Are the Irish too self conscious ?

RobAMerc

I will start this debate by saying yes - most definitely !

I mean ask an Irish person to do anything at all thats seen out of the ordinary and they are more worried about what others will think about them than any other consequences.

Irish bloke in bright jumper - jaysus I look a twat
Irish guy see's cyclist in cycling shorts - jaysus what a twat
Irish person see's another in a convertible car - twat
A few years ago - Irish person with sunglasses on - twat

Why do we always think other people do things so you'll look at them ?

Is it because we'd only ever try something different so people would look at us - ( And call us twats )

And before anyone else says it - yea I know I look a twat

Rb

I think it's more a trait of the older generation, such as our parents etc. who are a bit more...reserved? than the current generation of teenagers/20 somethings/early thirties.

We're also a nation of begrudgers apparently, so if you hear someone complaining about someone with a covertible, they're probably just begruding said persons success that enabled them to buy said car. I saw a guy driving a Ferrari with the top down and a pair of sunglasses on the other day and just thought "Wow I hope I'm in such a position when I'm that age", though I know a lot would think "Ooh someones going through his mid-life crisis-twat" out of pure jealously.

Irish people in general, used to have very little, now a lot of people have a lot of wealth and can show it off. Some didn't benefit from the celtic tiger and will begrudge those who did, it's just jealousy at the end of the day and in reality, they're the twats.

For some bizarre reason, a lot of Irish people expect a form of conformity from their fellow Irishmen, and should someone not conform to their expectations, they're begrudged or mocked for being different.

It's backwards thinking and "tunnel vision" (iirc) and it's a trait, as I said, that a lot of our older generation possess which unfortunately has been passed on to some of our generation.

Gone West

I will admit that there aren't a lot of real people in Ireland.
You just need to start socialising and making friends with individuals who do as they please.

I figured out a long time ago that its easier to be happy and carefree, rather than embarrassed and self concious about anything.
If you simply don't care what the next person thinks, it makes life a lot easier!

Sherifu

Keeping up with the Joneses. Lots of fake faggots about.

sidneykidney

I do the things i do or wear the clothes i wear beause i like them. I dont look for acceptance from anybody,people that know me my family and friends there the ones that matter not people on the street that look on you with disdain if you dont conform to the "norm". Well guess what fcuk off i aint looking for you to like me.

connundrum

I don't think it is self consciousness now, it may have been in years gone by.

What I find is that we're a very pass-remarkable lot. All of the OP's examples just show that the person who is commenting has a loud mouth.

People need to start minding their own business, and stop commenting on other people's lives/habits/dress sense etc.

I remember being the first one in my village to take up cycling, with the whole bike/shorts/top thing. Jaysus if I was called a faggot once I was called one a hundred times. My thinking was 'What in actual God's name has it got to do with you, you retard!'

But then I was from Offaly and that was just the way.

RealEstateKing

stuff, they just do it for different reasons:

In Italy, people will look down at you for not dressing up to the nines every time you step out of the house, for example, In Latin America, a similar culture applies.

Every culture has it's indicators of social status. Ireland, having been predominantly a peasant country - ruled by foreigners , has a culture which until recently took pride in ordinariness - "None o' yer feckin fancy stuff!". Caring about clothes, fine food, manners etc would have been seen as "trying to be English" in much the same way as a college education and being well-spoken would have been seen as "acting white" in Afro-American culture.

However, we've gotten very rich very quickly in recent years: So one half of us is still suspicious of people "putting on airs", and another is obsessed with money/social status in the American tradtion. So we're conflicted.

And as well as this, we are a very small country, you can tell from minute variations in accent, what social background/area a person is from, making it possibly to be intricately predudiced against people on this basis. This is not like America, where you pack up your stuff, move to the coast and reinvent yourself. Nor is it like Continental Europe, where there is a tradition of looking up to those with finer manners and more refined tastes.

We are Nouveau Riche Nation.

togster

I agree with real estate. It's not confined to Ireland. At the end of the day it's up to you as an individual to do what you want and not conform to status and label.

funk-you

I'd agree about a lot of people are pass-remarkable. I was at a BBQ at the weekend and to my shame my brother brought out a karaoke machine.

Anyway, a Girls Aloud song came on and a 20 something girl tells us they're terrible because they're all too thin. This girl seriously looked like she had an eating disorder and would break in a strong wind. Her comment had nothing to do with their personalities or music. Can't quite get my head around that line of thinking.

-Funk

all the stars

some aren't conscious enough joking there..

