We're In a Mo Wim Situation

Confirming that the silly season is not yet over, this newspaper is once again stirring up the essentially simple business of being a man. Once recognised as such, in the days before the analysis industry got going, and before "being" became an active verb, the condition (from the media viewpoint) now seems fraught with all kinds of difficulty.

For some reason, being a woman seems to be regarded as not half as interesting. When they find the time, men are often intrigued by women, but on the whole we do not waste time imagining what it means to be a woman, most of us finding it easier to dabble in advanced metaphysics with perhaps an occasional dash of ontology as a sort of easily digestible intellectual coleslaw on the side, and maybe a triple-strength gin and tonic to wash it all down. We are simple creatures at heart: but of course for the army of commentators, a man's heart is the perceived problem.

However, one has no desire to mock the pursuit of knowledge, however ineluctable or esoteric. One's heart (well, my heart) went out to my colleague Kathryn Holmquist the other day when it was revealed that out of 50 men to whom she had posed the question, "What is a real man?", only six deigned to reply. Our own Taoiseach even got a spokesman to say that this question "wouldn't be high" on Bertie's list of priorities at the moment. Right, then, we might ask, what is a real spokesman? Very often it isn't a man at all, but a PR creature keeping on message.

Meanwhile, many of us men were taken aback at rugby player Mick Galwey's remark, re the Irish defeat in the European Cup, that "at the end of the day there is something more important than winning matches, and that's family", However, most male readers and rugby fans will have instantly realised that the man is still in shock, and have no problem in forgiving him.

As for friendship between men, Kathryn Holmquist concluded that there might well be an "elegant, dignified mystery" of male intimacy which women cannot judge by their own standards, "in which the most important, intimate exchanges are contained in what is left unsaid". That's it in a nutshell. It's all in men's silences, vacuums and pauses. It's when men friends are not talking to each other that you have to take note, which of course is a bit difficult, since there is literally nothing to take note of. Back to metaphysics then.

Right. I note that Mr Michael Tutty, the front-runner for The Job at the European Investment Bank, has stated that "the job of the Department of Finance is to curb enthusiasm, just like your bank manager".

This is a bit odd. Twenty years ago it would certainly have been true to say that your bank manager was there to curb enthusiasm, to emphasise the permanent precariousness of your financial position, and to dissuade you from even thinking about a house extension, a new car or a foreign holiday. The defining qualities of the bank manager and his (never her) staff were negativity, gloom, temperance and pessimism, and these qualities radiated reassuringly from bank branches all over the country. We were all given to understand that global and personal catastrophe were imminent all the time, and for every day that it didn't happen, we gave thanks to God, the clergy and the banks, in that order. That's what contentment was all about. It was the way things were.

These days, however, the banks are wildly enthusiastic that their customers borrow as much as possible, plus another 20 per cent, and spend it as fast and furiously as we can. And despite Mr Tutty's claim about curbing enthusiasm, the Department of Finance is headed up by a Minister, Charlie "let the good times roll" McCreevy, who refuses to let anyone or anything dent his absolute confidence that we can ride the recent waves of prosperity forever.

The trouble about straightforward remarks made by people in the news, like Mr Tutty, is the perceived need for interpretation by the media. We had all the differing interpretations in recent days of honest remarks by Mo Mowlam regarding her standdown plans, and numerous glosses on Wim Duisenberg's solid, unadorned advice to the Irish Government. Plain speaking seems to rouse the deepest suspicions of a cynical media, regularly placing us in a Mo Wim situation. We should therefore bluntly reject Mr Tutty's assertion and insist that, currently, the job of the Department of Finance is about anything except curbing enthusiasm.

Times Square will return on September 28th.