Motley Magazine - Issue 2 Volume VIII

Volume VIII ISSUE 2 UCCMotley.ie

Motley

EDITOR’S note Team Editor: Ellen Desmond editor@motley.ie Graphic Designer: Cathal O’Gara Deputy Editor: Eoin McSweeney Current Affairs Editors: Eoin McSweeney deputyeditor@motley.ie Laura Cashman currentaffairs@motley.ie Features and Opinion Editors: Claire Crowley features@motley.ie Hannah Kingston deputyfeatures@motley.ie Entertainment Editors: Laura Hussey entertainment@motley.ie Kelly Doherty deputyentertainment@motley.ie Fashion Editor: Emily Horgan fashioneditor@motley.ie Creative Director: Laurence Keating creativedirector@motley.ie Webmaster: Andrew Shortall Public Relations Officer: Méadhbh Crowley Staff Writers: Adam O’Reilly Sorcha Lanigan Rachel O’Shea Contributors Vincent “First things first I’m the realest” O’ Brien, Louise Clancy, Cian Manning, Aaron Noonan, Colm Duffy, Killian Down, Elaine Hanley, Colm Connolly, Kieran Cunnane, Jane Farrell, Jonny O’ Mahony, Colm Cahalane, Gary Maloney, Lorna Lane, Aoife Stapleton, Martha Garry and Bethany Hart.

Special Thanks Kieran Murphy, John Murphy, Audrey Ellard Walsh, The UCC Students’ Union (especially Barry Nevin for his ongoing favouritism of Motley), The UCC Media Executive, Laura Harte and all the team at Webprint, Origin Hair Design, Lockdown Models, Julie Evans and Opera Lane and Una from Turning Pirate.

Very Special Thanks Paul Dollery from CWFC, Peter Desmond, Laura Allen from Universal Music, Harry Hudson Taylor, Conor Cusack, Emmet O’Brien, Angelina Pivarnick, Jack and Ronan from Booka Brass Band, Dr Angela Ryan of the UCC French Department, Fiona Shaw and all the unsung baristas of UCC Coffee Dock for their ongoing emotional support.

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Contents

Current Affairs

Laura Cashman ponders the implications behind recent celebrity photo hacking scandals, while Louise Clancy investigates the situation in Ferguson.

Following the latest murder of innocent Alan Henning by ISIS, Motley’s Aaron Noonan discusses the disintegration of Iraq and Eoin McSweeney chats with Cian O’ Donnell of UCC’s iGem team.

Entertainment

In an incredibly diverse entertainment section, editor Ellen Desmond chats to Harry of duo Hudson Taylor about their upcoming tour, Eoin McSweeney and Kelly Doherty meet with internationally acclaimed actress Fiona Shaw, Rachel O’ Shea talks all things comic with Emmet O’ Brien of Turncoat Press and Staff Writer Adam O’ Reilly catches up with Angelina Pivarnick from hit TV series, Jersey Shore.

Features and Opinion

Features and Opinion’s big interview this month is with Conor Cusack, who met with our deputy editor Eoin McSweeney for a selfie, Laura Hussey chats to Paul Dollery of Cage Warriors Fighting Championship to discover cage fighting isn’t what you may have initially expected, Martha Garry discusses how everyone’s experience of the same month in UCC can be completely different, while Claire Crowley battles it off with Sorcha Lanigan in a semesterisation debate.

Fashion and Beauty

Lorna Lane and Aoife Stapleton give us the lowdown on what happened across the globe during Fashion Month, while Emily Horgan and Laurence Keating dive into the fashion and beauty world influenced by the big and little screens.

“Going where the silence is” his issue has been printed at that time of year when everyone is more or less freaking out about life or getting carried away with themselves. Calm the cats, people, it’s only college. Whether you’re going out far too much or far too little, it’s all too easy to forget we’re only one month into term and there’s still plenty of time to make a change – whatever change it is you feel you need.

This issue also comes out at a time when the world itself, as a whole, is more or less freaking out. I said in my last editorial that each and every one of us is so lucky to be here and my words have been justified every day by what is being covered in the news. One story that has stayed with me in particular, as a person with a huge respect for journalism, is the sad end of James Foley. James Foley was a reporter and photographic journalist, known for working in the epicentres of some of the biggest world conflicts.

Foley was beheaded by ISIS (now IS) in recent weeks, following a long period of capture, because he was American.

US President Barack Obama said in an address that “the world is shaped by people like Jim Foley,” and I agree.

Foley’s parents spoke to Ryan Tubridy on The Late Late Show about his interest in ensuring that those who aren’t being heard have their story told. He wanted the world to see injustices the way they really are and he dedicated his life to doing so. At the UCC Journalism and Media conference in 2013 another conflict journalist, Mary Fitzgerald, spoke of the importance of journalists

“going where the silence is,” which were the words that convinced me I wanted to be a journalist.

I couldn’t send this issue to print without having some sort moment of respect for Jim Foley, who did something that I would one day like to do, and in particular for his incredibly brave parents, who have now set up a charity in his name (jamesfoleyfund.org).

In recent days, IS has also taken the life of Alan Henning, a British Taxi Driver who went to Syria purely for humanitarian reasons. His is a story I feel has touched everyone; not just journalists or politicians or the British public. Because the world is shaped by people like Alan Henning too.

Furthermore, the world is shaped by people who aren’t idiots on a daily basis. Anyone can make a difference by trying their best to be kind, always.

It’s impossible to know what’s going on inside another person’s head and one simple action by you can have an impact you could never imagine on someone else. It doesn’t matter if you disagree with someone or dislike what they are doing, taking caution to treat others with respect should always be a priority. I challenge anyone reading this to carry out one random act of kindness. And to those of you getting lost in the rat race current that is college, those who may be in need of an act of kindness, please try to remember that “happiness can always be found, even in the darkest of times, if only one remembers to turn on the light.” And also by writing for Motley (email editor@motley.ie), because that’s important too!

I couldn’t send this issue to print without having some sort moment of respect for Jim Foley

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Current Affairs

Pistorious’s Rise & Fall

Rise of the Islamic State

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Time For Some Change Climate change is becoming an ever more increasing danger to the earth’s population. Colm Duffy speaks to Petra Woods the Deputy Head of the Irish Delegation at the Department for the Environment, and Oisin Coughlan, Director of Friends of the Earth Ireland on the alarming issue. arm Irish summers may be a blessing for our tourism industry, but now, mild winters, early springs, and frequent cold snaps frequently cause widespread disruption. An extra couple of weeks baking in the sun is not something that Irish people will complain about too much, however Irish weather on the whole has become, if it is possible, even more unpredictable. The changing weather has also begun to bring unwanted guests to Irish shores, such as swarms of venomous Lions Mane Jellyfish, and the Portuguese Man O’ War. These problems are set to worsen as our climate becomes warmer. The impacts of climate change are no longer just in the paper, or in far flung tropical countries, they are right on our door step.

This makes the upcoming COP 20 all the more important for Irish people, and should engender a greater level of interest in its outcome. COP 20 will be held in Lima this year, with a legally binding global agreement on climate change expected to be achieved at COP 21 in Paris the following year. In the interest of finding out Ireland’s role within negotiations and our stance on climate change in general, I spoke with Petra Woods, the Deputy Head of the Irish Delegation at the Department for the Environment, and Oisin Coughlan, Director of Friends of the Earth Ireland.

As Ireland has developed, it has begun to pay more attention to the climate change negotiation outcomes than it has done in the past. A mere decade ago Ireland was represented by a single delegate at negotiations; now Ireland is represented by a team consisting of many government departments and other relevant agencies.

Deputy Woods is at the heart of this team, with the unenviable job of coordinating Irish efforts in challenging and complex circumstances.

However, Deputy Woods was optimistic about the role Ireland has played in negotiations so far, and will play in the future, stressing that: “It is a good thing for all of us that Ireland has a seat at the negotiating

table. There are 192 countries involved in negotiations, and it is extremely important that Ireland is very clear on what we are going to be called upon to do as part of the EU.” When asked about Ireland’s priorities with regards to climate change, Deputy Woods highlighted Agriculture as one area Ireland pays particular attention to. In Germany, Ireland spearheaded attempts to reach an agreement on a program for agriculture, which Deputy Woods described as a breakthrough.

She highlighted that there is plenty of focus on big member states, and what they are doing, but many forget that this is an open negotiation, and Ireland is as capable as anyone else of setting the agenda. Deputy Woods described Ireland as progressive and forward thinking, and our role within negotiations as constructive.

However, while both Petra Woods and Oisin Coughlan agree that the current global emissions trajectory is not shifting fast enough to stay within 2 degrees, they disagree on what Ireland’s contribution has been thus far.

The jokes about climate change have begun to come to a close Director Coughlan did agree that Ireland does prioritize agriculture as a key objective, but emphasized that it was less about saving the planet, and more about saving money. Irish Agriculture accounts for 30% of Irish emissions.

Ireland making the case that agriculture is “special” is an attempt to get agriculture off the hook as it were, meaning that Ireland will have to take less action when called upon.

Ireland has been supportive of the EU stance on climate change, but Director Coughlan regards Irish action on climate change as leaving a lot to be desired, saying that “Ireland has been supportive of EU ambition in talks, but then hopeless when it comes to implementing action. Ireland has begun to realize that ambition on the part of the European Union will absolutely mean action for Ireland, which we are less keen on”.

When asked why Ireland lacked ambition when it came to climate action, Director Coughlan highlighted that Ireland is unwilling to potentially put itself at a disadvantage economically by taking more than the minimum action required. In Director Coughlan’s opinion, the Department is not strong enough to get

other departments, such as the Department of Finance or Agriculture, to fall into line. “It is a Combination of the department of the Environment not doing enough, and not being strong enough. The only thing that can cut through that is a really strong minister, but we have never had one,” he said.

Can a small Island like Ireland make a significant contribution to when it comes to tackling climate issues? Both Deputy Woods, and Director Coughlan think we can. Director Coughlan emphasized that Ireland may not be among the very best when it comes to taking action, but we are not being dragged along kicking and screaming either. We can, and should do more.

In order to force climate change onto the government agenda, government ministers need to feel like it is a priority for Irish people.

Director Coughlan also eluded that, only when politicians appreciate the risk from climate change, and appreciate the risk to their own positions from an angry public, will we see a real change in climate change action.

The jokes about climate change and the sudden onset of fantastic Irish summers have begun to come to a close. Now is the time to put pressure on our decision makers to act in, not just the national interest, but global interest.

As the Irish people begin to realize the nearly annual disruption that climate change has begun to cause on the shores of this Island, Director Coughlan, borrowing from Al Gore, warned that there is a danger that we will go from denial to despair, without stopping for action along the way. It is not too late for action, but it won’t stay that way forever. It is high time that Irish decision makers found out how important our country, our landscape, and our climate is to all of us.

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Current Affairs

14.10.14

A Picture Paints a Thousand Words Laura Cashman discusses reactions to the recent surge in sharing hacked celebrity photos s a third wave of hacked celebrity photos gets shared, tweeted, emailed and downloaded, media around the world has become tired of reporting the same old story. With over 101 women affected in the first release of the photos in August, including names such as Jennifer Lawrence, the phenomenon has reached worrying proportions, affecting both celebrity and non-celebrity alike. Taking the recent increase in non-consensually released photos but a lack of discourse, we have to question both the affect this has had on society and what it reveals about our attitude to consent.

Are we as a people after becoming numb to this gross violation of human rights? And, are we willing to sit back and watch as others lose their right to consent?

While hackers hide behind the mask of anonymity on sites such as Reddit or 4Chan, there is still a hope the culprits will be caught.

After hacking several celebrity email accounts in 2011 for images and personal details, Christopher Chaney was sentenced to ten years in prison in the United States. However, the hackers of 2014 have taken it upon themselves to post locations, phone numbers, Facebook and Twitter handlebars accompanying stolen photos of women and mask their own identity.

While stealing photos is illegal in its own right and prosecution may be the answer for those who are caught, what about those who aren’t?

Either way, there has been a dark mark left on society, now regarding sexual consent and this will affect women around the world.

The response to the hacking itself was mixed. While some women’s right groups and the victims themselves considered this the most heinous of crimes, one that takes the power women have over their own bodies out of their own hands, others responded with less empathy. One example of this was Hollywood blogger Perez Hilton. Hilton has an enormous social media following and regularly reports for entertainment shows and channels such as MTV or TRT. Just mere hours after the release of the photos and videos, Hilton shared images off his website Perezhilton.com. While Hilton later apologised and withdrew both nude and censored images, he had drawn criticism for his first reaction which he later said was done in “bad taste” and claimed that in his sector, reporters have to work quickly which leads to mistakes. Hilton has also been joined by many other social media tycoons who further embarrassed and mocked the victims. The suggestion of women avoiding snapping saucy

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Are we as a people after becoming numb to this gross violation of human rights? photos has been banded around by many as a solution. While this is meant as harmless advice some say it gives an insight into modern day thinking on sex and sexuality.

However tempting victim bashing may be, advocates have appeared in their droves to remind people that this is not their fault.

Clementine Ford of dailylife.com reminds readers that “sending a photograph of your breasts to one person isn’t consenting to having the whole world see those breasts, just as consenting to sex with one person isn’t the same as giving permission for everyone else to fu*k you. Victim blaming isn’t okay, even if it does give you a private thrill to humiliate the female victims of sexual exploitation”. This has added another issue to the plethora of worries women’s rights organisations have to deal with on a daily basis - it is not just the exploitation itself but the cruel reaction of the masses. Feminist organisations as a whole have taken this issue on and it has given new light to campaigns such as “No More Page Three” which deals with the consensual yet archaic objectification of women in tabloid newspapers.

It also links in with the recent launch of the United Nations HeforShe campaign which tackles gender issues. This launch mainly gathered attention because of Harry Potter actress Emma Watson’s contribution. Making

an impassioned and widely commended speech on men’s roles in gender rights, events soon took a turn for the worse for the actress.

While Watson herself aired her grievances about the nude photos leak, tweeting her disgust at the lack of empathy in the comments which followed, she was later a target of the same leak threats. Watson was threatened, apparently, by 4Chan to have photos of her leaked after her speech to teach her a lesson for speaking as a feminist. This was later revealed to be a hoax by Rantic Media who attempted to draw attention to the sexism of the site. While the hoax may have been done for a noble reason, The Guardian writer Jessica Valenti makes clear that this was still damaging. “Sexually threatening an outspoken woman to shine a light on how outspoken women are sexually threatened - well that’s idiotic at best.” Valenti is right. The stunt also once again reminds us of how backwards our society really is regarding sexuality and how we are damaging others while meandering down this destructive path. Watson was used as a tool to create public outcry at 4Chan which there should be but many claim using another woman as a prop in this “game” is almost as destructive as leaking nude photos.

There is no doubt that international law has to be adapted for the change the freedom of the internet has brought, this leak is proof of that. This has had cruel effects on people’s personal and professional lives, celebrity and non-celebrity. However, the fact remains that it will not bring about change on our human response to these types of events. It will not alter the norms of society and as many people have begun to realise in academic and journalistic circles, this is the change that needs to happen.

14.10.14

Current Affairs

The Tale of the

Tragic Hero Following the recent decision in the Oscar Pistorius trial, Killian Down documents his rise to fame and his fall from grace. ccording to the Random House dictionary, a tragic hero is: “a great or virtuous character in a dramatic tragedy who is destined for downfall, suffering, or defeat. Undoubtedly, when one reads the term ‘tragic hero’ our minds are immediately transported back to late nights spent huddled over scraps of A4 pages decorated in fluorescent highlighter and the scrawled notes of our secondary school selves, completely engrossed or perhaps entirely perplexed by the Shakespearean tragedy before us.

Perhaps we were pondering the magnificent rise and debauched fall of Macbeth, the once glorified soldier and loyal servant to his king, thwarted by a fatal flaw, that of his own overriding ambition. Maybe it is Hamlet’s own hamartia, his understanding of the power of language that ultimately brought about his tragic demise that so enthralled us. However one does not need to pore over the works of Shakespeare in order to appreciate the meaning of a tragic hero; we need look no further than the story of one Oscar Leonard Carl Pistorius.

Many will scoff at the dramatics of labelling a modern day athlete as a tragic hero and perhaps I am being a tad dramatic in illustrating a point, but there is no denying that Oscar Pistorius’ fall from grace has been nothing but spectacular. Cast your mind back to December 2007, a mere seven years ago and Oscar Pistorius was being awarded the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Helen Rollason Award, a prize conferred for outstanding courage and achievement in the face of adversity. Fast forward five months and another illustrious award is bestowed upon South Africa’s golden son – a place in the TIME 100, a list of the world’s most influential people in which Pistorius ranked third in the “Heroes and Pioneers” category.

As the world anxiously

awaits the athlete’s sentencing,

the question is what was Pistorius’ fatal flaw?

Hero, courage, achievement in the face of adversity. All words that were associated with Pistorius. Already a picture is being etched describing the esteem to which the man was held. Add to this his astonishing display at the 2008 Paralympic Games where his hat-trick of medals was complemented by the setting of two new Paralympic records and a world record, and the extraordinary accomplishment in 2012 of being the first amputee runner to compete in the Olympic Games and a rather perfect portrait is painted of a fiercely determined and much admired athlete. With handsome looks thrown in for good measure, it seemed the world was at the specially-engineered feet of Pistorius, the athlete who had paved the way for the next generation of disabled athletes.

His achievements on the track were mirrored by the adoration that the South African nation had for him. He was undoubtedly a hero, a glowing tribute to his country, one that is all too often in the news for the wrong reasons.

His was not a story of rags to riches. His was a tale of the impossible and as powerful as any Shakespearean drama. It was hard to believe that a man ran in the Olympics with no legs, and none of us will see the likes of it again. South Africa had found inspiration.

Needless to say, there is always a sour turningpoint in the tale of the tragic hero. Pistorius’ demise began in the same fashion that so many of his finest athletic achievements had begun: a look of steely determination flashing across his face, the raising of a gun aloft, and the unmistakable deafening crack of a gunshot fizzing through the air. However this time the gunshot was not issued

by a starting pistol to signal the beginning of yet another victorious race for the ‘Blade Runner.’

No, this particular gunshot and the three that followed in quick succession signalled the end of Reeva Steenkamp’s short life at the hands of Oscar Pistorius.

Unless you have been living under an incredibly well-soundproofed rock for the last few months you will know what ensued. After a seven month trial, Pistorius was found guilty of culpable homicide (the South African equivalent of manslaughter) last month. As the world anxiously awaits the athlete’s sentencing, the question is what was Pistorius’ fatal flaw?

Depending on what version of events you choose to believe, one might suggest that it was merely being trigger-happy; a man so concerned for the safety of he and his partner that he opened fire on an unseen “intruder” who in reality was his own beloved girlfriend, the one he had sought to protect in the first place. Others who remain sceptical may forward the argument that his fatal flaw was a fiery temper or perhaps uncontainable jealousy that manifested in the coldblooded slaughter of Reeva Steenkamp on that fateful February night.

After all, Steenkamp had both beauty and intelligence in abundance as a model and a graduate of law and undoubtedly would have commanded the attention of the male population. Whichever view you choose to espouse, one thing is certain – it is incredibly difficult not to sympathise with the man who could say that the world was his oyster but who now only serves as the most bitter of reminders of how cruel fate can be.

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Current Affairs

14.10.14

Without

a Home Colm Connolly discusses the strife that asylum seekers in Ireland have to suffer through before they can even begin to think about a bright new future. midst the latest threat of ISIS, the release of Apple’s new iPhone, confident predictions in Ireland’s economy over the next year and the failed attempt for Scotland to remove itself from the United Kingdom, there has been a much more pressing domestic issue that, despite being reported in great detail in our national newspapers, I feel has been overlooked.

I speak of course of Irish asylum seekers, and their plight over the last few months.

Over the summer I recall being completely oblivious to the word asylum seeker, until I was overwhelmed one day in August when I read of a hunger strike that took place in Mount Trenchard, a direct provision centre in Foynes Limerick. Three men, respectively hailing from the Congo, Afghanistan and Iraq, refused food in an effort to raise awareness at the lengthy process that wil enable them to leave the centre, a process that was taking 10 years.