Yep i have been victim of the "twat" thing many a time as i never blended in with the norm.. and i liked it too! feic em, too scared to be an individual!

kwestfan08

Ireland is definatly too self-conscious IMO

Swarley

were only self conscious in the day time, then we get drunk and don't care about whats going on. good times:D

arbeitsscheuer

God I'm genuinely sick of threads like this... "The Irish" this, "The English" that, "The French" the other. What a load of bollocks. You're going to tell me that 4 million people have the same insecurities and neuroses? Are you f**king retarded? When will people realise that this dividing people into nations and then generalising about their character/personality is an exercise of extreme pointlessness, futility and ignorance. WTF.

Rant over.

Captain Darling

arbeitsscheuer wrote: »

God I'm genuinely sick of threads like this... "The Irish" this, "The English" that, "The French" the other. What a load of bollocks. You're going to tell me that 4 million people have the same insecurities and neuroses? Are you f**king retarded? When will people realise that this dividing people into nations and then generalising about their character/personality is an exercise of extreme pointlessness, futility and ignorance. WTF.

Rant over.

Do you think Irish people rant too much?

Ross_Mahon

I hate the way if you went out on rollerblades people would comment on you "What the hell is he like, rollerblades was SO 6 years ago" I think anything that other people aren't doing is 'not normal'.

Yes i think Irish people are fascinated with their image and men are becoming more feminine, have you seen the amount of new beauty products for men? No7 for men!

funk-you

arbeitsscheuer wrote: »

God I'm genuinely sick of threads like this... "The Irish" this, "The English" that, "The French" the other. What a load of bollocks. You're going to tell me that 4 million people have the same insecurities and neuroses? Are you f**king retarded? When will people realise that this dividing people into nations and then generalising about their character/personality is an exercise of extreme pointlessness, futility and ignorance. WTF.

Rant over.

Its AH, generalising FTW! Nobody said anything about every single Irish person. AH is about extreme pointlessness. If the OP wanted to discuss this in a way that you're talking about he probably would've f/cked off over to humanities.

-Funk

arbeitsscheuer

Infononymous wrote: »

Do you think Irish people rant too much?

Nicely done sir, that was very quick off the mark... Touché

funk-you wrote:

Its AH, generalising FTW! Nobody said anything about every single Irish person. AH is about extreme pointlessness. If the OP wanted to discuss this in a way that you're talking about he probably would've f/cked off over to humanities.

Fair point. I may have misinterpreted the OP's intentions.

gogglebok

arbeitsscheuer wrote: »

God I'm genuinely sick of threads like this... "The Irish" this, "The English" that, "The French" the other. What a load of bollocks.

Are you suggesting that being brought up with the same culture in the same environmental conditions has no effect at all on how people's personalities develop?

If it has no impact, what does? Are our personalities entirely determined before birth? Do we choose them from scratch? If it does have an impact, how could similar social and physical environments not affect people in similar ways? I'm genuinely not sure what your position is here.

RealEstateKing

When will people realise that this dividing people into nations and then generalising about their character/personality is an exercise of extreme pointlessness, futility and ignorance. WTF.

Yeah, that's right. Every country on the planet has had exactly the same history, geography, genetic make-up, language, literature, religion and culture, food, social makeup for these past 10,000 years.

Thats why they're all exactly the same.

***
Of course if one makes a generalisation such as "All English are X" it's quite possibly boneheaded, or racist. But making generalisations is the basis of all conversations about anything that is larger than one person.

gogglebok

RealEstateKing wrote: »

But making generalisations is the basis of all conversations about anything that is larger than one person.

Nouns are the tool of the oppressor.

newname

totally agree with the point about irish people and sunglasses, up till recently it would have been the norm for irish people to be sitting with their hand to the sky blocking the sun with squinted watering eyes rather than feeling able to wear sunglasses in some company!!

Affable

gogglebok wrote: »

Nouns are the tool of the oppressor.

And I am the oppressor of tools.

biko

Definitely more self concious. Foreign chicks will do some crazy stuff, Irish girls will stretch to doing it with the light on.

Davidius

Too much British slang in the first post. :pac:

Yes the Irish are too self conscious. Sometimes I can't say things to people because they fear that if somebody hears what I said to them people will think we're weird.

It wouldn't even be weird, it would be something along the lines of an in joke.

Though I think anybody who thinks that a person is judging another person because they are jealous of the other's success is generally fooling themselves.

Yes the Irish are too self conscious. Sometimes I can't say things to people because they fear that if somebody hears what I said to them people will think we're weird.

