Slugger O'Toole

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Slugger O'Toole is a weblog started in June 2002 by political analyst Mick Fealty. It began life as Letter to Slugger O'Toole, focused primarily on news and comment about Northern Ireland. From the beginning it has drawn its readership from a wide spectrum of opinion [1] both inside and outside Northern Ireland.

Contents

'Slugger' has developed a reputation as 'the watering hole of the political class in Northern Ireland.'[ citation needed ] It draws its regular contributors from a wide range of political perspectives including contributors with links to all of the main political parties as well as a number of 'independents'. Research commissioned in the summer of 2008 by Stratagem in association with ComRes revealed that 96% of the members of the Northern Ireland Assembly (MLAs) read the blog "regularly" or "occasionally".

As of 2023 the site has published over 40,000 posts and over one and a half million comments on the site. Each month the site gets about 70,000 readers. The site is run by volunteers and has never had any paid staff. The site is reader supported and does not get any funding.

Play the ball, not the man/woman rule

The site has a fairly rigorous comments policy in which personal abuse is discouraged and commenters are urged to 'play the ball and not the man' - a refrain that has since been popularised in the wider Irish political discourse. [2] The phrase refers to Ad hominem argument. The phrase was first suggested by early commentator Ian Parsley in 2003.

Origins of the name

The name of the blog was originally a reference to a sockpuppet character invented by Tim Murphy of New York, on an old CNN community called Peace in Northern Ireland. The name of the character is in turn a reference to the traditional Irish song "The Irish Rover", best known from a version recorded as a collaboration between The Pogues and The Dubliners. The relevant line is: There was Slugger O'Toole who was drunk as a rule. Murphy's "character" was invariably drunk on Bushmills, never listened to reasoned argument, and usually espoused strong loyalist politics, which often caught the unwary or recently arrived off guard.

The idea of the Letter was to try to explain the complexities of Northern Ireland, slowly, regularly and in short bite-size pieces over a long, long period of time. Just like trying to explain something complex to a drunk man.

However, the Letter part was dropped when the blog moved from its old blogspot venue and radically re-designed and built on a different blog platform. [3]

The Slugger O'Toole Political Awards

In the autumn of 2008, Slugger O'Toole announced a series of political awards. With the stated intention of 'promoting a conversational politics', the awards sought to identify good examples of democratic practice.

The inaugural awards were presented in Belfast on 7 October 2008 with comedian Tim McGarry as compere.

The 2008 winners were as follows:

The 2009 awards were scheduled to take place on 24 November at The Black Box in Belfast. The 2010 awards were going to see a change in format. [4]

Awards

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References

  1. ↑ "Politicians monitor the 'bloggers'". 26 February 2004. Archived from the original on 4 March 2009. Retrieved 6 May 2022.
  2. ↑ "Abusive verbal attacks on President Higgins mark a new low in political discourse". The Irish Times . Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 6 May 2022.
  3. ↑ http://sluggerotoole.blogspot.com/blogspot.com [ dead link ]
  4. ↑ "Slugger Awards". Slugger O'Toole. Archived from the original on 27 October 2020. Retrieved 23 October 2020.
  5. ↑ http://theorwellprize.co.uk/uncategorized/orwell-prize-2012-longlists-announced/ [ bare URL ]
  6. ↑ "Slugger O'Toole". Archived from the original on 6 May 2022. Retrieved 15 May 2009.[ better source needed ]
  7. ↑ "Belfast blogger wins peace award". BBC News . 14 May 2009. Archived from the original on 17 May 2009. Retrieved 15 May 2009.
  8. ↑ "Net & Politics 2006 (Top 10): The Top 10 Who Are Changing the World of Internet and Politics". Politics Online. Archived from the original on 15 August 2009.
  9. ↑ http://www.fistfulofeuros.net [ bare URL ]
  10. ↑ "New Media Awards: The winners". New Statesman . Archived from the original on 22 July 2004.
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