Why are we constantly told from various groups that Ireland is racist?

tj-music.com wrote:

Judging a whole nation without ever having met enough of them to justify your opinion is racism

How do you know I haven't met enough? I've met plenty. I've been to many of these countries too - Turkey, Nigeria, etc. My opinions are based on my judgements having met hundreds of Turks, Africans, etc. I'm not judging whole nations either, don't be so stupid. I'm simply saying that a disproportionate number of the people I met from certain countries are scumbags. It's a fact - not a braindead generalisation - but an opinion I've made after considered years experience. I wish my (vast) experiences were better... but they weren't. I am a realist.

tj-music.com wrote:

so YOU ARE A RACIST.

Well done, hotshot. Did you work that one out for yourself or did you read my first post? :rolleyes:

By most people's (admittedly moronic and incorrect) definition of 'racism' then yes, I am an utter racist. If one were to stop being an idiot for a few seconds, one might realise that I'm far from it but I won't hold my breath.

tj-music.com wrote:

I am a non national and I have been living here for 6 yrs and 4 months now and if the Irish would be big time racists I guess I wouldn´t be here anymore. Having said that, I have met more than just the odd racist and had my fair share of verbal abuse and mobbing.

Really? I've only ever seen one (very minor) incident where someone was racially abused in Ireland in my whole life. As for mobbings... drama queen?

tj-music.com wrote:

Shame on you

Why is that? Because I don't want crime increasing in this country anymore than it already has? Sorry if I have realistic, valid concerns about immigration into this country but as far as I'm concerned I'm entitled to them without being branded a racist. Shame on you.

Laslo wrote:

Actually... all of my ancestors, on both sides of the family, were French. D'oh!

**** off back to France where you belong Frenchie, we don't want your kind here, stealing our women and our jobs.

Fanny Cradock wrote:

Fair play to you, Laslo.

Through your unsubstantiated generalisations, built firmly on a basis of pig-ignorance, you make a greater case then I ever could for disregarding opinions from people like you.

Pig ignorance? Dunno there mate. Been in Turkey over a dozen times. Spent nearly two years living in Nigeria. Have had the incredible misfortune of having to visit Algeria three times. Spent anywhere between a week and several years in other unfortunate countries that I would rather not wish to visit again. But yet, my opinion is based on nothing but solid life experience. I suspect your ridiculous reaction is based on pig ignorance though. Where have you been? What have you done? What have you seen and experienced? That's what I thought.

I'm not sitting here, making judgements while I foam at the mouth. I'm simply saying that I really, really have massive worries about certain nationalities migrating to this country wholesale. Does this make me a racist? By definition, no. By 99% of a retarded liberal population's definition, yes. Definitely. I can live with that. I'm a self-proclaimed racist. It's a small price to pay for being a realist and actually knowing what's going on in the world around me. Sheesh.

tj-music.com wrote:

... I didn´t label you, you did that yourself.

Yes you did. And yes I did.

tj-music.com wrote:

Being concerned is one thing and calling Nigerians criminals obviously another.

I never called Nigerians criminals. I said that there are quite a disproportionate amount who are.

tj-music.com wrote:

It is people like you that spread fear among the Irish and "Us" alike.

Jesus. Don't start with the "culture of fear" nonsense. :rolleyes: Next you'll be accusing me of reading The Sun on a regular basis.

tj-music.com wrote:

I can only imagine what you would do if someone would give you a gun and you feel the need to defend yourself

Yeah, you can only imagine. That's about all you can do.

tj-music.com wrote:

it is called HATE and IGNORANCE

I don't hate anyone. And, as I've said, I've been around the block a few times and my judgements are based on extensive real life experience. Not some woolly-headed fantasy about living in a happy world where we all hold hands and dance around rainbows.

tj-music.com wrote:

all throughout history have hateful people used weapons. Now I am just the way you are: JUDGING you without ever having met you.

I don't know what to say to that. Bizarre.

tj-music.com wrote:

By the way, I travelled a lot myself but take it from someone who lives abroad: It takes a good while before you can actually judge people, because it takes a while to get used to different customs and so on.

