Talk:Irish people

Untitled
It appears there has been quite the edit war regarding image formatting here, with several edit warriors blocked for a short while. I have full-protected this page for a few days so that after those blocks expire the participants can come here and discuss it like adults instead of edit warring. I hope it is now clear to all involved that edit warring is absolutely not tolerated and if it recurs after the protection expires blocks will be significantly harsher. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:21, 12 October 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, bad to have edit wars. But now its frozen as kind of a mess, and no one can help fix it apparently. :( Johundhar (talk) 14:42, 29 March 2022 (UTC)


 * You're replying to an over 8 year old comment. If you have some discussion you wish to have, its best to start a new section at the bottom of the page. Canterbury Tail talk 16:19, 29 March 2022 (UTC)


 * After all these years, eh  ;)    SN54129  16:24, 29 March 2022 (UTC)


 * See, clearly I did not keep this on my watchlist, because I am kind of obsessive about archiving stale discussions exactly so this sort of thing doesn't go on. (worth noting that the page is only semi-protected, so any autoconfirmed user can edit it as of right now) Beeblebrox (talk) 18:50, 29 March 2022 (UTC)


 * I've now archived the older stale discussions and added one-click archiving to this page. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:59, 29 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Thanks Johundhar (talk) 21:32, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

Black Irish vs Black people who are Irish
@Denisarona and @Canterbury Tail:

We seem to have two separate groups of people to describe in this article. They are: This article about the Irish people has a section called ==Origins and antecedents==. It seems to me that it's not really possible for the older group to have any of its origins and antecedents in the newer group that descended from the older group. The second group logically cannot be not either the origin or an antecedent of the first group.
 * 1) People of European descent, with white skin and dark hair (rather than blonde or red hair), who have traditionally lived in Ireland for at least many centuries, and possibly thousands of years.
 * 2) People descended from the first group plus African people during the 18th and 19th century, who have never traditionally lived in Ireland.

Consequently, I don't think that the second group should be listed in the section called ==Origins and antecedents==. I've no objection to it being in the article, but it should not be in the section called ==Origins and antecedents==. Do you agree? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:48, 19 August 2021 (UTC)


 * Since nobody has objected, I have moved the descendants of the 18th- and 19th-century African slaves and Irish immigrants out of the ==Origins and antecedents== section and into the section about ==Irish diaspora==. People descended from the (pre-existing) Irish people and living in other countries are part of the diaspora.  They are not part of the origin of the Irish people. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:16, 1 September 2021 (UTC)


 * Actually looking at it it needs to be removed. It's sourced to Rootsweb, which is part of Ancestry.com which is a completely unreliable source per WP:RS/P. And the RTE source seems to fail verification as it doesn't appear to be anything more than advertising blurb for an old program. Canterbury Tail talk 20:20, 1 September 2021 (UTC)

Irish-language writers & literature in introduction
Hi wiki team - I'm concerned that the introduction, and the list of notable/famous writers, doesn’t reflect 1,500 years of writing and poetry in Irish (both pre- and post-Norman and/or Elizabethan conquest). In the grand scheme of things, a literary culture in English in Ireland has only existed for a few hundred years - which is actually a relatively small period of time, rich as its fruits have been! I wonder what's the best way to address this in the introduction of this particular entry.

Many thanks for your thoughts! IRideBikes25 (talk) 18:30, 2 December 2021 (UTC)


 * Good question. Category:Irish-language writers includes 360 individual writers, and has subcategories of its own. The article on Early Irish literature, indicates that the earliest surviving Irish inscriptions date to the 4th century. How do we cover 17 centuries in a single article? Dimadick (talk) 05:57, 5 December 2021 (UTC)


 * I think this article should just give a short introduction about with a pointer to a much more in depth article elsewhere. The Banner  talk 08:48, 5 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for chiming in, guys. As an Irish speaker myself, I was particularly concerned that the previous list of Irish writers basically only included writers in English from the past 150 years. I feel like my inclusions do a better job now but definitely don't encompass 1700 years of literature on the island. Let's keep trying.