Elsewhere, in Cork, Glounthaune and the Kinsale Road provision centre, further protests were held to raise awareness, not only to the lengthy process of asylum, but due to the mere inadequate condition of the living quarters these people were subjected to. It has always been difficult for me to grasp, given

the fact that I myself have never experienced such an unbearable hardship in my own life, that these people not only came from background of war, religious and political persecution, death threats and social unrest, but in a ‘leading European nation’ had to experience even further hardships. Whilst we wil always have our own domestic issues such as unemployment or the extremely worrying homelessness crisis in Dublin at the moment, there wil always be organizations or bodies there to at least attempt to help people in such circumstances, organizations run on the good wil of volunteers like the Simon Community or Cork’s Penny Dinners.

However, for these asylum seekers their voices are seldom recognized, despite the fact that they left their country to flee from a terror fil ed life to one where they could at least be given the opportunity to achieve a happy and secure future. Here, they are not even given that opportunity. The conditions of these provision centres should be immaculate. If we are going to make them wait ten years with just 19 euros a week, then the least we can do is make their purgatory someway comfortable. In one of these centres, a man who left Afghanistan after fighting for the Taliban in the early noughties, now has yet another war to face here in these provision centres. Interviews with both adults and children in these centres in cork revealed these volunteers’ torment and strife.

One volunteer spoke of contemplating suicide, whilst others admitted that they had resorted to prostitution in order to make ends meet. Young children attending school in Ireland spoke of the shame of not being able to go to a friend’s houses or invite them to their own. Mothers spoke of the difficulty they had in living in such close proximity to others with inadequate utilities while raising children who knew no other home but the direct provision centre. These parents took it upon themselves to

flee their own country in order to give their children a better life, yet, in their child’s eyes, they are unable to see how life in a direct provision centre could be given the title of a ‘better life.’

It was encouraging to see that members of the public supported these protests by delivering food and clothing to these people, but we need to ask ourselves some serious questions; why should they need to protest? Why aren’t we blocking up the streets in protest against this (we did it for the Gaza and Israeli conflict during the summer)? Do we only care more about injustices against other nationalities when it’s in their own countries? As soon as they experience an injustice in ours, is that just too close to home to open our mouths about? Of course many a politician has raised the issue at a political and media level, and, as usual, to very little further expansion. Of course, here I am sitting behind a computer, not doing much to cure the situation, but it’s vital that we do start raising awareness about this.

Given our horrific track record in human rights, thanks to lack of government intervention (or their intervention for all the wrong reasons), it’s about time we woke up to the fact that these people came here from lives so much more horrific and terror fil ed than ours would ever be. If we’re not going to allow them to become full time citizens after ten years, then the least we can do for these people is provide adequate and immaculate accommodation.

Imagine if war broke out in Ireland and you and your families lives were in danger, or you were of a race or religion that was no longer deemed acceptable and now subject to persecution, and you and your

Imagine the frustration of indefinitely waiting for something that may never come to you. family had to flee from your war torn, fear filled life here to a politically stable and fear free country, where no such attributes to your former life existed.

Then, as soon as you arrived, you and your family had to spend an indefinite amount of time in a centre where the facilities and living arrangements were incredibly under managed and inadequate.

Imagine the frustration, that you were not entitled to a comfortable living quarters, on top of your hardships previously. Imagine the frustration of indefinitely waiting for something that may never come to you. Imagine if your only hope was minor protests and the voices to that country’s population and politicians in attempting to raise awareness for your cause.

As a life rule I would say to treat somebody as your own mother would treat you. No mother would want their child living in such difficult conditions.

Awareness must be raised and action must be taken amongst the student community, the political face of Ireland and by anybody who has any feeling whatsoever for these people’s strife.

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14.10.14

ess than a month since the game changing Scottish independence vote, punters are out not only questioning what this will mean for Scotland, but the world. While much of the debate focused on the effect of Scottish independence on world markets and UK politics, the outcome of a No vote has left behind questions that have to be answered, including what effect the vote will have on other secessionist and independence movements around the globe.

For now, the soon to be first minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon has promised to ensure that the Smith Commission will work and the United Kingdom will in fact deliver on its promise of further devolved powers. Yet, beneath this promise, it is clear she is issuing a hidden warning to Westminster- deliver on your promises or the 1.6 million Yes voters and most of all the 45,000 who joined the flag flying, proindependence Scottish Nationalist Party postIndyRef will be waiting to voice their discontent.

While whispers of another referendum have yet to dissipate, it is interestingly closer to home that we can truly see the effects of the referendum.

The unadulterated show of public engagement and democracy at its finest that was brought about in Scotland has inspired pro-independence groups in other countries who are crying out for meaningful change. As Sturgeon claims, “Accepting the result means more than just accepting that yes didn’t win. It means accepting that there was a very strong demand for change in that vote.” This appetite for change can be seen elsewhere and nowhere more strongly than across the border in Northern Ireland.

In a state already ruled by partisan politics, it was predicted by many that a Yes vote would have had a destabilising effect on what is considered a peaceful Northern Ireland. While the lines would be clearly drawn between Edinburgh and London, what part would the other members of the United Kingdom have to play in this new order? While this question has been avoided for the time being, there are undoubtedly remnants of the issue still at hand in Northern Ireland.

The Scottish independence movement has challenged both the character of the United Kingdom and indeed the term Unionist. It has irrevocably damaged their traditional argument regarding the geographical and constitutional integrity of the United Kingdom and it has reinvigorated a new wave of Northern Irish Republicanism much of which is spearheaded by the fast-growing Sinn Fein.

Capitalising on this momentum, the party who took the Republic of Ireland’s recent local election by storm, have decided to push for a border poll.

This is the right of the people according to the successful Good Friday Agreement, yet, recent independent polls show the majority of those residing in the six counties would vote in favour of the union. This said it is clear that the Scottish

Current Affairs

Scotland: Where do we go from here?

Current Affairs Editor Laura Cashman discusses the future for Scotland and the world after the result in the recent referendum. based government has been actively claiming the vote is “not compatible with the Spanish constitution,” even going as far as to request the constitutional court to suspend the vote, support for the movement has been garnered.

The message in Scotland was one of hope and of a belief in a bright future, one that the Catalans have also adopted. Catalonia’s president Artur Mas recently said “the future is something you conquer, not a gift and we have to earn that.” referendum has begun this long debate.

As a recent Belfast Telegraph article points out, there is a common belief in the North that 25% of Catholics would support the union in a vote.

However, the fact still remains that these people do not vote for pro-Union parties in elections, much of which is a result of the centre right policies of unionist parties. Bearing this in mind, we have to ask why these people would vote pro-Union in a border poll if it is being headed by those that they have no history of voting for.

Evident from sport to their bilingual road signs, Wales has as strong a national identity as Scotland. Yet, a recent BBC poll shows the independence bug has yet to catch on in Cardiff with only 5% of Welsh voters supporting an independent Wales. Yet, the appetite for going it alone does exist with Leanne Wood, leader of pro-independence Plaid Cymru predicting independence “within a generation” with or without Scottish independence.

Interestingly, she also claims that a No vote in Scotland may actually further calls for an independent Wales. The No vote could in fact put the spotlight back on Scotland for a long time to come, this being to the detriment of Wales.

While the Welsh independence movement has yet to pick up momentum, it is clear that the years preceding IndyRef are crucial. Post-Scottish referendum Britain has shown that the union, unionism and the United Kingdom are changing and will continue to change across the two islands.

But events in Spain recently have shown it is not just British politics that can feel change a comin’. Spanish and Catalan politics appear to be heating up also. With a majority of Catalans in favour of the upcoming independence referendum, it is clear that independence is in the forefront of their minds. While the Madrid

The message in Scotland was one of hope and of a belief in a bright future, one that the Catalans have also adopted Until recently, few Catalans truly considered full independence but Spain’s painful economic climate has seen the separatists surge in popularity. This combined with the energetic Yes Scotland campaign has reinvigorated Catalonia’s politics with recent protesters in Barcelona showing their support by waving Scottish flags.

The referendum has reached all parts of the world, from Russia, where views are mixed considering recent support for the secessionist Crimea and the quashing of independence movement in Chechnya and Georgia, to Texas.

The Texas Nationalist Movement or TNM wholeheartedly supports Scottish independence and even looks to it for inspiration. TNM have actively been pursuing its goal to “secure and protect the political, cultural and economic independence of the nation of Texas,” while watching the Yes campaign with glee.

The Yes Scotland campaign captured the minds and hearts of the Scottish people. It released a wave of romantic patriotic sentiment rarely seen in our largely apolitical world. While Better Together spoke in terms of the economy and fiscal stability, Sammond had this and more.

Better Together had criticism, Yes Scotland had hope. Although the vote may not have been in their favour, the Yes campaign left a legacy on independence movements the world over the effects of which have yet to come.

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Current Affairs

14.10.14

The Rise of the

ISLAMIC

STATE

The advance of The Islamic State into Iraq has become increasingly worrying in recent weeks. Motley’s resident writer Aaron Noonan discusses what the conflict entails and how it has come about.

n 9 June, the Islamic State (IS, previously ISIS) took control of Iraq’s second city of Mosul in the North, before continuing their advance southwards and gaining control of further areas such as the city of Tikrit and the oil refinery at Baiji. The Sunni jihadist militant group managed to take large swathes of territory in the north of the country with relative ease and little to no resistance from an Iraqi army that greatly outnumbered them, but deserted as soon as the militants attacked. As it stands, the IS advance continues towards the capital Baghdad, with Iraqi and Kurdish soldiers fending them off. In recent weeks, the United States has begun a bombing and humanitarian campaign, which at first sought to prevent a potential genocide of the Yazidi minority, but has since been expanded across northern Iraq. The vital Mosul dam in the north of the country has seen control switch back and forth between Kurdish Peshmerga forces and IS, but beyond small strategic victories for the Kurds with the aid of US air strikes, the Islamist militants have yet to be sincerely challenged as they continue to conquer Iraq.

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Political and geographical disintegration has become as a genuine threat to the already fragile nation, as the fighting has blurred the lines between the on-going civil war in neighbouring Syria, where IS are fighting against the Assad government. What has transpired in Iraq has created a serious predicament for both Western and Middle Eastern nations, with the United States, Europe and Iran all having a vested interested in seeing that Iraq does not fall to the jihadists. With so many components to the crisis and several different actors, the situation is incredibly complex. Iraq is facing its worst upheaval since the American invasion of 2003, a worsening situation that has already been extremely damaging to a perpetually war-torn nation.

Political and geographical disintegration has become as a genuine threat to the already fragile nation

When attempting to understand the situation, it is pertinent to understand the different ethnicities in Iraq. Muslim’s make up roughly 99% of the country’s population, divided into ethnic Sunnis (32-37%) and ethnic Shias (60-65%). The Kurdish people occupy the northern part of the country, in a region known as Kurdistan. The region is not a recognised state, but takes in portions of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. Kurds are generally a moderate Muslim people with a strong nationalist ideology. The advance of the Islamic State throughout northern Iraq took most of the world by surprise. Indeed, the Obama administration failed to foresee it, as did then-Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri alMaliki.

Yet, for all the bewilderment at the Islamist organisation’s blistering advance, all the signs were in plain sight for those who cared to look. The United States’ invasion of Iraq in 2003 saw the ousting of Saddam Hussein, a Sunni dictator whose regime was particularly oppressive toward the majority Shias. In the aftermath, Iraq had its first fully fledged permanent democratic government elected in 2006, with al-Maliki

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How did they, in such short order, manage to disintegrate a country that the USA spent a decade attempting to rebuild? as Prime Minister. The Premiership of al-Maliki, a Shia, was largely sectarian and particularly oppressive to Sunnis. He implemented policies that have sought to fragment the large Sunni minority, rather than creating a more inclusive government and society.

In attempting to quell Sunni insurgencies in the wake of the American invasion with draconian policies, he consequently fostered discontent among the Sunni population leading to a political landscape that has allowed IS to flourish and capture many Sunni majority cities with little resistance. His sectarian strategy allowed him to consolidate his power, but as his ousting from power in late-July proved, a lack of Sunni representation in government and society in general backfired for the al-Maliki government. His nominated successor, Haider al-Abadi, is also a Shia, but he has received cross-party support and it is hoped that his tenure will be more politically, and religiously, inclusive than al-Maliki’s.

But who are the Islamic State, and how did they, in such short order, manage to disintegrate a country that The United States spent a decade attempting to rebuild?

It was formed in April 2013, as an off-shoot of several different regional jihadi groups, including al-Qaeda in Iraq. Its leader is an enigmatic figure known as Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, of whom only two authenticated photographs and minimal amount of footage exists.

Regarded as an astute tactician and commander, he leads an organisation that has been disavowed by al-Qaeda for attempting to overtake the al-Qaeda offshoot al-Nusra in Syria. The group has been actively fighting in Syria since that country’s civil war began over three years ago. They oppose Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, just as the United States does, but despite fighting toward a common goal in Syria, the United States classifies them as a terrorist organisation.

IS are known for systemic executions using tyrannical methods such as beheading and crucifixion, perhaps most notably on GlobalPost journalist and American citizen James Foley.

As the organisation, which amounts to over 10,000 fighters, gained experience in the Syrian civil war, they spilled back into Iraq, taking advantage of the Sunni discontent in the country as a result of al-Maliki’s policies and conquered large swathes of it. However, their long term goal is to create an Islamic state in the Middle

East, a caliphate that defies traditional borders, taking in parts of Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Cyprus and Southern Turkey. An unlikely prospect, but one that will ensure that most Middle Eastern and Western leaders have a stake in seeing IS defeated.

By the 23rd of June, ISIS had managed to capture border crossings to Syria and Jordan, a huge gain that would allow them to travel more freely between the Syrian conflict and the Iraqi one, not to mention the potential to expand into Jordan. The situation grows worse rather than better for those who seek IS’ downfall, but what are the possible remedies to the crisis?

The United States has a vested interest in the predicament at hand and the future of Iraq in general.

After almost a decade of continuous war in the country, Barack Obama pulled out the last remaining troops in 2011, leaving Iraq to fend for itself. Despite the United States’ recommendation that a residual force should remain behind to prop up the fledgling Iraqi army, alMaliki refused. Now, as the Iraqi army deserts in the face of insurgent attack, the United States and the Kurdish Peshmerga have been forced to step in. Punitive strikes have been used against The Islamic State, something al-Maliki’s government requested, and the potential for other Western nations to step in, such as the United Kingdom, increases every day. Obama has, however, ruled out any boots on the ground. After a decade of fighting two costly wars in faraway lands, American public support for another conflict has dwindled dramatically, with a Pew Research poll finding that 52% of Americans believe that their nation failed to achieve its goals in Iraq in the first instance. But, can the United States afford to lose a country that it spent ten years and thousands of lives fighting to secure? Will the execution of James Foley in Syria rouse support among Americans for a stronger, more vigorous intervention?

Decisions of state should be judged by results rather than intent. Invading another country with just cause is all very well, but it is unlikely that the Obama doctrine would support any boots on the ground without a crystal clear exit strategy, a prospect unlikely given how chaotic and fast-paced Iraq’s upheaval is. One can be sure that the Obama administration is acutely aware that an unsuccessful foray into Iraq would be its lasting legacy. But what is the alternative? Perhaps the

Current Affairs

greatest fear of western nations, particularly the United States and Great Britain, is for a ruined Iraq to foster and harbour terrorists, like its neighbour Syria.

The British government estimates that over five hundred of its citizens are fighting for jihadi groups in both countries. IS has recently released propaganda videos, with high production values, containing several militants with British and Australian accents issuing a call to arms to other westerners to travel to the Middle East and join them in the fighting. The video of James Foley’s murder at the hands of a British militant has emphasised the realness of the threat IS poses to Western countries.

Moreover, IS has used social media to a wildly effective degree, posting in English to Twitter and Facebook in conjunction with its professionally edited video clips. The security issues that arise from this are both serious and urgent in nature, as natural-born western citizens attempting to wage jihad at home will find it much easier to re-enter their countries. As IS consolidates its control over large regions of Iraq by targeting strategic locations such as the Baiji oil refinery and the vital Haditha and Mosul dams, the disintegration of Iraq looks increasingly likely. Although the Iraqi government have sought to put a fresh face on its politics with the nomination of al-Abadi, it is becoming marginalised as its credibility becomes irreversibly damaged. Although the United States has delivered airstrikes to the Kurdish region in the north in an attempt to stave off the militants’ advance, the Obama administration will understand that there is no true military solution to the situation, which is deep-rooted in sectarian strife, political exclusivity and a civil war across the border. A more inclusive government that tends to the needs of all Iraqis, including Kurds, is necessary if the threat of extremist Islamic ideology is to be eradicated.

Militarily, co-operation with the Iraqi Kurds in the north is both Iraq and the West’s best bet for now, with the US

The British government estimates that over five hundred of its citizens are fighting for jihadi groups in both countries currently arming them and assisting them with airstrikes.

The highly organised and disciplined Peshmerga troops are an asset to both Iraqi and United States interests, although the ever-present possibility of increased Kurdish autonomy remains a prospect, particularly given their prominence in the fight against IS. It is unclear how world powers will attempt to stymie The Islamic State advance in Iraq in the long-term. Any political player attempting to solve the crisis will understand that a permanent solution will require intense diplomacy and the finding of common ground between Shia and Sunni Muslims, not to mention the eradication of IS. Any military excursion by any single nation or coalition, no matter how vigorous or effective, will only serve as a short term solution to a long term problem.

How world leaders will achieve an effectual resolution, and whether the al-Abadi government will be able to hold Iraq together, remains to be seen. What is clear however, is that the fate of Iraq will have ramifications across the globe, with oil supplies, regional stability and the fight against home-grown terrorism all at stake.

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Current Affairs

14.10.14

Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known As UCC enters the internationally renowned iGEM competition for the first time, Motley’s Eoin McSweeney speaks to Cian O’Donnell, one of the members of the team involved. harles H. Duell, a former Commissioner of the U.S. Office of Patents, said that: “Everything that can be invented has been invented.” That was in 1899. We now have the internet, computers and smartphones, along with thousands upon thousands of other patents since then. So we can safely assume the commissioner’s prediction was horribly incorrect. Poor Charles.

Over a century later, the human mind is still working at a phenomenal rate, creating new ideas that would have boggled our mind just ten years ago. So what’s next?

Obviously we can expect the iPhone 7 in the near future, along with promises of hover cars, time machines and holidays to Mars. However, could the next great scientific discovery emerge from UCC? A group of students, ranging from first years to postgraduates and spanning several different courses in the college may be on the path to answering that question. The Internationally Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition was entered by UCC students for the first time this year. It focuses on the field of synthetic biology. I asked one of the students, Cian O’Donnell, to give a brief summary of

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what this science is capable of.

“Synthetic biology is basically the manipulation of life forms which have already existed for millions of years to do something new and useful. A good example is the use of E. coli to make insulin. You put the information or codes for human insulin into bacteria and hope it will begin to make a lot more of what you put in.

So we want to see, by putting this information into a cell, will it do something new and useful.”

The students entered the competition at the start of 2014 and have gone from strength to strength. The competition aims to “use synthetic biology to make new useful things or to get cells to do new, useful things that they haven’t previously done.” It also aims to educate the general public about synthetic biology so that there is no mystery behind it and so that ethics aren’t called into question.

“By getting students involved at a young age and having people work on the ethics side of things as well. Many teams have sociologists involved and students studying government degrees. They are looking at legislation because it is advancing at such a breakneck speed that people are finding it hard to keep up.

First of all, we are trying to make people knowledgeable about it so that it’s not scaring anyone and everyone knows what’s going on.

The fact that they are rewarding that in the competition is showing that we don’t want to go creating something in a lab somewhere and something is released upon the world without anyone knowing about it.”

The students had to think of ideas themselves, using synthetic biology to find ways to improve the world, while also getting the general public involved and using the internet (in the form of a website and a wiki) to allow the information to become freely available. They had to target a particular trait to enhance in a bacteria cell and it wasn’t long before they had found one.

“There is a fish, called the hagfish and this hagfish, in an agitated situation, exudes slime from the sides of its body and in this, there is a really strong protein. What we wanted to do was put this really strong material into a bacterial cell to make more of it. This is because it is extremely strong, yet flexible and lightweight. It is analogous to spider silk in some ways, except it is a much simpler composition so it will be much easier to make.

Basically what we did was put the information codes for the protein that occurs naturally in the hagfish, got that DNA and put it into E. coli bacteria. This then started producing this material. It’s like having an animal material in a bacterial cell.”

The teams are expected to fund their own pursuits, be that through advertising from various companies or accelerator programmes.

