Forbes Article - Limerick city

SoapMcTavish

Billionaire Stripe founder Patrick Collison has taken Forbes Magazine to task over an article referencing the Tipperary brothers’ “escape” from “stab city” to Silicon Valley.

“Some call it ‘stab city’,” begins the article by contributing writer Stephen McBride.

“Many folks think Ireland is all rolling green hills and five-star golf courses. But in the middle of the Irish countryside is a city called Limerick – known as the ‘murder capital’ of Europe. ”

Given the global success story of the Collisons – both brothers now reportedly worth $9.5 billion apiece – a profile in Forbes is not unusual. But the language has drawn fire on social media.

Patrick Collison quickly weighed in on Twitter saying the finance magazine was “not only mistaken about Limerick but the idea of ‘overcoming’ anything is crazy. We are who we are because we grew up where we did”.

That was actually Dromineer in Co Tipperary, some 30 miles outside Limerick. In a 2014 interview with the Financial Times, John Collison quipped about how he often wondered “if it’s desirable to grow up somewhere boring because you’re forced to find your own interests”.

Firm valued at $95bn
Those interests – computer programming – would eventually culminate in making Stripe a household name company recently valued at $95 billion, the most valuable start-up in the US.

“Limerick is the last place you want your kids growing up,” continued Mr McBride’s article, published on Friday. “But two brothers who went to high school there recently beat the odds. Not only did they escape ‘stab city’, they moved to Silicon Valley.”

Minister of State at the Department of Finance Patrick O’Donovan tweeted that as a representative of the Government he was calling on the magazine to “immediately apologise to the people of Limerick for the insult and hurt caused by the article”.

BTW - readers@forbes.com for feedback

thesimpsons

fairly shocking article tbh and while Forbes have taken the article down, it still remains on the author's own website and now is repeated in most of the irish media. Would be hopeful it would not dissuade any companies from investing in Limerick. Whatever about our past, Limerick is now a fairly multiculutural city with 3 universities/colleges and numerous manufacturing and technological companies together with heavy investment in R&D. I wrote to Forbes, and also to the Risk Hedge.com requesting they issue a retraction to Limerick.

MarkR

It's customary when posting an article, that you also post your opinion on it. You should also post a link to the actual article. I know in this case that it has already been taking down, but no point in just posting it in isolation.

My opinion on the story, it's lazy writing, relying on old tropes.

yop

That's bloody awful, takes me back to the level of lazy bashing from Gerry Ryan which really annoyed me.

It's like he robbed an article from the 90s

Tell me how

If it is true that it was written by someone from Dublin (correct me if I am wrong and I will delete this) then they should be ashamed at themselves for A, painting such a false narrative about the city and B, ignoring the history (and ongoing storyline) of their own local.

There's probably a bit of a Streisand effect going on in that the reaction to what was published could draw more attention to the story than if it had just been left alone. Still, not a great image to have potentially pop up in the newsfeed of people who may be considering further investment opportunities in Ireland.

Fair play to the Collisons for pushing back immediately and for the Irish Embassy in America for reacting with some positive imagery. I hope they took the opportunity to send out similar on their mailing lists.

https://twitter.com/IrelandEmbUSA/status/1380662127883616258

Mrcaramelchoc

readers@forbes.com


everyone should email this * and let him know how you feel.i did already.
someone might have a more direct email but thats the one i used.
a lazy assed journalist from dublin is all he is.
he shouldnt be writing obituaries never mind articles for that rag.

by the way that article is still up on riskhedge s website.

Yeah email him loads of insults and threats. That will show them the true Limerick.

breezy1985

Is this Riskhedge thing part of Forbes ?

The McBride guy contributes but saying this is Forbes is giving too much weight to what is essentially an edgelord
Looks like some clowns who think they will be the next Wolf of Wall St. Insufferable financial rebel muppets

adaminho

https://twitter.com/Nick468official/status/1380925330161074177

cantalach

Hello Limerick folks. I’m an exile living 100km to the south. The gentleman who wrote this lazy piece of journalism is Stephen McBride and you can tweet your views to his Twitter handle @DisruptionHedge (I think the handle alone gives a fair indication of the type of * we’re dealing with here).

N.B. I strongly oppose cancel culture, online abuse, etc. So please don’t misinterpret the above as a suggestion to hurl anonymous abuse at the man.

Mrcaramelchoc

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Yeah email him loads of insults and threats. That will show them the true Limerick.

I said nothing about threats but why don't you send him flowers that will get the message across better. good man.

Gary Owen

https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/man-critically-injured-limerick-stabbing-23895655
Bad timing.

MarkR

Gary Owen wrote: »

https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/man-critically-injured-limerick-stabbing-23895655
Bad timing.

One Eastern European guy stabbed another it seems. Doesn't count!