Punching back

Amid all the justified euphoria of the Irish, at home and abroad, celebrating Katie Taylor punching her way to gold-medal success at London 2012, a few less celebratory side-stories were played out in the media. 

The first came when our boxing champ was — in error we’re told, although some people think differently —  called British by a journalist in The Telegraph. 

Now, she may be from the historic Pale area of Ireland and have a Liverpool-born father but that does not make her British by definition — despite what some Irish from other parts of the island might have you believe. 

'Is that a Union Jack I see on the Aussie flag?'

Sure if she had been brought up British at 26 years of age she’d probably have at least two children by now and be living in some rough council estate at the state’s mercy. (What's that you say? This happens nowadays in good old Catholic Ireland? No way!) 

Nevertheless, colonial tendencies die hard (hence, so many Colombians love pilfering) so we’ll let our neighbour across the Irish Sea off on this one.

It’s a little bit harder, though, to be as lenient towards the Australian sports pundit Russell Barwick. Not because we’re offended — we tend not to let a few misinformed utterances upset us — but more because of the pure ignorance of a man in his position. 

For a prisoner – sorry, I mean an Aussie – to say Ireland ‘is a joke’ for not joining Team Great Britain at the Olympics is a bit rich to state the least. 

Without going into our own cultural, geographical or political situation, the very fact that Barwick comes from Australia is more than likely because of the British. His country’s flag proudly displays the Union Jack, its currency has the head of the British Queen while, lest we forget, he also happens to be one of her subjects. 

Surely, then, his dependency has a much stronger argument to join up with the British for sporting and other events than the Irish. Just let the Aborigines go it alone.   

A world of drinkers with the Irishman leading them — the 'Wrong Way'.

Then we had a couple of episodes bringing us back to the old drunken-Irish stereotype. The harshest if you will (again, not that we get too offended) of these came from, once more, an Australian. One, coincidentally enough, with a very Irish sounding surname, Hanlon (Peter). 

What he penned was deemed so offensive in this politically correct world (Survival of the Dumbest http://bit.ly/NNg2E8 has more on that subject) that the Irish Ambassador to Australia was moved to write a letter of complaint to Fairfax Media, the group which ran with the story. 

Come on, one of the better Irish traits is usually our ability not to take ourselves too seriously. 

Plus, what he wrote was semi-amusing and semi-accurate in some regards, such as: “For centuries, Guinness and whiskey have sent the Irish off their heads. Now all it takes is a petite 26-year-old from Wicklow.” 

In fairness, we probably still need at least a smidgen of Guinness or whiskey to really get us going.

The Yanks, too, got in on the ‘have a go at the "alco" Irish’ jibe, with USA Today chief sports columnist Jon Saraceno writing, “Back home on the emerald-green isle, pints of Guinness flowed freely, perhaps enough to replenish the Irish Sea.” 

Fair enough really, it’s just we’re not too sure if the Irish Sea needs replenishing.

'Get it into you, son.' They like beer in Latin America, too.

One of the biggest problems with this entire drunken-Irish stereotype is that we’re really not the world masters at drinking we — secretly or otherwise — like to think we are. 

We’ve encountered plenty of non-Irish across the globe who can drink copious amounts of booze yet they fail to get lauded for it. 

Sticking with the Aussies, sure our friends ‘Down Unda’ habitually have a stubby or whatever they call it for breakfast, followed by another few for lunch before ‘warming up’ with some more in the evening prior to a night on the lash. 

The Colombians, too, know how to drink, they usually just sweat it off much quicker than us with all that needless salsa dancing (for more on that see ‘Lord of the Dance’ http://bit.ly/S7A8eS). 

Heck, we’ve also witnessed a healthy drinking culture in South-East Asia – it’s just the poor buggers’ bodies there physically won’t allow them consume as much as us. If they could hold out longer, we’ve no doubt they would.

In truth, we’re happy to keep our world-renowned drinking reputation in tact. For one, it helps keep the global Irish pub business thriving – the same cannot be said for the national market.*

Plus, in order to overcome a perceived problem you must first realise you have one. 

