reclaiming indymedia ireland

My association with Indymedia globally preceded the creation of the Irish Indymedia site & at various times my named & nicknamed contributions have appeared in English, French, Italian, Norwegian, Swedish ( on the former Swedish Indymedia site which was disaffiliated), German, Catalan & Castillian. I have sporadically contributed to IMC UK since its launch at the RTS! Mayday event in London 1998 which is celebrated this forthcoming month. I have worked as a translator for Barcelona indymedia translating from Catalan and Castillian to English and focussed most of my time on the dissemination or reporting of news, political analysis, and relevant horizontal media content.

This blog will, I hope, explain to people interested in setting up a second Indymedia collective in Ireland of the problems and reasons for problems which can pervert the objectives of the universal binding principles.

Indymedia Ireland has existed for just over five years during which it has suffered many internal problems none of which were ever properly resolved. At a meeting of the collective in March with an attendance of 4 people a decision was made to implement IP blocks of various durations to purge the site of longterm contributors. One of those was the only woman who had described her brain injury and subsequent disability. After contributing constantly using my name, nicknames and a plethora of other nicknames to Indymedia Ireland for five years I took great issue with that decision & the description of that woman as “under par”. I had been myself blocked for two weeks, which was inexplicably rescinded three days later. Then I submitted this comment to an article on the history of the “Irish Times” :-

Title : Only one individual has served the Irish Times since the 1940’s.

David Crozier, the setter of the crossaire crossword began as a volunteer contributor in the late 1940’s, & continued submitting his puzzles after he had moved to then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) where he farmed tobacco till 1968. He got out of the “landed white gentry” crew just as the “unilateral independence declaration” of Iain Smith’s apartheid government lent particular resonance to the term “white N” (which of course this article thinks so important. Crozier survived the racial cleansing which followed Mugabe’s victory and subsequent government and formation of Zimbabwe, an event which saw the vast majority of white citizens leave the state. Indeed the only contributor to indymedia ireland from former Zimbabwe is the only contributor to have described at first hand her brain injury (Michelle Clarke), she ought take pride of place amongst the tiny group of 3 individuals who have contributed to this site with known disabilities of either physical or mental type.

Anyway.

Mr Crozier who began as a volunteer worked in the St George’s school in Harare till the 1980’s, when he retired, as an English teacher. He had won a pass degree from Trinity college just before the war. Back when Catholics didn’t go to that university and (perhaps not unrelated) only the most desperate or noteworthy worked hard enough for an honours degree. His career as a volunteer who turned to a paid contributor but whose indentity has never spawned or launched a horizontal career in media or who has never been the subject of accusations of forming a personal clique to extend his authoritarianism, being prejudiced against the anagramatically challenged or being unforgivably stupid by libelling people on email lists, has never really sparked much interest outside the small& select bunch of people who can solve his puzzles. Amongst that small group the task of bringing his new puzzles with their solutions by dispatch from Zimbabwe is still shared. The post isn’t very good over there, you know.

I’d suggest that the story David Crozier’s personal longevity (born 1917) and status as the longest serving & least known Irish Times contributor is a moral tale in itself. A tale & example of Irish culture, if perhaps a tad highbrow for many, certainly one that has a “human interest” angle & undoubtedly would serve the needs of anyone shmoozing on the “history of Irish media” lecture circuit. So I’ll turn to write a wiki page. (7 letters)

My IP was blocked for three months within five minutes of that comment appearing on the site.

No collective is free of problems, but every collective must see its core volunteers rotate constantly & never be allowed to impose or create a heirarchy. The next IMC Ireland site must from the outset see gender balance (The Irish indymedia site had no female “moderator” or “editor” for over half its history) & must respect & uphold the dignity of minorities and those with disability.