• paranoia@feddit.dk
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    3 hours ago

    What a fucking weird and racist post. “not even the Irish want to be Irish”

    • BlueFootedPetey@sh.itjust.works
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      2 hours ago

      It really is. As an American with some Irish, (if its a white from eastern europe it turned up on our dna test thingy) Im not sure if I or actual Irish people should be more offended.

    • Revan343@lemmy.ca
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      3 hours ago

      The Irish have had a very shitty troubled past, is probably what they’re getting at

  • dbtng@eviltoast.org
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    2 hours ago

    My wee Irish grandmother would take issue with this. Her pride was more about being Catholic, but she was definitely Irish. Soda bread. Weird Easter pastries. Ya, cabbage and alcohol too. Just little bits and bobs of Irish culture.

    … Um … I personally claim that I’m a European mutt. Drunkards all.

  • y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    7 hours ago

    Idk lol some of our ancestors are just from a place and sometimes that place is Ireland. Want my white-ass to lie to you instead?

    I’m Hatian now.

    • MBech@feddit.dk
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      6 hours ago

      It’s just a very foreign thing for us eurooeans. If we’re born in Italy, but some grandparent was born in Germany, we don’t consider ourself to be german in any way. We’d consider ourself italian and nothing else. It just seems so incredibly odd to even consider oneself to be german if you didn’t spend time growing up in Germany.

      • ViperActual@sh.itjust.works
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        6 hours ago

        I think the reason it’s so prevalent here in the US is because the vast majority of the population ended up here at least in part due to immigration. So identifying as ethnically originating from elsewhere is a part of that self identity.

        The disparity however, is knowing that while traveling through Europe, this style of self identification falls flat because simply being ethnically from a place doesn’t mean you can claim to be born and raised from there. And that meaning is what’s different between the US and Europe.

        • LilB0kChoy@midwest.social
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          3 hours ago

          I wonder if some of it doesn’t come from the people who came to America through forced immigration (I.e. the slave trade).

          I think it makes sense for people brought unwillingly to America to hold on to that ethnic heritage and culture work hard to instill it in their children, even if they were born in America.

          • zaphod@sopuli.xyz
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            3 hours ago

            Very unlikely, the people who claim to have some european origin are generally not the descendants of slaves. Descendants of slaves generally have very little knowledge about the origin of their ancestors. Slaves in America came mostly from Africa, most likely even displaced within Africa. Very little records were kept of individual slaves origins, because why would anyone do that, they’re slaves. These people identify as “just” African Americans.

            • LilB0kChoy@midwest.social
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              2 hours ago

              I think you misunderstood. I wasn’t talking about the people who claim to have some European origin but the practice in general in the US of acknowledging ancestral ethnic heritage as part of where you’re from.

              Descendants of slaves generally have very little knowledge about the origin of their ancestors.

              This might be true now, but 200 years ago people were brought here from other countries unwillingly and had children here. If we’re were forcefully taken to another country and then had children at some point I would talk to them about the people left behind and where I came from.

      • y0kai@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        6 hours ago

        I guess that makes sense. We have our “heritage” pushed on us from a very young age, or at least we did when I was a child. In the 4th grade we did an entire reenactment of immigrating through Ellis Island, NY in which we had to research our countries of origin, then draw from a hat to see if we died on the journey, got small pox, or any other number of things all before being “accepted into the wonderful cultural melting-pot that is the United States”.

        Then we grew up and learned that all immigrants are evil and must all be deported. /s?

        Regardless, my family immigrated from Ireland after having lived in County Cork for a very long time. This whole post just seems like shitting on people just to shit on people.

        Sad thing to be, nonsensical thing to want to be

        Well, thanks for calling me sad for a thing I’m mostly indifferent about and have no choice in, OP.

  • Bruncvik@lemmy.world
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    10 hours ago

    It’s the same nonsense as invoking “the luck of the Irish”. Said by people who have absolutely no idea about Irish history.

    • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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      9 hours ago

      Darn those extra lucky Irish.

      In Fact it’s well known that they fought overwhelming on the north side of the US civil war because they knew which side was gonna win from their luck, and it had nothing to do with recognizing slavery as another form of the serfdom they just escaped from.

  • sness@sh.itjust.works
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    7 hours ago

    My great grandparents came to the US and claimed to be Irish. We strongly suspect this was a lie and they were German but arrived during a time where Germans were… unpopular.

  • PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca
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    16 minutes ago

    It’s economically stable white people trying to find a way to be the victim.
    You don’t see actually marginalized white people (poor, disabled, etc) doing this, just suburban Karens and shit

    Edit:
    All these down votes but no counterarguments.
    It’s almost like people are mad because not only does this perfectly explain the phenomenon, but we can see tons of examples in American society of the oppressors trying to claim victimhood for repercussions to their actions. The glove fits.

  • tamal3@lemmy.world
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    11 hours ago

    Citizenship question: my grandfather’s parents were born in Ireland. My grandfather, who didn’t know he had been adopted until much later in life (by a Jewish woman), became an Irish citizen in his 50s and had dual citizenship until his death.

    As a desperate American… can I get Irish citizenship through my grandfather, a naturalized Irish citizen who was not born in Ireland?? I can (understandably) not find an answer to this on the Irish citizenship website.

    Sincerely, an American who spent 12 hours protesting at a No Kings rally yesterday

    • baggachipz@sh.itjust.works
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      10 hours ago

      I don’t think so, it has to be more direct IIRC. I’ve been looking into it too, for the same reasons. My Great Grandmother emigrated here… nope.

    • Bruncvik@lemmy.world
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      10 hours ago

      One of your grandparents had to be born in Ireland, not just obtained Irish citizenship later in life. If he was born in Ireland, you’ll need his original birth certificate. More info here.

      That said, I have a few formerly US coworkers who did get Irish citizenship by naturalization. That requires life in Ireland for at least 5 out of the last 9 years. Studying doesn’t count, so you’ll either have your current employer transfer you here, or you’ll find a job and move here. Your employer will apply for a 2-year work visa, which can be extended for another 3 years, after which you can apply for permanent residency. If you are employed in one of the critical skills jobs, you can apply for permanent residency in less than 2 years.

  • DrSoap@lemmy.world
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    13 hours ago

    I have a friend who came over from Moscow and is an immigrant to the U.S. herself. A few years ago she started telling me she has Irish heritage and she knows it because she felt it in her bones and can see it in her dreams. Now she goes twice a year to ‘reconnect with her roots.’ She was so confident that she did a 23andme and it showed that she was 99% of her heritage with a 1% broadly european. That 1% is what she is now claiming is her Irish portion.

    I don’t know. I really don’t even know.

  • psychadlligoat@piefed.social
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    13 hours ago

    I use it to explain my massive capacity for alcohol

    “I’m scotch/Irish on one side and German on the other, 3 generations both sides and they bred in the community until my parents!” as I’m on my third boot and finally starting to slur my speech lol

  • Venus_Ziegenfalle@feddit.org
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    17 hours ago

    I think some people just like to be in touch with their ancestry which isn’t suddenly cringe when you’re white. But I think for some other people it’s genuinely part of their victim complex. Irish people were among the most oppressed white minorities back in the day.

    • MelodiousFunk@slrpnk.net
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      14 hours ago

      Irish people were among the most oppressed white minorities back in the day.

      Most of the Irish Americans I know are just keen on dishing it back out to whatever Other they can target. I’m also related to most of the Irish Americans I know, so take that as you will.

  • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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    19 hours ago

    I’ve got Irish heritage. My dentist asked me about it because I have a red beard (brown hair). She explained that people with red hair are less responsive to Novocain. I always knew I wasn’t bullshitting that the dentist hurt me as a teen. Finally, proof!

