April 2nd, 2006
Sinéad O’Connor versus Mary Coughlan
There’s something simultaneously fascinating and horrifying about spats between people in the public eye. It is car crash narrative, the editorial of ambulance chasing. While feuding stars are fodder for pulp mags like Heat, Now et al, the broadsheets are not averse to covering them, depending on who is saying what and to whom. If the fight is between two women, the news editors will run it as soon as they’ve finished gleefully rubbing their hands together. Nothing grabs a curious reader’s eye like a bitchfest. It’s not always an editorial decision though. Suzanne Moore and Germaine Greer inveigled their positions as newspaper columnist and contributor respectively to sling mud at each other. When Moore falsely asserted that Greer had had a voluntary hysterectomy in her 20s, Greer responded with her famous remark, “So much lipstick must rot the brain” and described Moore’s appearance invectively as “hair birds-nested all over the place, fuck-me shoes and three fat layers of cleavage.” Years later when Greer was asked about the remark at a party, she replied: “If you’re going to insult someone you want to be sure it gets on their tombstone.” Greer, outspoken and Amazonian, is a master of public criticism and has described writers Natasha Walter and Naomi Wolfe as “lifestyle feministsâ€?. Greer doesn’t fall out with with every contemporary though - when Camille Paglia . who is 59 today - described The Whole Woman (the follow-up to The Female Eunuch) as “seriously unbalancedâ€? in a New York Times review, many expected the gloves to come off again. Instead, the two share a mutual respect for each other despite differing views on aspects of feminism and sexuality but they’ve never resorted to public sparring . unlike Paglia and journalist Julie Burchill. Paglia turned down a request to write for Burchill’s magazine Modern Review in 1993 claiming Burchill’s review of one her books in The Spectator was “malicious, distorted, error-filled, and anti-intellectualâ€?. Paglia attempted an insult of her own claiming that Burchill was “completely unknown in Americaâ€?. Faxes loaded with vitriol zig-zagged across the Atlantic with one of Burchill’s final missives stating:
“Dear Professor Paglia,
Fuck off you crazy old dyke.
Always,
Julie Burchill�
In spite of all the insults, Paglia consented to the publication of the faxes in The Modern Review.
In Ireland, our very own catfight has kicked off this week, with the rather bizarre and very public spat between singers Sinéad O’Connor and Mary Coughlan. O’Connor has recently started going out with Coughlan’s ex-husband Frank Bonadio. Claims of abusive text messages and harassment have been claimed on both sides, with Sinead appearing on the front of yesterday’s Evening Herald claiming that if Mary Coughlan did not retract slanderous remarks made about her that she would “break her faceâ€?. In a statement posted on the news section of her website, Sinéad repeatedly threatens legal action against Coughlan who she believes leaked text message transcript to various newspapers. She claims:
Dear Mary,
“You are the person here who has more to lose, so I would advise you to back off it now. As you don’t want me answering you back every time you spread falsities about me.â€?
.
“Apologies from you both privately and publicly, are the only things which will stop this mary and I am fully prepared to see it through to the bitter end. YOU have played the suffering victim here very well, but nobody buys it.�
.
“I would advise you to apologise and finish this. Because I will not stop until you admit what you have done.�
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“I do not mind how long it takes Mary, I repeat to you that I will have you crying for your mummy by the time I have finished with you, and I have nothing whatsoever to lose by taking you on.�
.
“Also cease running like a little baby to your ex husband every time I say anything, instead have the balls to deal with me directly or through your solicitors.
Sinéad O’Connor”
In today’s Sunday Independent Barry Egan (without mentioning this story once) ponders the kind of behaviour we’ve all come to expect from Sinéad O’Connor, but this kind of publicity is questionable, especially when compared to the Paglia/Burchill and Greer/Moore rows. Children are as absent from the lives of these women as they are present in lives of Bonadio and Coughlan (who have children together) and O’Connor, who has three children. Sinead has never been short of publicity but this time the use of newspapers to air a feud when whole families are involved seems like an act of dubious judgement.
April 2nd, 2006 at 1:58 pm
the difference between Camille Paglia and her assorted enemies and Sinead/Mary is that Paglia started fighting with them over “intellectual” issues and then moved to the personal. Which is her case, being feminism related is easily done. She even has a go at Susan Sontag in Vamps and Tramps (I think - long time since I read Paglia’s books)
While your point about children is interesting, I think the real point is whether or not the rest of us need to be included in this row. It’s so narcisstic and petty, you’ve really got to question both women’s motives in doing so.
Has Coughlan remained silent? Is it just O’Connor that’s making it public?
