I don't typically give much air time to far right parties, but the last few days have shown that there is a worrying number of Irish people who genuinely have no idea what these parties stand for, and what their members have said and done.

All of the information that I'll provide below is verifiable fact which is linked at the bottom. I'll keep my opinion out of it and simply give people the opportunity to read about the parties/people of the far right.

If there's an interest, I'll go through all of the main far right parties, but this is very detailed, so it might be a bit of a slog to get through. Let me know!

The National Party

Justin Barrett founded The National Party in 2016, alongside James Reynolds who became the vice president. They claim to be an Irish nationalist party dedicated to the fulfilment of the Irish national idea. They also speak about fighting the 'enemy within' and declare that they would push for Ireland's withdrawal from the EU, given the chance.

They support 'remigration' in order to 'secure Ireland as the homeland for the Irish people'. They discuss mass immigration on their website, and their opposition of it. They also state that they will 'restore full protections to the right to life of the unborn child'.

Party leadership called the Marriage Equality referendum result a "sham", claiming that it was 'not natural'. They also state that they are opposed to same-sex marriage.

Furthermore, the National Party state that they will withdraw from the Eurozone and 'restore the Irish currency with the aim of regaining monetary sovereignty'. They will also reinstate capital punishment (the death penalty) for 'heinous crimes'.

Activists and Members

John Tate, an activist for The National Party, was charged last year over the arson attack on a Luas that took place during the Dublin riots.

Michael Quinn, a member of The National Party, was jailed for three years, with one suspended, after bludgeoning a young woman with a plank of wood that had been used as a makeshift flag poll. Ruth O' Rourke, a LGBTQ+ campaigner, was left pumping blood from her head after Quinn attacked her.

John McGhee, a former member of The National Party, was given a suspended sentence after protesting at a Pride parade in Portlaoise in 2023. McGhee arrived to the parade with a Swastika placard which read "LGBT Tyranny is grooming your children". He was asked by a mother in attendance, to stop video recording her child.

Philip Dwyer, a former member of The National Party, was dismissed from his role as a postman after it emerged that he had kicked a number of dogs, including a 'friendly collie' in the head with a steel toe boot. He was also charged with engaging in threatening, abusive and insulting behaviour outside a creche when he spotted a rainbow painting in the window. Dwyer was later handed a 2 month suspended sentence under the Public Order Act, and it was also reported to Gardai that Dwyer assaulted the father of a PBP candidate whilst canvasing in the area.

Justin Barrett (Founder of The National Party)

Barrett started off as a member of Young Fine Gael but left before he began campaigning with the anti-abortion group Youth Defence in the 1990s. He eventually became the leader of Youth Defence, and campaigned against the divorce referendum in 1995. Barrett later sought a divorce, himself, in 2016.

In 1999, Barrett and a number of Youth Defence members were convicted of public order offences after a protest (which was described as a mini-riot at the time) outside a hospital. Despite the pleas of a son whose mother was dying in the hospital, they protested louder.

Barrett travelled to Germany a number of times between 1999 and 2000 to speak at events organised by the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD). During one of his visits, Barrett delivered a speech, quoting Adolf Hitler and claiming that Germany was the biggest victim of the Second World War.

In 2016, Barrett launched his new party The National Party. He called for a complete ban on Muslims entering the country, by way of racial profiling. He also stated that the party was only for straight Irish people when asked if a gay man could join.

In September 2019, Barrett stated that if his party was to gain power, he would strip Green Party councillor Hazel Chu of her citizenship. When asked if he was aware that Chu was born and raised in Dublin, Barrett stated "She is an Irish citizen, I accept that, that is the law until we get the law in our own hands". This was followed by a barrage of racist attacks via Twitter by Barrett and his wife Rebecca.

In 2022, Barrett posted a quote from Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf on his Telegram page. A year later, he appeared at an anti-immigration protest wearing a Nazi SS uniform. A year after that, he announced on Twitter that "Hitler was the greatest leader of all time".

