Oscar Wilde: British or Irish?

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde (October 16, 1854 – November 30, 1900) was an Irish playwright, novelist, poet, short story writer and Freemason. Known for his barbed and clever wit, he was one of the most successful playwrights of late Victorian London,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Wilde

Oscar Wilde Quotes on the English and Irish

The English country gentleman galloping after a fox - The unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable.


If one could only teach the English how to talk, and the Irish how to listen, society here would be quite civilized.

He is more forthcoming about women.

He was an extremely witty gentleman who suffered under outdated law which prosecuted him for his sexual leanings even though most in Westminster were closet homosexuals.

Obviously he was Irish....born in Ireland = Irish

Ignore any comments by Adam who'll say he was British just because Ireland was being occupied by the British armed forces at the time of Oscar’s birth.

Example:
Is a man born in France in 1943 to be considered German?
Of course not.........

Both.

***He was an extremely witty gentleman who suffered under outdated law which prosecuted him for his sexual leanings even though most in Westminster were closet homosexuals***

Which so clearly demonstrates the vile hypocrisy and double standards of the English English upper classes in the Victorian / Edwardian era. The persecution he suffered was abominable which is, of course, why he had to flee to Paris. I had the honour of placing a small posy of freesias on his tomb in Pere Lachaise cemetery - my only problem was finding a space for it among all the other fresh floral tributes on Oscar's grave.

A true genius of wit and literature. RIP Oscar.

<<under outdated law which prosecuted him for his sexual leanings>>

Not sure that the law was outdated in Victorian times, maybe by the 1950s!

<<because Ireland was being occupied by the British armed forces at the time of Oscar’s birth.>>

Depends what you mean by "British armed forces". It's important to remember that there were large numbers of Irish in the army. I have a few ancestors from Cork who served in army in India from about the time of his birth.

" <<under outdated law which prosecuted him for his sexual leanings>>

Not sure that the law was outdated in Victorian times, maybe by the 1950s! "



Technically you're correct, but laws like that are always outdated or at least incredibly hypocritical.




" <<because Ireland was being occupied by the British armed forces at the time of Oscar’s birth.>>

Depends what you mean by "British armed forces". It's important to remember that there were large numbers of Irish in the army. I have a few ancestors from Cork who served in army in India from about the time of his birth. "



It really depends on where their final allegiances lay. As for joining, the most common reason would have been on financial grounds since people have to support their families. A person may not recognise the state, but reality forces them to swallow their pride and do things they mightn’t be entirely comfortable doing. Others joined and made use of the British army training facilities (many did the same with the US army) in readiness for future conflicts in Ireland. A hundred thousand Irish nationalists joined at the start of WW1 in the vein hope that Ireland would be awarded Home Rule. Alternatively, others may have accepted or liked the political realities at the time and thinking of joining wouldn’t have cost them a second thought.

me above

"As for joining, the most common reason would have been on financial grounds since people have to support their families."

And how would this make an Irishman's motivation for joining any different than an Englishman's?

I didn't say there was a difference in that regard.

>>Depends what you mean by "British armed forces". It's important to remember that there were large numbers of Irish in the army. I have a few ancestors from Cork who served in army in India from about the time of his birth.<<

The thing is that this alone does not affect the original statement being referred to. This may sound rather inflammatory (I'm not trying to invoke Godwin's Law, but rather this is just a good example that came to mind), but remember that, for example, just because many Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, Croats, French, Romanians, Hungarians, Ukrainians, Slovaks, Dutch, Danes, and so on willingly aided Nazi Germany in both its war against the Soviet Union and in the Holocaust does not lessen the significance of Nazi Germany's occupation of much of Europe. Just because what is often termed as "the resistance" in both France, Yugoslavia, and Italy (after Mussolini's initial fall from power) were just as much civil wars amongst the French, Yugoslavs (be they Serb, Croat, or Slovenian), and Italians as they were wars between French, Yugoslavs, and Italians and Nazi Germany does not make Nazi Germany's occupation somehow "not as bad".

(Oh and if you do not know what I am talking about above, that is because much of such has been largely written out of the popular histories of what happened. Those French who hated the Third Republic and who saw the Occupation as the way to institute a new authoritarian order in France, who willingly fought on the eastern front against the "Bolshevist hordes" have been largely forgotten, and who helped carry out the elimination of the opponents of German and the French State (aka Vichy France) and the deportation of Jews, with only those who faught the Germans and the French who sided with them being remembered. Those Balts and Estonians who saw the Germans not as conquerors but as liberators, who fought against the Soviet Union alongside the Germans, and who carried out much of the Holocaust in the Baltic region are frequently overlooked. Those Ustaše, Iron Guards, and Arrow Cross who were responsible for much of the Holocaust in southeastern Europe are not mentioned much (except for the occasional mention of the Ustaše in the context of the role of Croatia in the Yugoslav wars). Only the Germans are remembered as being responsible, with those who helped them and who fought for them willingly being largely forgotten.)

To make things short, just because Irish did most definitely willingly serve in the British Army does not somehow lessen Great Britain's rule over Ireland or that which came before it (such as the Protestant Ascendancy). Collaborators, who themselves are often forgotten when convenient, do not somehow lessen the role those being collaborated with just by being remembered as such.

You seem to be implying that Irishmen serving in the British Army is analogous to say, Slovaks serving with the Nazis.

I resent this comparison and your suggestion of Irish "collaborators." This is a revisionist view of history.

>>You seem to be implying that Irishmen serving in the British Army is analogous to say, Slovaks serving with the Nazis.

I resent this comparison and your suggestion of Irish "collaborators." This is a revisionist view of history. <<

I am not saying that, but was just using an example that came to mind to state by analogy that just because Irish did indeed serve British military does not somehow make the British rule of Ireland "better". That said, though, isn't it just as revisionist to try to treat the British rule of Ireland as if it were benign in nature, which it definitely was not (e.g. the Potato Famine, the Protestant Ascendancy) just because it was not actively genocidal in nature either? (Of course, then, Nazis these days are largely marginalized in "polite society", where the British people who would be offended by the idea are not, BNP aside.)

"Ignore any comments by Adam who'll say he was British just because Ireland was being occupied by the British armed forces at the time of Oscar’s birth. "


He was both Irish and British in the Same way that I'm both English and British and Damien is both Scottish and British. The whole of Ireland was part of the UK until 1922.

Really, you don't need to have a high IQ to work one out. Although, come to think of it, you ARE Irish.

"Is a man born in France in 1943 to be considered German? "

No, but then France wasn't a part of Germany, was it? But what is now the Republic of Ireland used to be a part of the UK, just as Scotland and England are now.