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Surrealing in the Years Bedbug apocalypse the least of our worries when it comes to neighbours

We don’t want France’s bedbugs, but the UK is offering even worse.

WE HAVE ONLY a few days left to spend with our beloved Aertel.

No, RTÉ’s long-running teletext service wasn’t implicated in the scandals of this summer (though it would be interesting to learn that enormous secret sums of money had been spent keeping alive). The service is simply set to be scrapped on Thursday as part of the national broadcaster’s “need to prioritise the delivery of digital services to meet growing audience demand”. 

We can only hope then that the Aertel technology has not become sentient by the time some poor civil servant steps forward to pull the plug. The last thing we need is big blocky green texting pleading for its life, or worse still, going full Hal from Space Odyssey and doing its best to kill us, perhaps by withholding its extremely slow-loading cinema listings. 

The Aertel obituaries have already begun, proving that Irish people can mourn literally anything. These eulogies will likely open the eyes of younger readers to the potential of the kind of technology that, as of 2023, is barely considered technology anymore.

For example, apparently people used to be able to check the CAO points on Aertel? Apparently short stories were published on there?! Can we really say we’ve made the most of Aertel’s potential? We need to be pumping more money into this thing! Maybe Aertel is the correct venue for Toy Show: The Musical — conveyed entirely through the medium of text pages. It’s called avant-garde, look it up.

It seems that RTÉ could probably capitalise on the nostalgia factor and design a website that replicates the output of the old Aertel. If nothing else, that might appease the ghost in the machine so that it doesn’t go SkyNet on us and use its 1987-era coding to somehow activate the secret nuclear weapons that it (presumably) has access to.

But from one apocalypse to another.

Panic has arisen on the streets of Paris as an apparent infestation of bedbugs has swept the French capital. Viral social media footage shows the insects prancing about the carpeted seats of the Parisian Metro and clinging to the skin of unsuspecting American tourists. 

It would be easier to compartmentalise the horror of these images were it not the case that 60,000 Irish people will be travelling to and from this hive of hard-to-kill bloodsucking itch merchants for Ireland’s World Cup game with Scotland.

Remember last week when we were worried about the rugby fans singing Zombie? Wouldn’t it be nice to still be worried about that instead of having to lose the run of ourselves worrying that Ireland vs Scotland will be the Cheltenham 2020 superspreader event for bedbugs on these shores. 

The facts around the bedbug infestation have been somewhat hard to grasp, with local officials based in Paris using very different language to representatives of the French state government. 

French Minister for Transport Clément Beaune said there’d been “no resurgence of bedbugs” in Paris, and so there is no need for “psychosis” or “anxiety”. Deputy Mayor of Paris Emmanuel Gregoire, however, called on the state to eradicate the “scourge” of bedbugs on Paris. 

Who to believe? Co-founder of the Irish Pest Control Association Brendan Ryan told The Journal: “There is a degree of sensationalism going on with the reporting on bedbugs. In my experience it makes sense to be cautious anywhere you are travelling, without letting it ruin your trip.” 

Now typically, journalistic endeavours should not be guided by an irrational fear of bedbugs, but this is my column, and I happen to have an irrational fear of bedbugs. And I say: shut down the airports. Send in the army. Alert the Aertel defence system. 

Still, no matter how many bedbugs might end up making their way back to Ireland over the coming week, we must also be careful not to import a scourge even more virulent from our next door neighbours in the United Kingdom. 

Speaking in the wake of the Tory Party Conference this week, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said: “It does bother me to see the United Kingdom disengaging from the world – whether it’s reducing its budget for international aid, whether it’s leaving the European Union and now even talking about withdrawing from the European convention on human rights.”

Yes, the United Kingdom is disengaging from the rest of the world. Perhaps more frighteningly, it appears to be disengaging from reality itself. As the UK’s relationship with the truth grows ever more fractious, so too, naturally, does its relationship with the countries around it – countries which, for all their faults, make some fist of operating within the rather strict constraints of reality. 

In the last few weeks alone, there have been fabricated stories about councils that want people to use seven different recycling bins, a phantom meat tax, misplaced targeting of transgender people and extremely aggressive language about immigration

“That’s not the Britain I know,” Varadkar said this week, admitting “concern” at some of the language used during the Tory Party Conference, but of course, this is only the latest stop on a slippery slope Britain has been sliding down for years.

Sunak’s U-turn on the climate confirms that the UK is a country that is no longer taking its obligations to the global community seriously, and the divisive rhetoric that defined this week’s conference is only cause for more alarm.

Ireland must be increasingly wary of getting into bed with the United Kingdom. And not just because they’re connected to Paris by the Eurostar.

