There is news this week that the unlucky and unpopular International Rugby Experience in Limerick City might be the home of a women’s museum.

The concept of a women’s museum isn’t ideal. What will children think when they are taken on a special outing to The Women’s Museum?

It sends the message that women are special cases, so out of the ordinary, so weird and unique and rarefied that they need their own space.

A small, special space, miles away from the important stuff in the capital.

A special space in a building in Ireland’s fourth city that no-one else wanted and JP McManus quite literally couldn’t give away.

That said, it is better than nothing and very, very necessary.

If anyone reading this thinks women are whining, do an experiment.

On any given day, scan the homepage of RTÉ news (or any major national news site).

Almost every single day the only reference to women, and especially in terms of photographs, will either be a politician or the victim of a murder and/or an assault.

At this moment in history, Jessie Buckley will skew the figures but give it time.

But Jessie might, at least, make it into Tralee’s very fine County Museum. It houses a gallery with the whole history of Ireland, from cavemen to present day and it really is brilliant. Unfortunately, it was curated without reference to a single woman aside from a figure of a nameless Georgian-era lady playing the piano, and a reference to one of England’s queens. Even the most ardent Andrew Tate fan will concede that women did exist throughout history, out of literal necessity more than anything else.

In this week’s paper we learn of an upcoming TG4 documentary on the largely-forgotten Blue Blouses.

They’re so overlooked that a quick google (including the words ‘Fine Gael’ to help the American technology in its search) only shows results for the Blueshirts, and images of literal blue blouses for women. There’s one article from RTÉ that is PR, for the aforementioned TV show.

In The Scannal Collection on the RTÉ Player today, there are 23 episodes. It’s an excellently produced show but nevertheless, there are just five episodes specially on women. These document a fire in Cavan that killed 35 girls, the Mother and Child scheme, and the story of Eileen Flynn who lost her job in 1982 for living with a married man. Two episodes cover women that were murdered.

Another is on the 1990 Presidential Campaign so more inclusive, but the thumbnail image of the episode doesn’t actually include the woman of the hour, Mary Robinson. This might seem like nitpicking but that would be like having a programme on the All-Ireland hurling final and showing an image of all the teams that didn’t win that year.

It is probable that none of this is intentional, and it is a fact that if women were excluded from history, society, education, and politics as Irish women were for generations, they’re not going to be in historical documentaries, Not unless it’s about symphysiotomies or Churching or tearing up pictures of the Pope at least.

A women’s museum is welcome, at least for now. Let’s call it a temporary measure while the history books start to fill with the stories of women and girls who will, in the future, be included with the Big Boys in the ‘real museums’. Right?