My impression is that an organisation which expects its members to dress up in uniform, give and take orders, and learn to shoot guns appeals to a certain mindset. I think recent revelations give weight to that impression.
I would accept that the question (what are members of the DF up to overseas?) is speculative. It seems to me that given recent revelations, that speculation is warranted.
It is based on the premise that DF people are as recent revelations have shown them to be.
You have your view and you are welcome to it. The DF is an organisation of c. 8k people, over the last 20 years c. 12k people have come and gone. I don't see how its reasonable to consider 20k people, from all over the country (Inishowen to Cork to Kilkenny to Dublin and back), as some culturally and morally homogenous organisation. The recent revelations, while shocking and serious, are framed by those who "have complained or made judgements or have reflected on their experiences and observations, making those available to the Review" as stated in the IRG report. In addition, the IRG surveyed 527 members, 2/3 of which reported no experience of harassment and bullying. Further, you can't extrapolate the 1/3 to rest of the organisation, as the survey wasn't randomised, it was voluntary and interviews were by "open invitation". In fairness to the IRG they do note this "Not controlling the sample left open the possibility that we would not hear from a representative sample", though its unfortunate this fact was lost in all the copy.
As in any workplace, harassment and bullying also occur across a spectrum. If you are on the receiving end of course, you should be entitled to seek full remedy. Of course all instances are unacceptable, and i'm not diminishing the seriousness of the allegations in any way, its more the strength of language in the report has created a certain impression, evidenced by your own comments. Indeed the question is, from a cultural perspective, is the organisation significantly different from the prevalence of such instances in Irish society in general? And if so, what are the effectiveness of/requirements for additional protections that take account of this, given the nature of the work? (HR best practice in the civilian space is not sufficient for the military and neither is translating something directly from another military. So whatever systems are put in place for the DF will be unique and has to be constantly evolving. This is obviously feeding into the challenges).
Would I personally recommend a sister or daughter to not join the organisation, based on these cultural issues, no. Maybe not for other reasons, but that is a different story.
The problem arises from the people within the DF and the failure of the culture to do anything to rein them in. That is likely to be a bigger issue away from home.
Again you would be forgiven for thinking that it is some lawless free for all, if you had read the recent articles and accepted them at face value. This is of course not the case. The conspiratorial language is also dangerous. There's no evidence to suggest that Irish personnel need to be "reined in". You also do need an understanding of overseas missions, as if you did, you would understand that from a governance perspective, missions are multi-national with oversight from other nations with different cultures to ours (i.e. western european countries and others). In addition, there is an entire civilian component to each each mission, with oversight functions. The veracity of some of these can be questionable, granted, but given the thousands and thousands of tours of duty nothing has emerged that would warrant that language.
As I stated, previously, any member of the organisation has the full protection of civil law that applies to any member of society, in addition to the broader range of offences contained in the Defence Act., and the numerous independent (of the Defence Forces) avenues with which to pursue a complaint (which are not available to the general public). Obviously there are issues in the implementation and the functioning of the mechanisms and slow pace of adaption to the changing work environment.
The problem with a non-objective examination of the mechanisms in place are the knee-jerk reactions that will result, to the determent of everybody. Which we can already see happening of course. For example;
Chief of Staff, Lieut Gen Seán Clancy, said he had been ‘fortunate’ through his career, as had the people he ‘encountered’ in the military
We can see the politicisation of the organisation now and the Chief of Staff, who is limited in what he can say publicly, over and above other civil servants. His explanation of why the report was shocking to him (as to me) was turned into an evisceration.
Lack of faith in internal procedures reflected in IRG report no surprise, says Conor King
This plan seems like a disservice to victims.
1) They can already report to Gardai 2) If its mandatory to report to Gardai then there maybe instances where people will not/cannot speak to colleagues e.g. to seek support, as it would be putting them in a precarious legal position 3) Victims may not want to involve the Gardai, but seek justice through the military 4) Military Police will still be required to investigate instances overseas, however experience and skills could be deficient as a result of this.
They said the appointment is a mistake, described it as "unbelievable" and said they will be seeking a meeting with Micheál Martin
This plan is a disservice to the whole process of examining the culture, oversight and implementation of the change needed. The Dept. are the ones who have set all the ToRs for the reports into the organisation, create the conditions for and implement the oversight processes. They are the ones who failed to implement and oversee the recommendations of all the previous reports they commissioned, for Gods sake!
In any case, hopefully the statutory enquiry will provide the factual information necessary to implement the right structures and the Report of the Commission on the Defence Forces will be the basis for resourcing the DF, so the organisation can meet the standards it has set for itself and its staff.