RAG week in Sligo.

Ham Sambo

This years RAG week in Sligo I understand does not have the blessing of the IT's students union, this came about after the unsightly behaviour of students last year, and if the antics at the Brewery Bar in Sligo this morning are anything to go by the who can blame them.

I understand in the Brewery Bar on Sunday they had to close the doors at 8.30pm due to large numbers, and at 11am yesterday morning (Monday) they had a disco in the same bar, by 1pm students were falling out of the bar totally and utterly wasted with drink.

I have no doubt this is only the start of a very long week of trouble in Sligo.

sligoface

I graduated from the IT a few years ago. I thought the behavior of students during rag week was disgusting then and still do. Why should a bunch of spoiled brats from other counties be allowed to destroy this town for a week? In what other country would this be allowed, it's about two degrees below a riot in terms of damage and disruption to the town. Last year I've seen fellas standing outside pubs in groups hassling schoolchildren and working people walking by in the afternoon. Every year windows in town are smashed, broken bottles and litter everywhere. Let them go back to Cavan and do that sh¡te and see how they get on.

And now with the union not involved there probably won't be an organized cleanup effort. But the greedy pub owners know it's a gold mine for them, so they promote rag week regardless of the student union cancelling it. They should be made to donate a portion of their proceeds to the costs of cleaning up the mess, they are reponsible for it.

The whole charity bit of Raise And Give week was forgotten about ages ago. It's no wonder grants are cut and no one cares, the way so many students cause hassle on nights out casts such a bad light on the ones that work hard and stay out of trouble. They do exist, you just never see or hear about them the way you notice all the drunken eejits.

I see students falling about the town drunk Mon-Thurs night every week, so why do we need a separate week dedicated to this behavior? Besides that, they usually organize piss ups for the end of their exams, and for graduation. Considering we just had the holiday period and we have Paddy's day coming up soon, it's just ridiculous and really makes you embarrassed to be a young Irish person when you see so many people perpetuating the stereotype year round. I'm no teetotaler, just can't see why we can't cop on a bit and strive for something more fulfilling than getting wasted at every opportunity.

AgileMyth

It does have the union's blessing. They've asked people to be careful, same as every year.

Students are dickheads and rag week is them at their worst. What are you going to do? It'll be tidied up and forgotten about next week.

AgileMyth

coffeemagpie

Coming from a student who's being kept wide awake by students who just seem to have lost there minds! At the moment there is music absolutely blaring so loudly i can nearly feel the place vibrating, gangs of students smashing glasses, shouting and screeching from the top of there lungs and several boy racers outside the accommodation revving there engines so loudly you'd swear the cars were inside then house.

I'm all on for students going out and enjoying themselves but RAG week is a joke! I've been driven demented and its only the second day!! The people in the accommodation office have been driven up the walls and the guards have been around numerous times.

The students unions need to grow a pair and cancel RAG week. The purpose of RAG week was to raise money for charity and all it's done is cause havoc and give money to the publicans! I know the student unions are not to blame but they need it to stop.

I had my car parked outside the house and about 6 fellas all fairly drunk at around 11 this morning started messing with it going at the wipers and hopping around it for no reason so I had to go outside and shout at them to get away from it and they just laughed and mocked me. They eventually got tired of being idiots and went away. Now they didn't cause any damage and calling the one security man that was on wasn't going to be able to stop them if they did any damage to it! It's so intimidating!

The whole thing is a complete joke!


End of rant

Kettleson

I have seen some outrageous behaviour over last recent years, purely because I was in town before noon and saw the students in an awful mess hanging outside of pubs and the like. The Garda were very tolerant of their antics, too tolerant in my opinion. I can't begin to think what it would be like living in a student area.

What are the specifics of the laws that are being broken by their behaviour? Disorderly Conduct? Drunk and Disorderly? Causing a Nuisance? Drunk in a public place? And the laws being broken by the licences premises?

I think the Garda should arrest them en masse and chuck the offenders in a drunk tank. Then of course we will have student protests about harassment etc.

And what's this Raising and Giving nonsense/misnomer? RAG week was always about making noise getting drunk and defying authority, within reason. But Sligo seems to have over shot the runway in terms of acceptability entering into public lawbreaking.

sligoface

I was just going by what was posted about the student union not being involved, when I was in the IT they basically said that for them to cancel it would do more harm than good as the campus events and cleanups would not happen and the pubs would still promote it.

The gardai are way too tolerant, but what can they really do? They're outnumbered and don't have any cell space, plus the paperwork, etc.

It may be forgotten about in a week but I don't want to put up with this nonsense for a whole week every year.

Plazaman

So we can expect the Pukeville River flowing down The Mall again this year? A full days drinking would cost around €200. If you do that for 3 days out of the 5 it adds up. Is Mummy & Daddy funding their little angels to make arsés of themselves for a week. If not then if I see another protest about the grant being too small, I'll egg them (like they did to my car while driving down Bridge Street last year - €15 it cost me to clean).

