News Bulletin – April/ May 2006
26th April 2006
The “Black and Tan” flavour …a reception that is cold to the point of frigidity
Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream name has provoked howls of protest Ben & Jerry’s decision to give their latest flavour of ice-cream the same name as Churchill’s notorious army has provoked howls of protest. To practically the whole world it may seem like a harmless, cheerfully cutesie name for a new American ice-cream flavour, just adopted by the popular manufacturer Ben & Jerry’s.But some Irish-Americans have given the “Black and Tan” flavour a reception that is cold to the point of frigidity, complaining of its associations with one of the most notorious forces ever seen in Ireland.It is difficult to know whether the arrival of Black and Tan flavour ice-cream could cause controversy and outcry in Ireland, but it would certainly generate a great deal of conversation and debate.Although the Black and Tans force was deployed for only a couple of years, from 1920 to 1922, nationalist Ireland still associates it with murder, brutality, massacre and indiscipline in the years leading to southern Ireland’s independence.When a Tan was killed in Cork, they burnt down more than 300 buildings in the city centre and afterwards proudly pinned pieces of burnt cork to their caps.A British Labour Party commission reported that it felt feelings of shame at witnessing the “insolent swagger” of the Tans, whom they described as “rough, brutal, abusive and distinctly the worse for liquor”.The Black and Tans were created after the First World War by Winston Churchill and other ministers who were faced with a increasing tide of violence from the IRA, which had launched a campaign to drive Britain out of Ireland.Later, Churchill openly acknowledged the excesses of the Black and Tans, admitting in the House of Commons: “It was quite impossible to prevent the police and military making reprisals on their own account.”
Ministers pondered on whether they should officially endorse reprisals, and persisted in believing that the oppressive tactics of the Tans and other forces were on the point of delivering victory. Lloyd George famously boasted that he “had murder by the throat”.Professor Roy Foster wrote of the Tans: “They behaved more like independent mercenaries; their brutal regime followed the IRA’s policy of killing policemen, and was taken by many to vindicate it.” The historian, Peter Hart, agreed. The militarised police formed their own death squads and regularly engaged in reprisals against civilians. IRA violence only increased.”The name of the Black and Tans thus lives on to the present day, and can still be heard from the lips of republican orators driving home their ancient messages of British iniquity and Irish victimhood. Golden World Awards
Entry forms for this year’s Golden World Awards for Excellence in Public Relations can be downloaded at: www.ipra.org/services/gwa1.htm
Account wins
Wilson Hartnell PR (WHPR) has won the Health Service Executive (HSE) account, while the Shelbourne in Dublin has appointed Fleishman-Hillard as public relations consultants following a similar competitive process. Fleishman-Hillard will handle the communications programme for the re-opening of the Dublin landmark on behalf of Marriott International. Pembroke Communications is handling the launch of James Villas Holidays, specialists in private pool villa holidays with a portfolio of 1,500 villas across 25 destinations. Heneghan PR is now handling Gulf Air, the airline which operates three flights a week from Dublin to Bahrain and eastbound to Thailand, lndia, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia. Amy Buckeridge has won US brand Tammy Taylor Nate and golfing text service Pint Positions.com.
Irish companies start to get media coverage from their blogs
I’ve watched with interest over the past couple of weeks how a couple of Irish companies have started to get press coverage off the back of what was written on their blogs. For example, Karlin Lillington wrote a piece on Hosting 365’s free blogs offer in the Irish Times, Ireland’s leading broadsheet, because of what she read on their blog. John Collins also wrote a piece on .eu domain squatting in the Irish Times and quoted another Irish hosting company, Blacknight Solutions, in the piece. Was it just a pure coincidence that the company MD, Michele Neylon, who was quoted in the piece had posted about the subject a few days prior? These stories came about because the business blogs allowed the companies to communicate with a large audience in an efficient manner. Obviously in Ireland, this would probably be mainly restricted to tech companies for the time being as journalists in that sector have picked up on the trends faster than their peers. That being said though, more and more stories are popping up in the mainstream news from what was said online.Does this mean that blogs are going to replace PR? No. Good journalists have always found interesting companies and individuals. There are plenty of occasions where a PR professional’s role is simply reactive and to deal with a media query, rather than having pitched the story in the first place. The Internet effectively allows journalists to find information that makes for a good easily and efficiently.
Published April 24th, 2006 in E-PR: http://www.pkellypr.com/blog/category/e-pr/