For what it's worth, the mentions of Irish-language literature in the "Irish literature" entry are also not fully flushed out, so that's also worth investigating. IRideBikes25 (talk) 20:18, 5 December 2021 (UTC)

Ann C. Humphrey's piece
Hi there. In answer to your question there are a number of issues with that reference. Firstly, as per WP:CITEHOW, you can't cite a whole document to make a specific claim; you have to say where in that particular document supports such a claim. Secondly, I happen to have found Ann C. Humphrey's public linkedin profile, and according to that this particular piece is an undergraduate's dissertation which goes against the guidance as given in WP:SCHOLARSHIP. To quote the guidance directly: "Completed dissertations or theses written as part of the requirements for a doctorate, and which are publicly available (most via interlibrary loan or from Proquest), can be used but care should be exercised, as they are often, in part, primary sources...Masters dissertations and theses are considered reliable only if they can be shown to have had significant scholarly influence." So if it was a doctorate's thesis we could possibly use it, however it fails the guidance on the basis that it's an undergraduate's piece. Alssa1 (talk) 13:26, 2 January 2022 (UTC)


 * I can see why that resource is unreliable, thanks for clarifying.. However a quick google of "irish heritage in iceland" reveals a number of reliable sources confirm the assertion that Icelanders have a significant proportion of Irish DNA, e.g. this from 2000 and [ https://www.irishpost.com/news/new-dna-study-reveals-fate-irish-women-brought-iceland-slaves-vikings-155729 this from 2018]. The latter cites academic studies. My suggestion, for now, is to remove the suspect source and replace with a citation-needed tag, or for you to further research the topic and add some reliable sources instead. 10mmsocket (talk) 13:37, 2 January 2022 (UTC)


 * Thanks, I've added 'citation needed' per your recommendation for the mo. Alssa1 (talk) 13:46, 2 January 2022 (UTC)


 * Nice one. Thanks. 10mmsocket (talk) 13:51, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

There is not five million ethnic Irish people in the Republic of Ireland.
There are an estimated 600k plus thousand foreign nationals in Ireland adding to the population and thousands more children of those foreign nationals with Irish citizenship. So if we're going by ethnic Irish as this article details, the real number is around 4 million. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:BB6:6807:4600:F547:CF92:F007:16A4 (talk) 15:20, 8 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Evidence? The Banner  talk 20:12, 8 March 2022 (UTC)


 * As described at the start of the article Irish aren't just an ethnic group, but also a nation. No one is trying to claim an immigrant from say Poland is ethnically Irish. The numbers represent the nation as well as ethnic group. Canterbury Tail talk 20:37, 8 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Shouldn't these be separate articles then? I think you would be more genuine discussing the Irish population of foreign origin/citizenship in the Demographics of the Republic of Ireland article, and keeping the Irish people article about the 'ethnic Irish' (whoever exactly they're defined to be by this point, I'd personally love to know the answer to that one myself).
 * Who are Irish people exactly? Are they only people in Ireland descended from Gaels (and does it need to be fully, partially, what?) Is it only people who speak Gaelic? Is it only people with Irish names? Is it anyone who calls themselves Irish? Is it people who carry Irish passports?
 * What is the Irish identity? 88.110.96.131 (talk) 00:49, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

This whole article needs to be rewritten and updated to portray Irish people are the multi-racial non-homogenous modern ethnic group they are.
Irish people aren't just white and 'nation' doesn't suffice. It is widely accepted that modern Irish people are multi-racial, there are white, black, asian, south american and so forth. The entire article needs to be rewritten as it only focuses on the now outdated previously predominate long term white Irish group. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:BB6:6807:4600:464:3E57:9414:9C60 (talk) 09:42, 15 March 2022 (UTC)