In an ideal world there should be an army of photographers/vidoegraphers out day and night to capture the antics and post all on tinternet while mailshotting all the Mumsys and Pops at the home addresses of the students with the link.

rizzodun

http://www.independent.ie/regionals/sligochampion/news/pub-must-stop-student-parties-29109642.html

Seems like the warning has worked, surely he's risking his licence?

promethius

sounds like it's gone too far. can have the craic without taking it as far as some of the above describes.
when i lived in galway, the NUIG gang had made a bonfire in a green area and were intimidating everyone passing by etc
gaurds arrived and the word was these tough guys were in tears in the station, looking for parents to bail them out etc :-)

sligono1

If this premises is the root of a lot of the problems the authority's should shut them down, I know from my collage days this man is a greedy individual and well all that matters is his pocket,

Memories

I'm a first year student, and personally me nor my friends don't drink, purely because we don't like the stuff or see the obsession with getting wasted. Why waste your money when you could buy something more substantial with the money that you could keep and see again in the morning, Not throw away €200 over the course of 24hours. Some students have no concept of money what so ever. It's sad to watch. I understand that it's a choice that these people make, but you do wonder what goes on in there minds. Each person knows there personal threshold to begin with, that's fair enough, but why go over that a completely embarrass yourself and put yourself and possibly others in danger, that's what I don't understand.

The whole concept of RAG week began with raising money, now what do we have? Money going to pubs and off licences and definitely not charity. There is only the few people that would donate a few euro to the cause rather than spend that money on a row of shots down the road. Fun? More like utter chaos for the rest of us.

Authorities are way too lenient with these drunken people. It's good people that have to go around and survey and repair the damage after. I walked around town the other night and seen three lads streaking as they passed two Gardai and they didn't even bat an eyelid. Public Indecency anyone?

AgileMyth

Plazaman wrote: »

So we can expect the Pukeville River flowing down The Mall again this year? A full days drinking would cost around €200. If you do that for 3 days out of the 5 it adds up. Is Mummy & Daddy funding their little angels to make arsés of themselves for a week. If not then if I see another protest about the grant being too small, I'll egg them (like they did to my car while driving down Bridge Street last year - €15 it cost me to clean).

In an ideal world there should be an army of photographers/vidoegraphers out day and night to capture the antics and post all on tinternet while mailshotting all the Mumsys and Pops at the home addresses of the students with the link.

€15 is an extortionate price for a car wash.

bobmalooka

In all fairness there's hardly students spending €200 a day on drink when the pubs are selling bottles of beer for €1. RAG week isn't caused by student grants it's simply a culture of acting the ass which has been the case for at least 10 years.

Funnily enough I haven't heard of any serious anti social behaviour so far in this years RAG week, hopefully it stays that way.

I think the couple if pubs selling the really cheap drink shouldn't be allowed to open in the morning or lower their prices so much which promotes the crazy levels of drinking

sligoface

bobmalooka wrote: »

In all fairness there's hardly students spending €200 a day on drink when the pubs are selling bottles of beer for €1. RAG week isn't caused by student grants it's simply a culture of acting the ass which has been the case for at least 10 years.

Funnily enough I haven't heard of any serious anti social behaviour so far in this years RAG week, hopefully it stays that way.

I think the couple if pubs selling the really cheap drink shouldn't be allowed to open in the morning or lower their prices so much which promotes the crazy levels of drinking

I don't think any one is saying it is caused by grants, we're saying that the public sympathy for the grant cuts is nil due to their behavior.

I agree they shouldn't be allowed to start so early, it's the groups of student doing heavy daytime drinking that disrupts the town.

Plazaman

AgileMyth wrote: »

€15 is an extortionate price for a car wash.

Two car washes and a bottle of Windex. Who woulda thunk eggs (dried raw egg by the time I drove to the first car wash to be exact) would leave such a mess then some sort of weird subsequent residue. :mad:

As for getting rid of rag week altogther, GMIT have given up the ghost on rag week for the last number of years but it does not stop student organising their own unofficial rag week events. I think a zero tolerance policy for 1 or 2 years would clamp down on a lot of the shítehawking. Draft in extra Gardai from other counties, makeshift holding cells down in Finisklin and nice large on the spot fines to pay for the operation. Unruly house party with 50 or 60 drunkards? Sweep all up and slap a €100 or €150 fine on each.

Certainly wouldn't be simple to do, but the will is not there to do it.

bobmalooka

How are these pubs retaining their licences?

The Leitrim bar have cheap drink till 3 pm, as well as being hugely irresponsible by promoting early heavy drinking I thought happy hours were done away with.

I think most if us can understand people that age are impressionable and often don't recognise the impact of their actions, it's the people who take advantage and promote that behaviour for their own benefit who should be targeted

Memories

And believe it or not, I do know a few people that have spent €200 on Monday night alone. They go out, get hammered and then its a free for all with there drunken self buying drinks for everyone and buckets of this, and buckets of that and endless shots. It may not seem much at the time but the money tots up.