April 2nd, 2006 at 2:09 pm
The point about children is intricable from the about the public nature of the row. It all seems to unnecessary and I can’t figure out the reasons behind it. I’m especially surprised at Mary Coughlan getting involved in the public nature of the row.
O’Connor believes that Coughlan went to the papers (Sinead herself contacted various papers about the story) but I haven’t seen or heard any comment from Mary Coughlan.
April 2nd, 2006 at 3:39 pm
I haven’t read any of this, but Mary Coughlan was on Today fm talking with Ian Dempsey last week, where he brought up some picture taken of O’Connor and the ex-husband. Coughlan brushed the matter off, made some slightly derogatory comment, to the effect that they deserved each other, and moved on to the much more important issue of how long she spends hoovering, while in conversation with the Gift Grub Mary Coughlin.
April 2nd, 2006 at 4:52 pm
I saw something in one of the papers last week where Mary Coughlan had written a new song about her husband in which she called him a liar, whore monger etc etc (I’m paraphrasing here)…and then there was something from a ’source’ about her not being happy that her ex is with Sinead. I haven’t seen any actual comments from Mary on the matter though, so maybe the story was false. It’s interesting alright..but to be honest what’s most interesting to me is that the guy is her EX so why should she care who he dates? Did he cheat on Mary with Sinead or have they been divorced a long time? I will admit I’ve only glanced over the papers in recent days so I’m not really up on the whole matter..but it does seem really weird to me that she’d get involved in a whole slanging match over her ex. Y’know, he’s an ex for a reason!
April 2nd, 2006 at 11:50 pm
The reason it is in public is because people are interested in it. It sells papers so papers will run the story.
April 3rd, 2006 at 8:13 am
The guy on Ireland AM called it a “rival love war”.
April 3rd, 2006 at 11:03 am
I don’t know if they are, to be honest simon. I think the papers *hope* people are interested in it. Stories like this happen up and down the country day in day out…it doesn’t make it any more interesting that it’s Sinead O’Connor and Mary Coughlan. Personally, I think the public nature of the spat is pathetic.
Sinéad - I get a regular stream of people googling Barry Egan looking for photographs and trying to find out if he has a girlfriend just from mentioning him once.
April 3rd, 2006 at 1:14 pm
I remember reading the Paglia-Burchill exchange in the early days of the internet and thinking that it was an evenly matched affair. Re-reading it now, Camille Paglia wiped the floor with her.
April 4th, 2006 at 1:54 pm
Actually, the appalling Burchill does have two children.
April 4th, 2006 at 2:08 pm
Has anyone seen a photo of the ex Mr Coghlann? I thought he was Sinéad gram-pa when I first clapped eyes on him. I reckon Sinéad(lesbianpriestpopepictureripperuppersingeractressbrawler..
deepbreath… lunaticmotherloveher) oughta bi curamach, Mary’s a tough broad. My money’s on her.
April 4th, 2006 at 2:59 pm
Julie has indeed borne offspring, Stella, but I meant to refer to the fact that brawl between herself and Paglia didn’t involve children in the way that Mary’s kids are being dragged into this affair.
April 4th, 2006 at 4:07 pm
It’s hardly fair to tar Coughlan with the same brush as Sinead O’Connor:
whenever two people have a row in public, no matter how much one might be in the right and the other in the wrong people tend to dismiss both of them as “troublemakers” angry at being embarrassed, or disommoded by this public spat. I think this is happening here.
However Coughlan was married to this man, she is surely entitled to an opinion expresssed in private about his behaviour and the end of her marriage. O’Connor as usual is using the entire escapade for publicity - while doing her usual “I Vant to be Alone” Greta Garbo imitation. Coughlan has been remarkably restained and quiet in response - something O’Connor in her precarious mental state would not be able to ape if she tried.
Coughlan can’t help the fact that her husband was unfaithful and has left her - O’Connor should be able to help herself from having a schoolyard hissy fit over a bloke.
April 4th, 2006 at 5:32 pm
Did he leave Mary for Sinéad? Or had they split already? What’s all this about children?
April 6th, 2006 at 10:13 pm
Mary Coughlan has a great voice. Sinead is a tortured artist. Fame and money, and they still can’t afford to have their linen washed in private.
What I don’t understand is the general reaction to Sinead always seems to be one of barely disguised hate.
April 18th, 2006 at 10:39 pm
Idiocy from start to finish. Why bother commenting on idiocy?
April 18th, 2006 at 10:42 pm
…on second thoughts, why not take a slant about the phallocentrism of the press? Yawn.