Trinity News Vol. 68 Issue 7

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No one has a right to a namesake

Election special

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Life pullout

Women who wow in Trinity

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Tuesday 1 March 2022

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Poll: Fullam favoured for presidency, Staunton for welfare & equality

Maggie Larson

Maguire by 25 points in the race for University Times Editor.

Staff Writer

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President Gabi Fullam is likely to be elected TCDSU President over Rebecca Kelly, the poll suggests, though the outcome is far from certain.

The presidential race is the tightest in this election season, with the contest between the Union’s current Ethnic Minorities Officer and current Gender Equality Officer too close to definitively call. The poll shows an eight point lead and a margin of error of 8% for Fullam, suggesting her true lead in first preferences is between 0 and 16 percentage points.

Fullam is favoured among almost all demographic groups,

race go either way.

Education Sole Education candidate Zöe Cummins received 90.5% of first preferences in the Trinity News poll while RON received 9.5%.

The current STEM convenor has consistent support across all faculties and demographics and, with the 42% of respondents who are currently undecided unlikely to drastically swing the race, looks set to be comfortably elected Education Officer when voting closes on Thursday.

Welfare & Equality Disabilities Officer Chloe Staunton leads with 68.2% of first preferences in the race for Welfare & Equality Officer, while former Continued on page 2>>

PHOTO BY ELIZA MELLER FOR TRINITY NEWS

POLL CONDUCTED

BY TRINITY NEWS indicates that Gabi Fullam is leading in the race for Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) President, but the election remains too close to call. The poll, which was carried out between February 22 and 26 February 2022, uses a representative sample of 574 students. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.0%.

The poll results also suggest that a re-open nominations (RON) result may be returned in a TCDSU sabbatical election for the first time in at least a decade.

RON currently leads Mairead

with 51.1% of first preferences across the board, while 42.9% of first preferences are for Kelly and just under 6% are for the option to re-open nominations (RON).

Fullam is particularly popular among left-wing voters and students who have never held a position in TCDSU, which may be to her advantage when voting opens on Tuesday. However, while the proportion of undecided voters is smaller in this race than any other at 18.9% of respondents, it may be enough to swing the vote in either candidate’s favour.

If neither candidate reaches the quota on the first count, the presidential election will come down to the distribution of second preferences after the RON option is eliminated, which could see the

Vol. 68, Issue. 7

Member of College Board charged with murder Shannon Connolly, Jack Kennedy Deputy Editor, Editor

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RINITY ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR Dr Diarmuid Rossa Phelan was charged with murder, late last Thursday (February 24).

Phelan had been arrested and questioned by Gardaí after a man was fatally shot in Tallaght on Tuesday February 22. His name was not initially released, but the Irish Independent reported that the suspect was a “well-known legal professional”. On Thursday (February 24), the Irish Sun reported that the man in custody was Phelan.

Phelan (53) is a Fellow of Trinity and a member of the College Board. He is also a fellow of the European Law Institute.

College has declined to comment on the issue.

Phelan remains in custody. A detective told Tallaght District Court on Friday that Phelan “made no reply” when presented with the charges. His solicitor asked for the case to be adjourned Continued on page 12>>

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The final countdown

The 2022 TCDSU sabbatical officer elections are in their final days this week. Voting, which will take place exclusively online again this year, opens today. It will run until Thursday (March 3), and results will be announced that evening.

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Table of contents Elections Analysis: Strong lead for Lynch over Nadia and Donnelly

Analysis: Maguire faces uphill battle in final days of election

>> Continued from front page

News

- page 11

No formal protocol in place on student-staff relationships GSU funding remains suspended after seven months

Comment - page 20

There are no private solutions to public problems

SciTech - page 25 What Don’t Look Up tried to do and why it failed

Sport

- page 29

Round three of the GAA national football league

TRINITY NEWS EDITORIAL STAFF Editor Deputy Editor Assistant Editor Online Editor Life Editor Editor-at-Large

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Poll: Fullam favoured for presidency, Staunton for welfare & equality

President

Oifigeach na Gaeilge Cúnla Morris is polling at 27.1% and RON is at 4.6%. As almost half of voters are undecided in this race, the final vote share may look somewhat different, but a significant change would be needed for Morris to overcome Staunton’s lead.

Comms & Marketing Communications & Marketing Julie Smirnova, running unopposed for Communications & Marketing Officer, is polling at 92.7% with the RON vote at 7.2%. Though 42% of respondents remain undecided, the current Citizenship Officer is broadly popular among all demographics and can be reasonably assured of an overwhelming win at the polls.

Ents The polling shows a significant lead for Max Lynch in the Ents race, with 44.8% of first preferences compared to Nadia at 27.6% and Ross Donnelly at 24.22%. The vote to re-open nominations stands at just 3.4%. All three Ents candidates will be eager to distinguish themselves in the final days of the campaign, and with about 30% of respondents undecided at the time of polling, there are still voters to be swayed. Though it would be an uphill battle for either Donnelly or Nadia to surpass Lynch’s lead in first preferences, how students vote down the ballot is vital as this race is likely to come down to voters’ second and third preferences.

UT Editor Voters look likely to return a RON result in the race for University Times Editor, with the option to re-open nominations polling at 62.7% ahead of current Deputy Editor Mairead Maguire at 37.3%. Our poll indicates majority support for RON among all demographics, with a particular preference for reopening nominations among leftleaning students. With about a quarter of respondents undecided, Maguire would need to sway almost all undecided voters to be elected Editor. There was an active RON campaign in this race, a first since Muireann Kane ran for Communications & Marketing Officer in 2019. This result, if borne out, would also represent the first time an incumbent deputy editor has not been elected editor of the paper since it was made into a sabbatical position.

Surveyed students were given a sample ballot for each race.

Quoted statistics for candidates’ performance do not include those who indicated they were undecided or that they didn’t intend to vote. Levels of support are based on first preferences.

Fullam leads but r Gabi Fullam is more likely to become TCDSU president, but the numbers show it is still anyone’s game Ellen Kenny, Ella Sloane

Features Editor, Student Living Editor

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N PREVIOUS YEARS, the SU presidential race has taken a consistent form: three candidates, one already deeply active within the union, one less so but still engaged in union activities, and one promoting themselves as the fresh outsider to the union. This year, however, represents a new and complex kind of election.

Candidates Gabi Fullam and Rebecca Kelly are both currently part-time officers in Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU), holding the roles of Ethnic Minorities Officer and Gender Equality Officer respectively. This is part of a larger trend this year, in which most candidates running currently hold part-time offices.

Despite their similar union backgrounds, Fullam is leading by a significant yet tight margin according to the election poll

conducted by Trinity News. In a poll of 574 students, Fullam has earned the first preferences of 51.1% of decided voters, while Kelly is approximately eight points behind at 42.9%. A small, though not insignificant, number of decided voters indicated a desire to reopen nominations at 6.0%.

18.6% of respondents remained uncertain of how they would vote, the smallest of any race this election season. With a margin of error of approximately eight percentage points, the true gap between the candidates could be between 0% and 16%.

Polling shows no major genderbased preference for either candidate, apart from non-binary/ genderfluid students (the sample of whom was very small) who showed a considerably strong preference for Fullam at a rate of 69.0%.

Fullam, a final year sociology and philosophy student, topped the polls within Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (AHSS) with 51.6% of first preference votes there. Kelly, a final year law student, found considerable favour among (the small sample of) Health Sciences students, where she is leading by 24 points at 58.6% of first preference votes. Initial polling saw stronger support for Kelly among Engineering, Mathematics and Science (EMS) courses, but Fullam soon overtook, earning 51.1% of first preference votes against Kelly’s 42.4%.

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race far from over While Fullam topped the polls across most faculties, Kelly has garnered the support of her fellow union members; despite both candidates being active members and part-time officers of the union, polling shows that students

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Polling shows no major gender-based preference for either candidate, apart from among nonbinary/ genderfluid students

who have held a position within the student union are more likely to support Kelly, at a rate of 49.3%.

Conversely, respondents who have never held a position within the union are considerably more likely to vote for Fullam at 54.2% of first preference votes compared to 39.3% for Kelly.

Notably, 75% of those who voted for Fullam want the SU to be taking more direct action, compared to 57% of Kelly’s voters.

In line with these results, Kelly’s supporters are significantly more likely to feel that the SU does a good job at representing them already, whereas those who favour Fullam tended to respond more negatively to this statement. When asked how well they believe College handled exams, voters with a preference for Kelly are slightly more likely to think that College did a good job in relation to this. Those who support Fullam were more likely to respond negatively to how College dealt with exams; throughout the year, Fullam has shown support for Students4Change, an activist group that has criticised College’s handling of exams and lobbied for both in-person lectures and online exams last semester.

It appears that success in the ballot will be determined by demographic turnout, however slight; supporters and members of the current union will be a reliable source of first-preference votes for Kelly, while Fullam will need to depend on those less engaged

and more disappointed with the union this year. On the other hand, Kelly may need to regain her support among EMS students and mobilise her supporters in the Health Sciences to secure a chance at victory, while it seems that Fullam may rely on the higher proportion of AHSS students who vote in elections every year.

Overall, the left-right political divide appears to be a strong indicator of voting behaviour in this presidential election. Polling results demonstrate that politically left-leaning students (voters for Solidarity-PBP) are much more likely to favour Fullam, with 78.3% of those giving her their vote, whereas only 16.7% of this category voted for Kelly. Fullam also leads slightly in garnering support from centre-left (Green Party, Social Democrat, Labour and Sinn Féin) voters, winning 49.6% of the vote here, compared to Kelly who received 44.6%. On the other hand, Kelly strongly leads in the centre-right, gaining 64.0% of the vote from those who fall under this category (which encompasses Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and Aontú) as opposed to 28.0% for Fullam.

Previous presidential candidates have used their experience in the union , or lack thereof, to set themselves apart from their opponents; 2020/21 SU President Eoin Hand won on an “apolitical” campaign, while incumbent President Leah Keogh used her vast union experience to stand out. This election, union PTOs Fullam and Kelly have had to find other ways to stand out against their opponent. While cancelled hustings and campaigning meant neither candidate could fully flesh out or explain their plans for the union next year, both Fullam

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Overall, the left-right political divide appears to be a strong indicator of voting in this presidential election and Kelly took the opportunities they could to hone in on the finer details of their policies and carve out individual identities.

From her first speech at the Dining Hall Hustings, Fullam has appeared driven, drawing from her experience in competitive debating to deliver an “angry”, emotionally-charged campaign. In her first speech, Fullam focused on her own individual experiences in campaigning and activism, and her wording was careful to state what she specifically will do. Fullam later flagged that the biggest issue facing students right now is “too much sympathy and not enough change” from College, and she has laid out plans to protect the “most vulnerable” students in College.

Fullam has not had many chances to be probed on these plans, but her manifesto includes steps she plans to take in several areas, such as developing a “black students and students of colour advisory group”, similar to that within the Dublin City University Students’ Union (DCUSU).

Kelly has also shown a passion and drive for many changes on campus, though her rhetoric has not been as vigorous as Fullam’s.

Rather than leading with her own experience, her speech at the Dining Hall Hustings framed her campaign around what “we” as a College and union can achieve, with her at the helm. Kelly has in fact leaned more into her union position, expressing desires for a “proactive approach” to fostering healthier debate and discussions within the union. Kelly was particularly passionate about students’ safety, her biggest priority in this election. Like Fullam, Kelly has not many opportunities to publicly flesh out her plans regarding this, but used hustings to address flagged the lack of a distinct sexual assault policy in College and her urgent plans to create one as president.

Both candidates have been confident and prepared at hustings, emphasising their institutional knowledge and passion. When asked about their tangible impacts on the union this year, for example, Kelly expressed her pride at working with the ents officer this year to develop antispiking strategies for students such as cup condoms and anti-spiking scrunchies. Fullam, as ethnic minority officer, explained how she helped students by guiding them through “individual complaints through casework”.

At Council/Equality Hustings, both candidates highlighted

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President

inaccessibility on campus as an issue they promise to rectify if elected. Kelly emphasised the union itself as being somewhat inaccessible to students, whilst Fullam discussed her previous campaigning to make the GMB more accessible as well as her plans to hold office hours outside of House 6. The candidates also examined accessibility and inclusivity in relation to religious services offered by College, with Kelly stating that if students “want more support from our religious services, then that’s what we need to give them”. On the other hand, when asked if the chaplaincy is outdated, Fullam simply replied “yes”, and highlighted the need for a multi-faith centre on top of more secular support.

One difference between the candidates that became more apparent at Council/Equality Hustings was their planned approach to Irish language policy on campus. Irish is Kelly’s first language, something which is reflected in her manifesto and campaigning. During Council/ Equality Hustings, she was enthusiastic to highlight her plans to encourage more services as Gaeilge within the union, and for sabbatical officers to make a greater effort to use their Irish language skills at Council. On the other hand, Fullam has not placed as large an emphasis on Irish language policy in her manifesto or campaigning, and explained that she does not speak it herself.

However, she has highlighted the importance of preserving it as an indigenous language and encourages students to use whatever small bits of Gaeilge they may have.

The topic of accessibility in education is one that has dominated both Fullam and Kelly’s

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Kelly’s supporters are significantly more likely to feel that the SU does a good job at representing them manifestos and campaigns so far, though once again the finer details are what delineates each candidate.

While Fullam plans on taking larger strides through reforming the tutor system, identifying a location for the student centre, and forming a working group to review the scholarship examinations, Kelly has honed in on increasing accessibility for specific cohorts of students; she has discussed hopes to create accommodation for students working full or part-time, as well plans to lobby against the “hidden costs” for Health Science students.

On the second day of campaigning, Fullam shared that one of her posters had been “maliciously vandalised” in an allegedly racially motivated attack.

She posted a photo online of the poster with the eyes scratched out of the image of her face. In

Education Officer the post’s caption Fullam stated “This is the very culture that I am fighting to change”, something which is certainly evident in her campaign so far. Fullam’s manifesto and campaign have a strong focus on racial justice, as she plans to continue campaigning to rename the Berkeley library, advocate for children who are affected by the 27th amendment and will be soon entering College, further develop an inclusive curriculum, and implement racism bystander training within the College community.

Kelly’s campaign and manifesto have also discussed racial justice, emphasising diverse curriculums across all Trinity courses as a way to create a culture change on campus.

Out of the two candidates, only Fullam has received a strike beside her name from the Electoral Commission so far. Fullam was the first candidate of this year’s election period to be sanctioned, receiving a minor strike on the second day of campaigning.

Speaking to Trinity News, Fullam explained that the strike was issued due to someone outside of her campaign team promoting her campaign on social media outside of the approved campaigning hours. This resulted in Fullam being barred from canvassing for an hour on Wednesday.

Despite Fullam receiving this minor strike, leaving her in a slightly more precarious position to her opponent, neither presidential candidate appears to be at any great risk in this regard, and we will most likely see both names on the ballot come voting.

This sanction also does not seem to have affected Fullam’s chance at success as she maintains a lead against Kelly, though this race still seems to remain up for grabs.

Cummins set for comf in uncontested Educat The STEM convenor is predicted to win about nine-tenths of the vote Jack Kennedy Editor

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U N N I N G UNCONTESTED for the role of Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) Education Officer, incumbent STEM convenor Zöe Cummins received 90.5% of first preference votes in last week’s Trinity News poll, with the remainder going to re-open nominations (RON).

Though the proportion of undecided voters is quite high, at 43.0%, Cummins lead is so large that she can be all but certain of a very comfortable victory on Thursday (March 3). Uncontested races often have large proportions of undecided voters in preelection polls, so this figure is not necessarily reflective of any specific feelings voters have about Cummins.

Her support is largely consistent among different demographics

of voters, too. Her support among Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (AHSS) students was 89.4% and among STEM students it was 88.2% in the poll.

The difference between these two figures is well within the margin of error. Female students were slightly more likely to support Cummins; 93.5% did, compared to 85.2% of male students. Her support was effectively the same between people who had at some point held a position in TCDSU and those who had not, with the difference also being within the margin of error.

As is often the case with uncontested races, Cummins has faced comparatively fewer tough questions at hustings, and has not had her campaign and manifesto examined in direct comparison with a competitor. Nonetheless, she has clearly demonstrated a wide knowledge of academic issues, and her focus on “not so sexy” problems faced by students shows a willingness to do the kind of behind-the-scenes, often thankless, work that characterises the education officer role. Which of those issues she chose to focus on also demonstrated a good understanding of what matters to students right now.

As pandemic-related restrictions on higher education wind down, for better or for worse, many issues surrounding curriculum accessibility are

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fortable win tion election being re-examined. Students with disabilities had been calling for the online provision of course materials for years only to be ignored or rebuked by universities, but that position is much harder for College to maintain after a year and a half of online and partiallyonline teaching. Cummins says she will “fight for staff to have adequate training to provide quality lecture recordings” and push College to make “hyflex learning” available long term. If successful, this would not only be helpful for students with disabilities or part-time jobs, but also just generally useful for everyone.

Cummins has also pledged to “review the current system” of scholarship examinations (Schols), to “provide recommendations’’ to make it “more accessible to students, especially those from low-income backgrounds and students with disabilities”’. The fairness, or lack thereof, of Schols is a discussion that re-emerges almost every year, but objections to the existing system have become more frequent and more forceful of late. Some call for the institution’s total abolition. Though that seems unlikely to occur in the near future, it is almost impossible to argue that the current system is meritocratic. Acknowledgement of that reality by TCDSU would be a positive step, as would pressing College to do something about it.

Additionally, Cummins says she

wants to push Trinity to introduce “modular billing”, allowing students to retake individual modules without repeating entire years or going off-books. The importance of this issue cannot be overstated. Cummins rightly noted in her Dining Hall Hustings speech that the cost of repeating a year is massive, and it’s worth remembering that an attempt to introduce large supplemental exam fees was what kicked off the “Take Back Trinity” occupation. But is it doable? It’s hard to say. Trinity has an interest in charging students for repeating, but it would also benefit if fewer students dropped out due to being unable to meet these costs.

Promises by candidates to lobby College on various issues are often hard to evaluate, since their likelihood of success always depends on factors outside the candidate’s control. It costs very little to make such a pledge, and voters would do well to be wary of aspiring sabbats who aren’t aware of (or deliberately downplay) College’s deeply-entrenched aversion to change. And since TCDSU officers generally do not seek re-election, failure to deliver on these promises gets them in comparatively little trouble.

But Cummins certainly seems to be saying the right things; she knows what students care about, and what issues are emerging and topical. And if the poll is anything to go by, that preparation is paying dividends.

The STEM convenor’s campaign also promises more direct intervention on some issues.

Cummins has pledged to provide information to students about non-tuition “hidden” costs of College, to clarify what does and does not constitute plagiarism and what students can do when accused of it, and to create a portal for information on Erasmus and internship programmes.

Again, this is indicative of a good understanding of how to best use the education officer role; it’s mostly a technocratic position, consisting of sitting on committees and trying to move the needle on certain issues. Finding ways to directly and immediately benefit students from that role can be hard sometimes, but demystifying Trinity’s bureaucracy is a good use of the position at the intersection of College administration and TCDSU. Barring a huge upset, Cummins is set to be second-in-command of next year’s union. Only time will tell whether she can make progress on getting her desired College reforms implemented.

But she demonstrably has a firm grasp of the issues, and clearly understands where the education officer’s strengths and weaknesses lie. She has run a very solid campaign, which voters seem to have recognised, and her likely victory in the election will have been thoroughly earned.

What else we learned from the poll How Trinity students feel about College, TCDSU generally, and direct political action Maggie Larson Staff Writer

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HE POLL CONDUCTED BY TRINITY NEWS ahead of the 2022 Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) sabbatical elections also tells us how students feel about the union more generally, as well as a variety of other issues.

SU Representation For the third year in a row, the poll included a question about how well students feel TCDSU represents them. Students were asked if they agree or disagree with the statement “I feel well represented by the SU”, a slight reformulation of the question from previous years. 34.3% of respondents said they agree or strongly agree with the statement, 37.8% said they disagree or strongly disagree and 27.9% neither agreed nor disagreed. Feelings were stronger on the negative side, with 12.4% strongly disagreeing compared to 4.1% strongly agreeing.

Compared to the representation question in last year’s poll, which showed 12.3% for the most positive answer and 6.6% for the most negative answer, this appears to indicate growing discontent with the SU; however, it’s worth noting that when this question was previously asked, the answers were more open to interpretation, so some or all of the difference may be explained by the change to the way the question is presented.

How well-represented students feel varies among demographics. This year, for the first time in the Trinity News poll, respondents were asked if they had ever held a position in TCDSU. Perhaps unsurprisingly, those who had held a position in the Union at some point were more likely to feel represented by it; 50.5% of respondents in that category agreed or strongly agreed with the statement, compared to 24.9% of those who had never been formally involved in TCDSU. Current and former SU representatives are more likely to have strong feelings about the organisation in general; just 16.47% chose the neutral “neither agree nor disagree” option, in contrast to 33.0% among students who haven’t held a role in TCDSU. Male, non-binary and gender-

fluid students are less likely to feel represented by the Union than female students, according to the Trinity News poll. 56% of non-binary and genderfluid poll respondents disagree or strongly disagree with the statement “I feel well represented by the SU”, compared to 43% of male respondents and 31% of female respondents. The poll results don’t show a significant variation between faculties on this question; however, it is worth noting that a poll about SU elections is more likely to attract respondents who already have some interest in the union, a factor which may skew the results in combination with the smaller sample sizes for STEM and Health Sciences (HS) students.

Exams Students were ambivalent about Trinity’s handling of exams this year; respondents were slightly more positive than negative, with 37.1% saying exam arrangements had been managed quite well or extremely well and 30.2% saying quite badly or extremely badly, but almost a third of students didn’t feel strongly one way or the other, saying exams had been handled neither well nor badly.

Left-leaning students were significantly more likely to be critical of Trinity’s performance on exams; just 21.92% thought exams were managed quite well or extremely well, in contrast to the 50.75% of centre-right voters who selected one of those options. Students are likely focused on the upcoming summer assessments rather than dwelling on last term’s exam period; nevertheless, it should be a relief for college to know that the lasting impression of the somewhat frought Michaelmas exam session was more positive than negative.

Direct action Also in this poll, students

were asked “Do you think TCDSU should be engaging in more or less direct action (i.e. protests, strikes, sit-ins) than it is currently?”. The majority of students were in favour of more direct action, at 63.2%, while 28.0% believe TCDSU should continue with the current amount and 8.8% want less.

Arts students appeared to have a slightly greater appetite for increased direct action compared with STEM and HS students, with the poll showing support for more direct action at 65.4% among AHSS students, 56.1% in STEM and 54.1% in HS. Science and Health Sciences students were slightly more likely to vote to continue with the current amount.

Centre-right students were the only group not to have a majority in support of increased direct action. A plurality of this group, 45.6%, expressed a preference for continuing with the current level of activity, while 36.8% voted for more and 17.7% voted for less.

Left-wing students were overwhelmingly in favour of more direct action at 87.7%. This is largely unsurprising, given that the aims the union is trying to achieve through direct action tend to align more with left-wing political goals.

What is perhaps surprising is that there is so much support for increased direct action when the number of students who actually engage with TCDSU-run protests and actions is relatively low. The support for this question may be less based in real enthusiasm for attending more protests and more an expression of frustration with the slow pace of much of SU politics. Alternatively, students might prefer if the SU engaged in different kinds of direct action to the ones it does currently; more detailed research would be necessary to say conclusively.

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Welfare & Equality Officer

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Voters who are more satisfied with the status quo are more likely to cast their vote for Morris

Staunton has strong lead, even as many voters are undecided The election is not a sure thing, but Morris has significant ground to make up David Wolfe Copyeditor

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ast year’s Sabbatical elections were the first since 2017 in which the welfare & equality race was contested by more than a single candidate. The continuation of this trend in 2022 highlights the increased emphasis the pandemic has put on welfare, equality, and wellbeing. This year’s candidates are vying to lead the recovery from a “collective trauma” while not leaving behind the accessibility and equality advantages that the pandemic saw introduced.

Trinity News’ polling data indicates that Chloe Staunton

possesses a comfortable lead over her opponent Cúnla Morris, although among an asyet undecided electorate. 68.2% of decided voters gave her their first preference, while Morris lags behind on 27.1%.

However, this represents just barely over half of students polled, with 47.4% remaining unsure of how they will cast their vote, one of the highest proportions of undecided voters in any sabbatical race this year. This leaves open a path for Morris to secure victory by winning over the undecided contingent, though without a major upset in the race this will be a challenging feat in the final days of campaigning. They would need to convince the staggering majority of that bloc of voters. The desire to reopen nominations (RON) is unlikely to play as significant a role in this race as in others, with only 4.6% intending to vote this way.

Staunton more than double’s Morris numbers among almost every voter group bar students from the faculty of Engineering, Mathematics and Science (EMS).

Here, the margin is much closer at 45.6% to Staunton’s 49.1%. It

is unclear what is driving this statistic, Morris themself being a student of Irish in the faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, but it emerges strikingly nonetheless among a reasonably large sample of 124 EMS students.

Male and female voters are

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In terms of relevant experience, Staunton likely had an edge from the outset

about equally likely to vote for Morris, though the same is not true of Staunton; she seeks a six point drop in support among men compared to women, with 8% of men preferring RON to either candidate. Among nonbinary/genderfluid students, Morris scores slightly better than elsewhere, though the appetite to reopen nominations among this cohort matches that of male voters.

A final result of note is a tendency of voters who are more satisfied with the status quo to cast their vote for Morris, while supporters of Staunton tended to be more ambivalent or slightly frustrated with College and the SU. Among voters who intend to vote for Morris, 43.7% feel represented by the SU, while 56.3% are either indifferent or disagree that the Union represents them.

Among Staunton’s voters this latter proportion is a much higher 62.8%, while those who do feel represented make up 37.2% of her support. This is slightly unexpected given that Staunton has said that she “couldn’t fault” previous welfare officers, and is very much a ynion “insider” herself. This result

also holds true for voters’ attitudes towards College, with Staunton leading among students who feel that exam provisions were handled poorly, while a higher proportion of those who felt that exams were managed “quite well” favour Morris. This may indicate that dissatisfied students feel that Staunton’s familiarity with the inner-workings of both organisations better positions her to make concrete change from the inside.

Indeed, in terms of relevant experience, Staunton likely had an edge from the outset. While Morris has long been engaged in student welfare advocacy, having been an ordinary committee member on the LGBT+ Rights Committee, the Disability Committee, and the Welfare Committee, as well as a class rep twice throughout their years in Trinity, Staunton’s broad CV is nonetheless the more extensive one. Within the Union she has sat on three committees this year alone, is the incumbent Disabilities Officer, and has been BESS class rep for two years.

Alongside her experience with S2S and the Inclusive Curriculum Project, this has likely made her a very credible candidate in the eyes of voters.

As in recent years, accessibility was a recurring theme in every race. At Equality Hustings, the candidates were grilled on their plans to make campus a more accessible place. Morris pointed out that as well as House Six, the GMB should also be made accessible, while a question posed

by Cumann Gaelach prompted discussion from both candidates on making Seomra na Gaeilge accessible to all. Both candidates gave clear and confident answers to accessibility questions, though Staunton’s ability to reference her casework as Disabilities Officer possibly gave her answers added credibility.

Morris potentially stood to

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gain from placing emphasis on the equality side of the role in their campaign, but failed to do so. As an advocate for the Irish language and member of the LGBT+ community, both very salient topics at Equality hustings, Morris arguably had the advantage over their opponent whose CV was rather more welfare-oriented.

Despite this, it was Staunton who stressed the importance of equality in tandem with welfare throughout her campaign, while the word “equality” was entirely absent from Morris’ campaign literature, a point which was picked up on at Equality Hustings. This has likely been a factor in Staunton’s significant lead, attracting voters for whom equality, inclusivity, and minority rights are a priority; in Staunton’s view, “it’s all fine and well caring, but if you’re not striving to be more equal, inclusive and diverse, you’re not going to get much done.”

In contrast to last year’s race, both candidates are students from Ireland. Staunton’s manifesto nonetheless maintained a commitment to lobby for fee certainty and fee reductions for international students, a key element of both candidates’ platforms in 2021, while Morris’ campaign has made no reference to such issues. In January, Trinity was named 12th most international university in the world, with international students making up around 28% of the student body. Morris’ failure to address the unique challenges which face international students has potentially given Staunton the edge

Trinity students’ overall political preferences remain skewed to the centreleft. Consistent with last year’s Trinity News poll, the Social Democrats are the most popular party by far among the College community. The overall results are markedly different to parties’ levels of support in the population at large, with the exception of Sinn Féin

among a sizable cohort of voters, who face costly and unpredictably fluctuating annual fees. As well as this, Morris’ keen emphasis on Irish language issues, although encouraged and welcomed by many, has the potential to be an unfamiliar issue to as many voters as it has attracted among Trinity’s diverse student population.

Recent events in College have brought increased focus on mental health supports and student counselling resources.

Over 1,700 students have signed

“

For her part, Staunton does not see increased funding being a realistic option for Student Counselling Services

a petition calling for increased funding for welfare services in Trinity, and attention has been drawn to the waiting times and backlogs on both union and college resources, particularly the student counselling service (SCS). If this is what students want, Morris potentially stands to gain. At Equality Hustings they reiterated their manifesto promise to “push for more funding in SCS.” Speaking to Trinity News Morris said: “Through acquiring more funding and improving the quality of therapy available, I think we will see a huge improvement in student mental health.”

