Here’s a St. Paddy’s Day rant for you from the Irish Independent.
I NEVER thought I’d say this but, beneath all the plastic paddywhackery, St Patrick’s Day does offer a true insight into what it means to be Irish.
Take the whole festival idea. What better way to symbolise our combination of self-glorification and incipient obesity than by making the once lean parade sprawl out unhealthily into five days of celebrations?
The St Patrick’s festival website is full of solecisms, showing how far our standards of literacy have fallen on the island of saints and scholars.
We all know that we’ve sold our souls long ago, but we try to hide our cold capitalist hearts from the prying eyes of visitors. This is what Paddy’s Day is all about: promoting the idea of a cuddly sense of Irishness.
For decades we kidded ourselves that, shur, everyone loved the Irish. We thought this was a good thing. But the only other thing everybody loves is babies: pathetic, cute, helpless, without willpower. Who sees themselves like that anymore? Nobody. So why do we have a whole festival based around sustaining the myth? Who knows?
Against ‘Plastic Paddy’ selling his very soul – Irish Independent