I frankly do not get this holiday. Maybe if it wasn’t used as an excuse for people who know nothing about St. Patrick or Ireland and it’s history or culture to get drunk and act like jackasses while embracing Irish stereotypes, I might like this holiday.
As a non-Irish person, I just don’t see the reason for celebrating this holiday. It means nothing to me. It doesn’t reflect my culture or heritage. It’s like celebrating Cinco de Mayo, as a non-Mexican, why do I care about a Mexican military victory over the French in 1862? I wouldn’t expect Mexico to celebrate the Battle of Antietam. But I guess these holiday’s are more of a testament to America as a “melting pot” nation of cultures and people. We celebrate them because immigrants brought them from their native land and it has become part of our national identity.
But what I don’t understand is why this holiday doesn’t get more scorn. In my Columbus Day rebuttal, I kind of jokingly said that St. Patrick’s Day should be criticized because we are celebrating a man who forced Christianity on a native population. He may not have forced the Irish people into accepting Christianity, but he did introduce it to the island. You could argue that was the first step in eroding native Irish culture. His “crimes” aren’t as severe as Columbus’, but an argument could still be made.
Well, wherever you are, have a good day. If you want to celebrate the day, don’t get drunk and butcher the song “Danny Boy”. Take some time and read up on the man himself and Irish history. I think that would be a more appropriate way to celebrating this holiday.
With my Irish blood on me, I want to call you out. But then I remember what my Irish anger did to my driving today. Instead of driving happily, I started to think of all the "Irish" posers dressed in green. As much of an melting pot America is, it also has a REALLY BAD habit of commercializing certain holidays. Americans think that they will act Irish for a day, while the Irish lay OFF the drinks because it's a religious holiday.
ReplyDeleteI'm cool with sharing religions and being open minded, but as cultures continue to intermingle, we should not lose all meaning of religious holidays. I will recognize when my friends are celebrating Day of the Dead, Passover, sitting shiva, observing Ramadon... These are not tampered with (much).
But people have picked out their favorite holidays... Do we have a St. Michael's parade? Nope. How much attention is payed to All Saint's Day worldwide outside of the Christian sphere?
St. Patrick to me is a historical figure who will take some studying. Till then all the snakes are part of a myth, and he shall remain a saint who lived to bring messages to people. Point me to a good book with highly supported academic material, and I'd love to go into a further discussion about this. Till then I'm going to go watch other people misinterpret this holiday, and laugh as they proceed to get really drunk and look like absolute fools.
I'm Irish, and although I really want to drink, I'm going to save that for another day and go watch a free concert.