" Dubliners have more in common with the British than with fellow Irish "

TireeTerror wrote: »

You find British people to treat you with suspicion and not make you feel welcome?

Exactly! Got such a warm welcome in London the last time I was there (on my own incidentally). Everyone from the hostel I stayed in to the restaurant I ate to the people I was there to meet (interview). Even the girl behind the desk at the Tube when I bought my Oyster card was a delight.

Come back to Dublin to be assailed by junkies, now which country is more unfriendly?

I do agree with the garrison town thing to a certain extent. It's way more complex than the Indo article would suggest (hardly the first time I've used this sentence).

There ARE Dubs going to Garth Brooks, there are country people who live as if they are in Milton Keynes, there are British people who have moved all over Ireland or have come home as second generation. Some act as if they are still in Britain, some are more Irish than the Irish.

Also, if you look back at the history of Irish republicanism, you'll see that there were plenty of Dubliners and Anglo-Irish involved. Even Pearse's father was an English stonemason.

Emme wrote: »

The people in some rural towns have more in common with the British than the Irish. This applies to former garrison towns. Irish people are known for being friendly and welcoming but in former garrison towns newcomers are treated with suspicion and hostile indifference. Even after 20 years newcomers aren't made welcome. Perhaps these places have more in common with rural Britain than urban Ireland.

What I'm saying is that former garrison towns in rural Ireland have more in common with the British than the Irish because they're so unfriendly and unwelcoming. These towns don't even welcome new business.

Actually, I would say it's way harder to fit in a small Irish village than a town.

In the part of North Cork I come from (the town was founded as a bit of vanity project for the local landlord, making us very unusual) we would have a really long history of republicanism. Everyone's granddad was in the old IRA including my own. However, if you come from slightly lower down in Cork you are a blow-in- such as my best friend's mother. I had girls from a local village which is infamous for being clannish tell me after FOUR years of school they didn't know us well enough to practice their dance routine in front of the townies. Or my mother was told not to even bother applying for a job in the village as a village person would get it.

Irish villages would give Royston Vasey a run for their money.

drumswan wrote: »

Second generation culchies maybe

Kinda disproves the article though? I mean a lot of Dubliners have culchie roots... It's almost like we're the same people...

100% agree, I'd have more in common with people from England than Cork or some other place down the country.

You could say the same about Corkonians and Belfastians, it is just because the irish image abroad has always been of the countryside. Im a proud culchie myself though

OldNotWIse wrote: »

Thats fair enough, but I dont get why we get to be proud because of where we are from - it's not like we had anything to do with it! Be proud because of something you've achieved, not a circumstance. There's nobody better or worse than anyone else just because of where they are from. We're so small, we should stick together. The whole Dublin v The Rest of Ireland mentality saddens me tbh. I was at a work meeting one day and got chatting to someone about a match and she said she was happy X county had won. "Oh", I said, "Are you from there?" and she looked at me like I had two heads and said, "No, but you know...anyone but Dublin to win" - she practically sneered. What's that about? By all means support your own county but she was practically malicious

I hate the anyone but the Dubs mentality, especially from people who last went to Dublin when it was Nelson's Column. I go for the Dubs (if they're not playing Cork of course) purely because the other 31 counties aren't

orangesoda wrote: »

Not all off the Uk has the same culture, england has several cultures, wales have their own, scottish and then there is the obvious n.ireland cultures

Agreed. A west of England farmer would have more in common with a farmer from Cork than he ever would with a Londoner.

I'd rather be associated with England than anywhere outside Dublin or Wicklow.

What a disappointing article. The topic actually has potential to be very interesting, instead it's just lazy generalizations. I'd be inclined to say that Dublin people have about as little in common with English people as they have with country people.

First off, it's the only city of city size in Ireland. Other cities are glorified towns and far more parochial in nature. I'm not saying that that's anything against other "cities" in Ireland, I really like Cork and Galway, but they're just not true cities - they're towns by size and by nature. Cork borderline, I'd say. Yet by English benchmarks, Dublin is tiny and very low density.

Secondly, Dublin is, always has been and probably always will be far more diverse than the rest of the country. And that goes waaaaaaaaaaaaay back. That level of difference in diversity means that Dublin attitudes will ALWAYS be different to attitudes elsewhere.

Then you have to look at the history of Dublin - it reads very differently to the history of the rest of the country. My bf mentioned that an area near me sounds very English, doesn't sound Irish at all. I just thought it sounds very Dublin. Don't forget, Irish has pretty much never been the spoken language of Dublin. It's a viking and norman city and the placenames are as likely to reflect that as to reflect it being in the country of Ireland. There are plenty of people in Dublin who can easily trace roots back to England. I can and I don't even have to go that far back.

Another thing that will make Dublin people less like the rest of the country is that habits are more urban even when you go back several generations. "Where would you go for a cup of sugar if you ran out?" eh... To the shop. That kind of letting yourself in the backdoor of the neighbour's house doesn't exist here. It'd be downright odd and rude for the neighbour to call around to the backdoor and the to ask for something they could as easily get in the shop that's only a couple of minutes away!

But Dublin people are as Irish as anyone from anywhere else in Ireland, it's just a different type of Irishness. Look at many of the playwrights, if you want an example. Dubliners through and through. Held up as fine examples of Irishness. But certainly not like people from the countryside.

Anyway, it's a pity about the article. So much scope for a really interesting cultural and historical comparison, but falls flat on its face.

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

too much country blood in that mix to be a true blue Dub

Yup. Both parents should be from Dublin and at least 3 out of 4 grandparents from Dublin. Otherwise you're second generation country.