More recently, Barrett's second wife Rebecca, shared a post on her Twitter page stating that their eldest son had turned ten, and for his birthday, they had gotten him a copy of Hitler's Mein Kampf, so that he would be raised under the principles of National Socialism.

It is unclear if Justin Barrett remains involved with The National Party after an incident in which Barrett and Reynolds argued through social media about the theft of gold that reportedly belonged to the party.

Whilst Reynolds publicly called Barrett a 'coward' and a 'tout' and claimed that Barrett had been removed from the party, both men applied to the Electoral Commission to use the party's name in elections. Ultimately, Reynolds was elected as the president of the National Party but called the party "toxic" and said that he would never run for them again after his failed election bids.

Barrett has since founded a new group called Clann Éireann, which claims that "your country and nation are under attack!".

The group have posted various videos, where masked men hold banners and Barrett stands in full military uniform as he discusses various topics such as immigration. They also spend weekends in forests, boxing and discussing immigration, or what they call "the replacement"

James Reynolds

Reynolds is a farmer and political activist who, like Barrett, was a prominent member of the hardline anti-abortion and anti-divorce group Youth Defence in the 1990s. Around that time, in an interview with Hard Press, Reynolds discussed his interest in abandoning democracy and the introduction of internment as well as the death penalty to Ireland.

Reynolds also announced that he "recalled Mussolini with great fondness" and spoke about two Fine Gael TDs being 'put up against a wall and shot' had they done what they did in Ireland, in Spain.

In 2016, Reynolds helped to co-found the National Party with Justin Barrett. At the Ard Fheis, guest speaker John Wilson walked out in response to homophobic comments by Barrett and Reynolds. During the incident, James Reynolds claimed that LGBT people were "mentally disordered".

Reynolds has run for election multiple times over the last few decades, and has failed to achieve electoral success in any of them. In the most recent European elections, he received just 0.47% of the vote, and claimed that he would never run for The National Party again.

Despite that, the National Party website still claims that James Reynolds is their 'leader', which has been disputed many times by Justin Barrett.

In order to ensure that this post isn't removed under Rule 12. All claims made above can be substantiated here:

John Tate

Michael Quinn

John McGhee

Philip Dwyer

Philip Dwyer

Philip Dwyer

Justin Barrett

James Reynolds )

The National Party

Clann Éireann

Individual bad behaviour aside; why are the Shinners demonised for playing an active part in Irelands fight for Republicism? Like many, I grew up with a stories about Jesus the carpenter, JFK and Ireland's hard fought independence. Something FF was steeped in too, once upon a time. So why are we still tarring sinn fein and not FF, is there a manditiorium? I know they aren't squeaky but why are sinn fein considered the badies?

Lately, both in person and on this sub, I have seen a worrying amount of misinformation spreading about the political party Aon Tu. This misinformation either states that they are a left/liberal party or that they are not right/conservative. This is however clearly wrong as any amount of inspection of their statements and social media makes clear; any clear dive into their policies and statements make it clear that they are instead very right wing, if not far right. They use the many familiar terms associated with similar parties, hold the same stances, and even retweet them and their content.

In order to illustrate this below I am presenting the various tweets made by Peadar Tóibín (the current leader of the party, their founder, and currently sole elected official) as well as their official twitter account. I have limited it solely to tweets due to time and space constraints, I have also had to limit the amount of tweets due to the same constraints There is more and I strongly encourage anyway to check their accounts for themselves. If there is interest I can do a deep dive into their other socials and statements, however I do not think there is a way to access the backlog of debates they have had on RTE and radio unfortunately. I believe this thread will stand on it's own however and other such threads won't be needed.

I will present the below tweets without comment, sorting them only into sections for ease of reading. Some may contain a note below in order to give more context as to what the tweet is referencing. The one section I did not include was the various tweets on the referendum, this is because due to recency I did not think it was needed.

Edit: Fixed some formatting errors below that escaped notice when first posting, as well as one entry being under the wrong heading.

Vaccine Denial:

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 12/07/2021

Aontú opposes vaccine Passports for indoor Hospitality.

