3 ms·

So, what happened (slight oversimplification, but you can read up on it) was: * English people owned the land and the produce of the land in Ireland. * Irish

So, what happened (slight oversimplification, but you can read up on it) was: * English people owned the land and the produce of the land in Ireland. * Irish people had little choice but to work for English people, and were allowed tiny plots of often-horrendous land on which to grow their own food. Potatoes were one of the few things that could grow on the land the Irish were allowed to use. When disease affected the potato crops, the English simply shrugged, kept exporting their own produce, and let the Irish die (and notably took steps to try to prevent foreign aid reaching Ireland, on the theory that it would be shameful for foreigners to do more for the Irish than the English were doing). There are strong arguments to be made, especially given the historical English attitude toward Ireland and the Irish, that it turned into an opportunistic genocide: the English didn't set out at first to kill so many Irish, but given the opportunity to simply sit back and let the Irish die off, they took it.

masklinn 11y ago
> * English people owned the land and the produce of the land in Ireland. Of note, the english landlords didn't own the land out of any deservedness. The english crown had passed a number of penal laws fully intended to — and very successful at — transferring irish land from catholic owners to anglican owners. Amongst these: * catholics were mostly barred from education * catholics were barred from buying or inheriting protestant land * catholics could not buy land under leases of more than 31 years * catholics were barred from primogeniture (inherited land had to be equally split amongst all sons, fragmenting it), unless the heir converted Over just the 18th century (between 1688 and 1776) Catholic ownership went from ~25% of irish land to ~5%. And it started that low because the 18th century round of Penal Laws followed from the early 17th century one between 1606 (gunpowder plot) and 1660 (declaration of breda), which had already generated significant land transfer from irish catholics to protestant english and scottish settlers.
- Wildgoose 11y ago
  No, Irish people owned the land - typically absentee landlords, (albeit Protestant as you rightly point out). The Government imported millet from India to help feed people, but Irish radicals called it "Peel's Brimstone" (it's yellow remember) and said those who ate it endangered their immortal souls. They preferred the propaganda value of dead children. As for the "English", we were thrown off our lands by the Enclosure Acts, and forced into the factories as the only way to avoid starvation - by the same Norman-British upper classes that were abusing Ireland as well. But for some reason, although we are fellow victims, we are the ones that always get the abuse for acts not of our doing.

masklinn 11y ago

> * English people owned the land and the produce of the land in Ireland. Of note, the english landlords didn't own the land out of any deservedness. The english crown had passed a number of penal laws fully intended to — and very successful at — transferring irish land from catholic owners to anglican owners. Amongst these: * catholics were mostly barred from education * catholics were barred from buying or inheriting protestant land * catholics could not buy land under leases of more than 31 years * catholics were barred from primogeniture (inherited land had to be equally split amongst all sons, fragmenting it), unless the heir converted Over just the 18th century (between 1688 and 1776) Catholic ownership went from ~25% of irish land to ~5%. And it started that low because the 18th century round of Penal Laws followed from the early 17th century one between 1606 (gunpowder plot) and 1660 (declaration of breda), which had already generated significant land transfer from irish catholics to protestant english and scottish settlers.

Wildgoose 11y ago
No, Irish people owned the land - typically absentee landlords, (albeit Protestant as you rightly point out). The Government imported millet from India to help feed people, but Irish radicals called it "Peel's Brimstone" (it's yellow remember) and said those who ate it endangered their immortal souls. They preferred the propaganda value of dead children. As for the "English", we were thrown off our lands by the Enclosure Acts, and forced into the factories as the only way to avoid starvation - by the same Norman-British upper classes that were abusing Ireland as well. But for some reason, although we are fellow victims, we are the ones that always get the abuse for acts not of our doing.