Historian Thomas Cahill’s New York Times bestselling book, “How the Irish Saved Civilization” revealed the key role the Irish people have played in preserving the rich human history from fallen Rome. By saving the parchments of antiquity and copying and recopying these language fragments, essential elements of civilization, and even beautiful masterpieces (such as the Book of Kells) remain today.
From that rescue western civilization was not lost, but preserved, even from Viking invaders and marauders. Saving the written language and its values amounted to saving western civilization.
Last month the Irish just might have saved it again, when the people of the Republic of Ireland rejected the constitutional family amendment which would have offered replacement language for “mothers” and some chosen roles “in the home,” as well as a replacement of the term “family” with “durable relationships.” With 67% voting “no,” the outcome was resounding. While some argued that the amendment failed because it was poorly worded, Irish citizens and their families were firm in their rejection.
Read the entire op-ed in The Washington Times at https://highergroundtimes.com/higher-ground/2024/apr/12/how-irish-may-be-saving-civilization-and-true-defi/.
In a separate fight over language, last week Scotland enacted a law that makes it a years-long imprisonable offense to “incite hatred on the basis of race, religion, transgender identity, sexual orientation, age or disability.” Because this law essentially makes it a hate crime to misgender someone without knowing one may be doing so, a Scotland grade-school teacher shared her very real concerns with me. Because she already struggles to learn the names of her 300 or so students, she is concerned that she may not know each student’s preferred pronouns, noting as well that those preferences tend to change on a weekly basis for numerous students.
Her fears may be realistic; inthe first week of the new legislation, 4,000 investigable complaints were made to police, amounting to 60 complaints per hour. Not only did these keep the police from policing other criminal activity, but it was quite a revelation that of those first 4,000 complaints, 3,000 related to language used by Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf —a major and humiliating blow. The irony is astonishing.
Also last week, Connecticut Democrats were fighting over another language issue, so to speak, in determining if the addition of “expectant mothers” could be added to the descriptor “pregnant persons,” a term intended to avert prejudice and discrimination. The argument was that the latter is the more inclusive term.
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With biology asserting itself like this from Dublin to Connecticut, incarceration for unmet pronoun preferences in a Scottish grade school seems more than problematic – it feels chaotic, even in a free Scotland. So instead, maybe, as the Romans had to in the first centuries, we might begin to look to the Irish again as rescuers of sorts.
As commentator Patrick Luciani stated, “The Irish referendum wasn’t only about rights, tolerance, or one’s right to choose a preferred gender identity but about the nature of language. When the Irish were asked to vote, they knew intrinsically that words matter, and changing the constitution by abandoning the phrase ‘mother’ or ‘woman’ to satisfy the political trends of progressive gender advocates would have a deep and lasting effect on their culture and identity. That was a step the Irish weren’t willing to take.”
When language of gender inclusivity and reproductive freedom is used to limit women, and their families, that language tends to be a tool to acquire power, particularly in the law. People can see right through it. Saving the language and its values amounts to saving society.
So when the Irish people voted “no” they might have been saving civilization all over again.
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