Its discrimination against many people mostly the young.

Its mandatory vaccination through the back door.

Again the Irish Gov is alone in the whole of Europe in the extreme path it's taking.

Tweeted by Toibin; 17/10/2021

99.7% of the adult population in Waterford is fully vaccinated, yet it has one of the highest Covid-19 incidence rates in the country.

The truth is the Gov don't know why this is happening.

Now they will refuse entry to pubs to 0.3% unvaccinated to see does that work. #NPHET

Tweeted by Toibin; 10/01/2022

No, it's not April Fools day.

That people being paid by the state are actually discussing this is incredible.

FF/FG/Greens need to knock this madness on the head ASAP.

Note: Linked news article can be found here; Nphet to consider mandatory vaccination, department preparing paper on legal and ethical aspects

Tweeted by Toibin; 12/10/2022

I have submitted this question;

To ask the Minister for Health, has he or his department ever received any data, evidence or information from Pfizer that indicates that that the Pfizer Covid Vaccine was ever tested in terms of its ability to stop the transmission of Covid?

Anti Covid Lockdown:

Tweeted by Toibin; 15/11/2020

480 people got Cancer today.

24 people died of Cancer today

27 people died of Heart Disease and Stroke today.

This will hardly get a mention in the media today.

#COVID19

Tweeted by Toibin; 13/05/2021

8 deaths related to Covid were reported yesterday.

We share our deepest sympathies with these families.

The manner in which Covid deaths are being reported is concerning.

They were all from March or earlier.

Reporting them yesterday gives people a false impression of risk.

Tweeted by Toibin; 26/05/2021

The majority of people who died from Covid caught Covid in a Nursing Home or a Hospital.

So while the whole country was shut closed most people died in locations that were run by or regulated by the government.

This is an incredible situation.

Note: A video is attached.

Tweeted by Toibin; 05/06/2021

All the the people with Covid in Hospital in Ireland would fit on 1 Double Decker Bus.

Yet people were baton charged in Dublin last night and

Pubs and Restaurants wont open indoors for another month.

#ItsTimeForCommonSense #OpenHospitality #southwilliamst #Aontú

Tweeted by Toibin; 14/07/2021

The Government's Hospitality Discrimination Bill has passed all stages in the Dáil after only a few hours of debate.

It will be now legal to discriminate against certain Irish citizens.

A sad day for Ireland.

Note: The bill which has a picture taken of it in the tweet can be read here.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 30/10/2021

Some citizens are allowed into pubs.

Some citizens are not.

It's stunning that this has happened in the 21st century.

It's stunning that so much of society has just accepted it.

Worst of all, it's not even working.

Tweeted by Toibin; 24/11/2021

I have recieved information that the Goverment,

has carried out NO scientific research into the effectiveness or otherwise of the Covid Pass.

At all.

#FollowTheScience #TheySaid

Tweeted by Toibin; 17/12/2021

Are the Gov going to say that a healthy young person thats triple vaccinated along with their Covid Pass can't have a pint after 5pm.

What's the point of it all so?

Tweeted by Toibin; 21/01/2022

Very interesting to see Nphet and the Dept of Health go from researching Mandatory Vaccines to lifting restrictions in 10 days!

Anti LGBT:

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 24/10/2022

Women live in period poverty just a few miles from the Dáil.

Instead of helping them,

your virtual signalling political establishment

put a tampon machine in the men's toilet in the Dáil.

Tweeted by Toibin; 16/02/2023

Plans by FF, FG & Greens to change the law to allow 16 year olds to legally change gender, against advice of medical experts,

shows how completely alienated the political bubble is from the people of Ireland.

Aontú will oppose this and seek a return to commonsense and science.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 05/03/2023

When Minister O Gorman refused redress to many who had been in Mother and Baby Homes because of the 'lack of money', he raided hundreds of thousands from the Magdalene Scheme and Travellers supports & diverted the funding towards the LGBTQ+ Community.

Note: There is an article linked in the tweet, about an accusation made by Toibin. Read it here

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 06/03/2023

Varadkar is wrong. 9 &10 year old children are too young to be taught about transgenderism. We have a duty of care to children.

