To think friends are being over-senstive?

[pomadas87]

A friend (who lives abroad) messaged me and a couple of our good mutual friends - he shared happy news of his new baby and some pics. Everyone v excited and wished him congratulations!

He then said "so who's next to have a baby - she needs a playmate!" ... me and DH are newly married and are getting the question quite a lot...! Other friend said "I'm looking at you guys" (meaning me and DH)...

I then said "not for a while I'm afraid why don't you have another one straightaway and you'll have Irish Twins - instant playmate!"

Meant it in a joking way and then they all called me a racist, xenophobe etc.... I didn't realise it was offensive and now I'm feeling shitty! Did they overreact to my (stupid) joke or am I just an idiot?!

Does anyone remember the band "corner shop" with the song brimful of asha?

Should one and winter start a band called "irish twins"?

Saying "I want to use this term, I'm not offended by it, it's rooted in fact, how dare you discuss it, you're trying to control discourse" isn't opening up debate. By definition it's closing it down.

Saying "do you know the origin of the phrase? Have you thought about who first used it and why? Have you thought of alternatives that are just as accurate and less loaded?" is eye-opening and encouraging debate. 28 pages of debate.

Indeed diana.

I'm genuinely in shock at some of the comments here.

OMG I'm struggling with interpreting your tone.

One as an English person with Irish and Scottish in laws and Irish family, I Have always been very 'aware' iyswim. If they say things in jest then that's cool, but I would never 'instigate' a jibe, you know?

A few people can be offended if they wish.

Personally we find it inoffensive and I will continue to smile when its used to describe our family as I find it rather endearing used as it is in an affectionate and well meaning way.

After this thread I may use it more.

My tone is that I like Irish people, don't use the phrase (had to google it)and would advise anynone I heard saying it that some irish people might find it offensive.

My tone is also that, while I am sympathetic to ireland due to the treatment of people in the past, I do not think it gives you a free ticket to attribute every phrase or unpleasantness in your life to the people of one nation even where we do not actually know if they are to blame for the phrase. I think that is offensive.

I am simply telling you, how it is from my perspective, because I am sure it reflects the view of many silent people.

OMG I was referring to your comments about winter and I, I can't tell what you mean by it.

It comes accross as if you are mocking us but I'm wary of taking offence as I'm not sure whether I'm allowed to.

I am saying it is reasonable to be offended by it.
Being as offended by it as you are and blaming a specific nation, who is not necessarily even responsible for the phrase is a dangerous game. It is stoking the fire so to speak.

Diana, thank God you are not Irish. You nearly shattered my illusions of all irish people being lovely.

What have I done?

I don't think anyone is blaming or attributing current problems to any nation - strange leap.

Factually in the past the Irish were treated badly by the English thats a fact. Some people interpret this phase as a hangover from that. Some don't. I find the historical origins of phases quite interesting .

I don't think anyone is "professionally offended" or sobbing in the corner over the use of the term. Just if you do use this term often and genuinely aren't aware some people are uncomfortable with it its good to know so you make an informed decision when you use it. Most people don't want to offend others in every day conversation.

Slightly baffled by "all Irish are nice" cul de sac. What - all of them?!

I think the 'Irish are all lovely' thing is just patronising. Of course they're not! You get arse holes everywhere. Just because someone is born in Ireland doesn't mean they have a nice personality.

If you haven't lived outside of england you will probably fail to understand. It is easy to take the side of a perceived victim and fight for them to the bitter end and to justify an attitude of endless blaming even where the percieved bully is not deliberately doing anything to you.

At some point the bully becomes the victim and will blame the other....

Blame for some people can be considered a call to action. I am just saying it is a dangerous mindset and if you have lived in England for your whole life you probably do not really know what you are wading into.

Sorry I don't understand at all OMG

OMG you're not making much sense tbh.

Yes I agree Diana. It probably does feel patronising. I'd rather have a positive stereotype than a negative one and I'd use it to my full advanrage.

If you agree then why do you keep saying it?!

Do you really think that kind of thing is positive for Irish people to hear? That other people view them all as 'lovely'?

I'm afraid you can't generalise about any nation. Some Irish people are lovely, some are kind, some are clever, some are bastards, some are....

Do you see where I'm going with this?!

