The creeping prominence of the Irish language

I challenged you on two points and proved you wrong. You denied the first (claiming the constitution was robust) and haven't actually countered the second (the ifalse dea that if something hasn't been proven then the opposite must hold true).

You've gone off on serious tangents to avoid these, but I've ignored these and just reiterated the challenges because that's all I'm interested in - that's all that's relevant to my post - only for you to go off on even more tangents.

It is not a wishy washy survey. It is the ESRI!!

Reported in the paper of record as-

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/positive-attitudes-towards-irish-but-citizens-shy-on-fluency-1.2309262

There are various other studies on the attitudes to the Irish language. But I fear you will also have to try and ignore and them because they are not the results you wish. Your post is great example of boards.ie.

Poster A - 'Have you a source for that?'

Poster B - Source given

Poster A -disparages source as it does not suit their narrative

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I found another source which was a TCD thesis from TCD which echoes that of the ESRI study I previously mentioned. In regard to respondents valuing Irish as a cultural identity/ethnic symbol.

It involved the study of fourth class students attitudes to the Irish language.

http://www.tara.tcd.ie/bitstream/handle/2262/94246/Luke%20O%27Halloran%20PME.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

"The findings of this study yielded that the attitudes of the participants mirror the attitudes held by the public towards the language. Despite the vast majority of the participants expressing a negative attitude towards learning Irish during class discussions and reflections, there was a unanimous agreement amongst the participants that there is a place and need for Irish as our national language (CILAR, 1975; ITÉ, 1984, 1994). Participant 1 remarked “ I don’t like learning Irish in school but I know it’s important for us to be able to speak Irish because it’s our own language” whilst participant 2 said “Irish was the only language spoke hundreds of years ago so it’s important that we learn how to speak it to honour the people form our past”. This mirrors the findings of Devitt et al., (2016) that state there is a distinction between attitudes towards Irish and towards learning Irish."

Other posters on this thread have also mentioned this fact in various different ways. Some saying most Irish people are happy with the status quo. People don't want it lost but many are not too bothered to speak it in their daily lives.

Posters such as yourself the OP and Princess CB - are outliers in this debate with a large antipathy towards the Irish language. And view it as attack/enveloping/creeping and so on. Which is not true in any case as I have already said.

The majority of Irish people do not feel the same way that is just a fact of life. Otherwise the situation would have changed long ago through the ballot box and the parties in power would change legislation and the Irish constitution. There is no evidence that the majority of the Irish people want to remove the protection Irish currently has in law. If there was I am sure you and likeminded posters would have produced such evidence. I have yet to see it. Why? Because such views are fringe views on a small corner of the internet on this thread.

Successive Irish governments have tried to protect the Irish language in line with the EU and its views linking cultural diversity and language/endangered language. That is upholding the majority EU view as voted for by EU states. Which again shows how much of an outlier posters such as yourself are in the grand scheme of things.

Posters such as yourself the OP and Princess CB - are outliers in this debate with a large antipathy towards the Irish language

Ha! And you say I don't read your posts?!

The problem is that you see ANY criticism of the language as 'oddballs howling at the moon' before thinking - hang on - someone might actually have a point here - and that the system might not actually be helping the language thrive after all.

Again, you care more about the status of the language than either the language itself or the people it's supposed to represent.

My views on the Irish language - all Irish schools etc would be outlier views as well. But at least I realise that. But yourself and other posters seem to think they represent public opinion. Basically smashing the Irish language and view the Irish language as an attack. When at the very least the majority of Irish public opinion view the Irish language as part of the Irish cultural identity - but would not speak it as a language of communication daily. That is the reality the middle ground.

I think I have twigged @Hotblack Desiato by the way. The poster seems to equate the Irish language with the Catholic Church. Which you yourself tried to do by erronously claiming the RCC created a Catholic constitution when in fact. It was the opposite it pushed against the Catholic Church at a time it was very strong in Irish society. As shown by A44.2.

It is the same old narrative with yourself and @Hotblack Desiato Irish Language - Catholic Church - Backward - and so on.

The really funny part is I am not even religious. It is not true that the Irish language is linked 'conservatism' and backwardness.

In the marriage referendum debate = on Gay Marriage. I have saw members of the Irish language community wear pins such as these -

Also there are such things as Irish language poets who are strong feminists such Ciara Ni E - who is strong on female empowerment

Also the President of Ireland - a fluent speaker of the Irish Language views himself of a feminist

It really smashes the backward Irish language narrative that some wish to perpetuate. From my experience the majority in the Irish Language community are big on equality and inclusiveness.

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It is not simply any criticism of the Irish language, it is an attack on the Irish language that you and other posters are engaged in. I have criticised the Irish language and how it is taught in Ireland. But I have not attacked it.

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Also I don't care more about that status of the Irish language than the people. I believe it was not done correctly and needs to be done properly. Helping people engage in the Irish language and become immersed in it more.