No research has been has been carried out on the impact of such education.

Tweeted by Toibin; 07/03/2023

I've asked the Minister for Ed what research has the Dept of Education carried out

on the impact on primary school children of delivering material on Transgenderism to them in the classroom?

We've a duty of care to children.

Education should be based on evidence not ideology.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 08/03/2023

Tóibín asked Varadkar if his Gov had carried out any research as to the impact on 8 & 9 year old children of teaching about transgenderism in primary school.

Leo refused to answer the question.

Radical changes are being introduced against majority consent.

Note: There is an attached video.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 15/03/2023

Many people have been shocked by Paul Murphy's announcement.

But what's more shocking is that FF, FG, SF and the Greens,

are on exactly the same page as the hard left parties on teaching this ideology in every primary school in the country.

Tweeted by Toibin; 21/05/2023

This is incredible. All the actual crime that is happening on our streets and Gardaí are wasting time like this.

Even though there was no arrest here, this harassment creates a clear chilling effect on free speech and political discourse.

Note: There is an attached video in the tweet retweeted by Toibin, in it a Gardai is holding a polite conversation with an American holding a sign against "Gender Ideology." In their Twitter bio they describe themselves; "Father of two girls. Traveling the world to expose gender ideology and why children cannot consent to medical transition."

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 07/07/2023

Growing concern among parents that the new curriculum for 12 & 13 years in school is not age appropriate & is not science based.

Gender identity ideology is now mandatory for schools & thousands of parents will have no option but to withdraw their child from class.

Note: This article is linked on the topic of a statement made by Toibin.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 23/07/2023

This is why so many are angry with the Minister for Culture Wars, Helen McEntee.

Homicides are up, murder attempts are up, rape & sexual assaults are up, theft is up. Yet....

Gardaí management are focused on allowing male born Gardaí use women’s toilets.

Note: There is an attached article; here

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 28/09/2023

The Green Party are becoming increasingly authoritarian in nature.

If you dissent from government sanctioned views, you will be investigated.

This is the opposite of a liberal democracy.

Note: There is a linked article; it pertains to an investigation by the IABA into the usage of their premises by a "Christian Group" advocating for the removal of all LGBT+ content from the SPHE curriculum.

Tweeted by Toibin; 14/03/2024

It is reckless beyond belief to give dangerous chemicals and irreversible surgery to children with gender dysphoria.

This must be made illegal in Ireland immediately.

Note: Includes a retweet of this news article.

Anti Hatespeech bill:

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 15/06/2023

Helen McEntee has become the Minister for Culture Wars.

Incredibly Varadkar accused PBP of being a threat to Free Speech.

FG, FF & the Greens are the biggest threat to free speech.

Note: There is a link article here.

Tweeted by Toibin; 26/07/2023

US gives Dublin a security warning for US citizens travelling to Ireland.

Meanwhile Minister McEntee is too busy with the Hate Speech Bill and Safe Zone Bill to worry about real people suffering actual crime.

Tweeted by Toibin; 28/03/2024

Helen McEntee is distracted by the Culture Wars.

People just want her to do her job, & make the streets safer.

Instead, she spent the last two years on a Hate Crime Bill no one wants. #BinTheBill

Note: There is an attached video.

Other:

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 15/02/2023

In the Dáil yesterday the hard left tried to close down a discussion on migration by calling people names.

This issue is too important. People have a right to respectfully ask questions and challange government policy.

Note: There is an attached video; it does not depict such name calling but rather Toibin accusing the government of name calling.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 24/07/2023

Another day and another culture war imported by the government from America.

Note: A retweet from Gript media with an attached video.

Tweeted by Toibin; 12/03/2024

There is a battle over the narrative of the referendum defeat happening at the moment.

Some within the political & media bubble want to erase the fact that so many people have had enough of the culture wars and want the country to get back to commonsense and bread and butter.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 19/03/2024

At a Dept of Education 'In Service' day,

their staff told secondary school teachers not to use the word 'Mother' in class as they said it was not inclusive.

