JOAN BURTON ON VINCENT BROWNE: DO YOU WANT TO HEAR THIS FOR THE NEXT FIVE YEARS?
Jan 25th, 2011 by Conor McCabe
what a fool like, she spends the first part of the show claiming no one was letting her speak, denies her own party leaders words even though they were read out to her from an RTE transcript and then? spends the rest of the show spouting mindless crap and calls joe higgins ” your MEPship”, i don’t know about fianna fail but if this is what we have in store as being part of the next government i’m booking my flights earlier - (’Profbucko’, comment on YouTube)
Joan Burton’s disgraceful behaviour on Vincent Browne last night.
what a petulant spoilt little pup.
The sense of entitlement, that anyone would dare criticise her.
I only got to tape a few seconds of it. Hopefully I can get more tomorrow when it comes online.
Here are some random twitter comments:
- I wish i lived in dublin 15 so i could not vote for her
- could joan burton smear joe higgins any harder? any minute now she’ll drag the kulaks into it
- always voted Labour NEVER again after Joan Burton. Is she drunk? or just MANIC. dont have her on the prog cant hear anyone else
- Joan Burton IS insane. The authorities have been unable to find anyone brave enough to approach her to try to dart her
- Joan Burton, Minister for Finance? Is this how she usually goes on in private? Even if it’s a once in a blue moon thing…
- Joan burton thinks people are tweeting about her in a positive way. Gets better and better
- the good news Joan Burton is that you are trending the bad news is the reason why
- How low can we get?Now the shame of Joan Burton twitter trending.
And this is a screen shot of Joan Burton’s twitter page, take at 1.25am this morning.
Ha ha ha! That was classic tv! First FF shoot no only their feet but their toes too and Labour do this! The new Finance Minister please take a bow, if this is anything to go by, it’ll soon be your last.
Pity she’s not half as willing to go after her future coalition partners in the blueshirts as she is to attack genuine left activists like Higgins. Shame on her.
Joan…you let yourself down BADLY last night but more importantly you let women down as a whole. This of course is not new…just last night was worse than usual. You were rude, ingnorant, agressive and you just sounded like an uneducated fish-wife. You as Finance Minister!!!!? Not a hope…and while I had been considering a vote for Labour…..not in a million years. You are a complete fool to have made such an idiot of yourself in this way.
Vincent Browne made the point that she was just trying it on because Higgins and Bruton are both in the Dublin West constituency and the election is on. Her tactic seemed to be to keep talking no matter what, and not give Higgins a chance to make any point. Higgins, purposefully spoke quietly and deliberately in order to contrast with Burton’s shouting. As a result he came across a lot better. It was absolutely brilliant when Browne got the transcript of the Late Late interview. This, as an opener for a campaign was a fantastic own goal for Labour. Bruton was disgusting throughout. She seemed to cop on at one point, staying silent for what she said was 10 mins. The fact that she knew it was ten minutes (going by Vincent’s watch, she said) shows how aware she becoming of her performance. Two nights, and two senior Labour people have disgraced themselves in their attempts to distance themselves from parties and politicians who are against the economic lunancy that will drive Ireland’s economy and society further into the dirt and are supporting a party that will strip this country of everything of value. In doing so of course, they are increasing Sinn Fein’s and ULA’s prospects and in that sense, in terms of building a real opposition in the Dail, they’re doing the left some good.
Having seen Joan Burton’s disgusting performance on Vincent Brown, all I can say is thank God for the excellent Independents who are running this time. Shame on you Joan, you let down women, yourself and your party. I just hope you never get the chance to let down the country.
I can’t decide whether
a) She she was on drugs at the beginning when she put Vincent in his place…and the drugs then wore off and she ranted for the next 40 minutes like a psychotic maniac
OR
b) She was NOT on drugs at the beginning and they kicked in a few minutes later and off she went for 40 minutes.
Either way this was one of the worst performances I have ever seen from an experienced front bench spokesperson and I am sure than nobody in Irish politics ever wants to be trapped for hours at a cabinet table with this unstable harridan.
A career ending performance if ever I saw one.
My wife, who is sympathetic to Labour, said that Burton must have been slipped drugs before the show because nobody could behave like that otherwise. My view is that if she remains on the Labour front bench then the whole party is tainted with her disgrace. I have to say I wasn’t surprised. I live in Greystones and voted Labour in the last local elections - the first thing they did was put in a Fianna Fail mayor. Labour have shown that they are no different to the self-serving Soldiers of Destiny - it is time for a real change.
