[Micky Dolenz]

Mod

We seem to be getting a bit bogged down.

Move on from it please.

[Robdude]

Originally Posted by MungBean

Yeah, ya didnt know what a traveller was this time yesterday and now your confident enough to label them all lazy and call them tools based on an article about a group trying to highlight issues and improve the standard of living for people.

Your not exactly helping me here by living up to the stereotypical American who cant think for himself here.

Any time you make generalizations about anything; whether it be people, cars, rules, public policy; the very fact that you are generalizing means that it's not necessarily applicable to each and every X in the set of all things X.

I'm not labelling 'them all' as lazy and tools. I'm saying that as a whole, the group is lazy and tools.

You might disagree with that. Both lazy and 'being a tool' are highly subjective; there is certainly room to argue. You could even say that the articles I've read to formulate my opinion are biased or unrepresentative of travellers as a group and you might successfully sway my opinion of travellers.

But I don't see how you can claim that I'm not thinking for myself. Who told me what to think? Me. I didn't know anything about travellers, went out and did some (trivial) amount of reading on the subject and formulated an opinion. It's my own opinion. It might unfounded. It might be wrong. But it's certainly my own.

[lividduck]

Originally Posted by Makikomi

Context is everything.

I didn't use it, I was quoting it. Find anywhere else on boards.ie where I make reference to traveler's as anything other than "travelers".

Now if you want to ban my daughter from boards.ie go ahead, but you might have to wait a few years.

In that case I apologise

[MungBean]

Originally Posted by Robdude

Any time you make generalizations about anything; whether it be people, cars, rules, public policy; the very fact that you are generalizing means that it's not necessarily applicable to each and every X in the set of all things X.

I'm not labelling 'them all' as lazy and tools. I'm saying that as a whole, the group is lazy and tools.

You might disagree with that. Both lazy and 'being a tool' are highly subjective; there is certainly room to argue. You could even say that the articles I've read to formulate my opinion are biased or unrepresentative of travellers as a group and you might successfully sway my opinion of travellers.

The issue I have is with you generalising and calling travellers as a whole Lazy and tools. Calling the group as a whole lazy and referring to them as tools is labelling them. How the hell do you not understand that ?

But I don't see how you can claim that I'm not thinking for myself. Who told me what to think? Me. I didn't know anything about travellers, went out and did some (trivial) amount of reading on the subject and formulated an opinion. It's my own opinion. It might unfounded. It might be wrong. But it's certainly my own.

Because in the space of 24 hours you went from zero experience and understanding to having the opinion that they were lazy tools which you took from this thread because it was the majority opinion. Thats why I said you were not thinking for yourself.

You came in here and went away with an opinion about travellers without any experience, the fact you cited the article you did as "proof" of their laziness shows how little you actually knew in relation to travellers. If you looked at that article before you seen the popular opinion of travellers there is no way you could have drew that conclusion. So you copied others opinions and eagerly threw out an article about an action group trying to improve the living standards of travellers and called them lazy tools.

[Makikomi]

Originally Posted by lividduck

In that case I apologise

Absolutely no problem at all.

I'm well aware of people's sensitivities surrounding the issue of discrimination against members of the travelling community.

Now we're being all civil again I'll answer your question.

No I didn't correct her, tbh I thought it was funny at the time - not her use of the word but the comparison made between the size of the gravestones and thats why I used what she said in reply to a post by Slidey.

But ordinarily I'd discourage anyone from using the word.

When I use it myself almost 100% of the time I'm using it to describe a scumbag, in fact most people I know would use the word to describe a scumbag and not a traveller.

To the thread topic and their beliefs.

I've enough traveller mates to have formed my own opinions of them and their beliefs and wouldn't bother taking them (my opinions) from a TV show.

To further make my views on the matter known HERE is a thread from last year in this forum.

[Lelantos]

Originally Posted by Ghost Buster

They are as much as race as travellers.
If they carry a gene which makes them largely incapable of thinking for them selves then they must be a race?

I have worked with travellers & the one thing I will say is that the women are more open to change, to education & trying to understand country people. The men have generations of tradition & expectations of what a traveller man is supposed to be, that way of thinking is very hard to adjust.
I have been to traveller do's, in fairness, nothing like the C4 weddings, but I can tell you that one I was at 2 years ago was one of the nicest events I have ever been to & there was an ambassador present also. Settled folk, travellers & an ambassador, not often that gets a mention in the news is it?

[Robdude]

Originally Posted by MungBean

The issue I have is with you generalising and calling travellers as a whole Lazy and tools. Calling the group as a whole lazy and referring to them as tools is labelling them. How the hell do you not understand that ?



Because in the space of 24 hours you went from zero experience and understanding to having the opinion that they were lazy tools which you took from this thread because it was the majority opinion. Thats why I said you were not thinking for yourself.

