John Waters (columnist)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Waters (born Castlerea, Co.Roscommon, Rep. of Ireland) is a columnist with The Irish Times and former editor of Magill, an Irish political magazine. His career began with the political/music magazine Hot Press. He is also the father of a daughter named Róisín with singer Sinéad O'Connor. John has vociferously campaigned on fathers' rights in Ireland [1]

1 Politics
2 Eurovision song
3 Books
4 References

[edit] Politics

He criticised Amnesty International's campaign against domestic violence^[2] - because of its lack of gender balance - which led to a response ^[3] by the head of its Irish branch. He has opposed same-sex marriage.^[4], though he had no problem with a recent controversial advertisement for Paddy Power bookmakers which used a parody of Da Vinci's painting The Last Supper which caused an outcry among many Irish Christians.^[5]

He has referred to himself as a "neo-Luddite" ^[6] and refuses to use email. A believer in the "clash of civilisations", he has supported the invasion of Iraq. He was at one stage fired ^[7] during a dispute between him and the current editor of the Irish Times, but was reinstated. He is an admirer of Charles Haughey.

[edit] Eurovision song

In 2006, Waters wrote a song for the Eurovision song contest which wasn't accepted. He referred to people who had publicly criticised his song as "Corner Boys" in a column in Village magazine.