She dismisses any notion of a national demonstration or general strike and then says “My antecedents in the Labour Party are James Connolly and Larkin” - Jesus wept! Definitely on some kind of mad drugs.
“spoilt little bitch”;
“fishwife”;
“unstable harridan”.
Whatever your views of Joan’s politics and positions, the language being used to discuss her here is veering towards the misogynistic. I would have expected better from Dublin Opinion, and from left-leaning folk generally.
Damian, Joan tried that argument herself last night, when she accused Joe Higgins of having a problem with strong women.
I’ve just finished editing the footage of last night’s show and will be putting it up asap. You can see for yourself how Joan tries to spin Joe’s criticisms of Labour as anti-woman.
Is this labour party policy now, to try and spin this as an anti-woman thing?
She is a disgrace.
Hiya Conor, I’ve seen the ‘anti-woman’ defence deployed many times (sometimes fairly, sometimes not) by women politicians. Equally I’ve seen male politicians and broadcasters who have clearly deserved such a rebuttal. Brian Cowen, in his attitude towards Joan Burton being very much a case in point.
I didn’t see the whole epsiode last night, so I’ll reserve judgement until I see it. But what I saw struck me as a local constituency spat between two rivals with little love for each other, egged on by Vincent (who, I have to say, comes across as seriously patronising in the above clip).
I was much more concerned by Roisin Shortall’s comments the night before, which I thought were way out of order.
And as you know, I can’t speak for Labour Party policy
Damien, this wasn’t a local spat - in fact, the only time it was brought up was near the end when Browne was trying (unsuccessfully) to calm Joan Burton down.
I’ve just put up an edited ten minutes of it, but have a look at the entire thing - you will not find one personal attack on Joan Burton by Joe Higgins. Not one.
Damian, if you haven’t seen it perhaps you should reserve judgment until you have. Burton was an absolute disgrace.
I agree that there’s no need to use sexist language about her. Her incoherent, vicious, childish antics transcend gender.
Good God it was painful watching that Burton woman.She will cost labour votes. I wouldn’t touch Labour with a barge poll after that ! Cowen was right. Gilmore needs to reign that silly woman in !
Conor, Mark P - Once I get a chance, I will watch it (probably with gritted teeth, while hiding behind the sofa)
I’m not defending Burton’s performance, nor Labour’s positioning over the last week. But I felt that the commentary around Joan had overstepped the mark. (Comment #14 being a case in point)
I think that’s a strawman.
On this site we’ve portrayed Brian Lenihan as a decaying zombie, Brian Cowen naked, and Trevor Sargent’s head as a censor bubble in porno movies. That must make us anti-cancer sufferers, anti-alcoholics, and anti-smug ass dickheads.
You haven’t seen Joan Burton’s performance, but still feel the urge to defend her with a sideways attack on the language of the criticism levelled against her.
Did you hear the section where she says to Joe Higgins, ‘And what should we call you, Joe? Your MEP-ship?”
It’s a fucking disgrace.
Eh, overstepped what mark, Damian ? Is it Damians mark or Joans mark ? Choice coming from someone who didn’t even see the show. Talk about shootg the messenger but before you read the message ! Good man Damian.
@ Conor - Now you’re being facetious. As you well know, there’s a big difference between the robust satire of zombies etc, and the language being used to describe Joan
I’m not going to defend the performance - and haven’t done. It may well have been a fucking disgrace, but that doesn’t justify sexist language.
@ Michael - Seriously, would you have referred to Joe Higgins as ‘that Higgins man’?
‘Michael - Seriously, would you have referred to Joe Higgins as ‘that Higgins man’?’
Er, yes he probably would, or ‘that Higgins fella’ as I heard him described this morning.
Yep definately. What could be possibly wrong with referring to Joe as that Higgins man. Anyway I’m going to a different blog. This one is too challenging for me. Bye.
Well a lot of what we do here is political satire - especially image-based political satire - and one of the easiest ways to criticise political satire is on the use of language, so you can see where I’m coming from when you start criticising our use of language to defend someone who acted disgracefully.
As regards Brian Lenihan and zombies - it’s interesting to read your comments on that.
three of us here on Dublin Opinion - ec. myself and Donagh - actually had to think carefully about whether we were crossing a line in portraying Lenihan as a decaying zombie, what with the cancer treatment and everything. Eventually we decided to go ahead and use that type of satire, but it DID generate discussion among us on the limits of political criticism.
Similarly, the reproduction of images of Cowen as a drunken, naked, obese oaf - there’s an element of exaggeration in satire, it’s what gives it its spice, yet with Cowen we ARE dealing with someone who obviously has a drinking problem and is clearly unfit and overweight and in that regard to portray him in that way is not so much satirical as offensive - indeed, it borders on bullying.