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    Mute Dere
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    Feb 17th 2025, 12:12 AM

    The biggest purveyors of misinformation policing it….yay.

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    Mute Thomas Sheridan
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    Feb 17th 2025, 12:40 AM

    @Dere: The state just wants a monopoly on misinformation.
    Or at least one a selective release of information.

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    Mute Joe Willis
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    Feb 17th 2025, 7:42 AM

    @Thomas Sheridan: if that was true it would be on the news

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    Mute Maire Hicks
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:21 AM

    Controlling what we see, hear and read because they say it’s false information, but they get to continue with their lies that’s dictatorship.

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:40 AM

    @Maire Hicks:
    I don’t want shady politicians,Irish or foreign, having any say over my freedom to express an opinion! A plague on all their houses,to hell with the lot of them!

    103
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    Mute Clyde Bear
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    Feb 17th 2025, 2:51 AM

    @Maire Hicks: What utter twaddle!

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    Mute Maire Hicks
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    Feb 17th 2025, 3:18 AM

    @Clyde Bear: no not really, we are all entitled to our opinions whether we agree with each other or not and if I don’t agree with someone I would not call them out as a liar or accuse them of spreading misinformation, but yes there are cases of blatant lies especially governments, and it’s up to us to hear all sides and decipher the truth not to be told what the truth is.

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    Mute Paul C
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    Feb 17th 2025, 8:52 AM

    @Maire Hicks: you’ve hit the nail on the head. This isn’t about opinions, it’s about those who insist their opinion is fact even if it’s blatantly untrue. You’re entitled to your opinion but you’re not entitled to insist that opinion is fact.

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    Mute Maire Hicks
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    Feb 17th 2025, 9:32 AM

    @Paul C: it’s like that saying “I don’t agree with your opinion but I will defend your right to say it” (I think that’s it).

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:09 AM

    How does that work when the state itself along with state subsidised media is the biggest source of misinformation and disinformation, for example the blatant lies put out before last years referendums! Still O Gorman hasn’t been held accountable for his lies!

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    Mute Termaz FX
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    Feb 17th 2025, 12:32 PM

    @Jonn: care to provide proof?
    The only government lie I know of is “USC will be temporary”

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:58 PM

    @Termaz FX:
    I envy you, you must lead a very sheltered life!

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    Mute Mick O'K
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    Feb 17th 2025, 12:08 AM

    Proper order n’all

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    Mute Chop Chop
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    Feb 17th 2025, 12:27 AM

    Both the ISD and Global Witness are funded by George Soros’ Open Society Foundation. What is it with this guy and interfering in countries’ affairs?

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:19 AM

    @Chop Chop:
    For some reason The Journal is obsessed with promoting the irrelevant opinions of the shady sounding, Soros funded Institute for Strategic Dialogue! Why, it’s just another tentacle of the censorship industrial complex octopus? F@#k the ISD, to hell with them!

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    Mute Ulick
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    Feb 17th 2025, 2:23 AM

    The State controls what information you receive. Communism anyone?

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    Mute Hayagriva
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    Feb 17th 2025, 9:13 AM

    @Ulick: Socialism is when the government does stuff, and if it does a lot of stuff, it’s communism!

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    Mute did you every wonder
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    Feb 17th 2025, 5:56 AM

    We will build 40k houses this year, is that not disinformation, but an election?. Who decides what is disinformation anyway?.

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    Mute Paul C
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    Feb 17th 2025, 8:55 AM

    @did you every wonder: disinformation is portraying a lie as fact. If the government said they built 40k houses last year that would be disinformation. Saying they will build 40k houses and not doing it is disingenuous.

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    Mute AnthonyK
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    Feb 17th 2025, 6:58 AM

    Yes, there was misinformation. Remember Darragh O’Brien and the gov saying they would build 40k houses. That was MISINFORMATION.

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    Mute Johnny Wilson
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    Feb 17th 2025, 7:08 AM

    @AnthonyK: no it wasn’t, as commencements were 65k

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    Mute Furious George - The Wasp
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    Feb 17th 2025, 8:32 AM

    @Johnny Wilson: what’s the difference between a lie and misinformation. The CSO explicitly said the figure was incorrect

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    Mute Maire Hicks
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:38 PM

    @Johnny Wilson: 65k were started but how many were actually completed?

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    Mute FoxyBoiiYT
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:43 AM

    The far right and their useful id10ts hero want to import their American culture wars shyte here to Ireland. No thanks, we don’t need your lies. Flat earth, anti vax, anti immigrant, george soros obsessed, birthers etc… Ye got soundly trashed at the recent election, ye don’t speak for Irish people.

