Racial Slur Left Up

This is just unpleasant. If people don’t know the origin of something I don’t see why there is the need to call them names. I know the origin of paddy and why it is offensive but I had never heard of ‘Irish twins’ before until I saw it on here not that long ago. I would never have used those words as I didn’t even know it was a thing, and as I know it is offensive and why I wouldn’t use it for that reason also.

@KoalaCalledKevin i didn’t know uppity was offensive… off to look that up now.

ETA. For those that don’t know uppity was used by racist southerners towards black people who ‘didn’t know their place’. The article I read said it is racist when used towards black people because of this. I don’t think it is that commonly known though.

I thought 'mick' in taking the mick was short for micturition. The posh word for pissing!

I’m not ‘confused’. The use of insulting language to describe anybody is unacceptable.

I think you're confused. The slur @BarbaraHoward reported was a slur against a specific ethnic group. I am not calling any specific group 'thickos', unless it be a group consisting of the type of person who persists in denying their own prejudices and/or prejudicial language once they've been pointed out to them. It is in no way similar to using an ethnic slur which is directed against a specific ethnicity.*

(*And yes, Ireland no longer consists of a single ethnicity, but I'm not sure the kind of people I'm thinking of would be likely to have the slightest awareness of this.)

I have an issue with using the term ‘thicko’ or ‘thick’ to describe anyone. Doing so makes the user stoop to the same level as the very people they are calling out.
I can agree that the things you have listed show a degree of ignorance, overt racism or just plain lack of education whilst still thinking ‘thicko’ is an unacceptable slur.

Do you have an issue with people who don't grasp that 'Can someone from the Home Counties pronounce this name?' isn't everyone's main criterion for naming their child, deny that anti-Irish prejudice continues to exist, and continue to insist that Hiberno-English is a 'wrong' or mistaken version of the dialects of English they consider 'standard' being described as 'thick'?

‘Thickos’?

I hadn't realised the origins of this at all! I think when you grow up with words, that just are, and you don't feel like they really came from anywhere, it's really hard to see when you are using something offensive. Honestly it terrifies me as I dread to think what I have said or may say they I haven't realised the origins of.

Anyway, I'm glad I saw this thread.

Absolutely we all screw up. I remember getting into an argument online in the 1990s about the politics of black hair (about which I knew sod all) and having my ass deservedly handed to me. All you can do is apologise and learn from it. Rather than repeatedly insist that you're right and everyone else is wrong to be offended.

To be fair, I think people use phrases all the time without considering the origin.

Until Eamonn Holmes got in trouble for saying it about Meghan Markle, I had no idea "uppity" was considered racist. I thought it was just an insult, and if you don't know, it never occurs to you to look it up to check.

Growing up, I heard "throw a paddy" occasionally, not that often. But I never heard "paddy" in relation to Irish people, so didn't make the connection until well into adulthood. It was a phrase I very rarely used, and didn't hear very often, and so never considered looking into, or even thinking about the origins tbh.

I grew up in a new town in Essex full of former Londoners and not an Irish person in sight, and from what I remember, there was something called p....whack which was a dog chew, and so the word you mention OP, we always thought of it as a short form, which you could easily throw a long way in a temper. Particularly since as a child I had watched a film called The Inn of the Sixth Happiness in which there is a song that uses that word and giving a dog a bone in the same song. There are probably many other people who thought the same as me.

Having long since learned of the other usage and its offensive connotations, I wouldn't say it now.

It's whenever someone quite calmly points out that the saying is offensive and then explains why and as sure as shooting, someone pipes up to tell them it's not offensive and you've taken it all wrong 😑 The casual racism against the Irish is horrendous.

I don't think we know the origins but it could be from take the Mickey Bliss.

Huh looking it up "Mickey Bliss" cockney rhyming slang. Good to know I'm not taking the mick when I'm saying "taking the mick".

Take the Mickey isn't anything to do with Irish people.

It's absolutely disgusting and should not be allowed, it's an racially offensive slur !! Before people write or speak this they need to educate themselves !

I noticed myself saying "taking the mick" as a more polite version of "taking the piss" but I suppose it's not actually more polite if it's also anti-Irish, right?

That too. But there is inevitably an Irish poster who bobs up and says, brightly 'But we all say that in Ireland all the time! It's not at all offensive!' Which then makes me want to start explaining cultural cringe and internalised colonialism to the point where I bore myself.

I was in a London NCT group with another Irish couple who completely unironically used to term 'Plastic Paddy' about their unborn baby.

As an Irish person I find the phrase “Irish twins” far more offensive, it drives me insane when I see it on Mumsnet.