The candidates diverge in their views on this point; for her part, Staunton does not see increased funding being a realistic option for SCS. Speaking to Trinity News before the campaign period, she said: “Unfortunately, if I could I would fund more counsellors, but I personally cannot. I think it’s important to kind of loop in with the service and work on that.”

Rather her manifesto recommends working with existing frameworks, “through creating practical and constructive campaigns and working closely with the counselling service.” Following the momentum generated by this petition, it remains to be seen whether voters will agree with Staunton’s assessment, or bank on Morris’ more optimistic ambitions.

A priority for many voters will be addressing sexual harassment and violence, which has become a topic of increased discussion in Ireland in recent months. Staunton has pointed to a need to improve

the reporting structures that are in place, so that students feel comfortable and are able to report incidents when they need to. She also plans to broaden and improve the consent training that is given to students to tackle the problem of rape and sexual assault. Morris’ manifesto does not make specific reference to such issues, but they have addressed them during their campaign. In an interview with Trinity News, Morris said: “It all comes down to education at the end of the day and I will heavily collaborate with the gender equality officer, the president and the Equality Committee to make sure that it is discussed on a union-wide level.” The poll, which puts Staunton 45 points ahead of Morris among female voters, may indicate that women prefer the concrete steps on this issue

outlined by the former, over just fostering discussion.

With almost half of voters as yet undecided, the race is far from over for Morris, though they have only until Thursday to convince the electorate that they are the right candidate for the role. Likewise, those who wish to see Staunton win the officership mustn’t get too comfortable with her lead and make sure to cast their vote. Last year’s ents race saw a surprise victory for Greg Arrowsmith despite polling having indicated a likely victory for his opponent Antonia Brady, so it is certainly all to play for. Both candidates will be pushing until the end to prove themselves as the ideal advocate for accessibility, inclusion, and equality, key themes of this year’s elections across the board.

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

News

Communications & Marketing Officer

Smirnova on track for straightforward win Polling at 92.7%, Julie Smirnova has little to worry about in the election this week Shannon Connolly Deputy Editor

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U N N I N G UNCONTESTED FOR THE ROLE of communications & marketing officer, Julie Smirnova received 92.7% of first preference votes in a poll conducted by Trinity News.

Uncontested candidates in Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) elections can usually expect to earn around 8590% of the vote on average, with the remainder voting to re-open nominations (RON) for the role.

With only 7.3% voting RON in the poll, Smirnova can expect a significant victory in the solo race.

Of the 574 responses received in the survey, 53.3% said they knew how they planned to vote in this category, while 38.3% said

they were completely undecided.

8.4% of respondents said that they did not plan to vote in the comms & marketing race at all.

Smirnova polled equally well among Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences students and Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics students at 91.2% and 91.8% respectively, well within the margin of error. The incumbent citizenship officer was notably more popular among female students polled, at 95.3%.

Male students approved of her at a rate of 88.1%.

Smirnova is a Senior Sophister politics and economics student from Naas, originally born in Koryazhma, Russia. An active member of the College community, both inside and outside the union, Smirnova currently serves as TCDSU’s Citizenship Officer, and Public Relations Officer of Trinity St Vincent de Paul (VDP).

As one of three uncontested races this year, communications and marketing has received significantly less attention than multiple-candidate elections.

Smirnova has consequently faced less scrutiny and questioning on policies in comparison to some other candidates. With Media and Halls Hustings being merged

due to the cancellation of some campaigning last week, candidates have faced fewer questions at this stage of the race when compared

“

As one of three uncontested races this year, comms and marketing has received significantly less attention than multiplecandidate elections

with most years. That being said, Smirnova has certainly presented herself as a candidate fit for the role.

She was pressed at Council Hustings on her plans to maintain social media engagement, to which she answered that Facebook was “dead”, and Instagram was “bigger and badder than ever”.

Smirnova claimed she wished to make better use of Instagram and Twitter, though arguably TCDSU’s presence on those platforms is already very strong, with a notable pivot away from Facebook in recent years. Smirnova did not outline further what plans she would implement for social media, other than “coordinating” communication across all platforms.

The citizenship officer has stated continuously throughout her campaign that she wishes to “build a stronger union by building community”, and how she hopes to make spaces for marginalised groups in that union. When questioned in Council Hustings

by QSoc on how she would have a positive impact if elected, she said she would aim to “make a space for [LGBTQ+ students]”, as “platforming different voices is the only way”. Smirnova also touched on possible social media takeovers by QSoc and the LGBT+ rights officer, but did not offer any additional information as to how she plans to implement or facilitate this.

She has also spoken throughout her campaign about issues of engagement within the union. In her interview with Trinity News, Smirnova acknowledged that the issue has been brought up “in every single comms officer election”, and is “constantly reiterated, but then every year [it] stays the same”.

She attributed the union’s focus on communication channels such as social media and their weekly email as “the main reason” for the issue not being rectified. “People aren’t really paying attention to those things, so you’re improving something that nobody is looking at,” Smirnova said.

Speaking about accessibility and transparency with Trinity News, Smirnova did outline several tactics for how she hopes to actualise these ideals. She cited information workshops, adding an accessibility tool to a streamlined TCDSU website, providing union publications in alternative formats, arranging sabbatical officer hours in locations with a lift, including “accessibility statements and clear descriptions to all SU events”, as well as adding “agendas and minutes to the [SU] newsletter”, while publishing summary infographics on social media.

At Council/Equality Hustings, a member of the International Students Committee questioned Smirnova on what considerations she was taking for those who speak English as a second language.

Drawing on her own experience as a bilingual person, speaking both

“

The citizenship officer has stated continuously throughout her campaign that she wishes to “build a stronger union by building community”, and how she hopes to make spaces for marginalised groups

Russian and English, Smirnova pledged to “take a step back” and “listen” to those who speak different languages and who are not native English speakers. In relation to inclusion, the Mature Students’ Society pressed candidates on how they would make College and events accessible to mature students, given “mature students are often forgotten”. Smirnova acknowledged that it’s important to have events that cater to mature students, and that these events are publicised and boosted on the union’s social media, which is something she would like to work on if elected.

In this uncontested race, barring some seismic change, Smirnova is all but certain to be elected as TCDSU’s next communications and marketing officer. Her campaign has demonstrated she is a strong candidate who understands what is required of her role and the SU in the incoming year. With inclusion and social media presence at the heart of her campaign, Smirnova is looking to increase engagement and accessibility throughout her term next year.

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

News

Entertainments Officer

Strong lead for Lynch over Nadia and Donnelly in the race for ents role Despite the largely similar manifestos and campaign promises of the three candidates, Lynch looks set to take the role Fionnán Uíbh Eachach Deputy Comment Editor

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N THIS YEAR’S RACE to be Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union’s (TCDSU) next Entertainments (Ents) Officer, students might have expected a high degree of variety in what is this year’s most-contested race. Yet throughout the past two weeks, its three candidates have shown themselves to be largely united in their emphasis on core issues of accessibility, safety and sustainability.

Given this, and the shortened campaign period last week and the postponing of Media Hustings,

it might have been expected that voters would be relatively undecided in such a busy race.

However, in Trinity News’ annual TCDSU sabbatical elections poll, Max Lynch has come out with a strong lead over the other two candidates. Of the 574 students polled by Trinity News, Lynch won the first preferences of 44.8% of decided voters. This places the Junior Sophister computer engineering student significantly ahead of Nadia’s 27.6% of first preferences and Ross Donnelly’s 24.2% share.

Lynch tops the poll in all faculties other than Health Sciences, where Donnelly leads at 46%. Lynch’s popularity is highest among male students at 50.7%, but dips to 43.8% and 9.1% among female and non-binary/ genderfluid students respectively.

Nadia’s popularity is higher among Arts and Humanities students than with any other faculty at 31.2% and she pulls in 20.1% of male voters, 27.8% of female voters and a high 63.6% of non-binary/genderfluid voters. Donnelly remains largely consistent across genders at 23.6% among men, 24.2% among women and 18.2% among non-binary/ genderfluid students.

When it comes to political affiliation, 51% of voters identifying as left wing (S-PBP) favour Nadia’s candidacy, with 29% preferring Lynch and only 12% opting for Donnelly. This is perhaps unsurprising – while all three candidates promised greater diversity in their ents committee at hustings, Nadia has pointed to her “strong stance” on human rights issues and called for greater TCDSU engagement with issues like Palestinian liberation and suppoprt for Syrian refugees.

Overall frontrunner Lynch has been more reserved and committed only to supporting issues with overwhelming support across campus.

Accordingly, Nadia’s popularity drops to 31% and 10.6% with centre-left (Greens/SD/Labour/ SF) and centre-right (FG/FF/ Aontú) voters respectively.

Lynch comes first with 43% of centre-left first preferences, while Donnelly and Lynch tie among centre-right voters, both at 43%.

Unsurprisingly, voters favouring Nadia tend to support more direct action by TCDSU more than those of Lynch and Donnelly, although a majority of each candidate’s voters hold this stance.

The vast majority of students polled were completely decided as to their preferred candidate, with only 29.3% undecided. Only 3.4% of decided voters favoured reopening nominations.

The Candidates With a clear, although not unbeatable, lead in Trinity News’ poll, Max Lynch has proven himself to be a strong candidate.

While more uncertainty might have been expected given the number of candidates competing to be the next ents officer, Lynch’s roles as captain of the Trinity Surf Club and a member of DUDJ may be serving him well in the race.

A “mental health advocate” and co-founder of sustainable clothing brand Mobius, Lynch stresses his experience “having organised countless large trips around Ireland and abroad” and the time-management skills he has learned from this. Unsurprisingly, he also stresses the importance of sustainability in his manifesto and promises to make this a key feature of his tenure.

Lynch has been largely consistent at hustings and has so far been the only ents candidate to organise an event as part of his

campaign – his collab event with DUDJ in support of Women’s Aid was however cancelled following the tragic death of Mark Melnychuk last week.

A former computer science class rep and self-described “underdog”, Nadia has pointed

“

When it comes to political affiliation, 51% of voters identifying as left wing favour Nadia’s candidacy

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

News

Entertainments Officer

“

When it comes to increasing accessibility in Ents, all candidates agree that venues chosen should be usable by all students to her uniqueness in the race as a “queer, POC female” who understands the financial struggles of students – “I rent myself, I know the struggles, I know how horrible it is to find a place”.

She points to her experience working with events promoter Bodytonic and hasn’t been afraid to showcase her ambitious plans for ents during the race – promising a range of large events from cultural festivals such as Holi, Eid and St. Patrick’s Day, to a drag competition involving sports captains, and a biweekly Sunday Boot Sale for secondhand clothing. She has also pointed to her experience within the SU as a class Rep – unique in this race.

However, she has struggled at times explaining how she would finance such an ambitious set of projects, stating at Equality Hustings that “Ents has a huge budget” and telling Trinity News that concerning her plan to have buses back to Halls after events, “I would need to discuss this with the JCR”. Her campaign also suffered a stumble when she was hit with a major strike for campaigning outside of allotted hours on the first day of campaigning. Neither Lynch nor Donnelly have been awarded strikes as of yet.

For his part, Ross Donnelly, a Junior Sophister computer science and business student and incumbent ents officer for Trinity Sailing, has led a solid and informed campaign. At Equality Hustings, he was the only candidate aware in advance of the Cumann Gaelach’s complaint that some events were organised without consultation or notice this year and was able to add that DU Food and Drink had made similar complaints about Ents this year.

Donnelly has focused on lowering event costs and improving engagement with societies throughout his campaign and has discussed a “live calendar model” that could improve

communication between students and the Ents Committee “so that smaller, unique events don’t get swept under the rug”.

Core Issues: Accessibility, Safety, Sustainability Although this year’s ents race offers students a greater choice of candidates than any other, all three are largely united on the importance of improving accessibility, safety and sustainability at Ents-organised events.

When it comes to increasing accessibility in Ents, all candidates agree that venues chosen should be usable by all students. In last week’s Equality Hustings, Lynch highlighted that he has already been in contact with LGBT+ Rights Officer Jenny Maguire on this point and promised that “the venues we use don’t attack [LGBTQ+] people or make them feel uncomfortable”.

He also claimed to have been in contact with the Disability Service over the prospect of holding a silent disco. Donnelly, for his part, returned to a point he had emphasised in his interview with Trinity News, arguing that more events on campus would help to lower costs – “the Pav is only scratching the surface”. Yet Nadia has perhaps offered the most ambitious and far-reaching approach of the three candidates to improving accessibility and inclusivity – stressing her personal experience as “an ethnic minority” and committing to providing “free earplugs for people who are sensitive to hearing” at the SU in her interview with Trinity News.

Lynch has come out strongly in favour of cheaper Ents events generally, while Nadia, more specifically, proposed at Equality Hustings a plan that would see students in receipt of SUSI or part of the DARE or HEAR schemes benefit from subsidised prices to her events. For Donnelly, holding more events on campus would be a key part of lowering ticket costs and improving transport access for students.

Donnelly’s claim at Equality Hustings that “access is key in keeping diversity” is largely representative of the race as whole – all candidates have committed to forming a more diverse Ents Committee and listening to it.

Neither is there any real disagreement when it comes to the candidates’ approaches to ensuring the safety of all students at their events. Ideas range from Lynch’s free information sessions in Freshers’ Week, to Nadia’s intention to introduce more female bouncers, and Donnelly’s desire to see safe spaces within event venues for those in need of them. Both Lynch and Nadia have discussed their intention to introduce first aid and bystander training to improve safety – although Nadia stresses that this would be open to more than just the Ents committee. Again, all candidates agree on the importance of accessible transport options when

it comes to safety, although Nadia and Donnelly have perhaps been clearer on how they might achieve this – Nadia suggesting Halls buses costing “no more than a bus ticket” funded through her planned Sunday Fashion Boot Sales, while Donnelly suggests including bus costs in events’ ticketing charge.

Given his background as a cofounder of Mobius, Lynch might be seen as having an edge when it comes to pushing sustainability in the role and it is particularly prominent in his manifesto.

Nonetheless, all candidates have made building a sustainable Ents a key promise in their respective campaigns.

Freshers’ Week Throughout the race, what is perhaps most notable is the absence of Covid-19 as a talking point. This stands in stark contrast to last year’s Ents race, in which candidates Greg Arrowsmith and Antonia Brady both discussed the prospect of online events – this year’s candidates all seem confident that Covid-19 restrictions will not be a defining issue during their tenure.

Accordingly, the prospect of College’s first fully in-person Freshers’ Week since 2019 has loomed large during the race.

Candidates have however differed in their approach to the period that will likely set the tone of their tenure as ents officer.

For his part, Lynch has suggested hosting a single “Freshers’ Ball” along with the normal range of events “because Freshers’ Week is so packed full of events … I think we need one unifying event”. He has also repeatedly stressed the importance of charity events beyond RAG Week to his campaign at hustings and in his manifesto – pointing to the housing crisis as an example of the type of target such charity action would have.

Nadia has complimented the

“

Neither is there any real disagreement when it comes to the candidates’ approaches to ensuring the safety of all students

success of last year’s Freshers’ Week organised by incumbent Ents Officer Greg Arrowsmith and stressed that “I respect that not everyone drinks”. In line with this, she has suggested hosting film screenings and a “concert day, like a little mini festival” for Freshers’ Week.

At Equality Hustings, this has proven to be a point of some disagreement between Nadia and Donnelly, with Donnelly responding to her suggestion that more mature students might not want to “go out drinking” by emphasising that no one is ever too old for a night out. Both Nadia and Donnelly have emphasised the importance of transport for safety during this week in particular, however.

Trinity Ball at last When it comes to the return of Trinity Ball to the College social calendar, all three candidates have recognised the importance of the event for students who have missed out during the pandemic.

Donnelly has repeatedly drawn attention to his intention to showcase Irish and local talent at what is Europe’s largest private party – both to aid the local music industry and to keep costs low.

Both Lynch and Nadia have pointed instead to the importance of accessibility and sustainability at the event, with Lynch suggesting “recharge tents” and Nadia arguing for a cash-free Ball. Nadia has perhaps provided the most detail when it comes to the close-of-year event and has repeatedly stressed

“

Both Nadia and Donnelly have emphasised the importance of transport for safety during Freshers’ Week in particular her intention to introduce safe drug testing, blankets and better access to water.

Despite the relative similarity between the candidates (both in academic background and campaign promises), Lynch’s experience in society life with DUDJ and sustainability credentials with Mobius looks likely to secure his position over an ambitious Nadia and communication-focused Donnelly. This is by no means certain however. With a week of campaigning left to go, this is still a race to play for.

Other findings from the poll: • Voters for Fullam are somewhat less likely to vote all the way down the ballot than voters for Kelly • Most people who voted RON in the welfare race voted RON in every race • In the president and ents races, here’s a correlation between voting for Fullam and Nadia, and between voting for Kelly and Lynch • Maguire voters are more likely to also be Kelly voters than Fullam voters

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

News

University Times Editor

Maguire faces uphill battle in final days of election The deputy editor is currently trailing, as unanswered questions hang over her campaign Jack Kennedy Editor

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RINITY NEWS’ ELECTION POLL suggests that the University Times (UT) editor race this year could be on track for an upset.

Incumbent deputy editor Mairead Maguire polled at 37.3%, while reopen nominations (RON) came in at 62.7%.

If the result is borne out, it would be notable in two ways. It would be the first win for RON in any Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) election in at least 10 years, and it would be the first time a deputy editor of UT was not elected as editor since the position was separated from the communications and marketing role and made into a sabbatical officership.

The race had the second-lowest proportion of undecided voters of any in the poll, at 25.2%. Such a

high level of certainty is especially unusual for an uncontested race.

Usually, such elections have higher proportions of undecided voters in election polls, and the other two this year reflect this; 43.0% of those polled were undecided in the education race, and 42.1% in the communications and marketing election.

Maguire’s popularity is relatively consistent across Trinity’s faculties, with no statistically significant differences. She is somewhat more popular among female students, at 42.3% compared to 33.6% of male students. There is a general political trend; she is least popular among students expressing left wing political preferences, polling at 25.9% among them; has middling popularity among centre-left voting students, at 36.6%; and she is most popular among those with centre-right preferences, at 41.7%.

The centre-left grouping makes up by far the largest bloc among poll respondents.

All these polling numbers come with some caveats. Even perfectly representative polling is just a snapshot of how an electorate feels at a given moment in time; there are still several days left in the campaign, and swings from the poll results towards either Maguire or RON could still occur.

Also, though every effort has been made to make Trinity News’ poll as representative as possible, it

isn’t a perfect sample of voters.

For example, particularly in this race, participants in the Trinity News poll are comparatively more likely to have read articles in which allegations were made against Maguire of leaking confidential information about sources. The overall electorate may be less aware of or less interested in these issues.

Those issues have hung over the campaign, however. Maguire has run on a solid platform,

“

The race had the secondlowest proportion of undecided voters of any in the poll, at 25.2%

pledging to work to build a sense of community within UT, make the paper more accessible to students from various minority backgrounds, and get more parttime staff writers involved. But perhaps by making one of the focal points of her campaign “accountability”, the deputy editor has only drawn more attention to the allegations of wrongdoing against her.

Maguire’s consistent response has been moved to describe these allegations as “false and defamatory”. But faced with accounts from several students she interviewed, detailing how information they say they only told her was repeated back to them via third parties (sometimes verbatim as they provided it to her), this response has fallen somewhat flat. She has not gone into any more detail about why people— whose stories of harassment she was so grateful to tell back in September—might want to conspire against and defame her, and the poll numbers seem to indicate that many voters find these curt dismissals insufficient.

Nor did she address the wider issue, that a great number of the people she interviewed for that article reported being unhappy with how it was framed and how the sensitive issue was handled.

Other issues with accountability also cropped up during hustings.

Asked by LGBT+ Rights Officer Jenny Maguire why she had not responded to messages concerning alleged transphobia within the newspaper, the deputy editor said she “doesn’t necessarily feel obligated” to reply to messages on her personal social media, but that “things would be different” if she were elected editor. Again, this response came off as lacking; the LGBTRO had actually noted that the deputy editor later used exactly the same Instagram chat to ask about issues pertaining to the former’s role, so the claim that personal social media is an inappropriate platform didn’t seem consistent. Plus, the candidate’s answer focused exclusively on dismissing the notion that she personally might have done something wrong; she did not even acknowledge the potential transphobia that the LGBTRO had been trying to discuss originally, let alone seem eager to address it.

This response was also odd in the context of Maguire’s pledge to cease printing UT with the Irish Times, out of a stated desire to make the paper more welcoming to trans students. This is a good promise, and Trinity News’ editorial line on this issue is well-known, but voters might reasonably ask why Maguire was so dismissive to the LGBTRO if trans inclusion is something she wishes to champion. It’s also worth asking why this has to be an election promise; UT has been committed to ceasing printing with the Irish Times since before Maguire became deputy editor In November. If it’s something she believes she can achieve, she is currently second-in-command, and the paper is institutionally in favour of it, why not just do it now?

The campaign is not over, and Maguire may yet be able to win.

Such a turnaround would not be unprecedented either. Trinity News’ polling in 2020 favoured then-Radius Editor Susie Crawford for UT editor by 10 points, but Cormac Watson ultimately led Crawford by four points in first preference votes. Last year, Greg Arrowsmith polled more than 30 points below Antonia Brady for ents officer, but a herculean effort in the last days of the campaign saw Arrowsmith eke out a close win which surprised even him.

Given Maguire’s general level of experience and straight-downthe-middle campaign, it’s hard to interpret the poll results as being caused by anything except the allegations made against her. In order to turn the election around, it seems likely she will need to address these allegations before voting begins. However, it will be hard to revisit and deal with these issues, when both Maguire and UT editorial staff have been so critical of the allegations from the offset. How can they be credibly addressed after labelling them “wholly false and defamatory”?

The final days of the campaign will be all-important for the UT editor race.

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

News >> Continued from front page

Member of College Board charged with murder

Petition circulated calling on College to fund student supports

As of Saturday, over Dr Diarmuid Rossa 1700 people had signed Phelan is a fellow of Trinity and a Bella Salerno professor of law Deputy News Editor Shannon Connolly, Jack Kennedy Deputy Editor, Editor

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RINITY ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR Dr Diarmuid Rossa Phelan was charged with murder, late last Thursday (February 24).

Phelan had been arrested and questioned by Gardaí after a man was fatally shot in Tallaght on Tuesday February 22. His name was not initially released, but the Irish Independent reported that the suspect was a “well-known legal professional”. On Thursday (February 24), the Irish Sun reported that the man in custody was Phelan.

Phelan (53) is a Fellow of Trinity and a member of the College Board. He is also a fellow of the European Law Institute.

College has declined to comment on the issue.

Phelan remains in custody. A detective told Tallaght District Court on Friday that Phelan “made no reply” when presented with the charges. His solicitor asked for the case to be adjourned until tomorrow (March 2) but at the request of Gardaí, Judge Patricia McNamara extended the adjournment until Friday (March 4).

The case will be heard at Cloverhill District Court, where Phelan will appear via video link.

An altercation occurred on farmland near Tallaght village on February 22, during which a 36 year old man named Keith Conlon was shot in the head. Conlon was admitted to hospital, and passed away on Thursday.

The Irish Examiner reports that “it is thought” that Conlon and several friends may have accidentally trespassed on private land while out walking, at which point they were “confronted by a lone man”. During the altercation, before Conlon was injured, a dog was also shot. Gardaí recovered a legally-owned handgun from the scene of the shooting.

On Thursday, the head of the School of Law Dr Caoimhín Mac Maolain, emailed students in the school pertaining to “an allegation against a member of staff ”.

While the email explained they “cannot comment on an ongoing investigation”, they urged students to reach out to Student Counselling Services if they needed to talk to someone.

S

TUDENTS HAVE CIRCULATED A PETITION appealing for College to increase funding for welfare and mental health services. As of Saturday (February 26), over 1700 people had signed the petition.

According to the petition, “some light has been shone on problems associated with [College]’s welfare services” following the death of a student in the Library this week.

The petition lists a “huge backlog of emails from students seeking counselling and waiting lists, some exceeding 4 months” as an example.

“This is a funding problem and we are calling for signatures to de-

mand an increase in the university’s funding for mental health services.”

“No one would expect students to cope with physical pain for months without treatment, and the same should go for mental health”, it continued.

The anonymous group asks students to “please share your experiences with [College] welfare services to welfarepetition@gmail. com” if they “are comfortable doing so”.

Following the passing of the medical student on Wednesday evening, Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) posted a range of mental health supports that are available to students on their social media accounts.

A comment left under the post, calling out issues with accessibility with the student counselling services and the union’s welfare office’s slow email response time, gained over 450 likes.

It said: “Welfare needs to start responding to emails and student counselling needs to be more accessible with shorter wait times, the current wait time is not ok”.

Speaking to Trinity News, the group behind the petition said they have asked students to share their experiences with the welfare services provided so that they can “compile some of these stories and send them forward [with the petition] to appeal for more concentrated funding for Trinity welfare services”.

“In the wake of what happened on Wednesday evening, we know that many people will have been directly or indirectly affected by this. The public nature of what happened will be very triggering for some people and we believe it is time for Trinity to finally recognise the shortcomings of their welfare services.”

They added that while they “recognise that funding is limited, mental health services should be made a priority”.

According to the group “students who have particularly pertinent reasons for applying for counselling (such as post-traumatic stress and double bereavements) are not being accelerated through the waiting list and after weeks of waiting, are being told they are still

behind 100 people”.

“People have reported that their counselling sessions have felt very rushed and sometimes even cut short by the counsellor due to other sessions/ meetings”, they continued.

“The consequences of being made to feel that one’s problems aren’t really being listened to are very grave for those already in a vulnerable state.”

“We hope our petition will encourage Trinity to address these issues and be more proactive so as to improve the quality and availability of welfare support for students”, they concluded.

If you have been affected by recent events in Trinity, the following supports are available: • TCDSU Welfare Officer – welfare@tcdsu.ie • Student Counselling Service – student-counselling@tcd.ie • Niteline (9pm-2:30am) – niteline.ie / 1800 793 793 • Crisis Text Line – 50808 • Samaritans – 116123

Analysis: Backlog in College mental health services highlighted last week Jamie Cox

News Analysis Editor

I

ssues with Trinity counselling services were brought into focus this week, with large wait times for students to avail of services, sometimes exceeding four months.

The discourse evolved out of the tragedy last week, where a Trinity medical student passed away in the Library. College recommended counselling services to students who may have been struggling following the tragedy.

This frustration at the lack of response from the counselling service has led to the circulation of a petition, calling for the increase of funding for mental health services in College, which has received over 1,600 signatures. The petition states that following the events of last week “some light has been shone on problems associated with [College]’s welfare services”.

This backlog may be due to the

lack of funding welfare support Trinity receives. Trinity Counselling is a free service and as such, the number of students who are struggling and require services creates extensive waiting lists.

The counselling service was put under significant strain throughout the pandemic, at one stage receiving over 600 enquiries in a three week period. Over the last two years, the need for student counselling may have been unprecedented, however, there is still a lack of funding for the service.

The group behind the petition has highlighted further issues within the service, as students who do manage to secure meetings often find them cut short due to the pressure for counsellors to attend other students.

They have said that “people have reported that their counselling sessions have felt very rushed

and sometimes even cut short by the counsellor due to other sessions/ meetings”.

“

No blame has been directed at the counselling service itself

Continuing, they said: “The consequences of being made to feel that one’s problems aren’t really being listened to are very grave for those already in a vulnerable state.”

The events of last week have allowed for increased conversation surrounding this issue, with many students being invited to share stories regarding their experiences of mental health services in Trinity.

The petition is looking to “compile some of these stories and send them forward [with the petition] to appeal for more concentrated funding for Trinity welfare services”. As a result, conversation surrounding this issue has the potential to invite improvements to the services so many students currently find lacking.

No blame has been directed at the counselling service itself from the organisers of the petition, which is operating within its means in a system of limited funding. However, the petition has emphasised that further priority must be given to welfare services, in order to accommodate students.

Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) held a vigil outside the Berkeley Library on Friday evening to honour the student who passed away.

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TCDSU holds vigil in memory of medical student The union organised the event last Friday to honour the life of Mark Melnychuk Shannon Connolly Deputy Editor

T

RINITY COLLEGE DUBLIN STUDENTS’ UNION (TCDSU) held a vigil on Friday evening (February 25) to honour a Trinity student who

died last week.

Announcing the vigil on social media, the union said: “We’d like to invite the college community to attend a vigil this evening to honour the life of Trinity student Mark Melnychuk.”

“Our thoughts are with his family, loved ones and classmates at this time,” the post continued.

The vigil was held at 6pm, at the Berkeley Library. The medicine student passed away on Wednesday evening (February 23) in an incident in the Ussher Library. His body was discovered at approximately 8:50pm.

A cause of death has not been announced but Gardaí, who attended the Library on Wednesday, said they believed there was “no suspicious

PHOTOS BY ISOBEL DUFFY FOR TRINITY NEWS

element” to Melnychuk’s death.

A postmortem examination is due to be carried out by the state pathologist.

