Irish racism in England

[angell84]

I am shocked. I am half English, half Irish. My Irish mum lived in England for a long time, gave birth to us children there with her English husband, and then moved back to Ireland.

The reason that she always gave me for returning to Ireland, was that, "she could not take the nastiness to her anymore". She described one incident of many to me: she went to my brother's primary teacher in England, and said that he had lost something, he must have been six at the time, and the teacher said to her , "sure what do you expect - he is half Irish".

I always thought of it in an abstract way, I never really understood what she meant. Until I spent quite a long time in the U.K this year.

I was absolutely shocked at the hatred and nastiness, and calling Irish people stupid.

How can it be possible? The U.K stole alot of Ireland's land, committed mass genocide during the famine, eradicated the Irish language,

And yet instead of apologising, many people are going around calling Irish people stupid.

Isn't it nearly unbelievable? It would be like a German going up to a Jew and calling them stupid. That it was their fault , thhat everything happened the way it did.

I am really shocked

I think is learnt behaviour, phrases, lack of awareness.
Between beyond the pale, that is a bit Irish, don't we still own you, throwing a paddy, the POTATO caused the famine, most rational posters or in RL people will stand corrected, probably be mortified at their faux pas.
I can't say POTATO out loud with hearing Keith lemon's voice. 🤣🙈

I don’t suppose Boris Johnson is some sort of superdude. But I also think that the disaster narrative of Brexit will change. Obviously what happens in ROI and NI is a matter for the people of those countries, but for mainland Britain, the changes are going to be dramatic. That’s the point I’m making.

Whether Ireland is one country again is another matter- as a matter of politics you would expect the British PM to do almost nothing in NI except spend extensively and put in Brexit related work. Stormont needs to go back to work for NI.

But I suppose I must now know - are the English racist to the Irish? Because the thread seems to have covered the following in some weird meta bingo;

A) My parents are richer than your parents.

B) you don’t know about that so can’t comment

C) insert highly personalised example of experience as evidence

D) Suffer mild intellectual incontinence if you discuss Irish history as this must only be done in oblique terms

E) simultaneously worry about lack of connection to old oppressive nation but also experience anger that it’s forebears are even less engaged that before in curious case of Stockholm syndrome

F) ignore the elephant in the room that Brexit is going to change things and the chap in charge of it is now likely to bring that in rather quickly

G) Demand the Potato Famine be classified as a genocide (without explaining what that means)

H) Are the English racist to the Irish goes unanswered because it is dumb arsed question?

Lex. While Brexit might change things dramatically for Britain, it won't change Ireland. We are one of 27 nations. What our neighbour does, won't really really impact us. We've been preparing for it for years. We've 26 other countries in our corner.

A. Only person doing that grew up in a terraced house in Liverpool
B. No comment
C. Again no comment
D. Too many big words used for me to make sense of
E. Haven't seen any e.g. of that - quote me one
F. See previous post
G. Find a dictionary
H. QED (if in doubt - refer to A-G above)

Satisfied?

@Emeraldshamrock well I'm not lending money to strangers on the Internet and if you want to go to the beach just book a spot in clogga caravan park. There was no caravan park when I was young, just a lot of field and some stony beach.

@BillywigSting Ah go on go on go on go on. ☘ I was kidding pulling your leg, I don't need a lend. 😜
Clogga is a beautiful spot.

I) the Irish had their own form of this "racism" with the Kerryman as the butt. Those were the times everywhere, not acceptable now

I) the Irish had their own form of this "racism" with the Kerryman as the butt. Those were the times everywhere, not acceptable now

Racism does not mean that you think it means, @Davros.

I know, I'm just using the (wrong) word already used in this thread

When 'Kerryman' appears as an ethnic category on UK census and recruitment forms, and when Kerry 'migrants' to the rest of Ireland have statistically far worse MH, including higher suicide rates, and far worse mortality rates from cancer, than the rest of the population, and you might have a point, @Davros.

I'm English and I think a big problem is that a lot of us are ignorant (including myself).

I was never taught about any of this at school. I don't know about other schools and I've felt that I've learnt an awful lot from this thread about things that I just haven't heard about before.

I'm pretty sure if I ask my siblings/friends they also wouldn't have a clue and that is a problem. Yes we didn't personally do anything however it is important to know history.

Irish, Northern Irish and I have encountered endless racism from the 'you're all terrorists' to the the 'all drunks' or 'all thick' kind. Been here 25 years now and it deffo has eased off since I was first at Uni.

@Emeraldshamrock ah I know it's grand, it's a beautiful spot, brilliant place to grow up

@WhenISnappedAndFarted, but you've read the thread and thought about things, or recognised that there is something to learn, rather than saying you've never heard anyone being unpleasant to or about Irish people, so it must be all imagination, or that an Irish person once told you someone would key your UK reg car if you brought it to Ireland, so even stevens.

fanlights all I'm saying is that casual prejudice in the name of "humour" was as much a thing in Ireland as anywhere

@okpedro there IS a distinctly Irish 'look' as other pps have said....

....red hair and fair skin or dark hair and fair skin with light coloured eyes

red hair and fair skin or dark hair and fair skin with light coloured eyes
I love red hair, the travelling community has lots of beautiful red hair, though funnily enough many Irish have dark hair, brown eyes with tanned skin, Spanish genes especially in the west of Ireland.
The Spanish missed my ancestors we are all pasty.

emerald we're a mix in my family. My Aunt is relatively dark skinned and dark eyed with dark hair, I'm pale with black hair and light eyes as are my female cousins and my sister has stunning red hair

We’ll have to agree to disagree @Bluesheep 🤷‍♀️
There’s a big mix in my all Irish family. Blonde, dark hair and most of us have brown or hazel eyes. I have cousins with red hair and their children have dark hair and brown eyes
My brother is the only one of 7 with blue eyes and fair skin. According to pps none of us would pass for Irish

I don't have the Irish 'look' either apparently.

It's rather insulting to be told that we're recognisable as we're inbred. Grossly insulting actually. Or to say that we all look alike.

I always get asked where I'm from. Until I speak lol.

Some ignoramus' don't understand the complexities and random nature of genetics though it appears.

My Dad has blue eyes - piercing blue eyes.

All of us his children have brown eyes. A more hazel shade than my mother who has chocolate brown eyes.

Plus, if I do say so myself, we do produce rather goodlooking people

I probably have the colouring (just the colouring, unfortunately not the looks) of Kate Middleton (your darling English Rose) and Cheryl Cole. Do they look Irish?

I don't think we have any red heads in our family, all the young DC were suspected they were born with red tones, my two sisters are tanned dark hair with green eyes, I am blonde fair with brown eyes.
The milk man was a busy fellow.