{"id":5978,"date":"2019-12-03T13:15:09","date_gmt":"2019-12-03T13:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cassandravoices.com\/?p=5978"},"modified":"2019-12-03T13:15:09","modified_gmt":"2019-12-03T13:15:09","slug":"irish-timess-columnist-finn-mcredmond-in-2015-being-a-tory-does-not-make-you-a-bad-person","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/2019\/12\/03\/irish-timess-columnist-finn-mcredmond-in-2015-being-a-tory-does-not-make-you-a-bad-person\/","title":{"rendered":"Irish Times\u2019s Columnist Finn McRedmond"},"content":{"rendered":"

For anyone to become an opinion writer for the \u2018paper of record\u2019, the Irish Times<\/em>, requires considerable ability. But does a particular viewpoint give an aspiring columnist a distinct advantage?<\/span><\/p>\n

It is said that if you\u2019re not a socialist in your twenties you have no heart, and if you\u2019re not a conservative in your forties, you have no brain. Given the increasing centre-right consensus across Irish media, including the Irish Times<\/em>, anyone aspiring to be a journalist there might do well to accelerate that learning curve. There are, of course, true conservative believers from the outset.<\/p>\n

Once such appears to be the precocious Finn McRedmond, who in recent months has become a fixture op-ed writer for the Irish Times<\/em>. The daughter of David McRedmond, former chief executive of independent commercial television station, TV3, and currently chief executive of semi-state An Post, Finn McRedmond attended Rathdown Secondary School, and completed a Classics degree in Cambridge University, graduating c.2015.<\/p>\n

In a series of waspish recent articles for the Irish Times<\/em>, she has attacked the Brexit movement,[i]<\/a> lauded the statesmanship of Leo Varadkar,[ii]<\/a> while heaping scorn on both Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn.[iii]<\/a> These contributions situate her politics on the centre-right \u2013 liberal-conservative and Remainer \u2013 an ideological slant very much ascendant in the Irish Times.<\/em><\/p>\n

This outlook has been evident in the paper\u2019s coverage of the forthcoming U.K. election. Along with condemnation of Populists, especially Nigel Farage, the U.K. Labour leader is a recurring b\u00eate noire<\/em>,[iv]<\/a> albeit full-time U.K. correspondent Denis Staunton has generally remained impartial.<\/p>\n

The cartoon drawn by Martin Turner on December 3rd<\/sup> provides a good example. It features Corbyn alongside Boris Johnson with a list of some of the calumnies we have seen during the election. The point seems to be: these are two extremists \u2013 one as bad as the other.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Martin Turner, December 3rd, 2019.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Even apparently centre-left Fintan O\u2019Toole was moved to describe Corbyn before the 2017 election as: \u2018a highly problematic leader, not least in his inability to think about how to create a majority in England for this radical social democratic vision.\u2019[v]<\/a> Curiously, O\u2019Toole has not expressed views in any articles on the Orwellian campaign of online distortion characterising U.K. election 2019.[vi]<\/a><\/p>\n

In her latest opinion piece, McRedmond laments the loss of Ken Clarke, Nicholas Soames, Nick Boles and Philip Hammond from Conservative ranks, and reventilates paper-thin allegations of anti-Semitism[vii]<\/a> orchestrated to discredit Corbyn, concluding: \u2018there is no good choice, and no obvious way through this election.\u2019[viii]<\/a><\/p>\n

While still a student, McRedmond revealed she gave her vote (presumably enjoying that right as an Irish citizen) to in the 2015 General Election to David Cameron\u2019s Conservatives, who won an overall majority for the first time in nearly two decades. Published in the The Cambridge Tab<\/em> just after the election \u2013 with austerity in full swing as over a million people relied on food banks[ix]<\/a>\u00a0 \u2013 the headline read: \u2018Being a Tory does not make you a bad person.\u2019<\/p>\n

McRedmond supported David Cameron over the then moderate Labour leader Ed Milliband. Perhaps in response to university peers whose \u201chearts\u201d may have ruled their \u201cheads,\u201d she protested:<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not a bad person because I voted Conservative. I voted to decrease the deficit. I voted to raise the basic state pension by 2.5% a year. I voted to increase the health budget by \u00a38bn by 2020.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t vote for closing the NHS, I didn\u2019t vote for free champagne for all FTSE 100 CEO\u2019s, I didn\u2019t vote to \u201cliterally kill vulnerable people\u201d. I didn\u2019t actually vote for Satan. I voted for the party that I think this country needs.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2026<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t vote Conservative for low taxes so I can keep my mansion while everyone else can live in a slum. I don\u2019t even have a mansion. It\u2019s a townhouse.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

