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Scrap the Irish Language Commissioner

Larbre34

An Coimisinéir Teanga is at it again, forcing an Irish language awareness programme on the Gardaí, a force so stretched and weary they have barely the time and resources to fulfil their role in English, never mind find the time to learn operational Irish.

All told, An Coimisinéir forces a huge amount of wasted expenditure on state bodies, in terms of signage, reports and publications, made available for a population where 95% of the functional language is English.

So, in this time of belt-tightening, is An Coimisinéir a luxury we can afford? Would the money be better spent encouraging the use and love of the first official language willingly and voluntarily, rather than forcibly?

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marienbad

O'Connell just scored a great try in any mans language ! Bualadh bos Pauli ! Welcome back

Coles

Ikky Poo2 wrote: »

Again are you serious?

Where in the name of all that is holy, do you get the idea that someone who spent 14 years in the Irish education system would "probably speak the lanaguge"??

Because he was taught it for 14 years, maybe?

ZeitgeistGlee

Coles wrote: »

And we have established that TG4 doesn't spend the money promoting the Irish language, just like RTE doesn't spend it's €300 million promoting the English language. They provide a television service.

Are you using the royal "we" now Coles? I don't seem to recall "us" establishing that at all. Or by "establishing" do you mean excluding factors which do not suit your argument as you've done to explain the appalling retention of Irish, and adult literacy levels.

Seeing as you haven't answered my previous question I'll ask it again.

Coles wrote: »

I regard everyone who wishes to be Irish as Irish! It's simply a matter of choice. I've been consistent in this.

How do you define someone "wishing to be Irish"?

Please keep in mind that defining someone as being part of a cultural group, or excluding therefrom based on personally-held criteria is exactly what the BNP (the group you've compared others in this discussion to) do.

Wibbs

Coles wrote: »

I'll could remind you of some of my contributions to this debate if you like? How about establishing (wityhout challenge) that the State spends little more than €15 million per annum promoting the Irish Language?

When I posted details of TG4's budget, first you denied it and incorrectly said they got a modest amount of direct state support, the rest from ads and overseas sales. When I showed that they got the vast majority of their budget(30 million in 07) from direct financing from the exchequer, you ignored that completely and started on about their quality programming. Avoiding and misdirecting as per usual.

When the education figure was mooted you responded by ignoring the opinion of one of the best educators this country has ever produced who had forgotten more about education in Ireland than either of could ever know.

Here's a recent opinion piece on the matter
Some extracts;

"It is estimated that we spend something around €1bn a year just teaching Irish. Other programmes add to that cost. Foras na Gaeilge supports 19 Irish promotion organisations with state funding. Television service TG4 got €32.75m in current funding from Government last year. Its audience stands at something around 2% of the population. Raidió na Gaeltachta has, it is believed, an even smaller audience though official figures are not available. It may be assumed that funding for RnaG pushes the bill for Irish language broadcasting towards the €50m mark for just these two outlets."

"Though Irish was afforded official language status by the EU in 2007 a recent report suggested the language had been spoken just nine times by ministers at EU meetings in the last two years. In the EU parliament Irish took up just 0.23% of the speaking time during plenary sessions up to May 2012."

It's actually beyond ridiculous at this stage, given the utter failure of uptake of the language among the vast majority of Irish people. Well unless you include those who can just about struggle to get through asking can I go for a pee.

Actually on the topic of the Gardai;

This marginalisation[of the language] was highlighted yesterday when An Coimisinéir Teanga launched his annual report in Galway. Coimisinéir Seán Ó Cuirreáin revealed that gardaí are to get a laminated card carrying useful phrases in Irish. This follows instances where a garda competent enough in Irish to deal with the public through Irish was not immediately to hand.

Laminated cards for what is apparently "our native language"? Imagine the Gendarmerie having to carry laminated cards of common French phrases. You could not make this Swiftian farce up.

Basically if you think the Irish language costs this state only 15 million euro a year you're living in cloud cuckoo land, or willfully ignoring anything that doesn't agree with your narrow view.

ZeitgeistGlee

Coles wrote: »

Because I compared a vocal minority group who don't value diversity to the BNP? The comparison seems fair enough to me. But who exactly has been abused?

Yes, this "vocal minority group" you seem to repeatedly make reference to when responding to posters you disagree with as opposed to referring to the posters themselves.

I know judging by your previous comments about our intelligence you don't hold us to be particularly bright but while I may not be accomplished in Irish I certainly did enough maths to be able to put two and two together. :rolleyes:

Coles

@Wibbs. You're flogging a dead horse trying to say that TG4 spends theri money on the Irish Language. It's just not true. It's a television service.

Coles wrote: »

And we have established that TG4 doesn't spend the money promoting the Irish language, just like RTE doesn't spend it's €300 million promoting the English language. They provide a television service.

Coles

ZeitgeistGlee wrote: »

I may not be accomplished in Irish I certainly did enough maths to be able to put two and two together.

That's actually not very impressive.

