The History of The Irish...Worldwide
Is $34.5 Million Enough for Ireland's Magdalene Victims?
What do you think of the Irish government's announcement yesterday that it would provide the estimated 770 living victims of Catholic Church-run Magdalene laundries at least $34.5 million to compensate them for their months and years, even decades of forced labor?
In remarks to former Magdalenes, Justice Minister Alan Shatter apologized to the women and said he hoped they would accept the government's compensation plans as "a sincere expression of the state's regret for failing you in the past, its recognition of your current needs, and its commitment to respecting your dignity and human rights as full, equal members of our nation."
Here's some related information:
Ireland to pay $45 million to Catholic laundry workers (CBS News)
Irish Cillini and Magdalene Laundry Panel with Linda Evangelista, Toni Maguire, Mari Steed, Gerry Regan
'The Magdalene Sisters' Hits America's Shores
Tags: Faith, Magdalenes
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Kelly O'Rourke on
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Thank you for clarifying these issues, Mari. I have seen tributes to the ladies, and people mention the laundries with a shudder here in Galway. My only other source of information was a fictionalized movie I watched a few years ago called The Magdalene Sisters. I know the accuracy of that film has been called into question by both sides of the controversy, for opposite reasons.
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Permalink Reply by Gerry Regan on
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We reviewed the movie here, http://thenewwildgeese.com/profiles/blogs/the-magdalene-sisters-hit.... Of course, I had no way of judging its authenticity, but it made a huge impression on me. Mari, what do you think of "The Magdalene Sisters"?
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Permalink Reply by Rónán Gearóid Ó Domhnaill on
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There was also a TV movie called 'Sinners', equally dramatic. Both movies suit those who already have an agenda.
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Permalink Reply by Bernard Raymond O'Brien on
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like you?
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Permalink Reply by Mari Steed on
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'The Magdalene Sisters' was actually highly accurate. Director/actor Peter Mullan based the film on a 1997 documentary by Steve Humphries called 'Sex in a Cold Climate', which featured four women recounting their experiences. They represented four of the most common routes into a Laundry: one was raped by a cousin, but she was the one "punished"; another two came via the industrial school system, as my mother did; and the fourth had a child out of wedlock and was sent to a Laundry when her family wouldn't take her back. Of course, there was some dramatisation on Mullan's part, but honestly, not much. One of the interesting criticisms I once read of the film was that everything appeared "too clean" -- as if the facilities should have been shown as dirty, Dickensian places. Evidently the reviewer didn't know much about nuns and the old "cleanliness is next to Godliness" adage! Of course they were immaculate - women were made to kneel and scrub floors for hours, wash walls, etc. in addition to Laundry and sewing work.
I met Mullan at a 2003 screening of the film here in Philadelphia -- I had been invited through an adoption community friend of mine (the woman who actually ended up finding my daughter) whose son was part of Mullan's Miramax publicist team. We ended up spending four hours over pints and fags in Philly discussing the Catholic Church and its potential future. Interestingly, Mullan told me he based the Sister Bridget character on a nun he actually worked for as a young post-grad volunteer in London (he said his very Dorothy Day-Socialist Scots Catholic mother made he and his eight siblings do a year's Catholic volunteer work). He said this woman actually had a portrait of Mussolini in her office! Very erudite and interesting guy.
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It is highly unlikely that a priest would sing a song like the ‘Well the below the valley’, a song of rape and incest, as depicted in the film.
The nuns were depicted as monsters which is a bit simplistic unless you have an anti Catholic agenda such as the Orangemen or militant atheists have.
The nuns tended to keep places clean. When they gave up running hospitals thats when standards dropped.
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Mr. O Domhnaill, I respectfully ask you to stop implying that those who condemn the cruelty of many nuns, are Orangemen. I am no Orangeman. I am a Catholic Atheist! My hatred was well earned!
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The rhetoric is so similar. There are a few million Catholics out there. One cannot possibly tar them all with the one brush.
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Of course, we at many points will just have to agree to disagree. We have several priests here in the community. Perhaps one of them might weigh in as to whether a brother priest would sing "Well Below the Valley." I suspect that some would. I did not find that scene false.
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Christy Moore sang the song, but it was never really popular in Ireland. Most people find the topic unpleasant. I go to a fair few secessions around the country and have never heard it live.
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Why indeed did people not say anything Mari though I do not view the Catholic church as evil. It may be riddled with hypocrisy but so is Irish society in general. The Irish people and state were happy to make them all powerful, which was wrong. What happened to the modern liberal state that was formed in 1922?
Nor indeed would I view the Magdalens as some sort of gulag. The beatings that went on there were, according to John Waters part of the accepted culture of time.
I went to a convent school where I was verbally abused and mentally tortured and even struck by them, but have no chance to make a claim.
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