The mongrel Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, recently declared that “the Irish never were a homogeneous group [all the same].” He said this, without irony, while standing in front of the Irish tricolour—a flag that literally embodies the opposite. Green for Irish nationalism, orange for Irish unionism, bound by white to symbolise peace and unity. That flag represents the coming together of diverse traditions—yes—but within a shared identity that has defined the Irish nation for centuries. It takes a special kind of ignorance to miss that. Or worse: a special kind of arrogance to pretend not to see it.
Martin’s comment wasn’t just historically illiterate—it was symptomatic. His habitual sneering at the Irish people goes beyond mere political cynicism. It’s cultural contempt. He doesn’t lead the nation; he looks down on it.
He is, without a shadow of a doubt, an embarrassment. And it is precisely his smug ignorance—his buffoonish misreading of Irish history weaponised to scold his own people—that inspired the title of my new book: Embarrassment.
He agrees with the statement that “This homogeneous Ireland idea, this little Catholic thing, was never the case. We were never homogeneous. Always hybrids, always mongrels.” Another anti catholic prejudice to set to ooze from RTÉ in a new four-part documentary series.
Firstly, there is no Catholic teaching—none whatsoever—that demands belief in racial purity. You won’t find it in doctrine, catechism, or papal encyclicals. Nor does it appear in credible historical accounts. On the contrary, historical texts are replete with references to the English race, the French race, and so on—terms used descriptively, not biologically. As for the idea of racial purity, the Encyclopaedia Britannica traces the concept not to religion, but to the pseudoscientific obsessions of 19th-century theorists and colonial ideologues.
Race as a categorising term referring to human beings was first used in the English language in the late 16th century. Until the 18th century it had a generalised meaning similar to other classifying terms such as type, sort, or kind. Occasional literature of Shakespeare’s time referred to a “race of saints” or “a race of bishops.” By the 18th century, race was widely used for sorting and ranking the peoples in the English colonies—Europeans who saw themselves as free people, Indigenous Americans who had been conquered, and Africans who were being brought in as enslaved labour—and this usage continues today.
The peoples conquered and enslaved were physically different from western and northern Europeans, but such differences were not the sole cause for the construction of racial categories. The English had a long history of separating themselves from others and treating foreigners, such as the Irish, as alien “others.” By the 17th century their policies and practices in Ireland had led to an image of the Irish as “savages” who were incapable of being civilised. Proposals to conquer the Irish, take over their lands, and use them as forced labour failed largely because of Irish resistance. It was then that many Englishmen turned to the idea of colonising the New World. Their attitudes toward the Irish set precedents for how they were to treat the Indigenous inhabitants of the New World and, later, Africans.
However lurid the notion, the idea of a homogeneous Irish population has far more scientific grounding than political commentators like Micheál Martin seem to realise. By European standards, Ireland exhibits remarkably high genetic uniformity. Multiple studies confirm that the modern Irish are more genetically cohesive than populations in Britain or mainland Europe. A 2017 ancient DNA study revealed that most Irish people descend from a stable mix of Neolithic farmers and Bronze Age Indo-Europeans—with far less genetic disruption from later migrations than seen elsewhere.
Even more intriguingly, subtle regional genetic clusters still persist—such as distinctions between Connacht and Leinster—traces of ancient tribal boundaries preserved through centuries of low mobility. Despite waves of Norse, Norman, and English invasions, the core Irish gene pool remained largely intact, especially in the west and midlands. Viking DNA left a detectable mark, but its overall influence is minor.
This is not folklore or nationalist puffery—it’s cold, peer-reviewed science. And it utterly demolishes Micheál Martin’s offhand remark about Ireland never having been a homogeneous group. The real mystery is how a man with a master’s degree in political history and a background in teaching could be so catastrophically uninformed. Then again, this is modern Ireland—where you can pass the Leaving Cert by memorising headlines, get a master’s for regurgitating clichés, and go on to lead a nation without ever once being burdened by empirical knowledge. Irish universities should hang their heads—or better yet, close for renovations until they rediscover the meaning of education.
It is a bit strange that Ireland was once ruled by a government that despised the Irish people no matter what background they came from. It caused rebellion after rebellion until freedom from tyrannical rule was won. Now it is back. 100 Years later. Never a day goes by without some member of the Irish establishment sneering at the Irish. Back to square one. A toxic government sending young people abroad to avoid the denigration and sneers. Perhaps in the hope that their children will not be made feel like faulty humans. If Irish immigrants abroad remain the butt of racist comments, at least their children can grow up as Australians, ridding themselves of the pestilence of being Irish.
It’s a curious thing—this little country that once fought tooth and nail to free itself from a government that despised its people, no matter their background. Centuries of rebellion, sacrifice, and bloodshed—all to cast off a regime that sneered at the Irish and treated them as something less than human.
And yet, here we are. One hundred years later, and it’s back—this time wearing an Irish face and a smug grin. Not a day passes without some member of the Irish establishment delivering a fresh insult, a sly sneer, or a thinly veiled contempt for the very people they pretend to serve.
EJ
References
https://www.britannica.com/topic/race-human/The-history-of-the-idea-of-race
