Are we used to Dublin being a Kip?

dreamliner

Today I picked up a friend of mine who has travelled here from Israel on business for a few days. After stopping by his hotel we went out for coffee.

Whilst sitting having our coffee in town 5 young guys and girls started loitering outside and then just dumped all the food they were eating onto the ground including their packaging, it was quite disgusting if I'm honest. They were also smoking joints of weed.

What was most noticeable was our reactions, to me it was just some troublesome kids who are 2 a penny in this city and their behaviour wasn't anything i hadn't seen before. However for my friend it was very different, he could not believe what he had seen and held his eyes wide open in amazement. He couldn't believe what they had done, and not just that, but that nobody seemed to have batted an eyelid. Apparently such normalised anti social behaviour like that just doesn't exist in Israel and if someone did that, someone their senior would force them to clean up their miss, grab them by the ear if necessary. The fact they were smoking weed at what appeared to be 12 years of age finished it off for him, he couldn't understand how any society deems that normal. I just shrugged my shoulders ... i even remember a lad had to have alcohol pumped out his stomach in primary school cos he overdrank in a field one night, again nothing new for me.

Moving on then we were walking along the liffey and became the unwilling victims of random drunken abuse from a couple of junkies. My friend genuinely seemed scared and wanted to get the hell out of the situation, again anything they said just went in one ear and out the other for me, it's the same s***t i've heard them say to randomers since being a child in this city. He just isn't used to such situations in Israel and was adamant they would be approached by law enforcement if it occurred there.

Comparing the reactions of the 2 of us to both situations he witnessed on his very first day in this city, is it fair to say we as people born or living in Dublin for extensive periods of time have become used to such anti social behaviour and it become normalised, when it shouldn't be?

bodhrandude

Ah this is 'Our Main Street' thread re-titled.

SmartinMartin

Why didn't he fire a load of rockets at them, wiping out their families? Isn't that the usual reaction?

whisky_galore

I would agree with everything only Israel being some sort of a country or society to aspire to.

endacl

SmartinMartin wrote: »

Why didn't he fire a load of rockets at them, wiping out their families? Isn't that the usual reaction?

Anti-Israel dig accidentally becomes good idea!

Gimme A Pound

No evidence he supports the IDF. Dunno if Israel is such a bad society either (just its government/military, and even then, it's not black and white).

But on topic: yeah this kinda stuff is taken for granted here and the UK I reckon. The US too.

SmartinMartin

endacl wrote: »

Anti-Israel dig accidentally becomes good idea!

So you think is ok to kill people who behave antisocially?

dreamliner

I didn't intend for the focus of the discussion to be the military tactics of his country of origin, anyway i'll address it briefly. Him and I have discussed the situation there countless times and I wouldn't class myself as a supporter of their government's tactics, he himself has served in the IDF but never saw combat, and even he disagrees with certain things that have happened and the general way things go, as far as politics go he would be left wing there and is very much in favour of a multi cultural Israeli society where muslims, jews and christians live side by side, he regularly does business with Muslims in his home town of Jaffa and in general hates extreme views on both sides, he will choose a moderate muslim over an extreme right wing israeli as his friend ... also opposes netanyahu's inflammatory building in settlement zone C. His opinions aside though, even if he wasn't all those things i'm not sure he'd be my enemy, i have many Palestinian friends too, i find being friends with different people regardless of their backgrounds gives me lots of experience and helps improve my understanding of the world.

Thread drift hopefully out of the way now.

It was my first time welcoming him to my home city, Dublin, and i have to say i was so embarrassed at how the first day went which prompted this thread, is there anything the garda can actually do in either of the circumstances? I'm not sure how far laws can go in solving the general lack of respect for society so many have, it's almost as if it's cultural and will take a complete re-education of the population to solve it

mikemac2

Ah this is like the thread last week when all Irish scam public transport and every other country has only honest citizens and live in paradise

FanadMan

Dublin is a kip. And will be until the junkies/skangers etc are culled or electronically prevented from entering the city.

but........


"They were also smoking joints of weed"

.....this really tickled me

DubInTheWest

From israel and never saw anything like it lmao. Israel is a kip, even worse than Limerick I heard but I'm not 100% on that ?