In-person campaigning for TCDSU sabbatical elections was suspended on February 24 and 25 as a mark of respect, with online campaigning suspended on February 24. Media Hustings, which was due to take place on Thursday evening, was postponed.

In an email to students and staff on Thursday, Senior Tutor Professor Gerry Whyte urged the College community to reach out if they are experiencing difficulties following the news.

Professor Whyte also extended College’s “deepest sympathies” to friends and family of Melnychuk.

No formal protocol in place on student-staff relationships According to an FOIA disclosure, Trinity has no policies in place limiting sexual or romantic relationships between lecturers and students Shannon Connolly Deputy Editor This article contains discussion of sexual assualt and harassment.

T

RINITY HAS NO FORMAL PROTOCOLS or procedures governing staff entering romantic or sexual relationships with students, information given to Trinity News under the Freedom of Information Act 2014 has revealed.

There is no specific regulation in place, but “should a complaint be made, then it will be investigated under HR procedures”.

Both University College Dublin (UCD) and Maynooth University have policies governing such relationships. UCD’s policy states that “employees are strongly advised not to enter into a personal or intimate relationship with a student for whom they have a professional relationship. It can involve serious risks, and may lead to difficulties due to the unequal power of the parties involved.”

Maynooth’s policy says that “for a member of staff to embark on a sexual/intimate personal relationship with a student will always involve serious risks and may lead to serious difficulties which have their roots in the unequal power of the parties concerned.”

Both policies oblige staff to immediately declare to the university if such a relationship develops, after which steps are meant to be taken to minimise professional contact between the staff member and student in question.

Several UK universities, including University College London, the University of Greenwich, and the University of Roehampton, prohibit the establishment of such relationships outright.

Speaking to the Guardian in 2020, Rachel Fenton, a lecturer at the University of Exeter who reviews policies in this area, believes that such relationships should not be allowed. “These may contain such an abuse of power that consent isn’t really there,” she said.

Policies should “send a really clear symbolic and loudly-publicised message that such rela-

tionships are prohibited, so they are not normalised and not condoned.”

Last month, Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science launched the findings of national student surveys of student and staff experiences of sexual violence and harassment in higher level institutions.

The findings showed that approximately four in ten students thought that sexual violence and harassment were a problem in their higher education institution, with almost one third of staff members agreeing that their higher education institution is proactive in addressing sexual harassment and assault of thier campuses. A large percentage of staff members, typically a third or more, responded to this question by selecting “neutral” or “don’t know”.

According to the survey findings, approximately one fifth of staff were in agreement that there would be a negative response from the higher education institution (HEI) to a person who reported sexual violence and harassment, or that there would be “retaliation from the alleged offender or their friends”. Depending on the statement, approximately one third of survey participants chose the “Neutral” or “Don’t know” response.

According to the report, a majority of students said they had experienced sexism and sexist hostility. 67% reported this happening at least once, 63% reported offensive remarks, and 66% reported being put down or condescended to because of their gender.

54% of students said they had experienced sexual harassment, such as repeatedly being told offensive sexual stories or jokes, and over half experienced unwelcome attempts at being drawn into a discussion of sexual matters, or offensive remarks about appearance, body or sexual activities.

While 72% of university staff reported feeling safe from sexual harassment on campus, a quarter had also faced unwanted sexual comments. 81% of staff respondents agreed that they felt safe from sexual violence at their HEI. Over 80% of staff members agreed that they would be willing to complete bystander intervention training and consent awareness (76%), if such training was made available by their HEI. According to the Irish Examiner, there have been 75 reports of sexual harassment in colleges and universities between 2015-2020, with ten students and staff members being fined, suspended or expelled from HEIs following sexual harassment allegations over the last five years.

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PHOTOS BY ISOBEL DUFFY FOR TRINITY NEWS

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Students join protest against Russian invasion of Ukraine Hundreds of people attended the demonstration outside the Russian embassy in Rathmines Bella Salerno Deputy News Editor

O

N FRIDAY (FEBRUARY 25), Trinity students joined a protest against the Russian invasion of Ukraine, expressing solidarity with the people of the country. Hundreds of people attended the demonstration outside the Russian embassy in Rathmines.

Trinity’s Eastern European Society (EES) and Russian Society, in conjunction with Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) asked students to attend and “show solidarity with Ukrainian civilians and protest against WAR!”.

“You don’t have to be Ukrainian or even interested in politics - all you have to be is against war in the 21st century,” they added.

On social media, the EES wrote that they are calling for “Russia to cease [their] invasion of Ukraine, Ireland to recognise that neutrality is not an option, [and] spreading awareness” of the war.

TCDSU expressed their support of the protest on social media, “calling on students to join us and protest against the war in Ukraine”.

Speaking to Trinity News before the protest, TCDSU President Leah Keogh said: “TCDSU, are collaborating with Trinity’s Eastern European and Russian Society to stand in solidarity with all af-

“

It’s a cause close to my heart, I have family who live in western Ukraine and I’m terrified for them

fected by the current crisis in the Ukraine”.

She encouraged students to “join us at the Russian Embassy at 2pm to show your support”.

Speaking to Trinity News before the protest, the Chairperson of EES Ana Stinca said the society “have high hopes for today’s protest and especially after the disaster that we have faced yesterday”.

“EES together with TCDSU is standing in solidarity with the people of Ukraine whose life became a nightmare.”

“While most people feel relatively safe in Ireland, it was heartbreaking to watch them call their relatives and friends asking “Як Ти?” (How are you?) and hoping that the other person on the line is alive”: she continued.

On Thursday, the EEC organised a protest outside the Dáil where students stood with Ukrainian citizens “for 5 hours ...and saw the anguish on their faces while obsessively calling and refreshing the news”.

“For most students, that was the main reason to mobilise again today and show our support in numbers,” she added.

“We just want to show that we care for the ordinary Ukrainians who are suffering the direct consequences of this war.”

“Their suffering is our suffering as the results of war will indiscriminately affect us all whether you are from Eastern Europe or Ireland,” she concluded.

Speaking to Trinity News, Eugenia Hanniffy, chair of TCD Russian Society, said the group had joined the protest “to express solidarity with our fellow students who are impacted by the war in Ukraine.”

“Students who are Ukrainian nationals or have Ukrainian roots make up a significant amount of our membership. They attend our events, support our society and are part of our small, tight-knit community. To stand on the sidelines, be silent and not get involved would go against this feeling of community and friendship.”

“We are not a political society, however, that does not mean we condone government actions that affect the welfare and safety of innocent people,” Hanniffy continued.

“I am personally in touch with chairs of Russian societies from the UK, and their biggest concern is scrutiny from students towards Russian nationals and their societies. They claim to receive snide remarks and unpleasant comments online and in person. So far, we are trying to reach out to students to provide support and make sure they are not subject to bullying based on their nationality or personal opinions.”

“We urge the student body to be

“

We are trying to reach out to students to provide support and make sure they are not subject to bullying based on their nationality respectful, listen to students affected by this issue, and withhold any negative comments. They do nothing in this situation. This issue is much bigger than our differences,” Hanniffy concluded.

The protest was also attended by the Union of Students in Ireland (USI), as well as Dublin City University Students’ Union (DCUSU), University College Dublin Students’ Union (UCDSU) and students from the National College of Art and Design (NCAD).

Speaking to Trinity News at the protest, an NCAD student said they came to show their support because the cause is “important to stand up for”, something they “feel passionate about” as they would “feel helpless not doing anything”.

“I’ve been following the news and it’s been a very weird few days” they added.

A Trinity student said he came to the protest “to stand in solidarity with Ukrainian students across the world” and “show [Ireland’s] support from our little corner of it”.

“It’s a cause close to my heart, I have family who live in western Ukraine and I’m terrified for them”, he said.

DCUSU Vice President for Community and Citizenship Ross Boyd said the union is at the protest “to show solidarity for our Ukrainian students with other students’ unions such as TCDSU, especially for those most affected and have to hear about the tragedies happening in Ukraine”.

“It’s very much a humanitarian crisis, so it’s important that we take a stand on this and ensure that all voices are heard, for all the Ukrainian people”, he added.

USI Deputy President and Vice President for Academic Affairs Megan O’Connor said the USI are

currently working with the Higher Education Authority (HEA) “to identify students from Ireland who are currently abroad and students from Ukraine who are studying here at the minute who are affected by this”.

“We’re in touch with the Department of Justice in relation to the visa requirement being waived for Ukrainian citizens but we also need to ensure that those who are undocumented have the same access.”

“We’re also very cognisant of the fact that current assistance for provision for people seeking asylum in Ireland include that of direct provision which we are completely against so we are inclined to act with the Minister for Justice and the Department of Higher Education on that”: she continued.

O’Connor added that the USI “are working in collaboration with the Global Students Forum and the European Students’ Union in supporting the Ukrainian Association of Students and ensuring that they are supported at a European and global level”.

On Thursday, news broke of a large-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. Missile and air strikes were launched on Ukrainian cities and military bases, resulting in the loss of over 137 Ukrainian lives, with hundreds more wounded.

Thousands of Ukrainian civilians have left the country, and as many as 100,000 people have been internally displaced after fleeing their homes, the United Nations Refugee Agency has said.

Thousands of Russian citizens have attended anti-war protests across 53 cities in Russia, with at least 1728 people being detained by the state.

“

Most people feel relatively safe in Ireland, it was heartbreaking to watch them call their relatives and friends asking “Як Ти?” (How are you?)

DCU cancels Royal Moscow Ballet performance Sarah Emerson Deputy News Editor

D

UBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY (DCU) has cancelled a Royal Moscow Ballet performance of Swan

Lake.

On Friday (February 25), DCU announced that the ballet, due to take place that night in The Helix, DCU’s theatre venue, had been cancelled. The Royal Moscow Ballet has toured Ireland annually for over 10 years.

In a statement, a DCU spokesperson noted that the company is made up of a diverse cast and crew, including Russians, Ukrainians, Belarussians, Uzbeks, Japanese, Irish and Polish who have travelled and worked together for years.

The statement continued: “However, as a result of the truly shocking events that are unfolding in Ukraine, is it crucial that Dublin City University and all civilised countries takes all practical steps to stand in solidarity with the people of Ukraine, and send an unambiguous message to the Russian Government that their deplorable actions have consequences that will have impact across political, economic, sporting and cultural spheres at all levels.”

The Helix said that customers with tickets for Swan Lake would be issued refunds “as soon as possible”.

In response to the decision, the Royal Moscow Ballet issued its own statement in which it said it was in no way affiliated with or funded by the Russian government.

“The Royal Moscow Ballet is a multi-national touring ballet company who have been coming to Ireland annually for over 10 years now and always look forward to their annual tour of Ireland,” a spokesperson for the troupe said.

“We are young artists who just want to perform the art form we love and have done since childhood and bear no political leanings whatsoever and remain united as a group and as friends and wish only to spread the joy of our art form and culture.”

“We don’t carry any political message on this tour. We simply dance for peace,” the statement concluded.

Members of the ballet group also released a video on Friday in which they expressed concern for their friends and loved ones caught in the warzone.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine began on Thursday (February 24) as ground troops advanced across the country and cities were bombarded with airstrikes and missiles, after months of military build-up along Ukraine’s border.

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UT deputy editor accused of leaking anonymous sources’ names Students who contributed to an article about harassment in College societies said their stories were “treated like bits of gossip” Shannon Connolly Deputy Editor

F

OLLOWING THE PUBLICATION OF AN ARTICLE by the University Times (UT) in September 2021, several students have alleged that confidential testimony they gave to one of the paper’s journalists was leaked.

On 7 September 2021, UT published an article about a culture of harassment and bullying within Trinity’s two debating societies, the College Historical Society (the Hist) and the University Philosophical Society (The Phil).

The article was entitled “Phil, Hist Accused of Perpetuating Culture of Harassment and Bullying”, and contained anonymous accounts from victims who had experienced harassment within these societies. The article, written by current Deputy Editor Mairead Maguire, detailed how some senior members of the societies had used their position to make sexual advances towards first year students in these societies.

The article emphasised how many of the victims who spoke to UT had stressed their need for anonymity, for fear that identification of themselves or their abusers would lead to further harassment and bullying.

In November of last year, some of those interviewed became aware of allegations that their anonymity had not been upheld, and that individual stories had been passed around social circles on campus.

Over the last two weeks, a number of students involved spoke to Trinity News about their experience of the investigation.

One person spoke about the realisation that their anonymity had not been respected: “It came as quite a shock when I first heard about it, and then I discovered more of the extent of it. It felt like very personal stories of trauma were being treated like little titbits of gossip to be shared over drinks with friends, rather than treated with the gravity they deserved.”

The student continued: “Hearing stories back to me after they

had filtered through circles of friends was terrifying, because it was like a game of Chinese whispers, with names and events entirely mixed up.”

“It also seemed like these stories were more about improving [the deputy editor’s] standing as a journalist, but even that wouldn’t have been as awful if it wasn’t followed with such blatant disrespect by leaking the stories.”

One student explained the moment of realisation that her anonymous conversation with the deputy editor appeared to have been leaked. They said: “I remember when the penny dropped. Someone repeated back to me the actual text I sent [Maguire]. Exact wording. My stomach dropped. I instantly burst into tears.”

Another student recalled a similar situation. They said that they “started to hear from other victims that stories were being spread around at parties, in social situations”.

“They weren’t being spread by [the deputy editor], they were being spread by other people and being treated like bits of gossip,” they explained. “This wasn’t even an immediate connection; the names were told to me, who was at these parties, and I didn’t know any of them.”

One student detailed how the stories were allegedly leaked, explaining: “The most horrific thing I heard about everything being leaked was that it wasn’t even [the deputy editor] at a party, it was someone from her friend group telling these stories, and framing them as though they were gossip.”

“This is my life; and they were treating it like a party piece. They were swapping stories with people about abuse.”

The deputy editor was the only UT journalist who spoke with victims throughout the course of the investigation.

Students explained that they felt they had lost agency over their story once individual accounts had been allegedly leaked.

One student said: “To have one’s story leaked feels like the authority and power over your voice and your story has been removed.”

They continued: “Speaking out and seeing that story in an article, and knowing you’re letting others know they are not alone, feels like an empowering use of something terrible, and taking back control.

With the leaks, that authority felt as though it had been taken away again.”

Another student added: “I think as a victim, you don’t have the agency to tell your story anymore; you’re giving it to this person hoping that they’re going to service you, and there will be some sort of development of justice, and hearing that it was being spread around

“

This is my life; and they were treating it like a party piece. They were swapping stories with people about abuse like gossip was so unsettling. We didn’t know to what degree what had been leaked, what stories, who, where, but we all knew it was coming from [Maguire], because there was nobody else.”

“All these details were coming from one person,” they explained.

“It was traumatic.”

Trinity News was given access to some of the message exchanges which are alleged to have been leaked. Precise delineation of what information was on or off the record was not present. These leaked messages also contained lists of names of students connected to bullying and harassment within the two debating societies, both abusers and victims.

Despite this lack of clarification, information from these private messages were used in the UT article.

The story was published in September of last year, with students stating that the investigation began at least as early as May 2021. Some of those involved became aware of their anonymity allegedly being broken in November.

They added that this breach had a profound effect on them, with one saying: “I didn’t go to College in person for nearly two weeks; I couldn’t go in person because I was terrified that these people who had hurt me so badly would do something to me.”

“It was one of the most traumatic things that have ever happened to me, where I was alone at home trying to hold these pieces together and figure out when things were said, and when things were done,” the student continued. “This was less than two months from when the article came out.”

They continued: “Admittedly, I was suicidal. I was in such a state. I relived every single thing that first night; every single fear, every single story, things that I had pushed

down because I didn’t want to think about them, and all I could think about was ‘who knows about what happened’.”

Students emphasised how the promise of anonymity was stressed from the beginning of the University Times’ investigation.

“Everything was anonymous, that was the promised thing,” one student said. “That was the only reason why I continued with the project.”

Speaking about the actual conduct of the investigation, one student explained how the journalist would privately message them about how the article was coming along, followed by a question which would lead to a conversation between them.

“If you said anything, you felt as though you were saying it in confidence, because why would she tell anybody,” they explained.

“That’s the really scary part you know someone has your trauma written down somewhere with all these details that you haven’t admitted to anybody outside of your personal social circle,” they explained. “I still don’t know how far my story has gotten. I’ve been scared of coming forward again.”

Students who spoke with Trinity News explained how throughout the process of the investigation, they were asked for names of those who may have potentially been involved in harassment and bullying in College societies.

“I was asked for names of people who I was speaking to her about,” they explained. “These were individuals with whom I had negative experiences, particularly in my first two years of college.”

They continued: “However, at one stage she messaged me with a name, asking for more information, but I had none on this person, except that I knew who was involved in the story.”

“This person had not consented for their story to be shared or part of the article whatsoever, and I was rather annoyed that [the deputy editor] asked me out of the blue for information. It completely broke confidentiality, and I had a feeling that instances like this were more about who this information was about, rather than caring for victims.”

The allegations of leaked information have led to at least three complaints to the Press Ombudsman, two of which were seen by Trinity News, alongside submissions to the Junior Dean.

One student told of an incident in which anonymous information about a particular instance of harassment was allegedly leaked to an individual who had been involved in it. The student stated that they felt as though this was done with the intention of “help[ing] friends”.

Those interviewed expressed concern about the trajectory of the investigation, and the role the deputy editor played in their anonymous stories allegedly being leaked, with reference to the upcoming TCDSU sabbatical elections.

One student stated: “[The deputy editor] has already proven herself to have little respect for journalistic ethics, breaching confidentiality, and though that is never good, when it involves stories like this, it’s even worse.”

“These stories were personal ones of trauma, assault and harassment, and it shows a blatant disregard for the difficulty these students had in speaking up about them.”

The student continued: “For her to be editor would make UT an unsafe space for victims, make it harder for victims to speak up about their trauma. It is as though such personal stories were used for social gain and to further her career, and an individual like that, in my view, cannot be trusted in a position of power.”

“UT’s response to the leaking overall was pathetic. The fact she is still running for editor after this is symbolic of that - because I don’t think any newspaper with respect for the ethics of journalism would allow an individual who breached confidentiality like this to run for the highest position.”

Another student agreed, saying: “We were used for clicks, we were used for engagement with UT, we were the big Freshers’ Week story.”

“I think she hasn’t and won’t learn from this. This person shouldn’t be paid to deliver student journalism,” they said.

Maguire is running unopposed for the position of UT editor.

In a statement to Trinity News, Maguire said all the allegations were “wholly false and defamatory”.

She did say that she had “provided the Junior Dean with a screenshot of a Facebook Messen-

“

It was one of the most traumatic things that have ever happened to me

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News ger conversation that I had with a friend” as “this friend had made serious allegations and had repeatedly spread false rumours about another student, and the Junior Dean was investigating”.

“As is the case with many stories reported in student newspapers, this same friend who was spreading the false rumours was also a source for my article on the culture of bullying and harassment in the Phil and the Hist,” the statement continued.

Maguire concluded: “The Messenger screenshot was of a personal conversation with a friend and it was not a journalistic conversation”.

Subsequent complaints After publication of the initial allegations on February 14, more students approached Trinity News to express concern about the conduct of the same investigation.

One student, who was interviewed for the piece, explained how they became involved: “The way I got involved was someone in the year above me who had just spoken about their experience and other rumours they heard [Maguire] referenced me on. They knew I had this minimum weird, maximum bad experience with an older person in the [debating society] when I was a fresher. They prompted me to talk to [Maguire] because it seemed relevant, and that was fair enough.”

“When I was interviewed, one of the most unprofessional things was actually that [an individual]’s name was brought up to me, I was asked about stories about that,” they continued. “Mostly, I was just allowed to chat, and I don’t think the original conversation was that harmful. I walked away, I didn’t feel like I had catharsis or anything, but I was happy enough at that point in time to share what I had shared.”

The student expressed some concern for the clarity of the original interview, however. They said that it was explicit to them what was on or off the record throughout the course of their interview.

They said: “The original interview was kind of unclear at times; I wasn’t necessarily prompted or I wasn’t really clear what [Maguire] wanted out of my interview or what I was saying. I was trying to tell a story, that was true, about my experience.”

They added: “I was explicitly told that anything in the video-chat was on the record. I was given a pretty good idea of what was on the record. I didn’t have these casual interactions with [Maguire], and because we were not in contact through text [post interview], I don’t think there was any point where I was unsure what was on or off the record.”

They explained that following the interview, they had “no direct communication” with the deputy editor.

“If she wanted access to the messages, which she got, she spoke to the older student who originally referred me on, and that student would talk to me,” they explained.

“So there was no real direct com-

“

It became obvious who was going and speaking to [the deputy editor] based on the names on that list munication at this point.”

This student, however, expressed concern about the extent to which their statements had been used in the original article. They said: “I was under the impression the whole way after that they had other first year students, it was implicit to me that I wasn’t the only one, and I wasn’t going to be obviously identifiable; that I was going to be one of quite a lot of stories which were going to be showcased in this particular article. And I wasn’t. This isn’t true.”

“If you read this article, they say there are lots of first years who have suffered, and then they have one current first year,” they explained.

This student emphasised how they believe certain aspects of their story were taken out of context: “I think that while the quotes from me in the article are direct quotes, I feel as though there is an element to which they were taken out of context; or context is deliberately skewed.”

Another student who came forward to Trinity News also expressed concern over alleged missing context: “One of the flaws in Maguire’s article is that it really glosses over just how brutal women can be. Make it a problem where men are just abusive; that is not the case.”

“It’s not just ‘oh there’s older women in the [debating society] who stay silent; it’s not just ‘oh there’s younger women who are hurt and abused and there’s older men who prey on younger women’,” they explained.

Those interviewed expressed a serious concern relating to the alleged list supposedly kept and repeated by the deputy editor during confidential interviews.

The student explained how Maguire would ask about what they “knew” about a particular member in the society.

“It became really obvious she was keeping a list,” this student explained. “It became obvious who was going and speaking to Maguire based on the names on that list.”

Another student added: “About half-way through the investigation, I was hearing kind of dodgy stuff, a lot of the time from men who had been interviewed. I was

told that there seemed to be a list of men that she was taking names from and asking people about.”

“A friend of mine was interviewed to talk about the norms …

[They] stated that there were times [Maguire] was just like ‘have you heard anything about this person or that person’.”

They explained: “These weren’t, as far as I’m aware, women who spoke to her; these were men in the building. And not necessarily men who there had been stories about.”

A student interviewed said: “I know both the people who were interviewed for the original article; [Maguire] never once mentioned that both of those men were socially ostracised, one of those men being on committee when he did those things, was kicked out of the committee. That was never mentioned.”

Responding to these allegations in a statement to Trinity News, Maguire said: “The University Times’s article was the first to bring to light the culture of bullying and harassment in the Hist and the Phil. If the suggestion is that the article didn’t go far enough, then The University Times would be eager to investigate further.”

“Similarly, The University Times would welcome reporting from Trinity News on this issue or internal investigations by the societies in question about the culture of bullying and harassment, neither of which have happened to date,” the statement continued.

Maguire did not say if these were the opinions of the University Times editorial team in general. As she is running in sabbatical elections, Maguire is meant to have stepped back from her role as deputy editor.

“This is the first time anyone has questioned the veracity of what was reported in The University Times’s article, which was published in September,” Maguire added. “It is also worth noting that none of what was reported came as a surprise to anyone involved in the societies. In fact, the President of the Phil acknowledged on the record that there was an issue with misogyny in societies, including the Phil itself.”

“With respect to the allegations surrounding the nature of how some interviews were conducted, normal reporting processes are being presented as if they constitute journalistic misconduct.”

Maguire concluded: “This is wholly false and defamatory.”

Students continued to express concern over the nature of this alleged “list”. One student noted: “It was as if [the deputy editor] had opened up the list of rules about what you are and are not supposed to do during confidential investigations, and made a bingo card out of how many she could violate.”

Another student said: “It’s almost vile really; the fact that she had a list and she was running around asking people what have you heard about this person, because I think that’s the act of defamation here.”

They continued: “The GMB is very small; I can probably name

most of the people on that list just because I’ve talked to my friends, my friends have talked to me, I have received texts from [Maguire] about who is and isn’t on the list.” “[Maguire] should not have been going to interviews and asking people those names; but by the time I worked out what was going on, it was too late. The article was out,” they explained.

Another student interviewed added: “I don’t think it was necessary. I think an anonymous story means that she was never going to be able to do a ‘take down’ article of any one individual, legally it wasn’t possible.”

“I don’t think there was any merit in finding out [these names],” they continued. “At some point, it doesn’t really matter when you’re writing a story about a culture.”

“I don’t think it was necessary; and I think the prompting with men’s names was almost to try and get a certain narrative.”

Students who spoke to Trinity News over the last week emphasised how they believed the article was “written backwards”. One student said: “[It was] as if she started with an idea in her head about how sexual assualt and harassment works in the GMB and then chose stories that fit that narrative.”

“There were more stories than just the two mentioned in the article … it doesn’t start and end with that,” they explained.

They added: “Lots of stories were shared where I don’t think they were given the full nuance that they deserved.”

“I think [the deputy editor]’s bias really filtered into the article,” another student noted. “It was very one-dimensional.”

One student expressed concern as to how their story was handled: “I was not warned how my story would be used in the article, or of

“

It’s not just the parties, it’s the way the interviews progressed and no one was told what was on or off the record, the fact we were receiving texts from her as if she was one of our friends

the fact that it was then quoted by the Editorial Board after. The way they took about a third of the piece which was my story, which was not communicated with me that would be the case, was quite distressing at the time.”

“I was not given any notice about when this was going to be released,” they explained. “I had no confirmation from [Maguire]. I didn’t get warned.”

“It very much ruined that day when I was having it; because it is distressing having that kind of thing out there,” they added.

Students who spoke to Trinity News about these allegations expressed concern for the deputy editor’s campaign to become editor.

One said: “I have serious concerns about [Maguire] running unopposed for UT editor. I don’t think she should be UT editor; the first reason is, despite what the allegations say, I really am starting to question her intelligence and knowledge of journalistic procedure.”

They explained: “If you don’t know how to keep sources confidential, because it’s not just the parties, it’s the way the interviews progressed and no one was told what was on or off the record; the fact we were receiving texts from her as if she was one of our friends and was just trying to catch up; the fact we were never given access to our interviews; the fact that she was compiling a list of names and asking people in those interviews; the fact that those lists of names existed in the first place; the fact that people were made aware of what names were and weren’t on the list, even if they didn’t have any connection to the person in question.”

“You really do wonder how seriously she was taking this,” they continued. “You really do wonder just how qualified she is, because if the University Times editor is a person who oversees everything and the only person who can grant anonymity, why should that power be entrusted into someone who doesn’t know what anonymity is or how to protect it? It just baffles me.”

Another student said: “I think [my anonymity] was not protected; and it could have been. I think more steps could have been taken to make me actively anonymous, instead of just pulling my name.”

They continued: “I think we’re talking about not only one of the biggest publications on campus, but one which is paid; a position which is paid for by students.”

“I think the kind of people who have been screwed over by this are students who trusted someone to treat their stories with respect, trust that they would be used to tell an important but nuanced story about what it is like in the GMB and what can be done to change.”

“Their stories have been treated like loose pieces change and social currency for [Maguire] to get laughs at parties,” they continued.

“That is not someone I want reporting on the conduct of this university for the next year, certainly not someone I want being paid by my money.”

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

News

Analysis: Trinity’s removal of mask mandate leaves immunocompromised students concerned Sarah Emerson Deputy News Editor

L

AST WEEK, COLLEGE ANNOUNCED that it was lifting the mask mandate, in line with government’s own decision to remove requirements for face coverings in public settings.

From Monday 28 February, face coverings are longer compulsory within Trinity, except in healthcare settings.

Government’s removal of legal requirements for masks, in all settings where they are currently regulated, also came into effect last Monday. Face coverings will no longer be required in retail and hospitality settings, schools, and other public indoor areas. Masks are advised on public transport, but not required. Face coverings remain a requirement in healthcare settings.

Trinity has similarly commu-

nicated its decision to make the wearing of face coverings a matter of individual discretion. Last week’s announcement noted: “to continue protecting each other, especially the medically vulnerable, we still recommend mask wearing in our lecture theatres, libraries, tutorials and labs.”

Speaking to Trinity News, representative for the Trinity Ability Co_op Rachel Murphy expressed her disappointment regarding College’s decision to remove the mask mandate.

The Trinity Ability Co-op is a co-operative movement by students with disabilities in College who work towards making Trinity an inclusive environment for students with disabilities.

Murphy said: “I am definitely not alone in feeling anxious about the removal of the mask mandate

in Trinity and the rest of the country. A lot of immunocompromised and vulnerable students, like myself, are still finding it difficult to adjust to full capacity activities in College.”

“I find that it can be almost impossible to focus on College work when sitting in a crowded room, wondering if anyone here has Covid and how likely I would be to catch it from them.”

“I hope that students listen to College’s encouragement to continue wearing masks in lectures, tutorials and so on,” Murphy added. “If not, I fear that college will become an intimidating and scary environment for disabled students.”

Medical experts have stressed that community mask wearing is an effective means to reduce the transmission of Covid-19. In an

article published this month on the effectiveness of mask wearing, John T Brooks, MD, and Jay C Butler, MD highlighted studies showing the risk of infection is lowest when universal mask wearing is in place. Masks prevent infected persons from spreading the virus to others by inhibiting the exhalation of respiratory droplets carrying Covid-19, as well as helping to protect wearers from inhaling large infectious droplets. The efficacy of masks to protect wearers is less than the effectiveness of masks when worn by infected persons.