 * No, not really. There is a difference between the ethnic group "Irish people" and the much wider and diverse group of "People living in Ireland". See: Demographics of the Republic of Ireland. The Banner  <i style="color:maroon">talk</i> 10:00, 15 March 2022 (UTC)


 * The Irish people of today seem to be neither a nation nor an ethnic group under any of the traditional parameters. All Irishness seems to boil down to today is 'people calling themselves Irish', for whatever that's worth.
 * Like you allude to, the modern Irish people are of vastly different ancestral origins, but we cannot say they are bound together by a common Irish language, that they have all assimilated into Irishness, for almost everyone in Ireland today speaks English as their main (and often only) language.
 * Ireland is a political state, but to call any of the inhabitants of that political state Irish in an ethnic sense... is a very dubious thing to do and raises a bunch of serious, ugly questions about who in Ireland actually qualifies as 'ethnically Irish' by this point, and more importantly WHY they qualify as 'ethnically Irish'. 88.110.96.131 (talk) 00:45, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

People with an Irish ancestor are not Actually Irish people
We cannot consider People with an irish ancestor was actually being Irish, this is not how nation works, the Irish nation is compromised of people from Ireland and Northern Ireland. Those are the Irish people, and at most people with one parent being irish can be included, This article should reflect the reality of the Irish nation, not the fantasy of people with Irish ancestors. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.221.62.126 (talk) 15:29, 15 March 2022 (UTC)


 * This article includes actual ethnic Irish people and nationals. An American or South American etc with Irish ancestry is still an Ethnic Irish person, your genes don't magically change because you're not born in a certain place, Irish people born to Yoruba parents for example are still counted as Nigerian Yorubans too. That's how actual ethnicity works. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:BB6:6807:4600:1DE4:BF42:1A62:EBB8 (talk) 10:02, 18 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Without response to any other aspect of the above thread, genetic ancestry and ethnicity are not at all the same thing. Mutt Lunker (talk) 10:29, 18 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Well hold on, are all those Irish people with English or Norse or Norman or other types of foreign ancestry not Irish then? Is Michael Fassbender not Irish? Is Eamonn De Valera not Irish?
 * Like you say yourself, doesn't matter where they're born or what they call themselves, their DNA doesn't change. Their DNA is still 'not Irish'.
 * That's weird, if it's ancestry the defines someones' ethnicity... then aren't huge percentages of the Irish diaspora also likely descended from ancestors in Ireland who were themselves descended from foreign groups in the past, and not Gaels?
 * Where does it end? Are we going to require DNA testing to prove people's Irishness now? How deep down the purityspiralling rabbithole do you want to go exactly? 88.110.96.131 (talk) 00:39, 29 April 2022 (UTC)


 * Michael Fassbender is Irish because he is an Irish citizen. Unfortunately, most of the 36 million Americans who identify themselves as Irish in the census are not Irish at all. They are not Irish nationals and are not always of Irish descent to be technically seen as "Irish Americans". You can't choose your ethnicity randomly. My family is originally from North Africa, but I can't call myself Italian because I have some Roman ancestors.
 * Actor Ben Affleck grew up "hearing that he is Irish". I have checked his claims and looked up his ancestry in publicly available records, and I cannot find any Irish ancestors. I'm sure he has some, but most of his known ancestors are from England and few are from Wales and Scotland.
 * There is a great deal of ambiguity on this issue, and it should not be dealt with in the current way where someone claims to be something, and then we all just nod in agreement. Irish people are the people of Ireland. English or Welsh people with Irish ancestry are English and Welsh people of Irish descent. Irish Americans are those who have mostly Irish ancestors. And Americans of Irish descent are those who have some recorded Irish ancestry.
 * This is an even bigger issue with German Americans. They are now considered the largest ancestry group in the US. I have reviewed thousands of records of people who publicly claim to be German Americans, and in most cases they are predominantly British and Irish (of British and Irish origins). There is a trend in America that began in the last century. Back then, the census used to report a large majority of white Americans identifying as English. That changed when many began to identify themselves as "American," while many others chose to identify as Irish, German, and so on.
 * Even if we only analyze the available immigration data, there is no way that the number of German Americans exceeds that of British and Irish Americans. And since this topic is notoriously not based on any logic or scholarly approach, I consider it controversial and agitating, and it does not have a place on Wikipedia to be presented as "facts". Lewishamsmith (talk) 06:45, 13 October 2022 (UTC)