    • LogicalDrivel@sopuli.xyz
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      11 hours ago

      Not only Novocain, but lots of different types of anesthesia. Im a ginger and have woken up in several procedures, even after warning the doctor I probably would.

    • jcg@halubilo.social
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      15 hours ago

      I suppose you can’t blame your earlier dentists, though. How were they supposed to know? And if they automatically treated redheads differently, would that be racism?

      • DrSteveBrule@mander.xyz
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        7 hours ago

        It’s not racist to treat patients differently when you’re talking about how likely they are to react to drugs. Children/teens tend to become bewildered and/or violent when waking up from anesthesia. It’s not ageist to prepare for a worse case scenario by calling all hands on deck to hold them down to prevent injury.

        • shalafi@lemmy.world
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          6 hours ago

          Young men come up fighting as well. My ex-wife worked in surgery and got punched a few times. Don’t know what I’d be like now, but as a young men, back the hell up from the bed.

  • ChocoboEnthusiast@leminal.space
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    21 hours ago

    I think Americans caring about there heritage lives rent free in too many European heads. It doesn’t affect anyone’s day to day, and explains some weird idiosyncrasies in life.

    • hansolo@lemmy.today
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      16 hours ago

      It’s toned down since 23andMe was new, but I absolutely know people that will regularly call themselves by whatever European group they think gives them character.

      I always ask if they have an EU passport.

    • Justathroughdaway@lemmy.worldOP
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      20 hours ago

      I just love the shade thrown to Ireland, Guatemala and Lithuania. he did not hold back. “Not even the Irish want to be Irish” 😭 Also I think he is American.

      • baldingpudenda@lemmy.world
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        11 hours ago

        Was gonna quote trainspotting, but realized it’s scots.

        Tommy: Doesn’t it make you proud to be Scottish?

        Mark “Rent-boy” Renton: It’s SHITE being Scottish! We’re the lowest of the low. The scum of the fucking Earth! The most wretched, miserable, servile, pathetic trash that was ever shat into civilization. Some hate the English. I don’t. They’re just wankers. We, on the other hand, are COLONIZED by wankers. Can’t even find a decent culture to be colonized BY. We’re ruled by effete arseholes. It’s a SHITE state of affairs to be in, Tommy, and ALL the fresh air in the world won’t make any fucking difference!

        • Justathroughdaway@lemmy.worldOP
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          7 hours ago

          Scottish people live in a completely different reality were they were the victims of the British empire and not its biggest beneficiaries.

  • Sergio@lemmy.world
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    19 hours ago

    Guatemala is awesome. The countryside is beautiful and the people are descended from one of humanity’s major civilizations, the Mayans.

    I realize OP is only half-serious, but they still come off as really ignorant.

    • Omnipitaph@reddthat.com
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      18 hours ago

      As someone who is doing a massive research project on the Maya peoples right now, that civilization was technologically way ahead of the game! They had toilets with a sewage system, clean aqueducts and water purification measures, and ball sports a thousand years before the colonizers that fucked em up. A THOUSAND YEARS.

      • Zwiebel@feddit.org
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        15 hours ago

        Not to mention the 200 000 people cities when in Europe a 50k city was considered big

  • atlien51@lemm.ee
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    11 hours ago

    I’ve been asking this same goddamn question dude. I don’t get it

    • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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      11 hours ago

      The Irish was the last white European immigrant community that was treated poorly after immigration so by claiming to be part of that they get to claim to be part of that oppression and use it to pretend to themselves they are an underdog regardless how much their existence would be unlike any actual Irish immigrants.

        • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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          10 hours ago

          LOL, but the Italians came with basically the rest of Eastern/southern Europe for work around that time and were just wrapped up in the generic anti-immigration zeitgeist and the Polish, Slavs, Greek, etc didn’t complain as much and didn’t even manage to turn a bedtime story about a creepy Italian dude into a story of how they secretly actually founded America first.

          Though apparently up to like half of Italian immigrants were known to return home after they saved up enough money from US factory work. I think they just didn’t like being in the US.