Ireland gives a summer welcome to Citizen Traveller - yet again.

by Donegal SOS - Donegal SOS Fri Aug 06, 2004 15:50

Last weekend up to 50 people, including councillors, business people and community 'leaders', tried to blockade a convoy of travellers from entering Bundoran.

There was all sorts of talk of baseball bats, unsightly visions, moral derision and the 'good name of Bundoran' getting wrecked.

The reality is that its only the chances of community dialogue and conhesion that get wrecked when such confrontations occur.

In this McEniff land of dark sourcery (FiannaFail), there ain't much room for diversity or non-compliance with the local emperor's hoorish economy.

The traveller issue has not been taken up by many of us activists, community workers, and wannabe peace builders - we are failing the challenge as we are in relation to 'the northern question'.

We are picking distant battles with grand moral righteousness. Myself included.

Tis time to localise our struggles, or indeed - to at least confront our own struggles and dilemmas.

by chris Fri Aug 06, 2004 16:09

As a Canadian who lived in Ireland for about 16 months or so, the main thing I learned about travellers while living in Ireland is that most Irish people just plain don't like them. Their reputation seems to be of people who show up and take car parks hostage in exchange for a cash ransom. To most of us this is called blackmail.

by jean-pierre Fri Aug 06, 2004 16:29

Stop mocking their culture.

by dilseacht Fri Aug 06, 2004 17:03

it doesnt help their case when they run rampant around cappagh trying to hack the limbs off some unfortunate teenager with a machete

by jeff Fri Aug 06, 2004 19:36

after them before hiking off elsewhere

Not all travellers do this, but a number of them do. It is too simple to immediatly assume the people of Bundoran have a problem with the Travelling community as a whole. It is a RA town, the same bunch of people linked to trendy lefties Sinn Fein.

Ask anyone in Galway what they think of travellers. Most folk will say " cant judge everyone", then ask them about the Wards and the Mc Donaghs and their little re-enactment of Braveheart in a Galway industrial estate three years back.

by Rasta4i's Sat Aug 07, 2004 00:33

Very little is known about the origin of the travelers. Various theories have been proposed: they are descendants of people in Irish history who had been evicted from their lands; they are descendants of traveling tradesmen, such as tinsmiths; they are descendants of traveling bards. There is no doubt that they are Irish, attested to by their names.

The begging and the usual suspicion that attaches itself to itinerant people have made the traveling people an unpopular sub-culture in Ireland. Their being labeled tinkers is one indication of their status in Irish society. The word "tinker" can have a neutral meaning of mender of pots and pans, but it is most commonly associated with itinerants and gypsies with rough habits. In 1896, Katherine Tynan in the "Westminster Gazette" reports that "They are a wild lawless set, and 'tinker-' has come to be an abusive term in Ireland from its association with them." A report from Galway in the summer of 1986 shows that in the 100 intervening years little has changed in attitudes toward the travelers. This report tells about 70 people with sticks and hurleys attempting to push traveling people out of a field close to private homes. The caravans of the five families were finally removed by tractors pushing them out of the field.

The Shelta language is the traditional language of the Irish Travellers, adapted as a jargon from the Irish language.
"They form a separate social group and are distinguished by mainstream Irish society even when the Travellers are settled in houses. About a third live in caravan camps run by local councils while the others nomadize or are on unofficial sites. Their main occupation is recycling waste material." [1]
The Pavee Point website says:
Travellers are a small indigenous minority, documented as being part of Irish society for centuries. Travellers have a long shared history and value system which make them a distinct group. They have their own language, customs and traditions. [1]
Estimated numbers of Irish Travellers in:
· Ireland: 25,000
· Britain: 15,000
· USA: 10,000

Travellers are people too, talk to them next time instead of bubbling up more predigest ideas.

by Setlled Traveller Sat Aug 07, 2004 13:31

I'm sick and tired of do-gooders treating travellers like some sort of endangered animals. I'm a traveller with a house of my own, a good job and a family, I'm not a victim of society.

Leave travellers alone to get on with thier lives and stop interfering.

by Anony Sat Aug 07, 2004 15:26

It is about time Travellers start taking some responsibility for their own bad reputation.

Practically everyone in Ireland at some point has had a bad encounter with them, either through their begging, stealing, assault, abuse, wrecking the local green and general lack of give and take attitude.

