McIlroy hype cut short by blame game

RADIO REVIEW:IT IS ALWAYS nice to start the week on a high, so as Monday morning news bulletins north and south hummed with excitement about Rory McIlroy's victory in the US Open, even the most recidivist begrudger must have cracked a thin smile.

When Mark Twain described golf as a good walk spoiled he could hardly have imagined how winning one match could lift the spirits of a region not always associated with warm fuzzy feelings.

Both Morning Ireland(RTÉ Radio 1, weekdays) and Good Morning Ulster(BBC Radio Ulster, weekdays) carried reports from Holywood Golf Club that captured the unabashed joy caused by McIlroy's win – there were many chants of "olé olé olé" – and much heartfelt testament to the local hero's humility and charm. As the day progressed, however, the hype had reached levels that even a confident young sportsman like McIlroy might find daunting.

On Monday afternoon's edition of Talkback(BBC Radio Ulster, weekdays), McIlroy's achievement was seemingly uniting parties from across the spectrum. Presenter Wendy Austin kept listeners updated on tributes coming from the floor of the Stormont assembly, as DUP, SDLP and Alliance representatives tried to outdo each other in lauding the golfer. But it was Ian Paisley jnr who really raised the bar.

In his oft-expressed affection for his homeland, the golfer was not only “a credit to Northern Ireland”, said

Paisley, but a catalyst for the tourist industry. “If Northern Ireland plc doesn’t seize that as a marketing opportunity, we are mad, because he is now a magnet to get people to this wee country.” No pressure there, then.

By this stage, a few naysayers had emerged from the woodwork. Austin read texts from listeners urging the presenter and her guests to "get a life", as McIlroy had only won a game of golf. But, overall, the North's sporting purple patch seemed to boost local self-belief. As one euphoric Holywood resident said to Talkback reporter Helen Jones, "You name it, we've got it." Quite. It is hard to think of many other places where a talk show could open to the sound of gunfire recorded by an assembled media awaiting a sectarian riot, as was the case with Wednesday's edition of The Stephen Nolan Show(BBC Radio Ulster, weekdays). The street violence at Belfast's Short Strand interface quickly dispelled the positive vibes induced by McIlroy's victory, a fact bitterly referred to by several of Nolan's callers.

That aside, calls to the show largely divided along tribal lines. Initially, the PSNI was the focus of criticism, with some callers complaining that the police had their hands tied, otherwise they would be able to “go in hard”. A GAA fan from Newry berated all policemen as “cowards”. When Nolan told the latter guest to “wise up”, the host himself was also thus branded. “So I’m a coward?” asked Nolan, winding up for the killer comeback that never came. “Well listen, Mr Brave Man, thank you for calling me.” Like other broadcasters who trade on public outrage, Nolan is adept at stoking the flames of argument, turning his views on a penny if it keeps things thrumming along. To those callers looking for tough action, he defended the PSNI’s restraint; to another, who praised the police for putting their lives on the line, Nolan responded that they were not stopping the gunmen. Inevitably, the contributions descended into the traditional local pastime of blaming the other side. A resident from the loyalist side of the Short Strand divide phoned to say that the root of the trouble lay not with the UVF but with earlier attacks by Catholics on Protestant pensioners. In response, a republican activist said Sinn Féin members had kept the local youth population calm on the second night, while saying little about the gunfire, apparently from the Catholic side, that injured a photographer.

The exchange sparked one of Nolan’s wiser comments: “The trouble here is that you both know what’s happening on the other side but you don’t know what’s happening on your own side.” All in all, however, the show made for depressing listening, suggesting that no amount of sporting triumphs can paper over the traditional faultlines of Northern society.

A glimmer of solace was provided by the Drama on One: Pariahs(RTÉ Radio 1, Sunday), or, more precisely, the thoughts of its audience. Recorded at Maghaberry Prison, in Co Antrim, Vincent Higgins's comedy about a support group for those shunned by polite society – a thief (Alan McKee), a priest (Lalor Roddy) and a banker (Miche Doherty) – was an unsubtle, if sporadically funny, satire on modern Irish mores. But it was the insights of prisoners after the performance that were most arresting. One prisoner said acting in a prison play had offered him a glimpse of the person he could be in the jail's "hypermasculine environment".

“It’s a risk to get up in front of your peers and expose yourself, but it’s a good thing; it gives you the chance to be something else for a while.” He felt hopeful about life after prison. “A lot of people think after you do your time there’s no future, but in fact there is a future.” It was a consoling, even inspiring, thought. But with so many of his Northern compatriots still clinging to grievances of the past, it was slim consolation.

Radio moment of the week

Given how previous pronouncements have come back to haunt David Norris, one might have expected fellow presidential hopeful Michael D Higgins to be careful about his own media past as a columnist with the music magazine Hot Press.Apparently not.

Appearing on The Last Word(Today FM, weekdays), Higgins was asked whether he was "living the Hot Press lifestyle" at events such as Bob Dylan's 1984 Slane concert. Apparently not seeing where this was all leading, Higgins spoke of his "bohemian" side, before Cooper popped the question: "Did you inhale?" Higgins tried to glide over the query, but Cooper kept asking, saying it was "a Hot Pressquestion".

“Oh no, I can’t answer you now,” said Higgins. “This is not Slane any more.” On this evidence, a media minefield awaits him.