The Irish are Whimsical: Benny Lewis Hates America

Benny Lewis is an Irish author.

But he is more than that. He is an urbanite, a global jetsetter, a Hillary voter, a Remainer. We bet Benny thinks it soooo cool that Ireland is currently run by a gay dude from Mumbai. There's that heritage thing again that Benny just doesn't get.

Benny Lewis hates America.

How do we know? Point 11: Religious Americans:

But I can't stand certain Christian affiliations of religious Americans. It's Jesus this and Jesus that all the bloody time. You really can't have a normal conversation with them. It's in-your-face religion.

All that Jesus, all that open, emotional religion just make Benny and his fellow cosmo-types so uncomfortable...so uncool.

Could you imagine talking about Jesus in Dublin's new Indian-Thai fusion restaurant? 

Oh, and Benny? That's not avocado dip, those are mashed peas.

Ok Benny, you've bashed Christianity, now do Islam...

Yeah, we didn't think so.

The Irish are Whimsical Part III: Irish Eyes aren't Smiling

The previously mentioned Irish Journalist, Benny Lewis, takes exception to American Exceptionalism:

There is no best country. But those who go on about how America is No. 1 tend to be those who have never traveled or are lightly traveled.

How about saying America is great or even … "awesome"? I think patriotism is an excellent quality to have, and we should all be proud of where we were born. But nationalism (believing other countries are inferior) is a terrible quality. 

Get fucked, Paddy. We'll take no lectures on national greatness from people that on the great issues of the 20th century didn't really have much to say. Hitler? Stalin? Whatever...and change the telly to the 10 PM lottery announcement.

The number of countries inferior to the US of A is far too long to list in it's entirety, but we'll start at the top: Ireland. Christ almighty, Ireland was a Third World country until the 1990s.

You want greatness? Take a look a the fuckin moon, there boyo. Look up at the night sky. There's an American satellite traveling in interstellar space. Too far away is it? How 'bout the Panama fuckin' Canal, or the Eire Canal, or the Hoover Dam, or the brand new Tappan Zee Bridge. The internet? We fuckin built that. How 'bout the fact that you aren't some dumb Krauts shoe-shine boy, or the Irish Independent Oblast, the most insignificant part of the Soviet Union.

Lewis also hate's America's is car friendliness:

America is a terrible place for pedestrians. It's the worst place in the world to live if you don't own a car.

You're goddamn right this country is built for cars, Potato shitter. It's 3,000 miles across the goddamn continent. That's longer than your stupid effing metric numbers even go. Americans think nothing of packing the kids into the minivan and driving 1500 miles to Disneyworld. It's called Holiday Road, asshole. Fuck you.

Lewis goes on to say that Americans are always in a hurry: 

Americans are also very punctual, because of course time is money. So many of them could do with stopping to smell the roses and arriving late because they took their time. 

Yeah, we'll stop and smell the roses in our huge goddamn backyard behind our four bedroom 2400 sqr foot house when we get home from work.

Lewis thinks being on time is an American thing, Jesus wept. We'd rather be in a hurry than sit around some god-forsaken train station arguing about the best way to Innisfree. That's why we had 'time' to build the aircraft carrier USS America. There will never be a carrier named RoI Ireland.

Fucking parochial Irish crap like this is why we created a whole plot line in the World War 1990 universe just so we could wright a novel about the British blowing the feck out of the Irish...again.

The Irish are Whimsical Part II: You're not from there

How parochial can an Irishman be? Benny Lewis tries to answer that question.

In his long article about living in America, the Irish author takes exception to American's habit of discussing ancestry:

Every American you meet is not actually American. They are a fourth Polish, three-seventeenths Italian, 10 other random countries, and then of course half Irish. Since Ireland is more homogeneous, it's hard for me to appreciate this, so honestly I don't really care if your great grandfather's dog walker's best friend's roommate was Irish. I really don't.

Let us try to explain something to you there, my pale-faced freckle besotted mick. America is a nation of immigrants. Heritage is usually a fun and interesting topic of conversation.

This might be hard for you people to grasp.

Now up until 20 years ago there was never any reason whatsoever for anyone, anywhere in the world to actually want to immigrate to Ireland. For that matter, in all Irish history it's never been the wrong time to leave.

But here in America, people have been stepping off the boat for over 400 years. Yes, everywhere around the world, their coming to America. People's grandparents, parents, even themselves came here from some Third World shithole (like Ireland!) to make a better life. For centuries people have clung to their old ancestry. For example the Stroocks came out of Rotterdam. In our high school one was Jewish, Irish or Italian, and you better believe we all knew the difference.

Benno here is playing dumb. We've been to Ireland, and at least three times were asked if we had any 'connection' to the old country, as it's called on this side of the pond. So Big Ben knows that people in Ireland actually take an interest in their cousins across the Atlantic.

Oh, by the way, Dublin airport has a departure lounge for flights to America, and its covered with pictures of famous Irish Americans.

Benny just keeps going:

I should add, though, that it's a language difference, so "Irish" actually means "Irish American" as I'd understand it. That's fine, but I'm trying to convey that people genuinely from that country (born and raised) find this annoying. There is no right or wrong, but it's important to realize that rephrasing it or saying "I have Irish/Italian heritage" may be more appropriate if you are talking to someone from that country. This is especially true if speaking other languages.

Benny Lewis comes to our country and tells us how to talk about ourselves. Is that right? 

Actually, speaking of 'connections' we do have one to Ireland. On our mun's side were descended from a long line of Scots-Presbyterians, known colloquially in America as the Scotch-Irish becuase they fought for Orange Billy at the Battle of the Boyne and got a land grant in Ireland. So fuck all 'ya'll. 

The Irish are so Whimsical Part I: American eyes are Smiling

Benny Lewis, an Irish journalist and author, chronicles his year living in the United States. Lewis' piece comes with an upfront 'trigger warning' and we'll get to the need for that in another post. We're doing this guy all week.

[Really? You can't hear that?-Ed]

There's not much new here but we thought it'd be fun to draw attention to this:

America... You guys smile way too much. It's annoying! How can you tell when someone means it? And why the hell would a stranger doing a crossword puzzle on public transport want to look giddy?

While in Europe we were well aware of this American trait, and went out of our way not to smile like a big, dumb over-happy Yank. 

[Don't worry, the London sweatshirts and ball caps tipped off everyone-Ed]

Of fuck off, Ed.