So while we know we like to drink, other nationalities are still deluding themselves that they don’t. 

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*Check out our previous ‘An Irish lament’ http://bit.ly/MmS5bm for a detailed look at that. 

An Irish lament

One of the most common of the many Irish laments of the last few years has been the steady decline of the pub. 

From being at the very heart of the social fabric in its heyday, many of the once vibrant tithe tábhairne now resemble funeral parlours before the evening rush – and that’s on a supposedly busy Saturday night. 

So how did it come to this? Well, the worst recession the country has ever experienced has certainly played its part. 

As a BBC Radio 4 reporter smugly put it – as only the British can – when the true extent of independent Ireland’s financial woes were coming to light, “even the pubs in city centre Dublin are suffering. Now for the Irish that’s really saying something.” Indeed. 

Some people say the seeds of the public-house recession were sown well before the economic downturn – they point to the arrival of the smoking ban as the beginning of the end. It’s an easy scapegoat but similar restrictions in other countries have not led to a massive slump in the number of people heading out socialising.

Bringing the pub home.

Of course, the fact that the most ‘hedonistic’ age group – those in their late teens and 20s – are departing the forlorn state in search of much greener pastures is also a big contributing factor to the Irish pub’s sad and painful death. 

But what of those who remain, are they drinking less? The short answer is no. Most studies into alcohol consumption in the Ireland find that we’re drinking as much as ever. The crucial difference is that the venue has changed. 

The reclining sofa in front of the flat screen TV has replaced the high stool at the bar. For a nation renowned for its affability, that’s quite a sad turn of events. 

Instead of hitting for the ‘local’, having a few drinks and a chat in the company of others, many Irish are deciding to stay in and crack open a few cans in front of a rectangular box in their living room – where there is absolutely no monitoring of alcohol intake. 

So, it appears, the main reason why the humble Irish pub has witnessed a mass exodus in recent years is a matter of cost, pure and simple. 

At the very least, the price of a regular pint at a bar is three-times more expensive compared to what you will pay at a supermarket or off-licence. In such straitened financial times, people feel that there is no longer value in going to a pub, whatever the negative social consequences. 

In fairness, you can’t really blame them. Why there is such a mark-up between what you pay in a shop and the price for the same product – more or less – at your local hostelry is a mystery, especially when you see how things are done in other countries.

Take Colombia, for example. It’s possible to head out to a little bar here – or tienda, as the locals call them – and pay less (and that price is very small too) to consume a beer on the premises than you would if you wanted to bring it home. 

So, unsurprisingly, these places get hefty crowds daily – a sociable environment where you are drinking and chatting with others, with at least a modicum of supervision to boot. 

This is much better than drinking at home in front of the kids, right? Irish law-makers, backed up by the anti-drink, anti-pub campaigners think not, it seems. ‘Let’s make socialising in a pub so expensive that nobody can afford to go anymore’ is their mantra. The suck-the-life-out-of-the country policy has fully taken root.

Thumbs up to cheap beer in a sociable environment.

Now, from a rural Ireland point of view we can’t write about the decline of the pub without referring to the far stricter drink-driving laws that have been introduced in recent years. It’s a difficult, emotive subject that will rumble on. 

There is still an out-of-sight-out-of-mind approach taken by some country Gardaí to breaches of the law, especially towards older citizens. It might not be right, but it works most of the time. 

One thing, though, our Government could do, if it truly cared about rural Ireland, is to put some decent thought into providing proper public transport outside of the bigger urban areas. 

However, the chances of that happening are about as high as Brian Cowen becoming the next president or a Colombian sticking to his word. 

So, is the Irish pub as we once knew it, particularly the rural one, now just a blurry distant memory, never to be revived? 

Well, if the powers that be continue to pursue their current line of attack, then the answer is yes. Plus, with very few people left to stand up for life in the Irish countryside, who’s going to stop the rout? 

The sad thing right now is that it’s all happening under the watchful but seemingly indifferent eye of a west of Ireland prime minister. The west – along with other rural parts of the country – is falling asleep once more. 

This time, though, it might not wake up again.