Haggischomper

No, I only support them.

MizzKat

Scotch-Irish - Don't you mean Scots-Irish. Scotch being an alcoholic drink

I agree all of this is tacky, but I also think that anything that gets our fantastic country some publicity is good in my book. We put ourselves down too much. But the American's love us.

Yes, it's true they don't have a clue which part of England, Scotland is in.. :scared: but if I can get a can or even better, a 2lt bottle of diet Irn Bru without having to pay an arm and a leg in this country, then I'll wear a kilt, a hey you Jimmy orange wig and I'll sing that wonderful ditty "Tiny Bubbles" covered spectacularly by the fabulous Scottish singer Sydney Devine.

Haggischomper

Yeah, but I've seen it written both ways in history books. Highly annoying!

ScotsmanInTexas

Dude Scotch-Irish certainly is a bullshit Americanism. I am refering of course to the droves of mad American genealogists who claim to descend from someone who left Ulster yet have very British surnames. I won't go into the reasons behind the sad and sinister settlement of Ulster and how it came about or the fact that the people who settled there during the plantation DID NOT intermarry with the native Irish people who were of a different faith. I won't even mention the boatloads of British transportees (arrested in Britain) who were transported from Ireland to the Carolinas. It's all a complete crock of bullshit. The sort of bullshit that had people like Neil Armstrong believing he was Irish until he was invited to Scotland by Clan Armstrong. Complete and utter bullshit and Irish & Scottish cultures are actually very different (but alas not to your average American). I could go on here and question why it is that on St Patricks Day, I spotted more sets of Scottish pipes than Irish ones and wondered why they were playing the tune we now call Scotland the Brave and other Scots bagpipe tunes.

Haggischomper

It's my understanding that people (who should know better) use 'Scots/Scotch-Irish' instead of 'Ulster Scots'. Not saying they are correct to do so, just that the term exists.

Haggischomper

Yep, it was the same in Chicago - tons of Scottish pipes/kilts and very few actual Irish ones. Pretty sure I heard a snatch of Scottish tunes too on the little bit I saw on TV.

ScotsmanInTexas

Too true! They are just a wee bit mixed up in that department. Believe it or not, I was at a party at the weekend, some mad woman my wife knows and she told me she'd bought us a gift for April 6th! So off she went to get it and came back with an Irish shamrock akin to the Celtic logo. Now depending on which foot ye kick the ba' wi' the gift would either be appreciated or have you singing 'follow follow' and playing an air-flute on the way out. Either way she was miles off though, and that in a nutshell is my point. The woman in question is unbelievably a highly educated Doctor who thinks she knows something about Scottish and Irish cultures and yet cannot seem to distinguish one from the other. Although, I do find that lady to be a little anti-British and I very much resent that, because somehow she assumes I should be too, seeming to ignore the fact that I am patriotically British.

Haggischomper

Speaking of St Pat's day and Shamrocks - there seems to be an awful lot of clovers about!

tony_2003

Try sitting through history classes in an American UNI. England and Britain are one and the same to these "professors". This morning I was enlightened to the fact that "England joined ww1 after Germany invaded Belgium" I'm sure my great grandfather would have enjoyed a nice wee chat with the teacher if he were around

ScotsmanInTexas

Hehe. It's sad but true that little Scotland is well understated in the US. I mean what often really is part of our history, is quite often apportioned to someone else and our humble part we did in the wars which Great Britain was involved in from as far back as Napoleon is just plain forgotten, ignored or through plain old fashioned ignorance never actually known to even some of the better educated ones. It's a plain fact though since the first Jacobite uprising onwards the official Scottish regiments were on the government side, but try explaining that to someone called Dwight in a kilt whose just discovered which clan he belongs to and is angry as hell at how the little Belgian poof was dispatched & sent into exile. I mean Culloden was 350 years ago and even then Scottish regiments (formerly the Covenanters) supported the 'German Geordie'. What really annoys me though is when I hear the words Black Irish instead of Scots. Excuse me??? Hero's of the Alamo for example - oh yes says Dwight: Bowie, Crocket, Wilson etc... weren't they Black Irish? In fact almost anyone you care to name even people born in Scotland and never having gone anywhere else en-route to the US, within the Politically Corrected American history were the Black Irish (probably to their amazement if they could read accounts of their own history). So anyway somewhere about here is my protest and almost utter rejection of Tartan Day. If we really still lived the way a small number imagine we did 300 hundred years ago, with civilisation and invention never having touched us then today we'd still be Rustic peasants caught in an 800 year time-warp then all well and good - in fact we'd deserve to have this foisted on us once a year and to have our Scottish First Minister dress like a fanny for the world to ridicule. My ancestors though were wearing Trousers and suits in the Civilised Borroughs and cities of Scotland and even those in the highlands were more likely to have worn Trews round their bahookies (since let's face it even their Viking ancestors from 8th century onwards wore Brechin - 'Mr. Ragner Hairy Breeks' being a case in point), had the benefits of education, literature and culture of that time and playing their humble part in the darkest corners of an Empire which spanned the world. Give to Ceaser what is his.

MizzKat

Gaun Yersel........

Haggischomper

I really just want some haggis.

Bob

welcome to it
though there's canned stuff over here and veg haggis..errr...

tony_2003

I was just about to say all that
Also if the Kilt is our "National dress" how come 99.9% of us wear breeks?
Maybe the phrase was made up by Chic "i'll never watch a Scotland team managed by a foreigner" Young?

DaveC

Let me be the first to wish everyone a happy Tartan Day. Lang may yer lums reek. Or something.