The awful incident in Cavan

[hollyisalovelyname]

My thoughts are with the relatives and friends of those who died.
Just awful.
May they find some consolation somewhere.

WhiteRose but in this case the Gardai know that he murdered his wife and murdered his children. No we don't know what went on behind closed doors in the years and months leading up to this event but we do know for certain that he murdered his family and then took his own life.

Or are you implying that maybe Clodagh was the abuser and that's why he killed her and their three sons??

I think the 'let's not speak ill of the dead. it's best not to speculate' mentality is far more damaging and is what leads to people making excuses for men like Alan Hawe.

MitzyLeFrouf No, I'm not suggesting that at all but I am just trying to make the point that it's unfair to speculate.

Why is it unfair?

He murdered four people with a knife and a hatchet.

I have avoided speculating on what might have gone in in that house and prefer to stick to the facts as we know them, as Mitzy has outlined above.

However, I think it is entirely correct that we call his terrible crimes what they are, and stop explaining it away and trying to wrap it up in a narrative of 'he was a lovely man, he must have snapped, mental illness is terrible'.
I thought Suzanne Breen's article was really excellent, and i have been relieved to hear a bit more discussion of 'family annihilators' and the thought processes underpinning their crimes on the radio in the last few days.
We really need to face up to this, as a society, and try to look for answers rather than reaching for platitudes.

I cannot get this out of my mind. I cannot even begin to imagine how Clodagh's mother and sister must feel.

And now I keep thinking that evil creature was alone in a classroom with young children up to the beginning of the summer.

I agree that this must be faced up to, by Irish society, and that answers must be sought.
The burial of their murderer with an innocent woman and three innocent children sends so many wrong messages. I am not in any way criticising Clodagh's family for making that decision. I don't think anyone can even begin to imagine how they feel, and how they must have felt trying to make such a decision, in the aftermath of the vicious cold blooded. murder of their loved ones, and in the glare of publicity.
Unfortunately the whole narrative of the great guy, complete with GAA jersey draped on the coffin, sends so many wrong messages. Do what you like to your family, and all will be forgotten and you will be buried with full ceremony, and the community eulogising you.
I am sure the media has probably been selective in their quotes, and I am sure people were in deep shock when a microphone or camera was stuck in their faces.
But this cannot be left to fade into memory. Questions must be asked. He must not rest in peace.

I wonder what the 'pressure' Alan Hawe was under at school?

The parents of the pupils at his National school must be in utter shock.

I think the 'let's not speak ill of the dead. it's best not to speculate' mentality is far more damaging and is what leads to people making excuses for men like Alan Hawe.

This, 100%. Too many people like to rewrite history when someone dies, I've sat through too many funerals where the deceased was lauded as a great pillar of the community yet would have been known as a nasty piece of work and that's note even including the street angels and home devils.

I am in no way attempting to trivialise this awful awful crime, but the priest's comments about the family always being happy and welcoming put me in mind of the couple in Father Ted who are always at each other's throats until a priest enters the room.

People often put on a show for the priest (or any community leader-type) which means they rarely see people's true nature.

I thought the priests description of the visit to the house was very much part of the same narrative - of the man out in the community, being a great fellow and the woman at home. He actually referred to her as the "bean an ti".

I don't blame her family for the funeral arrangements - god knows how they are coping but I do think the joint funeral was the final silencing of the murder victims. There couldn't even be a sermon focused on them because of the fear of saying something about their murderer whose funeral mass it also was. From start to finish, the only voice heard has been the murderer's.

People upthread said that the priest probably influenced the family to have one funeral. I'd be amazed if the opposite wasn't true - that he discussed having a small private ceremony for Alan Hawes and a public funeral for Clodagh and the children. It would have been a lot easier to celebrate that mass without his coffin sitting in front of the altar.

Great post Math

The Irish are great actors.
I've been to funerals where you'd think the family members were closer to each other than the Waltons. That the family were such a close knit bunch and the deceased the core of the family.
The truth was he didn't talk to half of them.