It’s a fine line.
Yet, with yourself Damian, you brush off these concerns as “facetious” and instead focus on my use of “bitch” to describe Burton’s behaviour on Vincent Browne last night.
I can tell you now, I am not being “facetious” with regard to the use of zombie imagery to portray a man with a type of cancer that 80 per cent of patients die of within three years of diagnosis. We had to think long and hard about that one, but we went with it.
Calling Burton a bitch… well, if there’s a line I think we crossed it with Lenihan, don’t you think?
Conor,
I tend to agree with you that Damian is seeking to change the subject by concentrating on the incidental use of the word “bitch” rather than on the nature of Burton’s bizarre, aggressive, incoherent, childish and deeply right wing performance.
However, much as I have complete contempt for her, it is true that Burton gets, alongside more than justified criticism, a lot of sexist or outright misogynist criticism. You only have to look at the madhouse of politics.ie or at a minority of the twitter comments to see it. My view on this is that there is such a limitless supply of justified nasty things to say about Burton, that using sexist language is unhelpful and counterproductive. Apart from anything else it allows pro-Labour weasels to change the subject.
Or to put it another way, your post loses nothing by replacing the word “bitch” with a gender neutral terms like “arsehole” or “shithead”.
Just to add on from that last comment.
Take this image:
Now, I used that in a post that I’m really proud of. It’s from a year ago, and in it I spelt out why Fianna Fail’s support would continue to fall:
“And while it’s true that only a fool would write off Fianna Fáil, nonetheless let’s be clear as to the nature of its current difficulties. Fianna Fáil is in serious trouble not because the country is in a heightened state of moral outrage at its methods, but because the collapse of the international banking system means that the contradictions within Fianna Fáil - a populist party with a strong working class base, but controlled by banking and business interests - have run out of space. Fianna Fáil’s room for maneuver is almost zero. It can’t sugarcoat its business-led economic policies with populist gestures, such as a tax-break or, well, erhm, a tax-break (Fianna Fáil hasn’t been that original lately). Indeed, in order to get the country through this mess it can either raise revenue through the closing of tax-breaks, increase tax on unproductive capital in order to force it into circulation, and borrow the rest for an economic stimulus package; or, it can leave wealth alone, cut back on funding for basic goods and services, tax personal income, and appeal to patriotism and our sense of duty. Fianna Fáil has decided to go for the latter. Its decision to borrow to prop up dead banks means that Ireland is finding it hard to secure loans for the rest of the economy, the part of the economy where the jobs are (for now). The party cannot do both. It cannot prop up its financiers AND keep that working class vote on board. The international economic situation just won’t allow for such an option, and the party’s losing support as a result.
The only way that Fianna Fáil can remain as a party is, obviously, to hang on to its voters, but to do that it has to hurt its financial backers, the people who give it millions every year in order to make sure that their backs are covered. Fianna Fáil’s world has contracted so much that its internal contradictions are tearing shreds off each other. This is not about moral outrage over bankers, this is about hundreds of thousands of people fighting for their economic lives, while Fianna Fáil uses those people to fund a survival package for the powerful business interests in this country. Unless Fianna Fáil turns back from that path it will find itself lacerated in the elections. And if that happens, the best move for Labour would be to try to from a government with Gilmore as Taoiseach, leaving Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil in each other’s (right-wing) arms” (1 March 2009)
Yet, at the end of what I consider to be a strong piece of social and political analysis, here I am calling every single member of Young Fine Gael a cunt.
Sexist? Political humour? A valid point?
The style I’ve developed on this blog over the past four years is a mixture of coarseness and commentary. That’s how I write on-line, and the post quoted here I feel captures that mixture quite well.
So, given what I write, the way I write, and what I have written over the past four years, at what point does calling Joan Burton a bitch become a step too far?
All that happened is that the mask slipped, she feels that she is so close to the merc and perks that no one is going to stop her. Think again joanie,you just cost yourself any chance of any position in any government EVER. An absolutely disgraceful exhibition of a power hungry headbanger.
Right, finally had the chance to watch the full clip. Thanks for uploading it Conor.
My first reaction? Why’s everyone getting so exercised? Joan’s not exactly covering herself in glory. It’s a testy, narky, unprofessional performance, but no more than that.
(And I’m not getting into the question of the finance bill or reversing the cuts - suffice to say I’m not a fan of Gilmore’s line on that)
As I said earlier, Shortall’s sweeping dismissal of everyone to the left of Labour with her rag-bag and motley crew comments the previous night were far worse.