The team’s idea has been met with much interest and they have gone from success to success, so it was no surprise that such organisations would take interest. SynBio axlr8r, a programme that was based in Cork over the summer and used the UCC labs rewarded the team with funding and a location to do experiments. Using the microbiology department, the group made more progress and gained invaluable business experience in the process.

And the competition itself? It will be taking place in the Hynes Convention Center in Boston at the end of October and the team will be using the funding garnered from the accelerator programme and UCC to fly over and compete, along with paying registration fees. They will be up against some of the most prestigious universities in the world in a bid to have their idea gain even more publicity.

Science is evolving at an ever increasing speed. There is no doubt that more discoveries will be made every day for the foreseeable future. As Carl Sagan, the American astronomer said: “Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.” Hopefully that incredible discovery can be made in UCC and we wish the team the best of luck.

14.10.14

Current Affairs

The Shooting of Mike Brown and the Ferguson Riots After the shooting of Michael Brown in a suburb in St. Louis, Louise Clancy gives a summary of the fallout from the event n August 9th, 18 year old African American Michael Brown was fatally shot by Caucasian police officer Darren Wilson, in Ferguson, Missouri. Brown was unarmed and had no previous criminal record, despite being a suspect in a “strong-armed” robbery at a convenience store, only minutes before the shooting incident. Officer Darren Wilson, was in the vicinity out of coincidence and unaware of the robbery when he encountered Brown and his friend Dorian Johnson, while they were allegedly obstructing traffic on the street.

An altercation occurred between Michael Brown and Darren Wilson resulting in Brown and Johnson being asked to move off the street. A shot was fired from the vehicle, causing the two men to flee. Officer Wilson left his car and pursued the men, shooting approximately six times which killed Michael Brown, after repeatedly stating to the officer that he had no gun.

The day after Michael Brown’s death, news of the incident caused both peaceful protests and widespread looting in the St. Louis suburb due to

many viewing Brown’s untimely death as unfair and racist treatment of the black community. Two vigils were held by the community of Ferguson in memory of Michael Brown. At 9pm, vandalism by protesters began, resulting in riots with police for five hours straight. Nightly conflict between civilians and the police lasted for twelve consecutive days, including the deployment of tear gas bombs, rubber bullets and military equipment.

The civil unrest in Ferguson escalated quickly in the days after the shooting of Michael Brown; due to imposed nightly curfews, the arrests of both peaceful protesters and the journalists Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post and Ryan Reilley of The Huffington Post, and the shooting of a protester, who was critically injured from the incident. On August 18th, after violent clashes during the curfew, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon issued an order to deploy the National Guard to "help restore peace and order and to protect the citizens of Ferguson." Governor Nixon withdrew the National Guard three days later after observing improvements in the social unrest.

Michael Brown’s funeral was held on August 25th at the Friendly Temple Missionary Baptist Church. Around 4,500 people attended the funeral. By request of the Brown family, supporters

suspended their protests on the day of the funeral out of respect. The Ferguson Police Department has come under fire over their actions during the shooting of Michael Brown and the subsequent protests in the days following the incident by the media and federal and state officials for using excessive and unnecessary tactics. The St. Louis Police Department is currently conducting an investigation into the shooting of Michael Brown, namely trying to discover whether or not Officer Darren Wilson made a justified and lawful killing.

The eyewitness testimonials also clash with each other, particularly between Dorian Johnson and Darren Wilson, over whether or not Brown attacked Wilson.

On August 20th, the St. Louis county grand jury commenced hearing the evidence of the shooting to determine if a crime was committed and if there was probable cause that the defendant Darren Wilson committed it. The St. Louis County prosecutor said that the state will be finished presenting the evidence to the grand jury by midOctober. On September 16th, Wilson testified before the grand jury for approximately four hours, and was cooperative to the investigation, although he was not obliged to testify. The verdict of the trial may not be released until at the latest January 2015.

Features & Opinion

Paul Dollery talks Fight Club

UCC Gems

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INTERVIEW

CONOR CUSACK

Conor Cusack became illuminated in the public spotlight after he documented his struggles with depression in a stirring blog post in 2013. He speaks to Motley’s Eoin McSweeney on the struggles associated in Ireland today with mental health, his work in trying to break down taboos and his advice for those struggling like he once did.

Depression is a friend, not my enemy.”

This was the title of the blog post written

by Conor Cusack in 2013 that changed so many people’s views on mental health. It is hard to imagine anyone going through the pain and suffering that he described, yet, his story has given hope to so many. Cusack’s mental health began to deteriorate at the age of thirteen and it led to him planning his own death. Yet, he escaped the dark depths of despair that he had been trapped in and now leads a full life and is greatly involved in breaking down the stigma associated with depression.

“I don’t say those words lightly, because depression kills. It’s a fact. Not everyone who ends their life through suicide is depressed. It’s a complex situation, but you know depression is one of the major things that come on for them before they end their lives. I meet people and see people on a daily basis and I see the carnage and the horror that it has caused in their lives. When I was in the depths of my darkness, at its height, and if somebody had said that to me, I would have wanted to kill them.”

At first glance, you wouldn’t think that Conor had gone through such a harrowing experience. He is a smartly dressed man, cheerful and willing to answer everything. His hand is in a cast, a recent injury in a club match for his local GAA club Cloyne, where he is heavily involved. Now, hurling is one of his great loves, and he played for Cork in the All-Ireland Final in 2006. However it was an unhealthy obsession at one time, and one of the reasons that he was able to coin the above phrase.

“I had a poor sense of myself as a young person.

I had an unhealthy addiction to my sport and my studies, but I was using them as a way of being important and being seen and being valuable in the world. I didn’t have a strong sense of my worth as a human being, it was based on a lot of things outside of myself. Hurling and my studies were used to please other people and I wasn’t doing what was right for me.

“Depression forced me down a path that I didn’t want to go on, but that I had to go on, so that I could recover my well being. Part of the learning, or

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I had an unhealthy addiction to my sport and my studies one of the consequences of being on that path, or journey inwards as I like to call it, was that I started to develop a very strong sense of myself and a strong appreciation. I was worth more than the things that I was involved with. Ultimatel,y depression liberated me from a persona that I had developed to please those around me. I was now comfortable in my own skin.”

This explanation confused me as we began. How could I understand it, having never been in such a situation? How could I hope to delve into his past and experience the nightmare that had enveloped his world? How could I see, hear and feel the anguish that had disturbed his life for so long? Cusack said in his own blog that there is no need to explain depression to someone who has battled through it, but that putting it into adequate words for someone who hasn’t was near impossible. Yet, when I posed

the question, his response was certainly enough for me to shiver at the thought of such a harrowing experience.

“It’s just this cloud of darkness that envelops your mind. You lose your ability to get enjoyment out of anything; your taste in food, your ability to love, or to receive love is vanquished. Your energy levels are sapped. The energy needed to even get out of bed in the morning and just go for a piss is immense. It’s like this tree or animal with black tentacles, that just seems to reach into every single part of your body and spread darkness everywhere. Waves of anxiety and fear and loathing. People can’t see it. It’s hard for people to feel compassionate.”

Even after therapy and long hours with doctors and psychiatrists, Cusack’s health did not improve.

It in fact got much, much worse and soon he was contemplating suicide. As he illustrated for me, the days leading up to the planned self-destruction and the morning itself, I was enthralled by his honesty.

Here was a man, much older and wiser than myself, describing the darkest moments in his life to me, just to help others understand and accept the suffering that he had been through. He had it all planned

14.10.14 out, knowing where he was going to do it, how he was going to do it, and when the moment would be exactly right. I asked if that frightened him at all.

“No, because since I was thirteen years of age, when I first started experiencing panic attacks, there were no mobile phones, there was no internet, you lived in your own little bubble of the village that you lived in and the school that you went to. There was no discussion of mental health or anxiety or depression at that time. So I was very isolated and lonely, because I was convinced that I was the only person suffering from this.

“I went on a gradual scale from panic attacks to depression to a break down. This went on for ten years. The bullying that I had experienced as a kid, the panic attacks, the self-harming. I had endured a huge amount. My body and mind were now relieved at the thought of not having to endure it anymore.”

I don’t think that there are any words to describe accurately how someone feels in that moment. As you are about to commit the ultimate act, it is difficult to even know how you feel yourself. From the outside, it is almost impossible to tell how deeply lost and isolated someone can be. This happened in Cusack’s case.

“The key thing is that nobody wants to end their own life. What they want to do is end the suffering. I remember waking that morning and it was the best sleep that I had got in a few days. I was very calm about it and my family actually got to the point where they said, ‘Jesus, is Conor after turning a corner? He’s a lot more relaxed and seems at ease with himself.’

But the complete opposite was the case.”

However Cusack managed to pull himself away from his depression and, as mentioned above, it gave him a new lease of life. It was a combination of many things that helped him with his recovery, his work with a psychologist, meditation, reading vast amounts of books about the human mind, body and spirit, exercise and the support of his family and community.

His journey back to wellness was a long and, at times difficult path, but one that was full of rich and liberating learning.

Conor Cusack completed his therapy in 2004, and went on to have a successful hurling career. He began to lead a fuller life and soon enjoyed things with which he had become uninterested in. While it was difficult, Cusack is one of those who has experienced depression and fragile mental health. So what advice can he give to someone who is struggling with their mental health?

“It’s a difficult place for a person to find themselves in. I love the quote from Maya Angelou, the American poet who died recently: ‘There is no greater agony than the bearing of an untold story inside you.’ There is nothing with a greater capacity for freedom in the universe than the human self. That self always wants to be free, to express its own truth and be true to themselves.

“It is of vital importance that you talk to someone.

That might be a friend, a teacher or a parent. It might be a brother or sister, it might be a doctor or it might be a group within college. It could be anybody. It is important to try and find that support. It can be difficult to walk that path on your own. If you are someone who is struggling, you must find someone to walk that path with you. Or if you are a person that knows someone who is struggling than you must try and walk that path with them.”

Over 60,000 people are admitted to Accident and Emergency Departments each year in Ireland with self-harming injuries, With Mental Health Week approaching and Suicide Awareness Day having just passed, it has been a busy time for him. Cusack is now a Wellbeing Ambassador for the Gaelic Players Association and has been appointed to the GAA’s new National Health and Wellbeing Committee in Croke Park.

He travels Ireland, Europe and America bringing awareness and hope to others and trying to break down the stigma and taboo that still surrounds this very common aspect of the human experience. He feels very privileged to be in a position to support others and be a part of a new, fresh conversation that has opened up in Ireland around the Mental Health and Emotional Wellbeing challenges of our people. He manages to balance this with his day job working for a multinational medical device company.

“I think that I got to one hundred schools last year.

I’m taking a week off work for Mental Health Week and starting in Kerry and travelling up to Belfast, Galway and Mayo and back down the other side to Dublin and Wexford. I’m also an ambassador with the Gaelic Player’s Association. The number one issue that these players had regarding their wellbeing is depression. What I said to people often was these are the guys that you see on television, and they are showing incredible feats of skill, yet they are still having difficulties with their emotional wellbeing. Now at least they are coming forward and seeking the help that they need.”

The modern view of mental health is a more positive one and slowly, but surely, taboos are being broken down. A tool that has to be utilised is social media. While once it was a vicious weapon, used to create endless trauma for people struggling with their state of mind, it has now become a solution. Twitter, Facebook and blog posts can all be used to spread the word and further break down any taboos.

Features & Opinion

“There’s positives and negatives to social media.

When I was being bullied as a kid, at least when I came home and closed my door, that was the end of it. But for some kids now, either through their phone or social media, it becomes never ending. The other side of it is the daily interaction that I have with people in every corner of the country, and not only here, but in Europe and America too. The story can get to people in all parts of the country, that might not have heard it before. Like when I talk about myself at that time, 17 years ago or whatever, there was no discussion about it, and I felt like I was completely alone. With social media we can tell these people that they are not alone.”

Yet, there are still taboos and stigmas attached to suicide and depression that Cusack is determined to tackle. The focus seems to sometimes drift away from women and turn only to the issue of men’s mental health. There are two sides to every story and one is unfortunately not being told.

“Over 60,000 people are admitted to Accident and Emergency Departments each year in Ireland with self-harming injuries, and many of these are woman. Many men use a more vicious form of ending their lives and they are often more successful. But woman use methods that maybe aren’t as vicious.

Because of that, people are thinking that this is purely a male issue and they just focus on one side. That is an incredibly dangerous thing. Those kind of figures shatter the myth that it is only men who develop difficulties with their emotional wellbeing. Females experience just as much as far as I am concerned.

People think that women talk, and men don’t talk, but they still don’t talk about what is really important.”

No story that I had heard before stirred so many emotions inside me as Conor’s did. Anger, despair, love, joy, bravery. His words were both inspirational and moving, and the work that he has continued to do saves lives on a daily basis. As he put so eloquently himself: “Nobody can walk another’s path for them, but you can certainly walk it with them.”

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article you can contact the Samaritans on 116 123 or jo@samaritans.org or Pieta House Cork on 021-4341400.

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Features & Opinion 14.10.14 Laura Hussey talks to Cage Warriors Fighting Championship PRO and Cork native Paul Dollery about the largest mixed martial arts promotion in Europe. ormer UCC Arts student, Paul Dollery, joined Cage Warriors Fighting Championship as their PRO in 2011 after working as a sports journalist for Evening Echo and The Irish Independent.

He eagerly spoke to Motley about CWFC’s growing popularity and dispelled the very outdated views of MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) fighters as “glorified barroom brawlers.”

One of the aspects of MMA that can often make people uncomfortable with the idea of the sport is the venue - a cage. Surprisingly, Dollery explained that, while people often seem to find the cage intimidating, it is in fact, there to protect the fighters. Due to “the grappling involved, if the fights take place in a ring, guys can easily fall through the ropes and sustain serious injuries, which has happened before and still happens now in some countries where the cage is banned. Banning the cage is contradictory, because MMA competition in a ring instead of a cage can only cause more injuries than it prevents. There is absolutely nothing dangerous about the cage.”

While on the topic of misconceptions about the sport, Mr Dollery dismissed the claims that CWFC in any way glorifies violence. “Working in mixed martial arts, this type of question [the glamorising of violence] I’m probably asked more often than any other,” he explained.

“First off, combat sports can be divisive and some people just don’t like them from a spectator’s point

of view - plain and simple. I completely respect that people are entitled to that opinion. MMA is not for everyone, but hopefully I can impart some information here that might give people a broader understanding of the sport. The term ‘cage-fighting’ is something we prefer to avoid as it’s outdated and it has a lot of negative connotations attached to it. The name of the sport is actually mixed martial arts, or MMA,” he clarified. “Do we glorify violence? Absolutely not.

That suggests that we celebrate violence, which is of course not the case. Like boxing or any other combat sport, people do sometimes get hurt but not nearly as often as you might think. In the three years I’ve worked for Cage Warriors Fighting Championship, I’ve seen nearly 500 fights, but I’ve never came across anything more serious than bumps, bruises and the occasional broken hand.”

Do we glorify violence?

Absolutely not.

He went on to further defend the modern, technical and clean approach CWFC take to MMA: “Our fighters are not some breed of glorified bar-room brawlers, despite what people might think. They’re highly-skilled martial artists who have excelled across a range of different disciplines in a controlled environment, such as Braziian jiu-jitsu, Muay Thai and wrestling.

They’re just some of the varying disciplines that combine to make the sport of MMA. People don’t generally have issues with those sports individually, so there’s no reason to fear the worst when they’re amalgamated under the banner of mixed martial arts.”

Though this seems to be the case with CWFC and

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modern combat sports today, it appears that a lot of the negativity associated with the idea of Mixed Martial Arts fighting dates back to the roots of MMA. “I think one of the main reasons for the negative perception many people have about MMA stems back to the early 90’s from the origins of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), which is the biggest promotion in the sport. When they first started out, it was a vastly different sport. Back then it was known as NHB – which stands for No Holds Barred – or ‘cagefighting’. As the NHB name suggests, there were almost no rules at all. It was barbaric stuff and it’s hard to believe now that it was ever allowed to happen.

But things are extremely different now. The sport is well-regulated – before, during and after fights. There are strict and clearly defined rules, and experienced, qualified officials are in place to ensure the safety of fighters.”

The MMA community as a whole seem resolved to the fact that the perception of the sport as a whole is moving in the right direction. When it comes to gender equality, something that is sometimes lacking in MMA among many other sports including the most common, CWFC leads the way in the support for female athletes.

“Cage Warriors Fighting Championship is actually the largest promotion for female fighters outside the USA. I think we have around 30 female fighters from across Europe on our roster and we’re constantly signing more.

There’s some great talent in Ireland. Aisling Daly from Dublin is probably the most well-known, and there’s also Catherine Costigan from Limerick. Katie Taylor was in attendance at the UFC’s event in Dublin recently so hopefully Ireland will have an MMA equivalent of Katie very soon. Promoting women’s MMA is a top priority for us at CWFC and MMA is becoming much more popular for girls. If you go to any MMA gym around Ireland today you’ll see that.”

Despite the improvements made in regards to female athletes, MMA still has a long way to go. Dollery admitted, “There obviously aren’t as many female fighters as there are males at the moment, so it can be difficult for the girls to stay active in competition as opponents aren’t as readily available, but we’re definitely making progress on that front. Women are just as capable of competing in MMA as men, so there’s no reason to discourage them from doing so. The biggest star in MMA right now is actually a woman – Ronda Rousey – which is proof of that.”

Paul was positive when finishing up the interview about the views of MMA and its future as a sport. “The backgrounds of most of our fighters certainly don’t stack up to the clichéd tales people expect to hear,” he told Motley. “Contrary to popular belief, MMA promotions don’t scout out the next batch of talent outside pubs and chippers on a Saturday night. I think people are finally starting to appreciate that too. The UFC’s recent event in Dublin was televised live on terrestrial TV in Ireland by TV3, which was a massive development for MMA and a huge step into the mainstream. At CWFC we also recently signed a broadcast deal with Channel 4, so in addition to our existing deals with the likes of Setanta Sports, FOX and ESPN around the world, I think the sport is definitely moving in the right direction.” It appears the first rule of fight club is very different to what stereotypes would have us believe.

To find out about upcoming events and tickets check out cagewarriors.com.

14.10.14

Features & Opinion

Sam Pepper –

A Prank

Too Far

Méadhbh Crowley investigates the recent prank videos by YouTuber Sam Pepper which have caused uproar across the world.

Since his appearance on Big Brother in 2010, Sam Pepper has been entertaining his over 2.4 million subscribers on a weekly basis with his humorous prank videos, which see him and his YouTube friends play pranks on each other and the unsuspecting public. Unfortunately for him, Sam’s recent collections of videos have been catching the public’s attention, but for all the wrong reasons.

Pepper has released many a controversial “prank” video of late, including “How to Make Out with Strangers” where Pepper is seen to force women to kiss him on Vienna Beach and “How to Pick Up Girls with a Lasso” where Pepper physically restrains non consenting women, but no video has had the reaction that his latest batch has had.

On the 20th of September Pepper released the first of his “Fake Hand Ass Pinch Prank” videos, these videos saw Sam groping women in the street using a fake hand in his pocket which disguises what he’s actually doing. One of the women in the video repeated “I don’t like that” as Pepper continued to publically sexually assault her. Within hours of posting the video #ReportSamPepper was trending worldwide on twitter and soon after the video was removed from YouTube for violating their terms of use.

The video sparked a reaction across the YouTube community leaving Sam being isolated by many of his friends. Louise Pentland (aka SprinkleofGlitter) spoke openly about the video and her disdain of the world her daughter was living in. “It really saddens me that my daughter is growing up in a world where one day a stranger (male or female) could touch her without her consent,” said Pentland, “on a part of her body that is private (in my opinion) in the name of ‘comedy’ and then have thousands of other strangers comment on it saying it’s fine and she should be ok with it.” She went on to continue that “ I want my daughter to have the freedom and choices and feel that her body is respected”.

The reaction of the rest of the YouTube community was similar with Hank Green ,founder of VidCon, the world’s largest YouTube gathering, a conference which Pepper has appeared frequently tweeted “For people asking, its safe to assume that people who sexually assault women in “prank” videos will not be welcome at future VidCons”.