 * Since when is someone like me, who has one Irish great-grandfather, considered to be “Irish”? I am not Irish, not even in the slightest. The Only Irish have no interest in claiming me. Americans of Irish descent often refuse to believe someone from England such as myself could be of Irish descent “like them”.
 * No Irish culture was passed down to me. There are no official documents or lists listing me as Irish and I have zero right to claim Irishness. Who is rallying the figures in this article? How important are they? Do they have any scholarly or cultural merit? 86.159.213.108 (talk) 23:53, 20 June 2022 (UTC)
 * A little late, but here's my opinion: Americans routinely conflate "ethnicity" with "ancestry" but these are not the same thing, as noted above. An ethnic group shares a culture -a language, customs, habits, religion etc -and this often overlaps with ancestry, although not in every case. A lot of what we in the West think of as "ethnicity" was inherited from nation-state ideology, or the idea that ethnic groups (who share blood and culture) should organize themselves into political units. So there is an element of nationality to ethnicity as well.
 * As to "Irish Americans" and the vanishing population of "English Americans" -you are wasting your time trying to figure this out. As a simple thought experiment, imagine a basic population of 10 people, 5 married couples, 3 are totally English and 2 are totally Irish. That's a population of 6 English and 4 Irish. Now imagine each couple produces 2 children, a boy and a girl, bringing the Irish population to 8 and the English population to 12. All four of the Irish offspring marry four of the English and breed, producing a population that's now part totally Irish, part totally English, and part-English and part-Irish. The Irish ancestry is spreading itself out. You may also wish to adjust the numbers so that the two Irish couples have four kids each, the English couples one each, bringing the population to 12 Irish and 9 English. So now you have a larger Irish population than English, and it's the English ancestry that's spreading out via intermarriage in the next generation.
 * Of course American ancestry is far more complicated than this. In the European descended population alone, you have a significant number of people whose ancestors may have been French, Italian or German, who through intermarriage have acquired Irish/English backgrounds, maybe some Dutch, maybe Scandinavian. The opinion of most scholars who study this stuff is that there's a large population of Americans who are part-Irish and part-something-else, who nevertheless choose to identify with their Irish ancestry, which implies Irish ancestry is fashionable in the US (that's how a few million immigrants turned into 30+ million Americans). It is certainly not a discrete category.
 * I would agree that Americans of Irish descent are, for the most part, not "Irish people" and should not be included in this article unless most reliable sources describe them this way (extremely doubtful). Most of them do not have Irish nationality, are not culturally Irish, and have complex genealogies. This is not an Irish 'ethnic' group. Jonathan f1 (talk) 22:49, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

1.9 Million 'Irish' in Northern Ireland
Sorry, what is this based on? Are we defining other people's identity for them now and attributing Irishness to people who don't want anything to do with such an identity now? The article isn't about geography, huge percentages of Northern Ireland's population abjectly do NOT consider themselves Irish (and that's not just the British people of Northern Ireland, but does include them) and this is well known. 1.9 million Irish people in Northern Ireland is an absolute nonsense, and recklessly inflammatory, claim to make and you all damn well know it. I'm not even going to get into the other claims (such as 14 million UK citizens being 'Irish' because they have a single recorded ancestor from Ireland somewhere in history), that claim about Northern Ireland is particularly egregious and it doesn't even need to be explained why. Which leads me to believe it is intentional and motivated, and the fact that it still hasn't been removed further sheds intense scrutiny on and discredibility towards Wikipedia as a place for learning and objective fact. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.110.123.130 (talk) 17:30, 30 April 2022 (UTC) < Block evading sock. Mutt Lunker (talk) 20:12, 5 December 2022 (UTC)