Brooks and Butler concluded: “The overall community benefit of wearing masks derives from their combined ability to limit both exhalation and inhalation of infectious virus.”

“Similar to the principle of herd immunity for vaccination, the greater the extent to which the intervention—mask wearing in this case—is adopted by the community, the larger the benefit to each individual member.”

The Ability Co-op has previously criticised College for its unclear support and allowances provided for immunocompromised students, amid a full return to in-person learning this semester, without social distancing in the Libraries and teaching spaces.

In an email sent at the beginning of Hilary Term, the vice provost acknowledged that while temporary absence may take place due to Covid-19 symptoms, “there is no general provision for UG or PGT students to study remotely, unless the course has been designed in this way”.

Murphy said of the email: “While it is positive to have a return to in-person teaching which many disabled students will benefit from, it is also incredibly disappointing to see the increased accessibility that came as a result of the pandemic being left behind.”

The representative added: “The Trinity Ability co_op think it would be completely unfair and discriminatory for the college to ignore the voices of vulnerable students who hoped that important lessons had been learned over the last two years and that we would move towards a more inclusive, blended teaching and learning style.”

It remains to be seen whether the students at lower risk of developing severe illness from a Covid-19 infection will continue to wear masks after the mandate is lifted.

GSU funding remains suspended after seven months

Jack Kennedy Editor

C

OLLEGE FUNDING FOR THE GRADUATE STUDENTS’ UNION (GSU) remains suspended, more than seven months after that decision was initially taken.

The office of the senior dean confirmed to Trinity News that the organisation has not received funding since late July 2021. The senior dean chairs the Capitation Committee, which oversees the funding of the GSU and Trinity’s other four capitated bodies.

The outgoing senior dean made the decision to suspend the funding after the GSU Executive failed to engage with an internal union

investigation into its members’ conduct. The union’s president and vice-president claimed that they in fact had engaged with the investigation, which was conducted by the GSU Board, but did not produce evidence to substantiate this claim, despite being asked to by the board and by Trinity News.

The new, incoming senior dean later reaffirmed the decision to withhold funding in early August, and it was subsequently confirmed by the Capitation Committee.

Later, in September, the executive announced that it retroactively considered the board’s term of office to have expired in early July, a time when the board was investigating the executive.

It unilaterally replaced the board with an “interim board” it selected, something the executive is not empowered to do in any version of the organisation’s constitution. The board called this “transparent attempt to undermine the report completed by the board within its term of office”.

Additionally, both the president and vice-president of the GSU have been subject to impeachment proceedings for 10 months, but have not scheduled a vote on their own impeachment during this time. The president claimed in June 2021 that the votes could not be held until the board investi-

gation—which she did not comply with—concluded, but the board confirmed that this was false.

Trinity News has repeatedly asked the executive in the intervening eight months why impeachment votes were never held,

but has at no point received a reply.

Impeachment votes must be held at a general meeting of the union.

The GSU’s AGM was held on December 9, after being delayed for a week and a half due to administrative issues. The union’s con-

stitution states that its AGM must be held before the end of the first week in November.

The GSU president and vice-president did not respond to a request for comment.

PHOTO BY MICHAEL FOLEY FOR TRINITY NEWS

The union’s funding was frozen in late July 2021 after GSU leadership failed to comply with an investigation into its conduct

19

TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

News

Analysis: The campaign to rename the Berkeley Library Aidan Cusack

Contributing Writer

A

February of last year, College has recognised the importance of facing up to its colonial legacy, announcing an “extensive” two-year investigation in which Trinity will “examine, interrogate and reflect on its complex colonial legacies”.

As such, the issue of renaming the

Berkeley library has been brought to the forefront.

George Berkeley, an 18th-century philosopher, Anglican Bishop and scientist is one of Trinity’s most celebrated graduates and one of Ireland’s most prominent philosophers, with a similar sta-

PHOTO BY SABA MALIK FOR TRINITY NEWS

S PART OF THE DEBATE ignited by the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, many universities worldwide have been forced to confront their links to colonialism and the practice of slavery. As of

TRINITY NEWS EST. 1953

Write for us Trinity News, Ireland’s oldest student newspaper, has a long history of high-quality journalism. Many of our alumni are currently working in media, having spring-boarded their careers with the newspaper, and we are always welcoming new contributors to our written and multimedia sections. Opportunities to get involved include: • • •

Contributing an article to one of our many written sections Taking photos or creating art to feature in the newspaper and/or online Working with our video team to produce documentary content around student issues

All Trinity students are welcome, regardless of experience. Our editorial staff regularly issue prompts for contributors to work on and we also accept cold pitches for articles. For more information, see trinitynews.ie/write-for-us.

tus as Cecil Rhodes has in Oxford University. Berkeley kept enslaved people at his plantation in Rhode Island, justifying the practice of slavery as a path to Christian conversion.

On February 22, an emergency motion was passed in the Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) Council in favour of renaming the Berkeley Library.

It was proposed by Junior Fresh Middle Eastern, Jewish and Islamic civilisations class rep Louie Lyons, who created a petition with the same aim, which has garnered over 300 signatures.

Commenting on this campaign, Louie Lyons said: “I just thought it was beyond time action was taken.

Trinity proved renaming is an easy move to make by renaming the Schrodinger, so why not Berkeley, given what we know about him?”

Continuing he said: “It seemed like something someone should have done by now, but I guess if everyone thinks like that, it never gets done, so I took it upon myself to do it. Trinity has shown hints at supporting the idea and I thought student outcry could be the final push that college needs to decide to finally do this.”

The two candidates for TCDSU President, Rebecca Kelly and Gabirelle Fullam, are both supportive of the campaign. Kelly said: “After speaking passionately in favour of the motion at Council, I was delighted to see it pass. It is so important that our campus physically reflects and represents the students who walk through it each day, and

this was a fantastic starting point in claiming our campus. It’s amazing that this was a student-led initiative too and that their passion is being heard.”

Fullam stated that “you can see I support the renaming of Berkeley in my manifesto, so it has long been stated. However, it must be supported by meaningful actions to support students of colour, and not be merely symbolic, this is why anti-racism response training, as well as forming a Black, Students of Colour and Minority Ethnicities Advisory Board is vital, I have also been in touch with the USI and DCU Black and Students of Colour Advisory Board in forming how I believe this should be formed and getting advice”.

The result of this campaign will likely define the position of College on its past proximity to colonialism. The Trinity Colonial Legacies Project has stated that it is “seeking to address its complex legacy, looking not just at slavery but also its historical and intellectual connections to empire”. With mounting student and academic support behind renaming the Berkeley Library, the likelihood of the renaming of the Library appears to be something one could potentially see happening. It will be important for students to keep up what support has been given however, to ensure any desire for the Library to be renamed is heard.

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Nobody has a right to a namesake

Comment

Alexander Fay

page 22

It's wrong to call victims of harassment and abuse liars

Editorial

page 24

I am exhausted by this election campaign Sophie Furlong Tighe Comment Editor

R

egular readers of the Trinity News Comment section might be aware that I consider myself to be a victim of abuse. I write about it a lot.

Not because it has ruined my life – it hasn’t – but because I think it is important to talk about. It’s important to consider how abuse happens, so that we can better stop it from happening again. For me, it happened in an on-campus apartment, and then it happened in a dingy flat in South Dublin, and then it happened in a student society. None of these abuses needed to happen, and I believe similar instances can be prevented in the future— but not if we don’t talk about the harms of the past. It is with this in mind that I spoke, under the condition of anonymity, to University Times (UT) about my experience of abuse within a student society.

Nothing I said was mentioned in the article that was eventually published, titled “Phil, Hist Accused of Perpetuating Culture of Harassment and Bullying”. My stories were old, trauma made details fuzzy, and they weren’t particularly salacious. It turned out, as we have seen over the past few days, that it didn’t matter; UT had lots to work with. On February 14, this newspaper published a story that contained testimony from other victims of abuse that spoke to UT for the same article. The victim testimony contains a number of allegations— namely, that reporters in UT leaked the anonymous stories of their sources, that those stories were “treated like bits of gossip.” Somebody heard their own story repeated back to them at a party. When I spoke to UT’s deputy editor, I was told not even the editor of University Times would know I spoke for the story,

that their anonymisation processes were air-tight, and that the only person who could link my name back to some of the worst things that have ever happened to me was the deputy editor. One of the victims told Trinity News, “I still don’t know how far my story has gotten.”

I didn’t see TN’s article coming, and it was scary to read. Because of the culture in which we live – the one that asks us what we were wearing and how much we’d have to drink – shame is an emotion intimately connected to my sexual harm. But even more than the shame of people knowing what had happened to me (this is, after all, something I am trying to get over. I’m writing this article now, I’m tweeting out of frustration, I’m growing and shrinking) what dominates my mind is the fear. If my story got leaked, would any of my abusers recognise them-

PHOTO BY ELIZA MELLER FOR TRINITY NEWS

selves in it? Would their names be part of that leak? Would they be angry? Would they try to contact me? The answer to all of these questions is: probably not. The things I had to tell Magure were not particularly salacious, and they happened long enough ago that the people who hurt me aren’t exactly knocking about student publications’ offices. The really scary thing is the absolute uncertainty of it all, how I have to come to terms with the idea that this is something I will never know.

If these allegations weren’t enough to obsessively re-litigate in the precious minutes before I fall asleep every night, then came the response. The editor and acting-deputy editor of University Times wrote: “sources who spoke to Trinity News allege that Mairead treated their experiences as “gossip”. This is, in itself, no more than gossip.” This response is blistering in its race to accuse the oft-not-believed victims of abuse of lying, and in its lack of clarity about why such victims are lying. But more than the logical confusion of such a defence, there is an emotional heart to my discomfort with it. When will victims stop being told that they’re lying? Over and over again we are instrumentalised. The act of abuse is, itself, a theft of agency. Then our stories are taken and twisted by media to write a story that is out of our hands. Finally, when we speak up against this, we are called defamatory gossips.

I have written for this paper before about the “ideal victim”, and how I have struggled with the notion in the past. It only occurs

to me now, after a week of this, that the ideal victim is simple: she’s whatever you want her to be. She speaks for your story and she doesn’t care when you tell other people all the little details about what happened to her, she certainly doesn’t complain publicly. When she follows this script, you can’t even begin to thank her for sharing her story; when she deviates, she’s cynically attempting

“

If my story got leaked, would any of my abusers recognise themselves in it? Would their names be part of that leak?

Would they be angry?

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

Comment

I’m tired of it; I’m tired of denials in the face of evidence; I’m tired of being believed only when it is convenient, blamed when it’s not; I am tired of this election cycle

to ruin your career.

This is all happening, unfortunately, in the eye of a student’s union election. As usual, the deputy editor is running for University Times editor. Unusually, this means that these opinions and defences aren’t going to end for a good while yet. We’ll see them at hustings, we’ll see them in the recently announced RON campaign, and we’ll see them on our social media feeds. To be clear, it’s a good thing that University Times is facing scrutiny for both the initial act, and the response to the allegations. It is simply difficult, as a survivor of sexual violence, to see your identity dragged all over the campus-conversation for two weeks.

Sometimes, it really seems like we’ve come far in our discussions of abuse and sexual harm, and I suppose we have. But the last week of campus politics has shown me that we still don’t want angry victims, we don’t want ones that disrupt election campaigns or promising careers in journalism. We want what has always been asked of them— to bend to someone else’s will. I’m tired of it; I’m tired of denials in the face of evidence; I’m tired of being believed only when it is convenient, blamed when it’s not; I am tired of this election cycle.

You can vote for whoever you want in the UT election, or you can not vote at all. I don’t care, I’ll be gone next year. Maybe that’s selfish, maybe it’s cruel, maybe oppression demands more action than fatigue, and maybe I’ll have a different opinion in the morning.

But right now, it’s a Wednesday night, it’s raining, I can hear Trinity Choir rehearsing in House Six, and what I want most is to forget any of this ever happened.

PHOTO BY ISOBEL DUFFY FOR TRINITY NEWS

“

There are no private solutions to public problems Fionnán Uíbh Eachach Deputy Comment Editor

W

hat should you do when you realise you’ve made a bad mistake?

Own up? Accept responsibility? Nonsense – when in doubt, look about! Although by no means a new phenomenon (Irish people have always had a masochistic need to elect the irresponsible), the government has in recent years become quite adept at apportioning blame at a societal level for disasters of its own making on the one hand and then steadfastly committing to individual solutions for inherently systematic problems on the other. Whether it be an insultingly uninformed approach to housing, the response to the pandemic, or even the Marie-Antoinette-like pronouncement of Minister of State Seán Flemming that those concerned with inflation should just “shop around”, there exists a dangerous belief among those in positions of power in Ireland that problems of a systemic nature can be solved at the level of the individual. This is false.

When Minister of State for Finance Seán Flemming recently argued on RTÉ’s Drivetime that his constituents would be well served by opting to shop around for better prices when faced with a rising cost of living “rather than complaining on what the Government can do”, he rightfully earned both harsh criticism and pitiful mockery. Yet behind such a seemingly innocuous, though clearly economically illiterate, statement

lies a more serious problem: those in positions of power in Ireland have long treated public problems with private solutions.

This extends beyond the farcical commentary of underachieving politicians. Despite the fact that the people of Ireland have now had to suffer rising residential prices for close to a decade with no real equivalent growth in wages, the government exercised for years a near-homicidal commitment to treating a national problem primarily at the level of the individual – devoting huge resources to First Time Buyer and Rent to Buy schemes that, although beneficial to a fortunate few, only served to exacerbate rising prices generally. Even today, the government continues to fail in the delivery of its commitment to increase the supply of affordable homes in response to demand. This myopia is by no means limited to elected representatives however – it’s worth recalling the claims of Conor Skehan, TUD planning lecturer and Housing Agency chief between 2013-2018, that Irish people should “stop ourselves to be painted into a picture of being victims” and instead “move somewhere cheaper” in the face of rising house prices.

So much for hoping the ‘all in it together’ attitude would outlive the pandemic.

Yet even in response to the pandemic, the government has shown an unnerving reluctance to accept that societal problems cannot be solved by individual

actions alone. Although responsible for introducing the restrictions generally necessary to minimise the spread of COVID-19, the government’s implementation of these rules often arrived too late to avoid the unnecessary deaths that might have been avoided, had it initially relied on more than unenforced guidelines. Even now, this pull to the individual in response to the systemic rears its head again – despite there being no noticeable pressure for the change, we are now told that masks are again to be only voluntary when indoors. A naked attempt to finally bring the ‘pandemic bounce’ (currently the El Dorado for government parties) to Ireland, the same faulty idea rests therein; that the individual

“

So much for hoping the ‘all in it together’ attitude would outlive the pandemic

is best suited to deal with problems of inherently wider, societal seriousness.

There is a strange irony to this.

Back in the seat of government only a decade after its mismanagement and devastation of the Irish economy still vividly recalled by many, Fianna Fáil has little to boast about in its recent history.

Indeed when talking to a party campaigner, you’re more likely to hear a call-back to the social housing programmes of the 1940s (itself something the modern organisation shows no capacity to achieve) than any reference to its last decade of life. Yet if there is one policy achievement from the 21st century Fianna Fáil can actually boast of, it only points to the inadequacy of dealing with large-scale problems at the level of the individual. Enacted in 2004 by none other than Taoiseach Mícheál Martin himself when serving as Minister for Health, the smoking ban has undeniably saved countless lives and made indoor eating/drinking a more enjoyable experience for most.

It also demonstrates just how important engaging with systemic issues at the appropriate level is – would ‘just don’t smoke inside’ have had quite the same effect?

This is by no means a peculiarly Irish phenomenon. The claws of a neoliberal ideology deliberately blind to the failings of a purely individual-oriented approach to societal problems such as unemployment, housing costs or healthcare can be found in the attitude to problem solving of countless governments across the world. Yet after two years of a pandemic in which it was made clear time and time again that collective health measures and largescale expansionary fiscal policy alone offered the solution to many of the problems plaguing Irish life, it is time the government abandon its myopic focus on the individual and learn new tricks.

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Comment

Nobody has a right to a namesake Alexander Fay

Contributing Writer

T

rinity recently decided to change the name of the Schrodinger Theatre back to its original name — Physics Lecture Theatre. This decision was made in light of evidence revealing Erwin Schrodinger to be a serial abuser and paedophile, and has been generally accepted as a justified action. Yet, as with many recent attempts to shift namesakes and honorifics away from historic individuals who have committed moral wrongs, there remain a few people eager to call this an act of censorship. Are these actions — striking a name from a plaque, renaming streets, tearing down statues — examples of silencing?

Well, no, I believe they absolutely are not.

To be clear, the decision of the School of Physics to ditch Schrodinger’s name was completely correct. As a physics student myself who has lectures

on a near-daily basis in that room, I felt that the action taken has been sincere and well-thought through. Communication on the reasoning behind the decision and additional actions has been clear and comprehensible. Despite his achievements in the field and wide recognition as an important figure in science, Schrodinger was, simply put, not a good person.

There is no need now to continue wasting energy and attention honouring a horrible abuser with such a thing as a name above a door.

It is possible to understand and recognise his important contributions to physics without feeling the need to keep him on some sort of pedestal in our society.

This is simply not censorship.

We are not silencing the work of Schrodinger, or stopping people from having access to his views or information about him — his name remains in textbooks & his theories on courses. This is a late

realisation that this man should not be valued in this way anymore and needs not be recognised in our day-to-day lives. I do not need to be reminded of him every time I go to college, I’m aware of who he was and what he did and I do not think his work entitles him to a place of honour anymore.

His abuses did not appear to have much of an impact on him at the time, and nobody is being muzzled by finally responding to those actions with consequences.

People won’t suddenly forget who he is or his work purely because there’s no longer a room bearing his name. The idea peddled that people would become ignorant of certain histories or events because there’s no longer a physical man-made reminder of it visible is farcical.

Anybody banking on that notion as a good basis to continue having places named after awful people might do well to remem-

ber the removal of a statue of the slave-trader Edward Colston. In the summer of 2020, a statue of Colston was torn down in Bristol and chucked into a river (a joy to watch). I don’t know about you, but I certainly had no idea who Colston was until I saw his statue going for a swim. This collective act has brought a greater awareness to Colston and, importantly, his terrible actions as a slave trader. With the statue toppled and out of sight, we are not at a higher risk of forgetting about the crimes of the slave trade and the colonialism of the British. History centres on action and inaction — the action of pulling down monuments to such villains is the creation of new history which puts a spotlight on issues that have been previously ignored. The inaction of allowing such individuals to continue to enjoy a position of value on our streets and in our classrooms is worthless in comparison.

There is nobody on this planet – past or present – who has a right to namesake; much less anybody guilty of abuse. People’s need to focus on the loss of a namesake is bizarre, and comes across as an odd fixation on the most basic of acts available to shift who we choose to honour and display what we value as a society. By focusing needlessly on such, it shows a contentless in openly letting people know that some-

“

There is no need now to continue wasting energy and attention honouring a horrible abuser with such a thing as a name above a door thing no longer being named after an abuser is more of an issue than the abuse carried out. A failure to display no empathy or thought for those negatively affected by the actions nullifies an argument of censorship. It may be the unfortunate case at times that by perpetuating a need to keep “significant” historical figures in such positions of remembrance, we are in fact censoring the victims of their wrongdoings by disregarding the need for consequence and nuance.

There are wider, and perhaps more impactful or important, discussions to be had specifically about Trinity and how we continue to uphold values of colonialism through our curriculum, traditions, and systems as a university with origins embedded in the British Empire. Yet the point remains that however small, superficial, or even tokenistic the difference may appear to some in terms of renaming classrooms, etc., there is value in acknowledging the wrongs individuals we hold esteemed have committed, and making the conscious and collective effort to highlight the names and stories of those we believe to be better and more representative. There are countless instances of places on campus being named after particularly wicked people, the situation with Schrodinger is hopefully a step in the right direction for the college to rectify any mistakes (known and unknown) it has made in appreciating those who do not deserve it. Nobody is too intelligent, important, or influential to escape the duty we have in showing the world who we believe is an example to others.

23

TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

Comment

Student pressure is essential to make College more convenient for all Evan Carron-Kee Contributing Writer

I

t’s a dreadful experience, known to all who call the Arts Building home. You’ve just been corralled into the world’s strictest socially distanced queue at the Perch, you’ve gotten your dangerously hot americano, and you’re ready to study. You’re going to do the readings—sure week 6 isn’t too late to start, is it? As you make your way to the Berkeley entrance, you glance up at what could have been: the Lecky door. That’s right, there’s a door, right there, that could reduce the journey to the library to a trivial length! If it were open, you could walk out of a lecture and straight into the Upper Lecky. And when you want a break, or yet another molten hot americano, you could leave just as quick!

Yet this door is closed. Think of all the progress we’ve lost thanks to that cursed journey to the Berkeley entrance - not only

the diminished productivity of library-goers due to the increased distance to coffee, fresh air, and social contact — but also all the library trips that never were. Think of the poor Arts Building students who couldn’t face the journey into the harsh Dublin winter and so were cruelly consigned to yet another night at the pub. And what of the societal effects of denying easy library access to our best and brightest humanities students?

Admittedly this is no Hamilton, so it’s not like we missed out on a cure for cancer—but still, someone might if the Lecky door had been open last semester.

The Upper Lecky door is just one of many ways Trinity could be better for students, but isn’t. Given the amount of time it would save for everyone in the Arts Block, simply opening the door would be a really simple step towards improving the student experience.

Obviously, there would need to

be someone manning the door, but that’s simply the cost of a well-run college. At the very least, the door could be opened during the busiest hours of the day. On a related note, why are the large circular sofas in the centre of the Berkely-Lecky-Ussher building still pushed together? And why is the lounge area to the right as you enter the Berkeley is still cordoned off? There was already a mystery as to why College decided that pushing all the Arts Building furniture against the wall was a good way to combat the spread of Covid-19, but at least our trademark funky seats are now back. Perhaps furniture entails public health risks that I don’t understand, but I don’t think the current guidelines restrict sofas in libraries.

These concerns might seem trivial, but such issues form a part of a wider problem in College, where the student experience is

often overlooked. The underfunding of the Academic Registry is perhaps the ultimate insult to the student body. Every year, without fail, many students are left in the dark about when their lectures are, and God help anyone planning to attend a tutorial. Students can’t tell their employers when they’re available, or organise times for social events with societies until the timetable is finalised, often at the last minute. Wouldn’t the start of the college year be much simpler if the Academic Registry were given the resources to design a robust timetabling procedure that students could rely on?

Beyond the bare minimum of opening doors and giving students their timetables, College could take an ambitious approach to making the environment altogether more convenient and rewarding for students. Lecture recordings should be available for all students, for all classes. It’s unacceptable that students suffering from Covid-19 and helping us all by self-isolating are punished in some classes because recordings aren’t made available. The lack of recorded lectures is also an issue for students who have to work part-time. It’s really not that difficult to make life easier for every single one of the 18,000 students enrolled at College.

It only takes the smallest bit of imagination to make Trinity

PHOTO BY ELIZA MELLER FOR TRINITY NEWS

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Thankfully, student opposition prevented College from making life worse for sports on campus over the next four years a more convenient college, and to make life better for everyone on campus. Thankfully, many of these issues are being addressed by student representatives—take House 6 for example. Last year the SU and Trinity Disability Services secured funding to make House 6 accessible. It’s shocking that the situation was allowed to continue for so long. At best, it will remain inaccessible until 2024. If students were given the attention they deserve on campus, surely accessible buildings for society rooms and SU, CSC, and Trinity Publications offices would be made available somewhere else on campus? Of course, this would necessarily inconvenience someone, but it’s the least the College could do to make student life accessible to all until a lift is finally installed in House 6. The plan to move the Book of Kells to College Park is another particularly egregious example of how students are often at the bottom of College’s priorities list.

Thankfully, student opposition prevented the College from making life worse for anyone training or playing on campus over the next four years.

It’s clear that Trinity could do much more for students. And it’s also clear that students can change life on campus for the better— maybe keep that in mind when considering whether to register for the upcoming SU elections.

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Comment

Editorial: It’s one thing to deny allegations of unethical conduct, it’s another to insinuate victims are liars

O

n February 14, this newspaper published an article entitled “UT deputy editor accused of leaking anonymous sources’ names”. In a statement reproduced in full in the article, the journalist in question dismissed the allegations as “wholly false and defamatory”.

Less than an hour after the article’s publication, the University Times (UT) itself issued “A Note to Our Readers Regarding Reports of Mishandling of Sources”, followed up by a Twitter thread from the paper’s editor which was shared to the official UT twitter account.

A response to the publication of these allegations was expected. The tone and content of this response, however, was not.

The least desirable thing in the world would be for this to come to be seen as a “spat” between the two newspapers, as part of their larger “rivalry”. Publishing an editorial on the subject runs that risk. But this is not about Trinity News; we merely served in this case as the conduit for several people to relay their experiences. If anyone wishes to look less favourably on this newspaper or publicly call into question its commitment to solid reporting, we are sure we will be able to bear that burden. But another newspaper used its respected platform and considerable reach to level serious accusations of malfeasance against the aforementioned people, and we therefore feel an obligation to use our own platform and reach to note that these accusations are as baseless as they are repulsive.

The inclination to blame victims is, without a doubt, truly and completely wrong.

The two explanations offered by the UT editor were that the story was a “cynical attempt to take down a candidate a week before a TCDSU election”, and that the allegations are “a result of rumour and hearsay”. They both do not stand on their own merits and are mutually exclusive; the story can either have been a mistake based on misidentification of gossip, or it can have been deliberately concocted to take down an innocent electoral candidate. It cannot be both.

In reality, it is neither. To say that the allegations are “the product of gossip and nothing else” requires us either to wilfully misread the original news article or to think that the people in question are lying or mistaken about their own stories. The interviewees in the February 14 article did not just hear rumours their stories were leaked; third parties were gossiping about confidential details they told exclusively to the UT deputy editor, in at least one case verbatim as they told it. This cannot be the product of “rumour and hearsay”: either it is true, or

we are being asked to believe that these victims of harassment gave their testimony to someone else and then lied or forgot.

On the other hand, we are told it is a “cynical attempt” to sabotage an electoral campaign.

This excuse is not only unconvincing, it’s downright abhorrent.

The idea that people who have experienced harassment would manufacture these grievances and stories of severe trauma in order to influence a TCDSU election is as farcical as it is disgusting.

With no disrespect meant to the hard-working officers of the union, sabbatical elections simply are not the biggest issue at stake here. It is unclear to us how

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The paper has not made these people, who had already been through so much at the beginning of this affair, feel listened to and taken seriously

anyone could read the accounts of trauma and distress given in that article and think “this person is just using this to influence a student union election”. These are people to whom an awful thing happened for which they do not feel accountability was taken, and thus they’ve taken to sharing their stories publicly.

Of course, that does get at the other reason the UT senior editorial staff are well aware this wasn’t manufactured for the election; this issue has been present for almost six months now. Concerns were raised almost immediately after the article was published, and resulted in a number of complaints to the Press Ombudsman and the Junior Dean, both of which the paper must have been aware of. Perhaps those involved felt that the election provided impetus to come forward with their stories. SU elections are not significant enough to be worth committing defamation over, but they do afford the winners significant influence on campus, which several of those interviewed cited as a serious concern. What’s certain is that the victims do not feel their complaints have been adequately addressed.

A broader issue is the vigour with which the newspaper has officially rushed to the deputy editor’s defence. It is one thing to say that your official position is that no wrongdoing occurred. It is quite another to use the significant weight of UT’s name to call the allegations a coordinated, deliberate, defamatory attempt to sabotage her campaign. Astute observers of elections for the position of UT editor will already have noted that the position has literally never been won by some-

one who wasn’t previously deputy editor, and has only ever seriously been contested once. Questions have been asked before about how neutral the paper can be when reporting on the election of a senior member of its own staff. Any semblance of uncertainty around the answers to those questions is now gone.

Indeed, the response on the part of UT was all wrong, and is almost an entirely separate problem to that of the alleged leaking.

Even in a hypothetical world where the leaking hadn’t occurred and the students who told their stories were genuinely mistaken, this cannot be how an influential student publication responds.

If after six months and at least a half-dozen complaints people still do not feel their very serious accusations of mistreatment have been properly dealt with, something has clearly gone awry. To say that the paper “investigated” itself and found no wrongdoing is just an insult. Self-investigation never does seem to uncover misconduct, funnily enough.

The paper has not made these people, who had already been through so much at the beginning of this affair, feel listened to and taken seriously, to the point that they feel the need to make their grievances public. The automatic response should be compassion and a genuine desire to see what can be done for them. To accuse them of defamation and conspiracy is about the worst possible response.

The UT editor’s Twitter thread concluded by saying that “at no point has anyone questioned the substance of what [the deputy editor] uncovered”. This is, of course, true. No one wants to. It

is very much true that there exist structural problems that facilitate harassment, abuse and bullying within College societies. The article was right to highlight that issue, and were there not such serious complaints about how the investigation was conducted, it would be an uncomplicatedly great piece of journalism.

