[nesf]

I just find this odd, have lived in Cork for about a decade and never once had any trouble and can count the number of times I've seen someone else in trouble on less than one hand. I saw way more fights back home in the countryside where I grew up. I appreciate Dublin is quite different for a variety of reasons (the lack of many heroin addicts in Cork makes muggings that much less likely) but Ireland as a whole dangerous? No. Not really. Yeah Dublin and Limerick have some real no-go areas but by and large the country isn't too bad.

[Herbal Deity]

Anecdotes are very weak evidence...

However, I'm 20, have been going out during the day in town for 6/7 years and going out at night for 3. I have never experienced anything any more severe than the odd harmless idiot making a smart comment.

I went to Biarritz for 3 weeks when I was 17. One night several of my friends had their bags stolen on the beach, another night I was mugged on the way home.

I would perceive Dublin as being quite safe.

[masteroftherealm]

Originally Posted by supersaint3

that's such a simplistic attitude master. What about the resourcing of the police? etc. it's all very well to want to have a garda on every corner, but will the govt pay for it? will the people of the country when they're asked to ? No.

Heheh thats my exact problem. The government should be paying for it, the people should want it. Why does every taxpayer in this country think their paying taxes for? Certainly not for infrastructure, policing, international aid relief, healthcare, business support. It doesnt exist, simply we pay taxes for no return in this country. I take issue with that.

[Lockstep]

Meh, I lived in Brussels for 7 years and never had any problems myself, although muggings were extremely commonplace among youngsters.
Would view it as more dangerous than Ireland anyway.

Dublin is alright, anytime I've been out at night there it's been grand.

While I notice a lot less violence and organised crime in Ireland than anywhere I've lived on the continent, Ireland seems to have a lot more low-end loutishness, especially at night. Nothing too bad but I work in a Belgian pub and have never seen any fights, people throwing up, passed out in the street, either in the pub, when walking home from work or from just being out in general (ok, did see one guy passed out but he was English)

[ninja900]

If you think Dublin is rough, try Tullow on a Saturday night, I'd rather walk along Pearse St at 3am in a pink tutu than go back there again.

[Dannyboy83]

If you don't include pikeys, I've only witnessed serious violence on a handful of occasions in Cork among normal people, but I'm bound to have seen more violence than others due to the job I was doing.

If you include the pikeys, yea, well.....they live up to their reputation at every given opportunity in my experience.

[dRNk SAnTA]

Dublin isn't really that bad. I think it sometimes looks worse here than other cities because Dublin has a lot of council flats in and around the city center where as in places like France they are well out in the suburbs and the city is the affluent place.

[anonymous_joe]

Some of the parts of the Netherlands I've been to were fairly dicey. Definitely wouldn't want to have been to Rotterdam or Amsterdam without a Dutch person to make sure I didn't go anywhere silly and get my head kicked in.

Compared to somewhere like Brazil where I've been, in Dublin you're a lot more likely to be punched in the head by a randomer (which has happened to me once, where some lad hit me in the back of hte head and ran on.) but a lot less likely to be stabbed, shot, whatever.

[Cianos]

If you get in to trouble elsewhere, it's for a reason. In Dublin you get in trouble simply by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

[monosharp]

What absolute nonsense by most of the posters here, have any of ye actually left home for more then a 2 week holiday to the Canaries ?

I've lived all over Europe and a lot of Asia and Ireland (UK too) is a scumbag hole compared to anywhere else.

Of course, in Europe, you can find no go areas which are at least comparable to places at home. The difference is of course that the scumbags in these areas don't migrate into the 'good' areas in European mainland countries.

Go for a pint in Dublin at night and repeat the process in Vienna or Paris or Lisbon or Porto or Prague etc and no one could deny the difference.

You know what the major difference is in my opinion ? Irish (and British) people go out, get sloshed ASAP and then act the bollox on the street. European people go out to drink and eat with friends.

Dublin, Limerick, Waterford, Cork, Sligo etc centre after closing time is like a bloody war zone compared to other cities in Europe and Asia.

Right now I live in a city of 10 million people in a metropolitan area with a population of nearly 30 million people. I go out almost every single night until the wee hours and in 2 years I have seen a total of 2 fights. I have been in 2 arguments myself (apart from those fights) with surprise surprise, one Irish lad and one Welsh lad over here and I don't even usually associate with the ex-pat community that much.

Violent crime is practically non-existent, speaking of course from my perspective of Irelands scumbag rich environment.

And as for your statistics, you can stick those up your arse.

Every one of us who has lived abroad for any extended period of time knows the reason those statistics make Ireland look relatively peaceful. Because the vast majority of crimes go unreported in Ireland and the cops are fecking useless.

I could go out in an Irish town at night and encounter 5-10 fights/arguments and none of them will go reported and not a cop in sight. And even if by some miracle someone reported it, the cops would still most likely turn up too late or turn a deaf ear if they could at all ignore it. I've seen guards walking the street and seeing a fight in process turning and walking the other way. I have worked in bars and I have called the useless pricks to come over only to have to sort the situation out myself or wait for an hour or 2 until 'Paddy gets back from the shop' or 'Seamus gets back with the patrol car'.