Really? I wish someone had told me this before because I never knew. :rolleyes:

tj-music.com wrote:

How old are you? 102? Have you lived and worked among the people of all those countries you´ve been to?

No, not all of them. A good few though.

tj-music.com wrote:

I pity you, shame on you

I pity you. Get into the real world.

Yeah, nice one. "I don't agree with this bloke's opinions so I'll label him a troll" :rolleyes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKBCCDOUS9U

just watch that...i think its brilliant! many would say thats horribly racist...but realy...its just a joke! i know there are alot of racist people in ireland...or they are classified as being racist anyway but from what i can figure out about it alot of it is down to jokes? i always remember a guy in my secondary school who told so many jokes about muslims and blacks it was rediculous and some of them were rather harsh, but he was black and muslim so this isnt seen as racism, yet if i were to say them i would be racist? that is something i dont get...

yeh i found those jokes hilarious doe that make me racist? even though i find jokes slagging irish people racist equally as funny?

and yes people are going to judge a group of people a certain way if say for example in ireland minority X, if a person had multiple bad experiences with minority X and no posative ones they will naturally turn to dislike them..i dont know why this is but it seems to be the truth for almost everybody! its almost like an instinct or something.

and i cant realy blame them for being like this, but i only feel they are racist if when they do meet a person from minority X they dont even give them a chance to see who they realy are or if they are friendly etc....

The points laslo is making are true. Ask anyone who has spend any amount of time in Nigeria what they think of Nigerians, you will get the same answer all the time. He is right and we just need to realise this, but we cant because of liberal agenda and some weird chip on the shoulder (with the usual rubbish) to do with emigration:p

dodgyme wrote:

The points laslo is making are true. Ask anyone who has spend any amount of time in Nigeria what they think of Nigerians, you will get the same answer all the time. He is right and we just need to realise this, but we cant because of liberal agenda and some weird chip on the shoulder (with the usual rubbish) to do with emigration:p

Agreed but it should be pointed out to liberals wanting to jump up and down on you (as if it wasn't obvious enough already) that the majority of Nigerians are decent people. It's just there's a disproportionate number that aren't in comparison to, say, most socities in Europe. It's sad but true. You'd never get me into that country again.

Hobbes wrote:

No am I saying a so called war on christmas is an urban legend or at worst some Fox News O'Reilly invention.

I would say that the Washington Post reporting on the US president not using the word Christmas for christmas cards, and the Telegraph reporting on John Reid, the UK Home Secretary, doing similarly is definitely:

a) from legitimate sources on both sides of the Atlantic
b) shows a parallel between US and UK government level policy - something we are all not unaccustomed to observing
c) neither representative of a "war" on christmas anymore than a "war" on terrorism
d) indicates that there is a very clear change in behaviour regarding the use of the word Christmas by the US and UK governments and this actually did happen, was reported
e) The Wikipedia article is pretty well balanced and simply shows that such adjustments of words and speech regarding the Christian holiday is not new, but significantly, this time it is educational and governmental level changes.

I did not mention Walmart, I mentioned Macy's - why did you respond with Walmart? . Macy's actually really did that. I never suggested Walmart did anything did I, so you are giving solutions and counterarguments to something I didn't bring up there....The Washington Post and Telegraph did report about changes in respective government public words replacing Christmas in 2005 and 2006; yes, I know you might now continue to not believe this but it is actually also true

