This morning I was quoted in Trinity’s University Times. The tweet published was emotionally driven and written on Wednesday afternoon in the aftermath of bloody clashes with the Gardaí at the student fees protest in Dublin. However, I stand by what I wrote, but I can understand that being limited to 140 characters, it can easily be interpreted differently to how I meant it.
Fortunately, blogs don’t have a character limit, so here’s my full response to anyone who misunderstood the meaning behind it:
Regarding my tweet featured in the University Times this morning (http://goo.gl/CLGXy), at the time I wrote it, reports were still coming in as to what exactly had happened at the march in relation to the clashes with Gardaí. From photos and videos that were appearing fast and frequent on twitter, it seemed clear that there were certain elements at the protest that decided it was their right to drink cans and give abuse to the Gardaí. I can only assume that anyone willing to become involved in a stand-off with the might of Gardaí on horseback and in riot-gear has either had an excess of drink in them or a lack of braincells.
Pricing the poor out of education is certainly not what I meant by the tweet, and I accept that income level probably has nothing to do with the behaviour of those elements on the day, but needless to say, a rise in fees will weed out many of those not willing to take their education seriously, and as far as I’m concerned anyone willing to disrespect our elected officials by throwing eggs, or our Gardaí by clashing with them hasn’t taken their education very seriously up to this point.
From whatever background you come from, everyone should accept that a few thousand euro is more than pocket change, and no one will part with that kind of cash unless they actually wish to pursue third level education seriously. Anyone taking a student protest as an opportunity to drink cans and cause trouble, in my eyes, is someone that would sooner spend their money on anything but further education.
By raising fees (which I do believe should happen), it will weed out people from every social background that aren’t willing to take education seriously. It will also raise some much needed capital for the Government’s coffers, and capital, unlike violent protesters, is something the country is in dire need of.