On this day when all Americans have “a case of the Blarney,” it is important to remember that the actual Irish were literally the Mexicans of their day, when they came to America. Why? Nobody remembers now, but apparently the Irish took all the shit jobs the white people didn’t want, and because of this the hard-working immigrants were characterized as degenerate trolls. (See illustration at right.)
Today, of course, everybody loves the Irish and we can’t even remember why we hated them so much. (And then we see Bono and it all comes back, ha ha, Bono.) Anyway this article in the congressional webzine Roll Call raises the interesting possibility that the Irish invented lobbying in DC. What did we say about “taking the shit jobs nobody wanted,” right? Anyway, happy Irish Christmas! [Roll Call]
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Can we drive the snakes back to Ireland yet?
Huh. This is Ken’s opening shot in a “War on St. Patrick’s Day”. Everyone knows that drinking spirituous liquors and puking up green whatever is the reason for the season, not your secular-progressive “attempt to understand historical racism”.
“Nobody remembers now, but apparently the Irish took all the shit jobs the white people didn’t want, and because of this the hard-working immigrants were characterized as degenerate trolls.”
The subhuman thing came about during the the Famine so that people in England and elsewhere wouldn’t have to feel bad about the Irish starving. Google around for cartoons in Punch magazine from that era. Niiiiice stuff.
It’s hard to say which was worse – taking the lobbyist positions or becoming cops. The Irish did them both in America. And all we got out of it was this fuckin’ holiday (of sorts) where everyone pretends that they can outdrink us. It’s just like New Year’s Eve – amateur day.
Lest we forget, a tip of the tam o’shanter to the Irish for their groundbreaking work in religious intolerance, police brutality, public alcoholism, and domestic terrorism.
the Irish took all the shit jobs the white people didn’t want
The original Mexicans!
The Irishman was the Jew of the Liberal Fascists.
Have you looked at Ton Donohue lately? I think he inspired the band name “Gin Blossoms”.
“The Irish are the niggers of Europe … An’ Dubliners are the niggers of Ireland … An’ the northside Dubliners are the niggers o’ Dublin – Say it loud. I’m black an’ I’m proud.”
Roddy Doyle
(from The Commitments)
You are correct, sir! Only a hundred years since the last wave of Irish emigrants in the US. How quickly people forget. ‘Irish Need Not Apply’.
“a case of the Blogger”: fixed that for you.
[re=532343]Oblios Cap[/re]: Well, as a redheaded Scots-Irish lass who gets shitfaced on half a glass of wine, I guess I am shame to all those with Irish blood. Sorry. I do love potatoes, though.
[re=532347]Troubledog[/re]: On the other hand, Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, G. Bernard Shaw, James Joyce.
I have nothing to say about St. Patrick’s Day other than to celebrate it by fondly recalling one of my favorite headlines from the now-defunct Weekly World News, circa 1986:
“I Caught AIDS From the Blarney Stone!”
and oh, hey, look: free Irish stuff:
http://dcist.com/2010/03/free_irish_literature_from_solas_nu.php
[re=532337]Chickensmack[/re]: You just reminded me of something I’ve often wondered to myself:
Who drove the snakes from Hawaii? And why isn’t there a drunken, coconut bra-kissin’ bash once a year celebrating that little brown-skinned saint for his Samuel Jackson-esque heroics?
Ah yes, the day when plain white Americans whose great-grandparents were Irish immigrants love even more than usual to brag about it and go on about how great it is to be Irish, even though they’ve got no more practical connection to Ireland than they do to China.
The actual Irish, meanwhile, must laugh at us, using this day as an excuse to go out and get sloppy drunk; they never need an excuse.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: wealthy magical dwarves need not apply.
Hell, didn’t Angela’s Ashes pretty much document that we, oops, I mean they, are degenerate trolls? Irish sex, for example, its like the life of a savage, nasty, brutish, and short (which also goes for Irish penises). Guilt-addled catholic schoolgirls all named “Mary-Something” or “Something-Mary,” hysterically concealing their pregnancy until they give birth in a restroom stall, and still think it was just “heavy flow,” you know, the kind of heavy that cries. Date rape as romance, and puking, lots of puking! Thats what “Erin go Bragh” means, you know, you start out to say “Erin, go fuck yourself, but you puke halfway through, Brrraaaaghghhghghgh. Thank God for the police and fire departments, or we’d still be living in pig slop.
[re=532359]One Yield Regular[/re]: They were just stone fuckin’?
It wasn’t Jim, was it?!
