Ah you're a Catholic!

[Appleday11]

I moved to England to work last year. I'm Irish.

When I arrived at my workplace, one of my colleagues said "Ah you are Irish, this is a nice city, there is a Catholic church down the road that you can go to".

I think she was trying to be helpful but I thought it was quite bizarre. I'm not Catholic and I told her so.

Second time - I was out in the pub with a mixed group of people. Some of them I had never met before. One man said "ah you're Irish, you're a Catholic!" I told him Im not.

Third time- I was at another group. A woman said to me "you are Irish. Ah so you like such and such. And you are a Catholic". I told her I am not.

I found it strange as I have never really thought about religiom. Do some people here think that all Irish people are Catholics? My family were not religious at all and I was never brought up any religion

Oh wow but I thought Irish people were never racist, only the nasty English?

Blow me away, it looks like prejudice can be universal 🤯

Mark Twain, wasn't he a bit of a racist?

No- it means you also have generational trauma in your history. No more, no less. It’s not a competition, and it’s impacts and effects are nuanced and not identical

which honestly, seems obvious.

Yes, I know it is quite the shocker!

I don’t feel traumatised.

I don’t have a seething hatred of German and Japanese people that consumes me night and day.

It’s history. Nobody is to blame for the actions of their forefathers. That’s absurd.

I don't think this Poster is to blame for the competitive trauma.

My family are Irish and we only ever get, “you eat a lot of potatoes then?” (We do actually eat a lot of potatoes)

My Grandad thought he'd seen the end of his service in the war after he was involved in the invasion of Sicily but he was allocated a major role in the liberation of France and came ashore at Gold beach on D Day. When the ramp was lowered they had to rush up the beach but of course they were facing heavy machine gun fire from the German defenders. He just lay on the beach for many hours unable to move: War is a terrible thing and it effected my Grandad for the rest of his life. There were many dead soldiers around him but eventually he got off the beach at about 4pm . As a signaller he had to follow the front line and was being fired on from the air and ground. I know that my Grandad was traumatised by the way as he didn't want to collect his medal in Normandy for 75 years following the d day landings as he just wanted to forget about the war as soon as he returned home. We encouraged him to pick up his medal privately from the mayor and took him to France, we visited the Cinema in the Round at Arromanches and that is the first and only time I have we we seen my pretty stoical Grandad cry. He never blamed the conscripted young German men fighting him either.

Anyone who lived through the troubles in Ireland knows that not everyone is Catholic. Think your friends must be relatively young.

I think this is really offensive and I wonder if you know little about colonial oppression by Britain towards Ireland? Or perhaps you don’t actually understand the concept of generational trauma, otherwise I can’t make sense of your ignorant comment. I don’t feel as a Scottish woman that I have generational trauma and I’d be very interested in the rationale for an English person who claimed that.

OP I think some people are blind to the fact that it’s possible to be racist to Irish people. Not directing that at anyone particular on the thread but from living in Scotland with an Irish DH I know this to be true. I know at school I was taught nothing of Britain’s colonial history and the terrible things that were done to Irish people. I think that there are enduring roots of Britain viewing itself as being the country to ‘civilise’ the Irish, that people don’t even realise they hold as an unconscious bias. My DH has been called ‘stupid Paddy’ more than once when he lived in England. You still see people talk about ‘having a paddy’ sometimes on MN meaning throwing a fit, and people are often shocked when they are called out on it.

My grandfather...I am ancient...was in the trenches and wounded. When he recovered he was staff in a prisoner of war camp. The only thing he ever said was that the Germans were just like 'us'. Which sums up most people really.
My aunt in Dublin had a dishwasher in the seventies but got a washing machine about 1980. Which she shared with her daughter in law!

Very strange. My optician is middle eastern, I wouldn’t say ah you must be a Muslim. Just a really odd thing to come out with.

To be fair, one of my favourite Youtubers, (Irish) Garron Noone, also eats a lot of potatoes 😂

He is from the same town! He recently shared a video he found of someone making a pie where everything was made out of potato from the crust to the filling to the topping. It looked like a lot of work but I bet it tasted amazing. I am more of a fan of a freshly boiled potato with a bit of butter and salt simply because it’s quicker than a pie!

I watched that!!😂

Agreed. I can't imagine anyone saying that, unless it was part of a wider conversation. The OP must be meeting some strange people.

Oh, I know. But compassion fatigue eventually sets in.

Between 1845 and 1855, over two million people left Ireland to escape the Great Hunger, with a significant portion traveling on "coffin ships" to North America. It is estimated that at least 100,000 to 150,000 people died during these voyages due to disease, malnutrition, and overcrowded, poor conditions.
Yeah that's not as bad as been shipped out to the countryside for a few years for safety.
When people were leaving on the 'coffin ships' their families would have a 'wake' for them knowing that even if the did make it to America alive, they would likely never see them again.
Most didn't have the luxury of coming back a few years later as 'strangers' as you mentioned.
You really don't seem to have bloody clue!
Plus, you do realise that well over 125,000 irish soldiers fought alongside Britain in WW2? you don't have a monopoly on loss during WW2 you know

Irish folk get huge amounts of racism in the UK I'm afraid. This is just one example.

Heck... I was born here and I get people making crazy assumptions and being generally rude about me based on being Irish.

"Irish twins" and "Irish goodbyes" (both racial slurs), gypsies, comments about Catholicism, jokes about being stupid/thick, bad Irish accents talking about Crack, jokes about only eating potatoes... Sigh

Bit odd I guess. Whenever I tell people I have 5 siblings they assume my family are catholic, they are - but I think most of us are the result of my mum forgetting to take her contraceptive pill because my parents aren’t really deeply religious but my mum is deeply forgetful.

Yet I see no threads started by English people about ‘the problems with Irish people’, but many in the reverse.

‘Shipped off for a few years’

I feel zero duty to be polite and empathetic toward somebody who is so utterly obsessed by their own (mediocre) historical grievances that they are so rude and dismissive of children being forced from their parents for years for fear of being blown up.

No wonder the English are so utterly turned off by your history. You care nothing for anyone else’s, and don’t inspire compassion.

Irish historical grievances aren't 'mediocre'.

At the same time, belittling English suffering is completely wrong. What your family went through was terrible and it was horrible of the poster to dismiss it like that

Is there? My impression was young Irish people are increasingly secular.

Not nice, is it? I obviously don’t feel any history is ‘mediocre’ but that’s what it feels like to be bombarded with disrespectful comments about your history by the same people who demand you respect theirs.