Likewise, high profile YouTubers such as Tyler Oakley, Mamrie Hart and Grace Helbig co-signed an open letter written by Laci Green asking Sam to stop these “social experiments”. In the letter Laci pleads “While it may seem like harmless fun, a simple prank, or a “social experiment” these videos encourage millions of young men and women to see this violation as a normal way to interact with women. 1 in 6 young women (real life ones, just like the ones in your video) are sexually assaulted, and sadly, videos like these will only further increase those numbers”.

Two days later, Pepper released the second video in the series which saw young men being pinched by women in a public place. Similarly to the previous video, this video was also taken down for violating the terms of service. As expected the video received a similar reaction across the world with YouTuber Charlie McDonald (Charlieissocoollike) tweeting “Another day, another Sam Pepper video to report for sexual harassment”.

Later that day Pepper released the final video in the series “The Reveal”, where he claims the whole series had been a “social experiment” to highlight the plight of male victims of sexual harassment and domestic violence, after he was touched indecently by fans at various meet and greets. In the video, the 25 year old also claims that the series of videos have all been staged and everyone involved in the videos were actors, but his viewers and friends don’t seem to be buying it.

Mark Ludford, a blogger who claims he has distanced himself from Pepper, a former friend, wrote: “His

behaviour is fucking unacceptable and I’m glad this entire thing has blown up in his face, and I’m also glad YouTubers and viewers are standing by what’s morally right here.” Mazzi Maz, a YouTube collaborator with Pepper, said he had gone “too far”. Maz added that “we are meant to push the boundaries but you need to know what’s right and what’s wrong. YouTube is a place where you can get ripped to shreds. A sexual predator isn’t a good look.”

Saying that things aren’t looking too good for Sam Pepper may seem an understatement , but things went from bad to worse on the same day as three young women came forward with claims that they were sexually harassed by Pepper and also were forced by Pepper to send him indecent pictures of themselves when they were minors.

From searching the internet it’s hard to find anyone who believes any of Pepper’s claims that this saga was a “social experiment” and most believe the last video was a drastic clean up job to somehow pick up the pieces of his tarnished reputation.

Laci Green suggests some things that the viewers can do to stop sexually abusive videos on YouTube: Take sexual abuse seriously, and take videos in which women or men are sexually abused seriously; Stop watching the videos and supporting the content, while not ignoring that these horrible videos exist; Reporting any videos that violate YouTube’s terms of service; and Speaking up against sexual harassment, any way in which you feel safe and comfortable.

If you have been affected by this article please contact RCC 24 Hour Helpline 1800 77 8888

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Features & Opinion 14.10.14 impressive fundraiser. Countless people are dying across the globe every day because they don’t have access to clean water and here are tens of thousands of people dumping buckets of water over their heads, thinking they are doing a good thing; which they are – in part. As someone who did the Ice Bucket Challenge, I never stopped to consider this until a friend of mine put up a Facebook status to explain why she decided not to do it. While it was of great benefit for one cause, I couldn’t help feel ashamed and ignorant when I stopped to think of all the people who are dying from dehydration; it’s certainly giving with one hand and unintentionally taking with another. The Ice Bucket Challenge suddenly felt like such a “Western thing to do,” especially when you read the statistics.

5000 people a year are sadly diagnosed with ALS syndrome and 3.4 million people die from polluted water disease. 780 million have no access to clean water, that’s more than 2.5 times the entire United States population.

It’s important and interesting to note that American Actor Matt Damon used toilet water instead of tap water to stress the waste of clean water. The actor, who co-founded Water.org, a notfor-profit organization helping to provide safe water and sanitation to communities in Africa, Asia and Central America, said that the dare “posed kind of a problem for me”. Damon, who was nominated

by Ben Affleck and Jimmy Kimmel, said on camera that the challenge was awkward for him “not only because there’s a drought here in California but because I co-founded Water.org and we envision a day when everybody has access to a clean drink of water – and there are about 800 million people in the world who don’t – so dumping a clean bucket of water on my head seemed a little crazy.” He also pointed out that toilet water in the Western world is far cleaner than most of the water available to the average person in a developing country.

It’s also interesting to note that The Rice Bucket Motley Staff Writer Rachel O’ Shea, considers the two sides to Challenge has been started in India in late August The Ice Bucket Challenge 2014 and later spread to other South Asian nations, was also partly a response to the Ice Bucket Challenge’s wastefulness of water.

The Ice Bucket Challenge will help change and reform many MND sufferers’ lives for the better and we should all be proud and celebrate its enormous success. However this challenge has opened my mind to be more considerate of the bigger picture in the future. There will be another form of the Ice Bucket challenge to hit us in the near future that is for sure. I just hope that it is a challenge that doesn’t Donations as a result of the Ice Bucket Challenge resumably, everyone has by now heard of feel hypocritical and that we all give more thought “The Ice Bucket Challenge.” But for those have exceeded any possible expectations of such a to before we choose to what type of challenge to students who have spent their summer fundraiser. In Washington DC by Friday, August 29, start off or if we should get involved. the ALS Association had received over $100 million, indoors studying, preparing themselves for the In September, the Motley Magazine team were start of UCC’s academic year in September, The since it began tracking the campaign’s progress on nominated to do The Ice Bucket Challenge by July 29. With donations ranging from under one Ice Bucket Challenge is a task undertaken for The UCC Societies Guild and we thank them charity, and has become unofficially associated dollar to $200,000, Barbara Newhouse, President for the nomination and congratulate them on with helping to combat motor neuron disease (such and CEO of The ALS Association said “people completing the challenge for a good cause. as the tight charitable links which have developed have responded with such generosity, it is truly Some of us decided to take part in the challenge between the Challenge and the ALS Association). remarkable and we couldn’t be more appreciative. as individuals and we have donated to the Irish It is a challenge that has seen thousands of These donations will truly help fuel our fight against Motor Neuron Disease Association but printing ALS in ways that were never before possible.” people, including many high profile public this article in consideration of the other side is figures, sharing videos of themselves being While the Ice Bucket Challenge has raised our main response. We have not made a video doused with freezing water in a viral charitable an incredible amount of money for a truly worthy but instead wish to nominate all readers to text charity, it has also wasted unimaginable amounts challenge before, upon completion, nominating MND to 50300 to donate to the IMNDA. others to do the same. of water; which is the very sad down side of this

Considering the Ice Bucket Challenge

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14.10.14

4

Features & Opinion

Taking a gap year

By taking a gap year, I don’t mean lounging around the house, and catching up on every television show ever made (although that would be tempting!). A gap year is usually a year where people “find themselves”, which is either done by research, travel or working. However, if you want to do a Master’s Degree or indeed go travelling, you may need to work first, so maybe this is the year where you find a full-time job, work as many hours as you can possibly get, and save every penny to ensure you can then go on to fulfil whatever dream you may have!

Go back and do another Undergraduate Degree!

You wouldn’t believe the amount of people that I know who are considering doing just that. Some students find that they rather dislike their initial degree, realise they don’t want to pursue anything in that field, or just want to go off in a totally different direction. Instead of dropping out, though, these students kept working at their degrees, and are now ready to start a new chapter in their lives.

This is costly too, as there are no grants available (and very little financial assistance) for anyone who wants to pursue a second undergraduate degree.

This is also another three or four years out of your life, and you also may need to go on to further education once the second undergraduate degree is completed. It takes a chunk of your life, a lot of money and commitment to go back and stick out another undergraduate degree, so make sure you have all of your facts straight before you apply.

Master’s 1 Degree A master’s degree is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice. What that fancy definition doesn’t tell you, is that master’s degrees are expensive, and actually don’t guarantee you a job in your required field. However, if you’re passionate about a certain subject and want to build your knowledge, then a master’s degree could be a great choice. My only advice concerning a Master’s is to make sure you do your research; get the prospectus, email the department, visit the campus (if it’s not in UCC), and ask as many questions as possible. Make sure you know what you are getting yourself into!

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Graduate Programmes

Graduate programmes are educational programmes for individuals who have already obtained their basic degree, including those studying for a postgraduate degree or vocational diplomas. These programmes are usually two to three years in length and prepare you for the real working world. These companies put you through exams, so you have extra qualifications by the time you finish working there, and also require you to work (with pay!). There are various programmes, and numerous companies that take on graduates every year, so there is plenty of choice. Some of the most popular places that hire are: KPMG, Dairygold, Accenture, Nestle, Deloitte, Kerry, EY, AIB and HedgeServ. There are many talks from the above companies (and more) taking place on campus over the next few weeks, so make sure you go along to them if you have an interest!

Life after

College

Features and Opinion Editor Claire Crowley talks about life after college, and the different options available eaving college has been on my mind a lot recently. This is mainly due to the fact that I’m in final year and my days in UCC are now numbered. Each coffee from coffee dock, each lecture, each daily commute to and from college… these are in the last stretch of my four year degree. It could be said that I’m panicking. Part of me is itching to leave, and immensely looking forward to finishing that last exam in May. Another part of me is absolutely petrified at leaving the familiar surroundings of UCC. The future seems bleak at the moment, with the remnants of the recession still lingering in Ireland, especially for students who are just about to finish their undergraduate degrees. So, in light of this, I have decided to compile a list of options that may be useful, if you too, are on the brink of finishing off your undergraduate degree (and I’m also writing this article to put my own mind at rest).

Whatever your decision about the future, make sure you are doing what YOU want to do. By all means, take advice from your friends, family and lecturers, but remember that this is your life. Do what makes you happy. Even if it is not what everyone else necessarily thinks you should do. It’s a scary time, as the real world is looming, and you still may feel as clueless as you did when you were eighteen.

Remember, the Career Service is always on hand to offer advice and help!

3 Travel

Travelling is one of the best things you will ever do in your life. There’s a big bright world out there, and if you’ve always wanted to explore parts of it, or all of it, then now is the time to do it! You have a degree behind you, you’ve (presumably) worked quite hard to get that degree, and if you’re not entirely sure what the next step is, then travel could be a great step forward. The one thing about travelling (and probably the only reason I’m still in the country) is that it’s expensive. If you want to go off and travel the world, make sure you have a bank account to back it up. (Although, some may say that travelling with limited money is all part of the adventure, and that it shows you what kind of person you are, I would still prefer to know that there’s spare cash in the bank if needed!) Travelling changes you as a person, exposes you to different cultures and is something you will never regret.

The careers service can be contacted at careers@ucc.ie

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Features & Opinion 14.10.14

As September comes to an end, Martha Garry discusses why it’s ok not to feel ok

September, blue in

more ways than one eptember, this time last year, I was six stone and seven pounds. I remember being excited to start college having experienced the best summer of my life. I could not wait to turn the page to the next chapter, yet I had this certain niggling feeling of restlessness. I couldn’t sit down and I never felt hungry. I knew how many calories were in everything and I constantly wanted to brush my teeth. Everything had to be folded neatly and tidily into its little boxes. I felt edgy but very in control of everything around me. I was the master of my worries, fears and even excitement for the future, for getting out of the suffocating bubble of a town I grew up in.

This time last year, I was six stone and seven pounds. I had all my food in its little plastic containers, ready to be eaten at an alarmingly slow pace at the right times, with the right crockery and a magazine to remind myself that I was disgusting and did not deserve the thimble of porridge or the carrot soup.

I was not thinking about what my course would entail, I wasn’t thinking about making new friends, or the fresh night-life scene or clubs and societies. I was thinking about joining the Mardyke and the lies I would have to make up so my friends didn’t think I went there for that long. I was thinking about losing all the disgusting fat on myself so that I could take on anything that life threw at me in this new place. My first day in U.C.C feels like it was only a week ago.

It was overwhelming and exhausting. I felt tearful;

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everyone was looking at my fat thighs. I didn’t want to converse or hear myself speak so I just plastered on my “I’m happy” smile which I thought I had down to a tee.

I listened to all the maths, and chemistry and physics talks and immediately felt that I had made the wrong choice. Suddenly, I was a failure and all the work I had put into getting an impressive leaving cert, all the effort I had put into losing four stone in four months, meant nothing.

One week later, I transferred courses. I felt unhappy.

My grandparents gave me a large sum of money because they were so proud of me. I felt unhappy.

I had just moved into a beautiful new home with my two unbiological sisters. I felt unhappy.

I was experiencing freedom in its rawest form for the first time. I was miserable.

Numb were my emotions. I did everything with militant precision, everything I was supposed to do, but there was a dark cloud resting on my shoulders.

September; the month that my best friends organized my second intervention.

September, the month is suddenly dawned on me that I did in fact, have anorexia and that I was severely depressed. I was aggressive at first.

I defended what had become my new soul-mate, with all I had left. I had nothing though, nothing but the delusions and evil voices of “A” that whirred around my exhausted mind.

I had become a shell of the big busted, frizzy haired chatty girl with the laugh that could shatter glass. I was empty and everything was grey.

On the 24th of September, my demons were presented to me on a platter. On this night, what had become my arm-bands were ripped from me and I was thrown into the deep-end of reality.

With the support of my two nearest and dearest, as well as my overly loving and protective mother, I got worse before I got even worse, before I got better. It was a rocky, rocky road to navigate and is one that I still have to work on everyday.

September 8th 2014; I am nine stone and nine pounds. I have anticipated coming back to college for the entire summer. I am fed up of serving pretentious wankers their Pinot Grigios in the peak of Summer, for 40 plus hours a week. I am hungry for college life. I feel like I have life all figured out, that I’m in a better place and that I can take on anything that comes my way. This time, I was coming back to college a whole lot healthier than last year, I had all my rent money in the bank, and I was no longer fueled solely by my toxic low self-esteem. I had my girls, I had a new boy and all of my things no longer had to be neatly packed into their little boxes.

Then September nears and suddenly it’s back, that feeling. Restless, edgy, inadequate.

I was entering into another “Blue September”.

The dark clouds were a-closing down again, like turbulence in your ears or wearing a really tight hair band. Fresher’s week was a blur of cheap vodka and dancing, of skiving and sunbathing, and taking a much need break from those people and their many different variations of how to pronounce Pinot Grigio. Something was not right though. When the haze of the self-inflicted “Fear” lifted, it occurred to me that I hadn’t slept in two months. I realized I was starting to eat too little on purpose or binge until

Let your inner demons out I was completely and utterly inflated. The free-fall began.

My mom recently found me by the steps of Dunne’s Stores “in the bell jar” smoking a fag with tears in my eyes. I did not want a repeat of last year’s September so I filled the latest one with alcohol and pretending to be okay. Thankfully a drunken incident in which no one got hurt woke me up to this fact.

Vodka does not heal old wounds; it just creates the potential for new ones. I booked myself back into the U.C.C counseling service which is free of charge and excellent.

Last September, I realized it is absolutely o-fucking-kay not to be okay. Let your inner demons out. September is blue for me, but I’m going to turn that into a positive. It will be the month that I wash out all my mental toxins, the month that I realize that everything can not be done to the best of our ability at one time. It’s a month of new beginnings and excitement but if you feel like you’re the only one experiencing a bit of blue, trust me, you’re not. On the bright side, it’s over, the leaves are starting to fall, orange is coming back in and it’s trick or treat season once again.

14.10.14

Features & Opinion

’ve been on Erasmus in the lively French city of Tours for almost five weeks now and while my time here has so far been exhilarating and exciting, thoughts of home are never far away. Experiencing a different university in a foreign country is bizarre, and it has made me realise all the things about UCC that I miss and appreciate.

So, after careful deliberation, I give you my top four ‘UCC gems I’ve missed in the first five weeks of being abroad.’ Yes, I’ll admit the title is a little lengthy.

1. Sausages, Beans & Chips (fondly known to some as SB&C) There is no pleasure quite like leaving the library after a long day of extreme procrastination, strolling in to the main rest and ordering a plate of SB&C. So unassuming and straightforward, it never pretends to be something it’s not. But it does deliver, every single time. In the last year or so, there has been heated debate between true gourmands over whether or not the change in chip variety has threatened the appeal of this classic combo. There are also those who swear that SB&C is far superior without vinegar, those who can’t get enough of it and those who feel the beans are an unnecessary complication. Whatever way you prefer your SB&C, this meal is a prize, a reward. “Congratulations”, the sausages cry, “You’ve made it through the day, champ.”

And let’s face it, you’ve earned it -especially after wrestling with that stiff ketchup pump.

Have they replaced that yet?

2. Coffee Dock Everyone knows that as soon as you open the doors to the Orb, your biggest struggle that morning will be ignoring the inviting smells coming from Coffee Dock and attending the class you bothered to get out of bed for. If you do give in to your temptation, you can expect to join a long queue of like-minded rebels. I really miss Coffee Dock. To be honest, it’s not even about the coffee. Okay well sometimes it’s about the coffee. But mainly Coffee Dock is about the customers and the constant (caffeinated?) buzz they fill the place with. Friends catching up, trendy professors holding informal meetings, the awkward first tinder date, which anyone can spot instantly from the queue (hint: they usually sit near the doors in case a speedy getaway has to be made)… Some people are in and out in minutes, clutching their double shot Americanos as they rush away.

Others arrive in the late afternoon slump and continue slumping until the baristas are turning off the espresso machine. In Tours, there isn’t a proper on-campus café, and instead there are coffee vending machines installed in the corridors. While this coffee costs only fifty cent, being served by a machine (which can’t even ask my name let alone spell it incorrectly) just doesn’t quite cut the mustard when I’m used to the fine

UCC Gems

Writer Bethany Hart takes a different approach on an Erasmus Diary – by discussing what she misses about UCC 4. Societies and College Spirit

purveyors of creamy procrasti-lattés at my disposal in UCC. 3. The Boole Library Honestly, I never thought in a million years that I would miss the library. I definitely don’t spend as much time in there as I should, but now that I’m away I would love to be hanging out in the lobby with friends or pretending to write essays on Q2 while really pouring over endless Buzzfeed articles. The library is the best place on campus to observe student life. If aliens arrived in Cork demanding information on the student psyche, I would direct them to the library without hesitation.

Yes, it is primarily for studying in an attempt to reverse the curse put on our degrees by accidentally walking across the quad that one time. However, all the greatest library memories are made outside study hours.

Who hasn’t sat on the floor of the backstairs with their mates, stressed beyond the point of delirium, and laughed hysterically at stupid jokes, only to be deeply embarrassed when someone walks around the corner and gives you the evil eye as they return to their work?

I know I’m not the only one, this happens to everyone at least once. I love how some students are happy to wander the library, occasionally giving out an encouraging pat on the back to friends hunched over their laptops. I love the crafty ingenuity of the student card pass-back when someone’s forgotten their own, which is also up there with sneaking flasks of tea past security. I love how students dedicate themselves to one floor with such ardent loyalty; don’t you dare tell a Q3 head that there are no seats up there and he should try Q2. If he has to drag a chair from downstairs all the way to the top, so be it, he will not betray his brotherhood for anything. Gosh, I might start going more often once I’m home. Maybe.

I never thought in a million years that I would miss the library.

Missing UCC is missing the tiny nuances of a day on campus.

The most difficult thing about university life in Tours is that there are less than forty active societies and therefore very few on-campus activities and events. Pair this with the segregation of students according to faculty and you have a university that is seriously lacking in some community spirit. If there is only one thing to be said about UCC, it’s that it has this in abundance. It is impossible to be impervious to the sense of community and friendship present among societies and I have been particularly overwhelmed by it at certain points in the college calendar. Take RAG week, for example, the only time of the year when someone could run past you in nothing but a pair of boxers, a wig and fairy wings and you wouldn’t even be slightly perturbed. And of course who could forget student union elections week, which brings hundreds out to show their support for those running for positions. Even those harassed by campaigners to the point of angry disinterest might begrudgingly follow the hordes down to the Boole basement to throw a vote in the ballot box. With the demonstration of passion and devotion that students show in this week comes an overwhelmingly electric atmosphere that perfectly demonstrates the sense of pride and love that the students have for their college. Essentially, I’m learning more and more that societies, in particular, have been an integral part of my student experience and I miss that camaraderie every day.

Missing UCC is missing the tiny nuances of a day on campus. I can’t wait to get home, walk on to campus and before even reaching the quad, have someone I know knock on the window of the main rest at me, signalling a friendly ‘hello’ from inside. I’m never usually this sentimental, I swear, the Erasmus does strange things to a person, but sometimes it takes leaving home to realize how much you love it.