Ham Sambo

AgileMyth wrote: »

It does have the union's blessing. They've asked people to be careful, same as every year.

Students are dickheads and rag week is them at their worst. What are you going to do? It'll be tidied up and forgotten about next week.

Of course it will be clean and tidy next week, but at who's expense? Why should the local tidy towns or the Sligo Corporation have to clean up after these thugs, not to mention the damage they will leave some of the houses on the estates where they are renting, does not say a lot about where they come from.

Ham Sambo

bobmalooka wrote: »

How are these pubs retaining their licences?

The Leitrim bar have cheap drink till 3 pm, as well as being hugely irresponsible by promoting early heavy drinking I thought happy hours were done away with.

I think most if us can understand people that age are impressionable and often don't recognise the impact of their actions, it's the people who take advantage and promote that behaviour for their own benefit who should be targeted

More like 'ecstatic hour'! One pub was selling long necks and measures of vodka for 1 euro before 3pm, it is the like of these pubs that should be closed down.

AgileMyth

Seems a lot quieter than previous years to be honest.

sligoface

AgileMyth wrote: »

Seems a lot quieter than previous years to be honest.

Yeah its mostly the areas near the IT that are rowdy it hasn't been mad all over town like previous years. Better not let them know that though, we've still got Thursday to get through!

fillefatale

AgileMyth wrote: »

Surprised that holy joe Mickey Joe would be involved in an event that inevitably leads in more than a few one night stands... Thought his main source of income was being hired out for anti-choice granny rallies and 50th birthday parties.

Conor Bourke

I think you might be confusing him with Mickey Harte of Tyrone GAA who has spoken publicly as a pro "life" ( :rolleyes: ) supporter. To my knowledge, Mickey Joe of You're a Star fame hasn't featured in that particular debate. For the life of me I can't figure out why anyone would bother to bring him to a RAG week event though? He hasn't been relevant in about 10 years, didn't think many (if any) current students would even know who he is

fillefatale

Alaskimo-cake wrote: »

I think you might be confusing him with Mickey Harte of Tyrone GAA who has spoken publicly as a pro "life" ( :rolleyes: ) supporter. To my knowledge, Mickey Joe of You're a Star fame hasn't featured in that particular debate. For the life of me I can't figure out why anyone would bother to bring him to a RAG week event though? He hasn't been relevant in about 10 years, didn't think many (if any) current students would even know who he is

He was singing at the massive rally at Merrion Square last year, I had the misfortune of passing through it when they announced him. He was on the screen, done up to the nines looks like a Good Christian Conservative boy.

No idea why he was at the Rag week either, his going rate must be cheap? Doubt any current students have any idea who he is either.

Was walking through town today and nearly cut my ankle on a broken glass on the mall, there were a good few people gathering the smashed glass and take away rubbish up in bags, not sure if it was a cleaning company or tidy towns.

Conor Bourke

fillefatale wrote: »

He was singing at the massive rally at Merrion Square last year, I had the misfortune of passing through it when they announced him. He was on the screen, done up to the nines looks like a Good Christian Conservative boy.

Ah, I didn't realise that!

Dazzler88

Plazaman wrote: »

So we can expect the Pukeville River flowing down The Mall again this year? A full days drinking would cost around €200. If you do that for 3 days out of the 5 it adds up. Is Mummy & Daddy funding their little angels to make arsés of themselves for a week. If not then if I see another protest about the grant being too small, I'll egg them (like they did to my car while driving down Bridge Street last year - €15 it cost me to clean).

In an ideal world there should be an army of photographers/vidoegraphers out day and night to capture the antics and post all on tinternet while mailshotting all the Mumsys and Pops at the home addresses of the students with the link.

I think you are not being realistic here, firstly there is no student spending €200 a day on drink for Rag Week, the Leitrim Bar is selling drinks at €1,so most of these students are getting buckled on €20 or €30..

Plus in regards to the pictures idea, I think its already been done, its called Facebook. Parents are fairly naïve if they don't know what goes on during Rag Week.

I personally do not support the whole Rag Week idea but can tell you it wont stop. the Dublin colleges banned it over 10 years ago but there is still Unofficial Rag Weeks in every one of their colleges, every year.

red sean

Any idea how much money for charity was raised this year?

Plazaman

red sean wrote: »

Any idea how much money for charity was raised this year?

Per The Champion just over €6,000.

Kettleson

Plazaman wrote: »

Per The Champion just over €6,000.

..I wonder how much that works our per student? You'd wonder what the overtime and extra Garda on duty needed might have been, if anything? Still the kids had a good time eh...with no obvious harm done.

"Nearly 3,000 students at the IT". That's good going, €2 raised per head. Hurrah!

LaGlisse

Kettleson wrote: »

..I wonder how much that works our per student? You'd wonder what the overtime and extra Garda on duty needed might have been, if anything? Still the kids had a good time eh...with no obvious harm done.

"Nearly 3,000 students at the IT". That's good going, €2 raised per head. Hurrah!

I fairness to them its 5 Grand over the target