Virtue-signalling poll not about feminism
WHATEVER way voting falls today, the Government should take some lessons from this referendum.
For example, how you can’t fool all of the people, all of the time.
Or not to let the grass grow under your feet, if you’re going to present a question of weather vane cultural politics to the country.
The pendulum swings in seven years, which is how long this one took to get to the voting booths.
It was dreamed up in 2017, the height of the Repeal and #Metoo era but a lot of people see those kind of identity politics movements with clearer eyes now.
It reminded me of what the political theorist Ken Minogue called St George in Retirement Syndrome.
St George, having got great acclaim for slaying the dragons, looks for more.
He ends up swinging his sword into thin air, imagining dragons.
The Government might get lucky and pull a win over the line or it may get a bloody nose by voters who’ve had enough of its woke wheeze. Democracy will out.
But it revealed itself to the nation as a bunch of blusterers and bluffers, preaching about being “progressive” without a real understanding of what that means.
As a result, ministers argued unenthusiastically for changes that may cause more harm than good.
In political terms, it’s called a “problem of progress” when you go too far with zeal to make changes, resulting in negative consequences.
They walked themselves into a referendum the public had no appetite for, for changes that precisely no one had seriously campaigned to be made.
It was supposed to be another addition to Leo’s legacy as the most socially progressive leader ever. (While also being a rigid fiscal conservative.)
But as Aontu leader Peadar Toibin said, it ended up being an exercise in “peak virtue signalling”.
The double referendum on family and care can be logged as a hare-brained, backwards-thinking, Mad Hatters Tea Party charade.
They were so busy trying to make themselves look good with the next Pc-driven bandwagon, they didn’t foresee it backfiring somewhat. Part of the reason it did was the disingenuous
move to hold the vote on March 8, International Women’s Day.
Most female columnists and commentators were against it, for a variety of reasons.
Yet not one leading female politician had the backbone to say they rejected it too.
That’s a fail for feminism.
Online, an army of grassroots women said “No thanks” to the offer to remove the only recognition of the hardest work we do from the Constitution.
They didn’t buy into the narrative that Article 41 – which states mothers should not be forced to work due to money pressures – was “sexist” or “misogynistic”.
They knew raising children was not simply “care” and couldn’t be conflated with it for convenience.
Many mothers who work would love to be at home with their children.
Those with careers recognise other women who do it day-in day-out are Trojans.
There’s a reason why women are mentioned as doing work in the home – because we do.
Don’t be offended by the truth.
The referendum to broaden the definition of family stuttered due to the dubious term “durable relationships”.
This foggy notion seems to have been chosen out of a fear that specifically naming single parents may leave the proposal open to claims of exclusion from countless identity groups.
What we saw throughout this campaign was a political class who are intellectually lazy, political cowards.