It’s perfectly acceptable to raise practical, mechanical and logistical complaints about generative AI but on a fundamental level my problem with it is that I think it’s an affront to the essence of humanity.

entering the New Holy Roman War... on the side of the VATICAN

Hear a lot that AI can be used to enhance learning rather than outsource but every day I get emails like this (subject:"Turn big ideas into A work") offering me 50% off Grammarly to generate my work with AI, check it to see if it sounds like AI, then rewrite it with AI to not sound like AI.

I mean part of the issue here is that without any context the phrase “score a goal against a Premier League goalkeeper” is pretty much devoid of meaning. How far out am I, how many defenders are around me, is it just the shot or the play leading up to the shot? Either way yeah I absolutely could

Probably 80% of posters madness is downstream of thinking that posting on a niche microblogging platform is, in some way, important, rather than being a way to waste time on your phone

Usually I share some kind of snarky, pithy quote from my column here in the hopes that people will read it and share it or whatever but this week there really isn't one that does that kind of job. It's a column about the cruelty in our midst.

And let's be clear here, they did it on the back of the presidential election where voter appetite for a more progressive and humane approach was crystal.

wow i'm seeing double. FOUR young politicians.

No pithy quotes necessary @carlkinsella.bsky.social. Excellent piece! One to read #Speirgorm

"Ireland’s own cruelty could be seen on social media, where many comments struck the same triumphalistic tone that is the hallmark of Itamar Ben-Gvir... cashing in their humanity for a few likes on social media from the global network of far-right freaks."

Excellent piece by @carlkinsella.bsky.social. Ties together how the Irish people support Palestine while the govt talks out of both sides of its mouth, the wanton and egregious cruelty of Israel & the dehumanising of minorities in Irl - epitomised by the killing of Yves Sakila while people stood by😭

vengabus honking intensifies

There may not be pithy quotes this week, but there are plenty of soul searching hard truths in this excellent piece. Be prepared to stare into space for a bit after reading. Maith an fear Carl. #Speirgorm

Cur síos beacht ar an tseachtain @carlkinsella.bsky.social, monuar www.thejournal.ie/readme/surre...

Usually I share some kind of snarky, pithy quote from my column here in the hopes that people will read it and share it or whatever but this week there really isn't one that does that kind of job. It's a column about the cruelty in our midst.

im currently posting from inside one of these boxes please somebody help

CMAT's "that cunt Bertie" and @carlkinsella.bsky.social's "Lanzarote's Gerard Hutch." #Speirgorm

Trans people have been around your whole life. You’ve been sharing bathrooms with them your whole life. They’ve been in your communities your whole life. They’ve even been playing sport your whole life. And you didn’t care *at all* till a few years ago when every right wing org decided you should

More importantly, she called out Bertie's racism in her acceptance speech, called him a c**t and said fuck Farage and Reform, but for some reason that's not included in RTE's report.

This company that has built an apparently unworkable system for Irish Rail, reportedly headed to the bin at the cost of €50 million, is the same company the NTA has hired to bring contactless payments to Dublin's bus system. www.dublininquirer.com/the-nta-has-...

it's actually true that you cannot fund good government entirely by taxing the rich, which is why slopulist proposals to gut the tax base are a bad idea but taxing the rich at punitive levels is a goal in and of itself, billionaires are simply too dangerous to public policy to exist

it’s always been crazy to me that the Chinese were the ones who came up with the phrase ‘century of humiliation’. like you don’t need to call it anything man. we weren’t calling it anything before. don’t worry about it. we’ve all been there

This is disgusting treatment of the Flotilla activists, the woman being abused at the start of the video is Irish woman Catriona Graham. Our government cannot continue to stand by as apartheid Israel kidnaps, assaults and incarcerates its citizens, it must impose sanctions now.