But to say that the subject matter negates the allegations of journalistic malpractice is ludicrous, and completely backwards.

It strengthens them. First, because it makes clear that the people who are now accusing a UT journalist of violating confidentiality were giving testimony about harrowing events, meaning the inappropriate disclosure of that testimony is all the more damaging. This alleged leaking has the potential not to just to hurt UT’s reputation and harm the students in question, but to do serious damage to journalism as a whole. It reflects on the whole field, and students will be understandably wary of coming forward about issues like harassment and bullying in future.

Second, the premise of the September article was believing the accounts of the same students who are now alleging wrongdoing. It takes an extraordinary amount of courage to entrust a journalist with a story of abuse. It must be devastating to learn your trust may have been broken. It is more appalling still for the people you trusted with this trauma to label you “defamatory”, and to tell others not to listen to you.

We were rightly asked to believe victims in September 2021.

Why are the same people now calling them liars?

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

Mental illness might not all be in your head Shannon McGreevy

Scitech

page 26

What “Don’t Look Up” tried to do, and why it failed Sarah Moran

Head Copyeditor

A climate psychology perspective

A

dam McKay’s recent feature film Don’t Look Up has just received four Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, and is currently Netflix’s second most-successful release to date. The film, for the three people reading who haven’t seen it yet, satirises the climate crisis by replacing a very real threat with a fictional Earth-destroying meteor, due to hit in just six months. The plot follows two scientists, Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) and Randall Mindy (Leonardo Di Caprio), as they try to convince a star-studded cast of idiots to take action before the Earth and everything on it is destroyed. Bleak. So bleak in fact, that many reviewers critiqued the film for its nihilistic ending—but what was McKay trying to achieve if not a sense of dread and doom?

From a climate psychology perspective, it seems McKay attempted to decrease the psychological distance of the crisis for viewers.

Two concepts that help us understand the issue of climate inaction are construal level theory and psychological distance. Construal level theory suggests that the way we plan for the distant future and consider hypothetical alternatives to reality is by forming mental constructs of distant objects. Psychological distance is an egocentric experience that something is close/distant in some form, either temporally (close to the present or in the distant future); spatially (physically close/distant); socially (happening to you or someone else); or hypothetically (certain/ uncertain to happen). Informational distance has also been proposed, which takes into account how informed someone is about the event. The farther removed an idea is from us and our direct experience by psychological dis-

tance, the more abstractly we view it as construal level theory.

For people living in Ireland, and indeed most developed countries, the climate crisis is a future phenomenon that will affect other people before it affects us, and we must imagine its outcomes before we experience them. For most of us, the crisis is an imagined future event happening to people far away—it couldn’t get more psychologically distant. To be inspired to take action, we need a concrete mental representation of the crisis, that is, a low psychological distance between our idea of the climate crisis and our own psychology.

One suggested means of lowering our psychological distance from the climate crisis is by localising the issue through simple, coherent, relatable stories about its effects on humans. Don’t Look Up, which outlines very clearly the frustrations of climate scientists trying to inspire climate action, has the ability to trump scientific jargon when trying to close that psychological distance gap. Don’t Look Up did an excellent job of making the story relatable and coherent; anyone watching who isn’t an all-out climate denier was sure to feel Dibiasky’s frustration and eventual exhaustion. McKay recreated our world to just the right extent, whereby people could

recognise world figures (“Huh, Meryl Streep as Trump!”) without becoming disinterested in a story that was simply too close to home.

This mirroring and satirising of our culture allowed us, however, to adopt an “us versus them” attitude and feel accomplished without taking any real action. The vast majority of people watching, no matter the level of climate action they take in their day-to-day lives, would have agreed with and related to either Dibiasky or Mindy, patting themselves on the back for being on the right side of the film. This allowed viewers to write off climate inaction as something solely for comedic, power-hungry man-children—I don’t expect many people to have finished watching and openly admitted to seeing themselves in Jonah Hill or Mark Rylance’s characters. While McKay made it easy for viewers to

lessen the psychological distance of the climate crisis, he then unknowingly encouraged them to feel as though they had taken action just by agreeing with the sentiments of the film.

And then there was the ending.

While realistic (in that we will all die if we don’t take action against climate change), and initially a seemingly clever choice, the ending undoes the rest of the film’s work in inspiring climate action.

The ending evokes fatalism and nihilism, convincing viewers that they can’t do anything so they may as well not try at all, and that even if they do, some rich white woman will buy their silence. Again, realistic, but it doesn’t inspire us to action.

After localising the climate crisis, Don’t Look Up could have outlined meaningful actions people can take to minimise climate risk,

with the proposed solutions being on par with what the audience is capable of, or given some sliver of hope to the viewer. Of course, at the end of the day it’s simply a film, and can only do so much— the fate of the world doesn’t rest in Adam McKay’s ability to write and direct movies. However, with an all-star cast and the promotional backing to basically guarantee box-office success, Don’t Look Up would have been wise to end on a somewhat hopeful note, to avoid evoking more climate fatalism and to provide its millions of viewers with a sense of self-efficacy.

If you would like to avoid fatalism and feel a sense of self-efficacy, you can find more info about overcoming the psychological distance of the crisis at: climateoutreach. org/media/climate-psychological-distance/.

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The ending evokes fatalism and nihilism, convincing viewers that they can’t do anything so they may as well not try at all PHOTO BY ISOBEL DUFFY FOR TRINITY NEWS

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

SciTech

Mental illness might not all be in your head Current research suggests a new way to look at mental illness may be through the gut microbiome Shannon McGreevy Online Editor

T

he human gastrointestinal tract (GIT) contains a diverse collection of microorganisms known as the gut microbiota. Trillions of bacteria, protozoa, fungi, and archaea, currently reside in the GIT and have been linked to play a critical role in gutbrain communication via immune, neural, and endocrine pathways.

Due to these observed interactions between the gut microbiome and the brain, the therapeutic benefits of targeting the composition of bacteria in the GIT is of interest to the psychiatric community for the treatment of mental illness.

Patients with autism spectrum disorder, depression, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder have been shown to have significant differences in the diversity and composition of their microbiomes.

The media has also brought attention to this topic, as there have been claims that there are great benefits in altering the gut microbiome through probiotics, prebiotics, and/or dietary modifications in order to alleviate symptoms of mental illness. Understanding the underlying interactions between the gut-brain network in various psychiatric disorders as well as the benefits and limitations of using supplements that help diversify the microbiota in the GIT is part of the puzzle to understanding the complexity of mental illness.

The whole concept of the “gutbrain” axis is not a new phenomenon. Gastrointestinal issues have long been linked to psychiatric illness. For example, appetite changes have been linked to major depressive disorder (MDD), whereas nausea and diarrhoea symptoms were reported with those with anxiety disorders. Mood disturbances, anxiety, and stress are recognized as playing a role in irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and irritable bowel disease (IBD). Even those who do not experience mental illness have probably had feelings of an upset stomach associated with nerves or stress. While this idea of the gut and brain being intricately linked has been around for a while, it is not until relatively recently that considerable research has been performed in investigating the role of the gut microbiome in

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Stark differences in the composition of the microbiome between those with plantbased versus animal-based diets have been observed this “gut-brain” axis.

The colonisation of bacteria in the gut is understood to begin during birth since the uterus is a sterile environment. Interestingly, the neonatal microbiome has been shown to vary depending on the method of delivery with caesarean

section infants having a microbiome more resemblant to the mother’s skin and those born naturally with a microbiome having a closer resemblance to the mother’s vaginal microbiome. However, these differences tend to resolve quickly and by one year, infants exhibit a diverse and adult-like microbiome in their GIT. As adults, the most significant determinant of the composition of the microbiome is diet. It has been shown that shifts in composition of microorganisms present in the gut occur in response to dietary changes. Additionally, stark differences in the composition of the microbiome between those with plant-based versus animal-based diets have been observed. With the healthiest microbiome being a diverse collection of “healthy” microbes, maintaining this diversity is often the purpose of treatments with probiotics, as they are living bacteria that benefit the host when administered in correct amounts.

The communication between the gut and the brain is a complex bidirectional system where information is transmitted, interpreted, and responded to. The microbiome of the GIT has been shown to have a critical role in this communication network and the mechanisms by which the bacteria of the gut are interacting and influencing the central nervous system are be-

ing uncovered. Studying the microbiome and its communication along the “gut-brain” axis has been performed through manipulation and altering the microbiota of rodent models.

As previously mentioned, observing the impact of manipulation due to probiotics is one means of studying this complex relationship, but studies can also examine the effects of prebiotics which are found in plant fibres that confer and stimulate the growth of healthy bacteria and fungi in the gut. They can also be administered through “synbiotics”, combinations of probiotic and prebiotic, in order to increase their efficacy in altering the microbiome composition. Another buzzword in this research is “psychobiotic” referring to a pro-, pre-, or synbiotic that has been shown to demonstrate a positive effect on mental health.

Another common and useful method of studying the effects of these types of supplements in order to benefit those with mental illness is through faecal microbiota transplantation (FMT). Essentially, this is the transfer of one’s microbiota to another to replicate the microbiota composition for study. It has been used to transfer the diseased phenotype of a donor patient, like someone with anxiety or depression, to a model

organism for investigation. This methodology has proven successful in treating those with gastrointestinal infections like Clostridium difficile which is a common hospital-acquired infection. It has also been used for investigation with IBS and has been correlated with increased mood for those afflicted.

Phage therapy is another exciting technique used in this research that alters the microbiota through the use of bacteriophages or viruses that infect bacteria. Using this along with FMT could help make the transfer of microbiotas more efficient and accurate. Not much work has been done with using phage therapy, but it does provide a promising future avenue in research. Lastly, there are also “postbiotics” which can alter the microbiota. “Postbiotics” are bacterial products or metabolites that have activity in the host, so those most interested in looking at effects on the brain would be short-chain fatty acids (SCFA). SCFAs like acetate, butyrate, and propionate are produced by those bacteria which often colonise the gut. They produce these SCFAs in response to non-digestible carbohydrates, suggesting why a high-fibre diet is associated with health benefits.

All of these research techniques that have been used to study the “gut-brain” axis have helped un-

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

SciTech

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PHOTO VIA TONY WEBSTER/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Recent studies have demonstrated that psychotropic medications can alter the composition of the microbiome

derstand how the GIT and brain interact with each other in a complex manner and how mental illness plays a role in altering this communication network. Understanding the research methods provides insight into how to interpret results correctly and informatively. Researchers are looking for ways to help those struggling with mental illness, but it is imperative to follow the evidence and the effectiveness of altering the microbiota and its impact on psychiatric conditions.

The gut microbiota has also been linked to the immune system’s induction and development.

When the microbiota is abnormal, there is an increase in immune system molecules called pro-inflammatory cytokines that help drive inflammation. Many of the uncomfortable symptoms associated with GIT issues are due to inflammation in that region. Usually,

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Not much work has been done with using phage therapy, but it does provide a promising future avenue in research

the microbes from the gut are prevented from going into the bloodstream by the intestinal epithelium barrier, but stress has been shown to disrupt this barrier and cause a “leaky gut” allowing the movement of microbes and stimulating an inflammatory immune response. There are many psychiatric conditions associated with chronic inflammation and increased levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines, although the source is not known.

This link with chronic stress and a “leaky gut” could provide one explanation for the production of these cytokines and mental illnesses like depression.

Events in early life and chronic stress are deemed risk factors for depression, anxiety, and other psychiatric conditions. The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis controls and mediates the stress response in the body through many reactions ultimately netting the production of cortisol, the body’s primary stress hormone. There has been substantial experimental evidence that the gut microbiome plays a role in this stress response as a regulator of this pathway. Dysfunction in this HPA axis is common among psychiatric illnesses, especially mood and anxiety disorders. Interestingly, several prebiotics and probiotics have been demonstrated to reduce cortisol levels, possibly providing a means of intervention for these illnesses.

More traditionally implicated in psychiatric disorders are neurotransmitters in the brain. The body’s “chemical messengers” that communicate along the central nervous system. Specifically, GABA, serotonin, acetylcholine, noradrenaline, and dopamine are of major interest with mental illnesses. The bacteria in the gut are able to directly produce all of these neurotransmitters as well as those SCFAs previously mentioned,

which are thought to be important for the maintenance of neurons.

Unfortunately, the quantities of these messengers produced by the gut bacteria are relatively small, but this again demonstrates how intricately linked the microbiota and the brain truly are.

Serotonin especially is the most studied neurotransmitter in relation to mental illness for its implications in anxiety and depressive disorders. Tryptophan, an essential amino acid obtained from the diet in eggs, fish, and nuts, is a precursor for serotonin synthesis in the brain, although most of it is metabolised with the help of the microbiota in the gut via the kynurenine pathway. Certain meta-

bolic intermediates of this pathway, specifically kynurenic acid and quinolinic acid, are neuroactive.

Kynurenic acid has been shown to have neuroprotective properties, whereas quinolinic acid and kynurenine have been implicated as depressogenic. Therefore, an imbalance in these intermediates of the kynurenine pathway may play a role in depression.

Lastly to highlight the bidirectional characteristic of the “gutbrain” axis, more recent studies have demonstrated that psychotropic medications can alter the composition of the microbiome.

Of most relevance is that serotonin-specific reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) antidepressants appear

to alter the microbiota. This research is still in its early stages and no clear evidence exists, but it is something to remain aware of with alterations in the composition of neurotransmitters of the brain affecting the gut microbiome.

In order to put the complexity of this topic all into perspective, the genome of the bacteria in the human gut massively exceeds the amount of human DNA present in the whole body or every one human gene, there are over 100 bacterial genes. Understanding the complexity of the interaction between our bodies and these resident bacteria in the gut is essential for the future of physical and mental health. Hopefully, further research will be performed in this field and more correlations drawn between psychiatric illness and microbiota composition, but for now, the future looks promising.

PHOTO VIA SANADOR2.0/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

SciTech

You have to be orchid-ing

PHOTOS VIA MARGAUX JULIEN

The rare and protected species of orchid, serapias neglecta, is only found on the southern coast of France, Italy, and the eastern coast of the Adriatic.

But no population is as rich and abundant as the one recently discovered on the Solernzara military base in Corsica.

Researchers believe the orchid thrives in the lowcompetition environment created by the base’s regular cutting of the surrounding grass. Nonetheless, a survey of the base revealed more than 550 different species of plants, inclduing 19 which are legally protected in France.

Coming soon: the TRINITY NEWS app All of the latest in news, commentary and culture from Ireland’s oldest student newspaper, all in one place.

Made possible by a grant from Trinity College Dublin Association & Trust. For more information see tcd.ie/alumni, or @TCDTrust on Twitter

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

Groundhog day for baseball fans River Cooke page 30

PHOTO VIA REPT0N1X/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Sport

Dublin came into the weekend without a win to their name and were desperately looking to pick up two points Shane Patrick Donnellan Contributing Writer

I

’d say the inter-county hurlers of the nation were glad that they weren’t in action this week, as the third round of the GAA National Football League was a wet and windy affair. 16 matches were scheduled, of which five were postponed due to unplayable conditions.

Dublin came into the weekend without a win to their name and were desperately looking to get the 2 points from their encounter with Mayo on Saturday night. If history was anything to go by, those 2 points would be the Jackeen’s, as Mayo hadn’t won a league match against Dublin in Dublin since

1971. Mayo also had cause for optimism after last year’s epic All-Ireland semi-final, where they forced the match to extra-time, with Dublin blowing a 6-point half-time lead in the process.

The first quarter was close, with frees from Dean Rock helping Dublin to a 5-4 lead at the 19th minute. However, an unorthodox goal by Jack Carney (Carney kicked the ball off the post, which then rebounded into the net of Dublin goalie Comerford’s head) put a complete stop to any rhythm Dublin might have been building.

The Dubs gallantly clawed back level – 0-8 to 1-5. Dublin’s confidence was further damaged when Aidan Orme palmed the ball into Evan Comerford’s empty net three minutes before half-time. At halftime, Mayo were three points up, 2-6 to Dublin’s nine points.

After the break, two wasted shots in the first five minutes hindered Dublin’s potential to mount a new challenge. Mayo answered back with a beautifully shot 45 from the boot of goalkeeper Rob Hennelly to put them four points in the clear. For the next while, Dublin dominated the game, with Lorcan O’Dell’s goal chance being the closest they got to wrestling back control of the game. Once again, the wides hurt Dublin, with Mayo much more able to convert

the chances they had. A few high balls into the square around the seventieth minute might have raised the collective heart rate of County Mayo, but Mayo’s victory seemed imminent from the time their second goal was scored.

It finished up in Croke Park Dublin 0-12 to Mayo’s 2-11. This doesn’t bode well for Dublin’s status as a Division one team. To ensure their place at the top, Dublin will have to win all of their remaining four games, a tall order considering they must play Kildare, Tyrone and Monaghan away from the comfortable confines of Croke Park. A win for Kildare next week would give hope to all the Leinster counties that an end can be put to Dublin’s chance of twelve consecutive Leinster titles this summer.

Mayo will fancy their chances against an on- form Armagh in Dr Hyde Park next weekend.

Elsewhere on Saturday night, Armagh drew with Monaghan, Antrim beat Wicklow and Carlow bounced back well from their 25-point defeat to Sligo by claiming a win against Waterford.

Sunday brought with it rain, wind and the first ever female referee of a National Football League match. Maggie Farrelly officiated the meeting of Leitrim and London in Connacht GAA’s centre of excellence in Bekan, County Mayo.

In 2015, Farrelly became the first female referee of a man’s intercounty match, a match between Monaghan and Fermanagh in the Ulster MFC. A year later, she took charge of her first senior intercounty match, when Fermanagh met St. Mary’s University College from Belfast in 2016’s Dr McKenna Cup. “I referee matches at different levels week in week out,” she said after the match. “Yes this is a historic moment but it is done now. I don’t get too fussed about these things.” London came from behind to claim victory, as well as maintain their perfect record in Division four, something London doesn’t normally do in the League.

It finished up 9 points to Leitrim, 2-5 to London.

In Division three, Micky Harte’s Louth managed to overcome a 5-point deficit to Limerick, with fifteen minutes left on the clock. The match was moved from the Gaelic Grounds to the University of Limerick’s all-weather pitch 90 minutes before throw-in. Four points from Louth’s Sam Mulroy, one of which was a 45, reinvigorated the Leinster side, with Louth eventually finishing up 1- 14 to 1-12.

Kerry hosted Donegal in Fitzgerald Stadium in Killarney, in conditions that could only be described as miserable. The Kingdom

lined out in their traditional blue alternate jersey, while Donegal wore white, as both counties use green and gold as their first colours.

Kerry, playing with a strong wind in the first half, opened up the scoring with Seánaí O’Shea slotting over a sideline ball from a tight angle inside Donegal’s 21.

This was added to by Killian Spillane, who got a point on the 4 minute mark.

A pair of hand-passed points

by Rory and Shane O’Donnell kept Donegal in touch, however, after that Kerry pushed on and put considerable distance between the teams. Helped by three points from Seán O’Shea, two of which were frees, Kerry went into the dressing room at half- time with a 7-point lead, 9 points to 2.

The sun was shining when the teams came out for the second half. David Clifford came on the field in the forty-third minute, and five minutes later got the game’s first and only goal, in the most accidental of ways. A missed kick for a point by Clifford 25 or so metres out wasn’t dealt with correctly

by Donegal keeper Shaun Patton and ended up slipping through his hands and into the back of the net. The match ended 1-13 to Kerry, 0-7 to Donegal, after Seánaí O’Shea got his seventh point of the match.

Elsewhere on Sunday, current All-Ireland champions Tyrone scraped past the Lilywhites for their first win of the league and Derry reaffirmed their top spot in Division 2 with a win over Cork.

Roscommon and Clare both drew in a low scoring affair in Dr Hyde Park, finishing up 9 points apiece.

Meath and Down both also failed to get their first win of the league when they drew 2-6 each in Páirc Tailteann in Navan.

Results Division 1: Armagh 1-7 – 0-10 Monaghan Dublin 0-12 – 2-11 Mayo Kerry 1-13 – 0-7 Donegal Tyrone 2-7 – 0-12 Kildare Division 2: Galway v Offaly postponed Derry 1-13 – 0-7 Cork Roscommon 0-9 – 0-9 Clare Meath 2-6 – 2-6 Down Division 3: Fermanagh v Laois postponed Antrim 2-10 – 1-7 Wicklow Westmeath v Longford postponed Limerick 1-12 – 1-14 Louth Division 4: Carlow 2-12 – 2-8 Waterford Leitrim 0-9 – 2-5 London Sligo v Cavan postponed Wexford v Tipperary postponed

Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

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Sport

Groundhog Day for baseball fans River Cooke Contributing Writer

H

ere we are again.

The clock hits 6:00 a.m. EST. Sonny and Cher’s “I Got You Babe” starts playing. Denizens of and visitors to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania eagerly await the groundhog’s prediction. And Major League Baseball is locked out again.

I have enjoyed this paper’s coverage of the great sport of baseball—editorial support for the filthy, cheating Astros notwithstanding—courtesy of my sitcom arch-nemesis Jack Kennedy for some time now, and have been eagerly anticipating the start of the new season for many months after my Mariners came within two games of making their first playoffs in twenty years. However, as I have observed the off-season through the winter, it became quickly apparent that baseball might not come back as early as the first of April, which was the scheduled date. By February, I quickly came to realise it may not come back at all, at least not in 2022, and as we have come closer still to April that sinking feeling has increasingly been vindicated by reality.

It may not be apparent to those not watching closely why this is; work stoppages are nothing short of calamitous for the health of any sport, as they trade on visibility

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By February, I quickly came to realise baseball may not come back at all, at least not in 2022.

That feeling has been vindicated by reality

and currency. If baseball isn’t on, it is quickly forgotten about, and yet we are on the verge of our second such incident in three years. This doesn’t seem like a risk that the sport can afford to take, especially given the simply appalling attendance numbers over the last five years.

And yet, here we are. At this point, I feel I might be able to lend my perspective in order to help readers who have not ruined their sleep pattern staying up to watch American League West games why baseball team owners are about to potentially cut off their nose to spite their face.

Major League Baseball has, quite simply, the most powerful labour union in sports. While union culture as we might understand it did not take off in the United States to the same degree as it did in Europe, the Major League Baseball Players’ Association, founded in 1966, has leveraged the power of the players and their labour to a degree that would put industries on this side of the Atlantic to shame with respect to their say on industry matters. The union has routinely been willing to confront ownership in recognition of adversarial interests, fighting to ensure healthy minimum salaries, the most expansive draft in American sports, and

player control of the way they are marketed. It can take cases to arbitration on players behalf, and it has been behind the loosening of free agent regulations. Player likenesses are licensed through the MLBPA, not MLB itself, which has

“

This is not to say the union is uniformly good; they have shown little solidarity with their Minor League counterparts

led to the amusing historical quirk that labour scabs are not portrayed in video game adaptations of the series – which I love.

This is not to say they are uniformly good; they have shown little solidarity with their Minor League counterparts, neither allowing them into the union or to form a union in their own right, but in a conflict between employees collectively bargaining with ownership, it is far more clear cut that the normal, cynical narrative of “millionaires fighting billionaires.” There is a good side and a bad side. People come to watch the show put on by the players, not the owners. The value is created by the game played on the field, not in the boardroom.

This is not a neutral article.

But this doesn’t answer the question; why are we looking at a year without Major League Baseball? Ultimately, it is due to the expiration of the most recent collective bargaining agreement (CBA). This ceasefire between the PA and MLB is renegotiated every few years upon the eve of its expiry. The first one was negotiated in 1968, ensuring a minimum salary of $10,000 per year, and was written to last for seventeen years, and when it expired in 1981, both parties had to head back to the negotiating table.

This is not a bad thing; inflation, and the changing economy, would mean that a fixed minimum salary would lose its actual value very quickly. However, renegotiation goes both ways, and owners, far from willing to concede more, were eager to see some of the concessions they had allowed be rolled back. This will become a theme.

In 1981, following an eruption in tension over the free agency draft, MLB players used the leverage of their labour and went on strike, hoping that the loss of income would hurt the owners enough to concede. While there had been lockouts over the previous years, this was the first to break into the season, and it would ultimately end after six weeks. An estimated $146 million was lost in revenue due to the cancellation of 713 games, with the players going without an average of $4 million a week in salaries and the owners suffering a total loss of $72 million altogether. In the end, the owners won, with the players agreeing to restrict free agency to players with six or more years of Major League service.

This status quo lasted until December 1993, when the sport, unable to reach an compromise on a new CBA, went on the longest strike in its history (so far), with PHOTO VIA KEITH ALLISON/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

A short, painful history of labour relations in the major leagues

TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

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PHOTO VIA ARTURO PARDAVILA III/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Sport

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2021 had the lowest game attendance since 1984, with some teams having an average of less than 10,000 fans in venues built for 100,000

the players unable to accept the proposed elimination of salary arbitration and empowering of owners to force players to stay by matching salary offers (even if it came with a raise in salaries). It was, as they saw it, a bribe from the owners for players to surrender control over where they played.

The owners, trying to counter this, tried to bring Minor League players—who were not on strike— up to the Major Leagues as replacements, in a serious show of disrespect to the striking players.

For the remainder of their career, no replacement player would be portrayed in any MLB licensed media, and would be the subject of immense scorn. The season had to be cancelled, the 1994 World Series never happened, and in the end ownership lost $580 million, while players lost $230 million.

The strike only ended when future Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor declared that the players should return to the field of play under the terms of the previous agreement until a new one could be negotiated. The greatest leverage the players had, the ability to withhold their labour, had been taken away, and the agreement which was eventually negotiated.

However the impact on baseball was catastrophic. While the 1995 season is a fond one for me to remember, afterwards the sport was not nearly as popular as it had been, and would not return to prelockout levels until the mid-2000s.

When you take yourself off TV, you harm your product as newer and more exciting sports suck up the fresh oxygen. Covid-19, for much the same reason, has been nothing short of a hammer-blow to teams’ revenue, not only during lockdown but in the months after, as so much momentum had been lost.

Taken altogether, 2021 had the lowest game attendance since 1984, with some teams having an average of less than 10,000 fans

in venues built to host 100,000, even in areas with no Covid-19 restrictions. Looking at a stadium on game day was like looking at a ghost town, especially with owners who are guaranteed money through revenue sharing with the league having no incentive to perform, who spend as little as possible on the product so as to squeeze as much as possible out of the guaranteed revenue stream that is a baseball team.

In 2020, in order to get games started again, players compromised on a lot of their benefits, in what they believed to be a temporary measure to be able to play lockdown baseball. This included pay cuts to account for loss of fan attendance, a universal designated hitter rule, and other altered rules. Surprise surprise, the owners’ first priority is to make these concessions permanent, now that the door to them has been opened. And they won’t, at the time of writing, stop until they get it.

To them it is more profitable to have no fans, spend the absolute minimum on players and stadium facilities, and live off the revenuesharing stipend from the league alone, than to invest in the product and attract fans to attend games, short-sighted as this is.

For this reason, when the 2016 CBA expired in late 2021, owners were in no mood to spend any more money on their players. They wish to continue to be rewarded for mediocrity, with no incentive with reasonably flat revenue sharing to improve their teams, and for spending caps to put a ceiling on how much a player can earn, regardless of the value they create.

Across the period of this lockout, the trend has been repetitive; owners make a paltry offer, but signal that their next offer will be in good faith & more substantial, only for that offer to be no different than their previous offers. Far from allowing players to advance their position, the owners are making sure that progress, if it moves at all, only moves towards them. Of course, what is being threatened is incredibly damaging for them; they are not stupid. They understand that a prolonged lockout will harm the sport, and will cause them to haemorrhage fans. However, from all appearances they are willing to live with this, as they understand that time is on their side. As Joe Sheehan put it; “no amount of negotiation short of full capitulation will change [the owners’ position]. That’s the goal

here. Not baseball games, but breaking the union.”

Until they break, or the union falls, there will be no baseball.

“

Until they break, or the union falls, there will be no baseball.

Given the attitudes of owners, I do not expect movement soon

Given the attitudes of owners, I do not expect movement soon. However there are two pieces of good news. First, some enterprising New Jerseyite by the username DidItForTheStory has been drawing increasingly absurdist pictures of Mike Trout for every day of the lockout, and I cannot encourage you enough to check them out. My favourites are days 11, 35, 45, 60, and my absolute favourite two, otherwise known as Troutface.

Secondly, from everything I’ve seen, while the consolidation of the owners as a class—recognising their interests and standing together to crush the union—is disheartening, everything I have seen from the players indicates not only a willingness to see this through to the end, but a determination to. Scherzer, Cole, Semien, and Miller, MLBPA’s negotiators, have all spoken of their determination to win this fight, and Austin Slater has spoken of “a willingness to ride this out as long as it takes” on the part of the players he speaks for – as not only as the Giants’ First Baseman, but its union rep.

Godspeed lads. Go win one for labour.

Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

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Wet weather leads to five postponed GAA matches Shane Patrick Donnellan page 29

Sport

Why MotoGP is maybe the best motorsport And what F1 can learn from it Evan Carron-Kee Contributing Writer

M

otoGP has produced nine last-lap victory battles in the last three years, compared to thirteen since 1983 for F1.

