Why do the British Media constantly refer to Irish people as british!

The Irish media is just as guilty. JFK, the first "Irish-American" President. Had he been a drug-baron, or whatever, there would have been no mention of his Irish roots.

RTE news makes a special point of stating that someone is English etc, when connected with a crime, just in case the viewer is confused by the Irishness of the person's name. Take the latest case in Cork, where an "Englishman" Gerard Hagan has been charged.

Had he won the Nobel prize for his services to chemistry, "Englishman" would have been in very small print, if mentioned at all, alongside a list of the location and history of his Irish relatives.

References to Punch Magazine? Tarring of the entire media of one country?

Pity you can't remotely edit a thread to include your own poll of how many Irish people regularly read the Independent, the Times, the Guardian or any of the British tabloids printed in Britain as opposed to the Irish edits of same, or watch any of the regional television channels available in the UK (as opposed to BBC Northern Ireland) or, in fact, have ever visited, lived in or worked anywhere in England. (As opposed to the UK - because to be honest some Scots and Welsh people would have as much of a problem with you labelling them as English as some Irish people apparently have with being labelled British).

As for being pro or anti-English?

Well I lived in England for five years before moving to Australia. I'd love to tell you I discovered that you cannot pigeonhole an entire nation for the crimes of their predecessors, or that you can't make sweeping generalisations about a nation that doesn't realise the importance of its past colonisation to its own minority cultures. I'd love to tell you that I discovered English people aren't all as bad as some Irish people think they are.

But I can't tell you that. It's not true.

It's not true because I discovered no such thing because I wasn't fucking stupid enough to believe any of that ignorant, small minded, xenophobic shite before I moved there in the first place.

robinph wrote:

What about the proper Irish accents?

There is only the one Irish character in the books as far as I remember anyway, at least only one where being Irish is mentioned as part of the character background.
Anyway where would boards.ie be without the opportunity for people to give out about the British every other day?

The actor who plays the Irish character, Seamus, in the Harry Potter films is from Kildare, although I reckon he exaggerates his accent for the films, it's very Oirish.

I don't dislike the British at all; in fact, most of my favourite actors are British or Irish.

Of course, for poor old "Plastic Paddys" like me, it's the reverse amongst the more ignorant peoples of both places. In England, I was an Irish Bas***d, the mere fact that my parents were Irish, whereas over here, I'm an English Bas***d. As I appear to be unadopted by both, I've decided to describe myself as a Stateless European.

When I become famous (for something positive), both countries will be fighting over the right to claim me as one of their own. If I become famous for doing something bad, then I'll just be a bas***d of questionable origin.

tallus wrote:

How did this thread get from Why do the British Media constantly refer to Irish people as british!
to make up your mind. Do you hate the English or not?
Do you have an agenda you want to pursue brian?

Good question. A pathetic attempt by 'Brian Capture' to make out that those who object to being lumped in with the British are somehow anti-British. :rolleyes:

Presumably he thinks Canadians who object to being mistaken as Americans are anti-American too. As I said above it's pathetic.

alanmurphy83 wrote:

This is just something that annoys me about the British media. I just read a link on the BBC website here, and it says "She also said it had been "a hell of an achievement" to keep the cast of all the Potter films British.".

Now the only reason this annoys me is because I have seen numerous article that the new cast member is Irish as seen here

Now I would like to think that J.K Rowling just forgot about this but I doubt it very much considering she supposedly helped cast her. This has been done many times in the past especially regarding music. Anyone else annoyed by it, or am I just imagining these things.

Talk about getting worked up about the smallest things, I'm sure she ment kept the cast as a mainly british cast, I'm sure if you trawl through the cast you would find even more non-british people...maybe even some who are not Irish as well.