No party is perfect. No party will be the indisputable moral saviour of Britain. The bedroom tax is odious. Cutting benefits is sad and maybe not the best way forward. The country isn\u2019t going to be absolved of all moral transgressions with Labour or LibDem or Greens in power. In the same way that Conservatives aren\u2019t going to do that either. But I am sick of people occupying the moral high ground because for some convoluted and laboured reason they see their party ridding Britain of all immorality and filling it with biscuits. God Ed Miliband loves biscuits.<\/em><\/strong>[x]<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

It is noteworthy that McRedmond attended Peterhouse College while at Cambridge, among the oldest and most traditional institutions in the University. In the 1980s it became association with Conservative, Thatcherite politics, counting Michael Portillo and Michael Howard as alumni.<\/p>\n

Since graduating McRedmond has been writing \u2013 alongside Irish Times<\/em> work \u2013 for British commentary and news magazine Reaction<\/em>. Its editor-in-chief Iain Martin was previously head of comment for the Telegraph group, while Chairman of the board, Lord Salisbury, was once Conservative Leader in the House of Lords, opposing the Anglo-Irish Agreement in 1985, and offering freelance services to the mujahedin<\/em> in Afghanistan in the 1980s.[xi]<\/a><\/p>\n

Its advisory panel includes luminaries such as Lord Hill, a former European Commissioner and advisor to John Major, as well as Adam Boulton, Editor at Large for Sky News.<\/p>\n

McRedmond\u2019s association with the publication perhaps came about through Deputy Editor Alastair Benn, whose Linkedin profile reveals he too graduated from Cambridge in 2015, also with a Classics degree, and with whom McRedmond has collaborated on a number of podcasts.[xii]<\/a><\/p>\n

Finn McRedmond clearly has no taste for the Populism that has overtaken the Conservative Party, and being Irish, no truck with English nationalism or Brexit either. But anti-left bias might be detected in a recent somewhat snide Irish Times<\/em> article she wrote entitled: \u2018Are Sally Rooney\u2019s heroines too skinny?\u2019<\/p>\n

McRedmond opines: \u2018Rooney speaks the language of the so-called Woke Left. She is interested in political activism. And she has made her career writing about young people sensitively.\u2019 But, she warns: \u2018Her frequent references to thinness feels unconscious. A writer who is so careful and precise in her descriptions of people and their relationships has, like us, a culturally produced blind spot.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018This recurrent theme,\u2019 McRedmond warns, \u2018that women who are thin are more interesting than those who are not, and that women who are thin are the only ones worth writing about \u2013 is potentially dangerous.\u2019 She counsels that \u2018we should be sceptical of novels that propagate ideas most harmful to those supposed to find them most relatable.\u2019<\/p>\n

McRedmond is certainly a capable writer, and displayed refreshing candour in revealing her political choice. There is no reason to believe she is a bad person, but given the current orientation of media, her rapid progression to become a regular opinion columnist for the Irish Times<\/em> \u2013 the national paper of record \u2013 while still in her twenties, is surely connected to the political \u2018maturity\u2019 she has displayed.<\/p>\n

[i]<\/a> Finn McRedmond: \u2018Getting Brexit done is last thing Farage wants,\u2019 Irish Times<\/em>, November 9th<\/sup>, 2019. https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/finn-mcredmond-getting-brexit-done-is-last-thing-farage-wants-1.4076850?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fopinion%2Ffinn-mcredmond-getting-brexit-done-is-last-thing-farage-wants-1.4076850<\/p>\n

[ii]<\/a> Finn McRedmond, \u2018Neither rogue nor wily fixer, Varadkar confounds British\u2019, Irish Times<\/em>, August 17th<\/sup>, 2019, https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/neither-rogue-nor-wily-fixer-varadkar-confounds-british-1.3988483?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fopinion%2Fneither-rogue-nor-wily-fixer-varadkar-confounds-british-1.3988483<\/p>\n