 * It's a blatant irredentist claim and you know it, remove it. 88.110.123.130 (talk) 17:36, 30 April 2022 (UTC) Block evading sock. Mutt Lunker (talk) 20:12, 5 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Even Ian Paisley referred to himself as Irish.Trans-Neptunian object (talk) 09:24, 21 June 2022 (UTC)


 * You mix up the ethnic group with the nationality. The Banner  <i style="color:maroon">talk</i> 09:49, 21 June 2022 (UTC)


 * IP has a point, despite their unhelpful tone, that someone born in NI is not necessarily Irish. Holding Irish citizenship would make one Irish by default, and people in NI are entitled to it per the GFA (my own Mother qualifies!) - but is someone say, born to Chinese parents in NI and holding British citizenship, qualify as being referred to as "Irish" by default? Naturally I am not referring to the racist belief that someone has to be born to white Irish parents to be considered Irish, but rather I refer to self identification and how this article tallies such people into the figures of "Irish people". On the article for Welsh People it uses the self-ID figures, which makes sense as I know people born to English parents/parents of other ethnicities in England but who grew up in Wales and do not identify as Welsh at all. --Trans-Neptunian object (talk) 10:36, 21 June 2022 (UTC)
 * A year old comment but agreed here, not sure why it's citing the total population figure. Should either be:
 * Republic of Ireland born: 40,357
 * Holds Republic of Ireland passport (alone) or other: 508,226
 * Self-identification with 'Irish' alone or with other identities: Alone - 554,415, Alone and other identites - 627,814
 * Tweedle (talk) 19:16, 9 July 2023 (UTC)


 * That's pretty much how many Wikipedia contributors operate. Many of them promote a particular agenda, and publishing their claims publicly on Wikipedia, where potentially millions of people could read this article, fulfils their goals.
 * A lot of anti-British content is spread on this platform without anyone speaking out against it. I keep seeing articles where Welsh, Scottish and very rarely English are given as nationality in the infobox, although we all know that the official legal nationality, that of the sovereign state, is required there. So in the text of the article it is mentioned that someone is Welsh, and in the infobox Welsh is given as nationality. I have never seen Bavarians, Ainu, Kabyle or Afrikaner in the infobox. It's always German, Japanese, Algerian or South African (or maybe Namibian). Lewishamsmith (talk) 05:58, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 June 2022
I will correct a spelling mistake. 85.107.199.157 (talk) 20:09, 27 June 2022 (UTC)


 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 20:42, 27 June 2022 (UTC)

Unfortunately narrow and limited view of Ireland
This Wikipedia entry, almost in its entirety, focuses solely on male leaders, male heritage, and the patriarchal domination that has plagued Ireland since Christianity was brought to the island. Shame on those of you who can't open your minds to anything except the most narrow male-centric perspective on the history of a glorious and beautiful people, half of whom were not and are not male. This entry is the quintessential stereotype of the old American-Irish grandfather who desperately clings to past memories of men running the world, rejecting any possible progress toward telling the true, complete and vibrant history of all the Irish people. DrKBrennan (talk) 18:16, 13 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Hi DrKBrennan. You might be interested in one of the projects at WP:WikiProject Women which aims to counter this known bias on Wikipedia. The unfortunate fact is that history has largely been male-centric, as you say. Wikipedia is based entirely on what has been reported in secondary sources so if they don't exist, then it won't be on Wikipedia. Everyone here is a volunteer so if you have knowledge of the subject don't get angry, get contributing. Princess Persnickety   (talk)  19:18, 13 August 2022 (UTC)


