Iโ€™ve been out of the country on holidays for a few days. Back tomorrow.

Can someone tell me who organised the protests in Dublin and what are they actually protesting about?

#Mastodaoine #Dublin

@Anitambyrne They're frantic because as farmers and hauliers the price of fuel means that their livelihood is threatened - hauliers simply because fuel is too expensive; eg the price of a coach tour from Dublin to the Burren - the farmers because the cost of their fertiliser, etc is soaring, as well as the cost of using farm machinery
@sinabhfuil @Anitambyrne except for the anti-immigrant talk and the climate change deniers and the far right hangers on.
@Colman @Anitambyrne Oh among the connecting truckies and farmboys? Thought you were saying me and I was a tad puzzled
@sinabhfuil @Colman @Anitambyrne Yes, the protests have been orchestrated by anti-immigrant far right elements who are exploiting the dissatisfaction felt by those who are hit hardest by the fuel price increases. AFAIK the IRHA, IFA and other groups have distanced themselves from the protests.

@ccferrie @sinabhfuil @Colman @Anitambyrne

IFA don't back anything that risks getting arrested. They didn't support the beef blockades a few years ago either, and chickened out partway through the ones in the 90s.

Their absence doesn't really mean much.

@davey_cakes Ditto the IHA. They have to keep their noses clean. But the structures and networks of both organisations are leveraged to organise these protests. @ccferrie @sinabhfuil @Colman @Anitambyrne

@psneeze @ccferrie @sinabhfuil @Colman @Anitambyrne yup. I'm from a farm and don't know anyone on it, but that might just be because any neighbors that are still at it are dairy where it's not as easy to get away.

I'm also not surprised to hear people involved are saying racist things. I am from rural Ireland after all. I don't believe it's a smoking gun though.

@davey_cakes @psneeze @ccferrie @Colman @Anitambyrne Why should rural Ireland be racist?
@sinabhfuil Because rural areas are far more homogeneous than urban ones. Difference stands out in rural areas, it is the norm in urban settings. This also applies at country level where racism is the norm in places like Russia, Hungary and Poland for example that have low non-white populations. @davey_cakes @ccferrie @Colman @Anitambyrne

@psneeze @sinabhfuil @ccferrie @Colman @Anitambyrne that's part of it, but I think more in the sense that there's no obvious social cost to being openly racist.

I don't think the cities are that much better it's just more likely to be dressed up in "we have to be practical"

@davey_cakes @psneeze @sinabhfuil @ccferrie @Anitambyrne what I hear from Mayo is mostly the โ€œthey get everything for free, why arenโ€™t they looking after our own firstโ€ type stuff.

And thatโ€™s from a family with a couple of Central European ladies married into it. ๐Ÿคท๐Ÿปโ€โ™‚๏ธ

@Colman I remember when it was the unemployed who were the recipients of all this free stuff. Before them it was the single mothers. There's always some group to blame. @davey_cakes @sinabhfuil @ccferrie @Anitambyrne