[iii]<\/a> Finn McRedmond, \u2018 British voters trapped between Jeremy Corbyn and Boris Johnson\u2019, Irish Times, November 28th<\/sup>, 2019,<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/neither-rogue-nor-wily-fixer-varadkar-confounds-british-1.3988483?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fopinion%2Fneither-rogue-nor-wily-fixer-varadkar-confounds-british-1.3988483<\/p>\n

[iv]<\/a> For example: Chris Johns: Who would I vote for in the UK? Anyone who would defeat the Tory candidate, Irish Times, December 2nd<\/sup>, 2019. https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/business\/economy\/chris-johns-who-would-i-vote-for-in-the-uk-anyone-who-would-defeat-the-tory-candidate-1.4100958?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fbusiness%2Feconomy%2Fchris-johns-who-would-i-vote-for-in-the-uk-anyone-who-would-defeat-the-tory-candidate-1.4100958<\/p>\n

[v]<\/a> Fintan O\u2019Toole, \u2018Fintan O\u2019Toole: Corbyn\u2019s nostalgia less of a fantasy than May\u2019s\u2019, Irish Times<\/em>, June 6th<\/sup>, 2017,\u00a0 https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/fintan-o-toole-corbyn-s-nostalgia-less-of-a-fantasy-than-may-s-1.3108284?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fopinion%2Ffintan-o-toole-corbyn-s-nostalgia-less-of-a-fantasy-than-may-s-1.3108284<\/p>\n

[vi]<\/a> Frances Perrauden, \u2018Twitter accuses Tories of misleading public with ‘factcheck’ foray\u2019, The Guardian<\/em>,\u00a0 November 20th<\/sup>, 2019, https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/politics\/2019\/nov\/20\/twitter-accuses-tories-of-misleading-public-in-factcheck-row<\/p>\n

[vii]<\/a> Jamie Stern-Weiner and Alan Maddison, \u2018Smoke Without Fire: The Myth of a \u2018Labour Antisemitism Crisis\u2019\u2019, Jewish Voice for Labour<\/em>, November 26th<\/sup>, 2019, https:\/\/www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk\/article\/smoke-without-fire-the-myth-of-a-labour-antisemitism-crisis\/<\/p>\n

[viii]<\/a> Finn McRedmond, \u2018 British voters trapped between Jeremy Corbyn and Boris Johnson\u2019, Irish Times, November 28th<\/sup>, 2019,\u00a0 https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/british-voters-trapped-between-jeremy-corbyn-and-boris-johnson-1.4097084?mode=sample&auth-failed=1&pw-origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.irishtimes.com%2Fopinion%2Fbritish-voters-trapped-between-jeremy-corbyn-and-boris-johnson-1.4097084<\/p>\n

[ix]<\/a> Patrick Butler, \u2018Food bank use tops million mark over the past year\u2019, The Guardian<\/em>, 22nd<\/sup> April, 2015, https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/society\/2015\/apr\/22\/food-bank-users-uk-low-paid-workers-poverty<\/p>\n

[x]<\/a> Finn McRedmond, \u2018Being a Tory does not make you a bad person,\u2019 The Cambridge Tab<\/em>, (more than five years ago), https:\/\/thetab.com\/uk\/cambridge\/2015\/05\/11\/tory-not-make-bad-person-52498<\/p>\n

[xi]<\/a> Anthony Seldon, \u2018The Saturday Profile Viscount Cranborne, Conservative Peer: The last true blue blood,\u2019 The Independent<\/em>, November 21st<\/sup>, 1998, https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/arts-entertainment\/the-saturday-profile-viscount-cranborne-conservative-peer-the-last-true-blue-blood-1186204.html<\/p>\n

[xii]<\/a> Alastair Benn and Finn McRedmond, \u2018Deconstructing \u201cI\u2019m literally a communist, you idiot\u201d\u2019, Reaction<\/em>, July 25th<\/sup>, 2018, https:\/\/reaction.life\/deconstructing-im-literally-a-communist-you-idiot\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For anyone to become an opinion writer for the \u2018paper of record\u2019, the Irish Times, requires considerable ability. But does a particular viewpoint give an aspiring columnist a distinct advantage? It is said that if you\u2019re not a socialist in your twenties you have no heart, and if you\u2019re not a conservative in your forties, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5979,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[207,1808,3314,4512,6022,7377,9426],"class_list":["post-5978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-2019november","tag-columnist","tag-finn","tag-irish","tag-mcredmond","tag-politics","tag-timess"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5978\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}