Sir, – Once again, a degree of offence has been caused by careless remarks in the UK media appearing to claim two Irish sporting personalities as British. There are those who might suggest we should have more to worry about. They may be right – to a point.
However, I believe it will ring true to the majority of your readers that Irish people travelling overseas seem to find themselves on the receiving end of a degree of “nationality denial” that is at odds with the claims of State agencies to have forged a distinctive identity for Ireland in the world.
I have never encountered Swiss people being told they were German, or Belgians having to protest they were not French or Dutch. No BBC commentator ever suggests that a Croatian tennis player is Serbian!
And yet, speaking as someone who has backpacked extensively around the world, what holds true is that Irish travellers constantly have to remind their interlocutors that our country is a place in its own right. So may I then propose the following to the Government as we triumphantly stride the decade of centenaries? Harnessing our greatest talents from politics, business, the arts, comedy, sports and academia, could we simply set ourselves the target that by the time we reach 2022, we might actually have made the world aware of our existence? It seems a modest ambition. – Yours, etc,
BARRY HENNESSY,
Donabate,
Co Dublin.