Many Irish in the northeast (like my great-grandfather) worked in the mines around Pennsylvania and beyond. Montana had a copper mining boom which pulled people across. Butte actually has/had the largest Irish population as a percentage of any city in the US.
Basically someone got offended over something they shouldn’t have and another person asked what would happen if there were quizzes like this about other nationalities.
I don't know about anyone else, but here in the U.S., I have never in my entire life heard anyone say anything negative about Irish people or Catholics. I'm sure there's some old-fashioned bigots out there who still have an axe to grind, but I've never met any.
hm...my comments are still getting deleted. Now I know what brand of humor is too far gone for this site. Never would have guessed that it would be this.
QM, I used to live in a deeply Baptist area where it was quite common for people to ridicule the religious beliefs of Catholics for being different than theirs. Granted, it was mostly amongst the teenagers, but they probably picked up a few of their talking points from some of the adults.
I remember hearing anti-Catholic comments when Kennedy was running for president. I'm guessing some of the anti-Irish sentiment grew from anti-Catholicism. The KKK was also anti-Catholic and anti-Jew along with anti-African American.
I recall when I was in elementary school seeing Pollack jokes in some old joke books. But... they seemed outdated even then to my 6 year old self. I don't recall ever encountering anti-Irish bias except in historical period films or in what were obvious parodies of outdated racist attitudes. Sometimes you'll see a stand-up comedian joke about the Irish being drunks, or pale, or prone to fighting or something like this, but again, if you understand how these jokes work the primary butt of the joke is not the Irish, but rather the ignorant attitudes of those that the comedian is mimicking. This sort of nuance is very difficult for some SJWs to wrap their head around but it's almost inconceivable that the comics meant it any other way.
I thought everyone and their cat claimed Irish ancestry in America? Where do you draw the line? Being 1/64th decended from someone in Ireland doesn't make you Irish or even Irish-American in my opinion.
It is interesting to me the huge difference between American attitudes to ancestry and those of us in the UK. For example, I am at least 1/8 Irish (a great grandmother on my mother's side) and a bit more due to some unspecified ancestry on my maternal grandfather's side but I would never consider myself "British Irish" - I'm just English.
And I only just found out that my friend's wife, who I've known for about 6 years, is half Irish because we were talking about the EU Referendum and she mentioned that her mother's Irish citizenship would entitle her and her daughter and therefore be eligible for a Irish/EU passport.
I would say having an Irish surname doesn't automatically mean you are Irish, in my opinion. I think (recent - e.g parent or at least 1 grandparent at a push) is what counts. But that's just my opinion - claim what ancestry you like but after a certain point I think it just makes you look daft.