Request regarding scandal of 800 children found buried in Magdalene home in Galway.

[Brian Shanahan]

I posted the following in my EitB 35 thread. After a short bit of thinking I decided to open a thread here about it.

The following is not pretty, and also contains me venting about something I find disgusting and horrifying.

Very Important Business unrelated to the game Links to some very disturbing content are provided, sorry if I cause nausea or outrage.

Ye've all heard of the Magdalene laundries, correct? Well, back in the 1970's at one of the nun's places, in Tuam, Co. Galway, there was a mass grave of 796 infants discovered, where they were essentially tossed into a water tank and forgotten about. When the bodies were discovered nothing was done by the state authorities to investigate the obvious crime committed. It is only thanks to local historian Catherine Corless who has followed up on this grave and the murdered infants as much as possible that we actually have the publicity this week. And this issue was well known at the time in Irish state health and police authorities, as the local health authority had the following to say on the state of the poor children essentially imprisoned in the place:

A local health board inspection report from April 1944 recorded 271 children and 61 single mothers in residence, a total of 333 in a building that had a capacity for 243.

The report described the children as “emaciated,” “pot-bellied,” “fragile” with “flesh hanging loosely on limbs.” The report noted that 31 children in the “sun room and balcony” were “poor, emaciated and not thriving.” The effects of long term neglect and malnutrition were observed repeatedly. {source: Irish Central}

It pains me to say that in my country, Ireland, a supposedly civilised, secular and law abiding country, this religious scandal has been simmering away for the last forty years, and nothing done to catch the perpetrators of this mass murder, simply because of official deference to a discredited and disgraceful cult. I would ask each and every person who reads my thread to sign the following petition to call on recently appointed Justice Minister, Frances Fitzgerald TD, to finally properly investigate the matter and see what, if anything, can be done to properly do justice for the murdered babies and children.

Thanks in advance,

Brian.

[Twinkletoes89]

Went to sign it but your link doesn't work

Its a horrifying tragedy

[Brian Shanahan]

Went to sign it but your link doesn't work

Its a horrifying tragedy

Sorry for that. It seems when I try to make it into a link, it doesn't work but the when I copy and paste the address into the address bar it will go to the petition.

https ://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Frances_Fitzgerald_Irish_Minister_for_Justice_and_Equality_A_full_Gardai_investigation_into_the_mass_grave_in_Tuam_Co_Ga/
{space inserted to stop it being made into a link, after https}

Aaaarghhh. The link is not working no matter what I do. I reposted this thread over at CFC (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=527437), it works from there.

[antisocialmunky]

Not to minimize the horror and disgust of all this but what exactly would anyone propose to do? The perpetrators are likely dead and there's probably no way to determine cause of death whether from disease or starvation, maybe from abuse. And lastly since this place existed because of societal issues of the time, is it even valid to prosecute anyone for more than disposing of bodies in a horribly lazy and cheap way?

Is it even worth burning tax money on an investigation (archeological at this point) when the UN is already going after the Catholic Church for mass torture?

Quite screwed up at any rate. It reminds me of something similar happening in the states with an orphanage in Florida.

[Rowain]

Not to minimize the horror and disgust of all this but what exactly would anyone propose to do? The perpetrators are likely dead and there's probably no way to determine cause of death whether from disease or starvation, maybe from abuse. And lastly since this place existed because of societal issues of the time, is it even valid to prosecute anyone for more than disposing of bodies in a horribly lazy and cheap way?

The perpetrators have a chance to still be alive (small chance but possible). A lot depends when the deeds were done - the grave was discovered in the 70's don't know hoe long before the home was closed or when the last kid died there.
If it is possible to find clews about cause of death (I don't know I'm not a forensic ) then you could get a different charge.

Is it even worth burning tax money on an investigation (archeological at this point) when the UN is already going after the Catholic Church for mass torture?

Yes it is. On principle. If a nation decides that crimes aren't worth to get looked at just because it would cost money then it is going downhill fast. As government you have to assure your people that crimes will get investigated even if it takes some time.
And it doesn't matter what the UN does it has to be your own government.
Investigating also helps to understand why this could happen without persecution and how to make sure that similar deeds don't happen again.

[Brian Shanahan]

Not to minimize the horror and disgust of all this but what exactly would anyone propose to do? The perpetrators are likely dead and there's probably no way to determine cause of death whether from disease or starvation, maybe from abuse. And lastly since this place existed because of societal issues of the time, is it even valid to prosecute anyone for more than disposing of bodies in a horribly lazy and cheap way?

A) the church made lots of money out of these places, first they were paid the average industrial wage for each woman and child housed there by the state, second they had ready access to forced labour from the mothers which they used with abandon, and finally they were able to sell the children for adoption (usually to American couples) without the consent of the mothers for upwards of IR£5,000 (which in the 1950's was a big amount). The church in Ireland made untold millions off the backs of these women and children.
B) The societal issues were in place simply because of the power of the church. It was catholic "morality" that demanded that unmarried mothers were the "dregs of society" (as someone on a thread elsewhere described them to try and minimise the crimes committed), and had to be shut away from society for fear that they'd "infect the rest of us with their evil". This was church doctrine being implemented as state policy because the rcc had captured the arms of the state and perverted them to its own ends.
C) I don't know if you can receive podcasts from the Irish state broadcaster, but there was a talk today on RTÉ Radio One where they discussed the evidence there was from other places run by congregations for the same purpose, that children had been starved to death. This makes it, at the very least a case of manslaughter through deliberate neglect.

[antisocialmunky]

That's quite screwed up if it was that systemic and they got paid for it on top of that. I'm don't really know if it will go anywhere but good luck with your petition all the same.

[Krill]

To call it systemic is true in the grossest possible extent. The RCC acted as a supranational human laundering syndicate across entire continents and practised slavery in at least 1 country.

[darrelljs]

This made it on CNN.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/04/world/euro...ml?c=world

Darrell

[antisocialmunky]

To call it systemic is true in the grossest possible extent. The RCC acted as a supranational human laundering syndicate across entire continents and practised slavery in at least 1 country.

1 Country?

I wasn't aware that South and Latin America were just 1 Country. But I guess its easy to forget about the Conquistadors converting the natives so they could work them to death in gold mines and agricultural estates to save their souls. I suppose the Church only condoned that to save the souls of the natives but still.

People using religion or any other reason (religion is just the lowest hanging fruit) like nationalism to rationalize away their own horribleness knows no bounds.