Riders race at speeds of up to 300 mk/h, shifting their position on the bike simultaneously, almost like synchronous divers in the Olympics Formula 1 fans enjoyed perhaps the most exciting season in recent memory last year, as Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen took it right down to the wire in Abu Dhabi. However, such drama has become something of a rarity in F1 - overtaking is hard and smaller teams are completely uncompetitive. F1 is aiming to improve on-track action with new technical regulations, but another top-class prototype racing series has all these problems sorted out. Enter MotoGP; F1, but for motorbikes. The MotoGP season starts on March 6th, and if you already like F1, you should be very excited.

What makes MotoGP so fun to watch? First of all, bikes are a lot smaller than the barge that passes for an F1 car these days, which makes overtakes easier on narrow twisty tracks, such as Portimao or Assen (to see this in action, tune in to a Formula E race). The relatively small size of a bike also makes defensive driving much harder it’s just not possible to cover every possible line through a corner like it is in F1. This leads to aggressive racing and overtakes that happen on track. The current world champion, Fabio Quartararo, made two double overtakes in one race last year - can you imagine this happening with such massive cars in F1? In perhaps the most famous overtake in MotoGP history, at a blind crest before an 18-metre drop known as ‘the corkscrew’, Valentino Rossi pulled off an audacious overtake even as he was pushed off-track by his rival. As someone who once raced at the track (on a Playstation), I can attest to the difficulty of this manoeuvre. The sheer size of a modern F1 car would probably make overtaking impossible at

such a complicated corner.

MotoGP races are also significantly shorter - 40 minutes in comparison F1’s 90 to 120 minutes. This means the grid stays relatively close, and slower riders are rarely lapped. In Qatar last year, the entire grid finished within 16s of each other, which is unheard of in the world of F1. All this together makes for more exciting on-track action that lasts the whole race. To take one crude metric, MotoGP has produced nine last-lap victory battles in the last three years, compared to thirteen since 1983 for F1.

Other problems which plague F1 don’t affect MotoGP; for example, the new regulations focus on improving overtakes by restricting aerodynamic parts these improve speed and braking, but also produce unsteady, ‘dirty’ air, which reduces the efficiency of the aerodynamic parts of any cars behind, slowing them down and making overtaking very hard. By virtue of the small surface area of a bike, aerodynamic parts are very limited in MotoGP so dirty air isn’t a concern. In fact, MotoGP bikes enjoy a strong slipstream effect, where riders get a boost in speed by tucking in behind another rider, thereby reducing drag and improving their speed relative to the rider ahead.

Motorbike racing can be mesmerising to watch too, especially when you realise that a MotoGP rider doesn’t control the bike with only their hands and feet, but with their whole body.

Riders race at speeds of up to 300 mk/h, shifting their position on the bike simultaneously, almost like synchronous divers in the

“

What makes MotoGP so fun to watch? First of all, bikes are a lot smaller than the barge that passes for an F1 car these days

Olympics but with a little more aggression and toxic masculinity.

The key element to watch out for in MotoGP riding styles is the lean angle riders reach when going through tight corners. Riding styles define eras of MotoGP like the technical regulations define eras of F1, from the ‘railroad’ styles of early riders, with barely any lean-angle, to the gravity-defying ‘elbow-out’ style of Marc Marquez, who set the record at 68 degrees of lean and regularly saves crashes by simply propping himself up with his elbow.

Motorsports aren’t only about what happens on the track, though.

The skill and ingenuity needed to build a race car or motorbike is also part of their appeal. Admittedly, there isn’t as much attention paid to technical development in MotoGP as there is in F1, largely because MotoGP regulations are stricter and allow for less divergence between constructors.

However, this has an upside: it keeps teams closer together in terms of performance and makes it feasible for entrants with less funding to compete. MotoGP also offers concessions to teams who record poorer results, allowing them to update engines and other parts throughout the year, while the better teams have to stick with their original components.

Finally, teams are all paid the same amount, apart from factory teams who lease bikes to satellite teams, and thus have higher development costs. These might all seem like obvious steps, but F1 doesn’t offer concessions to new teams - the current teams opposed a plan to offer concessions to Porsche should they join, given that it might improve competition, God forbid. They also pay massive amounts of money to older, established teams such as Ferrari, because again, to do otherwise might make the sport competitive.

Meanwhile in MotoGP, Suzuki rejoined the grid in 2015, and won the Rider’s Championship in 2020 - and their main competition was from a satellite team running old bikes. The F1 analogy would be Alfa Romeo competing with Haas for the title in a 2019 car.

MotoGP is growing in popularity, but it has yet to reach the heights of F1. Yet in many ways, it has almost everything that F1 sorely lacks: overtaking, exciting races, numerous competitive manufacturers, and all with only half the number of wheels. If you’ve never watched motorsports, maybe consider tuning in on March 6th - you might be pleasantly surprised!

TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

An arts and culture round-up for St. Patrick’s Day page 5

Rediscover Christ in a new light page 8

Stories of endometriosis page 14

LIFE

TRINITY NEWS

Pullout section

On Erasmus in Zurich PHOTO BY EMMA LEAVEY

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Table of contents Campus couture - page 6 Trinity’s women who wow - page 4 Ag déileáil leis an chumha thar lear - page 7

A TAF time of year - page 10

How can Ireland tackle stealthing?

- page 8 Dublin international film festival

- page 16

Life staff Editor-in-Chief Life Editor Life Deputy Editor

Jack Kennedy Heather Bruton Eva O’Beirne

Arts & Culture Editor Arts & Culture Deputies

Elena McCrory Oona Kauppi Maisie McGregor

Sex & Relationships Editor Sex & Relationships Co-Editor

Maya Kulukundis

Societies Editor Societies Deputy

Ella-Bleu Kiely Ruth McGann

Student Living Editor Student Living Deputies

Ella Sloane Seán Holland

Lila Funge

Ria Walls

Let’s talk about Erasmus, a For the second part of this series, Ria Walls discusses a year abroad in Switzerland with Emma Leavey

I

n this instalment of Let’s Talk About Erasmus, I spoke with Emma Leavey, a third year law student who is currently studying abroad in Switzerland. Originating from Galway, Leavey is spending the year attending the University of Zurich. On top of her law modules such as Swiss Law and The Art and Science of Negotiation, Leavey also indulged in a two-credit intensive German language course in order to introduce her to the native tongue of her host country.

Erasmus is a great opportunity to branch out from your college friends and meet new people; whether they also go to Trinity or they are from another international university, you are all in the same boat — leaving the familiarity of your home college and moving to a brand new country.

When leaving Ireland, Leavey recounts that although three other Trinity students joined her in

Switzerland, she didn’t know any of them prior to Erasmus. She comments that on their exchange they rarely encounter other Irish or English international students; instead, the majority are from Sweden, Germany or Spain.

However, while one of her main concerns was the language barrier, the majority of residents in Zurich are fluent in English, allowing for smooth communication between the Trinity student and those at the Swiss university.

While describing the actual process of applying as being easy, Leavey is in agreement with what Quinn previously stated: choosing your modules is not a straightforward task. Attending an international university can cause issues in relation to this if you don’t speak the language of the country fluently, and Leavey unfortunately encountered this. Talking to Trinity News, she recounted that “while almost all modules were open to me as an exchange student, the only law modules taught through English are the masters modules”. This meant that she had to have an adequate base knowledge and understanding of certain modules before she was able to take them, instead of being taught from scratch. As she was left with no choice but to take these higher level modules, Leavey felt that the workload of 6-credit masters modules in Zurich were more intense than 10-credit modules at

“

While one of her main concerns was the language barrier, the majority of residents in Zurich are fluent in English Trinity; she stated that “30 credits workload here felt like a lot more than it does at home.” In this situation there isn’t much choice, and for Leavey she had to take on the more challenging modules on offer at her host university as they were all she could understand.

On top of this, the term times are another element that can be considered a drawback for some students on Erasmus. Leavey outlined that “the exam period is really long and classes continue right up until Christmas.” Leavey had to sit an exam on 23 Decem-

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

Society Spotlight

again! ber, affecting her travel home to Ireland for Christmas. Her last exam was at the end of January, causing an exhausting and drawn out exam period. At the end of the academic year, term doesn’t finish until the beginning of July, giving students a very short summer compared to what we get here at Trinity, Leavey explained.

Despite these negative aspects, life outside university proved to be a major highlight for Leavy. Unlike Ireland, the public transport in Switzerland is great, resulting in Leavey and her friends going on trips almost every weekend. They were able to travel the entire length of Switzerland on a train ride that took five hours each way, something which she described as “one of the most amazing experiences”. As well as this, Leavey was able to see sights she had never seen before; going on Erasmus allowed for her first time in this country, and she told of how she hiked and admired the famous Matterhorn Mountain in Zermatt. Leavey describes Christmas in the city as being an outstanding time of year, with ice rinks and Christmas markets to enjoy. Over Christmas they even went skiing — twice! Following her arrival in September, Switzerland had significantly less Covid restrictions than Ireland, meaning not only that nights out and bars could be fully enjoyed, but also that lectures were in person and

Trinity Hiking Ella-Bleu Kiely speaks with Trinity Hiking OCM Robert Gaynor about the hike life

H mask-less.

Similarly to Dublin, life in Zurich has proved to be expensive, which isn’t great for a student on a budget. Leavey stated that a meal in a restaurant comes to 35 Swiss francs (which equates to around 33 euros). Even worse, a single vodka sprite is €15. Aside from the price of nights out, the Erasmus Student Network at her host University have made Leavey’s time there so far very enjoyable through their well organised parties and trips that help exchange students get to know each other.

While it is more common at Trinity to go abroad for one semester, Leavey highly recommends going for the full year, stating “even

“

Similarly to Dublin, life in Zurich has proved to be expensive, which isn’t great for a student on a budget PHOTOS BY EMMA LEAVEY

though I’ve been travelling a lot there’s still so much of Switzerland I have yet to see. If I had to leave already I’d be really disappointed.”

It is a normal experience to encounter culture shock on Erasmus, and there are several elements that Leavey has noticed a difference in while abroad.

For example, she stated that the Swiss people are “definitely more reserved than Irish people”, and described how they don’t get as dressed up to go out as the Irish do, resulting in her being called crazy for wearing a dress without tights. As well as this, Leavey finds that she is often the youngest person in her classes or in social situations as most of the exchange students that she interacts with are older. In terms of the campus, the most treacherous journey for us here at Trinity is having to leg it from the Arts Building to Pearse Street with five minutes to spare — meanwhile, Leavey told us how her campus in Zurich is spread out over the city in a number of different buildings. She also reflects on the confusion in switching from the familiar Blackboard to instead using a variety of different academic platforms for each module, depending on what the specific lecturer wanted to use.

In agreement with Quinn, Leavey believes that the negative aspects of the process of Erasmus are always outweighed by the numerous positives and benefits.

Moving cities is a daunting experience, but — as proven by the fun had by exchange students — is very worthwhile.

iking culture has seemed to have moved up on the social scale in recent years. After being locked up indoors for so long, it was the outside that provided many of us with comfort. It still continues to. I spoke with Robert Gaynor, a second year Computer Science student and current OCM of Trinity Hiking - A STEM student who ventured his way over to the arts block, which he informed me was unknown territory. After a hike up to the sixth floor, we discussed the ins and outs of Trinity Hiking.

“At every meeting each week we literally just have a big map of the Wicklow mountains spread out in front of us”, explained Gaynor on how the society chooses routes for their hikes. “So, we get the map and we basically decide how difficult we want this hike to be. We like to tick off every level to our members. And we let everyone know in the emails beforehand, of course! We always pick areas that committee are familiar with.” A typical Trinity Hiking morning begins on the bus at 9am, which Gaynor described as “a bit rough and bumpy. There are usually always new faces. I suppose everyones a wee bit quiet first thing in the morning, but you step in some mud and after about half an hour everyone’s chatting.”

Gaynor humbly mentioned that on hikes, the Trinity Hiking committee are always on the lookout for members being too wet or too cold - “We’ve always loads of spare stuff with us just in case. Now, I say this as someone who hasn’t done scouts, but it feels sort of like that.” Inside the college sphere, Trinity Hiking collaborates with a diverse range of other societies. “We’re planning a collab with Environmental Soc to do a clean up. We’ve also been talking with some of the art societies to do a Bob Ross mountain painting night.” Stay tuned on the Trinity Hiking Instagram page.

These days, the process of getting your hands on a ticket for a Trinity Hiking hike is similar to one for Harry Styles in the Aviva.

With almost every excursion being sold out, Gaynor believes it’s truly something to do with the separation from city life that’s so appealing to a lot of members: “We’re all out in the wilderness.

It’s so nice getting away from the city centre, you know one hour on the bus and I can’t see a building for miles. It’s great. I think the people who come along who are the most apprehensive are the ones who enjoy it the most.

Sometimes people who come along are like ‘oh, I didn’t realise I needed this.’”

No matter where he ended up, Gaynor knew for definite that he was going to join some sort of hiking group in college. “I’m from the west of Ireland so… There’s not much else to do there.” The county Sligo native’s first hike with the society was at Tonelaghee in the Wicklow mountains. “Most of our hikes on the weekends are in and around the Wicklow mountains. Sometimes for introductory hikes for members or for people wanting something less challenging we’ll head over to Howth or Bray’’, he stated. The second year student also revealed that he has loved his time with Trinity Hiking so far and can’t imagine not being involved. “I find what’s nice about doing stuff like hiking is that no one is allowed to have notions. There’s times on hikes when you’ve seen everyone at their worst. I’m making it sound horrible but it’s all fun I promise”, he laughed.

When asked what he thinks it is about Hiking that appeals to people so much, he first referred to the aesthetics that can often come with the activity: “It’s funny. Like how many people do we know that own a Patagonia jacket of whatever”, he said as I shifted in my Columbia fleece.

“Hiking is good for your physical health, but I think emotionally it’s also a reset. Fresh air and being with people and having nice views is also a huge booster.”

He explained that being a bit battered by the elements empties one’s head completely. As well as giving you time to think - “You’re concentrating on what you’re doing. Now, I do love hiking when it’s dry and sunny, but I find when it’s wet and windy you can’t have any worries. Your feet aren’t getting any more wet than this. You just accept the situation you’re in and you’re like, I’m just going to enjoy this.”

Finally, on being asked if there’s any advice he’d give to first time hikers, Gaynor replied: “Good boots. They are very very important. You need proper ankle support. They don’t need to be fancy expensive brands, but we don’t want any broken ankles around Trinity.” This is your sign to take a break for yourself from being cooped up in lectures or the library. If you feel like doing so within the Trinity community, Trinity Hiking is there and already planning their next hike.

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PHOTOS BY ELIZA MELLER FOR TRINITY NEWS

Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Celebrating Trinity’s women who wow Leanne Healy profiles three women who inspire the college community

E

sme Dunne, a second year College student, is involved with EmpowerHer*Voice; this is a fantastic initiative which Dunne describes as a “global community-based platform for anyone and everyone who has been subjected to misogyny—ciswomen, transwomen, women of colour, white women, disabled women, non-binary people.

Actually, we use the asterix in our name to highlight that all groups encountering gender-related marginalisation that don’t use the pronoun ‘her’ are welcome in our community”.

Dunne describes the “overarching aim” of EmpowerHer*Voice is “to provide a space of collaborative and productive dialogue that brings together artists, creatives, activists, and academics. The voices we platform are typically marginalised or silenced by society—we feel that those on the margins of representation are in

the best position to critique the dominant image”.

Dunne explains how the main goal of EmpowerHer*Voice is to “reshape our shared reality, but that’s pretty big. I don’t think you can go into this kind of thing focusing on the end result—yes, it’s good to know where you’re heading, or hoping to head, but I think with advocacy work if you try to tackle absolutely everything wrong with the world you’ll be so overwhelmed you won’t get anywhere”. Her “dream for EmpowerHer*VoiceDublin is that it becomes a strong community—a safe space. Somewhere to find solace and support, to learn, to empower and be empowered”.

Dunne has been involved with EmpowerHer*Voice for years; she explains how EH*V “was started at my school as a society in 2015, and in 2018, in my final year of school, I was the director of the branch.” Dunne expresses how she has “always had a lot of opinions; I care a lot, I’m angry about almost everything, and I want change.” Dunne explains how she was “craving a community” and her “mental health at school was incredibly turbulent, and EmpowerHer*Voice came to me at a time I really needed it. I needed the support and the divine feminine energy!”.

When discussing her future

“

I envision EH*VDUB as a community, hosting events and talks which raise money for charity.

I want to have talks on sexual assault, body image and eating disorders plans, Dunne explains how there is “so much I want to do! Currently we are trying to build a team—but I want it to reflect our

mission. We aren’t EH*VTCD, we’re EH*VDUB, and so trying to get the word out is imperative, although it’s proving difficult. But on the whole, I envision EH*VDUB as a community, hosting events and talks which raise money for charity. I want to have talks on sexual assault, body image and eating disorders, host film screenings, poetry readings, gigs.”

To any person looking into getting involved in advocacy work, Dunne’s advice is “go for it. Just jump in. It can be hard, but it’s so rewarding, and so important.

Look for a community or organisation that reflects your values, or create one yourself. Maybe start with conversations with your friends—I think that starting small helps you find your feet and gain confidence. But ultimately, I would really encourage people to get involved in advocacy work because inclusivity is everything.

And EH*VDUB is currently looking for members, so if our mission appeals to you, we would love to have you!”.

Eva O’Beirne, a third year student, is a successful journalist who has burst onto the Irish journalism scene, making great strides by writing pieces on relationships, sex, and current affairs.

O’Beirne explains how she has “always been attracted to words and writing down my thoughts. I

was really really shy as a child and I am still quite an anxious person now, so writing down what I feel has always helped me make sense of what I’m feeling.” Looking back on her beginnings as a journalist, O’Beirne recalls how she “didn’t actually commit to being a journalist until my second year of college. I was always inspired by fictional female writers and fancied myself as a Dublin version of Carrie Bradshaw. There’s a certain glamour associated with being a writer and I think it comes from the perspective of not being afraid to voice an opinion”.

She explains how she “always wanted to write in some way but I didn’t realise that journalism could be a career for me. I still have severe imposter syndrome, especially when one of my pieces goes viral or someone I really admire interacts with it. My family is working class and I’m the first person who could afford to be a ‘creative’ which can be quite scary but my family are so proud of me”.

When describing how she comes up with her next idea, O’Beirne explains how she can “find it hard to turn off my brain when it comes to writing or wanting to pitch ideas. You can catch me researching or daydreaming about topics I want to write about a lot. I do have a certain niche of sex, relationships, women’s

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

reproductive health and women’s history and those topics certainly inspire a large amount of my articles”. She “enjoy[s] communicating what is happening in the world to people, especially the news that people may not be immediately aware of ”.

Many writers face an extreme amount of rejection when breaking into the world of journalism, with O’Beirne describing it as “horrible, plain and simple. And it is so hard not to take it personally”, however she “channelled all [her] frustrations in creating new opportunities for [herself]”.

O’Beirne explains how “rejection doesn’t stop when you get your work published or accepted though. You have to face rejection constantly on social media from people who don’t realise you see their harsh comments. She admits that she “can have very low self-esteem and learning not to depend on validation from others was vital to my journalism career”.

When asked what advice she would give to a person hoping to start a career in journalism, O’Beirne emphasises: “don’t doubt what you’re capable of. It is too easy to not think that you’re not good enough to submit your work. Always keep an eye out for opportunities. Don’t take criticism too personally. Take time to be proud of yourself and everything that you’ve done. Don’t compare yourself to others, focus on what you can do to expand your skill set, and ask for help if you don’t know where to go next.”

Francine Ibeh, a second year student, is the current chairperson of The Udoma Subcommittee of the Phil. The Udoma currently consists of Ibeh and her fellow subcommittee members, Annika Ramani & Aeva-May Conway.

Ibeh explains how “the Udoma aims for representsenation students of colour and ethnic minorities in the spheres of public speaking, debating and discourse.”

Ibeh emphasises how the Udoma is “giving a space to ethnic minorities to speak about their own personal experiences. In Trinity there has been a large emphasis on bringing experts to speak about themes such as racism, discrimination and marginalisation but oftentimes you don’t need experts to give an account or to explain these issues because many people in Trinity are going through these things and they are the experts in their own personal lives.”

Ibeh highlights how “the Udoma does not generalise a particular experience or say that all ethinic minorities go through a particular thing, but there are definitely recurring themes, issues and experiences that many ethnic minorities and students of colour face—not just within Trinity. It is highlighting that peer to peer experience and encouraging people to get involved in public speaking and debating”.

Ibeh, a keen debater, “has been debating ever since [she] was 11 years old and started in primary school. She explains how she “got into debating because I am quite a competitive person by nature”.

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I was the only mixed-race girl in my year which consisted of 240 students, so I have always been in an environment where I am the only person of a particular type - whether gender, race, ethnicity, socio-economic background To Ibeh, debating “requires you to listen to what someone is saying to point out the strengths and weaknesses in someone’s argument and it allowed me to hone in and develop my analytical skills.”

Her secondary school debating team consisted only of boys “who were one or two years older”, and as a result of this Ibeh “felt like I had to prove myself ”. The biggest piece of advice Ibeh could give when it comes to getting started in debating is “to just be confident— get in there and do not wait for someone else to do it if you want to get into it.”

Ibeh explains how she was “used to being the only unique person in a room”, reflecting back on times when she “was the only girl who was debating”. Ibeh describes how she “would oftentimes be one of the only public schools debating in competitions.

I was the only mixed-race girl in my year which consisted of 240 students, so I have always been in an environment where I am the only person of a particular type— whether gender, race, ethnicity, socio-economic background—so that experience has taught me to definitely be confident and go for it.” Ibeh urges people to not let these things “define your presence or your ability in anything you do—not just in the world of debating. You deserve to be in the room.”

Your arts and culture round-up for St. Patrick’s Day 2022 Saskia Steinberg previews what’s in store for St. Patrick’s Day 2022

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or the first time in three whole years, St Patrick’s Day celebrations are back! And what better way to celebrate than enjoy a four day weekend? So strap yourselves in for a full schedule of art and culture events to prepare you for the big day.

The Chester Beatty will be hosting three events in the run up to St Patrick’s Day. On Wednesday 16th March at 6.30pm is a celebration of both St Patrick’s Festival and Norouz (Persian New Year) with An Evening with Navá. Navá, a group of young musicians, will be “exploring the relationship between the ancient musical traditions of Ireland and Iran”. Music will range from Irish jigs to Persian dastgáh.

It is a free, first-come-first-serve and inperson event at Chester Beatty, Dublin 2.

Those with a passion for arts and crafts can enjoy two events on Saturday 19th March. At 12 pm, there is the opportunity to make shamrock suncatchers, inspired by stained-glass windows. This event is free and aimed at families, booking is via: https://chesterbeatty.ie/whats-on/ workshop-for-families-shamrocksuncatcher/.

At 3pm, teenagers can enjoy a workshop about Art and Resilience, led by art therapist Andrea Clare Plunkett. Let your imagination flow through working with paper, paints, brushes and markers, challenging both your senses and abilities.

Booking is free but essential, through the Chester Beatty website: https:// chesterbeatty.ie/whats-on/onsite-lab-clubfor-teens-art-and-resilience/.

New to 2022 is the Festival Quarter, in partnership with the National Museum of Ireland. Located in the Museum of Decorative Arts & History, Collins Barracks, Dublin 7, the festival will be running from March 16–20 . It has been described as “a magical day-to-night urban festival for all” and is definitely something

to look forward to. Showing off Ireland’s vibrant culture, the festival will have a massive concert stage, a Craic Comedy Tent and Story Yurt.

During the day, there will be film screenings, circus and science shows and a variety of games. Notable mentions to Bloco Atha Cliath, an exciting Urban music event featuring music ranging from celtic to drill, and a talk from The Indo Daily Podcast. At night, there will be a celebration of contemporary and traditional music. What could entice you more than Damien Dempsey on Friday and Malaki on Saturday?

Tickets are on-sale now via https:// stpatricksfestival.ie/blog/tickets-on-salethis-friday, ranging from €10–€20.

And if you haven’t been persuaded enough, the Irish Food and Craft Village will also be at the Festival. Food will be ranging from poutine to BBQ with a selection of craft beverages and refreshments, accompanied by live music and entertainment from the Festival Bandstand. Unlike the other events, entry is free and tickets aren’t required; however, it’s over 18s only!

For those who are craving calm amidst the celebrations, the Breathe Festival will be taking place on Friday and Saturday. The Festival will consist of yoga and mindfulness classes, as well as talks, and a mobile sauna! It’ll be located at The Law Society, Dublin 7. Tickets are between €10-€15 and are on-sale now via https://happenings.usheru.com/incinema/breathe-roadshow/law-societydublin?idFestival=203.

And finally, the National St. Patrick’s Day Parade will be back on March 17, with this year’s theme being Connections/ Naisc. The festival is a celebration of Irish culture, arts and heritage, combining both contemporary and traditional elements.

It’s always a hit with families but this year it’s undoubtedly going to be a spectacle for all! Starting at 12pm, the parade starts at O’Connell Street, ending on Nicholas Street. While it’s free to watch, grandstand tickets VIP packages are available to purchase via https://stpatricksfestival.ie/ events/parade.

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What do Trinity Fashion Society look for in campus couture?

Ria Walls speaks with Trinity Fashion Society’s campus photographers

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istorically, there are no other Irish colleges that come to mind that can even compare to the fashion standards that Trinity has set.

Walking around the Arts Building is like a fashion show in itself.

Recently, Trinity Fashion Society (Fashion Soc) has started an Instagram series entitled Campus Couture, which aims to showcase the most fashionable students spotted walking around College. In order to gain further perspective, I spoke with Fashion Soc members Ryan Byrne and Juno McCloskey, the society’s social media ambassadors, who are responsible for the creation of the popular ongoing series.

When discussing what inspired them to start up this online phenomenon at the beginning of Michaelmas Term last September, Byrne revealed to Trinity News that it was evident to Fashion Soc that students at Trinity have a very elevated sense of style. He noticed that “walking into Trinity is like walking into Paris Fashion Week” — a statement that many of us can agree with as we scramble to piece together an outfit before class.

The series was started to encourage students to wear whatever they want into college; McCloskey stated that “we wanted something that would show everyone, including people that aren’t necessarily members of the fashion society, how confident and unique people are on campus.” Weekly, the pair snap pictures of individuals on campus and then choose the best ten styles to feature on the society’s Instagram page (@fashionsoctcd).

While scouting potential fashion features, McCloskey recounted that they don’t look for anything in particular but instead focus on “anyone who obviously uses their clothes and accessories as a means to express themselves.

We look for people that stand out from the crowd and make brave fashion decisions.” Bryne believes that “there’s nothing more exciting than seeing people have fun with their outfits, and it seems since starting Campus Couture the outfits keep getting better.”

People often stereotype the “typical Arts Building student”, but McCloskey focuses on the individuality that is constantly found: “There are definitely stereotypical items of clothing that people associate with Trinity students, for example leather jackets, tote bags and Docs. If you think about it

though, these are great items that are stereotypical because they are all cool, even if a lot of people are wearing them.” For Fashion Soc, the Arts Building is a hotspot to be spotted and snapped. Byrne shared that “it seems this is where 90% of all pictures featured on campus couture are taken!” If you’re wanting to see yourself on the Instagram page, McCloskey advises that “confidence and authenticity are essential.”

Since beginning the online series the society have noticed an increase in their Instagram engagement. The Campus Couture posts gain around 1000 likes every post, while on average their other posts would reach 200-300. As well as this, the page gains continuous followers because of the popularity of Campus Couture; Byrne even commented that there have been over 700 new accounts following the Fashion Soc page since the series began. This surge in following has also increased the popularity of events held by the society to the point that they are regularly sold out!

I asked both Byrne and McClo-

skey for their favourite outfits that have featured on Campus Couture so far. Talking about the outfits below, Byrne feels that these images “demonstrate Trinity’s sense of style as a whole, representing a nice equilibrium of style.” McCloskey then commented: “I think it is really interesting that although these people have completely different styles, they are all wearing a staple pair of black boots. I think black boots are one of the most important items someone can own and I just thought it was really cool how they all had this in common.”

Trinity offers a wide variety in style and Byrne stated that “one minute we see mixing and matching with every colour of the rainbow and next we see monotone fits of blacks and beiges.” So, next time you’re getting ready for college and you feel hesitant about wearing a daring piece, just do it! As McCloskey said, “it’s so important to not take it too seriously, and to just have fun and be creative. Fashion should be used as a tool to express who you are and what you want people to know about you.”

Are the Gardaí r cyber-flashing?

Eva O’Beirne tackles the precarious legislation around online sexual harassment

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n 17 January 2022, an online Zoom vigil for Ashling Murphy was interrupted by a man who “cyberflashed” the attendees. He exposed himself and masturbated. On 23 February 2022, a Zoom webinar on violence against women was crashed by several individuals who shouted sexist and racist abuse and shared pornographic content. These incidents are notable, but to most women on the internet, being flashed nonconsensually is almost an everyday occurrence.

Cyber-flashing is far from a new concept, arguably it has existed since the invention of emails and text messages. From what we’ve seen in the past, copycat incidences are on the rise and they’re not being deterred from happening. Minister for Justice, Helen McEntee, recently spoke in the Dáil on the issue, underlining that it is technically illegal in Ireland due to the Sexual Offences Act 2017. “Flashing” is not restricted to physical places and “would also apply in the online context” according to the Minister. In addition, she said “it

PHOTO BY TRINITY FASHION SOCIETY

is an offence under section 45(3) of that Act to intentionally engage in offensive conduct of a sexual nature.”