EL_Loco

When was your first drink OP?
Were you under age?
If you saw the image of your former self while in the company of your tourist would he have been disgusted at the scene?

Do you support the gards as much as is within reason of a citizen who thinks it falls to them to stop littering and verbal abuse on the streets?

Note: (I'm not a gard)

sk8erboii

Are you a road warrior OP?

You living in some parallel dimension where Dublin is a post apocalyptic wasteland?

whisky_galore

sk8erboii wrote: »

You living in some parallel dimension where Dublin is a post apocalyptic wasteland?

It's as good as one.

Loads of cities have petty annoyances or scam artists, usually obvious enough and easily avoided, Dublin has got "you lookin' at me" types and scum that want to rob and do real harm to both natives and tourists.
Scum that scam and rob tourists abroad are afraid of getting a real physical hammering and kicking from their police if caught, here there's no such fear of the law.

MarkY91

Had my Austrian friend over two weeks ago. She is well traveled. She now considers Dublin/Ireland the second best country she's ever visited (Canada being number 1..relatives live there).

I'll be in Israel in two weeks. I'm sure I'll see scumbag behaviour just like I have in every city I've ever been to.

Hedgelayer

What I love about Dublin is the fact its our capital and has great culture and diversity.

I love the real dubs, the oul triangle types you can have a conversation with and they'll tell you Clare is a beautiful county and how they love rural Ireland...
And I about how I love the rare aul times

An unadulterated kip, to quote Joe Duffy.

I'm sorry OP but how on earth did it not occur to you that Israel should not be an example to any other country in terms of how it organises and regulates its society.

But also, Irish people are amazing for our self-loathing belief that this is the worst place in the world, and we're all terrible. Is it a relic of Catholicism, or colonisation, or what?

suicide_circus

not joints of weed!?!!

DrumSteve

Dublin isn't a kip.

iamwhoiam

I dont think the Israelies are really in a position to judge us because of a bit of litter if I am honest .

super_furry

Dublin's class.

topper75

DubInTheWest wrote: »

From israel and never saw anything like it lmao. Israel is a kip, even worse than Limerick I heard but I'm not 100% on that ?

Was this 'Limerick is a kip' lie purely fabricated by Dublin-based media as an attempt to deflect from Dublin issues?

What do you know first-hand about Limerick, if anything? I don't think you are 100% on Limerick either.

topper75

topper75 wrote: »

Was this 'Limerick is a kip' lie purely fabricated by Dublin-based media as an attempt to deflect from Dublin issues?

What do you know first-hand about Limerick, if anything? I don't think you are 100% on Limerick either.

I'm from Tipperary, and grew up with Limerick being my nearest city. I know it well as being a kip. He's not wrong in fairness.

If anything, the media seem to feel guilty for reporting fairly and accurately on Limerick's previous stabbiness, and now go to great lengths to emphasise the positive aspects. But we all know.

Yurt2

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

I'm from Tipperary, and grew up with Limerick being my nearest city. I know it well as being a kip. He's not wrong in fairness.

If anything, the media seem to feel guilty for reporting fairly and accurately on Limerick's previous stabbiness, and now go to great lengths to emphasise the positive aspects. But we all know.

Limerick was never as bad as it was portrayed in the media. It took an unwarranted kicking from the national media, many of whom would stick around for only a couple of days and film unflattering looking footage from a couple of sink estates and high-tail it back to Dublin.

It's the equivalent of ITV rocking up in Dublin, filming a few crap looking estates in West-Dublin, and making out like that's the entire story of the city.

A few (admittedly awful) families trashed the reputation of the city. The last few times I've been back, the place is well back on track and with all the development happening in the city centre, my money is on it being the most livable city in the country once it's all completed.

CrankyHaus

Leaving aside the whole Palestine issue Israel has fairly unique history and cultural aspects that would explain such a reaction from your friend.

While it has obviously changed significantly since, it was founded by secular socialists upon a model of community based engaged citizenship, characterised at least as much by responsibilities as rights. Things like universal conscription and the kibbutz model are fairly red by todays standards. It's not hard to see how that would engender a society less tolerant of anti-social behaviour than Ireland's and more likely to directly address it, whereas Irish culture is far less law and order focused and generally sees anyone taking it upon themselves to criticise anti-social behaviour as busybodies.

