Madam, - I would like to congratulate The Irish Times on running the excellent series "Under the Crescent: The Faces of Islam", which has made a valuable contribution to informing and helping to educate our society on diversity. Another series you ran in 2004, "The New Irish", was similarly valuable.
Amnesty works throughout the formal education sector in Ireland through human rights education programmes and our experience tells us that the human rights issue which most concerns students and teachers at primary and second level is diversity. This material will be an important resource for them.
You acknowledge in your Editorial of October 27th that there can be poor journalism on these issues, which is a sentiment Amnesty shares. It is also necessary to point out that the educational role played on such issues by The Irish Times and by organisations such as Amnesty International is equally a responsibility of government - and it is a responsibility that has not been effectively undertaken.
Finally, I would respectfully urge you - and other media - to consider a similar series focusing on another area where there is a high level of misunderstanding and stereotyping: mental health. The stigma surrounding this issue leads to an extraordinary level of ignorance and misinformation, and, consequently to unnecessary suffering and isolation. Yet every family in the country is affected in some way.
Other societies are increasingly able to discuss the subject openly, and it is essential that in Ireland we do likewise. - Yours, etc,
SEAN LOVE, Executive Director, Amnesty International (Irish Section), Fleet Street, Dublin 2.