ZeitgeistGlee

Coles wrote: »

@Wibbs. You're flogging a dead horse trying to say that TG4 spends theri money on the Irish Language. It's just not true. It's a television service.

Out of pure curiosity then Coles, if TG4 does not exclusively spend their money on the Irish language, how many of their programs are broadcast in English?

RTE is broadcast through English because it is the majority and de facto official language of the country, and yet it still makes time for broadcasts in Irish.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

An Coilean wrote: »

That is the conclusion that the official investigation into the incident came to.

No, they brought him back to the station to speak Irish. As I pointed out, even the report says there is no onus on the Gardai to deal with situations as the arise in Irish - just to make serivces available.

Coles wrote: »

Because he was taught it for 14 years, maybe?

Are you sure? No one taught me.

Coles

@Wibbs. wtf. I have asked that you provide some data to support the €1 billion a year figure. Please don't keep trotting it out until you can support it. Please.

ZeitgeistGlee

Coles wrote: »

That's actually not very impressive.

It wasn't intended to be because your attempts to insult people under the veil of "vocal minority" doesn't require an adult level of cognisance to see through.

Still dodging the questions though I see.

Coles

Ikky Poo2 wrote: »

Are you sure? No one taught me.

What did you do with your time?

Coles

Ikky Poo2 wrote: »

No, they brought him back to the station to speak Irish. As I pointed out, even the report says there is no onus on the Gardai to deal with situations as the arise in Irish - just to make serivces available.

Would it be reasonable for an English speaker to be handcuffed and detained simply because the Garda said he wasn't competent in the language?

taytothief

Wibbs wrote: »

"It is estimated that we spend something around €1bn a year just teaching Irish.

Wahwah. What's your view on how much we spend on teaching poetry, French, Spanish, religion, advanced mathematics, etc etc etc, on and on and on. Although, I doubt you've read up that much on those have you? Irish though, we definitely shouldn't be spending money on that, should we.

"I have travelled across the length and breadth of India and I have not seen one person who is a beggar, who is a thief. Such wealth I have seen in this country, such high moral values, people of such calibre, that I do not think we would ever conquer this country, unless we break the very backbone of this nation, which is her spiritual and cultural heritage, and, therefore, I propose that we replace her old and ancient education system, her culture, for if the Indians think that all that is foreign and English is good and greater than their own, they will lose their self-esteem, their native culture and they will become what we want them, a truly dominated nation."
Thomas Macauley

ZeitgeistGlee

taytothief wrote: »

"I have travelled across the length and breadth of India and I have not seen one person who is a beggar, who is a thief. Such wealth I have seen in this country, such high moral values, people of such calibre, that I do not think we would ever conquer this country, unless we break the very backbone of this nation, which is her spiritual and cultural heritage, and, therefore, I propose that we replace her old and ancient education system, her culture, for if the Indians think that all that is foreign and English is good and greater than their own, they will lose their self-esteem, their native culture and they will become what we want them, a truly dominated nation."
Thomas Macauley

Back to "the Brits did it to us!" again are we? Funny I seem to recall voting in an election for Dail Eireann and not Westminster a while back.

Coles

ZeitgeistGlee wrote: »

...the Brits did it to us.

I certainly agree that it's worth looking at the historical context of the inferiority complex that many Irish people feel towards their own culture.

Good point.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Coles wrote: »

What did you do with your time?

What time? I'm not able to account for every minute of my childhood.

Coles wrote: »

Would it be reasonable for an English speaker to be handcuffed and detained simply because the Garda said he wasn't competent in the language?

No. But then this has never happened to an Irish speaker either.

He requested to be delt with in Irish, and we've poitned out repeatedly, the handcuffs were probably OTT.

Iwasfrozen

Coles wrote: »

I certainly agree that it's worth looking at the historical context of the inferiority complex that many Irish people feel towards their own culture.

Good point.

The thing is, and it's been told to you many times but you just ignore it. The Irish language is not a defining characteristic of our culture. It may be for individuals but definitely not for the country as a whole.

opti0nal

An Coilean wrote: »

That is the conclusion that the official investigation into the incident came to.

But you said he was arrested for 'speaking Irish'.

It should only be a right to receive services in Irish, where Irish is a person's only language and they would otherwise lose other rights (not just the right to speak Irish).

English should be recognised as our first national language.

An Coilean

Teamshadowclan wrote: »

So reading through the report, some things jump out...

For one, the Gardai say he was not arrested for speaking Irish but because....

To be honest, this seems reasonable enough to me. Obviously it doesn't to you. So I wonder An Coilean, had you been in the Gardai's position and didn't know enough Irish to conduct the meeting with the guy who just broke the law, how would you have proceeded? Forget what they SHOULD be able to do. What would you have done?

As I see it, the situation is as follows. They pull over the man, who insists they speak Irish to him. They can't...what happens next in your head? They can't just let him go. They can't sit on the side of the road while they wait for an interpreter to be found and arrive on the scene. At this stage, it seems logical they take him to the station where he can be detained (though not arrested, imo) until they find someone who can help matters proceed. But do you see it differently?

