What is RTÉ up to? First they give us the brain-numbing Voice of Ireland and then they give us Michaela McCollum. When last seen, Michaela was in Peru wearing a very large bun on her head – or to be more exact, on her way to a Peruvian prison with a large bun on her head. She was prisonward-bound because she’d been caught trying to smuggle a largeish amount of cocaine. At the time I remember feeling a tweak of sympathy for the young woman. I cannot speak from experience, but I have this gut feeling that Peruvian prisons aren’t the most fun place you could go to.
Now, however, two years later, all that is behind her. No bun, no face pale with anxiety, no Peruvian prison. Michaela is back and boy, does she look different. Her hair has gone quite blonde with suffering, her face has been meticulously made up, her teeth whitened – and RTÉ has given her air time to explain how it was for her, what about that bun, did she act in a moment of madness or what? (The answer to that last one is yes – Michaela is a good person who did a stupid thing. We know that because she told us herself.)
So here’s the question asked by lots of people already but worth repeating: why is this convicted drug-smuggler being given air-time on the national broadcasting system, and treated as a celebrity to whose words we should all listen? (No, Virginia, I did not watch the interview. I have only one life and I didn’t think I wanted to give part of it, however short, to this young woman and her reminiscences.) I thought the southern establishment was opposed to drug-smuggling. Michaela has obviously been made over within an inch of her life, so who did that and how much did it cost? She’s been coached on how to sit nicely, how to do sincere and sorrowful – who taught her that? And finally, as my wise nephew Adrian asked online, why not, instead of interviewing Michaela, interview Anto who has just been released from Mountjoy for aggravated burglary? Better still, make it a game show. Maybe get Bob Geldof to chair, have panelists like Graham Norton and Gay Byrne, put it out at prime time and call it What’s My Crime? The audiences would pile in.
outraged by this as a licence fee payer. I expect Paul Williams will soon do an expose on this drug pusher & expose her gangland connections, after all these people do not work in isolation. Is this part of the war against drugs, a new low even for RTE. Expect to see her on the Late Late promoting her book. I wonder who will play her in the movie. I wonder could I spend awhile in that gaol & come out looking like that.
Expect the book and appearance’s on various celebrity shows to follow on from this.
It.makes.you.sick.looking.at.her.jude.
I.Have.A.Strong.Stomach.Jim.
Jude the media where all over this story when she was arrested. So now she has seved her time (barring probation) why wouldn’t they be interested in her again? But it seems some want her to a rot in prison or b wear sackcloth and ashes for as long as they think.
It’s like some are absolutely seething because maybe , just maybe she will make some money out of interviews books films…It smacks of jealousy… Good luck to her.I hope she makes a fortune.
If only the people who are outraged! had expended some of that energy on the bankers and goverments and the media in the south…but no lets pick on a 22yo female who dear god can be called pretty.
I’d agree, Angela – the banks and government and media in the south are more deserving of a kick in the arse. But I still don’t like the selectivity of it all. Her make-over was so kind of obvious, and I have doubts about the media being all over her case in Peru, and even more doubts (i.e., I disapprove) about her glamorization in every sense on RTÉ.
Jude If I had been in that hellhole of a prison the first thing I would do when I got out would be to visit a beautician. As for the media did you not see the media scrum in Peru who chased after her ? Or do you think that Peru is so backward.
Would you rather she appeared with facial tattoos or scars?
The girl will not be given a minutes peace by the media in any country. So I hope she takes full advantage of it and makes a fortune.
Well indeed, Angela – why not? Good luck to her and all other drug dealers – the war on drugs is a truly stupid war in any case. I suppose the thing that irritates me most is the blatant make over of her and the PR-style ‘I was young and foolish and I am horrified to think I might have killed people with these drugs’. That rings very hollow to my ear…
Sure its only a bit of smuggling Jude. Hard to get worked up about it eh?
Got it in one, gio.
Jude,
The girl was very young when she committed her crime and maybe it is just possible that she truly regrets her past actions and will make something worthwhile out of her life.