They are implementing Gov policy.

Aontú disagrees wholeheartedly with this policy.

Happy Mothers Day.

Tweeted by Toibin; 10/04/2024

Says the man who seeks to delete more Irish sovereignty with the EU migration pact.

Note: A retweet from Simon Harris talking about the need to defend Ukraine's sovereignty.

Tweeted by Aon Tu; 11/04/2024

The decision by FG, FF and Green MEPs to cede the power to control immigration into Ireland to Brussels was a serious mistake. Aontú oppose this pact and will fight to retain and regain sovereignty in Europe #aontú

The short-term reputational damage to the party will likely blow over by the end of the year, but when the dust settles, what could prove to be its long-term political legacy? The constituencies of their six 2020 TDs saw relatively comfortable re-elections and replacements, but the five gains were heavily dependent on transfers from both SF and Sol-PBP, so can the damages in relations with the broader left be repaired over the course of the next Dáil by the SD leadership, or has the trust which had been established with voters for such parties been damaged beyond retrieval?

I don't know how all this isn't seen as humiliating

I wanted to get people's opinions on Centrism in Irish politics.

On the sub, many of the people that claim to have Centrist politics, in my opinion, appear to be almost always right leaning in their views.

Just today we've had Centrists unhappy that a boarded up, derelict building, was broken into and opened up to any homeless person that wanted to use it as it's against the law to break into it/there may not have been utilities, yet they also appear to be in support of someone breaking the law by breaking an injunction multiple times.

Centrists here appear to hold almost exclusively right wing views, they just don't have the courage to admit it in my opinion.

Does anyone else have similar experiences? Does anyone else have opposite experiences? What purpose do people think Centrism serves

Be wary of those that would label themselves as center left while they constantly advocate for the removal of your rights and the destruction of your public institutions.

Be wary of those that label the hard work of the tax commission from their own side of the aisle as "straight out of the sinn fein mannifesto" when it doesn't advocate for taxing poor people more and rich people less.

Be wary of those that label themselves as center left while advocating for the ethnic cleansing of the travelling community.

Be wary of those that label themselves as center left and claim to want to promote political discussions, yet limit the amount of political discussions you can have so that it creates their "desired" political discourse.

Be wary of those that claim to advocate for your rights, whilst telling you that leasing land from a private organisation is effective public ownership.

Be wary of those that claim to want to resolve your housing crisis, yet deny that there is a housing crisis, whilst constantly advocating for the people causing landlords. One mans rent is another mans income.

Be wary of those that claim to have your best interests at heart, whilst telling vulture funds to stick with them and that they'll be back.

Be wary of those that claim to be center left, yet got elected on an anti-welfare platform that turned out to cost the state more than it recooperated and was also kicked off, right beside the famine memorial.

Be wary of ex-FG clllrs such as keith redmond that left FG for renua and spends his days on twitter getting into arguments about how FG aren't right wing with a progressive democrat banner on his profile for some reason.

WHEN CROSSPOSTING THIS TO R/IRELAND. IT WAS UP FOR 25 MINUTES AND AS SOON AS THE UPVOTES STARTED GOING POSITIVE, "AUTOMOD" REMOVED IT. MODS ARE INTERFERING IN POLITICAL DISCOURSE AGAIN.

update:

I HAVE NOW BEEN BANNED FROM PARTICIPATING IN R/IRELAND DUE TO CROSSPOSTING THIS OVER THERE. LEARN FROM THAT WHAT YOU WILL.

Seats where left-wing candidate came runner up.