Everyone knows mainly through experience when growing up as a kid it is dangerous to even enter a Travellers camp or to walk past on the same side of the road of a major iternant encampment.

They regulary burn cars, leave piles of toxic crap like scrap, plastic, rubber, asbestos and other shit behind them where ever they setup camp. Some people see these greenie environmental concerns as something exclusive to the comfortable middle class. Well that's a head-in-the-sand approach. Why should any group be exempt from blame, criticism or responsbility for poisoning the place. And pollution affects poor people and poor areas much more than other places and yet total silence on this.

Up to recently they regulary used to extract cash from communities in return for moving on again from the local area or roadside to some place or whatever.

This is largely the experience of many people in Ireland of Travellers. And the bunch who come over here for the summer every year are far far worse. I suppose that is because they have even less ties to the place.

The tresspass laws were changed because of Travellers because they had seriously trashed several places over a period of many months. This was a poltically reactionary move and has made life difficult for others as a result.

If Travellers actually got together and formed a real community and effectively policed themselves and bought their own set of sites spread around the country, so that they could travel around the country and not fuck up everyone else then people might actually begin to warm to them. They could easily arrange to have running water, sewers and rubbish collection. It would even improve their generally apalling health. When the rest of the population goes on holiday in a caravan, they usually go somewhere where there is running water and sewers. Travellers must have enough money to fund this scheme between them all, seeing that for years in Ireland it was observed that they regulary drove relatively new cars and had relatively new vans.

It makes no difference to me and I reckon anyone else whether some particular group has a great tradition or culture behind them or not. What matters is whether they dump on you are not. Who wants to have a quite pint in a pub, if a violent brawl breaks out beside you and you get threatened with a glass in your face. I don't and very few others do. It doesn't matter whether they are local thugs, foreign thugs, Travellers or whoever. If it is local thugs doing it everyone is happy that they are barred and arrested.

Unfortunately for Travellers they are easily identifed as a group and so it is easy to generalise, but perception is everything. It is up to the Travellers themselves to change that perception and nobody else, especially since they wish to remain some kind of semi coherent group. But that's the point, why don't they deal with it. They have no hestitation dealing with other problems like feuds among themselves. It's about time they became a bit progressive in their attitudes ands relationships with everyone else!

by knowing a replica. Sat Aug 07, 2004 17:27

without fire. Interesting logo.

by paul c Sun Aug 08, 2004 02:55

i always try to sympathic to such issues but i've never really gotten the leaving rubbish behind thing...

it was explained to me once by a communtiy worker who worked with travellors that because they didn't have the service we have such as rubbish collection that rubbish does build up at the sites..

but they the travellors do have vans and trucks which they could carry large volume of waste to a dump atleast... so im not really sure about that one

ok scrappage might be their livelihood and scrappgage can never look neat but
i don't think i ever herad a sactisfactory explaination for leaving the place in a mess?

by Chekov Sun Aug 08, 2004 04:05

Every single person in Ireland has had many "bad encounters" with settled people, so what can we make of that? It is pretty racist to assign collective guilt to a whole culture on the basis of such anecdotal evidence.

"Everyone knows mainly through experience when growing up as a kid it is dangerous to even enter a Travellers camp or to walk past on the same side of the road of a major iternant encampment."

I don't know this and I had plenty of experience of it as a kid. Again, this type of argument by anecdote does little more than expose your own prejudices. Your fear and prejudices feed off each other.

And as for the rubbish; if you were to remove all sanitation services from any community, especially one as deprived and beset by social problems as the travellers are, and you will find that conditions deteriorate rapidly.

The truth of the matter is that most travellers have a far harder life than most of us. Statistics clearly show alarming differences in longevity, literacy and other basic indicators of poverty. When travellers have as easy a life as you have, you can start lecturing them on their manners.

by cleanout Sun Aug 08, 2004 04:37

Settled people leave their junk on the side of the road. The people on my street will be doing it on one day this week. And Dublin City Council will be removing it for free. This happens once a year, between April and September. So lay off the travellers, they are only doing what we do.

by paul c Sun Aug 08, 2004 12:53

they carry loads around as aprt of the business they probablbly go to the dump as part of their business they have halfback vans...

if you go camping in the forest you don't leave your rubbish there cos you expect the county council are going to around to collect it for ya?

it just that point i just dont get it...

by moonwolf Mon Aug 09, 2004 12:36

This is an interesting debate.The "travellers are trouble" and "settled people are rascist"approach just hasn't worked for either side in this conflict within our society. It seems to me that both sides have a responsibility to confront this issue.

