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PaperclipPerfector  6d ago (text post)   876 thread views

Transnational Thursday for December 18, 2025

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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A few weeks ago I spoke about Ireland's new President, the outspoken leftist Catherine Connolly. So far, her presidency is going about as expected:

President Connolly hosted a visit from Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg to Áras an Uachtaráin* today, while also greeting runners taking part in a Gaza solidarity fundraiser organised by a member of Kneecap** in the Phoenix Park.

I didn't think it was possible to be so annoyed by a single sentence.

*The President's residence in Dublin's Phoenix Park.

**A hip-hop band from Northern Ireland who were recently facing charges in the UK of incitement to violence and offering support to proscribed organisations, owing to their conduct at various gigs in which they urged attendees to "murder [their] local MP", chanting "Up Hamas" and leading attendees in chants of "Ooh! Ah! Hezbollah!"

Something I've wanted to ask you for a while is how much of the Irish obsession with Israel you think can be explained by Jew hatred (probably at least some) vs widespread Irish enthusiasm for horrific gratuitous violence as some sort of spectator sport. The fact that a band like Kneecap can name themselves after a torture procedure and have backing from the country's elites is pretty remarkable to me as someone not from the country - I can't imagine even the most gung-ho Americans would want to be publicly associated with a band called something like "Waterboarding".

wunderground.com has tens of millions of daily users, and it is named for the terrorist group The Weather Underground. It's an app that tells you the weather, it's not a rap group where you expect some edginess or weird politics.

Banana Republic has over 400 stores worldwide as the higher end brand for gap, and it's named for brutally repressive corrupt right wing Latin American dictatorships.

I don't think Kneecap is all that surprising in a world where Snoop Dogg, former crip, is a color commentary correspondent for the Olympics.

Ireland is also unique in Western Europe for being a state with a very recent myth of national liberation. In many ways, it's surprising that the IRA isn't more prominent in Irish culture.

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