Abstract
Abstract This essay considers the theme of apology and what happens when the demand for apology is subverted, using the Vacuum newspaper as a case study. I consider the argument that played out in 2004 between the Vacuum and Belfast City Council, which partially funded its production. The Vacuum’s publication of themed double issues entitled ‘God’ and ‘Satan’ provoked the ire of conservative Council Members who proposed that the publication's editors must apologize to Members of the Council and the citizens of Belfast for the offence they had caused. In so doing, the publication secured its place as one of the most controversial Northern Irish print publications of recent years. In their response to the Council’s demand – a themed ‘Sorry’ issue – the Vacuum’s editors struck a defiant tone. Media discourse around the ‘Sorry’ issue of the Vacuum has centred on the element of public spectacle it generated, but this essay represents a reconsideration of its importance. I read it as informed by an ethics of resistance. By refusing to be co-opted into making a sham apology, the ‘Sorry’ issue illuminates the crucial importance of apology in the place and time of its production – in a country still reeling from the violence of the Troubles.
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