[re=532367]Prommie[/re]: that book was just relentlessly depressing. Wow. I have no idea how anyone survived childhoods like that. Basically, they don’t need food.
[re=532357]bureaucrap[/re]: Drop Joyce and I’ll support.
Our cafeteria at CUNY honored St. Patty and the Leprechauns with a menu featuring green rice, potatoes and yes, beer onion soup. Man, I can’t wait for Cinco de Mayo. That’s when we’ll have the cocaine-infused tacos served by a topless brown lady.
Celebrate the day by living the life of Riley, at work, as usual.
An Irish curse on all o’ ye! http://www.funfacts.com.au/strange-irish-curses/2/
[re=532355]Doglessliberal[/re]: You need to love potatoes and cabbage to make up for your English liver. Erin Go Bragh, lassie!
[re=532341]Terry[/re]: more importantly– it was actually the English that induced the starving and mass emigration with their “free trade” policies and strict control over Irish agriculture; yes, the English treated the Irish virtually as slaves
[re=532341]Terry[/re]: Yer lettin’ yer dialectical materialism show there, with this idea that prejudices somehow arise to benefit thems who own the material means of production. The Brits thought the Irish were fucking savages from way back, hell, the Vikings thought the Irish were savages, running around barefoot, hitting each other on the head with wooden clubs, oh, and their rich traditional literature comprised entirely of cattle-rustling stories.
Don’t ever forget that most wonderful of all Irish traditions, the traditional, no birth control, 14th child (9th who lived) the retarded menopause baby!
[re=532383]Cicada[/re]: OK, I love cabbage, done the right way. Not boiled.
[re=532341]Terry[/re]: Not just Punch. . . Thomas Nast did a lot to promote Irish Ape stereotype.
As for today’s stereotypes, enjoy Paddy’s Day with a nice bottle of Bordeaux or suchlike, because more people drink wine than beer here in Ireland these days. Sláinte!
Yes, and today we are all Irish…or whenever St. Patrick’s Day is.
My favorite activity is to listen to authentic Irish music.
This is my goto choice for St. Patty’s music: This CD has the best and most authentic cover available.
http://www.amazon.com/All-Best-Ireland-Irish/dp/B000000LR5/sr=1-1/qid=1156991148/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-0294326-9599936?ie=UTF8&s=music
So when someone compares Michelle Obama to an ape, he’s just saying she’s Irish?
That image is very disturbing. I wish you’d have chosen something else. I realize that it’s a shameful part of American history that we should never forget, but it’s too much. (Thanks as always, Nowirehangers!)
[re=532349]Oblios Cap[/re]: Yeah, let’s see, blacks, Irish, Eastern Europeans of any sort, Jews, Mexicans, who’s next? Muslins? Or are they only jobs they want the terroristy ones / being president?
[re=532367]Prommie[/re]: I always thought “Erin Go Bragh” was some kind of crossdresser thing.
Why can there be only 239 beans in a stew in Ireland? (Best Irish accent is important here) Because 1 more and it would be too farty.
Oh well, beautiful day here. I think I’ll go outside and enjoy my Patty O’Furniture.
[re=532354]TGY[/re]:
Last wave of Irish immigrants was 100 years ago? Where do you live? Can’t be the East Coast or Chicago.
[re=532361]Extemporanus[/re]: “And why isn’t there a drunken, coconut bra-kissin’ bash once a year celebrating that little brown-skinned saint for his Samuel Jackson-esque heroics?”
It’s called O’bama Day, celebrated with beer-summits, and kissing coconut-bra’d Wahines while inhaling Hawaii’s finest marijuana!
[re=532391]Prommie[/re]: Sometimes I wonder why Ireland’s national holiday is in honor of the man who introduced the country to Catholicism; a disaster from which the Irish have yet to recover.
[re=532386]Prommie[/re]:
Yeah, well, you got a point there. I’m guessing our ancestors would have been considered more civilized had the Romans had the will or interest to invade and control Ireland. The roads would certainly have been better, at least. Weapons, too, I’d bet you. Not those wooden head knockers.
[re=532417]Escape Goat Nation[/re]:
Check out songhenge.com. They send out 15 or so free and legal Irish/Celtic songs a month from a nice range of performers as a means of promoting those acts.
[re=532442]Terry[/re]: And they’re still taking our jobs! That is, for those people who are bartenders at “Irish” pubs.
[re=532340]SmutBoffin[/re]: Speaking of fun historical racism: Back in the 1880′s, Chester A. Arthur was accused of being a secret Canadian Irishman, and therefore ineligable for the presidency.
