A Shared Future? Exclusion, Stigmatization, and Mental Health of Same-Sex-Attracted Young People in Northern Ireland

2010 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 488-508 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dirk Schubotz ◽  
Malachai O'Hara
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Young People ◽  
Sex Education ◽  
Peace Process ◽  
School Bullying ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Northern Irish ◽  
Young Life

For more than a decade the Peace Process has fundamentally changed Northern Irish society. However, although socioreligious integration and ethnic mixing are high on the political agenda in Northern Ireland, the Peace Process has so far failed to address the needs of some of the most vulnerable young people, for example, those who identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Public debates in Northern Ireland remain hostile to same-sex-attracted people. Empirical evidence from the annual Young Life and Times (YLT) survey of 16-year-olds undertaken by ARK shows that same-sex-attracted young people report worse experiences in the education sector (e.g., sex education, school bullying), suffer from poorer mental health, experience higher social pressures to engage in health-adverse behavior, and are more likely to say that they will leave Northern Ireland and not return. Equality legislation and peace process have done little to address the heteronormativity in Northern Ireland.

Debates over Irish unification will gain traction

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Successful Implementation ◽  
Northern Irish ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The Status ◽  
Scottish Independence ◽  
The Uk

Significance The differing perspectives of unionists and nationalists on the creation of Northern Ireland as a political entity within the United Kingdom, together with Brexit and tensions over the Northern Ireland Protocol (NIP), have brought the contentious issue of Irish reunification onto the political agenda in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. Impacts Scottish independence would likely increase momentum for a referendum on Irish unity. Successful implementation of the NIP, giving firms access to EU and UK markets, may support arguments for maintaining the status quo. If the UK government abandons the NIP, the adverse trade impact on Northern Irish firms could increase support for unification.

Comparison of Northern Irish Children’s Attitudes to War and Peace Before and After the Paramilitary Ceasefires

1997 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 715-730 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frances McLernon ◽  
Neil Ferguson ◽  
Ed Cairns
Keyword(s):  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Young People ◽  
General View ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
War And Peace ◽  
Northern Irish ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Before And After ◽  
The Status ◽  
National Leaders

This study compares the attitudes of young people in Northern Ireland to conflict and conflict resolution, before and after the 1994 ceasefire announcements. Content analysis on the responses of 117 adolescents aged 14-15 years showed differences in their attitudes to war and peace and in their strategies to attain peace. Concepts of war as static and unchanging showed a significant difference after the ceasefire. In addition, the perception of war as a struggle between national leaders before the ceasefire shifted significantly to a more general view of war in terms of war activities and their negative consequences. Perceptions of peace as “active” showed a marked swing after the ceasefire to a more abstract view of peace as freedom, justice, and liberty after the ceasefire. Before the ceasefire, adolescents were reluctant to provide strategies to attain peace, but after the ceasefire, strategies were suggested with more confidence. Results also indicated that adolescents prefer an alternative to violence in the resolution of conflict. Although the proportion of adolescents who said the country was at peace did not change significantly after the ceasefire, the percentage who expressed ambivalent feelings about the status of Northern Ireland in terms of peace increased significantly. This suggests that, at the time of this study, many young people had not fully accepted the reality of the peace process.

scholarly journals Narratives of young people on same-sex relationships about their path and implications for mental health

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Andréa Noeremberg Guimarães ◽  
Gabriel Deolinda da Silva de Marqui ◽  
Maria Luiza Bevilaqua Brum ◽  
Carine Vendruscolo ◽  
João Marcos Werner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Young People ◽  
Data Interpretation ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Health Care Practices ◽  
Open Questions ◽  
Role Of Nursing ◽  
Life Path ◽  
Nursing Professionals

ABSTRACT Objective: To know the life path of young people in same-sex relationship from the discovery of their sexual orientation and the confrontation of problems arising from it, contextualizing situations that affect their mental health and reflect on the role of nursing in care, within the scope of Primary Health Care. Method: Qualitative research performed in two public institutions of higher education. Nineteen homoaffective young people participated in the interviews, following a script with open questions related to mental health and same-sex relationship. Data interpretation used the content analysis. Current ethical precepts have been respected. Results: The difficulties of youth concerning the discovery and acceptance of homoaffectivity are related to confrontations in the familiar coexistence and with social groups, cultural and religious aspects. Conclusion and implications for practice: This issue provokes reflections in the nursing professionals concerning the mental health care practices, considering the cultural competence in the Primary Care scope.

