User talk:Iolar Iontach/British Isles Discussion

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The comment about the Irish Sea is very apt, and a very good analogy. The whole sea is called the Irish Sea, even those parts of it that are part of UK territorial waters. Do I object to this blatantly inaccurate nomenclature, which clearly and obviously implies that part of UK territory is under Irish control? Hell no! I'm mature enough to realise that geographical terms don't always or necessarily correspond to political ones, which they often predate by a long time. TharkunColl 22:35, 11 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The reference to the Irish Sea is irrelevant. Names of lands where people live tend to reflect the names of the people that live there. Irish citizens are not British. People tend not to live in or on the sea thus the suggestion that Ireland has sovereignty over part of the United Kingdom's territorial waters is patently absurd. Iolar Iontach 14:44, 12 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This is not so. There are plenty of examples of the name of a people being taken from a pre-existing geogrphical term, even if the boundaries don't match. American is one, British is another. Why aren't you up in arms that the UK has appropriated the originally-Celtic word "British"? I would have a modicum of sympathy with that stance, as I don't particularly like the word anyway (always calling myself English unless the situation rendered it inappropriate). TharkunColl 15:19, 12 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Remind me what the names of the people from America and Britain are because I'm almost sure that it is American and British which reflect the names of the lands in which they live. The etymology of British isn't Celtic; it's Latin, possibly Greek which may have been influenced by (not derived from) an indegenous Celtic language. The word from the Celtic language certainly would not have referred to the entire archipelago. Indigenous usage of this inaccurate term is recent.
Irish and Britain don't fit because Irish people aren't British. British does not refer to Ireland EVER with the possible historical exceptions which are erroneous since Ireland is not a part of Great Britain, and hasn't been for several geological epochs. Iolar Iontach

Americans are called that because they live in a place called America, even though that term has a much wider geographical meaning than the USA.

You are simply wrong to state that "British" never refers to Ireland - it does so in the phrase "British Isles" for example. If some Irish people don't like it, well tough. The vast majority of the population of the British Isles will go on using it anyway. TharkunColl 07:34, 13 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

British never refers to Ireland because Ireland isn't British; I understand that this causes you great difficulty but Ireland is a sovereign state. If you think that Ireland is British then you need to raise this issue with Merriam-Webster and OED who reflect popular English usage and define British differently to you. Maybe the people of Ireland will then change their Constitution just for you.
Read what I said again: Names of lands where people live tend to reflect the names of the people that live there. Iberians come from Iberia; Africans from Africa; Europeans from Europe; Scandinavians from Scandinavia; British from Great Britain; and Irish from Ireland. It is questionable if Ireland is a British Isle; its government and popular usage do not reflect that it is. Whatever the population in the rest of the archipelago thinks is irrelevant. Most of the world believes Scotland and Wales to be parts of England, does that make it fact? Iolar Iontach 11:48, 13 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
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