THERE are many obvious minorities and their plights have been well covered by the media, but not all have been given the sympathetic shoulder they deserve.
This could mean modern groups such as thin people, feminists with common sense or those who take Jamie Bryson seriously. However, this much maligned genus has tried to integrate with us normals for centuries.
Of course I refer to Ging-ers. The Celtic albino has over the years learned how to be as invisible as their eye lashes, passing among us mostly in wary acceptance, but all too often in ridicule – thankfully there is no such intention here.
They exist on a sliding scale of gingerness from the most socially acceptable redhead all the way along the scale to nuclear curly. Even when they try to hide their genetic quirk by the use of dyes for women or the shaven head for men our two-week summer always betrays them when their skins erupt in a shotgun application of freckles.
Yet they are not considered eligible for DLA in spite of their obvious need for peroxide and factor 50. Still, many of them live happily as one of us when they are taken under our wing and I am proud to admit my part in the saving of one such unfortunate. She is ever grateful that I took her off the shelf (it needed both hands) although I have to admit there was so much dust on her it was more a matter of luck than judgment.
We have been blessed with children and twice blessed that the ginger gene was kind to them in that their mixed parentage is only noticeable when they don’t shave (especially my daughter). So don’t think of a ginger partner as a burden but rather as a nightlight. They have more uses than you might imagine.
I’m hugging mine – given the proximity of the knife drawer, it seems prudent. Now, as for that old chestnut that gingerism goes hand in hand with a fearful temper the only way to prove it one way or the other is to keep an eye on the obituaries.
GERARD HERDMAN
Belfast BT11
Interesting observation
I THINK it’s fair to observe that the DUP-Tory deal only results in ‘extra money’ should the Northern Ireland Assembly (NIA) be immediately reinstated.
If the NIA is not reinstated soon, then under section 59 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998 the Department of Finance Permanent Secretary, David Sterling, will reportedly only be able to draw down 75 per cent of Northern Ireland’s £10 billion-odd block grant by the end of July and 95 per cent by December in the interim, which means there will likely be a funding short fall of some £1bn over this financial year.
Arguably therefore the £1bn of funds secured by the DUP is merely the recycled £1bn shortfall from the NIA budget for this financial year.
Another interesting observation to be made is that the party whips for the DUP and Tory party signed the deal instead of the two party leaders. Arguably this signals that neither the DUP nor Tories expect the Tory leader to be in post for much longer.
But, does it also conversely mean that neither party expects the DUP leader to be in post for much longer? Time will tell.
BERNARD J MULHOLLAND
Belfast BT9
Ireland is not a bad country to live in for all its faults
THIS item was posted on Facebook by my daughter-in-law last week. She is a teacher in a First Grade School in Chicago.
‘I’m sitting here in my safe home, in my safe neighbourhood watching the news. 1,500 ppl shot and wounded in Chicago this year, almost 300 dead from guns. I hope and pray for the safety of my students over the summer whose parents have to tell them that they can’t play outside, students, who don’t know that it’s not normal to hear, see, fear gunshots. I hope they are safe this summer without a school to protect them.’
Those statistics are from the last six months in one city. God only knows how many will be killed by the end of the year. Yet there are millions of Americans who believe that it is OK to carry guns. When you read that, you can see that Ireland is not a bad country to live in for all its faults.
TONY CARROLL
Newry, Co Down
