Blatant rudeness to American Presidents...Past AND Present!

A Battered Mars Bar

Reagan, Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump....even Washington. They're not Brazilian football players with one name so why is it the norm for us to rudely address them by their surname only in conversation both formal and informal. It's a common sign of disrespect in this country to address someone by their surname solely.

Contrast this with our Presidents. We don't go around saying Higgins did this and that. The two Marys previous are usually referred to in full and not by just Robinson or McAleese.

Jack Lynch...we don't say Lynch. Now we do say Haughey, clearly proving the point that we're disrespecting American presidents for some unknown reason.

It doesn't stop on our Isles either. Even Osama Bin Laden was never referred to as Laden or Saddam Heussein just Heussein. Did we ever just say Cameron this Cameron that? No. If I said May is in a fiscal fascal foundry mess you'd say who? James May?....no Theresa May!

So after all that did anyone hear what Obama said to Trump about Bush?

Royal Irish

Sure Americans themselves say things like "Trumps mouth is a cock holster for Putins dick"

rebel456

I always thought it rude to refer to someone solely by their first name. Sort of lacks respect (not that some in the political sphere deserve much anyway)

In terms of American Presidents, aren't we just following what Americans do themselves, they always seem to call the person with the surname. In fact we do too at times, with Haughey as you mentioned, and DeV - even shortening that one, how rude of us!

BoJack Horseman

Largely because do we even know who our presidents were?

I can list back to Patrick Hillary.... Nothing beyond that, though I'm fairly sure Dev was in there at some point.

Add to that that they were/are powerless, so no one cares.

Who's 'we'

JustWantNetPlz

We live in a country where your surname tends to be your nickname, the fúck are you shíting on about.

Jim Bob Scratcher

No one outside of Ireland know's who Micky D Higgins is though

qwerty ui op

Washington is usually given full name so is FDR and JFK, Nixon Trump Bush tend to be more often just the surname. The ****tier you are the less people give toss.

Your Face

Would all the outrage merchants kindly just f--k off?

qo2cj1dsne8y4k

No worse that's referring to the leader of our own country as a biffo

Donald Trump

Yeah.

Show me respect bitches

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rggspuTEir8

Cookie_Monster

LexieOnRale wrote: »

No worse that's referring to the leader of our own country as a biffo

or Mikey D

Donald Trump

LexieOnRale wrote: »

No worse that's referring to the leader of our own country as a biffo

Yeah but he was a biffo in fairness

So much so that even if he wasn't from Offaly we could have justified calling him a biffo anyway

Rubberchikken

I like President Trump.

Hate me all you like🤣

Turquoise Hexagon Sun

Simple. Bush is short for President Bush. We're dropping "president" more than anything. The Bush Administration or Clinton Administration. You just say the name and guess what? It works.

With regard to your Saddam Hussein analogy. He's not commonly known by a title like "President" before his name. We also commonly refer to Saddam as just Saddam because his name is very unique in English. A bit like Hitler. We say Hitler, I think, because it's the easier of the two names to roll off the tongue.

Here's one that might blow your mind seing as you're been sooo deeep man.

Simon and Garfunkle

Two people going by their surnames and by their own accord! Is your mind blown?

Mine isn't

BTW, who says it's rude? I don't know, I'm guessing the OP is trying to be funny or something but when the premise seems a less than smart, I just have to answer kind of sincerely but I don't see any irony or joke in it. :P

ChikiChiki

Thread title is like something Trump himself would write. Sorry, I mean President Trump.

Annasopra

What?

I've often heard Haughey, Bruton, Kenny, Varadkar, Cowen, McAleese, Robinson, Higgins used.

I have also seen this used with UK too; Cameron, May, Thatcher, Major etc

I think here in Ireland we go a little bit further in informality using first names too; Charlie, Bertie, Enda, Leo, Michael D. They really font do this in other countries.