Settled society need to look at their prejudices, especially the feeling that "we are paying our taxes and contributing to society but theyare getting a free ride", this seems to be at the core of a lot of settled prejudice. They see a group of people who pay no taxes, conform to no societal values and yet largely seem to be in receipt of state benefits and they resent that. They also resent the undeniabale mess that goes with traveller encampments.

On the Traveller side a little honesty would go a long way. The truth seems to be that large sections of the travelling community have engaged in seriously anti social activities such as littering.Certaintly the lack of sanitation can be blamed for a small percentage of it, however it is a simple thing to put ones domestic rubbish in a bin bag and bring it to the dump.Most of this littering is business associated(stripped cars, old furniture, valueless scrap etc).Furthermore if the travelling community is made of as many self employed people as it's claiming how come they are not making tax returns and are claiming social welfare.

Inclusion in society as an individual or an ethnic minority brings both rights and responsibilities. It is not good enough to scream discrimination and denial of rights if one is unwilling to accept ones responsibilities. Both sides have rights, however both sides also have responsibilities. It is time they started to live up to those responsibilities.

by chekov Mon Aug 09, 2004 14:30

"however it is a simple thing to put ones domestic rubbish in a bin bag and bring it to the dump" Have you ever tested this? Not only is it not simple, it's not even legal. I believe that the government recently passed legislation limiting access to county dumps to licencesed vehicles - in an attempt to prevent communiities organising their own bin collections when the council imposed non-collection of non-payers of the bin tax.

by moonwolf Tue Aug 10, 2004 15:14

That is untrue Chekov. I personally have brought rubbish to my local dump. True you have to pay, but you can do it.
Also the main point of that remark is that most rubbish left by Travellers is NOT domestic it is business related.

by marina Wed Aug 11, 2004 14:34

and you don't have to be Stephen Hawking to work out that a bonfire of cabling to remove plastic from copper wiring is a lot worse than any number of incinerators.

by crush Wed Aug 11, 2004 15:34

How are settled people supposed to get along with travellers when they don't even seem to get along with one another. They seem to a people who thrive in an air of conflict.

by koibhan Wed Aug 18, 2004 13:29

lets look at this from another angle......imagine i moved out of my comfy house and decided to travell around Ireland in my newly aquired caravan.

I am travelling along a nice country road and find a nice bit of grass to pirch my camper on.

Set up camp - scope the local area - start robbing - get the fire on - burn some cars - burn the evidence - burn anything.

after a week of this, i become bored with the area move onto the next leaving behind my mess and any unwanted stolen items.....

would this be tolerated within society?

is this the case for some / all of the travelling community?

are they really a community?

by Paul McAndrew - TASS Wed Aug 18, 2004 13:54

What do settled people's streeets look like after a two week bin strike?
When did you last campaign for proper provision of enough halting sites with proper rubbish collection?
should we really be smug about how we handle rubbish ? land fills and incinerators?
what proportion of serious ecological damage is caused by settled people I wonder?
who is using the bigger share of natural resources?
why is racism against Travellers seen as acceptable among alternative types?

by paul c Wed Aug 18, 2004 17:18

my questions about rubbish did not discount the traveller people as whole ( as opposed to kaiboh there) ... but i stll never got a clear answer on that.... again it is a petty issue but i thought i'd ask seeing there be someone like yourself to give is a more direct answer...

i dunno there hasn't been any number of travellors parked legally or illegally in my area for years... ?

by Brian Cunningham Wed Aug 18, 2004 17:20

I grew up in Newry. In the town ( now a so called city ) there was a large population of travellers. They were given a substantial bit of land in the centre of the town and allowed to set up camp. On many ocassions I saw travellers stealing from shops, peoples washing lines and from the baks of peoples cars. They would regularly jump anyone who stood up to them and beat them. The council gave them proper facilities that you would get in any caravan park in Ireland and they burnt them down. Generally they are anti-social, light fingered and a law on to themselves. They hatred for them is justified and it is not simply because they choose to live an alternative lifestyle. People who defend their right to invade areas and do what they like should wake up and realise they are being taken for a ride.