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 2:05 AM

    @FoxyBoiiYT:
    You stick to RTE, pal, they won’t steer you wrong, you’re in good hands!

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    Mute Ulick
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    Feb 17th 2025, 2:24 AM

    @FoxyBoiiYT: Enjoy your Communist style censorship.

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    Mute John
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    Feb 17th 2025, 7:54 AM

    @FoxyBoiiYT: what a sad individual you are

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    Mute Thomas Sheridan
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    Feb 17th 2025, 8:34 AM

    @Jonn: RTE, Dublin centric + bought and paid for by the state. There was a time we could trust them.

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    Mute Canon
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    Feb 17th 2025, 5:28 AM

    It is a matter of some concern that tech firms are lobbying the European commission to punish Ireland (and by extension therefore any other state) for enacting legislation to defend its democratic processes of election to political power at the local and national level thus completely eroding its principle of sovereignty. If Irish law cannot protect its citizens from misinformation, disinformation and the kind of algorithmic targeting used by Cambridge Analytica then what is the point of having the European Data Protection Commission at all?

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    Mute John
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    Feb 17th 2025, 7:55 AM

    @Canon: what about the disinformation and misinformation being put out there by the government on a regular basis! Is that ok?

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    Mute KO
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    Feb 17th 2025, 6:06 AM

    So lies than, or false truths.
    Like when MM in front of many in the Dail, tv ,X youtube, etc, called MMcD a liar, and when repeatedly asked if said it and if so ,to withdraw it ..but he claimed didn’t say it?!

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    Mute Mike Dowling
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    Feb 17th 2025, 4:08 AM

    “Election Disinformation on Ice” – I don’t think it will be as popular a TV show as it’s dancing celebrity predecessor …

    28
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    Mute Garry Coll
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    Feb 17th 2025, 3:24 AM

    What has this year’s presidential election got to do with it.
    The role of the President of Ireland is purely ceremonial, he or she will sign what they’re told to sign.
    Why is this an issue?

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    Mute Joanne Stokes
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    Feb 17th 2025, 7:06 AM

    It’s 1984!

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    Mute Daniel Skelton
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:52 AM

    Just stop using cesspools that openly allows misinformation, like Meta and Twitter. Simple.

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 1:59 AM

    @Daniel Skelton:
    Define misinformation!

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    Mute Daniel Skelton
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    Feb 17th 2025, 2:48 AM

    @Jonn: X.

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    Mute Jonn
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    Feb 17th 2025, 6:09 AM

    @Daniel Skelton:
    That’s your answer? Brilliant! Go back to sleep!

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    Mute FoxyBoiiYT
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    Feb 17th 2025, 8:18 AM

    @Daniel Skelton: According to the right free speech means we should be forced to stay on Twitter with all the Nazis Elon has welcomed back with one raised arm.

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    Mute Fachtna BLAINE
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    Feb 17th 2025, 2:04 AM

    Selby is the most boring man on the planet, but he’s good

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    Mute Sickof thisshit
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    Feb 17th 2025, 9:49 AM

    We all know they will abuse and manipulate any such laws to silence opposition / critical views. Starmer-style.

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    Mute FoxyBoiiYT
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    Feb 17th 2025, 10:19 AM

    @Sickof thisshit: SS in the middle of your name, how subtle

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    Mute Sickof thisshit
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    Feb 17th 2025, 11:06 AM

    @FoxyBoiiYT: get back on yer meds..

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    Mute Patrick Newell
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    Feb 17th 2025, 9:07 AM

    The government being able to control what people see and hear round elections and someone decided to stop that……shocked I am ted just shocked

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    Mute CryptoWilf
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    Feb 17th 2025, 5:57 AM

    Hang on, is this the proposed hate speach law that’s been sidelined or is it a different one?

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    Mute Johnny Wilson
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    Feb 17th 2025, 7:07 AM

    @CryptoWilf: different

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    Mute William Jennings
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    Feb 17th 2025, 4:35 PM

    I’m not surprised that it is NGOs that were pushing the hardest to get this law passed. They are parasitic leeches that attempt to infuse as much left-wing authoritarianism into our politics as possible. What are are seeing is a Trojan Horse for collectivist ideologies that are trying to redefine what and when people can speak about online. No one has a fundamental monopoly on what is true, yet such a thing was nearly created with this proposed EU “misinformation” law. Why do NGOs push so hard for speech restrictions? They know their ideology cannot compete in the marketplace of ideas and collapses under scrutiny. They cannot win economic debates because free markets have lifted billions out of poverty. They cannot win social debates because their policies destroy communities.

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