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Features & Opinion 14.10.14

The Curious Case of

JAMES BARRY

Cian Manning reflects on the memory of a life in need of rectification in this country

J It appears Dr. James Barry was born Margret Ann Buckley

ames Miranda Barry, an army doctor, is believed to have been born in Cork (though some suggest Belfast), and such uncertainty seems to be the theme of this individual’s life. Similarly there is no definite year with regards to Barry’s birth; different years given for university registration (date of birth placed at 1799) and entry into the British army, meaning that he was twelve when graduating from the University of Edinburgh and fifteen upon becoming a surgeon in the army. Barry’s parents were Jeremiah Buckley, a merchant and Mary Ann Barry, sister of the artist James Barry - from whom the former took his name. The death of his uncle leads to the youth being in the position to be educated in Scotland and thus pursuing a distinguished career in the military. Noted for being a prodigious student, Barry was often mocked for his small height and slender build and a rather effeminate voice.

Firstly, Barry was billeted at Cape Town in 1816, with letters of reference from Lord Buchan who had been entrusted with the care of the Cork man to Lord Charles Somerset, governor of the territory. Rumours of an affair between the two surfaced, and lead to accusations of homosexuality. Barry would live in Mauritius for the winter of 1819. In fact, Barry would carry the reputation of being a ‘ladie’s-man.’ It appears that the relationship between the two would lead to the Irish doctor being made colonial medical inspector in 1822, receiving half pay from the

Notoriously quick-tempered and outspoken, he would lose his position as colonial medical inspector due in part to views expressed in relation to the conditions and treatment of prisoners in colonial prisoners 22

army.

From here the list of Barry’s achievements and medical foresight are numerous. Core to Barry’s philosophy was an assertion on hygienic standards, devising a programme for the vaccination of small pox across the Cape Colony, and proposed the distribution of drugs to a patient to be unlawful without a doctor’s prescription.

Not only did Dr. Barry look at solutions to illness but also preventive measures to ill-health with regard to sanitation and diet.

However, Barry was not only a visionary, but also a firebrand.

Notoriously quick-tempered and outspoken, he would lose his position as colonial medical inspector due in part to views expressed in relation to the conditions and treatment of prisoners in colonial prisoners. In addition, he challenged several men to duels though none were killed. Nevertheless, Barry would continue trailblazing, and on 25th of July 1826 performing the first successful caesarean section by a British doctor (Ireland being a part of the United Kingdom at the time). The boy delivered by Barry was named James Barry Munick Hertzog, who became a Boer general during the second Anglo-Boer War and Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa in 1924.

Though Barry’s medical career was exemplary, his army career was less so. He would go AWOL in 1829 to attend to an ill Somerset, and was court marshalled for criticising fellow army officers in 1838 in St. Helena. His role in the Crimean War was limited due to ‘seniority’, in spite of this he would treat a small number of wounded soldiers in Corfu and would scold Florence Nightingale (an advocate of Barry’s hygiene standards), perhaps in jealousy of Nightingale’s notoriety at the time.

On the 25th of July 1865 the life and medical career of Barry would end, and so would appear to be the conclusion of an Irish doctor from humble beginnings who rose to being a medical visionary after a remarkable journey. Yet it appears that the death of Barry would lead spark the most interesting affair in his story. Or rather

should I say her story! Though Barry’s death certificate would note gender as male, an obvious conclusion from the brief biography outlined above. However, Sophia Bishop, the chairwoman who laid out the corpse stated that in fact it was a woman who had at some stage had given birth to a child. It appears that Barry’s time in Mauritius in 1822 was to facilitate giving birth to the child that some suggest was the result of an affair with Lord Somerset.

It appears Dr. James Barry was born Margret Ann Buckley and when her family fell on hard times financially her mother would assume the role of ‘James Barry’s aunt.’ Such was the scandal from the revelation of Barry’s real identity and gender, the British army sealed and restricted it for nearly one hundred years. The doctor who had examined the corpse suggested that Barry may have been a hermaphrodite, though his scrutiny of the body was not intimate.

In light of this revelation one can assert that Barry/Buckley was arguably the first female to qualify as a doctor in Britain, over fifty years before Elizabeth Garrett Anderson who was considered to have been the first, graduating the same year as Barry’s death. Even so, Barry’s achievements should not be lessened, rather further elevated by the sad fact that she achieved so much while managing to maintain a secret that potentially hampered her ability to form cordial and even loving relationships. It appears that the memory of Barry is neglected in this country, surely something that should be rectified.

14.10.14

Features & Opinion

Pros & Cons

SEMES TERIS ATION Motley Staff Writer Sorcha Lanigan discusses the Advantages of Semesterisation he introduction of semesterisation by UCC has been described by the college itself as “the introduction of a semester system which is a pre-requisite to bringing in credit accumulation.” In other words, the semester-based system this year is one where modules can be fully taught and assessed in a single teaching period. Each semester at UCC consists of 12 teaching weeks followed by a study period that comes before the assessment of the modules that have been completed.

The main intention behind the idea of semesterisation is to modernise, revitalise, and make courses more accessible to students, by adhering to a more coherent form of study, and a greater distribution of the student workload throughout the academic year.

The advantages of semesterisation over end-of-year exams are innumerable. Semester-based systems are generally acknowledged to improve the student learning experience, and they also allow more flexibility in teaching and access to programmes.

For particularly laborious courses where there is an infinite amount of rote-learning and reading to do, this newly implemented allotment of time is invaluable.

You might even gain more confidence and deeper understanding of your course by the added pressure to speak up and engage more in tutorials and group-work projects - without the 5-week study month to fall back on.

the exams loom ominously in nightmares of tarnished college degrees and overall failure, accompanied with premonitions of working in McDonald's for the rest of your life

In terms of semesterisation vs. end-of-year exams, the 5 week study month remains a bit of a bone of contention. For those of us with resolute, steely, eyeof-the-tiger self-discipline who revel in constructing colour-coordinated timetables and highlighted battle plans of study, the month is punctuated with a military execution of completed chapters and assignments being ticked off and finalised. The exams are a doddle, and summer breezes by in a relaxed state of rest, relief and recuperation. However, for the other (ahem, I'm assuming 99%?) of us college students, study month requires a little bit more, um, self-restraint. The temptation to blow off study in lieu of going out, sleeping, shopping, partying, generally dossing or indeed a combination of all of these means that the exams loom ominously in nightmares of tarnished college degrees and overall failure, accompanied with premonitions of working in McDonald's for the rest of your life.

However, with the introduction of semesterisation, the system encourages better student engagement with current studies rather than the gruelling coffeefuelled cramming of information and late nights in the library that ultimately accompany final end-of-year exams. This reduces pressure on students, meaning less Red Bull and also that overall performance and results are not held dependant on a single month of the year. To me, this is considerably more fair, as the results of a single exam holds far too much importance on determining the outcome of how you'll spend your summer (i.e. sweating over repeats in the library vs. taking a chance and booking holidays away, while having to wait on bated breath and crossed fingers for your results). Although it will undoubtedly take some time getting used to, semesterisation is in for the most part, a vast improvement on the archaic and stressful ways of dreaded final exams.

Features and Opinion Editor Claire Crowley discusses the disadvantages of Semesterisation irst things first (I’m the realest), I don’t necessarily hate everything that semesterisation is bringing to UCC. I like the idea of splitting the year in two.

I have gone through Mays with ten exams, and know, that by exam seven or eight, my brain has turned to mush and has then relied on candles being lit and copious amounts of caffeine intake to pass my final few exams.

So, I see the positive side of having modules tested by a semester basis. It will decrease our workload and hopefully improve our overall grade. My main issue with semesterisation is that it was brought in during my final year in college. The previous three years have been filled with study months and cramming, and that is the system I was used to. To change the entire system for final year is unfair, as some modules have been cut, some clash with others, and suddenly we have final year exams in a couple of weeks.

The first year of such a big change to the university is bound to have some hiccups in it, which will take weeks to be fixed (if they can be fixed at all), and, for example, if you’re waiting to see if a clashing module you want to take in Semester one will have a time change, you could be missing out on the module if your first choice doesn’t work out (which is sadly, sometimes the case). Semesterisation also means you have less time to “shop around” with your modules at the start of the first semester, and really have to hope for the best when semester two rolls around.

It also means that students are not able to avail of as much part-time work in December.

In previous years, lectures in UCC finished in early December, with perhaps the odd exam or two taking place a week later.

Now, students will have less hours to work (work which could be financing their college education), due to the two week exam slot in December.

Overall, I think Semesterisation is putting a lot of pressure on students and lecturers alike.

This first year of it will be tricky for everyone in the college. I believe it will be a topic that will be heavily discussed over the next year, and, who knows, when the exam results arrive in June, I may be biting my tongue on the entire topic, and agreeing that it the pros outweigh the cons. Maybe.

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{Guys & Girls}

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Entertainment

Hudson Taylor

Fiona Shaw

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Back to

BRASS If any of you were lucky enough to attend any of Ireland’s biggest festivals this summer, then you without a doubt heard the jazzy tones of Booka Brass Band.

Dubbed ‘Ireland’s Best Live Act right now’ by the GoldenPlec in their review of their performance at Knockanstockan, Motley’s Emily Horgan was thrilled to get to chat to two of the seven (and a half) members of Booka to quiz them about how they keep the crowd going, balance their college work and the secret behind the bands unusual name…

So, tell us a bit about how the band started up?

Jack - We started off getting to know each other at band camp, basically. Some of us were in the National Youth Orchestra a couple of years ago as well. As the group kind of expanded, we knew people in the Dublin brass scene.

Ronan – It started off with six of us, four of us who had been there from the very start. We have kind of settled on a core group of seven with one in rotation – two trumpets, two trombones, two sax players, a sousaphone and drums.

Did you feel that it was a big risk to start up such a different style of band?

Ronan – At first, we obviously knew it was going to be a bit of a challenge. We have sort of followed our big influences: Hot Eight Brass Band, Hypnotic Brass and Young Blood that seem to have a great young following.

Jack – We are definitely conscious of that, which is why we bring in our popular covers. We still do New Orleans standards and original music, but we also do Beyonce and Jason Derulo covers to get people involved.

Ronan – Yeah, people are not really used to hearing pop songs on those kind of instruments - it’s really something that people can relate to. People can really appreciate the time and work that have been put in by some of the people in our band. We have had years, decades even, of practice and playing.

Does it not get tempting to get caught up in the whole festival vibe and just go crazy?

Ronan – It’s lucky because we are used to playing more serious situations so we do turn our blinkers on when needs be. We are obviously going to enjoy ourselves, but we are constantly aware too. It’s a skill you learn and maybe something we weren’t great at at first.

You always have a consistent level of energy, how do you keep it going?

Jack – It definitely helps that we really enjoy what we are playing and what we do. We have gotten to a point where we have a great mix of our own tunes which we love because it’s putting something of your own creation out there and pop covers that get the crowd going. At the end of the day, we prefer playing our own music because we have put so many hours into it.

Ronan – Of course it’s still a mix. We picked the covers because they are what people would like to hear and for ourselves as well.

How do you go about writing originals?

Ronan – Someone will come in with a melodic line, four bars or eight bars, and then Jack might add to that, which makes a massive change to the sound.

The bass and drums are usually the foundation of a lot of the stuff sometimes.

Jack – Ronan is always very good to put out a beat to it and then from there people usually suggest So, you played LOADS of festivals this summer, new lines. Our rehearsals are intense in a good way including Glastonbury. How do ye feel about because we are all pretty prepared and we get straight down to business. It’s just something we are that?

Jack – We were obviously starstruck. The show went kind of used to from our experiences before. down really well, considering it was our first gig outside of Ireland. We really were like kids around grownups What was the highlight of your career so far? there. We were playing on the Sunday and we Ronan – When we were playing in the Cork Jazz showed up on the Wednesday and were like “Hey, fest last year, we were playing the only Hot 8 tune we are Booka Brass, we are here for our passes” and in our set, Rastafunk. Next thing we know, the crowd they were so confused that we had shown up so early. parts and these two massive lads stroll out. It was

the trombone player and the sousaphone player from Hot 8! What are the odds.

Jack – They hop up on stage, one of them grabs the trombone off James, shreads a solo and then we played Jungle Boogie together. It was amazing.

What’s the plans for the future?

Jack – This summer we have really established ourselves as a good Irish festival band. Maybe next summer, we might go to Europe or maybe the UK for a month or so. There’s no one I know of that has anything like it in Europe.

Ronan – Of course, one of the goals we had once we set out was to play in New Orleans at some stage, so we would really love to go there.

Any advice for people studying music?

Ronan – Practice really was the most important thing to our success. We put an awful amount of work into this and we are really glad it paid off. Just really dedicate your time to it. The more time you put into it, the more you’ll get out of it.

And finally… where did the name come from?

Jack – It’s a closely guarded secret. No one is allowed know. Part of the reason was from a story that involved the word ‘Booka’ and we thought, “How awful would it be if we named our band after that?” Then we just did. But when our memoirs come out in years to come, all shall be revealed.

Be sure to catch Booka Brass Band playing in Cork for the Jazz Weekend – Friday 24th, 10:30 in Gallaghers, 12:30 in the Metropole Hotel. Saturday 12:30 in the Metropole again and Sunday in the Oliver Plunkett at 5:30. Booka are also working on an EP, have played with James Vincent McMorrow, Jerry Fish and have a gig in the Button Factory on Friday the 17th of October in Dublin with Paul Noonan from Bell X1. Follow them on Facebook for regular updates.

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The Big Interview

Motley Editor Ellen Desmond chats to Harry, of much loved folk pop duo

W

hen Motley spoke to Harry, of Hudson Taylor, the duo were “doing a little bit of last minute recording, a little bit of extra for the new album, little bits of fun stuff.” This “fun stuff” is all for the deluxe edition of their upcoming debut album, which is set for release in February 2015. Answering my phone call, Harry was instantly likeable and described his partner in crime, Alfie, as within his view, “on the ground, sitting down with a book in his hand where he’s writing down some lyrics.” It wasn’t difficult to release a certain endearing charm is a huge part of Hudson Taylor and their success, but of course, their talents speak for themselves too.

It all appears to be happening pretty fast for brothers Harry and Alfie, better known as simply “Hudson Taylor” (their surname) but Harry admitted for them it’s been a long road. “It may seem like it’s going quite fast but it’s actually been quite a long journey for us,” he explained, “we started off about six years ago in Dublin and then moved to London about three years ago,” which is where it’s all been happening for the brothers. That said, he also admitted getting to gig in Ireland is still one of the best things for him, and that “some highlights have definitely been getting to come back to Ireland and play great festivals like Longitude and Indiependence and things like that, over this summer and last, it’s just been a real pleasure to just come back home and play to home audiences – and of course to international audiences as well – but it’s just really cool as a whole to just do music as a living I suppose, there’s quite a lot of upsides and quite a lot of good things going on!”

The increasingly popular duo has got some major plans in the works too, so it doesn’t look to be quieting down for them any time soon. With a debut album in the works and a tour to follow, the world can undoubtedly expect a lot more from Harry and Alfie in the weeks, months and even years, to come. Harry added that “one of the best things that has probably happened so far is probably finishing our album, which is kind of a big deal, I suppose, for us. It’s a long time in the running so that’s a pretty big deal to get done.”

The new album, named Singing for Strangers, is exactly what old fans and unsuspecting fans-to-be have been waiting for. “It took a while to come to the decision of the title,” Harry told Motley, “but we thought that was kind of an apt title, ‘cause it sums up what we’ve been doing for the last six years.

It’s mainly been busking and playing a lot of gigs to people we don’t know.

But I suppose the idea behind it is you’re playing for strangers because you wanna make them smile and you wanna like, hopefully relate to them, so we thought that was a cool name for it.” It’s allegedly going to be jam packed with everything their loyal fanbase are so utterly fanatic about and Harry described it as “in terms of genre stuff, it’s going to be pretty much Hudson Taylor, folky, poppy, brothers singing in harmony kind of music.”

“I don’t think there’ll be any extreme surprises in there,” he went on, “it’ll mostly be versions of songs that we’ve been playing live but… we might have a collaboration on there. That’s something we’ve just done on deluxe actually, which I can’t tell you about right now but yeah that’s something that’s going on the deluxe edition.” Motley knows which edition to buy, anyway!

It’s quite incredible really, how popular Hudson Taylor have become without even having their first album released yet. When asked what it could it be that makes them so different, Harry explained that “we do really love the whole live thing and we play live with a lot of energy and I think maybe that might be part of the thing that has been helping us make tracks and I suppose also having started out busking and also putting stuff on YouTube, which we did to develop a bit of a fanbase, because they’ve all helped us quite a bit by spreading the word – just people telling their Ma and their Da and their cousin and their best friend, whoever, to just go check us out, that’s all been very helpful.”

To ease the wait for the debut album, the 19th of October will see Hudson Taylor’s single Chasing Rubies released. Chasing Rubies is a very catchy, well worked, singing in the shower tune that is doing amazingly well

at the moment on Vevo. It was also named BBC Radio 1’s track of the day earlier in September.

“Chasing Rubies is a song that Alfie wrote three years ago about a girl,” Harry divulged, “and the name is inspired by where he met the girl, the Ruby sessions, which is a thing that happens every Monday night in Doyle’s pub in Dublin and that’s where he met the girl and so that’s the title for Chasing Rubies. And yeah, that’s our new single coming out soon which is great but also quite strange for us ‘cause the song, it’s been around quite a while, so it’s weird to finally have a single version of it.”

Highlighting the success of the Chasing Rubies video, Harry also gave us an insight into the making of it, which seems to have been as enjoyable as it looks on screen.

“We went and we filmed the music video for it in Galway, which was really fun, we got to go and well, basically we got to play the song in a pub and then jump in the sea and that was kind of all we had to do for it really!”

At the moment you can catch Hudson Taylor “doing these little live stream gigs” which will be going on for the next few weeks leading up to the single release [19th October], “and probably further on as well if they go well, we might do a bit more. We used to do them a few years ago and it’s definitely a really cool way to engage with people directly, in the moment, saying hi how are you doing and you see all these people are watching right there and then. And I guess the gig that we’re announcing winners for on the streams; will be a really intimate gig later this year where we plan to play the album in its full entirety - while during the livestreams as well we might do older stuff and that kind of thing.” You can catch their live streams and hear more about their competitions on the Hudson Taylor YouTube channel, every Wednesday at 5pm.

With the extremely amiable and fun image that the pair constantly gives off, the question had to be asked, what in the world must it be like working so closely with a brother? “It’s actually very relaxed,” according to Harry, “we just basically sit down with a couple of guitars or with me on the piano or with Alfie on the piano and we just, the best way to put it is we just jam, and yeah that’s how we write the songs.

We don’t really get into much kind of fights or anything we just go for the laugh, you know?”

It’s easy to forget how young the Hudson Taylor brothers are, when listening to their classy lyrics or watching their retro style videos.

Even in terms of genre they are very open to admitting they are heavily influenced by “60s and 70s stuff”, and comparisons with Simon and Garfunkel are regularly put forward by critics and music journalists. But it was just a few years ago, when if the music industry didn’t work out for them, that “Alfie was going to be a hairdresser, he was really into that and I [Harry] was gonna be, well I was in the middle of doing a computer science degree. I wanted to do a kind of geeky job where I was developing apps for music or something, I had that in mind as a kind of plan but eh, I didn’t really fair very well at the computer science degree. College was great fun but I didn’t really like the actual degree itself.”

If he could meet his 16 year old

14.10.14

Entertainment

If I could go to any city in the world, and when I play there there’d be at least 100 people show up to see me play a gig with my brother, I’d be pretty chuffed with that self, Harry says he’d “probably tell my 16 year old self the usual classics, like stop caring what other people think of you, you know? Eh, because I remember when I was in school and I was 16 I was just this outcast kid who, when all the teachers were like what do you want to do when you grow up? I was like, oh well I want to be a musician and then they’d always be like, ah yeah but there’s not much chance for people in that field you know it’s only for a very small percentage of people – and they basically put you off like, doing anything and its hard like at the time I started to find myself looking at, that’s probably why I found myself looking at computer science. ‘Cause I felt like I had to find myself a ‘career job’ just yeah I dunno I was dissuade from my passion and so I would tell my 16 year old self not to be dissuade by your elders who are apparently telling you what they think is the best thing for you to do because in the end it turns out it was a good thing to do music.”

The news is looking good for Irish fans too, on top of the new album there are some Irish gigs in the pipeline for 2015. “I think in February or March time when we’ve released the album,” Harry says, “then we’re planning to do a tour, which hasn’t been announced yet or anything but I’m sure that the dates will definitely include Cork.”

