Audience stayed and listened to Billy Connolly

Connolly used insulting language

Below is this week's column in INM's Irish regional newspapers.

Michael Commane

Some of you may have read or seen about the Billy Connolly affair at the beginning of May in Killarney.

The Scottish comedian was performing in the Irish National Events Centre in Killarney when he noticed a photographer taking a shot of him.

The big man with the power of the microphone told her to get out and called her a ‘f...... c..t’.

The woman in question is Valerie O’Sullivan. She is a well-known and highly regarded photographer in Ireland. But far more than that.

When I was working at The Kerryman Valerie supplied photographs for the paper week-in week-out. I know nothing about photography but I do know that she is an excellent photographer and has won many awards for her photographs. I also know what a lovely person Valerie is. And I know that first hand.

The night of the incident Valerie was employed by the INEC and was doing her job, taking photographs, without using a flash, as was required. Billy Connolly had the stage, saw Valerie taking the photographs and roared out his abuse.

The first I heard about it was in a report in a national newspaper and then the following Saturday Marian Finucane was interviewing a group of people on her show to mark the 70th birthday of Shay Healy. It so happened that these three or four people knew Billy Connolly, so Marian called Billy and they were chatting away. Marian mentioned what happened in Killarney and there was a general laugh about it all.

Comedian and big man Billy Connolly with a microphone can call a woman a ‘f...... c..t’ in front of over 2,000 people and he gets a laugh. Wonderful.

On the Marian Finucane Show he remarked he was proud of what he said. Marian did say that she understood how the photographer would be upset but that Billy Connolly had a point of view too. An amazing comment to make.

In the last few days I was talking to a man who was at the concert on the night and who also heard the Marian Finucane Show. He is an honourable person and had the good grace to write a letter of complaint to RTE.

Deputy Michael Healy Rae called for a boycott of Billy Connolly. I’m against all sorts of boycotts, whether in church or outside, but what has me baffled and flabbergasted is that it appears not one single person in that auditorium that night got up and walked out. Not only that, but I gather in subsequent gigs in Ireland he performed to packed houses.

I am also flabbergasted that none of the participants on the Marian Finucane Show said a word in protest. Not one of them gave any sense of being shocked at a big powerful man with a microphone, using abusive language. Nor a word about how a powerful man treated a woman.

It’s easy to look at TV footage of the past and comment on how primitive we were. Do you recall the run-up to the presidential election in which Mary Robinson was a candidate where Pádraig Flynn commented that she was “having a new-found interest in her family”.

It’s easy to look aghast at history and condemn so much of what was done. What am I doing today to make the world a better place?

The Billy Connolly affair has confirmed for me how difficult it is to go against the tide. How difficult it is to speak in a genuine and open way your own opinion, especially when it goes against the prevailing mood.

We wonder in amazement how the Germans let the Nazis do what they did.

The next time I hear Billy Connolly on my radio I’ll be switching station. No, that’s not boycotting him. I just don’t want to listen to someone who has used foul and degrading language in public to a friend of mine.