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Updated 10.50pm
COLIN FARRELL HAS spoken out about how his brother was beaten up because he’s gay, and how he believes ‘it’s sad, disappointing and unfair’ that his brother had to leave Ireland to get married.
The Irish actor appeared on the first Claire Byrne Live show tonight to weigh in on the issue of same-sex marriage.
It comes after Health Minister Leo Varadkar spoke publicly about being gay yesterday morning. The Minister said he “wanted to be honest with people” ahead of the forthcoming same-sex marriage referendum.
Speaking about his brother Eamon, Farrell said he found out that he was gay when he was nine years old.
“I never thought of it in terms of any unnaturalness or any such thing and I’ve seen my brother go through a lot,” the actor explained. “I’ve seen him be at the tail-end of the whip of intolerance many times through his life and they are his battles and they are his wounds and they are his traumas but bearing witness to them at close quarters – of course caring for him as much as I do – had an effect on me.”
For his brother, being gay was nothing close to the “lifestyle choice” that some people speak about in this debate, Farrell said. Eamon came out to their mother at a young age and then suffered through a childhood and adolescence at tough Dublin schools.
I remember him coming home with blood on his shirt, and he got plenty of beatings and he got just called names continuously…so he had a very, very, very tough time, a lot of cruelty, like real, absolute shameful cruelty that was placed upon him…
Eamon married his partner, Stephen Mannion, in Canada. Farrell said, “To see them every day live their lives as a happily married couple is an amazing thing.
To think that they had to leave their own country to do that is sad and disappointing and just grossly unfair I feel.
The actor said he tries to understand the point of view of people who are against same-sex marriage but he can’t see how declaring love and faithfulness between two people can be a threat to others.
All we’ve known up until now is marriage between a man and a woman and guess what? There’s a hell of a lot of unsuccessful marriages between men and women. There’s a hell of a lot of children who have to experience day-to-day the arguments, the bickering, the domestic violence, between their parents.
“We’re talking about Irish society being the best version in any referendum, divorce, same sex marriage, being the best version of ourselves that we can be.
I carry Ireland with me everywhere I go, and I love my country deeply.
….This is my coming out of the closet as it were publicly and saying that I support this vote with every fibre of my being.
Farrell recorded the interview with Byrne via satellite link from Los Angeles.
First published 8am
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All the 8th amendment does is harm women’s health. Replace it with legislation that treats pregnant women and girls as autonomous humans, not Tupperware containers. The rally for lies this Saturday will be interesting.
@DaisyChainsaw: I find these, while no doubt well meaning, a tad disturbing in that the more options and recommendations that are made, the more they’ll cherry pick from and ignore but still be able to quite legitimately say they followed the advice of the Citizens’ Assembly.
That all makes sense. Hopefull the Oireachtas implements the recommendations of the report.
@Daithí Ó Coinnigh: Kenny announced when the Assembly delivered not what was wanted (by the politicians in government) that there was another committee to be set up and ‘consider’ the Assmbly’s output – i.e. Water it down or even better – drag it into a dark alley, ignore it and bull ahead regardless.
Let women determine their own treatment options – NOT politicians!!!
If you’re going to explain the word consensus, don’t do so incorrectly. Consensus is where you arrive at something acceptable to all or the vast majority. Thus, these recommendations are acceptable to the vast majority of the assembly.
Are we going to need new jumpers with REPLACE on them instead?
@Fiachrá Ó Dubhthaigh: repealing and then creating legislation for this is the best way.
Ireland’s obsession with referendums for everything really needs to stop, the only way this can stop is us stopping adding everything to the constitution even when it doesn’t need to be in it.
Repeal! It’s their choice. We are all human and I have no right to tell another human how to live.
@Nicholas J Campbell: we are all human and we ALL have a RIGHT to live.
Just bring it in, make it available for anyone who plans on having one & get it over with.
Nicholas we are all human and we all have a RIGHT to live
There still wasting taxpayer money !
Women are tax payers too and their health deserve to be properly looked after
Nicholasjcampbell we are all human and we ALL have a right to live
The first thing I have to say is “When did 25% become a consensus”. The second thing is ” I believe that the Citizens Assembly is one of the most sexist groups I’ve ever come across. Have men and boys not got an equal right to control over their reproduction . Or any ! This assembly is so biased that it didn’t even mention condoms for boys and men.
This article is either poorly written, or the Citizen’s Assembly was all over the shop.
“These recommendations were arrived at via a consensus (ie a majority were in agreement) of the members’ responses.”
and then
“Between 15 and 20 members calling for a recommendation (roughly 25%) was taken to be consensus.”
If the latter is what they viewed as a consensus, then the must have only a cursory relationship with a dictionary.
“usually in singular: A general agreement.”
have your say