Kerala1, until I actually meet an Irish person who is an arsehole I probably will continue with thinking all irish people are lovely. I am sorry if that offends you.

Of course words like the 'n' and 'p' word shouldn't be used. We all know that they're overtly threatening, hate filled and racist. Initially when the worst language became unacceptable it was a good idea - but it's been used as an excuse to start policing language to the nth degree in quite a sinister way.

It's designed to exclude. It's an ever changing code which is difficult to keep up with. It's controlled and defined by middle class, Guardian reading, university educated, left wing liberals often employed in the public sector and it's deliberately designed to be difficult to keep up with and a constantly changing code. It means they can be confident that only people like them feel comfortable joining debate and they intimidate those who don't know the code into silence for fear of being publicly denounced as prejudiced or racist.

It excludes people from debate on the basis of class, education and debate on the basis of class and age and education level. People simply don't know what is going to be classed as offensive this week so they end up in a situation where they can't say anything. It's a type of elitism designed to exclude.

Just as an example of this: I live near Rotherham. Almost everybody knew what was going on. People saw cars full of old Asian men picking up girls from school and they knew these girls were going missing and attending school drunk and on drugs and had drugs, booze and money they shouldn't have. It was obvious what was going on and widely known. But when people tried to talk about it publicly they were shut down.

There is a local internet forum where people repeated tried to bring it up for years but were deleted and banned 'because that's racist'. People bought it up with the council and were just told there was no problem except for their own racism. And yes it was generally middle class people policing working class people and deeming what they had to say unacceptable.

Being offended by this on it's own might seem harmless, but in the wider picture it's part of the 'you can't say that' culture which is designed to confuse and exclude. If a relatively benign phrase like 'Irish twins' is offensive it really does leave people questioning what they can say and feeling like it must be best to say nothing. It is a rather sinister method of cultural control and manipulation of public discourse.

So to sum up; people know the phrase has its origins as an insult, but don't care, and want to use it anyway. Which is entirely up to them.
But also if people don't like it, they should shut up because they are "stifling debate"....which doesn't make an awful lot of sense. What do you want to debate then? And why aren't they allowed to be part of the debate?

And also represented is the view that Irish people should stop saying anything bad at all about English people, because the thousand years of occupation, oppression, cultural destruction and death is over now and current English people had nothing to do with it and think its mean to mention, especially because they think all Irish people are cute and entertaining. And if they want to use terms that used to be bad but aren't seen as it now, you should let them because they are now the victims.

Wow.

It's designed to exclude. It's an ever changing code which is difficult to keep up with. It's controlled and defined by middle class, Guardian reading, university educated, left wing liberals often employed in the public sector and it's deliberately designed to be difficult to keep up with and a constantly changing code

This is such bullshit, and is simply the same as the old cry of "God, its PC mad, it was fine to say P and Chky when I was young, I can't keep up!"

If you're talking about the ridiculous labelling like trying to make people say "pregnant persons" in case a trans man is having a baby, you might have a point. But using this "liberals are making us all silent because we're not supposed to use racially/culturally stereotyped insults" is just pathetic.

Nobody is being silenced. You can say what you want. You just can't complain when the people you are talking about don't like what you are saying.

Great post Winter.

Very interesting posts Bill, certainly worthy of deeper consideration. It was a point I made earlier in the thread, that context was important. If someone was to say 'Irish twins' in a sneery snide denigrating way I would certainly take offence, but in a different context, between Irish family members, for example, I certainly wouldn't.

Some words and phrases can only said to be hurtful, there typically isn't a benign way to use them, but that can't be said to apply to everything. I also think that it is possible for what was a hurtful offended word of phrase to evolve to be acceptable in a different context, sort of a 'reclaiming' if you will, most clearly when it becomes a phrase used by those it was once intended to denigrate.

I also agree that the concept of offence can be used to shut down debate and it is a hard one to police. Evidenced by this thread were some are personally quite deeply offended and some are not at all. Who decides what is offensive and what is not? Where do we draw the line? Personally I opt for context in determining this for me personally - I try not to take offence unless it is clear that the object was to offend.

Certainly this has been a very interesting discussion.

I dont even know what to say. Im really saddened by some of these latest posts. I thought general mindsets were further along than this. We're still not allowed our own voice. Irish, sit down and be quiet, the people who matter are speaking. the attitude that led to so much suffering in the world. It persists.