Top o' the morning to you! We'll step off the curb and start the parade this year with a look at the world as seen from the other side of the pond. As you can see, many of the issues are universal, but the view of them is not what we've come to expect here. For starters, the MSM are, er, a little less inhibited when it comes to saying how they feel. Take, for example, The Irish Examiner which is less than enthused with the performance of the Taoiseach, Enda Kelly, during his recent trip to D.C.
For those who missed the cringing moment, Mr Kenny told a Washington DC audience: “If you’ve got a problem, or you have an issue, or an anxiety, or a concern or a proposition, or a proposal, I want to hear it. My number is a public number, you can call me anytime. Citizens in other countries find it difficult to figure out how anybody can ring the PM, or the Taoiseach in my case, and say ‘I want to talk to you’. Sometimes I don’t get a chance to answer all the calls....”
So, pitching himself as a sort of national call-centre manager, we can imagine the response if we took him up on the offer, but sadly missed the jackpot moment when Mr Kenny answers his own phone: “Press ‘one’ if you are a rich Irish-American, or well-connected Fine Gael lobbyist, for instant access to the Taoiseach.
“Press ‘two’ if you are a general moany-hole bleating on about having medical cards for your sick child snatched away, hospital A-and-Es shutting down, or not being able to afford to feed your families, so you can be made to listen to several hours of that really irritating bit from Riverdance being played over and over again on a loop, until you finally hang-up in despair.
“And don’t even bother pressing ‘three’. Just hang-up immediately if you are a whistle-blower, because we are not interested in what you disgusting troublemakers are up to.”
Does Mr Kenny actually read the embarrassing scripts his flunkies draft for him, before spouting them, or did he just think we would not get to hear that crap back home?
:
Sharp critiques are not the only manifestation of the Irish view of the world, however, as this morning's Irish Times reminds us, there's room for introspection as well:
St Patrick is a capacious symbol for this country, incorporating many traditions and appealing to several distinct identities in a common sense of Irish nationality. The shamrock expresses a similar pluralism in the Christian Trinity. That cultural plasticity is worth recalling today as Irishness is celebrated here and around the world in many different states, communities and languages – and in many different ways. A world made smaller by globalised communication, political interdependence and markets provides an appropriate setting for such a diasporic identity. Whatever the maudlin sentimentality it attracts, we have much to learn about how to incorporate such differences in our national self-understanding and political structures.
Donald Clarke takes a look at identity politics, both in Ireland and in the U.S.
It’s all about identity politics these days. I’m great because I’m this or that. You’re spiffing because you’re the other. Why, for example, is everyone, at this time of year, required to be “proud” of being Irish? It’s not as if being born in the island constitutes any sort of achievement. Be proud of designing that cathedral or constructing that suspension bridge. You won’t catch me celebrating the accident of my birth or heritage. Then again . . .
The dispute concerning the ban on gay groups – or, more specifically, those carrying (horror!) banners – marching in the New York City parade has already been examined rigorously in these pages. . .
The ironies that colour this debate are too dazzling to ignore. The American St Patrick’s Day parade – and all associated celebrations – offered a template for the sort of identity-soaked festivities that have come to occupy so much of our calendar. Long before the age of cheap air travel and transatlantic phone calls, the parade allowed first-generation immigrants an opportunity to huddle together and nurture shared cultural preferences. Something similar happened in Puerto Rican and Italian neighbourhoods.
Later, the gay community adopted similar strategies. When the mainstream is ranged against any one group, identity politics – the need to embrace one aspect of one’s personality above all others – offer protection, solace and a means of redress.
This seems like a simple enough concept to grasp. Yet it is astonishing how many halfwits fail to get their head around the notion.
Even as we look at the problems of today,
Simon Carswell reminds us that the past isn't really past:
If you ever take the train from Philadelphia to Chicago, almost 30 miles west of Philly’s 30th Street Train Station you might see a stone wall and blurred sign as you fly by at 80 miles an hour.
The sign commemorates a mass grave at Duffy’s Cut, a spot along the railway line in wooded Pennsylvania, where, in 1832, 57 Irish immigrant workers, employees of a contractor named Duffy, either died of cholera or met a grisly end at the hands of locals fearful of being infected or hateful of new immigrants, fresh off the boat from Ireland, during an era of “nativist” attacks. Such violent incidents against Irish Catholics and new arrivals from Ireland were common in the 1830s and 1840s as older immigrants sought to protect political interests or prevent the suppression of wages with the arrival of new workers. Just think of William “Bill the Butcher” Poole, the violent anti-Irish protagonist in Gangs of New York , Herbert Asbury’s 1928 non-fiction book or Martin Scorsese’s film adaptation, to get an idea of the hatred nativists had for new immigrants.
Investigative work by Bill Watson, a history professor at Immaculata University in Pennsylvania near the Duffy’s Cut site, and his brother Frank, among others, over a decade has revealed the more sinister aspect to the story of the 57 dead immigrants. About five years ago, researchers digging the area uncovered the remains of seven people, three of whom showed signs of having met violent deaths.
So whether you're heading off to celebrate today, or you're scratching your head at those who do, remember that the Irish experience in America is simultaneously unique in its Irishness and commonplace in the annals of the American Experience. And remember, as you look overseas, that we might all take a moment to try to see ourselves as others see us.
Slainte'