No kidding, Jeez, read it and I thought Taiwanlight Zone was you under a different name…
Erm, Cromwell?!?!
Just spitballing here…
The point is, all that happened centuries ago. No one has seriously oppressed the Irish in over 100 years. Get over it and stop your whingeing. In America, the Irish are treated the exact opposite of an oppressed minority. There are hundreds of other ethnic groups who have had it far worse than the Irish, some of whom are suffering today, not their great-great-grandpa’s time. It’s annoying when someone complains about the Crown stealing peasants’ lands as if it’s some sort of current event.
From what I hear, most actual Irish people in Ireland itself don’t have this chip on their shoulder, it’s mostly North American descendants of Irish immigrants. It reminds me of Bono’s rant in Rattle & Hum against Irish Americans talking glibly about the “revolution”. “Fuck the revolution!” Most people in N. Ireland and Ireland just want to forgive, forget, and get on with their lives.
That’s true.
That’s not.
Everyone has been to some degree “oppressed”. Compared to almost every country on continental Europe in the 20th century - you know, being conquered by the Nazis, then by the Soviets - the Irish have nothing to complain about the past century. They should try being Polish to know real suffering.
How have the Irish been “oppressed” in the past century? Outside of Northern Ireland’s shooting zones, of course. Not in America, where most of the ethnically Irish people live - you’d have to go all the way back to 1910 to see any serious discrimination against the Irish. In the U.K., you’d probably have to go back to the 1950s - you know, a half century ago.
[quote=“mod lang”]Everyone has been to some degree “oppressed”. Compared to almost every country on continental Europe in the 20th century - you know, being conquered by the Nazis, then by the Soviets - the Irish have nothing to complain about the past century. They should try being Polish to know real suffering.
How have the Irish been “oppressed” in the past century? Outside of Northern Ireland’s shooting zones, of course. Not in America, where most of the ethnically Irish people live - you’d have to go all the way back to 1910 to see any serious discrimination against the Irish. In the U.K., you’d probably have to go back to the 1950s - you know, a half century ago.[/quote]
So now it’s a HALF-century. If I came up with a good answer, would you then change that to a QUARTER-century?? Oh yeah, and now it’s only Irish-AMERICANS?
I really don’t want to start this argument, because personally, I haven’t had a hard life. However to say that the Irish (and I was referring to the Irish in Ireland, btw) haven’t been oppressed in the last [insert number of years here] is, well… “inaccurate”.
So let’s see… you’ve ruled out 1906 to 1956, Northern Ireland’s “shooting zones” and the rest of Ireland. Doesn’t leave me much to give you, does it?
Oh, and to say that oppression is relative to being Polish is just bollox.
I’ve never oppressed IrishStu, except on here. And he’s a mod and I’m not, so if anything he’s oppressing me.
You see, mod lang? This is EXACTLY what I’m talking about!! Cheeky English blokes like this giving me “all that”. 
Hey Stu,
Screw the English!
I’ve always been on the side of the Irish and against the English oppressors. In ALL the movies. Even the ones with Brad Pitt, where we all had to do our best to suspend reality and get [color=red]passed [/color]the bad accent (a task we all face whenever you’re with us IRL, Stuey 
Another similarity with Brad Pitt. Hmm…).
Plus, I think the English talent for oppression is a myth. Today’s English are all meek and easy prey. It doesn’t take much effort to oppress them. I do it few times a week. And I can recommend it to anyone!
EDIT: “passed” should be “past”, according to an anonymous English teacher slash stalker. It better be right, you hear!!!
Hey, the British haven’t bayoneted and eaten Irish babies for at least a couple of centuries. The worst an Irishman had to deal with in 1950 was being barred entry to a pub with a “No dogs or Irish” shingle.
BTW, you’re wrong about the U.S. being conquered and settled by mostly Englishmen. The frontier was won by Scots-Irish. There have been more Scots-Irish Presidents than WASP Presidents in the U.S. Hillbilly Pride!
Fight! Fight! Fight! 
Mod Lang: You think there’s been no discrimination against the Irish in modern times? Well my father, completely uinterested in politics, kept his head low, built up his bar in Belfast with 80 to 100 hour weeks (one of the lazy incompetent Fenian Bs as the Loyalists affectionately called us- and maybe still do when no one’s looking) . His reward? His bar was burnt out one night in August '69. The people who did it slashed the hoses of the firemen trying to put it out. Later on when the place was totally demolished they wrote something like this on the wall:
“We will never give up the blue skies of freedom for the grey mists of an Irish republic.”
It’s always a consolation to know that the thugs who burnt you out of your business have the souls of poets.
In the 1980s one of the loyalist clergymen lost it altogether and told the world he’d like to see the Irish and their clergy (he was another half wit who thinks all Irish are Catholics) sent to the gas chambers.