Hector Savage

SmartinMartin wrote: »

Why didn't he fire a load of rockets at them, wiping out their families? Isn't that the usual reaction?

Lies and bull****

Hal3000

You can tell your friend that this happens because there is ZERO accountability for anything in this country. The scumbags in this country are well aware of that and couldn't give a rats. You can also tell your friend that our current leaders have totally ignored domestic issues so along with a massive spike in gang warfare, our fair city is slowly going down the tubes.

SporadicMan

Interesting insight into the mindset that causes these issues.

"Your friend is from ISRAEL, this invalidates anything he said about Dublin!"

Israel can be a disgusting country and Dublin can still be a ****ing kip. OP never said that we should aspire to emulate Israel on all issues.

lawred2

dreamliner wrote: »

Today I picked up a friend of mine who has travelled here from Israel on business for a few days. After stopping by his hotel we went out for coffee.

Whilst sitting having our coffee in town 5 young guys and girls started loitering outside and then just dumped all the food they were eating onto the ground including their packaging, it was quite disgusting if I'm honest. They were also smoking joints of weed.

What was most noticeable was our reactions, to me it was just some troublesome kids who are 2 a penny in this city and their behaviour wasn't anything i hadn't seen before. However for my friend it was very different, he could not believe what he had seen and held his eyes wide open in amazement. He couldn't believe what they had done, and not just that, but that nobody seemed to have batted an eyelid. Apparently such normalised anti social behaviour like that just doesn't exist in Israel and if someone did that, someone their senior would force them to clean up their miss, grab them by the ear if necessary. The fact they were smoking weed at what appeared to be 12 years of age finished it off for him, he couldn't understand how any society deems that normal. I just shrugged my shoulders ... i even remember a lad had to have alcohol pumped out his stomach in primary school cos he overdrank in a field one night, again nothing new for me.

Moving on then we were walking along the liffey and became the unwilling victims of random drunken abuse from a couple of junkies. My friend genuinely seemed scared and wanted to get the hell out of the situation, again anything they said just went in one ear and out the other for me, it's the same s***t i've heard them say to randomers since being a child in this city. He just isn't used to such situations in Israel and was adamant they would be approached by law enforcement if it occurred there.

Comparing the reactions of the 2 of us to both situations he witnessed on his very first day in this city, is it fair to say we as people born or living in Dublin for extensive periods of time have become used to such anti social behaviour and it become normalised, when it shouldn't be?

where exactly did you take him? and why?

steddyeddy

Wow OP your post had everything. A probably imaginary event in Dublin, imaginary friends from Israel. A hypocritical statement from the imaginary friend about his imaginary trip to Dublin. Those are all the ingredients you need for a good provoking in After Hours. Good luck OP xxxx

Yurt!

Yurt! wrote: »

Limerick was never as bad as it was portrayed in the media. It took an unwarranted kicking from the national media, many of whom would stick around for only a couple of days and film unflattering looking footage from a couple of sink estates and high-tail it back to Dublin.

It's the equivalent of ITV rocking up in Dublin, filming a few crap looking estates in West-Dublin, and making out like that's the entire story of the city.

A few (admittedly awful) families trashed the reputation of the city. The last few times I've been back, the place is well back on track and with all the development happening in the city centre, my money is on it being the most livable city in the country once it's all completed.

Ah it was pure rough there in the late 1990s in fairness. Certainly, parts of it were always lovely suburbs and were unscathed by crime and poverty, but it must have been a miserable place for a lot of its residents to grow up in.

In my part of Tipperary, having friends from Limerick was a euphemism for being somewhat dodgy. It was a place the bad kids went on weekends. A lot of it was exaggeration, and I know the city has improved a lot recently. The University has done wonders for that city, and that's wonderful.

It still seems to have plenty of problems, all of which stem from poverty, and if anything I suspect that the media have taken on board the criticism of their coverage (some of which is deserved) but now there are problems in Limerick that the media almost seem reluctant to cover.