We’re a funny lot when it comes to expressing ourselves. Who? The Irish. People in general. Or maybe it’s just me. Columnists like me make the bizarre assumption that our opinions and reflections are of interest to others. It’s our conceit, and we witter away to fill up column inches in the vague hope that it will ring a bell with others. In some ways, I just file copy here every fortnight with a “take it or leave it” attitude, expecting that most will leave it. I know myself how I read personal columns, in newspapers and magazines. Some I always glance at, to see whether or not they are tackling a subject that interests me. The late lamented Nuala Ó Faoláin had such a column. Some I disagree with, generally, like John Waters, but read to see what they’re banging on about now, to test or confound my own beliefs and values. I know in the first few lines whether I am interested or not, and, truth be told, most times, I move on. I expect the same is true for you, dear readers.

Sometimes, we get attacked, and that is part of the risk of putting one’s head above the parapet. When I got very involved in the Cathal Ó Searcaigh scandal, with every instinct in me screaming that the film Fairytale Of Kathmandu was disingenuous at best, and destructive, manipulative and dishonest at worst, I expected to get into trouble. When a crowd is throwing stones in a lynch mob, it’s not the most sensible thing in the world to object. Such is the power of documentary film-making, it appeared that most people accepted its premise without question, and the stories told in it, without subjecting them to decent cross-examination. It was trial by media, at its most dangerous. It has been a monumentally difficult task to try to suggest that the film was a text, a construct, a subjective and biased perspective, without being accused of being a defender of paedophiles. In particular, my outrage that counsellors and counselling agencies were used as a fig-leaf for this film, and seemed only too happy to jump on the bandwagon of stone-throwers, contributed to a decision to “out” myself as a therapist in this column, to challenge the notion that all therapists and counsellors supported the film’s intent. Even though I spoke personally, of course, I ran the risk of running into difficulties with colleagues and clients. Therapists and counsellors are, according to traditional schools of thought, supposed to be neutral, invisible, “blank screens”. However, young men interviewed in the presence of a counsellor in Fairytale signed no release forms and have vociferously demanded that their interviews be withdrawn from the film. If I were that counsellor, I would be deeply ashamed of myself. Lending the moral authority of counselling/therapy to a series of interviews in a documentary is one thing. But the counsellor’s responsibility is, surely, solely to the interviewee, and he or she should support them right the way through their experience with the film-maker, and ensure that they come to no harm from taking part in the film. I seem to be the only one objecting publicly to this misuse of a counsellor’s role. In this day and age, we counsellors appear to be the new priests, with similar quasi-mystical powers and moral authority and codes of silence. I, for one, think that is very dangerous. We are only human, and there is nothing about us that makes our opinions any more or less valuable than anyone else’s. It stands to reason that of course I speak for no other therapist or counsellor in this matter.
Being willing to accept flak for taking principled stands is one thing. But I had a shock recently, again on the theme of self-expression. I’ve been part of a creative writing class, and one little poem that I wrote seemed to go down well and got a few laughs. I went home and, in a sort of “ah, fuck it” mood, I put it on my blog. I suppose the response I got in the class went to my head. I liked making people laugh, and, in the dreadfully pathetic way that we bloggers and twitterers have, wanted to try to repeat the experience and get more laughs.
Within a few hours, someone anonymous had left a comment, just three unforgettable words: “Pretentious, childish drivel”.
Having navigated my little boat through stormy weather, and waves of opposition, and got through it all relatively unscathed, these words seemed to me to be like a harpoon from nowhere, piercing a hole in my hull, letting water in at an alarming rate. I felt like drowning. But didn’t.
It doesn’t matter how good or bad the poem was. It doesn’t matter who my anonymous critic was. What matters, I think, is that there are people out there who are only too willing to become your worst nightmare, the voice of your most damning inner critic, and puncture you right where it hurts.
I’d love to draw a good satisfying moral from this story, but, for the life of me, I can’t.
“Shit happens”, is the nearest I can get to it.