Why does the RTÉ and Tubridy saga have such a hold on us?

BBC News leads with Israeli drone strikes on a Palestinian refugee camp; France TV with ongoing riots relating to a police killing of a young man; Germany’s Die Welle with the situation in France; Italy’s RAI with the war in Ukraine.

Here it feels like wall-to-wall RTÉ, Tubridy, Forbes, PAC. Why?

The back story. In summary, presenter Ryan Tubridy, already on a handsome (one might say irresistibly gorgeous) salary, received €345,000 of additional, undeclared, payments from the national broadcaster. These came via sponsorship deals underwritten by RTÉ and through a “barter account” which has been likened to a slush fund.

Is this acceptable? No. Is it right that there would be consequences? Certainly. But consider. Ireland - homelessness; health system inadequacy; rampant inflation. Abroad - Palestine, Ukraine, Xinjiang, desperate migrants drowning in the Mediterranean. Does this matter of Tubridy merit so much attention? Have any of the above exercised the same hold on people’s passions as the Tubridy story?

From a broadly psychological perspective, there are a number of possible reasons that strike me, and I would roughly divide these into extrinsic and intrinsic.

To begin with the extrinsic. Humans are social; we are strongly influenced by our environment and what others say and do. If influential figures in our circle begin a discussion in a pub, café, or over dinner, it becomes a topic with which we are likely to engage. 

After all, everyone else is talking about it - so who are we to stand back?

The media can play a role like this in society generally and - as outlined eruditely by Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky in Manufacturing Consent, and rather amusingly by Gore Vidal in various essays - often dictate both the topics considered socially important and what ranges of opinions are valid.

The media - unsurprisingly perhaps, considering RTÉ is a huge player in the field - have focused very strongly on the Tubridy issue. It is in every media organ; this makes it natural topic of discussion at work, at home, with friends and one with which we almost all engage.

From an intrinsic perspective, we are likely to be seeing the typical human reaction to feeling cheated. This is related once more to how we have evolved to be social.

“Ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na doine” - you might have seen this graffiti on Sullivan’s Quay in Cork city. It literally means “people are protected in one another’s shadows”. We have evolved to rely on one another, to cooperate - and a good thing too! Supporters of the Thatcherite notion of ‘rugged individualism’ may well ponder how schools, hospitals, supply chains, cities, railways, and running water would work without our mutual reliance - or indeed how the Echo would be produced!

Without co-operation, we could never have become so advanced - even hunting and scavenging in days of yore required considerable teamwork.

Considering what we know of the evolutionary process, our co-operative ancestors survived and reproduced, where this was far less the case for their more isolationist contemporaries. We carry the genes of the co-operators.

This social existence relies on trust, and the research shows that we are largely trusting of others - most of us are decent and sincere, and we assume others to be the same. For the most part we are right, of course, but that trust does allow some freeloaders to slip under the radar.

We can tolerate all sorts of inequality in incomes or living standards, if we can believe it is right or fair or necessary. We see in this country a (granted, sullen at times) acceptance of income inequality and living standards, because - rightly or wrongly - we believe that this is just how it has to be. It is the contract.

In a country with a median household income of €46,999, we did not rage at a TV and radio broadcaster (one R. Tubridy) being paid €440,000. It was the contract, how it had to be. But then we discovered we were not being given the facts - we thought we had been cheated, lied to, taken for fools. And that makes us angry.

In ancient times, the perceived freeloader/cheat who had broken the contract would be expelled from the community and left to fend for themselves - a pretty hopeless prospect. Things are different in these times, but the emotions are the same - perhaps not that different to the current status of Boris Johnson and the Tory party. We can put up with anything, it seems, but being cheated.

I am sure everyone reading this can think of examples in their own lives where people who have been members of groups or teams have been found to be taking advantage of the trust of other members, and been cut off. There are perhaps lessons here for us all. 

For those in power or positions of privilege - don’t lie to people, don’t try to deceive people; it may work for you, but if it is discovered it will not end well.

For the rest of us - remain trusting of one another, but perhaps don’t just accept that what we’re told actually MUST be (this is a common ploy of those who wish to take more than their reasonable due), and remain vigilant against abuse from on high.

In our more immediate, mundane lives, we need to police our boundaries, protect ourselves. but also remain open to the essential decency of the vast majority of people.

The Tubridy affair can teach us much about how to behave and the consequences of breaking the implicit contract that binds us.