It’s hardly surprising Maria Walsh reached for ‘male, pale and stale’ label in FF candidate row

Maria Walsh was responding to a journalist’s question when she took a swipe at Fianna Fáil’s three confirmed European candidates as “male, pale and stale” (MPS). As answers go, the Fine Gael MEP’s labelling was trite. There is a reason why clever phrases, even Shakespearean ones, become cliches and deaden the brain.

Then again, in fairness to Walsh, who is campaigning to keep her seat in the Midlands Northwest, all three candidates selected for the Fianna Fáil ticket are indisputably white, male and 56. For the 36-year-old vice-chair of the parliament’s LGBTI Rights Intergroup, steeped in European Union inclusivity and diversity policy, it would have been odd if she had ignored this strikingly homogenous alignment of Fianna Fáil stars.

Her point, almost buried in the cliche, was that a greater diversity of candidates is out there waiting to be found but that people “of a certain age with a certain skin colour and a certain gender” were too comfortable with the status quo.

Two of the MPS trio, Barry Andrews and Billy Kelleher, were quick to acknowledge the problem staring them in the eyes. It wasn’t just about political correctness. Election 2019 produced one MEP for Fianna Fáil; Fine Gael won four, three of them women. Andrews mentioned “structural problems around Irish politics”. Kelleher noted the challenges faced by women in politics: “They can’t go canvassing alone at night, and Holly Cairns closed an office.”

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The last of the trio, Barry Cowen, said he had hoped candidates would have focused on their own campaigns. But the whole point of an election campaign is to get noticed, usually by casting aspersions on your rivals and Cowen is a bit of legend in that area.

But the MPS jibe had cut through. “What about her ? ... It’s ageist, it’s racist – the colour of your skin, pale?” He didn’t accept it at all, he told the Sunday Independent. “I’d hate to think of the reaction if I said that.”

He’s not wrong. Then again, the three bowing out of the European Parliament happen to be women.

Still, like a lot of other older white males, he sees a double standard at work. He can’t help that he was born male and white so why is he expected to take sweeping insults about his sex and skin colour in his stride? What about her, he asked – meaning presumably that Walsh was born pale too, so who is she to talk?

Walsh’s labelling may have been trite but it wasn’t racist – she wasn’t offering ideas or theories of superiority of one race or group of people of one colour or ethnic origin, as commonly understood in the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.

Cowen and Walsh share the same race, colour and ethnic group so not only is it nonsense to allege racism (or reverse racism as some suggest), it suggests a lack of insight into the brutal, relentless reality of it.

The essence of the MPS persona is an unshakeable sense of entitlement, the kind that shakes ‘political correctness’ at any societal corrective and sees the whole effort as a zero-sum game

Cowen didn’t level a charge of sexism – understood as prejudice or discrimination based on one’s sex or gender, especially when linked to beliefs around the fundamental nature of women and men and the roles they should play – against Walsh, although other wailing bros have. Undeniably the “male” element of MPS comprises a sweeping dismissal of a whole sex. But this is where context and common sense come in.

MPS is a phrase used “to condemn an organisation for being dominated by white, middle-aged men”, according to the dictionary and is understood as such. The men know who they are – or should. The essence of the MPS persona is an unshakeable sense of entitlement, the kind that shakes “political correctness” at any societal corrective and sees the whole effort as a zero-sum game.

The “stale” – dried out, old, past its best – element of MPS is more difficult to defend, though it well describes the tired old imagery of a bunch MPSs dominating their environment. The problem arises when it is directed at individuals. Many 64-year-olds lead more productive and generous lives than any 37-year-old, so who gets to apply the label? Cowen can hardly be blamed for calling out ageism if he is being written off at 56.

But the fight for equality has been long and painful, punctuated with plateaus and backlashes. Reasonable men know this. When women see an all-male ticket, panel or board dominated by white men, it’s hardly surprising if they reach for a phrase that might be rude or un-nuanced.

Men who agitate about labels or being supplanted by hordes of vengeful women should look around them. Fewer than a quarter of our TDs are women. The access-all-areas European Parliament – a shoo-in for Barry Cowen – is still just 39 per cent female.

Having appointed three grand men to direct the forthcoming referendums and elections, Micheál Martin responded to criticism by saying he doesn’t propose “to exclude men from any further deliberations in public life” – which appeared to suggest that men have been excluded from previous deliberations, intriguingly. Asked about Maria Walsh’s MPS comment, he answered that she should be careful what she wishes for.

So for today’s head-wrecking exercise in lateral thinking, try to imagine the same scenario, but with the sex roles reversed. Instead of addressing a question about inequality the party leader threatens the addition of a man to an all-woman ticket. Merely to snark the rival male incumbent. What are the chances?