One must consider that there was supposed to be a specific section of the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Act 2020, colloquially known as Coco’s Law, that would make the specific act of cyber-flashing illegal. But it was abandoned due to complications and the fact that it would delay the process of making image-based sexual abuse illegal.

I think the lack of detail opens up too many opportunities for Gardaí to undermine victims and for the general public to misunderstand the severity of the issue.

And I’m not the only one. Dr. Catherine O’Sullivan, a lecturer in criminal law and criminology at University College Cork, has previously spoken out about the issue of defining a “public place” when it comes to the internet.

In reference to Section 45 of the Sexual Offences Act 2017, she said: “There is a definition of public place given in the section, but because when we think of a public place, we think of a physical public place as opposed to a virtual one, I don’t know would this section apply.” Furthermore, the definition of “grossly offensive” communication under Coco’s Law could be manipulated by a judge or jury, according to Dr. O’Sullivan.

Surely this should set alarm bells ringing. We do live in a

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Ag déileáil leis an chumha thar lear Labhraíonn Niamh Ní Dhubhaigh le mic léinn faoin chumha i ndiaidh an bhaile agus tú ag staidéar thar lear

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ready to tackle horrifically misogynistic society, whether we want to admit it or not. Lest we forget, in 2021 it was brought to light that over 3,000 domestic abuse calls were marked as “cancelled” and ignored by Gardaí. Even in the cases where they were allegedly marked as cancelled by accident, when gardaí called to domestic violence victims’ homes, they failed to follow procedures for dealing with such cases. If Gardaí cannot respond effectively to physically reported crimes, how can they be trusted in the virtual sphere?

We’ve seen how the Gardaí have acted in response to a national cybercrime incident before.

In November 2020, Garda Commissioner, Drew Harris, couldn’t admit the extent of the infamous Discord leak. Despite activists’ claims that over 40,000 images had been leaked and that child pornography had been found amongst the files, Harris asserted to national media that Gardaí were not investigating any crimes in relation to the leak. He also claimed that no formal complaints had been made, which contradicted the stories of several victims.

Perhaps it is the backlash around this incident that has motivated Minister McEntee to throw her support behind the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill.

Proposed by Minister for Culture, Catherine Martin, the Bill will establish a Media Commission to replace the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland and provide for the appointment of an Online

Safety Commissioner who will oversee the establishment of a regulatory framework for online safety. According to McEntee, this commissioner will “devise online safety codes requiring certain designated online services to operate appropriate systems and processes to minimise the availability of some of the most serious forms of harmful online content.”

But will this Online Safety Commissioner truly be able to monitor illicit activities in a system that is barely equipped to treat victims with respect? Even McEntee conceded that “the training for lawyers, gardaí, and judges may be outdated and may not have taken account of how the internet can facilitate sexual violence and digital abuse.” Afterall, you could argue that the categorisation of IBSA into a harmful communications bill instead of legislation that deals primarily with sexual violence minimises victims’ experiences.

At the end of the day, we need to properly enforce punishments around this kind of behaviour, to remove the power trip that individuals may get from sexually harassing people online.

We can’t have laws that “appear” to be enough to tackle what is a traumatic thing that so many of us face on a daily basis. A promised commission, a future committee.

All these policies are coming far too late.

hart ar mhí ó shin, bhí mé ag ullmhú do m’aistear go Páras i gcomhair Erasmus.

Agus mé ag déanamh machnamh ar na smaointe a bhí agam ag an am, níor shíl mé riamh go mbeadh deacrachtaí agam.

Nuair a bhog mé ó Dhún na nGall go Baile Átha Cliath cúpla bliain ó shin, shocraigh mé isteach láithreach i dtranglam Hallaí na Tríonóide. Réitigh mé le mo chomrádaithe tí ón fhíorthús agus thit mé i ngrá le trup trap na cathrach.

Cuir ar aghaidh go dtí an lá inniu, tá mé i stiúideo beag bídeach i gcathair úrnua. Ní raibh aithne agam ar éinne nuair a shroich mé an chathair agus ní raibh mé cleachtaithe leis an chóras ollscoile nua. Cha raibh mé ach ag iarraidh filleadh ar Éirinn chun mo chuid cairde a fheiceáil agus bheith i rang beag clúthar i mBloc na hEalaíona.

Thosaigh mé ag smaoineamh ar na mílte mic léinn as a bhog thar lear chun freastal ar Choláiste na Tríonóide, nó a d’imigh thar sáile ar feadh téarma chun staidéar a

dhéanamh i dtír nua. Ba mhisniúil an mhaise dóibh é sin a dhéanamh.

Bhí tacaíocht uaim, agus thosaigh mé ag brath ar chuid de na mic léinn seo le haghaidh comhairle.

Labhair mé le Pádraig Mac Brádaigh, mac léann a bhog ó NuaEabhrac go Baile Átha Cliath chun staidéar a dhéanamh ar an Luath agus an Nua-Ghaeilge. Dúirt sé nár “mhothaigh mé cumha nuair a bhog mé ar dtús go hÉirinn, ach tar éis tamaill, mhothaigh mé píosa cumha nuair a rith sé liom nár thuig achan duine mo chuid nósanna féin - mo chuid nósanna a bhaineann leis an Bhéarla, le nósanna cainte agus rudaí mar sin.”

Chuaigh Gráinne Nic Cathmhaoil go Lyon sa Fhrainc i gcomhair Erasmus an téarma seo caite.

Nuair a cheistigh mé í faoin chumha, dúirt sí, “Níor mhothaigh mé cumha i ndiaidh an bhaile ar Erasmus ach mhothaigh mé cumha i ndiaidh córas a raibh aithne agam air (...) an córas oideachais agus an teorann teanga, bhí na rudaí sin difriúil agus deacair.”

Thuig mé na ráitis seo go huile is go hiomlán. Tá mé cleachtaithe le teanga na Fraincise, ach ní shílim gur féidir a bheith go hiomlán cleachtaithe le nósanna muintir tíre eile sula mbogtar ann. Chuir sé isteach orm ar dtús nuair a thosaigh mé ag labhairt i bhFraincis le duine, agus nuair a d’fhreagair siad i mBéarla. Cén chaoi a raibh a fhios acu? Sa deireadh, thuig mé go raibh na daoine seo ag iarraidh cúnamh uaim chun a gcuid

Béarla a chleachtadh. Maidir leis an choláiste, chaoinigh mé córas Choláiste na Tríonóide. Bhí na mílte tascanna le críochnú agam sular thosaigh na ranganna anseo fiú. Ach ar an lámh eile, mhéadaigh m’fhéinmhuinín agus mhothaigh mé chomh bródúil asam féin ina dhiaidh.

Más rud é go mbeidh tusa ag dul thar lear chun staidéar a dhéanamh, nó más rud é nach bhfuil tú socraithe agus tú ar shiúl ón bhaile go fóill, seo cúpla nod duit. De réir Phádraig, “déarfainn le haon duine atá ag dul thar lear mar chomhairle, gur chóir dóibh dul isteach sa chultúr agus bheith sóisialta. Bainfidh sé sin an suaitheadh cultúir atá ort díot – foghlaim nósanna dúchasacha na tíre.” Mar chomhairle, dúirt Gráinne, “Déan iarracht bheith i do chónaí le daoine dúchasacha na tíre. Is bealach iontach é an teanga a labhairt agus chun a bheith níos compordaí leis na daoine ón tír sin.”

Níl aon amhras go mbeidh deacarachtaí ag baint le d’aistear ar shiúl ón bhaile. Déan do dhícheall, labhair le daoine nua, déan iarracht ‘sea’ a rá níos minice ná a mhalairt agus foghlaim faoi chultúr na tíre. Tá mise ag déanamh na n-iarrachtaí seo mé féin, agus creidim go socróidh mé sa chathair nua seo gan mhoill. Tar éis an tsaoil, beidh an baile fós ann nuair a fhilleann tú.

PHOTO BY NIAMH N NÍ DHUBHAIGH FOR TRINITY NEWS

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How can Ireland tackle stealthing?

Eva O’Beirne discusses the lack of popular awareness of this issue

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or those who don’t know, “stealthing” is a colloquial term for the act of removing a condom during sex without the consent of the partner. It’s illegal in many places such as the UK, and is a form of sexual assault. In October 2021, California became the first US state to adopt a law explicitly making the practice illegal.

Over five years ago, the Columbia Journal of Gender and Law published a paper by Alexandra Brodsky detailing the “new sex trend” and its emotional impact on victims. Fears around pregnancy and STIs were most prevalent. One victim named Rebecca told Brodsky, “None of it worried him. It didn’t perturb him. My potential pregnancy, my potential STI, that was my burden.”Another victim interviewed for the study said, “The harm mostly had to do with trust. He saw the risk as zero for himself and took no interest in what it might be for me and from a friend and sexual partner. That hurt.” One victim quoted even referred to the act of stealthing as “rape-adjacent.”

I fear stealthing suffers the same issue as many other kinds of sexual assault where people

may not be aware that what has happened to them is assault or that they can pursue legal action when it does. Irish legislation appears to have covered the practice without realising due to what is known as “conditional consent” under Irish criminal law; but just because something is technically illegal doesn’t mean the population is informed. Figures released from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) show a 35% increase in rape prosecutions in 2020, but according to the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, only 14% of rape cases make it to court.

Many victims simply do not come forward, and that is because Ireland’s handling of sexual assault is notoriously poor. Around 90% of rapes aren’t reported in Ireland.

The gaping holes in Ireland’s sex education system have prevented and will prevent the spread of knowledge about stealthing being a form of rape. The Relationships and Sexual Education (RSE) program barely touches on nonheterosexual intercourse or pleasure, so I highly doubt teachers are willing to tackle the nonconsensual removal of condoms during sex and the reasons why a person would do such a thing. It’s worth noting there is also a fairly significant volume of stealthing videos on sites like PornHub, which could misinform teenagers about what sex should be like.

You have to realise that the lack of specificity when it comes to sexual assault encourages a culture where we are not equipped to talk about traumatic events that happen to us.

Without popular culture, I doubt

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None of it worried him.

It didn’t perturb him.

My potential pregnancy, my potential STI, that was my burden

many of us would understand what stealthing is.

Fresh discourse around the topic came with the launch of the HBO series I May Destroy You, which featured a storyline in which the protagonist Arabella (Michaela Coel) is a victim of stealthing.

The series served as a point of awakening for many people who had condoms removed during sex without their knowledge, and underlined the severity of the assault they experienced. “He’s not rape-adjacent or a bit rapey: he’s a rapist,” Arabella declares, in what is one of the first, if not the first TV series to display the concept of stealthing.

Ireland cannot tackle stealthing until it has adequate consent education, and we’ve been screaming about this issue for years. According to research carried out among 2,150 students by the National University of Ireland Galway (NUI Galway) SMART Consent team, just 15% of women and 20% of men admitted to being content with their sex education at school. In fact, no school is obliged to follow any standard RSE program, instead, it can simply be taught “within the ethos of the school”.

Perhaps what will really motivate the government is a survey on the issue that reveals the extent of the problem but even then, can we expect a proper response? When commenting on the results of a Department of Higher and Further Education survey on sexual violence and harassment in thirdlevel education, Minister Simon Harris and Dr. Pádraig MacNeela had horrifyingly inappropriate responses. With over 8,000 student participants, it provided a startling insight into the reality of sexual assault on college campuses. 14% of students said someone had oral sex with them while they were incapacitated and unable to give consent, seven per cent said they had been physically forced into oral sex. 34.2% of female students had experienced vaginal rape through coercion, incapacitation, force, or threat of force.

Despite these horrifying numbers, the department focused on the result of the survey that indicated the majority of students “feel safe” reporting these incidences, and Minister for Higher Education, Simon Harris, began his statement by welcoming the “positive developments” indicated by some survey results.

Dr Pádraig MacNeela, the academic leading the analysis of the report responded in the same way. For context, 79 per cent of male students reported feeling safe socialising at night on campus, compared to just 22 per cent of female students. Just over half of female students said they even felt safe during the day.

Unfortunately, a lot of stealthing awareness and condemnation looks like it’s going to come from social media, individual activism and sex and relationships writers, at least in an Irish context. Our “conditional consent” model could hold up in court, but the majority of victims simply may not know what happened to them was rape and hence won’t report it for fear of social ostracisation. And from what we’ve seen, the government has no issue putting it on the back burner.

Redisc Ella Sloane discusses Christ and His Cousin: Renaissance Rediscoveries with curator Dr Aoife Brady at the National Gallery of Ireland

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unning until 8 May 2022 with free admissions, Christ and His Cousin: Renaissance Rediscoveries offers its viewers a unique “window into the past”, and is rife with symbolism recognisable to any Renaissance expert, or lover. The exhibition consists of eight oil paintings dating from the 16th century, all of which playfully depict scenes of the Virgin Mary alongside Jesus and St. John the Baptist as infants. I spoke to curator Dr. Aoife Brady from the National Gallery to gain an insight into the

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After the large restoration project, revealing the vivid masked imagery, Brady immersed herself in curatorial work in preparation for their exhibition

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

cover Christ in a new light stories behind these paintings, the transformative conservation process that they underwent, and her own curatorial work.

Interestingly, Brady explained that these paintings are very diverse in their periods of acquisition, ranging from the early years of the gallery’s formation in the 1850s until around 1960. Despite some being acquired over a century ago, many of these pieces have never been seen by the public.

Before being displayed they went through an extensive restoration process headed by the Gallery’s Head of Conservation Simone Mancini, spanning approximately 15 years. Brady described how the new clarity achieved through this process allowed their team to not only reassess the works’ authorship and date, but also provided them with a renewed appreciation for the compositions themselves. Brady stated that “as decades of dust and aged varnish were removed from the canvas and panels, hidden details began to emerge from the depths of this murkiness, revealing complex and fun compositions brimming with symbolism.”

After the large restoration project, revealing the vivid masked imagery, Brady immersed herself in curatorial work in preparation for their exhibition in the Hugh Lane room. This involved realms of research to explore how best to interpret these works and tie them together with an overarching narrative theme. Brady reveals that one of her favourite parts of the curation was “the day you get to hang”. This is carefully planned in advance using a 3D modelling software which helps you to clearly visualise the paintings that will be hung in the exhibition space.

Brady explained that “everything from the paintings’ security to their appearance has to be considered.”

When asked which is her favourite piece, Brady directed me towards a charming portrait

by Florentine artist Fransesco Bacchiacca, aptly entitled The Virgin and Child with Saint John the Baptist (1492-1544).

She explained that this is one of the few works in the exhibition with a definite identifiable artist. Bacchiacca was one of the major exponents of Mannerism, an artistic style that emerged and dominated Italy between the Renaissance and Baroque periods. Brady explained the unique appeal of the painting’s composition which she felt “reads almost like a modern photograph.” She continued to describe the naturalistic sense that exudes from the painting as we witness the Christ child tugging his mother’s hair and an infant St. John grinning back at us. “John

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Asked why it is so important that the National Gallery shows this exhibition and works like those included in it to the public for free, Brady replies simply: “because they belong to you” the Baptist is usually depicted wearing camel hair, but here he’s been given a very trendy looking leopard print robe,” Brady pointed out. This is a tradition that artists began to adopt in the latter half of the 16th century due to John’s association with Baccus, the Roman god of wine, producing a distinctive intermingling of pagan and Christian iconography.

Both figures were known for their wildness and as disruptors of convention. The painting’s “wacky acidic palette” and dreamy character expressions are complemented by a bright green background, instantly grabbing the viewer’s attention.

More fascinating symbolism within the paintings provide clues which prophesy Christ’s later crucifixion. Dr. Brady turned to a piece attributed to an artist from the studio of Antonio del Ceraiolo as an example, demonstrating just some of the “visual puzzles that Renaissance viewers would have been able to interpret quite readily”. An infant Jesus is pictured holding a goldfinch, often seen as a prefiguration of his crucifixion. The delicate bird perched in his hands is said to have received the characteristic red plumage on its head when it plucked a thorn from the forehead of Christ during his crucifixion.

Coral bracelets worn by Jesus and his cousin John also prophesy his

later suffering — their bright red colour symbolises his blood shed during the Passion. Further details include lilies in the painting’s background, which relate to the innocence and purity of the two infant children, and the traditional Marian colours of red and blue, representing her divine love, purity and royalty.

When asked why it is so important that the National Gallery shows this exhibition and works like those included in it to the public for free, Brady replied simply: “because they belong to you”. She continued, stating “it is important that people have an

opportunity to see things that are in storage that might not be accessible on a regular basis. This is a collection that belongs to everyone in the nation.”

Closing our conversation, Brady encouraged everyone to come and take a look at the paintings on display which encapsulate “a wide array of approaches” in their treatment of Christ and his young relative, John the Baptist, ranging from “severe to naturalistic”, to “softly painted and sharply delineated”, to “bright to dark”. She concluded: “ I think it’s important from your readers perspective that they are

not put off by the religious nature of this exhibition because it is a lot more about storytelling and legend and 16th century civic life, than it is about Christianity.

In fact, these paintings were not all destined for ecclesiastical settings, many were hung up in people’s homes.” Certainly the captivating variety of artistic styles and compositions included in this exhibition centred on Christ and his cousin, combined with the wealth of symbolism deftly incorporated into each piece, reveals something of wonder for everyone.

Giovanni Antonio Sogliani (1492-1544), The Virgin and Child with Saint John the Baptist, 1620-1630, Oil on Panel, Unframed: 64cm x 56cm. Photo © National Gallery of Ireland, NGI.4089.

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A TAF Time of Year Ella-Bleu Kiely speaks with TAF festival director Seirce Mhac Conghail on the nature of the society

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his year’s Trinity Arts Festival (TAF) week began on the day devoted to romance.

Running from 14-16 February, the society of tote bags and glitter held events every day from morning to night ranging from scrambled egg workshops, pop-up plays, live gigs, and a botanical campus tour. What inspired the TAF committee for this year’s festivities was the yearning for a jolt back to real life. And, also, the yearning for “a bop’’, shared TAF Festival Director Seirce Mhac Conghail. The society aimed to provide this for students alongside a short shock of art and its usual madness.

In the past few years, the cultural scene in Dublin has struggled significantly; the idea of creating something without the barriers that have cropped up in the past two years was purely exciting to TAF. “It was just so great and inspirational thinking and planning how we could actually work with so many local artists and performers in person this year … It’s all about bringing together the external and different threads to merge in TAF. We make a stage for the art,” Mhac Conghail said.

Most of Trinity’s societies will hold their own traditions, and TAF is no exception. Mhac Conghail, after pondering TAF’s unique customs, stated: “I’m not one for holding on to certain traditions if it doesn’t have value or it’s not fun anymore. That being said, there’s loads of TAF traditions that I’d like to see live on in the future.”

It’s difficult to know how some of these TAF traditions originated — take, for example, the annual

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TAF encourages participation for the practice rather than for the result

Modern Ir Caroline Costello guides us through the new initiative set by the Department of Foreign Affairs to showcase and repair the Irish art and culture section

F TAF Pink Party. Mhac Conghail outlined that “The paper trail isn’t really there for us, the hard cold facts of why we do these things.”

When asked why others should get involved in TAF life, Mhac Conghail pointed to its beneficial balance: “We only host two major events per term and there’s an intensity in preparing for them.

But you can easily return to your life and your studies. It’s such a great balance of academic, social and society life.” There is a constant feeling of community and culture circulating around TAF, and it has that “immediacy and intensity and deep satisfying involvement.

There is excitement and stress that comes with that, but it’s not going to absolutely overwhelm your college life. People should also join because all our events are free! Fundamental.”

TAF encourages participation for the practice rather than for the result.

“It’s not about that big production machine that you get caught up in in college and society life”, the Festival Director expressed.

What first attracted Mhac Conghail to TAF was a quote from The Secret Garden: “All the world was a purple shadow and silver.”

They got involved in the society by accident, and simply thought “it looked really cool, but at the same time so vague and hard to understand. [...] It ended up that loads of people were going to the GMB Take-over and it was just such a magical experience.

I thought that it seemed like something pretty unique amongst all the societies. Trinity has such

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Trinity has such a vibrant society life anyway, so TAF seemed quite distinctive and worth getting involved in a vibrant society life anyway, so TAF seemed quite distinctive and worth getting involved in.”

Aesthetics are important to the society, which are set by the Installations Officer alongside the Publicity Officer. Mac Conghail explained that in order for TAF to create an initial online energy, students need to feel intrigued and part of it: “Since TAF is such a small society it basically sort of lives and dies on its publicity in a way. Year on year the publicity is of a very high standard and it’s also a huge job.” Aesthetics and visuals are crucial to the festival, but never in a specific way. “However, we love pink”, Mhac Conghail added.

Year on year, with different committees, TAF’s message and

approach alters. This year, for Mhac Conghail, the approach was that “everyone needs art in their life, in a big or a small way. We all need culture.” Life is not truly formed without art, and TAF is all about bringing it into people’s lives just that little bit more even if only for a short amount of time. “Unless you are someone who is intimately involved with the arts, especially these days it can be hard to interact with them. It’s all about the simple pleasures of art. Quick things that spark joy.”

Although only making two major appearances a year on campus, the TAF committee pride themselves on being all that’s good about society life in Trinity. “TAF is never about one single thing but I feel like it represents some of the best things you can do in a society.

There’s a lot of independence and creative freedom in Trinity’s society life. TAF is also all just so crazy. I think it’s the fact there’s so much going on in one week which creates a particular feeling that’s really infectious and unavoidable.

It’s powerful,” Mhac Conghail said.

TAF is a celebration of all various art forms in College. There are so many wonderfully obscure societies on this campus of ours, and so many of them conjoin to support TAF in its celebration of culture. Mhac Conghail even confirmed that “if you really want to make something happen, there’s a good chance it will be with our societies.” This TAF week, the society successfully showcased the nuts and bolts of art with room for bright expression.

rom museums and galleries closing, to concerts cancelled and attempts to move events online, the arts and culture sector was one of the most impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic. Following two years of on-again off-again lockdowns, this impact on the arts will continue to be felt for the years to come. In response to this crisis, Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Catherine Martin, set up the Arts and Culture Recovery Taskforce in 2020. The idea behind this group was to create a platform for “solution-focused recommendations for the recovery of the arts and culture sector.” The Taskforce was chaired by Claire Duignan, board member of the Irish Music Rights Organisation, Fáilte Ireland and the Irish Times amongst other organisations, and included members such as the Arts Council, Business to

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The idea behind the exhibition is to recreate and contextualise the exhibition of modern Irish Art that was held in Paris in January 1922, exactly 100 years ago

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

Irish art takes centre stage in Paris

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Seeing Ireland is just one strand of a larger initiative being curated by the Department of Foreign Affairs

Arts, and Ealaín na Gaeltachta.

This Taskforce then published a report titled ‘Life Worth Living’ in November of 2020, which offered ten recommendations to help the arts and culture sector adapt and recover post-pandemic.

The report was divided into three sections: ‘Ensuring Recovery,’ ‘Building Resilience’ and ‘Facing Forward.’ Several suggestions in the first section highlighted the importance of protecting livelihoods and careers in the industry. Recommendations

included piloting a Universal Basic Income Scheme, extending the Professional Artists on Jobseekers’ Allowance Scheme to other art forms, establishing a new VAT compensation scheme for Artists, and ensuring fair pay for creative content. With the extensive number of cancelled events, the report also noted how certain events are excluded from the Covid Restrictions Support Scheme (CRSS). The report suggested creating a business support grant scheme, alongside

the Government continuing to provide financial support to Local Authorities to avoid any loss of income in 2021 — to support their continued investment in the arts. Under ‘Building Resilience,’ we see an emphasis on creating wellbeing supports for the arts and culture sector, with an upskilling scheme for artists to help generate new artwork following the pandemic. The final section, ‘Facing Forward’, focused on the need for physical spaces for cultural activities, particularly

outdoor spaces, and improving the environmental impact of the arts through the funding of a Creative Green Programme.

We have seen these suggestions put into action in recent months following the easing of restrictions and the opening of various arts and cultural centres. On January 28th, a new virtual Irish exhibition was launched called Seeing Ireland: Art, Culture, and Power in Paris, 1922. The exhibit was organised by Professor Ciaran O’Neill and Dr Billy Shortall, in partnership with the Trinity Long Room Hub Arts and Humanities Research Institute, and was funded by the Decade of Centenaries/ Commemorations Unit and Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media. The idea behind the exhibition is to recreate and contextualise the exhibition of modern Irish art that was held in Paris in January 1922, exactly 100 years ago. This exhibition was seminal to the Irish arts, showcasing works by Irish artists such as Mary Swanzy, Sean Keating, Jack B Yeats, and Grace Henry. The virtual exhibition was designed by Niall O’hOisín of Noho Design who reconstructed the gallery from one single documented image of the event.

The project website also features an interactive map with motor tour routes and notable landmarks of the time, so that anyone can revisit this seminal moment a whole century later.

The launch was filmed live from the Trinity Long Room Hub, featuring speakers like Minister Martin herself and the French Ambassador to Ireland, H.E Vincent Guérend.

The event included a panel discussion with the artists

Mick O’Dea and Sinead Ni Mhaonaigh, chaired by Trinity’s own Dr Angela Griffith. Minister Martin opened the launch by discussing the importance of the Exposition D’Art Irlandais, which presented over 280 works in Galerie Barbazanges of Paris in January 1922. She noted how this Irish-Parisian cultural event was an historical moment not only in modern Irish art but in cultural history up to the postcolonial present. The Minister was followed by the French Ambassador, who discussed the extraordinary links between these two countries. He noted that not only was 1922 the year of this groundbreaking exhibition, but that several important events were staged that linked Ireland and France together. That year, an international conference was held in Paris called the Irish Race Congress, following the ratification of the Anglo-Irish Treaty which was generating new Irish identity politics at the time.

It was also the same year as the first publication of James Joyce’s Ulysses, which was published in Paris on February 2nd. This influential event was even recently celebrated on its centenary by the Irish Cultural Centre in Paris.

Ambassador Guérend spoke on how the arts and culture sector will be a focal point for France in the coming six months to celebrate the sense of common belonging for European nations, particularly between France and Ireland, to highlight the importance of cultural exchange.

Professor Ciaran O’Neill noted this was Ireland’s initial emergence onto the world stage and how the nation was presented through its Arts and Culture, rather than the internal division and conflict that was going on at this point in time.

This idea mirrors current events, following the crisis in Ireland of the Covid-19 pandemic and the goal of Martin’s Recovery Taskforce to put arts and culture at the forefront of Ireland again.

Seeing Ireland is just one strand of a larger initiative being curated by the Department of Foreign Affairs. It is not only in connection with Trinity, but also with the O’Brien Collection in Chicago, the Keough-Naughton Institute for Irish Studies in Indiana, the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris, the Snite Museum of Art and the University of Paris-Sorbonne. This shows how Martin is pushing for this improvement within the sector following the recommendations of the Arts and Culture Recovery Taskforce by reaching out to our past and bringing it into and bringing it into the present. We will be looking ahead to seeing what other events are up his and Catherine Martin’s sleeve to help the sector recover and make “Life Worth Living” following Covid-19, and in the following years to come.

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Saol na Gaeilge Reading betw Alice Rekab’s faoi bhláth arís Léiríonn rath mór Sheachtain na hÉigse nár lagaigh an phaindéim beatha na Gaeilge ar champas na Tríonóide Fionnán Uíbh Eachach

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gus sinn uile inár suí cois leapa ag breathnú ar léachtaí taifeadta lá i ndiaidh lae le dhá bhliain anuas, is cinnte gur bhraith Gaeilgeoirí na Tríonóide uathu an deis a dteanga a labhairt lena gcairde ollscoile i rith na paindéime. Seans go raibh imní ar roinnt mhaith acu go raibh saol na teanga féin i bpríomhollscoil na tíre á chur i mbaol. Ar an dea-uair, tá léirithe ag rath ollmhór Sheachtain na hÉigse 2022 go bhfuil beocht sa Ghaeilge i gColáiste na Tríonóide go fóill.

Mar chuid de Sheachtain na hÉigse, a cuirtear ar siúl go bliantúil ag an gCumann Gaelach i dtaca le muintir na Scéime Cónaithe agus le hOifigeach Ghaeilge an Choláiste, reáchtáiltear imeachtaí cultúrtha agus faisnéise le húsáid na Gaeilge a spreagadh i measc mhic léinn an Choláiste agus leis an teanga a cheiliúradh. Is minic a eagraítear cainteanna le hiriseoirí, le ceoltóirí, le healaíontóirí nó le hionadaithe gairme i rith na

seachtaine cultúrtha seo. Dar ndóigh, ba theoranta i bhfad ná mar is gnách a bhí cúrsaí anuraidh agus na srianta sláinte diana á gcur i bhfeidhm ag an rialtas, ach tháinig an Éigse ar ais le preab i mbliana.