Well the studies I have seen say it is more complex than that - as does the ballot box. Many Irish people may not speak Irish daily but it is clear the majority value it. And the middle ground are happy with the status quo. You can call that apathy if you wish. But the Irish people are happy with it. I don't think they should be IMO as more should be done to further the Irish language for future generations. I don't think I represent public opinion on the Irish language. I am not the middle ground

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However, there definitely is the 'Irish is backward' view among a small cohort in Ireland. Such as @Hotblack Desiato who entwines the Irish language with the Catholic Church as so on. And erroneously repeats the myth that McQuaid was fundamental creator of the Irish constitution. That was not true it is overstated. Similar to how it is overstated that DeValera was a fundamental creator of the Irish Constitution. The real creator of the Irish Constitution was John Hearne.

But that does not fit the narrative/agenda for some. It is fairly transparent at this stage for those on this thread who are Anti-the Irish language. They come out with the usual stereotypes and tropes. Revealing an agenda and/or a lack of knowledge in the debate.

I am relatively happy with the status quo. Sure I'd like if the gaeltachts were a bit stronger but Irish isn't just for people living in Gaeltachts, it's for all Irish people. There are equal opportunities to learn it, it's never been earlier to learn it and there have never been more opportunities for those with Irish. Slow progress but it's not oppressive and gives people freedom to engage with Irish as much as they wish in adulthood.

I've seen this claim about more Polish speakers than Irish speakers made on many occasions.

It's like that other claim, that there are as many people in Manchester as there are in Ireland.

Wikipedia tells us that there are 2.8 million people in Greater Manchester - there are around 5 million in the republic of Ireland, and between 6.5-7 million living on the island.

In relation to languages spoken in Ireland, well around 250,000 speak Irish on a regular basis, and 1.8 million claim to be able to speak it. I think there are around 150,000 Polish speakers in Ireland, North and South.

(ESRI 2015) 'In the Republic, almost two-thirds (64 per cent) believe that Ireland would lose its identity without the Irish language.

'Until that changes - you and small cohort of like minded people are just the oddballs in the corner howling at the moon.

That figure - 64% - is an interesting one.

Last year - 2020 - an exit poll was carried out after the general election, and one of the questions asked was "Can you speak Irish, and to what extent"

Overall, 64% of those polled said that they could speak Irish. So a substantial majority of those who voted claimed to know Irish!

Now, not all of those who can speak Irish actually do so, but overall 36% said that they in fact actually use the language.

We should make sure our politicians know these facts. They might be more responsive if they were made aware, and kept aware, of the facts.

Do you think that Banana and friends might begin to realise that Article 8 of the constitution is unlikely to be changed any time soon?

How do you know that 99% speak fluent English? I don't think that the question is even asked in the census, so in the light of so many adult immigrants, I would doubt it.

I think I have twigged @Hotblack Desiato by the way. The poster seems to equate the Irish language with the Catholic Church. Which you yourself tried to do by erronously claiming the RCC created a Catholic constitution when in fact. It was the opposite it pushed against the Catholic Church at a time it was very strong in Irish society. As shown by A44.2.

There's a lot of people out there who equate the catholic church (but never any of the protestant churches) with backwardness. I cannot see any logical reason for this, other than that some people see the Church of Ireland as a civilising (i.e. anglicising) influence, and manage to ignore its connection with the class that exploited Ireland for centuries. They completely ignore the presbyterian church, the free presbyterian church, and a whole range of minor sects each one more rightwing than the next.

These same people see Irish as a backward thing, i.e. a non-anglicising force. Most of them won't say this directly, many of them try to dress it up as something else but it comes across very strongly nevertheless.

Still, they equate these two forces and consider them backward. But if we dropped English and learned Chinese instead, they'd be singing the praises of Chinese and still tell us that Irish was hindering our ability to speak Chinese.

Link?

1.8 million people can speak a few sentences of irish, an will cead agam ,conas ata tu, etc 2million irish people are catholics, yeah they go to church to go to a wedding , funeral, maybe once a month, the last time i heard someone speak irish is about 30 years ago when i went to school.

Again, here we have someone equating one of our religions with the Irish language. Does that make you a Protestant of some sort, or do they get a free pass for everything?

i think theres more people speaking polish or russian everday than people who actually speak irish in daily life ,excluding those who work for tg4,pr irish teachers .

I've dealt with Polish above. As for Russian, in 2011 there were 22k speakers in the Republic and 1k in the North.

But if you enjoy your cliches, who am I to put you right?

If the number of regular Irish speakers doubled then a lot of the current issues would be resolved e.g. state services. That would still leave Irish as a minority language which a comfortable majority would continue to ignore.

That isn't all that difficult to achieve given the infrastructure now in place. That's why Im happy. But it's up to individuals to go and learn Irish as adults and I recognise that this isnt always possible.