If the same thing happened here you'd have the cops involved within minutes in every single instance.

Heres a real life example for you.

My house was robbed when I was living in Dublin. Heres what happened.
- I called the cops. 2 hours later a patrol car with 2 guards arrived.
- They came to the door and asked me what happened, i.e > Asked me the exact same thing which I had already told them on the phone. They wrote it in their little notebook, perhaps because whoever answered my phonecall in the station couldn't write. They told me the forensic gang will be out later and they left.
- The next day, let me repeat that, the NEXT day the forensic crowd came to take fingerprints etc.

My ex-girlfriends house was robbed in a small city here in Asia (3 million)
- She called the cops. 10 minutes later and 2 cops were there, one stayed with us and the other went patrolling around the area. 10 minutes after that the forensic gang arrived, took fingerprints off every possible entry area and the other cops went interviewing the neighbors.
- The other two lads then went to the other buildings in the immediate area again, talking to the neighbors and taking copies of any and all CCTV footage.

So to summarise;

Ireland is a scumbag hole because of the culture, the lack of penalties for acting like this and the complete ineffectiveness of our police force.

And when I lived in Ireland I thought that this was normal everywhere.

[lightening]

Actually, I really should stop going to the Canaries for two weeks every year. Monosharp has opened my eyes to the reality of what a scary place Ireland is. He's so cool, lives in a foreign city with 10 million other super cool people, has a girlfriend and doesn't have to see "5-10 fights" every night like I do.

Boastful, assuming about other people, resentful bull****e post.

[Terrontress]

Originally Posted by lightening

Actually, I really should stop going to the Canaries for two weeks every year. Monosharp has opened my eyes to the reality of what a scary place Ireland is. He's so cool, lives in a foreign city with 10 million other super cool people, has a girlfriend and doesn't have to see "5-10 fights" every night like I do.

Boastful, assuming about other people, resentful bull****e post.

That's a bit harsh to be honest. I have lived for periods of over a year in Germany, London, Belfast and Dublin and can largely back up what he says.

There are many Irish people who consider themselves to be seasoned citizens of the world because they spent a gap year going round Australia, working in hourly paid jobs to get money to sit in pubs full of Irish people and talk about how great Ireland is, get sick, have a fight, try to score. They then come back to Ireland saying "I've seen the world, I didn't like it, Dublin is much better than those foreign countries".

Don't get me wrong, a lot of my experiences overseas have been as a tourist, but in my 8 years in Dublin I have seen untold fights, many of them vicious right in the middle of the road. I haven't felt threatened and have just walked on past. But that kind of behaviour would not be seen as frequently elsewhere.

[Angry Troll]

interesting thread here...i have in fact been wondering about just that myself for quite a while...i am german and have lived and worked in dublin for over six years now…and let me add i still like living here, all things considered…
but one of the things that never fail to infuriate me, besides the rip-off and some others, is the extreme number of skangers and generally scumbags here in dublin, basically anywhere you go, and all that comes with it like violence, thievery, beggary, littering and puking all over the place and all that…and this is something you simply do not see in any german city at any remotely comparable level and normally limited to anti-social hotspots outside city centres…and even there it is rather rare at that extreme level…
just what exactly is the issue in this country…i don’t get it…

[lightening]

Originally Posted by Terrontress

That's a bit harsh to be honest.

Yeah, it is a bit I guess. Apologies Monosharp. There is a bad element in Dublin, I'm not denying it. I don't consider myself to be a seasoned citizen of the world, but I have seen enough to realise that Dublin is a safe place to be.

But this anecdotal stuff, 5 to 10 fights witnessed ANY time you go out in Ireland? Give me a break.

Assuming people that like Dublin and Ireland go on two weeks holiday every year in the Canaries or have done the year Australia thing and think they know it all is pure ignorant.

[thebman]

Originally Posted by Angry Troll

interesting thread here...i have in fact been wondering about just that myself for quite a while...i am german and have lived and worked in dublin for over six years now…and let me add i still like living here, all things considered…
but one of the things that never fail to infuriate me, besides the rip-off and some others, is the extreme number of skangers and generally scumbags here in dublin, basically anywhere you go, and all that comes with it like violence, thievery, beggary, littering and puking all over the place and all that…and this is something you simply do not see in any german city at any remotely comparable level and normally limited to anti-social hotspots outside city centres…and even there it is rather rare at that extreme level…
just what exactly is the issue in this country…i don’t get it…

Extreme drinking culture IMHO. The drunker you get and the more crazy the crap you get up to, its like a higher honor to some people and I was drunk is the excuse the next day.

Then you have some people that are just hell bent on destroying everything decent in the country like amenities built for their own free use. I suspect that most of those people have nothing else to do during the day and are most of the same people that want to live on the dole their whole lives and then claim society has it in for them and that they are hard done by and also given the rest of the unemployed people a bad name that have good reasons for not being in work like genuine disability claimers or the recently unemployed.