Mark P - I largely agree with you - pro-labour weasal comment excepted, of course
Conor - I honestly never connected the zombie image to Lenihan’s illness. I was thinking zombie banks. Biffo and the drinking references - fair comment, and sadly, not commented enough upon until recently. But calling a female politician a ’spoilt little bitch’? Hardly the high point of political satire. And it does feed into a misogynistic narrative about Burton.
I’m not trying to deflect attention from the issues here. There is an urgent need for a proper debate around Labour’s positioning and tactics. I want to see a Labour-led government, but more importantly, I want to see a progressive Labour-led government. I’m not happy with the fiscal policy as it currently stands. I think the tactics around the Finance Bill have been poor, and I’m majorly pissed off at the rhetoric around SF and the ULA.
I’ll leave it at that.
Conor, there is obviously an argument that “cunt” is always a sexist term, but when you apply it to a mixed gender group the effect is at least muted as compared to applying it to, for instance an individual woman politician.
I certainly don’t object to profanity, but the word “bitch” and indeed the witch picture are a bit too obviously gendered in their effect. I’m not calling you a misogynist - and there was no shortage of female posters on twitter using the same term last night - but I think that emphasising her gender does nothing to add to the power of the insult and indeed offers people like Damian an easy way out of dealing with your argument.
It’s a different point from objections to the degree of nastiness in satire. The problem isn’t that the term is particularly nasty or vicious, and indeed you could say a lot nastier things before I’d blink.
Burton does get a lot of straightforwardly misogynist abuse, insults about her appearance for instance. Politics.ie is full of it. I think in general it’s a good idea to keep left wing political criticism and satire distinct from that. As I said above, I don’t think that your post would lose anything from its condemnatory effect if you’d happened to use a gender-neutral insult.
I’m a bit reluctant to keep going on about this though, as I’m only helping people shift the discussion away from Burton’s behaviour and the views she espouses.
I still think that your sense of offence is more political than anything else.
If I had said that Harney was a petulant little bitch, would you have felt the need to comment on my use of sexist language?
The thing about Biffo is true. The drunken oaf is a cheap shot (and I do stand accused there) because it’s not really satire. One point of satire is to ridicule a folly or a vice, but with Cowen the ridicule is already there. To laugh at Cowen’s appearance or his alcoholism is just cruel. But that’s the flip side of comedy. It hurts, but in political comedy that’s usually the intention.
Calling Burton a bitch may not be the most comedic line ever, and in the piece here it’s not funny at all, but then again, neither would be calling Mary Harney a bitch.
Mark, that’s not a witch image - it’s the cat lady from the simpsons. The other image is Leatherface from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I would consider the cat lady character a cultural trope, one that expresses in a visual way someone who is acting crazy. Its usage with regard to Joan Burton is entirely appropriate in this instance I would reckon. She was figuratively throwing cats at Joe Higgins. Leatherface I used because it’s an extreme example of a person who is incoherent and only understands violence. Using it with Joan Burton in relation to a late-night political debate is just exaggeration but that’s the nature of this particular type of comedy. And again, political humour is cruel. It may not always work, it may not always be funny, but almost always it is cruel.
As regards the use of what is termed sexist language - if some people can use it as a way of avoiding the issue - and I don’t think that is what Damien is doing, I would argue that his uneasiness with the term is in relation to a member of a party he supports but he wouldn’t see it that way and that’s fair enough - then so be it. People who want to avoid the issue will use anything to avoid the issue, sexist language or no.
Take the two posters I put up of Joan Burton. We are now in the situation where it seems that while using Cat Lady from the Simpsons in relation to Joan Burton can be seen as sexist, using Leatherface from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre - a serial killer who multilates his victims before killing them with a chainsaw - is ok. If it bends, it’s funny, I suppose.
One of these days I’m gong to write that sketch, because this really makes me laugh. Leatherface ok, cat lady no.
[On a different note Mark P, for some reason your comments are ending up in spam. I think it’s the way IP addresses work - shared and reused and all that - but it means that I didn’t get to your comments as quickly as I should have as they weren’t in moderation. That’s why the times on your comments are out of sync with the others. Sorry about that.]
By the way, my latest poster has Eamon Gimore as a wet-nurse to Brian Cowen. I suppose if I had used Joan Burton as the face of the wetnurse that would have been sexist, even though she is the finance spokesperson.
Any old excuse to mention :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmKiADSyV2A
Joan of Arse - so that’s where they go their name from