Tara abandoned by a generation who prefer soulless symbols

TARA, here I am. I have come all the way from Kerry to be with you before the vultures, with bulldozers and JCBs, open your lower belly. They are impatient to inflict the wounds.

You are abandoned, forsaken and rejected. All the powers that be - Meath County Council, the Government, NRA, An Bord Pleanála and the High Court - have walked out on you. We pay them to protect you but they betrayed us. We trusted them too much.

Tara, I know you sympathise with the people who are forced to commute to Dublin five days a week. But why are they not angry with Meath County Council for not putting in a bypass at Dunshaughlin and a proper one in Navan 20 years ago? They allowed them not only to close down but also to rip up the Dublin/Navan/Trim railway line over 30 years ago. And they still trust them. There were so many other options for this road. Are you the same Tara who was magic for Master O'Connell, the principal of Tarmons National School in Tarbert? He instilled a love of you into our hearts, and I can still see the face of Fr O'Flaherty (our history teacher in St Brendan's, Killarney) come alive at your name. But that was a different generation, other times. You are no longer in fashion. This generation prefers soulless symbols - motorways, shopping malls, four-wheel drives, big trucks and, of course, the euro. I expected all the people in Ireland to have run to protect you. It would have been unacceptable, I thought, to run a motorway through the Tara/Skryne Valley, opening up a wound that no plastic surgery can cure. But this generation was not touched, nor incensed. How sad. Will you forgive us?

The day Environment Minister Dick Roche sanctioned the motorway, I was watching the evening news in a pub. One man said, when he saw Mr Roche on TV, "Isn't he a pity? I wouldn't ask him to mind my chickens, and Bertie Ahern put him in charge of our heritage and environment. He has no bottle, afraid of the hawks." Poor Mr Roche. Maybe he has no power. An Bord Pleanála, which is not comprised of elected representatives, makes all the big decisions. Or does it? Who has real power today?

Democracy, the people's participation in the ordering of their own lives, is now perceived as a meaningless facade that hides the ruthlessness of corporate self-interest. The suspicion that political ideologies and institutions are becoming irrelevant because politics is being reduced to following 'the laws of the market' is creating political unease among people and cynicism among the young about voting. Tara, what else can your support groups and friends do now? Are all avenues closed? Has your hour come? Will we call the lone piper to play a dirge?

Tommy O'Hanlon
Tarbert
Co Kerry

As for the rest Nigel it's symptomatic of the greed-ridden culture we now live in - from Tesco to Tarmac and all the priests and politicians in between. Whatever happened to civil disobedience? I've still got the chains and padlocks we planned to use at Stonehenge; we could go down in history as the Two Megateers - as well as downing the last of the summer wine along the way...

Beautifully put Nigel, a real rant of righteous anger against the stupid and morally bankrupt leaders,companies and those who choose to "filch" our common heritage from us...

p.s.and I can't resist this - WHY do we, or a council, have to pay £350,000 for a gold torque, that really belongs in our museums anyhow....

Loud applause from me [the cat got a bit freaked tho].

It's time to get my tunnelling gear out of retirement and dust off the old handcuffs. Extreme at my age, but what else can you do? Rant at people who are 100% in agreement seems the only choice nowadays - I suspect the days of Greenham, Newbury and public protest in general are gone now.

Soulless Symbols? You bet.

Someone, somewhere, has to recognise the pristine efforts of George, FFS, not to mention yourself and all those who have yelled until hoarse into the wild wind of indifference. Fuck them. Sorry. No. I'm not. I'm sorry I'm right here, right now.

Love to you all

Peace

Pilgrim

X

Hi All,

I thought you would like to know, NYCC have found the petition, it was lying on the same dusty shelf they left it on in 2005. They have confirmed that apart from including it as an objection to the last Ladybridge Application, they have done nothing with it. In short, your voice is meaningless in North Yorkshire, in our county apathy is openly encouraged and the democratic process is openly avoided.

I have thought of an angle, my local mp is William Hague. He has been given the task of energising the Tory rural vote so I've asked him to accompany me to parliament. I reckon he will avoid this.

If he does, would that not be a welcome Labour spin opportunity for a deputy Prime Minister looking to be the next pm? I could stand outselde of parliament with a placard "Tories hate the country, tories destroy our heritage, tories ignore the electorate".

But I'm a really nice guy these days, I really want to avoid any form of negative action and most impotantly I know that the more I canpaign to save Thornborough the worse it will get - this is a barometer of the state of our nation and the harder we push for the right thing the more the worng thing will happen.

"The largest stone circle near the English border—the Stonehenge or Avebury of the north of England—formerly stood near Shap. The stone avenues leading to it are said to have been nearly two miles in length. The engineer of the Carlisle and Lancaster railway carried his line right through the very centre of the ancient stone circle forming the head of the chief avenue, leaving a few of its huge stones standing out on the western side, where they may he still seen by the passing traveller about half a mile south of the Shap station. If the line had been laid only a few feet on either side, the wanton desecration and destruction of this fine archaic monument might have been readily saved. Railway engineers, however, and railway directors, care far more for mammon and money than for mounds and monoliths".

Professor J.Y. Simpson M.D.
December 1860

This slipped my mind after the locals won their appeal, saving an earthen barrow in the process. I must make a point of getting down there and checking it out, as there are two in the area and several round barrow cemeteries scattered around.

http://save-wye.org/2006/09/17/now-can-you-please-help-the-folks-on-the-hill

"I finally got paid today for my hoard, and received a message on my answer phone from radio Gloucestershire, apparently they want me to speak to them about the outcome.

I think you can call this payback time, as I now intend under the freedom of information act to get a complete breakdown of the costs of the excavation and see why it cost £20000,

and why they spent tax payers money on buying up all the magazine articles I wrote, and sending them to the landowner, to cause a rift between us.

And why a museum which had been closed for 2 years after a £5 million refurbishment didn’t have a secure finds cabinet to house the hoard, so they conned the general public into paying £3000 for one, did this represent best value.

And why the archies didn’t turn up for 2 months after I discovered the hoard, even though some of the gold was on the surface.

And finally why the archies are complete ---HOLES.

Although it think the last question is fairly obvious.”