This society is shamed by the two cases which ended last Wednesday in the humiliation and potential impoverishment of two women, Joy Fahy and Beverly Flynn.
It doesn't matter what you think of either woman, or whether you believe their cases should have been brought to court. The point is that both cases illustrate that this society is in breach of the spirit of its own Constitution in failing to offer its citizens a means to resolve routine differences without ending up in whatever might be deemed the modern equivalent of the workhouse.
The issue here is not the rightness or wrongness of any citizen's claim or defence, but rather the question of access to one of the most fundamental resources in any civilised society: the arbitration of apparently unresolvable disputes by means other than violence. That, and not spurious notions of freedom of speech or the vindication of investigative journalism, is the lesson our democracy needs to take from last week's judgments.
Article 40 of Bunreacht Na hÉireann, guarantees inter alia that the State shall "defend and vindicate the personal rights of the citizen". These rights include the right to equality before the law and, in the case of injustice done, to the vindication of the person, good name and property rights of every citizen. Whatever the tactical wisdom of their decisions to issue the respective sets of proceedings in the prevailing circumstances, it is clear that, as citizens, Joy Fahy and Beverly Flynn had a perfect right to pursue the cases they pursued - Ms Fahy in relation to what she claimed were abuses of her person, property and employment rights, and Ms Flynn in seeking to vindicate her reputation.
Whether they were in the right or in the wrong, whether or not they could prove their cases, and whether they were well- or ill-advised in taking these cases is all entirely irrelevant. Both women felt aggrieved and both sought the legal remedies the State purports to make available to its citizens, availing of the law and the legal system in attempts to resolve differences which appeared otherwise intractable.
How can this State claim that, by virtue of their failure to wholly prove their cases, these two women have deserved the punishment in the form of the penury which must surely befall any average citizen as a result of such crippling legal costs?
In what sense does a system which invites its citizens to undertake such gambles claim to "vindicate" those citizens' rights?
And this is to step around the issue of equality, which presents a further appalling dimension of all this. Both Ms Fahy and Ms Flynn were pitted against opponents brandishing comparatively formidable financial resources.
For RTÉ to lose its case against Ms Flynn, and incur costs estimated at above €2 million, would have been a serious matter, but not a fatal economic blow.
But how can any citizen, even a comparatively wealthy individual like Ms Flynn, ever hope or be expected to meet, never mind recover from, such a burden?
Similarly, for Dolores O'Riordan and her husband to lose to Ms Fahy would have been a serious matter from other viewpoints, but not from a financial perspective. It is now estimated that Ms Fahy faces bills amounting to €150,000 - i.e. the costs of her victorious former employers - as a result of losing the substantive elements of her case.
For an ordinary citizen, such as Ms Fahy appears to be, this figure amounts to a working lifetime's monetary accumulation. For the O'Riordan-Burtons, it amounts, at a guesstimate, to less than 1 per cent of net worth. For these fabulously wealthy members of the rock royalty, it amounts to the equivalent of an individual on the average industrial wage getting an unexpected bill for, perhaps, €1,000 - a significant problem but not a crucifying one. That a system can propose such a moral mismatch and still describe itself as a justice system is a diseased joke.
That lawyers can enrich themselves at the expense of people of modest means, and then stand up in court and talk about fairness and ethics is a monumental, institutionalised hypocrisy.
The message from these two cases for any Irish citizen of modest means is clear: do not take a legal action against anyone with deeper pockets than yourself, unless you are absolutely certain that you can prove your case. Both of these cases illustrate that it is not necessary to hold referendums in order to disenfranchise Irish citizens - the law as it stands does this to perfection.
For the next few weeks we will have to listen to politicians lecture us about the importance and sanctity of Irish citizenship, but all we need to know is that true citizenship comes down to the girth of your wad. The Irish nation belongs to Goliath, and David takes his entire material security in his hands if he wants to have a go.