I realised when I moved here (and I was only a kid) how much other people care WAY too much about what other people are doing/saying/thinking. Everything I said was judged or interpreted in some way. Everything I wore was commented on. If anyone ever came in with their hair dyed or a piercing they were the talk of the school. When I lived in England, nobody cared half as much about other people and their business. You can walk around in London or Manchester wearing anything under the sun and nobody looks at you, here if you wear something slightly different, you get stares. One of my friends at school once commented that 'nobody liked my watch' and I thought how truly pathetic it must be to go through your life making decisions based on what other people think. It's a great feeling to just be yourself, and a lot of people must miss out on that.

It's hilarious when you see black people/polish/spanish on a dance floor. They're always so open and can actually dance. And then you see an irish guy/girl dancing with such constraint, usually with their elbows tucked into their arm pits.

hairymolly

The way I see it, 'they' are not paying my mortgage, bills, putting food on the table, 'they' can have any opinion they want. I'l do it my way.

Red Hand

T'is far from boards.ie ye were raished!

cashback

One thing we definitely have is some kind of inferiority complex. You'll often see it when some Hollywood star is asked what they think of Ireland, have they been often, what do they think of the Irish. It gets embarrassing after a while.
I still remember Kathryn Thomas etc. running up to every celebrity at the Special Olympics in Croker a few years ago. "What do you think of the Irish effort?", "Isn't this an amazing stadium?", "Is this the best Special Olympcis yet?". Cringe.
Reminded me of Bart with Milhouses mom...."Tell me I'm good."

BraziliaNZ

took only one post for someone to say the word "begrudger", every Irish person's favourite word when discussing our country...
Anyway - there is definitely something wrong. My hair is usually about 3 inches long at most and I used to get kids shouting "hippy" at me when i lived in Smithfield. Also I saw kids with skateboards or who dressed differently getting attacked a few times by other kids a few times in town and had to break it up once because 4 of them were picking on one poor youngfella because he looked different than they did. I always felt really self-conscious when wearing shorts or sunglasses even on nice days in Dublin. I don't know why. Down here it's different, anything goes pretty much. All my friends at home are great and don't care what anyone does or looks like but your average Paddy seems to almost get offended if you look or act differently.

RobAMerc

Deleted User wrote: »

It's hilarious when you see black people/polish/spanish on a dance floor. They're always so open and can actually dance. And then you see an irish guy/girl dancing with such constraint, usually with their elbows tucked into their arm pits.

How very true !

Do we think everybody on the dance floor is just looking at us and laughing or, maybe just maybe they're too busy enjoying themselves and letting go to give a fiddlers what we're doing so we should let go and enjoy ourselves !

Wompa1

I wish we were more self concious..during Rag Week in Galway a guy pissed in a letter box!!!

all the stars

Deleted User wrote: »

It's hilarious when you see black people/polish/spanish on a dance floor. They're always so open and can actually dance. And then you see an irish guy/girl dancing with such constraint, usually with their elbows tucked into their arm pits.

Being the topic it is, im not gonna be coy about this one -

that comment is rubbish, On much more than one occasion i have had some of the foreign ladies on the dancefloor try to usher me out of their way as i was doin my thing and have to say, im a good dancer, i look good dancing, i dont be doing this awkward pretend im on a pole goin up & down like these other women - i am a sexy dancer! Nothing too in your face, and i have had women, try to get their mens attention back from them oogeling at me!

While on hols in Spain the professional podium dancer got down as all the lads were taking pics of me! She got the bouncer to get me to stop! (worth mentioning she was in hotpants, stilletto's and a boob tube - i was in a skirt below the knee, and a vest top )It was funny - so Irish people can dance! and im not too self conscious.. Just wanna do my thing - feic the haters!

Ruskie4Rent

While i tend to like genuine unique people more than sheep, there are things that would make me think someone is just a 'twat'.
Like dudes that wear scarfs and sunglasses indoors. Its not really a comment on their individuality, it's more than likely they are just 'twats'. Prejudice, I know, but when i see people that seem pretentious or vain i can't help thinking they are 'twats'.
Twat is a good word.

BraziliaNZ

Ruskie4Rent wrote: »

While i tend to like genuine unique people more than sheep, there are things that would make me think someone is just a 'twat'.
Like dudes that wear scarfs and sunglasses indoors. Its not really a comment on their individuality, it's more than likely they are just 'twats'. Prejudice, I know, but when i see people that seem pretentious or vain i can't help thinking they are 'twats'.
Twat is a good word.

That's a f*cking TERRIBLE attitude. You summed up all I hate about Dublin, people with that attitude.