In Reply to: re: re: read it again posted by me on October 21, 2007 at 11:27:10:

I think there is a fine line between winding up people and been downright ignorant. Matt teasingly called me a traitor because I wished the English team well. Have I reacted in any way - No, and why because I can see the humour in it.

However 'Me' I personally find your post offensive, I am from Castlebar, but have lived in England for seventeen years and a bit feed up of the anti-English slant on this board that appears on a reasonably regular basis.

It was a good match and South Africa worked hard for their win, and as a nation England is justifiably proud that their team even got to the WC final. Rugby is hardly the most genteel of sports, and I am not sure the incident you describe above was a vindictive move by the English player.

I am proud to say I love living in the UK, it is a great country, but not perfect. It is unfair to tar a country on the actions of a few, Ireland I would imagine as a similar number of "dirty players" on what ever playing field, be in Sports, Business or simply life in general per capita as the UK.

My seven year old son is English, and I want to be confident when I take him home to Ireland he is accepted for who he is as an individual rather than he is English, therefore a "dirty, violent blackguard".

Many families in Castlebar have Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Sisters, Brothers, cousins and grandchildren in the UK. This has been so for many generations, and will most likely be so. You would be reasonably hard pressed to find a family in England that does not have some Irish connection and is extremely proud of the link however tenuous (and they often are!)

I think this Anti-English bias has a lot to do with what we were taught at school, history books paint a picture of the English coming in to Ireland and reeking merry hell. I do not contest the accuracy of some of the accounts of history by any means, but feel the Nuns and the Brother did a very good job at painting the Irish as the best and the English as the worst. In Primary School I feared the English based on their accounts, but as I got to know English families that visited or came to live in Castlebar, I questioned their teachings.

The Irish were hardly saints, before the English arrived. There was considerable barbarism by the Irish on their own.

It is time to really take a close look at England. There are many good and honest people, many law abiding and peaceful people, many warm and friendly people that open their country and welcome so many foreign nationals to it's shores. It is a country with a personality that is slightly different from the Ireland, but at the heart of it all there are many similarities.

Maybe I am a traitor, I really enjoy living in England, I will probably live my days out here (they might be numbered after this post!!) I am proud to be married to an Englishman, and that my son is English. I am home later this week, so gather the rotten tomatoes and get ready to trounce a proud traitor ;-)