[Good old Ulster bluntness. I reckon the Loyalists have been defeated by their own big mouths. Thank God the word “subtlety” doesn’t exist in their vocabulary. Mind you if they had been flexible back in 1871 this whole mess could have been avoided by a sensible compromise. The Eglish were willing to compromise (except of course the Tories who’ve only recently figured out how unpleasant many of the Loyalists can be to anyone who doesn’t totally agree with them. Now the Loyalists have managed to alienate even them. Anyone for an own goal?) the Irish too but the loyalists said no. But I digress]
In the 1990s it took an almighty effort by the Irish, English and Americans to get agreement for a peace agreement in the north. I think the old attitude of “not an inch, no surrender” lives on as does the Orange Order. While the situation has improved it’s too early to say that discrimination is past.
I take your point about the Scots-Irish (hmm, you don’t object to that hyphen do you Mod?) but they didn’t go there in a vacuum. The power behind them was the government in England. The language spoken in North America today is English and the dominant country in Britain is England. Not every settler was English but they were all proxies of the English Government. The reason I prefer to say “English Empire” is that “British” is such a con word. Ireland, Cornwall, Wales and Scotland were just as much colonies of England as Canada, India, etc. I think Ann Robinson’s comments on the Welsh a few years’ ago were pretty revealing. So the use of “British” to imply equality is pretty disingenuous.
I don’t know about cheeky Englishmen and bayonetting babies, but I finally got around to watching the film. Pretty good lighthearted entertainment in my opinion. Several silly parts, such as the chopstick scene or all the times irishmen thought he was speaking Chinese. 
Ok, maybe most irish don’t speak the language, but they’d have to be morons to mistake it for Chinese. I didn’t see the film as insulting the irish for no longer speaking their native-tongue. Nor did I see it as making a particularly strong statement. Yes, languages are disappearing worldwide and that is sad, but the film didn’t seem overly deep. Just an odd plot with the quirky irony of a Chinaman being more irish than some of the locals. In particular, the light-hearted ending seemed to say, “no offense intended.”
[quote=“Taiwanlight Zone”]Mod Lang: You think there’s been no discrimination against the Irish in modern times? Well my father, completely uinterested in politics, kept his head low, built up his bar in Belfast with 80 to 100 hour weeks (one of the lazy incompetent Fenian Bs as the Loyalists affectionately called us- and maybe still do when no one’s looking) . His reward? His bar was burnt out one night in August '69. The people who did it slashed the hoses of the firemen trying to put it out. Later on when the place was totally demolished they wrote something like this on the wall:
“We will never give up the blue skies of freedom for the grey mists of an Irish republic.”
It’s always a consolation to know that the thugs who burnt you out of your business have the souls of poets.
In the 1980s one of the loyalist clergymen lost it altogether and told the world he’d like to see the Irish and their clergy (he was another half wit who thinks all Irish are Catholics) sent to the gas chambers.
[Good old Ulster bluntness. I reckon the Loyalists have been defeated by their own big mouths. Thank God the word “subtlety” doesn’t exist in their vocabulary. Mind you if they had been flexible back in 1871 this whole mess could have been avoided by a sensible compromise. The Eglish were willing to compromise (except of course the Tories who’ve only recently figured out how unpleasant many of the Loyalists can be to anyone who doesn’t totally agree with them. Now the Loyalists have managed to alienate even them. Anyone for an own goal?) the Irish too but the loyalists said no. But I digress]
In the 1990s it took an almighty effort by the Irish, English and Americans to get agreement for a peace agreement in the north. I think the old attitude of “not an inch, no surrender” lives on as does the Orange Order. While the situation has improved it’s too early to say that discrimination is past.
[/quote]
Well, that’s WAR, not discrimination in normal countries. The Irish and Ulster nationalists are equally to blame, from an outsiders’ perspective - it’s just mindless Hatfields & McCoys. They’ve forgotten what they were orginally fighting over, and now have only an endless cycle of revenge.
“Irish-Americans are the most ridiculous hyper-patriots on the earth. Yeah, so your great-great-grandfather fled from the potato famine in 1850, so that makes you, a guy born in Kentucky, as Irish as anybody. The way that people in America with even the teensiest bit of Irish blood in them overcompensate with puffed up “Irish pride” is pathetic. It would be funny, too, if people like you weren’t the same ones funding terrorists like the IRA…”
I guess I’m going to throw down on this one.
I wouldn’t have responded to this but since you attacked me personally and didn’t actually back up this opinion until you were goaded by others.
I’m letting it fly. I’ve also talked with Irish friends here and abroad (no, not Irishstu) and they agreed that it was worth reponding to.
What you posted was slanderous and since the Mods seem to be looking the other way, I take it that it’s a free fire zone.
I don’t doubt that you aren’t educated about Irish history, you’ve displayed that well enough on your own. So take it like a man, woman, simian or whatever you came out as from the hole of your mother.
First let’s address the issue of why the Irish don’t speak Gaelic.
Under the colonization by the English, laws were enacted that forbade the Irish to speak Gaelic in public forums. Laws against religon, land ownership, the right to vote were also put in place that limited the freedoms of the Irish. As Wittgenstein wrote: “Those who control the language control the power.” The English knew this as well.