With so many possibilities, it’s difficult for anyone to know where they want to be in the future but for Harry it’s definitely all about continuing to make music. Despite initially answering “Ah jaysus!” to the ever dreaded Dream Question, he went on to admit the long-term hope is “to be able to sustain a living, 100% off making

music. That’d be a pretty good thing. Or like, if I could go to any city in the world and when I play there there’d be at least 100 people show up to see me play a gig with my brother, I’d be pretty chuffed with that.”

We at Motley agree that day isn’t too far off for Harry and Alfie alike, as the talented brothers seem to be having no trouble stealing hearts and fans across the globe. As my phone call with Harry came to an end, he added that he looks forward to reading the interview and “seeing how boring I come across” but boring is definitely the last thing I’d call Hudson Taylor.

“See you when we’re in Cork,” Harry says, before hanging up and indeed he will - I can’t recommend them highly enough.

Dates and venues have since been announced for Hudson Taylor’s upcoming tour, which will see them in Cork’s Savoy on the 1st of March and Dublin’s Olympia Theatre on the 26th of February. The tour also sees Irish gig dates in Belfast, Galway, Dundalk, Kilkenny and Limerick, tickets for all of which are available now from Ticketmaster. Latest track Chasing Rubies will be released on October 19th and debut album Singing for Strangers is set to hit shelves in February 2015.

Motley

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Entertainment

14.10.14

High Fidelity: Album reviews from across the genres Death From Above 1979 The Physical World 4/5 Death From Above 1979's new album, The Physical World, is the latest in a plethora of rock and roll duo's taking over our airwaves. However, the difference here is, the band have been doing it for over a decade. Their first album, You're A Woman, I'm A Machine gained them cult status in their home town of Toronto. After a split in 2006 however, the band faded into the memories of the hardcore 'dance punk' scene. After reforming in 2011, and touring extensively, the band is back with a passion. To listen to “The Physical World”, on more than one occasion, you really have to remind yourself that this is only two guys with some drums, a bass and a synth. Their ability to mix the genres of upbeat pop with gritty rock and roll really comes together in “Trainwreck 1979”, the bands first song released from the album. To finish, this album is a fantastic example of the more unusual side of the two-man-bands that have shot to popularity over the past few years.

Jonny O’ Mahony

The Drums - Encyclopedia 3/5

Alt-J- This Is All Yours 4/5 Alt-J's second album, This Is All Yours, sees them refining the formula that led to their massively first album An Awesome Wave; but takes the debut's odes to adrenaline into a more sexual context. There's a few lovely surprises along the way, including a refreshing Indian influence on the latest single “Every Other Freckle”, guest vocals from Marika Hackman and Conor Oberst on the acoustic track “Warm Foothills” and a surprisingly clever Miley Cyrus sample on “Hunger Of The Pine”. While the album has some of the band's best songs yet, it feels slightly more incoherent than their debut; some tracks fall flat and the album has an inscrutable interlude played on a recorder. Fans of the first album will certainly appreciate the second, but it seems to be winning over new fans too: it's currently at #1 in the UK album charts and is driving their sell-out arena tour.

Colm Cahalane

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Three years after their successful sophomore release, Portamento, The Drums are back with Encyclopedia, another trip through their jangly take on indie rock. Despite tensions within the band and the departure of Connor Hanwick, the duo are back on form with Encyclopedia. The band’s bubblegum pop sensibilities are still there, but now with an added darker edge. The new atmospheric, experimental side of The Drums is certainly welcome however, the lack of cohesiveness with the record accentuates the fact that The Drums are still struggling to fit into these new shoes. That’s not to say there isn’t strokes of genius on the record.

The 80s synthcore of “There Is Nothing Left” and “I Can’t Pretend, an extremely pleasant anthem” are absolute gems. If the band focus their sound and work out exactly who the The Drums really are, album four could be a stunner.

Kelly Doherty

Jamie T - Carry On The Grudge 5/5 England’s most underrated greatest son, Jamie T is back with his long awaited follow up to 2009’s Kings & Queens. The half indie punk singer, half street poet has returned with his tales of the broken working class. However, this time around, it seems that it’s Jamie himself who’s the subject of his tales.

With themes of isolation, addiction and ruin running throughout the release, it’s a dark one but Jamie T carries it off with his usual relatable turn of phrase and easy going yet blunt style. With less of an emphasis on hip hop than its predecessor, Carry On The Grudge alternates between the raucous punk of lead single, “Zombie”, the perfect messy underdog anthem, to the reggae influenced “Don’t You Find” and everywhere in between. Carry On The Grudge is an album which is never apologetic and never smooths over just how desperate people can be. At the still tender age of 28, its exceptional that Jamie T has already created three of the most insightful, acute and powerful records of recent years and Carry On The Grudge is the best of the pack. Jamie T is still one of the greatest voices of our generation.

Kelly Doherty

14.10.14

It’s A Shore Thing Motley Staff Writer Adam O’Reilly interviews Jersey Shore ex-housemate Angelina Pivarnick on her new reality show, how she deals with the haters and her thoughts on the upcoming marriage equality vote!

In its prime, Jersey Shore was the most successful reality show on television. With its excessive drinking, bust-ups and general grossness, it was something we could all relate to. Subsequent British spin offs such as Geordie Shore and The Valleys became quite popular in the past few years; however nothing could ever compare to our beloved Guidos! Angelina Pivarnick joined the show when it aired in December 2009 and starred in the first two series of the infamous programme; before constant arguments with her co-stars led to Ms Pivarnick deciding to leave the ‘shore house’ after refusing to do a shift at Danny’s t-shirt shop.

Whether you watched ‘the shore’ or not, be aware that we all have a little Guido in us. The show gave us all golden lessons to live our lives by; first of all you can never be too tan, second of all the higher the hair the closer to God and finally it is so not classy to expose your “coochi” while Jersey-turnpiking (please refer to online index of Jersey Shore dance moves) at the club.

Motley managed to catch up with original Jersey Shore star Angelina Pivarnick as she reflected back on her time as the girl who everybody loved to hate. Love her or hate her however, Angelina had left her mark on the world and try as you might, it’s a mark you’re never getting off your windscreen.

The Staten-Island Guidette has dipped her spraytanned toes in everything from TNA Wrestling to the music industry and has given us some of the best cheese Pop has to offer. Dropping her first single I’m Hot in 2010 threw the internet into a frenzy causing the emergence of internet trolls everywhere who slated the Pop rookie but while they attacked our favourite Jersey girl they unknowingly fell right into a trap and publicity surrounding Pivarnick blew-up once again. The single itself can only be described as Swagger Jagger meets Friday nonetheless it’s intoxicatingly catchy and certainly worth a listen.

Don’t fret children because Motley can exclusively confirm there is more music on the way. On being quizzed about her music Angelina replied, “I'm

Entertainment

glad you guys like I'm Hot. There were four of us from Jersey Shore that released singles, and I've heard that my single got the most hits and most downloads, so that I'm proud of!” And we’re proud for you Angie.

Jersey Shore was notorious for its ill-tempered castmates who just couldn’t see eye to eye about anything. Throughout series one and two, the shore house slowly turned on Angelina and tough as she is, there’s only so much a girl can take. According to Pivarnick, fellow castmates Mike and Snooki made her life a living hell; “Mike was always getting on my case about everything. He always accused me of not cleaning up and he even put a dirty pad under my pillow. Gross. And you all saw what happened before I left the show, I whooped Snooki's ass!”

Clearly neither party were too eager to stay in contact but Angelina claims she bumps into the lovable Vinny from time to time as they live close to each other on Staten Island.

Fans will be happy to hear that, after successful funding, Angelina will be going ahead with her own reality show which is yet to be announced. If that’s not enough hot-tempered Angie will also be starring in a show about mobsters…naturally. When asked if she was excited as us about the new show she told Motley, “Yes! I'm super excited about it!

I've been wanting to do my own show for a long time, so I can't wait to get it going. We're just in early stages of planning right now, and I'm working on another show right now before my own series gets started. It's called “The Familia” which is a mob series drama. It's going to be hot!” Hot? Well who are we to argue with that knowledge bomb.

All jokes aside, we can definitely learn a lot from the thick-skinned diva as even the best of us find ourselves in moments of vulnerability and oftentimes the victim of bullying. We had to ask Angelina how she managed to hold her head up high when it seemed the whole world was against her and she didn’t hesitate to dish out some advice saying, “I just laugh it off. People have their opinions about me, and I was a strong personality and I was definitely portrayed as the villain on Jersey Shore, and people don't generally take the villain’s side. As much as I have haters, I have the best fans as well.”

Even when times were at their toughest the StatenIsland sweetheart tells Motley that she always had her fans to lean for support, as she gushed, “I'm always getting really sweet fan mail and messages from them, and it's awesome.”

Cameras and glamour aside, Angelina has many passions including training as an Emergency Medical Technician and First Responder and she confesses that overall her main dream is to have the chance to work with people who are just as passionate about their work as she is.

With the upcoming marriage equality referendum approaching in Ireland and Angelina’s dedicated work with the No H8 campaign, we had to ask her what advice she would give to her Irish fans who may be voting. She says to the fans and readers of Motley, “Be yourself, always! Live unapologetically and don't listen to what anyone has to say about you. As you saw on Jersey Shore, I go through life not caring about what people think about me, and that's how you stay happy. Stay true to yourself, and fight for what you believe in!”

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Entertainment

14.10.14

Na Na Na Na Na Na Na

GOTHAM aders might remember a little show from a few years back called Smallville. It was quite popular in its day; it lasted ten seasons and was the longest running science-fiction series in the US. Smallville was about the early years of one Clark Kent, the once and future Superman, and told what amounted to an extended origin story about how (and why) a young farm boy from Kansas would grow up to become the Man of Steel (or how Tom Welling became Henry Cavill). The show had a strict “no tights, no flights” rule emphasising that this was a story about Clark and not about the Superman per say. That is not to say that the show shirked away from delving deep into the Superman mythos. Instead the show featured characters who savvy viewers knew would later go on to become Superman’s greatest allies, and often future members of the Justice League, such as Bart Allen (The Flash), Victor Stone (Cyborg), Arthur Curry (Aquaman), John Jones (The Martian Manhunter) and Oliver Queen (Green Arrow). Before the birth of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Smallville pioneered the “nudgenudge” and “wink-wink” that inherently comes with cameos. Indeed, Lex Luthor, Superman’s arch-nemesis, was a main character for seven seasons and much of the show focused from his inevitable fall from grace as he transformed from Clark’s closest friend/confidant into one of his greatest foes. Therein, however, laid one of Smallville’s greatest problems and arguably the problem of many similar prequels, in that they are only effective because you know how it all the ends. Viewers know that Lex and Clark’s friendship is doomed from the start, but the show tries its best to make us like Lex as a character and the dramatic

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Gary

Maloney

reviews

the

upcoming show that’s set to hit Irish TV screens this month.

Jada Pinkett Smith as Fish Mooney is as intimidating to the audience as she is to her underlings

focusing on Gordon as opposed to Bruce, Gotham allows us to see Batman’s origin from a different point of view and allows the show to become about more than just Batman. It can explore Gordon and the entirety of the GCPD as characters in and of themselves and not define them by their relationship with the Dark Knight.

Gotham has a lot of potential and the first episode, while not without its faults, promises a web of conspiracy along with an exploration of the depths to which Gordon will go and the turmoil of a boy trying to find the light in the darkness. The dialogue, for the most part, is smooth and offers great Easter Eggs for those who are willing to look (a certain comedian springs to mind). McKenzie works as a young and naïve Gordon who has to face the harsh realities of life within Gotham.

Mazouz, for what little we saw, makes a good Bruce Wayne and the emotion displayed in the immediate aftermath of his parents’ murder is quite powerful. On a side-note, much has been made of Sean Pertwee’s unorthodox cockney take on Bruce’s butler; Alfred Pennyworth. Suffice to say, go in with an open mind and you may find that this is one of the most amusing takes on Alfred since Michael Gough.

Jada Pinkett Smith as Fish Mooney is as intimidating to the audience as she is to her underlings and not being a character from the comics could work to her advantage as the writers can really take her anywhere they want.

However, the show also places a lot of emphasis on the rise of Batman’s greatest villains and in this it whiffs of Smallville. Robin Lord Taylor is the real breakout star as Oswald Cobblepot whom the show will stop at nothing to inform you will one day assume the moniker of the Penguin. He adds a level of viciousness that we don’t see from the lot of the other characters and by the end of the pilot the chain of events which will transform him into the Penguin have very much been set in motion.

Similarly, we meet a young coroner named Edward Nigma with an unusual obsession with riddles and a young thief with a fondness for cats. These are great nods to the fans, but again, the show (and especially the show’s marketing) relies on you knowing who these characters are going to become. Some might say that this ruins the show and any suspense it hopes to create. We know Gordon doesn’t rid the city of crime and we know he doesn’t rid the Police Department of corruption. He can’t because if he does then there is no reason for Batman to exist. For Batman to exist, Gordon has to fail and while having a character who personally fails, but goes on to inspire another who will bring order to chaos might be intriguing for some, it also risks alienating a lot of people. There are some tone issues, Gotham can’t decide whether it wants to be Christopher Nolan or Tim Burton, but given that this was a pilot, I’m willing to give it a chance. For Gotham to succeed it must find a balance, between the inherent absurdities in its underlying premise and its desire to remind people that comic book properties can be serious artistic works. Gotham, much like the city itself, may not be perfect, but there is a lot of good to be found within it. It’s not the show that we need, but one that we deserve.

irony that the show creates was always startling. We could hope that Lex would triumph over his demons and become a good person, but the show, to be truly effective, could only ever work if we know that Lex has to become the villain.

So what does all of this have to do with Gotham?

Well, firstly, interesting to note that Smallville was originally conceived as a “Young Bruce Wayne” show with a similar rule-set and vision as to how the series would end. Although the show-runners eventually decided that Clark was a better character to focus on, people have remained fascinated with the notion of a series focusing on Batman’s early years and the leaked pilot script only has lead more and more fans to dream what might have been. Now they seem to have their answer in the form of Gotham; a show about Batman, but doesn’t feature the Caped Crusader. Gotham stars Ben McKenzie as a young James Gordon as he tried to clean up the corrupt Police Department and uncover the truth behind the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne. Our future Dark Knight, played

by David Mazouz, serves as a side-character who begins to form a bond with the young Gordon as he Gotham is set to air on RTE TWO in October himself is exploring what he needs to become. By of 2014.

14.10.14

Could film be sweeter than fiction for multitalented new aged writer Emmet O Brien?

Fresh from the success of releasing his first short film ‘A novel approach to Dating’, Motley is excited to interview recently accomplished film maker and extraordinarily talented writer, Emmet O Brien. While O’Brien has penned many comic books, his most noted work is an anthology book entitled, ‘I’m awake, I’m alive’. A creative and versatile individual, he also writes short stories, prose and poetry, but his latest venture into the world of film could prove to be the most sensational transition of his career to date.

So you have recently released your first film online ‘A novel approach to Dating’. How does it feel to finally have your first film release?

I’m so happy to have finally released the film. It’s a very new thing for me to go from critic to putting out my own stuff, so we’ll see if I can handle the reactions! In general, it’s been odd having to sit on a film for a few months while it goes through film festivals etc. So by the time you put it out it feels like a long time ago since it was fresh and new for you.

You wrote and directed the film. How did you find the production process?

I had co-written things in the past but this was the first film where I acted as both those things and as a producer, so it was overwhelming but I was very lucky to have so many great friends who collaborated. For a 9 minute film it has a huge cast of over 20 people and so many extras. Between the cast and crew the production was hectic but very smooth. I was quite lucky! I also met some amazing new people over the course of it and want to pay particular tribute to my leading lady, Rachel Feeney, who just understood what was a very odd and abstract role.

You mentioned on your linked in profile, that you helped another artist on an animated short. Did you that inspire you creatively or maybe just encourage you to create your own work?

Robb Pratt the artist who I have worked on with a short was a huge inspiration to me. The amount of work and passion he brings to every project he does and the fact he does a lot of his projects for the sheer love of it is a philosophy I really could get behind. The pieces I wrote for him were some of the most

Motley’s Rachel O’Shea interviews new found filming talent and comic book veteran Emmet O Brien

enjoyable things I have ever worked on. It’s a short for Flash Gordon that is a throwback to the 30s serial style adventures and I’m so happy to be a small part of the great work he does.

We believe you are currently working on your latest film project .Could you tell us a little bit about that and when it will be released to the public?

Yeah I’m working on my 3rd and 4th films simultaneously at the moment. One is a super hero film set in Bantry called “Comic Potential” (co-written and codirected with a great filmmaker named Ross Carey). It was so much fun to do, we got a costume designed exclusively by Samantha Kennedy for it and the other is an animated film called “Same Old Song and Dance” with the artist Cethan Leahy and David Nelligan doing more animation for that. My second film “Sleepover” is currently being sent off to festivals and will be screened as part of the IndieCork film fest in Oct.

More ambitious stories and a contract with a big company would be nice...

How did you come up with the name for the film?

Was it because of the many literary puns that were made reference to throughout or does it symbolise something else in the film?

Originally the film was called “Read Dating” as a play on speed dating but every time anyone ever said that name, it would sound like “Re-Dating” as in to date again, which didn’t fit. Then it was briefly “Textual Attraction” but when musing on the concept and how I felt this was a fairly unique premise the final title became undeniable. The possibilities of language really tickle me so having yet another pun in the name of the film was great and this even extended to the tagline which is “She was hoping it wouldn’t be a total Noun-event!”

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Did you learn anything from the making of the first film? Is there now anything you are going to do differently with your second film?

Just to be open to suggestions and to learn that you may ideas you love on the page but that it won’t work on the day. Also lighting is so important. Oh Lordy.

You also wrote short stories for the comic book ‘I’m awake, I’m alive’ - an anthology book with seven stories by ten creators. How did you get involved

with that project?

IAIA was a huge project and it was conceived by myself, Chris O’Halloran and Colin O’Mahony under our imprint Turncoat Press. It really was a dream come true and as a lifelong fan of comics, finally getting some work published in that medium was a real thrill. It has led to the creation of a monthly gathering of people who are interested in making comics. We meet the last Monday of every month upstairs in the Roundy and it has already sparked some interesting work. For the Dragon of Shandon festival at Halloween, members of the group have produced a comic which will be on sale at it! So it’s an exciting time for interest in comics in the City! As for the future we are planning another anthology for next year, a smaller sci-fi themed one and we plan on releasing more one shots and mini-series’ as Turncoat Press develops.

Where do you see your work taking you in the next 5 years? What is your goal for the future career wise?

More ambitious stories and a contract with a big company would be nice.

Ideally I would love to have made my first feature by then. I love short films but yes it would be great to progress into longer form. Film offers certain possibilities and then there are things one can only do in comics. However, I have always maintained that my dream job would be a comic writer above all else. There’s a singular pleasure to a great comic that I just can’t describe and I would love to be a part of the lineage of that industry. Otherwise just continue as I am, writing in whatever medium I want when inspiration hits.

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Entertainment

14.10.14

Let’s Be Cops?

Maybe Not

Kieran Cunnane reviews the latest Damon Wayans Jr. buddy-cop movie et’s Be Cops is not worth your time. But as a fan of Damon Wayans Jr. from the preposterously cancelled sitcom Happy Endings, I had to go and see it. The shallow premise pitches Justin Miller (Damon Wayans Jr.) and Ryan O’Malley (Jake Johnson) as two no-name losers impersonating cops in LA where their egos are massively boosted by fawning women and the power of making actions with no consequences.

Soon they find themselves in trouble with Russian gangsters and that’s when it hits you – you’ve heard this story before. But as the box office numbers of 22 Jump Street and Ride Along have taught us, buddy-cop comedies are in and Fox jumped on that bandwagon.

That’s not to say Let’s Be Cops is a particularly bad film. While Wayans takes the majority of the physicalcomedy action with scenes like stripping on top of an eager birthday girl and intercepting a naked intruder who lands his testicles in Miller’s face, both leading actors do share on-screen chemistry. This is where the film is best; watching Miller and O’Malley abuse the power of being treated like real cops leads the film into its funniest scenes. Unfortunately,

this doesn’t last long as they (inevitably) start to face the repercussions of getting in the way of gangster Mossi Kisac (James D’Arcy).