Must be interesting to be among the group of writers and editors overseeing the death of writing and editing

In the coming months I'll be doing some workshops with children experiencing homelessness, a life-changing ordeal for those kids leading to long lasting trauma, and the Minister here describes that as a "short-term challenge"

A man who died shortly after he was restrained following an incident outside a pub in Dublin’s Temple Bar at Christmas last year suffered fatal compression of his neck while face down on the ground, an inquest has heard jrnl.ie/7045341

a big part of why i think the wealthy are so in favour of the rapid acceleration of tech at all times is because it enables them to commit more crimes. crimes the law hasn't thought of yet and can never possibly keep up with. simply unfathomable crimes of every genre

Remarkable to hear RTE mention the words "shoplifting" at the end of the News but not mention the words "security guards" or "choked" or "physical assault." Despite the fact there's no evidence so far of the first and video evidence of the second.

There’s a weird attitude among many Irish people that no punishment is too great for the smallest of crimes. Plenty of Irish people are also racist. When those two things meet, you get the most disgusting opinions imaginable

I can't get over nobody intervening, I really can't.

have Gript started speculating as to the names and nationalities of the securities guards involved yet or do they only do that sometimes

I’ve just invented a third kind of hiding place that’s neither a nook nor a cranny but sadly all the VC money is going towards AI these days

My new bit is referring to Westmeath as ‘Wetsmeath’ and seeing how long it takes for someone to point it out

Delighted to tell you all that I have a new series in @thejournal.ie where I get to grips with all things Ireland-coded! Have you ever stopped to think... what exactly is a parish pump? jrnl.ie/7040952

'Remind me again, whose decade of leadership left Ireland in such a precarious position as to be so gutted by the 2008 financial crisis that we never really recovered? Was it the Congolese, or am I remembering that wrong?' This week's column on BertieGate2026, with a smattering of Micheál.

One really fascinating point here (among many) is that a peril of organic-looking PR is less that people will be tricked into liking a band, and more that some journalists can be suckered into treating people/phenomena as massively influential when they probably are not!

This is indeed a really fascinating element of all this, and I’d argue that journalists are often even worse dupes for this kind of marketing than the average person, bc so many are pushed to be the *first* to identify a new star, name a new phenomenon, etc.

especially pissed off to learn they’ve been making delicious salty butter out of our most famous horse

This is excellent @carlkinsella.bsky.social. "Lanzarote's Gerard Hutch" was unexpected an unexpected moment of mirth but so apt and true. We should all borrow that phrase (with your permission, of course) going forward. #Speirgorm.

Tuam should be the focus of anyone worried about religious overreach into people’s lives, not ‘Sharia law’. What a ghoul

"Ahern has also both defended his comments as unpolished and not intended for public consumption, while also arguing that the backlash against his comments signals a threat to free speech. So which is it? Did he speak in error, or did he simply speak too freely?"

Surrealing is becoming as integral of a Saturday morning ritual for me as getting the 15 extra minutes of sleep the dog allots me before whining begins

I also love that Bertie is worried about Sharia Law when Ireland had women & kids tossed into the Church ran Laundries for slave labour & sexual abuse for "being sinful"- and he was in favour of having Church records sealed so as to protect religious orders from consequences.

Carl becoming (already is?) one of our best writers.

Excellent piece as always from Carl. Can you imagine how upset I am that John Stephens hasn't called canvassing

"... while canvassing for Fianna Fáil’s Dublin Central byelection candidate John Stephens, who is polling at 4%, behind Sinn Féin’s Janice Boylan, Soc Dems’ Daniel Ennis, and Lanzarote’s Gerard Hutch." 😂

'Remind me again, whose decade of leadership left Ireland in such a precarious position as to be so gutted by the 2008 financial crisis that we never really recovered? Was it the Congolese, or am I remembering that wrong?' This week's column on BertieGate2026, with a smattering of Micheál.

my new bit is declaring that increasingly important public services are 'free' until it's in poor taste

yeah i mean it has for sure gotten worse

you know it's bad when they're not even in a hurry. like yeah we'll do it tomorrow don't worry about it