by koibhan Wed Aug 18, 2004 17:32

after a two week bin strike the street is going to have lot's of bin bags. It does not mean there will be burnt out cars or rubbish strewn down to road.

how would suggest to dispose of rubbish?
(slighty of the tinker track)

have you any eveidence / figures about natural resources or is it purely guess work?

who are alternative types? (hippies)

by penny4dababbie Fri Aug 20, 2004 18:39 penny4dababbie at tcdsu dot ie

This war is happening everywhere including Ireland. (But mostly in towns where "travellers" have a problem with the closing times in oubs)

The Irish government is at present using draconian new laws to move Indigenous Irish Travellers from anywhere that they attempt to camp.

(This is untrue)

They are the Irish equivalent to the Indigenous Peoples of Mexico and they are being described openly by members of the establishment in Ireland as 'Terrorists'.

(This is untrue - they have never been described as terrorists. Not are they an indigenous people. Here we go again - the idea that Ireland has an indigenous people who drive Hiace vans - Vikings, Celts, etc got it all wrong)

They, unlike the EZLN, have never taken up arms to fight for Justice, Peace and Dignity.

(But have taken up slashhooks and beer bottles on a global scale - http://www.thecourier.co.uk/output/2004/05/18/newsstory5928841t0.asp + http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1157731&issue_id=10679)
"Travellers engage in 'the usual funeral row'

ADVERTISEMENT



TWO Traveller families fought a pitched battle with knives, forks and slash hooks yesterday in Roscommon town following a funeral of an elderly Traveller.

A number of civilian cars and Garda squad cars were damaged in the melee.

Up to 300 Travellers from rival families attended the funeral in Ballygar and the burial service which passed off peacefully.

However, a row broke out between a number of males as the funeral concluded shortly after 1pm. One family, the Corcorans, had been burying an elderly relation. Trouble broke out between local and visiting Travellers.

Fighting went on for up to half an hour before gardai managed to quell the situation. Local gardai said they were expecting some trouble but not the near riot that occurred.

In the end there were no arrests. One garda described it as like a scene from Braveheart. "There was no reason for it. It was just the usual funeral row."


They have done nothing

(true)

except live their lives as their ancestors have for generations. They are a nomadic people.

(who drive Hiace vans. We are NOT talking Bedouin here. More like bed mattresses)

Just today I read of 30 families who had moved their caravans to an unused portion of land near the city of Dublin (our capital) being driven from this land by the Irish Police.

(in accordance with law passed by a democratic state)

So why am I telling this to the Zapatistas and Mexican Civil Society?

(to meet the terms of my own agenda and to further the myth of solidarity)

To point out that in the Fourth World War things are becoming the same everywhere.

(a lie)

And to point out that the resistance everywhere finally can realise this through channels of authentic speech and authentic tellings of the truth.

(so, yes, travellers, start a weblog or post to indymedia.ie today and feel better immediately).

by Jack Sat Aug 21, 2004 00:32

Just because you live in a caravan doesn't mean that you have a special sacred right to Tresspass on other people's property and litter in public property. If I decided to set up camp in the playground of my local school I would be thrown out. Why should travellers be any different? If People were meant to live in parks they would be rezoned as residential areas, except that the same people who campaign for travellers to be above the law would launch protests against this. There IS a lot of unnecesssery racism against travellers, but this does NOT give them the right to move into other people's fields.

by paul c Sat Aug 21, 2004 01:58

trying ti figure this out, people seem to be very pious when its other people breaking "the law", like theyve never bent a law in there lives

by David McCarthy - Traveller Visibility Group Mon Aug 30, 2004 17:30 tvgcork at hotmail dot com 021-4503786

