Why Ireland is a safer place for children now
THE thought struck me with all the debate about banning smartphones in schools that in the era of corporal punishment, wasn’t it a pity that we hadn’t got them then to record what was actually taking place in ‘Modern Ireland’.
Most who attended school in the Sixties and Seventies like me witnessed on a daily basis beatings and thrashings that in many cases went beyond the accepted norms of the time.
To those teachers who are still alive and fit into that sadistic bracket, I promise you that you are not forgotten about.
Regularly when I meet up with my generation, the conversation comes around to such experiences. I believe it took me 30 years before I recovered from my time in school.
Regarding smartphones, they should be banned from schools. Parents need to become more technology-aware and supervise their children online.
It took official Ireland about 80 years to wake up to the cruelties perpetrated on the children of our nation. Relatively speaking, the abuses taking place on the internet are out in the open in a short timeframe.
I believe Ireland is now a safer place for children! Jim Jackman, Castleknock, Dublin 15. I FIND an extraordinary anomaly in the definition of abortion as a human right. The most basic right of all is the right to life and that right is absolutely denied to one of the human beings involved in the abortion process.
This calls into question the philosophy that tries to justify abortion because it denies that the child in the womb is in fact human. But if the child is not human, what is it and at what definable stage of gestation does it become human?
This is an extraordinarily difficult question to answer. In fact, there would appear to be no satisfactory answer available and for that reason, the question appears to be deliberately entirely ignored.
But it is the crux of all argument about the rights and wrongs of abortion. If a child in the womb is not human or subhuman, it can be disposed of at will and utilised in any profitable or preferred way available.
If it is human however, the child must be afforded protection of the law and right to life, which can only be forfeited in cases of real and acute danger to the life of the mother. Otherwise, human life is greatly devalued.
Padraic Neary, Tubbercurry, Co. Sligo. I AM sure that by now most people in the country have read the media reports about the vicious abuse of a dog in Mountrath. The dog was a muchloved family pet who was found wired and nailed to a tree and suffered a brutal death.
How can any so-called human being put an animal through such cruelty? People who abuse animals like that can go on to abuse or even kill another human being. And people who abuse animals may have been beaten themselves or witnessed domestic violence. But that does not excuse such vile behaviour.
People who torture animals should be harshly punished by the courts. Maureen Lowndes, Geashill, Co. Offaly. IN PROFESSING its belief in the equal treatment of women and men throughout all aspects of Irish society, the Government should formally recognise February 1 each year (Lá Fhéile Bríd) as a public holiday in honour of Saint Brigid, just as March 17 is a public holiday held in honour of St Patrick.
Tangible recognition of Ireland’s national woman saint by the introduction of a public holiday would bring about equality in our calendar of feast days. Tom Cooper, Templeogue, Dublin 6w. DESPITE the fact that the sport has given Ireland its most success on the international front over the last few years, horse racing is not getting a fair crack of the whip from some media outlets.
I’d like to put forward one example. Last week the Irish Mail on Sunday’s 30-page sports section did not afford racing even one full page of coverage.
In my opinion, the ‘sport of kings’ has more followers in this country than rugby but the oval ball game gets a lot more column inches and airplay.
Indeed, rugby is getting so much coverage that many feel think it has overtaken Gaelic games as our national sport.
There is also over-the-top exposure of cross-channel soccer. Horse racing is left trailing as far behind as some of the runners we back. It may be asking too much for this imbalance to change.
Frankie Fallon, Kells, Co. Meath.