I have been to two funerals that the Guards had to attend because the chance of war breaking out amongst the relations was extremely high. The funerals weren't gangster families they were just ordinary people.

The Priest conducted the ceremonies as if the families were the actual Waltons.

War did break out later when the drink started to flow and some of the Waltons were arrested.

I must say i was a little surprised at the descriptions of the family, and the priest visiting the house etc. It sounded like something from a few decades ago.
DH and I are a similar age and very few of our friends are remotely religious. Of course there's nothing inherently suspect in being religious, but that sort of reverence for the parish priest, pillars of the community stuff is very unusual in a couple our age.

TheVery
Are you urban or rural?
Small villagey place, Alan the deputy principal, involved at church- altar boy son, readers at the Mass etc - it might explain the priest visiting?

I live in a small/medium sized town but grew up in a rural area.
I didn't mean the priest visiting, I meant everything you've listed.
That description is familiar to me from childhood but none of my contemporaries live like that.
It sounds more like something from my parents generation. I have one friend who is religious (lives abroad) and a couple of others who go along with the communion etc, but are not regular mass goers. None of my friends, work colleagues, acquaintances have that level of involvement with the church.
It may have no significance whatsoever, it just sounded odd to me.

I think I know what you mean TheVeryThing.
I had the same thought about it sounding like the way things were in the village where I grew up, and where my parents and some of my family still live.
It's a completely different scenario there now even down to things like, for example, none of the teachers live locally. The priest has responsibility for a number of parishes, which i would say is becoming increasingly common in rural Ireland. So, even he doesn't live locally.

So the automatic 'pillars of the community' stuff, which would have been the case when I was a child, is completely changed / non existent. That was partly why, to me, it did sound like something from a bygone era, the description by the priest of his visit to the house at Christmas.

Just glancing back through the thread, yes, a private burial for the murderer would have been probably a better way to go. Once again, I emphasise I am not criticising Clodagh's family. I cannot even begin to imagine their utter devastation. On top of their huge loss, they also know that she and her three boys died in the most savage, brutal manner, and how absolutely terrified their final moments must have been.

Did anyone read Kathy Sheridan's piece in today's Irish Times? While I understand her points about the community and family reaction, I think she has completely missed the intent and importance of the criticism of how Clodagh was lost in the reporting.

It sounded very odd to me too.

I suspect Hawe was a really good sucker up, and he found a priest and a few GAA auld fellas who really appreciated the sucking up. Hence the respect of those pillars of the community, who were conditioned in a time when the suck up culture ruled Ireland to feel no hairs on the back of their necks rising when they saw it happening in their own lives. It probably gave them a sense of comfortable familiarity. Being a male national school teacher probably marked him out for greatness too among the older generation.

He probably stood out like a sore thumb from everyone else his age in the community. I saw the reports of him always being there for anyone in trouble, collecting money for the GAA, etc., and thought he might be a really, really cunning bastard, very much a chameleon.

I hope that priest will wake up and realise he was used and ask himself how he allowed that to happen, and I hope there is someone in the GAA feeling a bit worried about the status that organisation lent to this man.

What bollocks the IT article is. It's nothing more than a justification on grounds of 'common decency' for not asking the right questions. This is nobody's shame but Alan Hawe's and the journalists whose shocking coverage rightly ignited the fury of even my 82 year old mother. The rest of his family has nothing to be ashamed of, and the community does not have a vested interest in painting what he did and why he did it in any light other than the cold clear light of day.

I agree mathanxiety, I think the priest should wind his neck back in, he hasn't painted himself in a good light at all. I've read comments on an Irish site that the priest made a comment at the funeral telling people to avoid curiosity and said it's not up to those left behind to seek answers. Typical sweep it under the carpet job.

Excellent article here, hits the nail on the head

granta.com/he-had-his-reasons/