The Royal Wedding

A surprising statistic came out after the Royal Wedding on April 29th of this year: Ireland ranked number 1 in internet searches (excluding England) of the term "Royal Wedding." Will the chilly, often cold relationship of these two countries this comes as a great surprise. Prince William and his wife, Kate Middleton are famous far outside the United Kingdom...especially next door.

Google Trends is a site that tracks the web searches done by country, thus allowing us to see what many Irish wouldn't freely admit: they are very curious and interested in the English Royal Wedding. The future King and Queen of the United Kingdom outpaced searches for "Osama Bin Laden killed" more than one whole week after the wedding had happened.

A lovely day that was watched the whole world over...even by those who have long held a less than pleasurable view of the royal family.

Response to Bin Laden's Death

With the killing of Osama Bin Laden by the Navy SEALS earlier this week the world has rejoiced in the controversial end of one of its leading terrorists. As the leader of one of the world's most prominent terrorist groups, Al-Qaeda, Bin Laden was in the free world's cross hairs since the attacks on the Twin Towers in 2001. The response and reaction from throughout the world was one of joy and satisfaction. While his death can't undo the carnage is organization has caused, his death has been a major blow to Al-Qaeda and more importantly shows that those organizations that go through with terrorism will be punished.

In Ireland there was a general consensus that this was an event to celebrate. The Taoiseach (or prime minister) of Ireland, Enda Kenny, remarked "The removal of Osama Bin Laden’s ability to plot heinous acts is a major achievement in the effort to rid the world of the threat of terrorism." Kenny pointed out the many "countless deaths" that Bin Laden had been responsible for were not without justice.

Not surprisingly, the most interesting response was that of the Arab world. Ireland's RTE News reports that many in the Arab world are skeptical of the story that has been currently reported. "'Are we sure that he has been killed?' said Tehran shopkeeper Ali Asghar Sedaghat. 'Or is it another game of the Americans?'" Also, many from the Middle Eastern countries believe that this doesn't end Al-Qaeda, but instead brings it more power.

Omar Bakri, a Lebanese Sunni cleric, mourned Bin Laden as a martyr:  'His martyrdom will give momentum to a large generation of believers and jihadists. Al-Qaeda is not a political party, it is a jihadist movement. Al-Qaeda does not end with the death of a leader. Bin Laden was first the generation of the Qaeda and now there is a second, third, fourth and fifth generation.'

Propaganda - Film Edition

Irish film has a long and torrid love affair with the Irish War of Independence (1919-1921) and the Irish Civil War (1922-1923). Films such as The Wind that Shakes the Barley (2006) and Michael Collins (1996) are two of the most well known films of Irish cinema, both are Palme d'Or winners, and both tell the story of soldiers of the Irish Wars.

Michael Collins tells the story of the title's namesake in such a way that it cannot be interpreted as anything other than propaganda. It tells how Ireland should be a free country, a republic, and that Ireland's people should do whatever is necessary to accomplish this. It has parallels with current times (1996) because there was a lot of uprising in Northern Ireland and there were calls for a unified Ireland. The films director, Neil Jordan, obviously sympathized with this point of view and the film was very much a way to show the importance of unification of all fronts in a classic story. Jordan was born Irish-catholic in the beginning of the 1950s and during that time there were rumblings of a unified Ireland; it was a time to end any British rule whatsoever. This film shows a way to glorify, to romanticize those ideals.

The Wind that Shakes the Barley also was a Palme d'Or winner. This films wasn't as openly political as the first in terms of the country of Ireland. Instead, it focused on the effect war had on the small town people who ended up fighting on the front lines. This films could be interpreted as a call for non-violence.

These are only two of the many films that Ireland has produced on the wars that shaped and defined their country. Even today the topic is highly controversial and in a sense not completely final. There is always talk of Northern Ireland joining Ireland as one Irish country and then there is the catholic vs protestant violence that has ceased greatly in recent years but has never completely gone away.

Press Freedom

Every year Freedom House puts out a list of every country's freedom of the press ranking. The index breaks each country down into three categories: free, partially free, and not free. Also, there are three scores that are used to decide on this final decision: political, economical and legal environments.

Ireland had a total score of 15 out of 100 (like golf, the lower the better), ranking them in a tie for 14th with St. Lucia. Like many Western European countries, Ireland scored very high on this index (11 of the countries ahead of Ireland were also Western European countries). Ireland scored a "4" on Legal Environment, which relates to how the laws in the country are set up to ensure and protect freedoms in the press. For Political Environment they received a "6", and that has to do with the amount of influence the government or partisan interest has in controlling the media. Lastly, they scored a "5" in Economical Environment, which relates to the transparency in the media and how much control or dominance the major media outlets have.

