Are you a Caveman?

Irish TD for media Pat Rabbitte says those who do not watch TV are Cavemen

Well, on the news front. Mr Rabbitte will be introducing the household broadcasting charge. It will come in to effect on Jan 1^st 2015, sheer totalitarianism.

          RTE will be introducing a new childrens channel. Get them younger. With libraries closing down with school costs rising and more

and more children going to school on an empty stomach because their parents can’t afford to feed them, I was going to say, you’d wonder whose interests are being served here but you don’t have to wonder, as if the children didn’t have enough distractions as it is.

         During the recent abortion legislation it was the same pro abortion media. On a couple of instances he was on the Pat Kenny show, where he would refer to pro life people as, ‘so called Pro life people’. I texted him saying ‘his chickens would come to roost’. Not much later he was told by RTE that his front-line TV programme was being axed. RTE said they couldn’t pay a presenter over 500,000 euros per annum. So poor Pat said he was leaving rte. He was by far their most celebrated presenter with RTE for 41 years. He would be an RTE version of Terry Wogan. Even more of a celebrity than Wogan would be in England. He has however picked up a lucrative post with Newstalk Radio with a 2,500,000euros for a 2 year contract. Newstalk is an ultraliberal station, pure poison, with programmes of graphic content even in the afternoon. It has what I can only describe as a homosexual apologetic programme on a Saturday evening. The first guest on Kenny’s programme 2^nd Sept was the archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin, very much loved by the media.

          A headlines in the irish times last month ran, ‘new abortion law used in irish hospital’, it was misleading, giving the impression that a woman’s life had been saved by the introduction of the abortion law. Though the legislation has been signed into law it hasn’t actually received a commencement order. Hence the lies and bias from the media. The headquarters of this newspaper were picketed by sixty protesters protesting at this coverage.

        On a Saturday afternoon in July just before the abortion legislation was introduced over 60,000 people took to the streets of Dublin to protest at this legislation. I listened to a news bulletin on Spirit radio after the march. It is a Christian broadcasting station. On a previous march they had a correspondent on the ground and had given an accurate account of proceedings with accurate numbers of people. However on this occasion in their bulletin they said 30,000 people marched. I couldn’t believe my ears. So I rang up the station to inform them that they were in error as regards the figures they were giving out. They put me through to the person in charge who explained that their news team were on holiday their staff were all volunteers and they were using Newstalks news bulletins. But I said you can’t give out false reports it would be better to have no bulletin than these false figures.  He said he knew the figures were wrong and said he felt terrible himself when he heard the misreporting. He said, by law they were required to have a news bulletin and that they could lose their licence if they didn’t. I explained it would be better to run the gauntlet of the law than to misrepresent actual figures by such a wide margin and also stated that those who were promoting life were coming under constant attack from the secular media and I thought I could have expected better from a Christian broadcaster. He kept on apologizing and saying he had no choice. There had also been a small counter demonstration by pro abortionists numbering about 200 yet the same report put their numbers at five thousand. It was incredible. When he was apologizing I said to him ‘it seems to me in a similar situation you would do the same again’. He just kept reiterating that he had no choice. He said he would put the director of the station in touch with me when he came back from holidays. I said ok but he never got in touch. No credit to the government for implementing a law that forced them to do that yet even so they should have been able to see right and wrong and acting accordingly. Looking back on the incident you can see the irony of the situation. Here was a station set up to proclaim truth yet wouldn’t proclaim a truth in case they would lose their licence to proclaim the truth. The Pontius Pilate situation springs to mind. It also reminds me of a passage of Thomas a Kempis where we think we’re good until God sends some situation to test us and we fail miserably.

             Back to Pat Rabbitte, on the RTE Radio 1 morning news 7am-9am, Aug 26^th approx (you may want to listen back to it it  may have been 25^th or 27^th) on being interviewed about the household broadcasting charge and people not having a TV. He referred to those who do not watch TV as cavemen. Or rather he said, ‘I don’t believe we have cavemen here in this Country. What he was really saying was. There are I believe,  lying deceptive cheats who don’t pay their licence and if there are some people who don’t happen to look at TV they are cavemen, that is, an anathema to society and should feel the full weight of his censure. Rabbitte probably sees those who don’t watch TV as a greater danger to (his idea of) society than those who don’t pay their TV license.

          Following his remarks, there was a flurry of calls to the radio shows (if you wanted to listen to it). One such was RTE radio 1 liveline 1.45pm to 3pm. (The programme shifts back and forth between different issues so when he goes of the topic he will return to) these programmes come with a health warning. There were many people ringing up to say how incensed they were by his remarks that they didn’t watch TV and they weren’t cavemen. It was interesting to hear all the different reasons why people weren’t watching TV. Also from a sociological point of view it was interesting. Unfortunately there were too few disposing of it for altruistic motives but they were disposing of it nonetheless and that is to be welcomed.

             A TV cable co has called to my house asking if they could put a little box on the side of my house. Some years ago they laid cables through my garden under the garden wall. They weakened the foundation and cracks came in the garden wall. I live in a corner house so the work was done through my garden and so through the garden of the next garden house. A few months ago they came to do more work I told them about the wall. I asked them if they could do something with it. They said ‘yes yes we will tell our boss about it but I never heard from them again. Now about two weeks ago they came back again saying they wanted to do more work. I pointed out the wall to him. He said he would have to go and check the records at this stage he offered me free cable TV. I told him I don’t have a TV he said to me your one of the few. I said more and more people are giving up the TV he nodded in agreement. He then offered me free super fast broadband. I refused, I said to him I won’t be bought off.  He came back about a week later saying that their engineers said it was a tree nearby that was causing it. I disagreed. He said go down to the council and they will fix it. I said I will do that. But in the meantime you’re not doing any work on my house.

If you should post this letter here is a question I pose to other CUT members should I accept the broadband and allow them to work or refuse the broadband and not allow them to work? Your advice suggestions and opinions welcome.

               

The ‘caveman’ -  Dublin

Better known as the Prayer Crusader under the patronage of St Rita