This is where the film takes a turn for the worst. The funny escapades of Miller and O’Malley diminish as we are reminded that not only are they in mortal danger but the film doesn’t want to try something new; Miller and O’Malley are obligated to catch this criminal and save Miller’s love interest Josie (Nina Dobrev) by the end of the movie. This plotline is just too familiar and has been done better by the countless films that have come before it. I didn’t expect the film to be groundbreaking but it would have been more enjoyable if we had additional silly cop scenes and fewer scenes emphasising the stakes at cost.

Additionally, there are supporting actors in the film that are brutally underused. This is particularly in the case of Jon Lajoie who makes his big-screen debut as Miller’s boss. His place in the film was solely to make Miller look even more like a loser.

Don’t expect any laughs like those you might find when he’s rapping as E=MC Vagina. There’s also Rob Riggle whose talents are restrained as he plays

A Nightingale Falling Motley’s Jane Farrell reviews the limited release War of Independence drama Nightingale Falling is set in the early 1920’s in a rural Ireland wracked by the War of Independence. Only shown in select cinemas around Ireland, this is a perspective on the war that has not yet been portrayed. Our main characters are two Protestant sisters occupying a gracious house on the periphery of the community. Their father was a high ranking member of the British army and they bear the weight of this contentious inheritance in their small, largely Republican, village.

There are unavoidable parallels with The Wind that Shakes the Barley (2006), Michael Collins (1996) and The English Patient (1996), but what this movie does differently is to give a neutral vantage on the politics of war, and frame the story around a domestic struggle incited by the conflict between Christian duty and danger. The Black and Tans swarm the area, and the secrecy of the IRA adds a pervasive sense of looming peril. Against this

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backdrop, the quintessential Big House provides the stage for a different kind of tragedy, as the two sisters – May (Tara Breathnach) and Tilly (Muireann Bird) – go about their desolate lives.

May’s psychological unravelling is particularly effective. She goes from a headstrong, commanding and daring woman, to one blinded by envy, desperation and bitterness. The naïve and almost

a straight-faced cop who meets the two leading characters as they try to catch two perpetrators intruding a supermarket. We can see how funny he is in 21 Jump Street so why did he have to be so grounded in this comedy?

Nevertheless, there are great supporting roles found in Keegan-Michael Key as a criminal-turnedinformant and Natasha Leggero who delivers a bizarre yet humorous seduction attempt on O’Malley. While these roles were fine, they certainly didn’t have the potential that Lajoie and Riggle’s roles had to round up an overall fantastic supporting cast.

Let’s Be Cops is a lot of what one expects; superb chemistry between its leading actors in a film that delivered a thin storyline and cheap laughs to insipid younger sister Tilly provides a stark contrast to her sibling and they create a remarkable dynamic which is both intriguing and credible. Their conflict revolves around Captain Shearing (Gerard McCarthy) who they idolise while under their care, highlighting the torment of unrequited love. Elements of Frank O’Connor’s story ‘Guests of the Nation’ are to be found in how the sisters take an injured British soldier into their home and nurses him back to health. The political war thus becomes pooled with the domestic war as desire; secrecy and desperation threaten to perturb any sense of their previous familial harmony.

The movie was filmed in Daingean and the surrounding areas in July 2013. The cruelties and hardships on all sides are the undercurrent to the plot which focuses on love, desperation, and madness. Released on 12st September 2014, this drama from Mixed Bag Media was directed by Garret Daly and Martina Mc Glynn and written

by PJ Curtis. With this wealth of expertise behind the scenes, it is unsurprising that the end product is so striking and exquisite.

A Nightingale Falling picked up the Best Independent Feature Film Award at the Underground Cinema Film Festival in Dublin and rightly so. Plot, acting and cinematography blend seamlessly in this movie to create something poignant, powerful and exceptional. This is undoubtedly an Irish movie that garners a lot of attention and warrants more.

“We are indoctrinated with the success of democracy, but actually still what goes on is, vengeance, vengeance, vengeance. But you can’t run a society on vengeance.” It was apparent quite quickly that this was not going to be an everyday conversation. How would you describe an evening with Fiona Shaw? Mystical, enthralling, riveting? No, I think that it deserves much more than one simple word.

Shaw grew up in Cork and later received a degree in UCC. From there she went onto RADA and this is where her acting career began to take off. It is hard to argue her status as an Irish icon, especially due to her achievements in theatre and film.

A star of the stage, Shaw performed the male lead role in Richard II, Celia in As You Like It, and the young woman in Machinal among many others. These delivered to her acclaim and awards, along with her recitation of T.S. Eliot’s Wasteland. Her film and television roles create an even longer list of adjectives needed to illustrate her talent. My Left Foot, Jane Eyre, True Blood and of course her portrayal of Aunt Petunia in Harry Potter always springs to mind.

However, she was in UCC to promote one performance in particular, at a conference organised by Dr Angela Ryan, of the French Department. She was speaking of her lead role in Medea, the tale of a woman who is betrayed by her husband, Jason, and is ruined by it. She tries to cause Jason as much pain as possible by murdering her own children.

“Medea is the darkest story of all, and not because a woman wants to kill her children, in fact the story is about, if anything, a woman who does not want to kill her children. I suspect, what is really being debated is whether the passion between a man and a woman is greater than the passion between a mother and a child. We build our societies on the basis that children are the most important thing, but is it true?”

Her belief that ideas from even ancient plays can still excite the senses and cause emotional upheaval was a theme throughout the interview.

She takes the morals of these stories and relates them to her own life and others.

“Every day in the paper you read about someone killing their children and you can be well sure there’s such a story behind it, because nobody sets out to kill their children. Nobody wants to kill their children and the terror that’s put into the play is because of people being frightened of a woman who might kill their children. But when I played it, people said ‘I would hate to have you babysit my children!’ It has nothing to do with that, it is interpreted with each generation, because they must look like us, sound like us, be like us and yet this aspect of the human mind is being looked at.”

Her idea that every story is different plays into her love of the stage. A different audience means a different show. “I played it 380 times, around the world, so there were different people, but in general, people laughed more in America,” she said, before adding, “and they were more

Fifteen Minutes with

FIONA SHAW

“

We build our societies on the basis that children are the most important thing, but is it true?”

shocked probably.” Her ability to jump from one topic to another began to make the interview more and more engrossing. When asked about her love for theatre she replied saying that “It takes longer to get to it. You have to practise.

You have to excavate the truth of the scene. In a film, you’re usually a hired hand. Somebody has already decided what the scene is. Well actually, we recently did a comedy in Canada with Adam Sandler and they absolutely changed it as they went on and they asked would I change it.

“But in general, a film is such an expensive item, its truth already exists in the edit. But in a play, the truth belongs to the people making it and their rigour in discovering what that might be.”

The thought of discovering the truth behind a play brought out a girlish grin and a youthful exuberance that did not match her age. Her focus on Medea’s themes brought out the best in her and you could tell that she was happy when either acting or talking about the art that she had mastered.

She has combined two of her loves in acting and drama in the past and tried her hand at

“

A star both on the screen and stage, Motley’s Kelly Doherty and Eoin McSweeney speak to Fiona Shaw on her play Medea, life in theatre and vengeance.

directing. She directed three operas, most recently in 2013. Stories from her acting career about changing certain scenes due to a different perspective made me nod at how easy a transition it must have been for her to make.

“In the play, Beckett states a grey dress against a grey background. I wore a red dress against a red background, which our designer says is grey.

Our designer says one colour cancels another. I think that, thirty years later, Beckett wouldn’t have written that. In 1972, there was a special kind of grey, we now sense of a million greys. That grey on your sweater didn’t really exist and there’s all sorts of different greys, so he meant a blank thing.”

Electrifying. That’s about as close as I can get.

I could only imagine that when she entered any room to give a talk, the audience would surely have to be enthralled. Speaking to Fiona Shaw for even fifteen minutes will provide you with enough quotes to last a lifetime. I leave you with one of these. “Medea is about outsiders. And most good plays are about a very simple idea that’s total.”

Entertainment

14.10.14

What Happened Bridgie Cleary?

Elaine Hanley reviews the latest play to grace the stage of the Everyman Theatre Tom MacIntyre’s play What Happened Bridgie Cleary depicts a true story of a Tipperary seamstress, who was burnt to death by her husband in 1895. Mikey Cleary claimed that his wife had been abducted by fairies and that a changeling had been left in her place, and so he was jailed for manslaughter.

The news story received worldwide attention, and Bridget Cleary is most popularly described as the last witch burned in Ireland, even though it was never proven that she was a changeling or a witch.

Throughout the play, Bridgie experiences flashbacks to her husband’s accusations in the form of the rhyme “Are you a witch or are you a fairy, or are you the wife Mikey Cleary?”

This play serves to go beyond the facts of the case and examine the emotional turmoil that Bridgie created when she was both alive and deceased.

The guilt felt by her husband Mikey is portrayed in a dominant role in this production, which is not something I expected when I first entered the

Everyman Theatre to see this play. The themes of love, jealousy, rage and desire drive the play, and the events which lead to the death of Bridgie Cleary.

The set itself was very minimal, designed to depict purgatory, as pillars of hanging clothes encompass a bare stage, with the exception of Bridgie’s precious Singer sewing machine, and four corner stones which became significant props as the play unfolds. A small production with only three actors, Joanne Ryan’s portrayal of Bridgie is strong and enchanting, retaining the focus of the audience.

The independence of Bridgie as a seamstress is effortlessly portrayed by Ryan, and she really is the glue keeping the play together. One scene which stands out is the transportation Ryan creates when she describes Bridgies becoming “reborn” as a child, into the world of nature. This transportation and close relationship with nature may well be seen as one of the reasons why Mikey Cleary suspected his wife of being a changeling.

Destiny?

Vincent O’Brien suggests that the hype machine has struck again question that should be answered before this review starts in earnest is “What is destiny?” I have no specific answer to that question, unfortunately. It looks as if Bungie treated the list of genres like a shopping list and tried to cram as many different games into one as humanly possible. The hype surrounding Destiny had reached fever pitch in the last few months, no doubt due to the $500 million budget - that was mostly spent on marketing, it appears! Yet, the actual game we get is not what Bungie has been promising us and lets us down in a variety of ways.

Destiny is the first new IP from the world famous studio Bungie, creators of Halo. A lot of gamers had believed that Destiny would revolutionise gaming the same way that Halo had but unfortunately all the ideas that Destiny brings to the table are either rehashed versions of old ideas or borrowed from other games that do it better. There have been a lot of comparisons to Borderlands in the time

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since its release and I feel that that’s an unfair comparison, as Borderlands does a much better job of delivering the social and looting experience that’s supposed to be at the heart of Destiny.

No review of Destiny would be complete without touching on the social features of destiny, or more likely, the lack of them. Some genius in Bungie HQ thought that in their social MMO experience that

Mikey Cleary’s guilt over the death of his wife is an unexpected aspect of the play. The powerful emotions which result from the feelings of rejection and unrequited love could be deemed as motive for the murder of his wife, yet I somehow doubt it. Whilst Mikey’s pure and true love for Bridgie is conveyed at every opportunity, it is in some ways cheapened by the details of Bridgie’s extra-marital affairs, including their neighbour William, who completes the set of characters we see on stage. One sad aspect of the play is hearing Bridgie declare her true love for the man who used to buy eggs from her; however she consistently denies having an affair with him. Perhaps she was more in love with the independence he gave her, as a result of earning her own money, than the actual man himself.

This play depicts Bridgie, Mikey and William as all being prisoners in the purgatory of unrequited love, and as Bridgie says in the opening line of the play, “I never knew anyone that wasn’t someway prisoner,” maybe this play can speak to a little part in all of us.

it would be smart to disable voice chat and have the games default settings be that your Fireteam (a small group of players who complete missions together) be set to friends only. This might work if you have a lot of friends playing the game but if you’re like me you’ll struggle to find people to play the game with you despite the fact that the world seems heavily populated. It’s infuriating to see such a misstep coming from Bungie creator of some of the best social gaming experiences in Halo 2 and 3. If you are like me and kept an eye on the games development and watched all the developers’ blogs, you will quickly realise that a lot of what was promised is not delivered on. I could write another 500 word article just on the story and how much it disappointed me but I’ll keep that for another day!

In conclusion, Destiny fails to live up to its tremendous hype but not only that, it leaves the player wondering how a studio who produced such a revolutionary gaming experience as Halo managed to create one of the most soulless, boring, repetitive games in recent history. Again though, if you can get a group of friends together the experience rapidly changes in to something that can make Destiny worthy of its €60 price tag. Destiny is one of my biggest gaming disappointments of the past generation and will fall into the ever growing list of games that just didn’t live up to the hype.

5/10

14.10.14

Entertainment

Yes, But Are We Enemies Elaine Hanley tells us why her latest trip to the Triskel Arts Centre will not be her last! s someone who has lived in Cork for the past three years, I am a little shy in admitting that I had never been to the Triskel Arts Centre before going to the poetry reading entitled “Yes, But Are We Enemies” on September 23rd. However, this poetry reading changed my attitudes and I will definitely be attending more events like it in the future. The Enemies project is a collaboration initiative, designed to bring artists of different styles, cultures, content and ideals together to create diverse work, which somehow seems to complement its counterparts.

The Enemies project extends to other disciplines such as photography and music, and has featured over 200 artists, poets, musicians and photographers since the founding of the initiative in 2013. “Yes, But Are We Enemies” is the Irish contingent of what is fast becoming an international collaborative movement, and so it is very exciting to see Cork playing a key role in this debut Irish tour. At the Triskel, we saw this collaboration style in the form of paired poetry in which two poets, some local and some travelling with the Enemies project, co-wrote and read a shared poem. It’s an interesting technique as it allows for more than one aspect and multiple sets of emotions to be explored within a poem.

As a result of including more people into the creative process, poets benefit from including more people in the audience of the poem. The overall aim of the evening was to encourage us as observers to question how we read and listen to poetry, and to ultimately have our attitudes towards poetry, especially paired poetry, changed.

Throughout the night, seven pairs of collaborative poets read their combined work to a small overcrowded room in the Triskel. It was also reassuring to see UCC students who were invited, in their own right, to partake in the reading.

Sarah Hayden and Rachel Warriner opened the festivities with a poem about body image. At points, both poets read the same lines of the poem, which created a ghostly aspect to the poem, which suited the tone of being haunted by one’s own body image and the ideals of what we should look like. Cal Doyle and Doireann Ní Ghríofa took a different approach with their poem, as Doireann described the physical landscape of Cork City, Cal gave an account was more hard core (which included several profanities, which lead me to question the suitability for the child sitting beside me). More organic performances followed from the pairs of Paul Casey with Afric McGlinchey, Ailbhe Darcy with Enemies co-curator SJ Fowler, and Sam Riviere with Enemies co-curator Christodoulos Makris. I personally didn’t think that the other two pairs, Eleanor Hooker with Sarah Hesketh and Billy Ramsell with Patrick Coyle, worked very well together.

These poets read their individual poetry rather than reading poetry together, which I thought was the purpose of the evening.

A thoroughly enjoyable evening by some incredibly talented poets. From now on I will not overlook what the Triskel has to offer when I’m looking for something to do, and I strongly encourage you to do the same.

Cork International Short Story Festival:

Kristiina Ehin and Rachel Trezise Jane Farrell looks at what the Triskel Christchurch had to offer on Wednesday 17th of September udiences in Triskel Christchurch on the night of the 17th were treated to the mesmeric tones of the Estonian author, Kristiina Ehin.

As part of the Cork International Short Story Festival, Ehin, an internationally renowned poet and prose writer, read two short stories from her new collection, Walker on Water.

She lulled us into a peaceful trance as we followed her tale of a somewhat fickle woman and what happens when she considers her man’s time to be up. The sense of calm that seeped into us at the beginning of her story became one of amusement, then horror, as a series of grotesquely comic twists disrupted our reverie. Ehin has certainly managed to reconfigure fairy tales and elements of gothic romance into deceptively simple yet enchanting tales, all undermined by a dark undercurrent of brutality and psychological disorder. Having also written a retelling of Southern Estonian folk tales, it is clear from the two stories we heard that elements of the oral tradition pervade her writing. Ehin also presented a four-day poetry master-class as part of the festival.

A fluid transition into the work of Rachel

Trezise followed and the audience was treated to yet another melodious accent, this time Welsh. She read a story from her collection, Cosmic Latte, the winner of the Readers’ Choice Award in this year’s Edge Hill Short Story Prize. This story also dealt with a female protagonist, but in a strikingly different setting than that of Ehin’s. The audience was now transported to a nail salon in the Rhondda valley of south Wales (the birthplace of Trezise). Passivity and dominance were played out in stark relief and the fiction featured an equally startling – and arguably even more grotesque – plot twist that both complimented and enhanced the humour of the piece. I, for one, found myself squirming in wonderful discomfort. Dealing with middleclass realism, this was a locally based study of workplace politics, nepotism and the difficulties of pandering to a demanding boss.

Like Ehin, Trezise offered a workshop as part of the festival.

Both authors provided entertaining, shocking, transfixing and unforgettable short fiction, and the length of the queues at the books table after the event was testament to their quality.

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Entertainment

14.10.14

Dunham: A Essential Cult Books Lena Young Woman Kelly Doherty goes through the most essential cult literature from the 20th & 21st century

Tells You What She’s Learned

Laura Hussey reviews Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She’s Learned

Less Than Zero

by Bret Easton Ellis Another coming of age novel, Less Than Zero shocked readers with its depictions of the socalled MTV generation and their casual sexual relations and drug usage. Harsh, shocking and gritty, Bret Easton Ellis’ abrasive and discordant writing style makes a blunt point about the extents that people are willing to go to just to feel. While the wealthy, lavish lifestyles of these LA teenagers may not be parallel the lives of us Corkonians, the search for meaning, identity and a sense A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers Quite literally a heartbreaking work of staggering genius, Dave Eggers half of purpose is universal autobiographical/half novel tale of the aftermath of his parents’ consecutive to all. deaths is one of the saddest, most emotive works of all time. Dave Eggers’ ‘stream of consciousness’ writing style and conversational tone in addressing his audience is highly unique and leaves the reader feeling like you’ve gained a new best friend, albeit one who’s a great laugh, is wonderfully insightful and is one of the best writers of our generation.

On The Road

by Jack Keroauc Written in 1957, On The Road is the ultimate American novel and is essential reading for any young person discovering what it means to be alive.

Fuelled by drugs, dreams and a desire to see the world, Kerouac’s narrator Sal Paradise embarks on a reckless trip around the US. Renowned by most as one of the best novels of all time, On The Road is the ultimate crossover success.

Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace What the massive Infinite Jest takes up in time and effort, it certainly makes up for in reward. The great opus of the tragic literary genius that was David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest offers insight into the struggles of modern society with addiction, the entertainment industry, relationships and, mostly, themselves. It may be a challenging read but Infinite Jest could change your life.

Catcher In Rye

by JD Salinger The landmark coming of age novel by JD Salinger, Catcher In The Rye follows Holden Caulfield through the trials and tribulations of growing up. Whilst Holden may not be the easiest character to relate to, his bristly nature makes him a refreshing anti-hero.

Dealing with issues such as isolation, angst and finding yourself, Catcher In The Rye is the ultimate novel for every young adult who’s ever felt like an underdog.

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby One of the most beloved modern British writers, Nick Hornby’s talent for writing accessible but intelligent novels is at its height with his landmark writing, High Fidelity. Following Rob, the record store owner, through his painstakingly self-aware efforts to find out where exactly he goes wrong with the women in his life, High Fidelity casts light upon human tendencies towards self-indulgence and how that can prevent us from seeing what exactly is in front of us. A must read for all music fans and the perpetually unlucky in love.

Generation X by Douglas Coupland Generation X is a framed narrative of the lives of three twenty something year olds. Like a Canterbury Tales for the modern young person, Generation X is an effort by Coupland to counteract the mainstream media’s misrepresentation of his generation. Whilst it was written in the early 90s, the characters (the neurotic Dag, Andy with his ‘McJob’ and Tobias the yuppie) translate perfectly to our generation and make for a novel that constantly questions the boxes we allow ourselves to be placed in.

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n a recent article by New Statesman discussing Dunham’s highly anticipated memoir, it was suggested that Lena is, in fact, not real; that her entire quirky persona is fictionalised and that “Lena Dunham has been playing ‘Lena Dunham’ for a long time.’ While slightly over embellished, admittedly trying to differentiate Lena Dunham, the writer and actress from Hannah Horvath, her alter ego on the smash HBO show, Girls can be quite precarious and this book certainly doesn’t help matters. Yet, it proves to be very entertaining and insightful.

