In this week’s episode, researcher and investigative journalist Dr Eoin Lenihan explains the confluence of social, economic and cultural forces that have created the modern Irish political landscape.
Dr Lenihan was raised in County Clare, a part of rural Ireland famous for its rich cultural heritage. His father was a professional storyteller and an expert in Irish folklore, and Dr Lenihan grew up taking pride in what he now calls the ‘old Ireland’. He describes the powerful sense of Irish national identity, community and tradition that he believes is collapsing in the ‘new Ireland’ of today.
After specialising in online extremism, Dr Lenihan wrote an essay about left-wing extremist group Antifa for Quillette in 2017. Titled “It’s Not Your Imagination: The Journalists Writing About Antifa Are Often Their Cheerleaders”, the essay exposed mainstream media bias in coverage of Antifa activities. Dr Lenihan’s essay showed that some journalists were open advocates for the extremist group, and that their content was correspondingly biased in their favour. In 2021, his findings were re-confirmed by publication in a peer reviewed journal. The article caused a savage backlash, with editor-in-chief Claire Lehman stating that it caused more controversy than any other piece published by Quillette.
In his book, Vandalising Ireland, Dr Lenihan identifies similar forces at play in the development of the modern Irish political landscape. In this interview, he explains how the rapid decline of the Irish Catholic church left a void in social services that was eagerly filled by non-governmental organisations (NGOs). These NGOs, in receipt of massive government funding and wielding huge political influence, promote a highly politicised vision of left-wing ‘social justice’ that is routinely at odds with the views of ordinary Irish voters.
Dr Lenihan gives immigration as a prime example of this dynamic. While Irish voters consistently identify immigration as an issue of concern, no mainstream Irish political party represents their views. In fact, as Dr Lenihan explains, the incestuous alliance between NGOs, political parties and media outlets combine to stifle the expression of opposing views on immigration. Dr Lenihan describes the tragic murder of Ashling Murphy as “the moment that radicalised me”. A primary school teacher and expert in traditional Irish music, Murphy was brutally murdered by a Slovakian immigrant in 2022. Dr Lenihan explains how media coverage of the murder ignored the role of immigration entirely, focusing instead on a ‘social justice’ narrative about the supposed ‘misogyny’ of white Irish men.
Dr. Eoin Lenihan
Follow Eoin on X: https://x.com/EoinLenihan
Visit Eoin’s website: https://www.eoinlenihan.net/
Vandalising Ireland: How the Government, NGOs, Academia and the Media Are Engineering a New Globalist Ireland: https://amzn.eu/d/00Sdwnqb
“It’s Not Your Imagination: The Journalists Writing About Antifa Are Often Their Cheerleaders.” (Quillette. 2017): https://quillette.com/2019/05/29/its-not-your-imagination-the-journalists-writing-about-antifa-are-often-their-cheerleaders/
“A classification of Antifa Twitter accounts based on social network mapping and linguistic analysis.” (Social Network Analysis and Mining. 2021): https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13278-021-00847-8
Eddie Lenihan’s Tell me a Story podcast about Irish folklore: https://www.youtube.com/@tellmeastorypodcastwithedd7774/videos