Its an interesting question, the Garda was put in a dificult position because of the failure of the organisation both to put an appropriate proceadure in place and to informe members of the force of their obligations under the law to accomodate the use of Irish.

Personally I can't see myself arresting anyone for choosing to speak Irish, a far more reasonable responce would be to phone the station and ask to be put in touch with an Irish speaking Garda who could help with the situation.

What I find interesting here is how this was, then, an unprecedented situation. In all the decades of the "rules" being in place, they had not encountered a situation which led to the Gardai deciding on a procedure to deal with such situations. You'd think it would have arose before if there were so many people desperate to conduct their businesses in Irish.

Its far from unprecented that someone would choose to use Irish when dealing with the Gardaí, that they were arrested as a result other hand might be. The report indicated that prior to this, the Gardaí have been relying on an ad hoc approch based on members of the force fluent in Irish being available, where they were not available, presumably those who desired to use Irish were forced to use English.

Fortunatly for people who want to speak Irish, the issue has been brought to light by this persons stand and a repeat of this incident should be avoided by an apropriate procedure that does not involve the needless arrest of members of the public, being put in place by the Gardaí.

Lord TSC

An Coilean wrote: »

Personally I can't see myself arresting anyone for choosing to speak Irish, a far more reasonable responce would be to phone the station and ask to be put in touch with an Irish speaking Garda who could help with the situation.

And if such a Gardai isn't available at that moment?

And I still reject the premise he was arrested because he spoke Irish; he was arrested because he broke the law and would not/could not communicate his details to the Gardai. There's a difference there....

shruikan2553

A question for the people who think we should speak irish. Why? What logical reason outside of a hobby is there for it, how is my life any better?
People have every right to speak whatever language they want but you cant expect everyone to speak it as well. I have no interest in learning polish or Spanish but I don't hate the languages.

ZeitgeistGlee

Coles wrote: »

I certainly agree that it's worth looking at the historical context of the inferiority complex that many Irish people feel towards their own culture.

Good point.

Is that really all you can do now Coles? :rolleyes:

Still waiting for your response about what constitutes an 'Irish person' to you by the way.

An Coilean

opti0nal wrote: »

But you said he was arrested for 'speaking Irish'.

He was arrested because of a failure of the Gardaí to accomodate his right to speak Irish.

It should only be a right to receive services in Irish, where Irish is a person's only language and they would otherwise lose other rights (not just the right to speak Irish).

Why? If someone wishes to conduct their business with the state through Irish, why should they be forced to use English?

English should be recognised as our first national language.

Good luck with that.

An Coilean

shruikan2553 wrote: »

A question for the people who think we should speak irish. Why? What logical reason outside of a hobby is there for it, how is my life any better?
People have every right to speak whatever language they want but you cant expect everyone to speak it as well. I have no interest in learning polish or Spanish but I don't hate the languages.

My answer to that question is that I could not care less what language if any you choose to speak, as long as my right to speak Irish is respected.

That is the problem for some people in ths thread, they simply can not bring themselves to respect the choice of Irish speakers who wish to speak Irish.

opti0nal

Teamshadowclan wrote: »

And I still reject the premise he was arrested because he spoke Irish; he was arrested because he broke the law and would not/could not communicate his details to the Gardai. There's a difference there....

Irish language enthusiasts raise issue the level of the 'right to speak Irish' as if it were as important a human right as that of access rights for disabled people.

It's just a ploy to create more work for Irish speakers or, alternatively, a way of increasing the Irish-speaking population by coercion. It's an offense to disobey directives from the Irish language commisar.

opti0nal

An Coilean wrote: »

That is the problem for some people in ths thread, they simply can not bring themselves to respect the choice of Irish speakers who wish to speak Irish.

Irish speakers insist on forcing English-speaking children to speak Irish. Where's the respect there?

An Coilean

Teamshadowclan wrote: »

And if such a Gardai isn't available at that moment?

And I still reject the premise he was arrested because he spoke Irish; he was arrested because he broke the law and would not/could not communicate his details to the Gardai. There's a difference there....

If you could not find a Garda capable of telling you how to say 'What is your name' and 'Where are you from' in Irish. Then there is something seriously wrong with the Gardaí as an organisation.

clairefontaine

An Coilean wrote: »

My answer to that question is that I could not care less what language if any you choose to speak, as long as my right to speak Irish is respected.

That is the problem for some people in ths thread, they simply can not bring themselves to respect the choice of Irish speakers who wish to speak Irish.

I guess the problem is not your right to speak Irish, but your expectation for the cops to speak it back to you or to understand what you are talking about.

Coles

ZeitgeistGlee wrote: »

What constitutes an 'Irish person' to you by the way.

Another interesting question. I have a very open definition, but it's based on the person making a conscious choice. If they have chosen to identify themselves as Irish then that's good enough for me. I suppose it also requires an allegiance to the land and a respect for the native tradition, heritage and culture. I find most people who lack this really don't want to be considered 'Irish' and usually choose another identity. Like you guys.