Irish posters - "having a paddy"

[BarbaraHoward]

Irish posters - can I canvas your opinions on the use of "having a paddy" to mean "having a tantrum"? I've been having a bit of back and forth (well, plenty of forth not much back in truth) with MNHQ over the past day or two and I want to check that I'm not going against the majority view here.

IMO, the phrase is awful, and plainly anti Irish. I know most people using it aren't doing so to slag Irish people off, but the phrase is still awful IMO.

I've been here a long time, and reported the phrase more than I can remember. Usually, it's just deleted right away. Raising it on a thread always derails it as people just go on the offensive.

I reported it yesterday and got the immediate email that it was being checked out, but the post stayed up for hours despite a follow up email, another post and a thread in Site Stuff. It was then edited rather than deleted, which I thought was the norm for offensive language. I reported another use this morning and it's still up.

What are your views? Is this a fight worth having with MNHQ or am I out of step with the majority of Irish posters on here?

Thanks :)

I notice the username “britsout” hasn’t been taken yet 😂

Irish and living in Ireland and its not a turn of phrase i have ever heard here. First place i heard it was on Mumsnet and i immediately felt it was offensive.

Just because something is normalised does not mean it is right.

As a child we sang the rhyming song "eenie, meanie miney mow..." the next sentence contained a racial slur. I know that now and never use it as its so offensive. Thankfully my child has been taught to use the word tiger in that rhyme but i always get a twinge of guilt when i hear it sang, that something so horrible could be normalised into a child's song.

I was a child and young teenager in England in the 60s and early 70s. I've heard the slurs, heard the jokes, seen the cartoons. I even saw a 'no dogs or Irish' sign once. I've heard about the innocent Irishmen locked up for years rather than let officialdom admit the police could be dishonest.

None of it is funny, and English people who do not even have the courtesy to notice it are unimpressive.

I was literally looking at that and thinking 'Is it a kind of French soup, like a ragout?' Clearly didn't get enough sleep last night.

I'm Irish. It's offensive. I've commented accordingly on previous posts. Ignorance is not an excuse for other forms of racism, so I don't know why it should be ok in this case.

100% this.
@MNHQ

No it doesn't offend me or anyone I know. It baffles me why so many non Irish people get so offended on our behalf.

The thing I find really offensive, is when people come on these boards and tell us Irish about why we should be offended, as if we're "the thick Irish". We know the history.

The people claiming to be Irish and who are offended, I can bet my life they don't live here. 3,2,1...all the offended who claim to live here.

We were taught that that was unequivocally unacceptable ca 1965. I'd never heard it (or the offensive word) before I went to school - and afaik only heard it in school (again, in England) in the context of being told it should not be used..

I was, and remain, shocked that that word was used in a book title by Agatha Christie in the 1970s.

Agree, the pale is also an old English term meaning boundary or limit (from palisade) so being offended at it is a reach I think.

Oddly posts suggesting that someone isn't being truthful are far more likely to be removed, rather than one that is ageist or sexist.
Ageism seems to be alive and well as so many resent the older generation for having had the ''best of everything''

Free University -plus free grants
Cheap house prices in relation to wages
The best of the NHS
Pensions at Sixty! - they definitely did have an easier time of it- especially property values that could escalate from £10,000 to £2,000,000 in 50 years.

But that generation also had War to live through.

I'm wondering if the posters who claim to know Irish people who use this phrase can tell me if these Irish people ever lived in Ireland or have they maybe lived in the UK for so long it's become a phrase they use without thinking.

I'm Irish, have lived in Ireland for 42 years and never heard another Irish person use it.

A thread not so long ago had an Irish person claiming they "always" use this phrase and they live and grew up in Dublin I was sceptical to say the least

Nor me! I live in the North East and thought it was just a colloquialism.

I had no idea it was offensive - didn't know it was a slur against Irish people but I suppose that makes sense. Now I know, I'll avoid saying it.

I think it's fine to keep challenging it as you're clearly just pointing out something that most people don't know? But also probably good to realise than many people are simply not aware rather than having bad intentions.

The only people I know who have ever used this saying are my older relatives (first and second generation Irish immigrants). I've never liked it, but I'd never made this connection until today.
I don't use it myself anyway, and I definitely wouldn't use it now I've had this pointed out to me. I wonder how much other slang there is with unpleasant roots that I/we use without thinking. (I grew up in the kind of environment (early 80s) where I genuinely thought the newsagents next to school was called the P* shop for a while because that was the only way I ever heard it referred to. Luckily, the first time I used it myself, my mum overheard and was able to correct me!)

In the same way that being named Karen is fine but being called a Karen isn't.

Irish living in Ireland. It's not used here, but my London colleagues have used it and I don't like it. I find "they're having a what...." sometimes gets them to think about what they're saying.

It is offensive. I understand that may people use it without ill-intent and I think giving them a bit of grace is fine. Equally I expect when people are told why it's offensive that they would stop using it. There are plenty of non-offensive ways to get that message across.

We all get it wrong sometimes. I'm sure plenty of us used or heard phrases that would now be regarded as racist or ableist in childhood. Now we know better, we do better.

For the record Micks and Taigs are not okay either.

At the very least they should be edited, ideally with an explanation.

In this are (Greater Manchester) we say - don't have a Benny- kind of meaning the same - so might be better to encourage the use of that ?

She wrote it in the 1930s, though, @DeanElderberry -- and the original title, which is the one you're referring to, has been replaced, successively, by Ten Little Indians, Ten Little Soldiers, and then by And Then There Were None (which is the last line of the 1890s song which is referenced by the original title), which I think it what all modern editions now use.

But there were definitely copies with the original title circulating around in the 1970s. I had one myself.

I've only heard people use it in relation to toddlers {like at a play group} and decades ago- by English people.

''Oh dear! Emily is having a paddy as she wants to go on the pedal tractor, and Alex isn't letting her''

A minor tantrum.

I find this comment offensive.

Irish person living in Ireland with obviously lots of Irish family. Not a saying I have heard a lot here but I have heard it. It doesn’t offend me.

Yes it's offensive to Irish people, but I think most people have no idea its derogatory

I'm Irish and I hate the phrase, I find it offensive

Never heard of it- wouldn’t care myself tbh!

No, it’s very offensive. I can’t see how you wouldn’t realise this.