Stop saying Dublin 4 when you mean South County Dublin

[Papinian]

Hi

Full disclosure: I am from Ballsbridge in Dublin 4.

For many of us who grow up in Dublin 4 (Donnybrook, Ballsbridge, Sandymount, Irishtown, Ringsend), it is a source of some annoyance that the term has become associated with a bunch of people who are actually from suburbs further out (Blackrock, Stillorgan, Foxrock, Killiney, Booterstown even). Those of us from Dublin 4 refer to these people as South County Dublin.

If you look at the fee-paying schools (rugby-playing fee-paying schools in the case of lads) they are not in Dublin 4 at all, with the exception of St. Michael's in Ballsbridge which doesn't even fit the image that well. And even in the case of St. Michael's most of the pupils are from South County Dublin, not Dublin 4. Admittedly Lansdowne and a number of rugby clubs are in Dublin 4, but if people are willing to see Drumcondra as distinct form the generally rural Irish crowds which pack Croke Park they should be capable of realising that the people who live in Dublin 4 are a (largely) separate group from the Lansdowne rugby crowd.

The truth is that with large parts of Ballsbridge and Donnybrook now full of offices there aren't even that many kids growing up there in the first place.

The original 80s use of Dublin 4 as a term was referring more to Garrett Fitzgerald (who was TD for Dublin South East) and the FG liberal political class in the area. (Even that characterisation isn't quite true - if you look at referenda results, Dublin South East is markedly less liberal than Dublin South or Dun Laoghaire)

In the mid-90s when I started college it was already becoming a term used to describe the South County Dublin crowd driving their parents' cars to college in UCD and speaking in their DORT accents. (Yes, the accent is a DORT accent - not a Dublin 4 one.)

It is often people from rural Ireland who come to college in Dublin and haven't been there a wet weekend before they are classifying different areas (most of which they wouldn't know how to get to) and saying things like "Tallaght's very dangerous" and "You can't go into Ballyfermot after dark" who are also saying "She/He's a real Dublin 4 type".

Try to get it right.

Thanks

[Ard-Taoiseach]

Roysh, I will.

[codology]

Typical D4 attitude.

[Reggie Perrin]

[Pidge]

If you look at the fee-paying schools (rugby-playing fee-paying schools in the case of lads) they are not in Dublin 4 at all, with the exception of St. Michael's in Ballsbridge which doesn't even fit the image that well.

Why not?

[Reggie Perrin]

I wasnt going to comment but...

Who gives a ************************e about D4 (except a small gang of D4 types in D4).... get a life... move out to South County Dublin or the Country and acclimatise mate

[TheJudge]

Try to get it right.

This implies that someone here has got it wrong which I see no evidence of. In any case, if that's the height of your problems, you've got f**k all to worry about. Ya gotta ask yourself.....

[Papinian]

Pidge: St. Michael's students generally don't kick lads in the head late on a Saturday night. The school's also somewhere where decent grades in your Leaving are considered more a mark of achievement than being on the rugby team. And Michael's is the ONLY fee-paying rugby playing school in the whole of Dublin 4. How many are there in South County Dublin? Six?

Reggie Perrin: Perhaps you're not one of the people on this site who bandy the term D4 around. If not, good. But there are an awful lot of other people who do. I don't know what townland you're from, but I'm guessing you wouldn't want it mischaracterised either. So try not to be offensive.

TheJudge: I never said this issue was on a par with hunger in Africa or even the overblown AerLingus/Shannon/Heathrow controversy. It's just a simple, factually-backed assertion in a Chat thread.

[stringjack]

It's about UCD.

[Reggie Perrin]

Pidge: St. Michael's students generally don't kick lads in the head late on a Saturday night. The school's also somewhere where decent grades in your Leaving are considered more a mark of achievement than being on the rugby team. And Michael's is the ONLY fee-paying rugby playing school in the whole of Dublin 4. How many are there in South County Dublin? Six?

Reggie Perrin: Perhaps you're not one of the people on this site who bandy the term D4 around. If not, good. But there are an awful lot of other people who do. I don't know what townland you're from, but I'm guessing you wouldn't want it mischaracterised either. So try not to be offensive.

Fine... you are of course entitled to your opinion and that should be respectedk.... i still dont get how it overly upsets though... a relatively minor issue imho