01.10.06
Mary O’Rourke
It seems that our boy Conor developed his talent for unfortunate remarks from his Auntie Mary. But no humiliating apology from her. She was fabulous on Irish radio yesterday (RTE here and The Last Word, here – click on first hour of Monday ) I think she’s around 50 minutes in) defending her “they worked like blacks remarks”. As you know, I am no FnFer, but really, she’s inspiring.
From today’s IT
“Speaking on RTÉ radio yesterday morning, however, Mrs O’Rourke defended her use of the phrase. “It was meant in a complimentary fashion, praising the hard work of my team and indirectly myself,” she said during an interview on Today with Pat Kenny.
“There was absolutely no offence meant. It is a well known phrase in Ireland, but perhaps in a different Ireland it’s no longer relevant. Perhaps I should say ‘like Trojans’ but then would you be upsetting the Greeks or something, I don’t know.”
Ray said,
January 10, 2006 at 4:46 pm
Ray said,
January 10, 2006 at 4:47 pm
{picks up sarcasm meter, bangs it off desk a few times. Looks puzzled}
(your comments software doesn’t like angle brackets)
Sarah said,
January 10, 2006 at 4:52 pm
tee hee. I was going to include in that post, that you could all turn your meters off, but it was too much fun leaving you guessing.
Leon said,
January 12, 2006 at 1:08 pm
Mary WAS PC. The expression is to work like a nigger so she toned it down alot.
Niall said,
January 25, 2006 at 10:35 pm
My dad always used ‘Kaffir’.
Jason McG said,
July 20, 2007 at 2:42 am
I only heard about this statement by Mary O’Rourke recently. Amazing phraseology from an educated representative … a “compliment” that could best be replaced by retiring from public life … will the insensitivity run in the family?