 * So either fix it or tell us how to fix it instead of going on a rant. What is missing? What significant people need to be added? The article talk pages are for discussions on how to improve things, not just complain like on a forum. If you think it can be improved then please by all means make suggestions. <b style="color: Blue;">Canterbury Tail</b> <i style="color: Blue;">talk</i> 20:11, 13 August 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 October 2022
80.6.48.34 (talk) 17:31, 13 October 2022 (UTC)


 * No question or request, so no action needed. The Banner  <i style="color:maroon">talk</i> 17:43, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 26 October 2022
Add Culture of Ireland template American cupcake lover USA (talk) 09:17, 26 October 2022 (UTC)


 * Why? This article is about the ethnic group. So that template is - in my eyes - irrelevant. The Banner  <i style="color:maroon">talk</i> 09:30, 26 October 2022 (UTC)


 * I agree, it also already has a sidebar with of Template:Irish people. -- Mvqr (talk) 12:33, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
 * I find it troubling that there are prominent editors on this article who don't seem to have any idea what an ethnic group is. The sociological definition is "A category of people who share a cultural background such as language, location, and religion.". Ancestry may be part of it (and often is), but it's not the only part and may not disqualify someone from having an ethnicity. There are Hispanics in the US, for example, who may be 100% European genealogically but are culturally Hispanic and speak the language, making them distinct from other whites. There is nothing irrelevant about emphasizing culture when we are speaking of ethnicity -it's arguably the most important aspect. Jonathan f1 (talk) 15:15, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

What's an "Irish person"?
This issue's been brought up already but I'm going to raise it again. If you're going to define "Irish people" as an ethnic group in the lead of the article (which is more than just ancestry) then consistency would improve the quality. Thus if "Irish people" share a culture (customs, habits, politics etc) then it's demonstrably false on the facts to say there are 36 million 'Irish people' in America, 7 million in Australia etc. These are not 'Irish people' but are people who are part-Irish and part-something-else, and that part-something-else could be a dozen different ancestries. Almost none of these people are culturally Irish and very few of them have Irish nationality.

If this article were about Irish ancestry it'd be one thing, but there are people in the Republic of Ireland who may have other European ancestry or whose parents may be from Africa or the Middle East. If Leo Varadkar is an Irishman by virtue of citizenship and culture, what's the basis for claiming an American as Irish by virtue of blood? This sounds very Nazi to me. Jonathan f1 (talk) 14:57, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
 * So just remember one thing, this isn't necessarily solely Wikipedia editor's interpretations or views. We write what reliable sources state, not what we want. Not saying it's right or wrong, just that everything should be based solely on what reliable sources say. <b style="color: Blue;">Canterbury Tail</b> <i style="color: Blue;">talk</i> 15:49, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
 * "Reliable sources" can be anything from journalism to scholarship, depending on the article space. This article is very clearly related to sociology and cultural anthropology, and thus it doesn't really matter how many journalists and cultural commentators use erroneous ethnic labels on Americans. I'm aware of no academic specializing in ethnicity who describes 30 million Americans as "Irish people". Jonathan f1 (talk) 16:32, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Also please do not compare things to Nazism, it leads to people ignoring your points and comments due to hyperbole. <b style="color: Blue;">Canterbury Tail</b> <i style="color: Blue;">talk</i> 12:20, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Spare me your tone policing. The Nazi reference had to do with the blood & soil ideology of Nazism, a racially defined ethnic identity. Modern sociologists do not define "ethnic" groups on DNA -they emphasize the cultural backgrounds of communities, and focus on aspects like language, religion, customs, habits, politics etc. "Irish"-Americans are not ethnically Irish (some are, but nowhere approaching 30 million) and it's misleading lumping them into this article with actual Irish people and the rest of the DNA community in and outside the Anglosphere. Argentina, Chile and Brazil are also cited in the article, and the implication is that "Irish people" are a racial group.
 * As far as Irish-Americans go, they have, at best, a symbolic ethnicity, which is very different than being ethnically Irish. And many don't even have that. Jonathan f1 (talk) 15:04, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Leo Varadkar is ethnically Irish too. Being multiethnic doesn't negate any one part of the whole. 2600:4040:7669:4700:C285:42C1:733D:9478 (talk) 03:25, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

