Last year, I wrote a column in these pages about the former teacher Enoch Burke’s long-running campaign of public self-martyrdom, in which I claimed to see it as a work of conceptual art. The whole thing – the endless court appearances; the repeated jailings and forcible removals; the performance of stoic resilience in the face of supposed state repression; the cod-legalistic repudiations of judge’s rulings – struck me as a masterpiece of pure self-generating spectacle. It seemed amusing and absurd to consider Burke as a product of exactly the sort of media-saturated modernity to which he would fancy himself diametrically opposed. Although my intent was largely ironic, there was at least some small part of me that sincerely believed it.

A week ago, Burke was back in the news – not a particularly remarkable turn of events, admittedly, given how little he seems to have been out of the news since he was first suspended from his teaching position well over four years ago now. Burke was once again outside the gates of his former school, Wilson’s Hospital in Westmeath, marking the beginning of a new school year by reprising his performance as “Sacked Teacher Enoch Burke” (sometimes referred to as “Jailed Teacher Enoch Burke”).

In a video he himself recorded and posted to social media, he could be seen trying to enter through the gates of the school, and being prevented from doing so by a remarkably calm security guard in a bright orange jacket. Burke, as is his custom, berates the guard relentlessly.

BREAKING: A security guard has barred teacher Enoch Burke from entering school this morningHe is blocked from his place of work after he refused to call a young child “they” and affirm transgenderism, an anti-Christian ideology upheld by church, state, and government.… pic.twitter.com/TZPCz6lvzp— Enoch Burke (@EnochBurke) August 28,........

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