Way I see it, the Irish were basically the Africans of the 1880s (and, presumably, Africans were the Muslins of the 1880s), so basically, Chester A. Arthur was the white, 1880′s version of Barack Obama, our beloved, if underrated, possibly secret Muslin Kenyan President.
Where did you find that picture of Pat Buchanan’s parents?
[re=532357]bureaucrap[/re]: [re=532374]magic titty[/re]: Seconded. But I’ll raise you Samuel Beckett.
In Chicago the Irish started out in the mayor’s office and worked their way up from there.
[re=532357]bureaucrap[/re]: Great writers–and all of them got out while the gettin’ was good. Swift kept going back, but then he was loony (aren’t we all?)
Today is the day when can all give thanks for the birth of such distinguished turf-cutters as Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Pat Buchanan, Ronald Reagan, Senator Joe McCarthy, Father Coughlin, Boss Tweed and pretty much every overseer on every large plantation in the ante bellum South. Why do the Irish hate America?
[re=532479]queeraselvis v 2.0[/re]: Samuel B: yes!
Lobbyists, cops and Bono – truly a sorry lot.
[re=532500]Zorg[/re]: John Lennon: Secret Irish
I was ready to honor the contributions of Irish-Americans, but then I remembered that Troy Duffy recently released Boondock Saints 2: All Saints Day, so fuck the lot of youse.
[re=532452]Bearbloke[/re]: You ain’t my brah, haole! Throw yer own damn luau!
I still hate the damn drunks.
“Everyone else has a religion. The Jews and the Irish have a psychosis.”
Brendan Behan (the fookin’ drooken IRA gunman, he!)
Oh, and I still say that “At Swim Two Birds,” by Brian O’Nolan, is one of the funniest books ever written.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_Swim-Two-Birds
And that’s not just because I was Madly In Love With the girl who recommended it to me during her Junior year at Trinity College.
(Yes, yes. Even Neilist can love. I know how unbelievable that seems.)
:::Sob:::
BARTENDER! ANOTHER BUSHMILLS!
“The bells of Hell, go ting-a-ling-a-ling,
But not for you and me!”
[re=532577]Neilist[/re]: maybe, but the Irish happened to save all the books during the dark ages.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/17cahill.html?th&emc=th
And then when we were taking our land from the Messicans back in 1847 a bunch of ‘em deserted and joined the enemy! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Patrick%27s_Battalion
No blacks, no dogs, no Irish.
No Irish immigration to America, no Pat and Bay Buchanan. Just sayin’.
I know quite a lot of people of Irish descent. Only a few of them are degenerate trolls.
[re=532417]Escape Goat Nation[/re]: I didn’t realize Walter Matthau was Irish. Or sang.
[re=532414]wheelie[/re]: Thunderbird makes a Bordeaux?
[re=532384]Way Cool Larry[/re]: I think the English, particularly Cromwell, just stone cold killed the Irish; slavery woulda been luxury. But you can’t tell the kids today that. They won’t believe you.
[re=532500]Zorg[/re]: Alls ah know is that lots and lots of Southerners have Scots-Irish ancestry, and lots and lots of Southerners are lunatic wingnuts. Do with that what you want.
I see Wikipedia says that Scots-Irish refers to people of Scottish descent, mainly Protestants, who emigrated here from Ulster; there are about 3.5 million Scots-Irish in the U.S., mostly in the South, Pennsyltucky, parts of Ohio and Appalachia. After 1945, many moved to Calif. and Fla. My, my, don’t that explain a lot.
I don’t understand why today’s Scots-Irish tend to be nuts, except that once they went South before slavery, all was lost. Beyond that, I don’t get it. I always wanted to be Irish, and one day I will finish “Finnegan’s Wake.”
[re=532639]Katydid[/re]: Any fookin’ Prod who emigrated here from Ulster is a Land-STEALING BASTURD FOOKIN SPAWN OF JAMES THE FIURST, THAT ORANGE SON OF THE DIVIL HISSSELF!
Or put more politely: “Scots-Irish” is one of those . . . whatdayacallem? . . . oxymoronic thingies.
[re=532639]Katydid[/re]: The Scots-Irish were the Scottish and/or Welsh Presbyterians (Orange Order) sent in by the English Crown to occupy land stolen from the Irish, usually after the English made life in Scotland and Wales unbearable. Many of them emmigrated to the US where they continued to be oppressive assholes. They aren’t really Irish, more Scottish and English with some Irish maybe thrown in there. My father has researched our family history a great deal, and I have to say I’m not proud of some it.