IT WAS ILLEGAL FOR THE IRISH TO SPEAK GAELIC. The English made Ireland the only Western European country ever to be a colony. A much more different situation than what the Welsh had.
The potato famine was not an act of God nor Irish agricultural mis-management. The famine was a man made disatser orchestrated by the English. There was plenty of crops and cattle produced during this time in Ireland. It was sent to England. There were numerous diplomatic missions sent by other European countries and America that realized what a disaster it was. They pled with parliment to do something. The English did nothing because they wanted the land cleared of tenant farmers to produce more cattle to feed their growing industrial machine and they needed the cheap Irish labor in areas (such as Liverpool) caused by the famine.
The potato (A non-indigenous crop to Ireland) was eaten by the tenant farmers. No potatoes-no food for the poor. Food riots were quelled by the English army, people were hung and jailed for stealing food.
A quarter of the population starved to death and numerous deaths occured from starvation related diseases that were never a problem before the famine. The death toll on immigration ships, which were converted slave ships, was so high they dubbed them “coffin ships”
“Yeah, so your great-great-grandfather fled from the potato famine in 1850, so that makes you, a guy born in Kentucky, as Irish as anybody.”
My grandfather left Ireland after the Irish civil war, my family didn’t leave because of the famine. His family gave him a mock funeral knowing that they would never see him again. Yes, he settled in Kentucky so that part of your disrespecting of my family’s history in public is true.
My grandmother left after ALL of her family died because of disease. She was adopted by a Scots-Irish family worked in a factory until she was 14 then saved up enough money to buy a one way ticket to the States and left on her own. So, I’m third generation.
You singled me out and guessed correctly that I’m an Irish-American, are we any worse than Aussie, English,Scotch,South African,Mexican -Irish?
How would it have read if you wrote: “The way that people in America with even the teensiest bit of ARAB blood in them overcompensate with puffed up “ARAB pride” is pathetic. It would be funny, too, if people like you weren’t the same ones funding terrorists like the Al Queda…”
So you are accusing me of funding a terrorist organization because of my ethnicity?
It’s true the terrorist organization known as the IRA was funded for years by the Irish overseas-not just by Irish Americans. This was stopped in the 60’s by the Kennedy administration making it illegal for American citizens to privately fund or fight in foreign armies. The governtment wanted to keep that right for themselves. Kennedy by the way was an Irish- American.
I don’t support the IRA. And contrary to what my family history may present: I don’t hate the English. I don’t hate Protestants or Catholics. I have a very real link to Ireland and yes, when the Irish left Ireland they brought their hatred of the English with them. I do hate people like yourself who made broad sweeping generalizations, disrespect my family and the hardships they overcame and accuse me of funding terrorist organizations in a public forum.
Although I’m not his biggest fan, Mordeth should be thanked for presenting this link to the movie.
I wouldn’t have seen the movie otherwise. Maybe I was speaking through clenched teeth last time so you didn’t get it- I don’t have a problem with this movie.
If this gets me banned I’d like to thank Maoman for having this forum and letting me post my opinion. I guess I have to go out swinging.
Smelltheglove a nod to your post as well.
I’ve got some Irish in me. I’ve also got some English in me. So the way I figure, I’m oppressing myself. 
I’m bowing out of this conversation. You obviously take it a lot more seriously than I do.
[quote]I’m bowing out of this conversation. You obviously take it a lot more seriously than I do.
[/quote]
Like I said, a different psychological viewpoint.
That’s not the whole truth though. You must be aware that many Irish-Americans (and migrant Irish) continued to give money to the IRA (through front groups) until well into the 1980s (at least).
I’ve been following your discussion and now I’m not sure anymore…
Is Brad Pitt the good-guy or a baddie?
I cried at the end when he gets shot, but now I’m thinking I should be happy that the IRA didn’t get those rockets, right?
“I cried at the end when he gets shot, but now I’m thinking I should be happy that the IRA didn’t get those rockets, right?”
That’s okay they probably sold them to the Libyans at a profit.
“That’s not the whole truth though. You must be aware that many Irish-Americans (and migrant Irish) continued to give money to the IRA (through front groups) until well into the 1980s (at least).”
This is true, but this made funding the IRA an illegal and treasonous
act which is why they had to use front groups. By stopping the funding or at least making it difficult to send money. Fei is right it didn’t stop it completely.
Suddenly the Uncle Sam was telling the Irish-Americans that their Knights of Columbus Bake Sale for Bombs was wrong. The high percentage of Irish clergy in the 70’s and 80’s in America also influenced their American parishes made funding the IRA “sinful”. They pushed for the non-violent ways in their American parishes (Bobby Sands, peaceful protests, hunger strikes etc.) They also emphasized how much violence and hatred the IRA were spreading.
That’s why the IRA had to look to rogue nations later on, like Libya for training and funding.
For the American’s that didn’t sit well. To borrow from Chief:
“That dog just ain’t gonna hunt.”
My grandfather had a pail that sat on the end of his bar for years for donations to help the IRA. It wasn’t his pail nor his bar but publicly supporting the IRA was never a problem or a shameful thing.