St. Patrick's Day = Xmas + Halloween?

The legend of Seany McGee

I was putting this together wondering if anyone is thinking about St. Patrick’s Day with the coronavirus fears and the answer is yes, the CITY OF CHICAGO is thinking about it thank you very much (update! Not this year, Paddy.)

Today the question is, when did St. Patrick’s Day become a thing with gifts and the threat of terrorism from some sort of demon leprechaun?

My son was starting to get hysterical because he was worried “the leprechaun” was going to get in the house and get him (?). He’s also really scared of being pinched at school. I could really live without St Patrick's Day. Sorry to my Irish witches.

☘️Witches☘️ wrote in to defend their holiday:

“I love Irish culture- music, dancing, sports, knit sweaters, people. I can do without the green clothes, dumb shamrock glasses, leprechauns and obnoxious drunks that St. Patrick day brings out.”

“Ugh, St. Patrick's Day is like goddamn Christmas where we live. So we started doing the green water in the toilet just so the kids didn't feel totally left out - both of them were melting down this morning scared that the leprechaun was in their closet, etc. I don't need more BS in my morning! I should have them watch Leprechaun and give them something to really be afraid of.

“I only wear green on St. Patrick’s Day because I work in an elementary school, and these kids are unrepentant. 🍀”

“Oh my son set a trap last year. He woke up terrified that a leprechaun was in the house. Then he went looking for gold. I got Irish soda bread on St. Patrick's day when I was little and thought that was the biggest treat ever.”

“Send your kid over to hang with my hooligans and we'll feed him cupcakes and soda bread and give him tattoos and distract him from the pinching stuff. We are borderline those crazy Irish people. 🍀”

“I have an irrational hatred of this holiday. Love the Irish. Just hate the frat boy mentality it brings out in mostly non-Irish/barely Irish people. My daughter is a 1/4 Irish and over my dead body will she wear green next week. If she wants to participate I would fully support her in Irish step dancing classes. Erin go bah humbug.”

“My father used to say that we should have more respect for our ancestors than to paint our faces green and pass out in gutters.”

“My college used to celebrate by lighting dumpsters on fire.”

“My Irish immigrant grandmother hated St Patrick's day because of the way jackasses use it as an excuse for public drunkenness. Also, my family was borderline nuts with the celebration (green shirts, decorative buttons and stickers, parade, big family dinner with corned beef & cabbage) but I never heard of a leprechaun trap until three years ago when my kid's Kindergarten teacher made it a thing. I think this is further evidence of the Pinterest-ification of childhood.”

“What is with this leprechaun terror BS? I don't get it. Never grew up with it. I just want some Irish music, dancing, a bagpipe or 20, and a Guinness or two. Is that too much to ask?”

“The leprechaun stuff feels very much an extension of Elf on a Shelf to me.”

“This must be an American thing - even though I have Irish ancestry on both sides and grew up in an area with a good percentage of Irish people, I have never heard of the pinching and green toilet water (wtf??) Maybe my town was the wrong kind of Irish though, we did have a Loyal Orange Lodge and I think they had a parade in the summer.”

“I'm pull my hair every year seeing Trump supporter ‘friends’ on social media posting how proud they are to be Irish yada, yada, yada. How much have they forgotten that in the 1800s they were the Mexicans/Muslims. I can't.”

“We have somehow avoided knowing about the Leprechaun thing, even though my mother and her mother loved the green-wearing shamrock-y-ness of SPD. Which is weird because I don't even really know who is Irish on that side. My father also loves it, even though his father is a Scottish immigrant and his mother is American mutt. I think it has more to do with him having gone to Notre Dame. My MIL also identifies as Irish, even though she's maybe 1/4. Maybe all American Catholics who aren't totally Italian or Polish end up thinking they're Irish?”

“I've always loved the cultural touch points of my Irish heritage and growing up South Side Irish in Chicago, it was even more underscored. We had a leprechaun hunting party for a mischievous scamp named Seany McGee in (Catholic) grammar school and the South Side parade was really just fun day to be an underage drunk. My family does a family dinner with storytelling, music and singing, corned beef and cabbage (blech but yay for brown bread!), a toast to our health--it's essentially like a wake but without the death. That being said, I'm not a fan of the Target version of St. Patrick’s Day nor the excuse to be a belligerent asshole in the name of ‘Irish’... though I will deck my kid out in a weeks’s worth of ‘First St. Patrick's Day’ onesies so... #McHypocrite?”

“What's with the pinching and the traps? I have never heard of that! We grew up celebrating in the traditional American way with corned beef and cabbage (which I find utterly disgusting) and my mom would put a green Hostess Snowball in each of our lunches (also vaguely disgusting). But there was also a religious component of the holiday, thanks to my deeply Catholic father: he was genuinely celebrating the feast of St. Patrick. We celebrate every year with food, but we skip corned beef in favor of green-frosted cookies, my grandfather's soda bread, and green jello jigglers for school lunch.”

“I generally support teachers and everything but why are they doing this to us, with the leprechauns?”

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