She did do a hair and beauty course whilst in prison, so it is perfectly possible that her new look came as courtesy from her fellow inmates.
By the way I do a great “sincere and sorrowful” but the wife never buys it.
Ha haaaa – very good, Bd – I like it, even the wife doesn’t…As to Michaela – my objection is to her case being paraded on RTÉ. What not Anto? Or my Auntie Peg, who used to smuggle pots of jam secreted in her knickers…OK, Auntie P might be difficult to interview since she’s been dead 25 years or so. But you get the drift…
Auntie P smuggled pots of jam in her knickers?? Sound like bloomers to me, Jude! No knickers are that big! I remember my great grandmother running around the backyard after her pet dog stole her bloomers off the line, crying “give me ma bloomers back ya crazy dog! the whole bloody street will see them!”. You could’ve hid a lot of pots in those bloomers, I tell ya!
She should have got life with hard labour like the many potential recipients of her angel dust. Next thing she’ll be nominated for An Seanad.
What did you say, fiosrach??…Crikey. And I’ve been trying to remember who did Michaela remind me of…Nearly drove me mad, it did.
Not for the worst time, Estemmed Blogmeister, agus Fiosrach, a chara, youse pilfer the words from one’s mouth.
While the name of the Other was on the tip of one’s tongue one just could not it to drop.
Perhaps, the last lines in ‘The Hostage’ by Brendan Behan who first caught sight of his own Da when the latter was in Mountjoy, are apposite in this instance;
‘The bells of Hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling
For you but not for me;
Oh, death whee is this sting-a-ling-a-ling
Or, grave thy victory ?
If you meet the undertaker
Or the young woman from Peru*
Get a pint with what’s left over
Now I’ll say good bye to you’.
*oops ! that should of course read; ‘the young man from the Pru ‘
Matthew 7.07 (Douay)
She’s done her bird, served her time and been punished for what she did, it’s looking like now is to be rewarded for it with touted book deals, chat shows and even a possible movie. Everyone deserves a second chance. Let him without sin etc…..
What about the kids that get these drugs, no second chance here!!!
I don’t think she has anything new to add to this horrible crime, keep calm and keep your head down.
The reason why the media is all over it is simple. The narrative has to be maintained that the ‘war on drugs’ isn’t working and poor craters like mc collum are a result of it boo hoo. It’s better if we legalise it all. Take the money off the gangsters and into better things….such as the pockets of those entrepreneurs who are itching to take over the cake like Richard Branson. Also the more plebs that are inconvenienced by drink and even more drugs the better. That way there’s no danger of them threatening the status quo. They’ll be too caught up with sorting out their own problems than sorting out problem rulers. Dumbing down big time.
Btw do you think a republican prisoner just released would be afforded the same kid glove treatment that this woman got? Do you think he/she would have got a gentle interview? Only if the narrative of the great and the good was to promote a republican agenda.
shes done her whack,whats done is done.
I had to laugh at a certain “journalist” bitching about Ms McCollum “getting publicity” This journalist would give “publicity” to Myra Hindley as long as she took a strident enough anti SF line.
Michael C
Once again ,Michael,we’d be obliged if you’d name the journalist in question.
It’s always fun to observe the indignance of media luvvies who hoover up coke complaining when the small cog of the deliveryman gets spotlighted. Given that a fairly hefty portion of radio, TV and newsprint in Ireland are marching to the Bolivian beat, it’s no wonder there’s media interest in it. Sure it’s only a bit of smuggling and what would they do in Montrose without the likes of poor Michaela?
Who else laughed at the time when Michaela and her Scottish friend were caught? lol I remember it was me and my elder brother watching the news when it was first reported and we busted out laughing and my brother said “Scooped!” at the sight of Michaela and her friend standing there answering questions whilst their belongings were being searched. For those ignorant of Belfast street slang “Scooped” means “caught”.