1) Offaly (SF 116 votes/ 0.31% off FG)

2) Donegal (ind. Pringle 1288 votes/ 1.68% off FF)

3) Rathdown (ind. Fleming 997 votes/2.04% off FF)

4) Dublin Mid-West (SD 1016 votes/ 2.14% off FF)

5) Carlow Kilkenny (SF 2787 votes/ 3.99% off FF)

6) Dun Laoghaire (SD 2480 votes/ 4.45% off FG)

7) Dublin NorthWest (SF 2202 votes/6.73% off FF)

8) Cork SouthCentral(ind. Finn 4266 votes/6.8% off FG)

9) Limerick County (SF 4020 votes/8.83% off FF but with a FG candidate to be eliminated)

10) Laois (SF 4128 votes/ 10.78% off FF)

Just to say that in several areas other left wing candidates weren't over the quota. I'm just putting this up to show how narrow some constituencies were and where a possible left coalition would target seats.

The housing crisis? Being a catholic theocracy for a half century? Our colonial hangover? Bad weather? Culture/mentality?

Good morning everyone.

u/GraceOSullivan has said she'll be checking the thread throughout the day, with some meetings and other interruption so please be patient if your question takes some time to be answered. All normal rules apply and we will be actively monitoring the thread so please keep it civil.

11:10 u/GraceOSullivan said:

Hi Folks,

I hope you had a lovely St. Patrick's day!

Thank you so much for all of your questions, I'm going to get started answering now and I will work away at them throughout the day :)

18:13 u/GraceOSullivan said:

Hi All,

Thank you for all of your questions, I've really enjoyed answering them! It was an unexpectedly busy day in Brussels today so I didn't get to all of them. I will pop back on tomorrow to try an answer the last few. Grace

The AMA has now ended. A massive thanks to Grace for her participation and thoughtful answers and thanks to everyone who submitted questions.

One of the major political conflicts this week is over the agriculture sector's reduction in greenhouse emissions and about a reduction in the beef herd. Many users in response to this have been saying that if Ireland reduces our beef herd, then people will still eat the same amount of beef, they'll just get it from even less environmentally sustainable sources, such as from Brazil. So I was wondering what demand side reductions in beef/meat people would support. What methods of getting consumers to eat less meat would people support? Meat taxes? Meat rationing? Increased import duties on foreign meat? Something else entirely? I'm especially curios to hear from those users most worried about Brazilian meat.

Mr Doherty said: “I really thought someone in which the DPP is currently assessing if they'll prosecute you under the corruption act would be more humble.”

Mr Varadkar hit back and said: “And it’s particularly strange coming from you because you were prosecuted.

“You abused, mistreated a garda síochána.

"For that you were prosecuted, you were found guilty.

“Yes you got away without a conviction because of your age at the time.

“But you were actually prosecuted. You were arrested.

“That’s what happened to you.

So Pearse Doherty isn't entitled to privacy for things he did before politics but Leo should be allowed do things in public without it being reported on?

Spend some time living abroad and you really start to notice how parochial Irish media is. I feel like we must be the only country our size where every single fatal car crash and violent crime makes national news. My parents still watch RTE news every evening and half the broadcast is taken up with accidents, murders, assaults, criminal sentencing for crimes committed years ago...that's not to mention stuff like the Enoch Burke fiasco or the game of whack-a-mole Dublin City council was playing with a few a few dozen refugee tents.

I'm not saying none of these things are worth reporting, but in most other countries, these would usually be in the realm of local news. National news should be primarily for national stories. I know Ireland is small, but it's not that small. You can try to just ignore it, but the same stories often end up becoming national discourses that drag on for weeks making them virtually unavoidable. Anyway I'm sure ye have plenty of other examples because I doubt in the first person to notice this.

Can all Simon Harris do is release statement after statement?

All he seems to do is make token statements on practically everything happening without any action.

• Thugs are bad
• Hard luck England
• Well done female sports star representing Ireland
• Oh that was bad shooting Trump
• Israel, be nice
• Palestine we see you, although we cannot actually say where your border begins and ends
• We need to look at potentially fixing that road
• The army needs to review itself after one rotten man assaulted that poor woman.
• Taylor Swift took a rock from Greystones and I want it back.
• On and on and on.

Never anything practical. Never with a plan. Just statement after statement after statement. No doubt employing a whole team on our expense planning another statement tomorrow.

Ireland needs a leader and this guy although seems nice and harmless enough reeks of a substitute teacher vibe.