Scots and Ulster Scots
The reason why I said that putting both Scots and Ulster Scots as related ethnic groups in the infobox is redundant is because while Ulster Scots are a distinct subgroup of Scottish people, they are still Scots, who are already listed. ~Cherri of Arctic Circle System (talk) 05:20, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Abandoned user draft
Please would an interested editor assess the extensive material added at User:Grimhelm/Irish people, incorporate what is useful, then blank that page as WP:COPYARTICLE, and leave a note here when done? – Fayenatic  L ondon 15:17, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Common ancestry
Reverted to original state where ancestry, history, and culture are all stated as qualities of Irish people.

That's not denying that people with history, culture and not ancestry aren't Irish. That's just saying that ancestry is a part of it even when culture isn't.

More than nearly any people, the Irish are in fact surprisingly genetically similar. 2/3 have the exact same Y DNA. This is an interesting scientific fact. Irish born outside Ireland can still be considered Irish. DenverCoder19 (talk) 05:16, 13 December 2023 (UTC)
 * I reverted your edit. Since you made it originally, and were reverted, you are the one who needs to get consensus for inclusion in the article. Per Wp:BRD you do not re-add it in and then discuss, you discuss once reverted. Will need consensus now for you to add it back in. Note this is strictly procedural. <b style="color: Blue;">Canterbury Tail</b> <i style="color: Blue;">talk</i> 15:00, 13 December 2023 (UTC)
 * My first question to you and is: what is wrong with "common ancestry"? Why is it removed?  The Banner  <i style="color:maroon">talk</i> 18:29, 13 December 2023 (UTC)
 * As there is no explanation of what is wrong with "common ancestry", I have restored that. The Banner  <i style="color:maroon">talk</i> 10:40, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I see nothing wrong with the 'common ancestry' line either. Alssa1 (talk) 11:42, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Just adding my 2c that "common ancestry" is appropriate because it's in a wide variety of sources. DenverCoder19 (talk) 00:57, 3 February 2024 (UTC)

Irish people numbers in the infobox
It is of course possible to have articles or sections about Irish people, or about Irish Americans, but an infobox does not have any room for fine points. It is currently saying that there are 36 million "Irish" people living in America and that is clearly using a very broad definition based on ancestry and/or sentiment. These would mainly be people who have never been in Ireland, and who are "Irish" in a secondary "hyphenated" way. Those numbers are clearly misleading as currently presented because, for one thing, it means the USA is the place where most Irish people live! Andrew Lancaster (talk) 21:47, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Unclogging the Genetics section
Presently, the Genetics section of this article is full of old studies that are no longer relevant. Population genetics and archaeogenetics have advanced enormously over the last decade and a half or so, and so it doesn't make any sense to put articles from before 2010 in dialogue with cutting edge research. It would now be fringe, for example, to seriously look, "at the possibility of a more recent Mesolithic- or even Neolithic-era entrance of R1b into Europe." The major introduction of the R1b haplogroup into Europe is now universally understood to be a Bronze Age phenomenon (aside from some rare subclades), and the Basque connection is now so outdated that there's really no reason to mention it.

Because this article is about the Irish people the genetics section should focus on the Early Bronze Age Bell Beaker migration, when the Neolithic population was largely replaced by Indo-European newcomers who formed the basis of the Irish people. Read more here. J. P. Mallory even takes seriously the hypothesis that this is the origin of the Irish language in Ireland (then just a strain of Proto-Celtic), although that's by no means consensus yet. There's a lot of good information in the Genetics section as it stands, but it's partly buried under outdated material.

I would edit the page myself, but it's restricted and removing a bunch of sources (at least everything before 2010) will probably require some explanation anyway. 2601:85:C601:9D60:7070:768D:B91A:F992 (talk) 08:57, 11 July 2024 (UTC)