{"id":196655,"date":"2025-11-23T22:11:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T22:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/196655\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T22:11:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T22:11:10","slug":"social-media-pressure-and-fake-videos-undermining-democracy-taoiseach-says-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/196655\/","title":{"rendered":"Social media pressure and fake videos undermining democracy, Taoiseach says \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The negative influence of social media<\/a> \u2013 including the proliferation of fake videos<\/a> \u2013 has caused such stress and pressures to public representatives that it is now undermining the democratic process, Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin<\/a> has said. <\/p>\n

Mr Martin said it has become very challenging for people to run in elections, particularly for women. <\/p>\n

\u201cI know from talking to new TDs and people who were in politics<\/a> in the last five to six years, it is very challenging. It is 24\/7, and the onset of social media has had implications \u2013 including (the use of) appalling fake videos. <\/p>\n

\u201cIncreasingly that\u2019s creating a pressure and stress on public representatives and those running for election, which is undermining the whole democratic and electoral process,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Mr Martin was speaking to the media on the final day of the G20<\/a> summit in Johannesburg, South Africa. <\/p>\n

He was referring to an interview in a Sunday newspaper with the TV presenter Gr\u00e1inne Seoige<\/a>, who described her decision to stand for Fianna F\u00e1il in Galway West as the worst of in her life. <\/p>\n

Mr Martin said he understood where she was coming from and said the fact that elections were becoming more challenging for people to contest was an issue for Irish democracy more broadly. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think more generally, we\u2019ve got to look at the pressures that are on politics and on politicians and on public representatives, and we have to consistently look at the supports that are available to encourage people to become involved … and to navigate the challenges of the modern era, which are quite serious.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Martin dismissed any suggestion that Fine Gael leader Simon Harris<\/a> would have any difficulties fulfilling his duties as T\u00e1naiste and party leader while also in the role of Minister for Finance. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Media outlets need to break ties with XOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is the most experienced member of the Fine Gael cabinet. He would have gone through the last budget with myself, Jack Chambers, Paschal (Donohoe) and (Independent TD) Se\u00e1n Canney at the leaders\u2019 meetings. <\/p>\n

\u201cBudgets, because of the nature of coalition governments, have to be a collective exercise. There has to be one where all three pillars to the coalition government have inputs, and have to get buy-in and agreement and sign off.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the fact that two Fianna F\u00e1il representatives and one Fine Gael person attended that meeting was immaterial as everything was agreed by consensus. <\/p>\n

The G20 summit concludes on Sunday, after which the Taoiseach will travel to Angola\u2019s capital Luanda where an EU and African Union summit will take place on Monday and Tuesday.<\/p>\n

After he left the G20 conference centre on the outskirts of Johannesburg, the Taoiseach visited Mandela House in Soweto. He also laid a wreath at the monument to Hector Pieterson, the 12-year old schoolboy shot dead by police during the Soweto riots in 1976.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The negative influence of social media \u2013 including the proliferation of fake videos \u2013 has caused such stress…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,13,14,17244,108893,6,11,12,15,16,5765,5,44,1114,7,8,65,66,67],"class_list":{"0":"post-196655","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-featured-news","11":"tag-featurednews","12":"tag-g20","13":"tag-grainne-seoige","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-latest-news","16":"tag-latestnews","17":"tag-main-news","18":"tag-mainnews","19":"tag-micheal-martin","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-simon-harris","22":"tag-social-media","23":"tag-top-stories","24":"tag-topstories","25":"tag-world","26":"tag-world-news","27":"tag-worldnews"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115601308589111137","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}