You're response:
a) suggest that this whole christmas thing was an urban legend or a Bill O'Reilly invention - so why the **** was CS Lewis writing about it a century ago?
b) I don't watch television, as I have long had enough of fanatical everybody. You are trying to discredit the Washington Post and Telegraphs' 2006 observations on christmas, and have responded with an opinion from a show which was with a "fanatical christian and a fanatical jew". I need and people here deserve a better response than a suggested You Tube link to some TV show.
c) The WIkipedia says a lot. Now, your post decided that it was a "lot" of one thing, whereas it actually has a lot of both sides of the controversy - I think again you are setting goal posts and attempting to undermine the credibility of the content by framing it in a certain way. Have you any actual observations on the Wikipedia entries references or are happy to sum things by saying they are "full of crap". I don't think that post was a reasonable response - again I apologise for going off topic but you basically undermined a lot of clear evidence that it is NOT an "urban legend" by simply undermining sources, without providing evidence that it IS an urban legend/invention of Bill O'Reilly.
d) avoided any observations on the action of Macy's in 2005 and the about turn in 2006 - but instead had a response about Walmart. Is your opinion also that Macy's actions were an urban legend and never happened? Respond regarding Macy's, US White House and UK Home Secretary please - if someone has not made any change to behaviour than that's one thing and besides the point (e.g., bringing up Walmart, wrapping up a response in the "you are Bill O'Reilly fan" when I already mentioned I am not - but what about the examples that behaviour HAS changed - what is your opinion on the White House, Jack Reid, Macy's? OR - are you really suggesting that that is all Bill O'Reilly/urban legend? .

Racism is really just criticism based on a prejudice.
It's one thing for you to say "irish people are more violent when they are drunk" because presumably you understand the dynamics of Irish society and are basing your criticism on valid judgement, rather than a prejudice against Irish people.
If an American, say with Irish heritage, were to make such a remark, well that's racist, because it's criticism based on a preconceived notion that has not been validated: prejudice.

There is also another element to this: it is one thing for an Irish person to make Irish jokes, a jew to make jewish jokes, or an Asian to make Asian jokes. People joking (or making prejudicial remarks) outside of their own identity usually just comes across as stupid and racist and almost universally in very bad taste.

That is exacerbated by the subject of the prejudice being the economic, social or political underdog. We can sympathise greatly with the anti-American sentiments of an Iraqi, but American anti-Iraqi sentiments would probably anger most of us quite a lot. It's about vulnerability.

You as (I am presuming:) ) an Irishman, are neither vulnerable nor ignorant in expressing a disapproving opinion of a bunch of Irish people. I don't know how many Italians you know, but if you were sermonize equally on them, basing your claims only on having visited Italy a few times and met a few Italians in a pub, then I would say yes, the same remark had probably assumed a racist tone.

Tha Gopher wrote:

Its more of an issue in England than the US. Renaming of town celebrations as "winter festivals" and "winter lights" and whatnot by mainly Labour councils.

More of a war on common sense than christianity tbh. Its funny, in my work I deal with mainly English customers, and over the Christmas period the only people that wished me happy christmas were two with muslim names and one with what I believe is a Sikh name. :rolleyes:

Very intereting piece showing how the 'camapign against Christmas' is nothing more than overhyped tabloid wish-fulfilment.

The funny thing is, I bet its their own reports about how 'you cant celebrate Christmas now because you might get sued' (really? has that ever happened?) that make in-house office idiots worry about putting up the tinsel.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/christmas2006/story/0,,1967367,00.html



The highlights for anyone who doesnt want to read it all.....


Perhaps the most notorious of the anti-Christmas rebrandings is Winterval, in Birmingham, and when you telephone the Birmingham city council press office to ask about it, you are met first of all with a silence that might seasonably be described as frosty. "We get this every year," a press officer sighs, eventually. "It just depends how many rogue journalists you get in any given year. We tell them it's bollocks, but it doesn't seem to make much difference."

According to an official statement from the council, Winterval - which ran in 1997 and 1998, and never since - was a promotional campaign to drive business into Birmingham's newly regenerated town centre. It began in early November and finished in January. During the part of that period traditionally celebrated as Christmas, "there was a banner saying Merry Christmas across the front of the council house, Christmas lights, Christmas trees in the main civil squares, regular carol-singing sessions by school choirs, and the Lord Mayor sent a Christmas card with a traditional Christmas scene wishing everyone a Merry Christmas".

Lil Kitten wrote:

And when talking about taking jobs, it doesn't mean down the local mc Donalds. So naive. The Asians work hard and I have no prob with them. Do you really think that once they're settled they won't try to give their children the best education possible and to get into college and get a decent job?? THAT'S where the competetion lies, 20 years down the line. You can see that in America with the Irish and Jewish in particular.

are you also advocating all those irish people abroad with good jobs return and start farming spuds then?

I think they call this 21st century life. We live in a Global economy now.