For any fans of the HBO programme, this collection of stories that make up some of Dunham’s twenty odd years comes highly recommended; from platonic bed sharing to being in ‘jerk recovery’, the encounters Dunham has simply screams Hannah Horvath’s awkward knack for falling into incredibly awkward situations. In the show, Hannah tries to get her book of short stories published but it is Dunham who sees this become a reality. Many of the stories are hilarious, dealing with friendship, sex, bad fashion choices and body image but a truly unexpected confession is that Lena was date raped in college. Her recounting this scene was no doubt difficult but hugely admirable in the way she describes her struggle to come to terms with her rape; even years later as she pitches a version of it for her TV show.

Her stories are comforting, painstakingly honest and funny. Not That Kind of Girl proves to be a certainly worthwhile read.

Fashion

Fashion Month TV Update Inspirations PAGE 40

COOL BAGS FOR

College

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Ok, so bags are a necessary evil when it comes to college. You need one that not only carries all the books and notes you need, potentially a laptop and a charger thrown in the mix, and on top of all of that it needs to carry a carton of milk home at the end of a long day. But how do we balance practical with stylish? Emily Horgan and Sorcha Lanigan have searched high and low for their picks that will have you strutting through college, rain or shine, with all your items in tact.

Our Pick

JumpFromPaper create the most amazing 3D effect satchels that will be sure to get you noticed strolling through college. The best news? They are selling them in the Glucksman. Form an orderly queue, please.

Top Tip

Vintage satchels are classic and will never go out of fashion. Check out Cork’s many vintage shops to grab some great bargins, but make sure that they are a strong leather, especially if you are planning on lugging your laptop around in the rain.

Metallic Backpack: Topshop

The Dos and Don’ts of Halloween Costumes Sorcha Lanigan gives us the low down on how to handle this month’s closing day – October 31st (better known as Halloween).

DO: be resourceful (read, cheap). There's no point splashing out on an over-the-top, fantastically ghoulish ensemble that manages to be both terrifically expensive and horribly impractical. The only scary thing about that is having to view the balance left in your student bank account afterwards.

DON'T: employ cultural appropriation (i.e.

be racist.) A subtle tribute to a particular heritage is fine, such as an artfully applied bindi or donning a hula skirt. Painting on a different skin colour, geisha attire or 'whitewashing' is all so not cool and bound to get your house egged and / or TP'd (and rightly so). You have been warned.

DO: Go easy on the makeup. There is nothing more appealing than bright, colourful sticks of fresh face paint, and the fabulously hirsute accessories that accompany, such as false eyelashes or moustaches. However, sometimes less is more, particularly when looking

back at photos of yourself the morning after: can in hand, smiling blearily at the camera, face smudged and smeared beyond recognition of either your real self or the character that you're impersonating. Also, I once wore a moustache and used so much glue that it took 3 days to vacate my face, regardless of the amount of soap I used. I am also a girl.

DON'T: be afraid to use hair dye. If you

are going to use a funky coloured hair dye to spice up both your costume and life then that’s great, but make sure to a) perform a skin test prior to using and b) that the dye is labelled as 'temporary' rather than 'permanent.’ Moonshine or the Funky Skunk in town both do entire rainbow tinted ranges of fab

hair colours to use, if you're brave enough to opt for this move.

DO: pair up. If you have a buddy that wants to double up for some gruesome twosome action in matching costumes then that is great!!

Axel Rose and Slash, Wednesday and Pugsley Addams, Zoolander and Mugatu, Mama and Papa Smurf; the list is endless. The more creative the better and of course, group costumes work too.

DO: look at what you have lying around already if you're stuck. For example, toilet paper roll? BOOM, transform yourself into an Egyptian mummy princess. Black shoe polish?

Alacazam you're Charlie Chaplin. Although more like Alaca-dayum if you pull off the right accessories with this one boys; am I right?

DO: have fun with whatever you're going as, but don't get TOO saucy. Just like trick or treating, there is a certain cut off point that you have to be aware of, particularly if you're going for a slightly racy look. (Read: sexy animals don’t count as a costume.)

And finally…

Have fun, be original and most of all, stay safe.

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TV Inspiration

CATWALK TRENDS

any things influence fashion, but recently, our small screens have been making a massive impact on how we dress. Fashion editors Emily Horgan and Laurence Keating explore the different movies and TV shows that have made the biggest impact this season (and justify that Netflix addiction you’ve been hiding).

Orange Is The New Black

We may not be open to admitting chain-watching the second season of OITNB following its release in June, however there is no denying the influence that Piper and her fellow inmates have had on our runways this Autumn/Winter. With boiler suits and relaxed silhouettes dotted across the catwalk, notably the luxe leather boiler suit H&M’s Studio Collection debut, it is safe to say that the fashion displayed in our favourite Netflix original has officially made a jailbreak into our wardrobes.

If you are still not convinced, you only have to see Alexander Wang’s A/W14 Campaign to be swayed: an unmistakable nod towards the series.

Understandably, boiler suits are not for the faint hearted, so a more subtle approach can be taken by teaming a masculine bomber jacket (see, H&M Studio Collection) with a simple understated LBD. If you are brave enough to go full inmate chic, make sure to bring some femininity into your outfit with some classic heels.

Now if we are going to go literal on the title, we can of course say that orange is also trending for this season. Just take a peep at Alexander Lewis’s AW14 offerings, which shows feminine and silky cloths in a more subtle shade of orange, with a bolder statement seen in Marques Almeida’s collection. Pops of orange really do brighten up your autumn winter hues, so consider adding it in through accessories like bags, scarves or even use a tone of lipstick to give an edge. Of course, we are taking all of our hair and make-up tips form the lady herself, Morello (but maybe we won’t be taking relationship advice off her just yet).

Cartoon-tastic

Fashion has started taking itself a little less seriously with designers seeking inspiration from some of our best loved childhood cartoons. Mochino, much to our delight, showcased a wide range of

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sweaters, jackets and heels all donning the many faces Spongebob Squarepants. Another catwalk infiltrated by our animated friends was Fay’s Spring/ Summer display at Milan Fashion week, with Snoopy printed across all of their collection. Street style has embraced this trend with open arms with The Simpsons and Adventure Time cropping up on sweaters, hats and shirts everywhere. Apart from physical prints, fashion has often been inspired by cartoon characters, especially Daria – remembered for her ‘whatevers’ and angsty sighs no more clunky boots teamed with earthy, dark tones are all big statements this season.

And lest we forget the original hipster and selfconfessed ‘football head’, Arnold from Hey Arnold, who rocked flannel shirts and peak caps before they were even considered cool. So whether you are taking inspiration from a character itself or just splashing a bit of much needed cartoon, we are taking our inspiration from Cara Delevingne who teamed her Bart Simpson crop sweater with jeans and washboard abs (we’re not jealous, not one bit). Alternatively, you could go full on head to toe pattern a la Rita Ora - not for the faint hearted.

Game of Thrones

Yes, we said it, Game of Thrones is not only influencing the way we think and speak sometimes (tell me I’m not the only one who looks pensively into the distance when someone mentions that winter is coming), but it has also surprisingly made an impact on our winter trends too. No, we are certainly not advising you to wear swords as accessories.

We are talking cloaks, wools and heavy jackets that even Jon Snow would be proud to wear. For maximum inspiration on the cloak front, check out Dolce & Gabbana’s Fall Winter 2014 collection.

With its mystical air, perfect balance of masculine and feminine shapes and textures and even its hint towards chainmail and knight’s attire, it really does

remind us of one our favourite book-come-TV-series.

When it comes to jackets, it’s the length, colours and fabrics that really channel our inner Starks.

This season sees the hems of our jackets drop a massive amount, with billowing ankle skimming duster coats as our staple jackets this season. And with heavier fabrics and more earthy, muted tones being seen on the catwalk (check out Isabel Marant Fall Winter 2014 for some jacket envy), it will have you truly prepared for those long cold nights at The Wall. Practical and totally bad ass – what more could you want?

Suits

Much to our disappointment, The Law Department does not accept ‘watched all episodes of Suits’ as grounds to pass exams. To sooth our pain, we can instead take comfort in the fact that we can all consider ourselves tailoring experts. Mike Ross and Harvey Specter may be seen as unlikely role models for female catwalks but androgyny has been a trend that seems unshakable for all seasons. This time around, we are focusing on clean cut tailoring, much like the men of Pearson Hardman’s New York law firm, but with quirky cuts and lengths. Play around with the typical suit tailoring by wearing culottes or cropped skinny trousers instead of full length flares.

Another way to play around with this tailored look is to add structured capes into the mix – for ideas check out Yves Saint Laurent’s Tuxedo Cape. A bit out of our student budget we know, but high street versions are popping up everywhere so don’t go taking out a loan just yet. Of course, we are lucky not to have the restrictions that the lads in Suits had put in place when it comes to dress codes, so make sure to add quirky accessories like a colourful clutch or eye-catching flats to finish off the full look.

As for that law degree, unfortunately we’ll have to return to Q+2.

MAKE UP TRENDS The Simpsons for Mac

Clueless

Ok, we know this is a bit of a throwback, but bear with us. Not only did Iggy Azalea channel her inner Cher with Charli XCX acting as her Dionne for Fancy, the high street has also really embraced the girl’s wardrobe choices for this coming season.

Think fluffy hats, fluffy jumpers, fluffy pens… Our recommendation is a fluffy clutch teamed with a structured outfit. Aside from this, tartan is a major piece to the Clueless trend puzzle. Feeding off the idea of good tailoring and co-ords, tartan is the print that was made famous by this iconic TV show.

I mean, who could possibly forget that yellow skirt suit?

Simone Rocha paid homage to tartan in her collection for Autumn Winter 14, with cropped tops and midi skirts dripping in the pattern. I know what you are thinking, the skirts worn by the girls never left much to the imagination and as any Irish Mammy would point out, “You’d get a cold in your kidneys,” but believe us when we say that the catwalks have taken the influence and made it more grown up. Recommendations as to how to shop like Cher and Dionne (without the price tag) is to hit Topshop, who are truly embracing everything Clueless. Now all we need is the convertible?

Cosmetics giant MAC has teamed up with America's real First Lady, Marge Simpson, to collaborate on a collection in honour of the shows 25th anniversary! The somewhat smaller than anticipated collection consists of two blushes, two eyeshadow quads, four lipglasses, a set of Marge-like spikey false lashes and some pretty nifty nail stickers.

As an ENORMOUS fan of both The Simpsons and MAC I was deeply excited for this collection and have to say I am a little disappointed there wasn't more to it; some limited edition bags or brushes would have been great! However, with that said, the collection we are presented with is similar to many of MAC's launches over the past couple of years - A mixed bag. The eyeshadow quads are an interesting mix of blue and purple shades ("Marge's Extra Ingredients") and more green tones ("That Trillion Dollar Look") with neither set performing outstandingly. Many of the shades in both quads are easily found elsewhere and considering how iconic Marge's hair is, I was very disappointed to find the blue shade in "Marges's Extra Ingredients" to be badly pigmented and a little dusty. The lipglasses come in four shades, with the most unique being "Nacho Cheese Explosion", a Simpsons yellow!

The best of the four is "Itchy&Scratchy&Sexy"

Lipglass, a brightened pinkish/purple.

The nail stickers, or "Cutie-Cles" are excellent and really look fantastic when applied!

The blushes, as with most of MAC's blushes are fairly great but again in shades that many people will already have. They do come with a cool overlay print of Marge's face though so if you're on the lookout for a slightly larger than normal but still average coloured blush these could be for you! Overall the collection is quite middle of the road which is a huge shame as it could have been absolutely amazing. It certainly doesn't do Mrs. Simpson any justice!

Must Haves:

Itchy & Scratchy & Sexy Lipglass Marge Simpson's Cutie-Cles nail stickers

Pulp Fiction for Urban Decay

Another week, another makeup company pop cultural anniversary cross over. This time Urban Decay, the leader in eyeshadow palette sales, has created a collection to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of Tarantino’s blood soaked epic.

The collection consists of five times: an eyeshadow palette (no brainer), a lip liner, lipstick, nail polish and heavy metal eye liner. Most of the pieces in this collection are highly durable and can be found under many, many other brand names. As Urban Decay’s brown based Naked Palettes are so wildly successful, chances are you’ll have something similar to the Pulp Fiction palette.

The set contains five eyeshadows, with one pan containing both a black and white shade. The shades are absolutely nothing new, especially not for Urban Decay but they are really fantastic quality so if you’re looking for a new neutrals palette with a great black shade (and some cool packaging), this could be the ticket.

The lip liner and lipstick, both named Mia Wallace are again, nothing new shade wise (both a true red, the one Uma Thurman sports throughout much of the movie, funnily enough), but the pigmentation and texture as overall quality is phenomenal in both products. Urban Decay’s Revolution lipstick formula is sensational, I can see this red shade becoming a favourite for many - I hope they extend the shade range a little more.

The nail polish is a similar red colour, also

named Mia Wallace and again, may be something you already have. The bottle cap has a really detailed and interesting skull detail on top.

The final item in the launch is a Heavy Metal Glitter Eye Liner in Gunmetal which is supposed to be a black liner shot through with various shades of glitter but is a somewhat chunky glittery liquid liner that never really applies evenly or opaquely. It does look really nice layered over a black or purple gel liner. All in all, the collection is essentially pretty basic in terms of shade range but the quality is fantastic - a great pick up if you needed to replenish a basic palette or red lipstick.

Must haves:

Mia Wallace Revolution Lipstick Mia Wallace 24/7 Glide On Lip Pencil

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Fashion Month Update

If you weren’t one of the lucky ones who got to attend any (or all) of September’s numerous fashion shows dotted between New York, Lonadon, Milan and Paris, fear not. Aoife Stapleton and Lorna Lane pick out all the best bits from each city that will be hitting our wardrobes for Spring Summer 2015.

NEW YORK

September 4th – 11th Just when we were coming around to the idea of layering and wearing heavy coats again, the catwalks had us dreaming of warmer weather. Fashion Month kicked off in New York, where the never disappointing stream of shows illustrated the undeniable creativity that American design houses hold.

Minimalism appeared to be an integral trend this season with Hugo Boss, Vera Wang and Narciso Rodriquez opting for simplified colour palettes and clean lines. Wang’s predominantly colour deficient showcase was a bold statement.

Although black clothing is unconventional for spring/summer dressing, the designer compensated for that lack of colour by playing with interesting textures and feminine frills. Excellent tailoring added to the appeal of such a minimalist collection.

So if you want to stand out next season just remember, less (colour) is more.

Contrastingly, designers such as Oscar de la Renta and Diane von Furstenberg provided us with fantastically typical spring collections. Between stripes, lace and pastels, gingham seemed to be a ‘having a moment’ with de la Renta producing a show-stopping baby-pink gingham coat and von Furstenberg proving you can never have enough gingham, styling it head-to-toe (shoes and all).

Spring/Summer would be nothing without some floral prints, and finding a way to reinvent such a tired trend is imaginably difficult. However, Michael Kors succeeded in revitalising the look. Dreamy three dimensional floral patterns appeared in the form of sequin arrangements on mid-length tulle skirts.

The fluttering skirts were juxtaposed to boxy t-shirts and tailored shirts which made for the perfect combination. I am more than excited to see how the highstreet takes on these eclectic trends to produce more wearable (and affordable) looks this coming spring.

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Motley

MILAN

September 17th - 23rd With Milan being home to some of the biggest names of old school fashion royalty in the industry, the Spring/Summer shows of Milan Fashion Week were guaranteed to give the fash-pack something to talk about yet again this season.

The 70s truly is back, with models from Prada, Gucci and Cavali gracing the catwalks donning fringing, flares, platform clogs, camel leathers and not to mention Pucci’s breath-taking, tie-die silk fabrics of their 70s-esque maxi dresses.

Milan’s catwalks undeniably had the strongest 70s vibes from the four fashion weeks by a long shot.

Another prominent trend throughout the week was denim, which is set to take a front seat this coming Spring/Summer, as the runways were replete with denim garments of all variations. Lots of denim-on-denim looks were showcased by Gucci and Trussadi, while designers such as Fendi and Dolce & Gabbana brought fresh and exciting new perspectives to the classic jean pant with new silhouettes and additions of lavish embellishments.

However, the designer who truly outshone the rest, in terms of originality, was Moschino. The renowned fashion house once again took its unconventionality to new heights, this time drawing inspiration from the Barbie doll. This was Jeremy Scott’s second collection for Moschino and he delivered outstandingly, following the success of his McDonald’s inspired collection seen at the Autumn/Winter shows earlier this year. With roller skating Barbie blondes debuting the “all pink everything” collection, this is a look that certainly is not for the faint hearted!

LONDON

September 12th – 16th As the Spring/Summer 15 fashion weeks draw to a close, it’s no doubt a fun and exciting season is to be anticipated when it comes to matters of fashion. With each city showcasing its own impressive collections from some of the top fashion powerhouses of the moment, London was no exception. With A-listers like Alexa Chung and Olivia Palmero gracing the FROWS, and some high profile street-stylers being papped, it seems Somerset House was the place to be this past LFW. With a show of revolving fairground rides by handbag designer Anya Hindmarch, to Erdem’s tropical jungle set, there was undoubtedly a show for everyone. Trend wise, the catwalks saw a mix of minimalistic structured black and white pieces with the addition of some more playful patterns and colours. Designer Maedham Kirchhoff, who has gained considerable recognition recently following his collaboration with Topshop this year, pulled out all the stops when it came to creativity and expression. The collection has been described by Vogue UK as a “London fashion melting pot”.

More modest approaches were seen on the catwalks by designers like Simone Rocha, Tom Ford and Tata Naka paring things back somewhat, with more muted colour palettes and a mix of both romantic and structured silhouettes with delicate flashes of sheer panel.

Some of the key trends included 70s inspired looks, from big fuzzy hair at Marques Almeida, to House of Holland’s showcase of 70s floral prints, while Topshop Unique’s fresh and modern collection has brought the Sports-Luxe trend back for yet another season.

PARIS

September 23rd – October 1st Fashion month was brought to a close in the most fitting of cities, Paris.

Paris fashion week is renowned for showcasing some of the most eccentric and artistic of fashions and this year was no exception.

Isabel Marant débuted a collection with bohemian vibes at its core and the entire show had a relaxed, summery aesthetic with many of the garments featuring frayed edges. The designer chose to replace belts with ropes adding to the laid-back nature of the range. Gladiator sandals, ponchos and fringing all played a major role in the collection with the colour cream being a key feature. The cool essence of it all has you lusting after a sun holiday.

Escaping from stereotypical spring prints, many designers in Paris played with grid-like patterns. Both the Balmain and Issey Miyake shows previewed the look. We saw grids in the form of office-appropriate palazzo pants as well as skin-tight pencil skirts, a welcome change from stripes and florals.

Not to be outdone by the presence of baby North West in the FROW (how cute is she?), the Balenciaga show was one not to be missed. It seems as though duster coats aren’t going anywhere this coming season and we’re okay with that. The show featured sleeveless versions of the coveted coats. Fitting for the warmer weather, they were both modern and chic. I’m sure we’ll be seeing many variations of these on the high-street next spring.

Lest we forget our own MSL Cork Fashion Week kicking off on the 3rd of October. For more info visit corkfashionweek.com

Navy lace top Amity (Carey's Lane Cork)

Plaid shirt Miss Daisy Blue (English Market Cork)

Navy lace top and skirt Amity (Carey's Lane Cork)

“Andy” bowling shirt Miss Daisy Blue (English Market Cork)

Mustard Yellow Shirt Model’s Own

Maroon beaded dress Amity (Carey's Lane Cork) Jewellery by Azure Jewellery (Carey's Lane Cork)

Cream Lace Skirt Miss Daisy Blue (English Market Cork)

Navy Trench Coat Amity

Kayleigh's styling, hair and makeup Laurence Keating www.facebook.com/laurencekeatingmakeup Adam's styling and hair by Evan Bradley www.facebook.com/ForTheLoveOfLicious Photography: Amy Frahill Photography www.facebook.com/amyfrahillphotography Models: Kayleigh and Adam at Lokdown Models Shot at ORIGIN HAIR SALON Cork 021 4270155 Multi award winning Origin offers the best student discount in the city.