I know the situation for Michaela and her friend wasn’t comical but there was just something comical about them both standing there while their suitcases were being searched by police, both with a look like a rabbit in the headlights. And, of course, that huge bun on Michaela’s head. I’m surprised that Bun doesn’t have its own twitter page by now. I heard Willie Frazers fringe has its own twitter page.
On a serious note, after I had stopped laughing at Michaela and her seriously foolish failed plot of smuggling drugs, the first thing that popped into my head was the film “Midnight Express” and I seriously started to feel sorry for the Irish girl. Being a foreign prisoner on a continent renowned for its brutal prisons is a very unenviable position. Go watch “Ross Kemp: Extreme World” where one episode was about South America prisons, where in one incident gangs cut off a man’s head and played football with it for a number of days. Gang rape, amongst men and women, is common (the dreaded shower room…). Where exploitation of weaker inmates is considered “normal”, whether its for material gain or for sexual favours. Where gangs are in charge, not the prison officers. Prison officers themselves have also been known to be corrupt and aren’t shy to indulge in things they shouldn’t. The conditions in the prisons are horrendous, where many inmates don’t even have a bed but have to sleep on the ground, the place is overrun with bugs (not the small bugs that have full grown men in Ireland jumping out of their skin but the kind that are as big as your hand and can deliver a bite capable of killing) and the food, I’m sure, wasn’t of “The Ritz” quality, some of it capable of being used to tar a roof or a drive way from what I’ve heard.
And don’t get me started on “The Midnight Express”. That big hairy, sweaty, Turkish rapist prison guard still gives me the creeps. Poor Billy, he did exactly what Michaela did and tried smuggling drugs and ended up getting scooped. For the next 15 years he lived his life in a brutal Turkish prison eventually driving him crazy until he was about to get raped again by the big, hairy, sweaty prison guard and he accidently kills him and escapes.
Michaela is extremely lucky to get such a lenient sentence, I was suspecting her to get at least 20 years and for a Hollywood blockbuster to be made about her experiences when she was eventually released: Midnight Express Part II.
But there’s a valuable lesson in this for anyone foolish enough to think about smuggling drugs: Don’t do it because the chances of succeeding is extremely, extremely remote and its not worth spending half your life in a prison cell, potentially getting a private visit every now and then by a big, hairy, sweaty prison guard……
Hi Ryan …i think you’ll find that the episode with the “big hairy sweaty Turkish prison guard “was made up to give the narrative of the film a little more poke….a neat little touch of racist spice….The original biographical strory that Hayes wrote was harrowing alright , because prisons in other countries are set up tp punish rather than to educate…but the guard was killed by someone else at another time entirely…another kind of storyline that didn’t suit the film’s intent.. Storytellers! Hah they all love a good yarn…no matter how true or false..!
. Also it should be noted that Mr Hayes was caught smuggling some four pounds of very good high -grade quality Turkish hashish, which is an entirely different kind of beast than a suitcase full of cocaine .It is what most students such as himself smoked back in the day and didn’t think much of it .It was one of the reasons he was travelling abroad ..They used to call it the “Hash Trail”. I did some of that myself back in the early 1970’s The fact that it was illegal at all was considered an injustice by most young people back then. .
As for the young lady and her cocaine bust.Well that could happen to any silly young person who thinsk that they can get something for nothing only to discover that there’s always a price for everything.She knew the risks but decided to ignore what her head surely knew.. Coke does much more damage globally than most other drugs except possibly alcohol but that’s another story.Turkish hashish wouldn’t be in the same league at all.
To give her a makeover and plant her in front of a TV camera is just another bit of media exploitation anyway. She’s being hustled by the same kind of people who handed her the suitcase full of coke..They want a news story .She may recoup something from all of this of course. there’ll be a ghost written book in it .Christ…there might even be a film and a round of television shows .The public love all this kind of garbage which is why TV reality shows mop up so many viewers. she could be made a latter -day saint or that “bun” might take off and conquer the planet .Look what happened to the arse that crashed the internet….
Can’t disagree with anything you say on this Jude, thanks be to God she was caught.