Why don't the Irish like the British? Those who know at least a little the history of these two countries understand that the inhabitants of the Emerald Isle have plenty of reasons to hate their neighbors. It is believed that the conquest of Ireland by England served as mutual intolerance. The entire history of mankind consists of the conquest of some countries by others, but no nation has such hostility towards its neighbors.
A bit of history
It is believed that the island has been inhabited by people for more than 7 thousand years. The mild climate contributed to this. The modern population of Ireland is the descendants of the ancient people from the Black Sea and the Mediterranean, who forced out the ancient inhabitants of the island.
In VI BC. e. the Celts invaded here, conquered the territories of Ireland and Britain, and assimilated the local population. It is they who form the foundation on which the language and culture of the Irish are based.
The English are the descendants of the ancient Germans,Saxons, Jutes and Frisians, who displaced the Celtic population of Britain. Already in this one can see a distant contradiction between the two peoples, but it is not the real reason why the Irish do not like the English.
Eight hundred years of resistance
In the XII century, the conquest of Ireland began, at that time part of the island was annexed to the English crown. Among the Irish, tribal (clan) relations were preserved. England was already a feudal state. All fertile lands belonging to the clans became the property of the English barons. Free islanders fell into vassal dependence on them. The level of development of the conquered regions was strikingly different from the free territory.
The main problem was clan fragmentation. What united the Irish was a single religion. The Reformation bypassed this country. The locals remained Catholics. This caused religious hatred between representatives of different faiths.
The British did not stop trying to conquer the whole of Ireland, but the local population desperately resisted. The worst was the invasion of Cromwell in 1649. Commanding an experienced army, he practically conquered all of Ireland. Having captured the cities of Drogheda and Wexford, he ordered in the first to kill all those who resisted, and Catholic priests, in the second, the massacre was committed without his order.
Thousands of people fled to the unoccupied territories, fleeing death. He handed over the rule of the island to General Ayrton, who continued the policy of extermination of the local population. From now on the Irish hateEnglish.
Extermination of the inhabitants of the Emerald Isle
For hundreds of years, Britain pursued a policy of genocide against the indigenous population. By the beginning of the 17th century, 1.5 million people lived on the island. By the end of the same century, there were just over 800,000, of which 150,000 were English and Scots. Many Irish, even those who did not take up arms, were sent to the Connacht region - a barren desert.
The "Settlement Act" was signed, according to which the deportees caught on another territory of the island were awaiting the death pen alty. These are the first reservations. The practice of segregation was subsequently applied by the British in all colonies. In North America, it led to the extermination of the indigenous people - the Indians.
Why do the Irish hate the British? The colonization of Ireland took monstrous forms of genocide along ethnic and religious lines. In 1691, he adopted the form of laws, according to which Catholics and Protestants who were not members of the Anglican Church were deprived of their civil rights - they could not vote, freely practice their religion, study, hold positions in the public service, and speak their native language. This led to the fact that the formed administrative elite consisted entirely of English and Scots. The Irish were an illiterate people until the twentieth century.
British Nazism
From the beginning of the 15th century, there was a put forward version of the racial superiority of the Anglo-Saxons over the Irish, which in every possible waypromoted. The latter were compared with blacks and were considered subhuman. That's why the English don't like the Irish. The Statute of Kilkenny of 1367 strictly forbade marriages between Englishmen and Irishmen.
King James II sent 30 thousand imprisoned residents of the Emerald Isle to the colonies of the New World, who were sold as slaves on the plantation. In addition, he issued a proclamation in 1625 demanding that this practice be continued.
White slaves
Why don't the Irish like the British? Many do not know that, along with Africans, they were turned into slaves and taken to the British colonies of the Americas. The cost of a white slave was 5 pounds. At this time, it was not the Negroes who were the sources of slaves in Antigua and Montserrat, but the Irish, and they were cheaper than the Africans. After the Black Continent became the main source of supply of slaves, the number of whites began to decline due to the fact that some of them died out due to hard work and disease, some mixed with Africans.
It was customary to brand white slaves in the form of applying the owner's initials to the body with a red-hot iron, for women - on the shoulder, for men - on the buttocks. White slave girls were sold to brothels. Now, is it not clear why the Irish do not like the British, who for hundreds of years destroyed them in order to liberate the island from the indigenous people, leaving the necessary part that would work hard and dirty work? Doesn't this remind you of anything? They only missed the gas chambers.
Migration
The unbearable living conditions created by the British in Ireland forced many to look for a better life in other countries, in particular America, believing that it would not be worse anywhere. Because of the terrible poverty, they left one by one, having received the first money in America, they sent them to their homeland so that the next family member could leave.
This process was accelerated by two factors: the entry of Ireland into the United Kingdom in 1801 and the Great Famine that took place in the country in 1845-1849 and was popularly called the Potato Famine. It was artificially created by the British government. In four terrible years, about a million people died, another million emigrated to America.
The attitude of the British government towards the Irish, and this is discrimination and segregation, is evidenced by the fact that until the 1970s, emigration to America continued and the process of reducing the Irish population steadily increased. How do the Irish feel about the British? They hate the English. They absorb this feeling with their mother's milk.
Independence
If you think the Irish have silently submitted, you are wrong. The Irish fought against their enslavers. Revolts were constantly breaking out, the most significant of them in 1798 and 1919, when the Irish Republican Army went on the offensive against the British.
In December 1919, a peace treaty is signed, according to which Ireland becomes a dominion, in fact a free state (with the exception of 6 counties of Northern Ireland). Irish and British conflictscontinued until the end of the 20th century.
In 1949, the country proclaimed independence and secession from the Commonwe alth, which, along with England, included all British colonies. Shootings caused by Irish and English extremists stopped only at the end of the 20th century.
Ireland today
Ireland's position changed dramatically in 1973 when it joined the European Economic Society. It remains neutral, refusing to join NATO. The movement for the annexation of Northern Ireland has intensified in the country. The economic development of the country has received a significant acceleration since 1990. In the present tense, these differences are not so noticeable.
Starting with D. Kennedy, all US presidents, including even Obama, openly declared their Irish roots, as if refuting the British claims that their neighbors are rednecks. Henry Ford, an Irishman, also refutes this. As a member of the EU, Britain cannot actively oppose its neighbor, and Ireland today is an economically developed country with a combat-ready army.
Starting from the end of the last century, population growth began, although it is associated with migration, but already to Ireland. The number of migrants is slightly less than 500 thousand people. To a greater extent, these are residents of European countries of the former socialist camp and the countries of the former Soviet Union.