scholarly journals ‘Absent and yet Somehow Present’: Idealized Landscapes and the Counter-historical Impulse in Contemporary Northern Irish Photography and Writing

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 64-76
Author(s):  
Stephanie Lehner
Keyword(s):  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Peace Process ◽  
Northern Irish ◽  
Point Of Departure

This article explores how three artists are responding to the idealized landscape that is contemporary Northern Ireland. I argue that the rural/urban dichotomy which implicitly or explicitly forms a point of departure in the photographic collections of David Farrell’s Innocent Landscapes (2001) and John Duncan’s Trees from Germany (2003) is also evident in David Park’s 2008 novel, The Truth Commissioner, offering a new lens to explore the play of absences and presences that constitute the peace process. The three works allow us to perceive how idealized landscapes act as façades that conceal, contain and defer alternative realities.

scholarly journals ‘The Troubles' and the peace process in Northern Irelanda in Seamus Heaney’s "The cure at Troy"

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Juan José Cogolludo Díaz
Keyword(s):  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Social Problems ◽  
Peace Process ◽  
The Political ◽  
Seamus Heaney ◽  
Northern Irish ◽  
The Troubles ◽  
Sectarian Violence ◽  
The Future ◽  
Irish People

Based on Philoctetes, the tragic play by Sophocles, the poet Seamus Heaney creates his own version in The Cure at Troy to present the political and social problems in Northern Ireland during the period that became known euphemistically as ‘the Troubles’. This paper aims to highlight the significance of Heaney’s play in the final years of the conflict. Heaney uses the classical Greek play to bring to light the plight and suffering of the Northern Irish people as a consequence of the atavistic and sectarian violence between the unionist and nationalist communities. Nevertheless, Heaney also provides possible answers that allow readers to harbour a certain degree of hope towards peace and the future in Northern Ireland.

The Making of an Outsider: Growing Up in Poverty in Northern Ireland

2010 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 453-467 ◽  
Author(s):  
Goretti Horgan
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Young People ◽  
Social Exclusion ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Mental Health Problems ◽  
Health Problems ◽  
Growing Up ◽  
Disadvantaged Community ◽  
The Past

The young people who are the focus of this article grow up in communities ravaged by poverty and conflict. School is where they spend most of their time, but their experience of school is, generally, not motivating and increases their feelings of social exclusion; almost one in ten young people whose family depends on benefits leaves school with no educational qualifications and the future they see is bleak. Small wonder, then, that so many suffer from emotional and mental health problems and engage in self-harming behavior. This article will use qualitative data from two studies carried out over the past 5 years to explore the experiences of young people growing up in poverty in Northern Ireland and look at the extent of their exclusion from the norms of society. It will argue that this exclusion is such that some of them feel “outsiders” even within their own, disadvantaged, community, and this is dangerous in a society which is still emerging from conflict.

Party Politics and Religion in Northern Ireland

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil Matthews
Keyword(s):  
Northern Ireland ◽  
General Rule ◽  
Religion And Politics ◽  
Party Politics ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Northern Irish ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Good Friday ◽  
Party Differences

Contrary to popular belief, Northern Irish politics is not an entirely religious affair. The widespread and longstanding use of the labels “Catholic” and “Protestant” to denote political allegiance undoubtedly contributes to such an impression. The relationship between religion and politics in Northern Ireland is, however, more complex than these convenient labels suggest. Indeed the question of whether and to what extent religion possesses any political significance in the region has generated considerable academic debate. Organizationally, there is a clear separation of church and party in Northern Ireland. The main political parties have eschewed formal ties with churches, and faith leaders have largely confined themselves to involvement in “small p” politics. The one exception to this general rule has been the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). Its close ties with the Free Presbyterian Church has long rendered it a unique case in the British and Irish context. The historical relationship between the main unionist parties and the Orange Order, a quasi-religious organization, further blurs the lines between religion and party politics in Northern Ireland. Since the signing of the Belfast or Good Friday Agreement in 1998, alternative or non-ethnonational political issues have become increasingly salient in Northern Ireland. More specifically, touchstone moral issues have taken center stage on several occasions. Abortion rights and marriage equality, for example, remain high on the contemporary political agenda, with clear party differences observable on each issue. The staunch moral conservatism of the DUP, derived from its commitment to a fundamentalist Protestant doctrine, again sets it apart. The continued exceptionalism of Northern Ireland on these issues, compared with the rest of the United Kingdom and, increasingly, Ireland, serves to reinforce the importance of understanding the role religion plays in shaping party policy programs and party competition in the region.

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