A last supper for Globalism & the GAA.

The good news first. The world is falling apart. No doubt, this hasn’t escaped your attention. This becomes even more apparent to me now by only occasionally diving into social media to catch up on the news. So, rather than a 10-fix of coffee a day, my current news consumption is more akin to a weekly shop at the supermarket. And as I walk down the aisles of my local GlobalismIsFucked and fill up my trolley I can’t help but notice just how much fresh produce there is on display to choose from at present.

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Take your pick and fill the basket with a list including: men clobbering women at the Olympics, Israel’s bomb attack in Iran, the financial meltdown on world stock exchanges last Friday, assassination attempts, senile presidents pushed into reaching for the midazolam, riots in the UK, and the curious sight of working class Irish and English flags marching side-by-side down the street in unison. We won’t even mention that distraction depiction scene used to open the Olympics. Well, I’ll use it for a sexy headline, I suppose.

Suffice to say, the only reliable way to attack personal faith exploration successfully is by distraction methods. By inner distraction or outer distraction and we live in a world of exponentially increasing outer distractions designed to create chaos and inner turmoil. Whipping people into divisive hysteria and so if at the end of the latest detour away from the road of personal pilgrimage people must hold on to their religions and faith they might at least do it by mingling it with a little newfound cultism. And there are so many avant-garde globalist cults to become a disciple of. As the globalist class of elite humanity destroyers are unusually expert at herding stray alley cats into one of their anointed global anti-globalist gangs. Tesla & Musk, Jordan Petersen, the Tate brothers, and Russell Brand to list but a few. Or a monthly subscription to Gript for the down-in-the-mouth Irish tabby cat. Just a note on Elon Musk. Many point to his enterprises with Space X, Neuralink and Open AI as evidence of his many contradictions while missing an obvious point. Tesla is not a car business but rather the world’s largest Artificial Intelligence company and by some distance.

Yet, globalist visions of the world still crumble and so a mist is descending on western civilisation. When it lifts, in a generation or two, I suspect we might well find out the the world we thought we’re currently living in actually died at the turn of the 21st century or maybe even before. The remaining question is how many people will die before the new world emerges and whose tune will humanity be dancing to when that time comes.

At times like this when my feet are more planted in the physical world as opposed to the digital one I am reminded of an inconvenient fact. Most people strive to be good and if not good at least decent. Our definitions of good and evil can get skewed as we reduce each other to our latest opinion. Indeed, I must share a recent email I received that made me laugh and gave me pause for thought. Two years ago, I ran an event in Tuam for alternative journalists and one or two Antifa heroes bought tickets to the shindig so as to find out the location of it. Earlier in the week, I sent an email out to previous attendees of events I’ve ran from the ticketing site Eventbrite about Tuatha Dé Danann. I got the following reply.

I must admit I was tempted not to delete her email address in punishment but alas this personal faith journey shit forced me to follow her instructions and not start creating fake weekly KKK events around the country to email her about. We are both on our separate journeys thru life and hopefully neither of us are embodiments of the worst labels we fling at each other.

Now, I must say, the actual most moral person I know by deed and not just word is double-jabbed and doesn’t believe in God. Yet, goes about life in a variety of very measurably real and self-sacrificial ways and lives an observably good life. Ever so quietly. So, whenever I muse on what heaven might look like it’s a picture that places her in it a lot more clearly than I can envisage seeing my own face there. But, let’s not drift off into more esoteric ponderings and worries but end this segment by just remarking on my current beliefs; God is good, faith is personal and the world is gloriously falling to pieces.

Now, back to things of a more distinctly Irish flavour. The Gaelic Athletic Association. If watching the All-Ireland hurling final a couple of weeks ago was a timely reminder of the beauty, wildness and uniqueness of the Irish spirit still prevalent in the world around us, then watching the All Ireland football final last weekend drop-kicked me from the clouds back down to earth with a dull thud. Two teams - one of them my home county - over-coached and following a generation long pattern in the game of attempting to remove as much risk, spontaneity, joy and individuality from the spectacle as possible. The managers of both teams are all-star giants of this ancient game yet I suspect if we rewound the clock back twenty years and asked either of them to play in teams managed by the 2024 version of themselves they might well shoot themselves in the balls first.

The over-coaching is not the sole fault of either manager - Padraig Joyce and Kieran McGeeney - but rather a function of an evolving GAA hierarchy who refuse to adapt the rules of the game to protect the essence of why Irish people grew to love it in the first place. The GAA have taken the woke government money and RTE studio influence and seem to be de-wilding the product to make it as unmanly as possible. The exposition of wonderous feats of individual skill blended with exceptional teamwork, bravery, edge of the seat theatrics and the odd act of the dark arts thrown in for good measure is not an Irish stew globalist Ireland is interested in promoting. In short, the complete game of Gaelic football has flashes of glorious light and just enough shadowy darkness to remind ourselves that our shit doesn’t entirely smell of marmalade as a people on the Monday morning after a great game. So, in a sense, these corporate anoraks refuse to protect the freedom of the individual to express him or herself. Instead, rigid systems and organised patterns of play are order of the day. A microcosm of some of our problems in the wider Irish living environment. Watching the game got me to thinking about its similarities with the outer world we live in. Perhaps a better term than the word “live” would be to say: an outer world and even GAA in which we are forced to operate.

The best teams in any sport are generally the ones that mix exceptional individuality with exceptional teamwork successfully. For every GAA team gifted with an individual with the god-like ability to kick five or six points from play, this team usually also possesses two or three unassuming teammates whose sole purpose is self sacrifice. Their unseen running, tackling, tireless sweat and selflessness is the heavy spade work that allows the talented individual the freedom of his patch of the field so he might flourish. The talented in the most successful teams never, ever forget this humbling truth. The ones who do forget usually find themselves in unsuccessful teams as self sacrifice is only worthwhile if everyone is pouring their efforts and ego into the greater good and beating heart of the team. Too many individuals and the team doesn’t work. Too many plodding if fearless corner-backs and the team doesn’t work either. Successful teams as with successful lives are all about finding the balance that works for them.

There’s an analogy in there for the world we live in but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

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