This is in response to the post headed “getting the place a bit messy” by paul c on Sunday, Aug 8 2004, at 1:55am
Paul, I think it is really useful when straightforward points like yours are posted on this forum. They generate more light and less heat in debate, and allow opportunities to give answers.
Some Travellers dump rubbish. That is true. But they are not alone. They reflect the bad attitude in this country towards the environment. Even some Health Board officials in different parts of the country have dumped medical waste for years in unauthorised sites.
But the majority of people, including Travellers, are more responsible and respectful towards the environment.
In the Traveller Visibility Group we have noticed some trends regarding illegal dumping . . .
When an unofficial camp is set up, fly tippers often target it as a place to dump rubbish and rubble. These are usually people out to make a quick buck by charging naïve people €20 or €25 on the doorstep to dump their waste material for them. The fly tippers know that they will probably get away with it, as it will be blamed on the Travellers in the camp. Some of the fly tippers are themselves Travellers, but many are not. During this summer, even a Cork City Council lorry was spotted tipping rubble at an unofficial camp. As you can imagine, the accumulated waste can become a health hazard for the Travellers living at the camp, particularly for the children. Families living at an unofficial camp in Cork this year wanted to stop the fly tippers. As they felt too intimidated to confront the fly tippers face to face, they phoned the Gardaí and Cork City Council with the registration plates of the lorries. The tipping continued, until the families could no longer live among the rubbish and left. And who do you think was blamed for the mess? No prizes for guessing.
Another trend we noticed is that when a camp forms, say consisting of 6 families, they co-operate to dispose of their rubbish. For €1 or €2 a day per family they pay for their non-burnable rubbish to be dumped at the landfill site. The families share the job of bringing it there. What they can burn they burn at the camp. This is mainly packaging. With 20 to 30 children in the camp you can imagine the amount of food packaging alone. When evictions take place, it is often a quick and stressful event. I know that if I was in that situation, I would not be thinking of disposing my domestic refuse! So, after an eviction (which is one of the more common reasons why a camp moves on) you will probably see some domestic refuse, sometimes bagged, sometimes not. But it is more than likely the refuse from just 1 or 2 days. Let an unsympathetic media hack loose on that story, and it can be blown hugely out of proportion. During the eviction of the 94 Travellers from Kilmore Road Lower last year in Churchfield, even though it was a scene filled with stress, the families took the trouble to burn their remaining domestic refuse, all in small, neat piles. That night, after the families were gone, some young and not so young neighbours, kept one of those fires going by making a bonfire out of old beds and couches. The mess left the following morning was bad, and who do you think was blamed?

by Amo Fri Sep 17, 2004 18:12

Anyone looking for a piece of "traveller" culture would do worse than to look at the halting site at the back of Guinesses on James St.

It is the nearest thing I have seen to an open plan dump that supports human life.

And sorry - but "settled" people cannot be blamed.

They only fucking well built the damn place to be destroyed.

by Traveller Wed Feb 23, 2005 13:37

I do not believe it is fair to tar them all with the same brush. Has it not occured to some people that in all communties there are trouble makers and wasters. The only difference is that if a member of the settled communty is a trouble maker only his name is black listed not his familys or cousins or everyone withe the same surname as him, if one traveller is a thief or a trouble maker every traveller is put down as the same. To some people when they think of travellers they think of scum bags and leaches, no one ever mentions the hardworkin decent travellers that are about, and if a person notices a wealthy hard working traveller they try to tarnish their name by saying he must have stolen it and the like. I feel travellers are treated so unfairly because the settled community wants a group to look down at and penalise its part of irish human nature. I have heard a hunderd and one times people sayin this and that about travellers and how themselves wouldnt do this and wouldnt do that but they happen to forget about them fighting with other people and littering. I have also noted that the majority of people who bad mouth travellers are nothing but scum them selves and they try to run all travellers down to make themselves feel higher. Another point to note is that most of the problems assosicated with travellers are either directly or indirectly caused by the government. A good example of this is the failure to construct adiquate halting sites and many schools try to ban travellers from entering the school or if they allow them to enter they try to seperate them all into once class regradles of age, how is a traveller meant to get an education and improve themselves if schools are doing this. I will end here even thou there are several more topics i could go into detail with. So for once will people stop harassing travellers and try to help them improve themselves or just stop giving them abuse.

by me Thu Oct 27, 2005 02:51

i grew up with travellers but im not a traveller myself, you cant say all travellers are bad, thats placing people in category's, its the same as people say they dont like the english, just because one was born in a certain place or born into a certain family doesnt mean you are that person, its not anyone's fault in who their parents are or where they live or how they speak or what they wear etc;
i cant understand anyone who says all of a certain race are the same not one person on this earth is the same so... think about it the next time you are putting a person into a category!!!!!