In summary, oppressors oppressed us, so now we are oppressing others.
Sorry about that. I’ll make it right by taking out Jim DeMint if I get the chance.
[re=532347]Troubledog[/re]:
religious intolerance, police brutality, public alcoholism, and domestic terrorism.
We’ve got to find a way to work more of the other three elements into the holiday going forward.
[re=532704]Oblios Cap[/re]:
Abner Louima getting raped by a coupla Micks with a crucifix on top of a Guinness truck full of amonium nitrate? Afterwards: who’s for Denny’s?
Disclaimer: my paternal grandmother’s name was Beatrice Riley, imported directly from the emerald isle. The remainder of my lineage lacks specificity, consisting of lightly-documented liaisons between drunks and good-hearted women with poor taste in men.
[re=532693]Mad Farmer Manifest[/re]: In summary, oppressors oppressed us, so now we are oppressing others.
Hmm. There’s a lot of that going around lately. Wyatt Cenac did a great piece on black people and Jews protesting against same-sex marriage….the package was was pitch perfect. The people he interviewed were completely clueless.
What do you say to an Orthodox Jew holding a sign that reads, “Gay Marriage: A Threat to a Religious Society” What do you say to a black man who says he identifies with George Washington because GW was part of a minority, and he believed in a cause, and he fought for it, so therefore he’s against same-sex marriage?
There is no point in talking to these assholes. Cenac says:
“It was just as our forefathers had envisioned. That one day people who had been discriminated against for their religion, or the color of their skin, could come together to discriminate against people for their sexual orientation, without the slightest bit of irony.”
Hey, Ken, how did you find a picture of Memaw and Pepaw?
I love that the xenophobic anti-immigrant party of the 1840/50s called themselves “No-Nothings”. It’s almost as good a name as “Teabaggers”. I just discovered that I can view the convict record of one of my Irish ancestors online at the Tasmanian government archive. His name was Patrick Fitzpatrick and he was sentenced to transportation on 3 January 1848 for stealing potatoes. He then got in trouble on numerous occasions while serving his sentence – mainly for drunken fights, then made good, eventually owning his own pub. To add to this perfect storm of Irishness his record shows that he was 5′ 1 1/4″. So I’m descended from a leprachaun.
[re=532639]Katydid[/re]: Those of us who are exclusively Irish DO NOT GET the Scots-Irish, either. FUCKING CRAZY. And, oh, how me Celtic blood boils five shades of red when I hear that runny sack of diarrhea, Patrick Buchanan, go on about his Irish ancestry. WE DON’T WANT CREDIT OR BLAME FOR YOU, ASSHOLE!!1! B’gorah!
[re=532391]Prommie[/re]: Nice – picking on Trig again!
Milton Meltzer wrote in his book Slavery that in New Orleans they always had an Irishman to stop the cotton bales that were being unloaded because if he was knocked into the water and drowned nobody cared – slaves were too expensive to lose.
[re=532788]Trailer Trash[/re]: Well, there is that. See? No matter how low on society’s rung you are, there’s always a new immigrant group lower’n you!
God Bless Murrika! Land of the
Displaced Angerbrave.By the 1880s they dominated every police and fire department in the country and had moved into urban politics, having that language advantage over most other immigrant groups. only a mere 20 or 30 years after the “No Blacks, no dogs, no Irish” signs and the chants of the Know Nothings –
“The Dutch, the Dutch!
They don’t amount to much,
But they’re a damned sight better
than the I-i-irish!”
What a piece of work those nativist Know Nothings must have been. By Dutch they meant Deutsch — Germans — but, you know, “keep government out of my Medicare!” kind of thinking. When asked about their secretive political movement, they were instructed to cross their arms and say, “I know nothing.” Even then it must have been tempting to follow up with, “Right, that’s obvious, but what’s your party about?”
We’ve come a long way though, now the Irish are free to be as willfully ignorant and bigotted as any other white exurbanite…
I wish Wendykat would just get laid and go away already.
[re=532758]wendykat123[/re]: Oh, that’s a terrible Website! Nothing but drunken Micks and Neocon Jews to choose from. Go to Ashley Madison instead and spend your money there.
Boy, Geico has been running that caveman ad a LONG time.
[re=532758]wendykat123[/re]: Yeeeaaaah baaaaby, I’m 107 and in the market for some young tail that can’t yet vote…
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