Agus Seachtain na hÉigse á seoladh aici, labhair an Propast Linda Doyle faoi thábhacht na Gaeilge do chomhphobal an Choláiste agus faoin áilleacht atá aimsithe aici féin sa teanga le linn a saoil. Is tráthúil a bhí a cuid cainte; bhí réimse iomlán áilleacht na Gaeilge le blaiseadh ag an gCúirt Éigse a eagraíodh ar an dara lá den tseachtain agus inar thug an file óg Gaeilge Ciara Ní É sampla dá cuid filíochta do ghrúpa mór mac léinn in Aitriam an Phrointí. Tá cáil bainte amach ag Ní É úd le blianta beaga anuas as a stíl filíochta comhaimseartha trína ndéanann sí cúrsaí LADT a shní, mar aon lena ról lárnach i mbunú an imeachta filíochta dátheangaigh Reic, a thugann stáitse d’fhilithe óga Gaeilge na hÉireann iad féin a chur in iúl.

Cuireadh béim ar chúrsaí faisin agus athchursála ag an gCúirt freisin agus tugadh an deis do Ghaeilgeoirí an Choláiste foghlaim ón gcruthaitheoir agus craoltóir Emma Ní Chearúil faoi Aonachamarach, margadh agus malartú éadaí a eagraítear go rialta ar fud na tíre agus a thugann deis do chainteoirí Gaeilge bualadh lena chéile agus éadaí nua saor in aisce bhreith leo ina dhiaidh.

Ní ansin a tháinig deireadh leis an tseachtain áfach; tugadh an deis do mhic léinn an Choláiste foghlaim faoi na deiseanna éagsúla oibre atá ar fáil do chainteoirí Gaeilge in Éirinn agus i gcéin. Labhair cainteoirí ar nós iriseoirí, dlítheangeolaithe

lonnaithe sa Bhruiséil agus tuairisceoirí de chuid TG4 faoi na deiseanna atá ann do mhic léinn a bhfuil saol oibre trí mheán na Gaeilge uathu. Eagraíodh seisiún faisnéise faoi dheiseanna intéirneachta do mhic léinn tríúleibhéil sa Ghaeltacht i gcúrsaí eolaíochta, teicneolaíochta agus iriseoireachta chomh maith.

Eachtra neamhghnách a bhí sa Cheardlann Mhanainnise a cuireadh ar bun Déardaoin, an 10 Feabhra i dtreo dheireadh na hÉigse. Thug an ceoltóir fidle Manainnise Isla Callister blas den teanga Ghaelach eile seo do mhic léinn na Tríonóide ar líne agus í ag léiriú nach amháin go bhfuil an Mhanainnis agus an saol Gaelach go ginearálta ina mbeatha i ndiaidh na paindéime, ach gur féidir an tslí bheatha dhigiteach, a chur as dúinn uile le dhá bhliain anuas, a úsáid chun caidreamh nua a chruthú idir cainteoirí na dteangacha Gaelacha.

Cuireadh deireadh leis an tseachtain chultúrtha go déanach Dé hAoine le hOíche na gCumann i gClub Chonradh na Gaeilge, rud a bhí de dhíth i ndiaidh na tréimhse gnóthaí úd.

B’fhada an tamall ó bhí de chumas ag muintir Ghaeilge an Choláiste bualadh gan ceist an dúnta luaith ná an scartha shóisialta, agus nach iontach gur tapaíodh an deis. Ba dheacair an tréimhse í an phaindéim dúinn uile, do lucht cainte Gaeilge an Choláiste ach go háirithe, agus ba shoiléir ó shuim na mac léinn san Éigse go raibh an tseachtain ina faoiseamh mór dóibh. Is léir anois, agus an chéad Éigse ó dheireadh na srianta sóisialta curtha i gcrích againn, gur faoi bhláth atá saol na Gaeilge ar an gcampas arís.

PHOTO VIA KAIHSU TAI/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

the Douglas H Caitlin Kawalek explores the multiplatform Family Lines Project at the Douglas Hyde Gallery

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he centrepiece of the online page for Alice Rekab’s multiplatform Family Lines Project at the Douglas Hyde Gallery is a composite artwork that combines images of individuals with trees, animals, traditional African sculpture, and digital drawings. Its most prominent feature is a photograph of a young woman who observes a diamond in her palms, bordered by digitally-created beams. Her posture is poignant in light of the artwork’s neighbouring image – that of a page from a book that details diamond smuggling in Sierra Leone, a destructive practice in which Western markets are complicit – whilst the digital beams replicate what Rekab has deemed an act of “honour” or making “shine”. Similarly multifaceted, the collaged trees are wintry and bare, indicating both decline and the potential for renewal. These complexities bespeak Rekab’s continual concern with the “expressions and iterations of complex cultural and personal narratives” and are characteristic of the Family Lines exhibition as it spans platforms, artists, and forms of dialogue alike.

The project aims to voice the generational experiences of Black and mixed-race individuals in Ireland, focusing particularly on stories of migration and survival within family units. It was developed in collaboration with Éireann and I, a community archive for Black migrants that works against traditional archival institutions, to both shape and faithfully represent the collective memories of marginalised communities. The exhibition takes various forms – currently online, it will be presented in the Gallery this coming summer and is complemented by a collection of public billboards. It allows for engagement, conversation, and collaboration through its series of participatory workshops, its

inclusion of other artists’ work, and the dialogues that supplement these additions. This expansiveness indicates the recognition that ideation and understanding are often processual and collaborative, inviting us to assume a more reciprocative role than that of the passive observer imposed in more traditional gallery settings.

A significant part of the project is its online film screenings.

Having begun last September, these will continue monthly until July. The films are a combination of contemporary and late twentieth century issues that affect Black and mixed-race individuals alongside those that are more specific to the present day. There is considerable stylistic variance across the films.

December’s screening, The names have changed, including my own and truths have been altered by Onyeka Igwe, is an eclectic piece, attempting to voice “a truth in as many ways as possible”. The film narrates stories of African diasporic life to push against the dominance of colonial history, with Igwe explicitly noting the incongruity between the traditional archives and her own family history. Other screenings have included films from the Black

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TRINITY NEWS | Tuesday 1 March

ween the lines: Project at Hyde

The Ultimate Guide to Paddy’s Day in the Capital Ria Walls rounds up some of the best events on in Dublin this St. Patrick’s Day 1. St. Patrick’s Day Parade Location: Dublin City Centre Date: 17th March Time: 12 noon Price: Free / Grandstand seats €77 Dress Code: Green, green and more green Thousands are expected to gather and turn the city green this March as the famous Paddy’s Day Parade returns to the streets of Dublin. The whole city will be taken over by performers, festival floats, face painting, costumes and LOTS of drinking.

After two years of empty streets on March 17th, this year will be booming with those of all ages desperate to make the most of the Irish holiday. While the event is usually streamed live on RTE, it is worthwhile to get out and see it in person. So nip down to the nearest EuroGiant, get some green face paint and shamrock accessories, and prepare yourself for a great day.

Audio Film Collective, Martina Attille, and Ufuoma Essi.

This month features The Expulsion by Larry Achiampong, a film inspired by the director’s childhood experiences of attending work with his mother, a cleaner who took on night shifts in central London. The piece addresses the lived experiences of the migrants whose significance goes unrecognised by wider society – those individuals who “wipe the boardrooms on which you dictate our futures,” and yet are treated worse than their white workingclass counterparts. Achiampong compellingly combines naturalistic images of a cleaner as she works alone in an office space – highlighting the physical labour of her hands as she sweeps, wipes, and throws away – with a voiceover that elucidates her experiences through poeticised passages, often emphasised by vocal distortion.

In the film’s introductory soundpiece, he explains that this lack of recognition is a purposeful move by those in power, and that unacknowledged and undocumented individuals are actually desired for the kinds of menial labour that allow societies to function. For Achiampong,

this unfairness constitutes a personal trauma, and he relates the experiences described in his film to those shown in next month’s screening of Jennifer Martin’s TEETH, a fictional depiction of an interracial couple interrogated by UK Home Office.

In their written accompaniment to Attille’s film Dreaming Rivers, Rekab describes learning their family story as a child: “I carried a photo, who we were and where we came from. I taught people how to say our surname. These were fragments of lives remembered, and retold, woven together to make some kind of sense to anyone who asked the question ‘where are you from?’” This phrase encapsulates the heart of Family Lines, privileging the personal experiences of minority groups in Ireland and uniting of them in a multi-form exhibition by means of their common thread, their misand underrepresentation. Through its accessibility and potential for engagement, the project provides us with an important opportunity for conversation, relation, and reeducation; it unpicks the archive’s histories and weaves them anew.

2. Festival Quarter – Day Time Location: National Museum of Ireland Date: 17th-20th March Time: 12 noon - 6pm Price: Free Dress Code: Casual and green With something for everyone, this four day long festival hosts performances, music, talks, dancing and so much more.

Suitable for all ages, there will be live performances such as Céilí Mór, as well as a food and craft fair. This is the perfect spot to go with your family, your significant other or your mates.

The theme for this year’s Paddy’s Day is ‘connections’, from looking back over the past two years and reconnecting, to creating new connections. RTE claimed that this year will be the “biggest and most ambitious [St. Patrick’s Day] ever produced”.

3. Festival Quarter – Evening Location: National Museum of Ireland Date: 16th - 19th March Time: 6pm-10:30pm Price: Free / ticketed for certain acts Dress Code: Concert vibes and (you guessed it) green With no kids allowed to this one, the Festival Quarter transforms at night to an all-Irish concert-style venue. There will be Irish acts performing music, comedy and so much more. At

the event acts such as LYRA, THUMPER and Malaki will be playing, ranging from rave to rap to hip hop to orchestra. This is the perfect opportunity to discover Irish artists during one of the most Irish weeks on the Emerald Isle. You can see more about the acts taking place each night in greater detail on the Festival Quarter website (stpatricksfestival. ie). With concerts only recently reemerging, there is no better way to soak up the atmosphere of live music than at a festival. Certain gigs have a small charge of no more than a tenner, while others are free of charge, making it a cheap night out.

4. Nightlife Location: Grand Social Date: 17h March Time: 11pm Price: tickets range from €9 to €15 Dress Code: clubbing, green edition If you’re hoping to round off your Paddy’s day with a night out then look no further. The Grand Social are hosting Delicious, a four hour long DJ set planned to take you into the morning in the best way possible. It is advised to buy tickets in advance in order to guarantee your spot and avoid any disappointment. Alongside Grand Social, many other pubs and clubs

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Thousands are expected to gather and turn the city green this March as the famous Paddy’s Day Parade returns to the streets of Dublin

across the city will be partying all night long to see off the longawaited event.

So no matter what you’re into, there is something for everyone this St Patrick’s Day in the city. Get your green on and go celebrate!

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Tuesday 1 March | TRINITY NEWS

Endometriosis and PCOS are eve We need a healthcare system that 10 people highlight the devastating reality of being diagnosed with chronic disorders in Ireland to Eva O’Beirne

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o assess the failures of the Irish health system, and also to raise awareness for Endometriosis Awareness Month, Trinity News spoke with ten people who all suffer in some way from either endometriosis or PolyCystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS).

Several of these individuals also suffer from adenomyosis and Crohn’s disease as well as poor mental health due to the neglect of the health systems they’ve experienced for most of their lives.

Endometriosis is a painful disorder in which tissue similar to the tissue that normally lines the inside of the uterus, the endometrium, grows outside the uterus. Endometriosis most commonly involves ovaries, fallopian tubes and the tissue lining the pelvis but can affect the whole body.

Kate, who is a 23-year-old nurse from Dublin, told Trinity News about her experiences with endometriosis. Coming from a family with several women who suffer from the condition, it is surprising that she wasn’t diagnosed until she was 20, but that highlights the complications and failures of the public health system in Ireland. “From when I was 13 I always had horrible period symptoms, extreme cramping, migraines…when I was about 16 this became a major issue as I was regularly being hospitalised due to episodes of pain that would often cause me to faint. I felt like I was never understood and people would constantly tell me it was “normal” to be in pain,” she explained.

Kate spent around four years “in and out of different hospitals” before her diagnosis. “Just about every doctor I spoke to told me I was “too young” to have endometriosis. The one doctor who told me he could put me on a public waiting list for a laparoscopy told me that due to waiting lists I’d likely not get a call until my mid-twenties.” When she turned 20, she was diagnosed with

stage 3 endometriosis and told it had progressed badly for someone so young.

As for treatment, Kate was offered hormone replacement therapy (HRT), the Mirena coil or a yearly laparoscopy. “I pointblank refused HRT and accepted the Mirena coil with a view of continuing laparoscopies to have endometriosis burnt off my uterus.

Kate was also gaslit by her medical practitioners.

She explained how last year she made an appointment with a new gynaecologist and had “a nightmare experience.” Kate had the same repeated conversations with him regarding HRT and her preferences and so offered her an alternative of a contraceptive pill for her condition. “While in the hospital car park, the doctor called me and said I wouldn’t have protection on this pill and would still have to use barrier methods.

I brought my prescription to my local chemist who told me I wouldn’t be able to use my medical card to cover the cost of the drug and it would be €177 a month.”

“The pharmacist said she was 99% certain the drug I had been prescribed was a form of HRT. I did my own research once home and

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[They did] everything to shift the blame of my pain onto me.

Demanding if I was pregnant, did I have STDs? Did I hurt myself with a sex toy, am I getting my ‘holes’ mixed up?”

found out this was true. Since then, I have not sought any treatment for my endometriosis as I feel traumatised from my previous experiences. I now just take standard painkillers to manage it, which is rarely effective.”

Jodi, a 21-year-old student, has a similar experience with being treated horribly by staff in an Irish hospital. She explained: “I had a bad experience with nurses and doctors in James’ Hospital Dublin who did not take my pain or symptoms seriously. [They did] everything to shift the blame of my pain onto me. Demanding if I was pregnant, did I have STDs? Did I hurt myself with a sex toy, am I getting my ‘holes’ mixed up?”

As a result, she went to Poland earlier this year for treatment: “I travelled to Poland to seek a medical exam. I wanted to go and get seen so badly I didn’t register properly that I was travelling to the other side of Europe for a doctor’s appointment.”

When asked how endometriosis affects her daily life, Jodi pointed out that she misses days of work, days of college, and that “It’s really starting to have a hugely negative emotional toll on [her] with feelings of anger, frustration, guilt, restlessness, agitation, sadness.”

She noted the emotional toll it has had on her: “I never know when a flare-up is coming so I can never prepare for it, the fear that it’s going to come at an inconvenient time makes me incredibly anxious, constantly living on edge of when it’s going to attack,” Lara, a 21-year-old from Navan, Co.Meath also spoke to us about her daily experiences with endometriosis. Currently studying for her Master’s in human resource management in DCU, Lara described how endometriosis affects her in “every way” on a daily basis. “From the moment I wake up in the morning, I feel bladder pain, bowel issues, along with my regular endometriosis pain,” she said.

“I cannot have painless sex, I cannot wear tight clothes. I have pelvic floor therapy every fortnight. The fear of infertility, along with the unknown, has a huge emotional toll. I go to therapy along with taking 20mg of Lexapro.

I would not be able to live without painkillers and I am in constant fear of ovulating or menstruating.”

On February 4, RTÉ reported the case of Laura Newell, a 39-year-old woman who died after taking overthe-counter medicines to treat her undiagnosed endometriosis. But instead of focusing on the issue of endometriosis - which takes nine years on average to get a diagnosis in Ireland - TDs in the Dáil

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“Word for word he said, ‘I don’t want you to have regrets if circumstances change for you, maybe you leave your partner, your sexual orientation changes, you meet someone and HE wants children”

discussed the availability of strong painkillers on the internet. When asked about how she felt about the news story, Lara commented that she can “relate to being treated like I was “just looking for painkillers”.”

“I am privileged to be prescribed the painkillers that I need, but if I wasn’t, I would not be able to live without them. This is a tragedy for the endometriosis community, as it highlights the mistreatment and lack of education surrounding the disease. If this woman had adequate healthcare, this would not have happened,” she continued.

Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) affects how ovaries function. It can affect hormones, fertility and periods, causing hair loss, chronic pain, internal cysts and weight gain. Polycystic ovaries are very common, approximately affecting 20% of women. Éabha, a Master’s student from Cork, spoke to Trinity News about her diagnosis journey: “I suppose while I had been noticing

symptoms of PCOS since I was 18, I only really started to take these seriously and seek a diagnosis when I was 20. I had started to notice that my hair was thinning a lot, to the point I had two almost bald patches behind my ears. I decided to properly get checked out by a doctor, since Googling my symptoms had freaked me out a bit.” Éabha noted that “as usual” Google was very wrong but was “surprisingly was more accurate than how the real doctor reacted.”

She was told to stay away from Google and everything was once again blamed on stress and her lifestyle. It took until she was 22 to get an ultrasound.

Even after obtaining her official PCOS diagnosis, Éabha has found that medical assistance is incredibly poor: When asked what she thinks should be done by the Government to improve PCOS screening measures, Éabha pointed out that accessibility is a major issue. “I think the screening process could definitely be evaluated that every woman in Ireland over the age of 16 should be eligible for a free ultrasound much the same way as every woman over 25 can access smear tests and every woman over 35 can access mammograms,” she said.

Rachel, a 27-year-old from Meath, told us her story about how her sexuality affected her diagnosis journey and what it was like to seek PCOS treatment abroad. “At 12 I started my first contraceptive pill to help manage the pain. Despite the fact my period reduced me to tears every month and left me lying in bed unable to move, I stopped looking for help. I kept being told that it was normal, that it was part of being a woman,” said Rachel. “When I was 23 I met my now wife, Karen. She rarely needs to even take paracetamol for her period. It was only then I really started to think about the difference in our experiences and started to look into what could be causing my severe period pain.”

“I can’t count how many appointments I had with GPs from the age of 11-25 about my periods,” explained Rachel.

“Each time it was just a different combination of painkillers that were recommended. In 2019, when I turned 25 I went for my first smear test and as part of the appointment, I talked about my period history. The doctor listened to everything I had to say and was the first person to tell me that the pain I was experiencing was not normal.”

Rachel described how she was referred to a gynaecologist

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eryday issues. t reflects that who scheduled her in for surgery to look for endometriosis. “I ended up being readmitted to the hospital twice after the surgery within two weeks for severe pain.

It turned out I had cysts on both ovaries and I had developed an infection after the surgery,” she recalled. After being discharged with dysmenorrhea - “a fancy medical term for painful periods” according to Rachel - she was bedbound for three months in 2020 due to pain. After seeking private treatment, she finally received her diagnosis of PCOS. But things didn’t get better for Rachel. In 2021, she still faced multiple A&E visits due to cysts rupturing. Her hospital then suggested a trial of decapeptyl, which induces menopause for a few months. When she realised she would have to see a gynaecologist again, she specifically requested not to see her initial male doctor as “he had been dismissive previously” and “didn’t take [her] pain seriously.” Despite reassurance that he would not be present, he appeared during the appointment to sign off on her drug trial. He refused to.

“I asked him at what point would a hysterectomy be considered for my pain considering I have tried all of the less invasive options that are recommended. He told me that it would not be an option because of my age. He said I was too young to consider such a drastic decision,” said Rachel.

Once Rachel and her wife challenged him further, the reasoning only got worse from there. After explaining to him that she had felt suicidal due to the pain, the consultant then said that he didn’t want Rachel to get a hysterectomy while her judgement was “clouded by the pain”.

“Word for word he said, “I don’t want you to have regrets if circumstances change for you, maybe you leave your partner, your sexual orientation changes, you meet someone and HE wants children.”

Soon after this, Rachel was admitted to A&E again. The doctor gave her ten days’ worth of codeine and warned her to only come back if she showed signs of sepsis as it “wasn’t the place for chronic conditions.”

Rachel recalled the moment she gave up on Ireland’s healthcare system: “ I asked her what I should do if the pain doesn’t go away and she told me to speak to my GP about getting a referral to a pain clinic for ketamine injections to manage the pain.

Christine, who was born in Limerick but has now relocated to Scotland, highlighted the lack

of care and affordable treatment options for those with PCOS when telling their story.

Christine explained how “there’s a relief in receiving a diagnosis” but “as a lesbian, being on the pill is an unnecessary convenience”.

Christine also noted the cost of the pill as a treatment”, and said “it should be free” as a result.

Kitty, 24 and from Limerick, has also recently relocated to Scotland.

They expressed their frustration at the Irish healthcare system as when they were 17, a doctor had found high testosterone levels in their blood, which was caused by PCOS. Kitty discussed how the Scottish system is much preferable to the Irish one as medical appointments are free. “I used to be paying €90 for my medications, plus €60 for my doctor’s visits and an extra €30 for any blood tests or examinations,” Kitty explained.

When asked what they are most angry about when it comes to the treatment of people with reproductive issues in Ireland, Kitty pointed to the fact that these disorders are “so overlooked

“

“Word for word he said, ‘I don’t want you to have regrets if circumstances change for you, maybe you leave your partner, your sexual orientation changes, you meet someone and HE wants children.”

despite being so common.”

“It got ignored by my first doctor, I was never taught anything about it in school, the information I did find is incomplete or dangerous regarding diets and fertility because we’re made to rely on word of mouth online, and a lot of wellness bloggers exploit that in my opinion. A lot of the information out there is misleading or downright dangerous. I came across so many wellness blogs pushing for people with PCOS to stick to a strict keto diet, to cut out all sugars, basically saying if you eat white bread or anything fried then you’re 100% gonna become diabetic,” Kitty explained.

“That makes me really angry because I’ve struggled with an eating disorder for most of my life and a lot of people with PCOS do, so for wellness bloggers to advise such strict food exclusions is very dangerous.”

Several of those who came forward to tell their stories for this article suffer from multiple disorders as well as endometriosis or PCOS. Danielle, a speech and language therapist, told us about her experiences with endometriosis, PCOS and adenomyosis. She recalled when she was a teenager, she “was asked by a doctor if I discussed my periods with my friends. I was 15 at the time and so embarrassed by this. I answered no and the doctor responded by asking how I knew my periods were so bad if I wasn’t comparing them to others.”

Danielle travelled to the UK in 2020 in order to receive excision surgery which is comparable to “taking the weed out by the rootit takes longer for the weed to grow back and doesn’t in some instances.” When asked what she wishes people would know about her conditions, she said: “That there is no cure. Endometriosis is not the lining of the womb but cells similar to the lining of the womb. The definition is so important as it gives reason as to why medically stopping the lining of the womb from growing doesn’t halt the growth of endometriosis.

A hysterectomy will not cure endometriosis. Endometriosis is a whole-body disease.”

Sarah Jane, a 28-year-old media coordinator at Web Summit, also came forward to tell her story about suffering from PCOS, endometriosis and adenomyosis.

She became aware of her chronic pain at the age of 8.

She described how as a teenager, she missed so much school that the Department of Education sent an officer to her house to see if she really was sick. “I would have done anything to be able to function like a normal teenage girl. I tried my best but sometimes it was hard. I found it hard to talk about this because I was under the illusion that you don’t talk about women’s health issues,” Sarah Jane explained.

Sarah Jane described how nearly all of the good experiences she’s had with her diagnosis journey have been outside of Ireland. “There are three standout moments of horrible experiences

“

“When I first considered I had endometriosis, I Googled it and all the information I found was incorrect.

I know until recently the NHS had the incorrect definition on their website” that will never leave me. The first one was when one of my Irish gynaecologists told me I was the issue. It’s my fault I can’t be helped - and she was saying this all because I can’t take the pill due to mental health issues as well as suffering from migraines.”

“The second moment was when my second Irish gynaecologist said to me that he didn’t know what to do next for me. He then turned and flippantly said ‘how about we take out your right ovary and see if that helps.’. I broke down into tears. The fact that he wanted to do this without freezing my eggs or couldn’t guarantee this would help was utterly upsetting. He couldn’t understand why this was upsetting either.”

The third stand out moment for Sarah was in August 2020. She had been suffering from pain for almost 10 days and was unable to eat. “A gynaecologist came up to me and looked at my notes and then said “Have you a boyfriend?”, I was confused but I said yes. She then said “Do you want kids?” and I said “Yes, but not for another few years yet, I’m on 26 and just got my dream job” and she turned to me and said “Well, my advice is to play that card and get pregnant, it will cure you,” she said. This was the fifth time Sarah Jane had been told to get pregnant. She sobbed for the rest of the day in the hospital bed.

It took Sarah Jane 14 years to get a diagnosis. She has had 9 surgeries since 2016. She described the severe pain she experiences nearly every day: “Sometimes, when I am in bed at night I can’t move because if I move, this shooting pain will start again; I’ll be sweating, I’ll be putting the pillow in my mouth as to not scream in pain, my chest against my bed, grasping the sheets tightly, tears will be streaming down my face. I’ll take the strongest pain relief I can and

watch the clock until I can take my next batch. Sometimes, I try not to breathe too much because that causes the pain to increase.

It’s not surprising that wordof-mouth and online activism has become a major support for those who suffer from these disorders. Northern Irish activist and writer Sarah Rose, also known as @mypelvicpain on Instagram, spoke to Trinity News about the misinformation that exists when it comes to these chronic disorders: “There’s no updated knowledge surrounding these conditions.

There’s no joining up the dots or the big picture when you’re getting diagnosed.” She also notes that endometriosis is automatically linked to the womb’s lining: “It isn’t the endometrium. It’s not a bad period, it’s not a menstrual disease, it’s a full-body condition.

It impacts every organ, including the brain and lungs.”

Her own experiences with chronic pain began before she turned ten. As a teenager, Sarah Rose developed an eating disorder due to the pain. From the age of 18, it took her a decade to get a diagnosis. “I felt like I was losing my mind, I was constantly in A&E, constantly seeking help. I’d wait two years to see somebody just for them to say there’s nothing wrong with me.”

If it wasn’t for social media, Sarah Rose wouldn’t have realised that she had endometriosis. “When I first considered I had endo, I Googled it and all the information I found was incorrect. I know until recently the NHS had the incorrect definition on their website,” she explained.

Sarah Rose shares information about her experiences with endometriosis, adenomyosis and Crohn’s on her Instagram page, @mypelvicpain. With over ten thousand followers, she promotes how both the UK and Ireland can reform their healthcare systems to start taking chronic illnesses seriously. When asked what she thinks should be everyday knowledge about these conditions, Sarah Rose pointed out that people are often left suffering for nearly a decade before getting help. Currently in Ireland, it takes on average nine years to get an endometriosis diagnosis.

In Northern Ireland, it takes an average of eight and a half. “The one thing that is the most damaging thing about endometriosis is the misinformation,” she explains.

“There’s no cure. And people assume that there is. All the “cures” relate to the womb and nothing else. People are also told it can only occur during certain ages so they’re dismissed and forgotten about.”

In order to write this article, I put out the call on my social media. I lost track of all the people who responded to me. A wave of horrific stories and sadness flooded my mentions on Twitter and Instagram. The cost of these issues both emotionally and financially is irreparable. No one should suffer like this.

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Dazzling debuts at Dublin International Film Festival 2022 Khushi Jain highlights two debut screenings for this year’s hybridstyle International Film Festival

D

ublin International Film Festival 2022 has a stellar line up of over a 100 films from 19 countries, which festival Director Gráinne Humphreys has managed to compress into a span of 12 days.

Scheduled to run from February 23 to March 6, it will run on a hybrid model with online as well as in-person screenings. This year will feature an especially fascinating collection of comingof-age stories. Documentaries like Young Plato and Futura move into classrooms and take the streets, tackling the big questions of life

in youth. But there are two films that capture the tediousness of growing up with a particular raw delicacy.

Words fall easily to their knees; it is in silence that powerful emotions bloom. The Quiet Girl is about Cáit (Catherine Clinch), a nine-year-old girl who envelops herself in these very silences, “many a person missed the opportunity to say nothing and lost much because of it.” Cáit is sent to live with foster parents for the summer and the film focuses on her movement from a stale, callous and tired domesticity to a loving and stable one. Based on Claire Keegan’s short story Foster, this is Cáit’s fragile coming-of-age.

The camera softens as it follows her gaze, poignantly lingering on spaces even after characters have left them. Incorporating the concept of rememory, the film breathes life into the lifeless, be it sunlight on the kitchen floor or the wallpaper of the bedroom.

The tenderness with which Colm Bairéad tells this story of family, love and grief is sure to leave eyes

soaked, and hearts sobbing.

Murina, the other piece of interest, takes place on the breathtakingly beautiful coastal seascape of Croatia and unfolds as a family drama of abuse, misogyny and freedom. At the film’s epicentre is Julija (Gracija Filipovic), who belongs more to the sea than to the land. Reckless and ripe for womanhood, she bears her father’s autocracy and mother’s perceived passivity. This already troubled familial triad is further agitated by the arrival of an old friend, creating a domestic storm of disturbing proportions.

The film is steeped in symbolism.

It collapses the vast sublime of the ocean with individual ambitions and anxieties, to produce a naked and intimate narrative. Julija spends almost the entire film in a swimsuit, remaining incessantly tethered to the sea. It is a treat watching Filipovic bring her to life with such authenticity. Murina certainly marks a sparkling blue debut for Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović.

The Quiet Girl became the

Solution to Issue 6 crossword

ARTWORK BY ELLA SLOANE

first Irish language film to have its world premiere at Berlinale where it also won the Grand Prix for best film. It is set to open for Dublin International Film Festival on February 23. Murina

has similarly been bagging its fair share of awards including the highly coveted Caméra d’Or at Cannes 2021. It will be screened both in person and online on February the 28th.