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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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Ahhh ..the auld jump in front of the truck and pretend you’re hit while on a summer strike trick… One of the classics.
Next one is the I didn’t think it would close down with the loss of hundreds of jobs trick.
Ya scab
I have a dash camara on my vehicle to record road incidents,it takes excellent video with time and date confirmation,and is accepted as evidence in court, yea could be really interesting.
And of course you keep all the footage Richard including any infringements of the road traffic laws that you make yourself? or wait let me guess, you dont make any.. good man Dick.
Dump greyhound now. Switch to Citybin. They are great. Greyhound recently won a huge Dublin City Council contract. I bet they quoted a pittance to get same and are now trying recoup their losses from their workers. The same council handed them the original and monopoly contract for Dublin which put the public at their mercy and they hammered us with huge prices. Monolopy at work. It took a case in the european court to open the market to competition.
We should all be supporting workers trying to improve their lot
Like the Labour do…..
You must be part of the Citybin PR machine Martin. You should get your facts straight. DCC was losing €20m a year with these same workers. It was cheaper for them to pay Greyhound to take the business a few years back. You can now get bins of Greyhound for as little as €69 per year if you threaten to leave for Citybin
Workers never worked for council check your facts
Would support them if they start doing their jobs n collect the rubbish. Lucky sods have a job. No pity at all.
A lot of scabs out there
Scab
Sweet Jesus. Hope you’re not let out unsupervised.
Plenty of jobs for you and people that think the strikers are lucky to have a job in greyhound ,walking behind a truck for 10 hrs for 330 euro per week .
This is not going to end out well..
Only one side can win….hopefully the workers.
Yes serious damage will be done to a van…..
Siptu a disgrace as always. Good to see employer operating in spite of union
Another idiot.
Greyhound ya right….
Of course they are.
Scabs
It mentioned walking in front of trucks, no mention of jumping.
Perhaps Daragh Brophy or the headline writer would like to comment on whether greyhound claimed people were jumping in front of vehicles?
It’s a he said she said situation….whatever it was….the driver is responsible
Read the title again bud..
Dump them into the bin truck. There only fit for dumping,
Greyhounds run not jump :P
What i meant was that the title mentions the word jumping but the quotes in the article only mention walking. Sensational headline, bud.
if employers can’t cut workers minimum wage ,they’ll cut their hours ,worker always comes out the loser.
The driver did not stop Why?
Funny how a spouse of employee is in and out of greyhound all day and was there for 2 hours before incident ,dint know they had a “bring a spouse to work day” god forbid he / she would have had a human cargo in the back of the van ?.
@Audrey Hayden…how do you know this information? Were you there at the time?
I think you have a vested interest in spreading untruth and malicious information that has no basis in fact?
Are you a member of SIPTU or perhaps related to someone who is?
Ans then I will wait for the eventual “Scab” comments….
have your say