes i wonder if eamon de valera was a hero or a criminal it was his idea to give the church a special place in the constitution which in turn allowed the church to get up to all these sins

    Wikipedia has a good article about it
    The State recognises the special position of the Holy Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church as the guardian of the Faith professed by the great majority of the citizens.

    The State also recognises the Church of Ireland, the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, the Methodist Church in Ireland, the Religious Society of Friends in Ireland, as well as the Jewish Congregations and the other religious denominations existing in Ireland at the date of the coming into operation of this Constitution.

    And it was the majority of the citizens.
    Nothing outrageous there. Nothing legal, no defined extra powers.

    I'm not sure what I was expecting but it looks pretty tame to me


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 20,919 ✭✭✭✭Gummy Panda


    SamHall wrote: »
    Its not a fcukin chimney.
    Nodin wrote: »
    ???

    When the milk lad is looking at the dark haired ones fanny he blows smoke onto it and she says "Its not a fúcking chimney"


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,472 ✭✭✭✭Grayson


    mikemac1 wrote: »
    Wikipedia has a good article about it



    And it was the majority of the citizens.
    Nothing outrageous there. Nothing legal, no defined extra powers.

    I'm not sure what I was expecting but it looks pretty tame to me

    I disagree with any mention of religion in the constitution except maybe a statement regarding fredom of belief. But yeah, that is pretty tame.

    Unfortunately in practice it meant that the catholic church ran the laundries, 99% of the primary schools, most of the secondary schools and the hospitals.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 12,395 ✭✭✭✭mikemac1


    Aye and we didn't have MRSA from badly run and dirty wards

    HSE could learn something from the nuns and the ward sisters


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 318 ✭✭Assassin saphir


    In my day girls behaved themselves because they didn't want to be sent to the Magdalen Laundry. There was no reeling around drunk and nearly naked in town at the weekend. Not every change is for the better.
    Are you for real????
    So girls who go out at the weekend, get drunk and wear skimpy clothes deserve to be locked up, beaten and put to work?
    The magdalene laundries didn't solve anything, they ruined the lives of thousands of women.

    Shame on you!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,327 ✭✭✭Madam_X


    Are you for real????
    So girls who go out at the weekend, get drunk and wear skimpy clothes deserve to be locked up, beaten and put to work?
    The magdalene laundries didn't solve anything, they ruined the lives of thousands of women.

    Shame on you!
    Don't give them what they want. They're either sick or a troll and there's no talking to them. They actually said when it comes to North Korean death camps that the prisoners shouldn't commit the crime if they don't want to end up there. And they said women who don't wear a skirt to a job interview don't deserve a job. :D
    Ironically, even though girls were "more well behaved" back then, several of them still got raped and sent to those hell-holes. A victim-blamer refuses to see these things though, especially a misogynistic woman. Logic: long departed.


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