You came in here and went away with an opinion about travellers without any experience, the fact you cited the article you did as "proof" of their laziness shows how little you actually knew in relation to travellers. If you looked at that article before you seen the popular opinion of travellers there is no way you could have drew that conclusion. So you copied others opinions and eagerly threw out an article about an action group trying to improve the living standards of travellers and called them lazy tools.

Nah - I hadn't bothered to read the thread; just the title. Whether or not it is the majority opinion on Boards.ie would have little impact on my opinion. I read the article and did a quick wikipedia search and - given that information - felt as though the group met my standards for being 'lazy tools'.

Given that a group of people can either be 'Lazy tools' or 'not lazy tools' it's expected that a large number of people are going to share my opinion, whichever opinion I hold. Even if I do more research and that leads me to believe that they are not lazy tools; there would be plenty of people that would also hold that opinion.

Having the same opinion as someone doesn't mean you don't have your own opinion.

What's really interesting is that you seem to have detailed insight into what I do in front of my PC.

How can you possibly know if I read the thread or not. Or what impact reading this thread had on my understanding of Travellers? You said, " If you looked at that article before you seen the popular opinion of travellers there is no way you could have drew that conclusion." but that is *EXACTLY* what I did. Given the information in that article and only that information; that is the opinion I would have of any group of people. Given that I've had zero real life experience with anyone who identifies as a traveller, I have very little vested in this either way. I don't neither good nor bad opinions of them. Racially, I'm not even sure if they are different than Irish or whatever, even if I were a racist bastard; I don't even know if I should like or dislike them.

From the article:

They could make you feel welcome, that would be a start. We face a lot of barriers when we go to use services. As soon as we say where we are from or they hear our accent, they look down at us.” She says that medical staff often complain that Travellers don’t show up for appointments. “We don’t always get them because we mightn’t have a postal address and many of us can’t read them anyway.”

That statement, in isolation; is enough for me to form an opinion. Someone is complaining that people don't go out of their way to make them feel welcome while consuming their services. In the very next breath, the speaker justifies what is incredibly rude behaviour (not showing up for an appointment) because they can't arrange for mail delivery and even if they do get the letter, they can't read them and can't be hassled with finding someone who can.

Nobody likes to be stood up. If you have an appointment, you went through SOME trouble to arrange that. I don't have any medical appointments in Ireland because I haven't gone out of my way to create one. The very fact that someone has an appointment means that they have requested it's existence. Not showing up is a jackass move. It happens enough that medical staff complain that travellers don't show up. Not showing up for appointments defeats the purpose of having appointments.

If I missed an appointment, when I did return to that medical center or restaurant or business - whatever it is. I would begin by saying, 'I'm sorry'. That would, quite literally, be the first words out of my mouth. 'Hi, I'm sorry, I had an appointment last month but I missed it.....' I would *expect* that they would be visibly annoyed to some degree. Since, you know, by not showing up or cancelling in advance, I'm basically saying that I consider their time to be insignificant. I would absolutely NOT complain that, after a long history of not showing up, people working at said medical center, restaurant or business, didn't seem to care much about my appointments. Obviously, I don't care much either.

Short of mental illness, I think there are certain things people should be able to do. Basic common stuff, that people who live in societies can expect of one another. Now, if you can't read - I'm actually okay with that. But when you get a letter and the logo on the letter matches the logo you saw at the medical center you requested an appointment at, maybe that means something. Maybe, if you want to maintain a good relationship with the folks who work at the building - you should take some action to decypher it.

Also from the article

Mary Brigit Collins says when her child comes home from school she says, “Mammy, the teacher asked me to draw a picture of a house.”

“They never ask her to draw a picture of a trailer.”

Again, knowing nothing about traveller's this tells me a lot.

First, it tells me that traveller's children are able to attend non-traveller schools. This makes me question why other students in public schools can learn to read and write? It also gives me an example of what is considered discrimination. In my humble opinion; that is not even close to discrimination. And I say this as someone who lived in a double-wide trailer as a child. This is not an example of discrimination; this is an example of a society that (like all societies) incorporates their cultural values into their educational system. And, as I'm not Irish - I really don't give a crap if Ireland has a discriminatory educational system - but I'm telling you, that's not an example of discrimination. I was in college before my parents owned a house. I never once felt discriminated against because I was taught what a single family home was. I also drew pictures of barns, horses, boats and countless other things that my family never personally owned.

I could pick apart everything I used from the article to formulate an opinion and link the relevant wikipedia articles. And I'm even willing to admit that my opinion might be ENTIRELY WRONG; given that I'm basing it off of no actual experience and only two quick Google searches. But it's absolutely my opinion - and I'll stand behind it until confronted with additional information that might change it. Which is also entirely possible. I have no vested interest in this.

[BigEejit]

Originally Posted by bensweeney

Your lucky, I grew up in Tuam. Surrounded by them, Do gooders will never understand the reality until they live in close proximity to them.

This +1000

[LH Pathe]

'tis said, that shorts that so much as cover the thighs, would not compliment the sockless brogues, on a fine day.