Ireland should be look upon very positively with regards to their media control and the relationship it has with their country. Ever since 2002, when the first internet ratings were listed at Freedom House, Ireland has scored favorably and has never left the top 20 in the world rankings. This shows the importance Ireland places on their freedom of the press.

Here is a look at each regions freedoms. Green means free, yellow means partially, and blue means not free.

Traditional Irish Communities

Traditional Irish communities were based around one of the two major agricultural professions of Ireland: fishing and farming. Cities and towns were either built near a port or in the middle of sprawling fields that were used for raising livestock and farming the land. The five biggest cities in Ireland all have become such do to their location having the perfect conditions for both. Dublin, Dun Laoghaire, and Galway are all right on the ocean. Cork and Limerick, although not on the coast, are built on major waterways that run right into the ocean. The fertile soil of these two cities gave the perfect conditions for growing crops.

These days the old traditions of Ireland are slowly fading away. There are many different beliefs as to why this is happening, but the main one is technology. With the far reaching capabilities of the internet, the Irish youth have a very different childhood than their parents did. Traditions such as daily blessings, holiday traditions and special event customs have all slowly deteriorated over the last few decades.

Blessings were a very common thing in Ireland just one generation ago. With the rough history filled with misery and hardship, the Irish have learned to make light of nearly everything. Because of this, they have blessings for nearly everything.

Holiday traditions that have went dormant during the technology age are quite significant. However, it isn't so much that the people of Ireland really stopped what they were doing, instead they went along with the rest of the world and started celebrating like everyone else (most notably the U.S.). St. Patrick's Day use to be a day spent in church and with your family. However, after cities in America began having large, lavish parades in honor of the holiday, Ireland eventually followed suit. The St. Patrick's Day festival is a five day event in Dublin, and the reason it was created wasn't for celebratory purposes, but instead to boost tourism. This "tradition" didn't actually start until 1995.

Easter is another holiday that has drastically changed over the past 20 years. A very sacred day in most of Ireland, Easter brought on many traditions. "Spring Cleaning" use to be something that started with the beginning of lent 40 days before Easter. This was done so that your house would be in top shape for it to be blessed by your priest. The week before Easter would be one of fasting until Easter Sunday. These traditions were practiced by a strong majority of Irishmen, but now is much less frequent.

Irish weddings have an extensive history, preceding even Christianity in Ireland."Tying the knot" originates from the ceremony where a ribbon or cord would be wrapped around the couples' wrists to signify infinity. "Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue" use to have another line that said "And an Irish penny in her shoe." Over time this has been lost.

Northern Ireland vs the Irish Republic

The island that Ireland resides on is split between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The Republic of Ireland is what is commonly referred to as Ireland. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom. Below, the counties in gray belong to the United Kingdom and the counties in green are that of the Irish republic.

In London, on December 6, 1921, the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed marking the end of the Irish War of Independence. Where as Northern Ireland still has a great deal of loyalty to the U.K., the Republic has now created its very own culture that has began to separate from its neighbors to the North. The best example of this would be what Ireland has given to the world of Literature.

James Joyce (Dublin), Flann O'Brien (Strabane), Jonathan Swift (Dublin), Oscar Wilde (Dublin), Bram Stoker (Dublin), as well as Nobel Prize winners for Literature William Butler Yeats (Dublin), George Bernard Shaw (Dublin), Samuel Beckett (Dublin) and Seamus Heaney (Mossbawn) all are of Irish origin. The majority of them hail from Dublin making it the unofficial Literature capital of the world.

Jonathan Swift

James Joyce

Impact of Media Conglomeration

With the ever expanding multinational media conglomeration encompassing nearly every part of media in the world, it is somewhat surprising to find out that Ireland is only minimally affected. The main provider of television and radio media is Raidio Teilefis Eireann which has a substantial lead in both markets over all of its competitors. This could be due largely to the fact that Raidio Teilefis Eireann is a semi-state company. It broadcasts in both English and Irish.

According to the RTE website, the company has a board that is appointed by the Irish government. The head of that board is the director-general, currently Noel Curran. While RTE does have much control over the media market in Ireland, it still does have to occasionally deal with conglomeration due to showing certain television shows from America. Desperate Housewives, the Simpsons, and Grey's Anatomy are just a few of the shows that RTE shows regularly.