You can’t be Irish if you’re gay – or gay if you’re Jewish?

by JanieM

I’ve been too busy to pay much attention, but my son just pointed me to a controversy arising from the Chicago pride parade. What, a controversy surrounding LGBT issues? Surely not.

***

Rainbow flag with Star of David booted from Chicago gay pride parade triggers [pun intended] thoughts of googling the ongoing history of how you can’t be Irish if you’re gay.

 

If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?

--Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago

Comments

[JanieM]

"googling" link, corrected.

Also, in case anyone clicks through to the youtube link (which is, to me, laugh out loud funny) but isn't familiar with the original of the song, here's that. (And now we can talk about stereotypes...)

[JanieM]

I don't know what happened with the links, and I don't have direct access to fix them, so Here's the third one again.

[Chuchundra]

I prefer this version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDcdhoTbzKU

[wj]

Fixed the links.

Sometimes, typepad can be a real pain. (And it's especially irritating when there is no obvious problem to fix. Grrr!)

[JanieM]

Chuchundra -- cute. I was never a Gilligan watcher so I had never seen that. But the song does lend itself...the pastor at one of the Catholic parishes in my hometown when I was a kid was named Hennessy -- they had a version of the song for him, too.

And of course, only part of the "You can't be Irish..." song echoes Harrigan, it's quite a mashup of references. Looking for it on Youtube sent me down memory lanes in several directions.

[JanieM]

wj - thanks.

[ral]

Well, someone has to say it. "Oy!"

[wj]

Feh!
also comes to mind.

[Countme-a-Demon]

I hate it when liberals are so conservative.

[Countme-a-Demon]

What of the liberal cakes? For whom shall they go unbaked?

Courage, me lads and lassies, there remain abodes where the Irish, Jewish, gay, and the scientific shall be shunned alike:

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2017/07/science-bows-out-at-the-white-house/

[russell]

Rainbow flag with Star of David booted from Chicago gay pride parade

I try to be respectful of other people's sensitivities and concerns, but I will admit it can be hard to keep up sometimes.

I blame intersectionality.

Mostly I try not to be a jerk, and hope that my desire to not be a jerk somehow gets communicated.

All of that said, I have no interest in going back to the good old days when things were .... simpler. If it helps folks get a seat at the table, I can live with being confused.

you can’t be Irish if you’re gay.

In news that probably has good old Knocko McCormack spinning in his grave, there has been a changing of the guard in the leadership of the South Boston War Veteran's Council. They sponsor the annual Southie St Patricks' Day parade, which has been famous, for lo these many years, for its profound and militant lack of interest in having gay veterans march.

At least, in any visible way.

The new guy is 34, he's fine with gay men and women participating.

For anyone who is unfamiliar with South Boston aka Southie, just think Bull Connor era Alabama, with shamrocks, Guinness, and a scally cap. Plus gangsters, and politicians, and gangsters who are politicians.

Good old Southie.

If it can happen in Southie, it can happen anywhere.

[Countme-a-Demon]

"for its profound and militant lack of interest in having gay veterans march."

I have a feeling gay veterans marched anyway.

[hairshirthedonist]

My grandmother's sister used to sing part of that Harrigan song on St. Patrick's day. I always thought it was something she made up. My GG grandmother was a Harragan (variant), and that was my great grandfather's middle name.

My GG grandmother was from London, as were all of her ancestors as far back as I've been able to trace them, but that didn't stop ol' Aunt Ida Mae on St. Patrick's day. It's an Irish name, dammit, so someone came from Ireland, however long ago it might have been.

[wj]

If it can happen in Southie, it can happen anywhere.

Or perhaps the way to put it would be:
If it (something new and different) has happened in Southie, it's already old news in most of the country.

I think that, all around the country, there are pockets where people intensely dislike change. ("Intensely" as in more that most people dislike change -- which is quite a bit, actually.) Some of those pockets are bigger than others; maybe even encompassing most of a state. But they exist even in places which have reputations for being extremely open to new ideas. A couple of neighborhoods in San Francisco (yes, really!) come to mind.