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Let’s start with the genocide “theory”, and boy, is this one a doozie. In recent years, memes and social media posts, which tend to surface around St. Patrick’s Day, have put forth the baseless claim that Ireland’s original inhabitants were Twa pygmies from Central Africa. When you celebrate St. Patrick's Day that's the celebration of their genocide." The theory was neatly summarized by the author and speaker B.F. Nkrumah in a widely shared Facebook video in March 2018: A Guest Post by Morgan Daimler. Every March the pagan community, without fail, sees a surge in conversations and diatribes on saint Patrick, usually rooted in the ideas that Patrick was a maniac who wiped out the druids (represented by snakes), destroyed Irish paganism, and singlehandedly converted the entire island. Scholars believe the snake story functions as an allegory for St. Patrick’s eradication of pagan ideology. 5. Green has historically been associated with St. Patrick’s Day. So-called black people who are aware of the accurate history behind the story of St. Patrick’s day frequently challenge other “black” people who ignorantly celebrate the expulsion and genocide out of a lack of awareness. The ignorant ones usually respond by saying “what’s the damage in it, it’s just clean fun.” The first St. Patrick's Day Parade actually took place in Boston, Massachusetts, back in 1737; the city is known for its high percentage of residents who claim an Irish ancestry. However, some modern Pagans refuse to observe a day which honors the elimination of an old religion in favor of a new one. This has led some Pagans to believe that “snakes” are a metaphor for Pagans, and view St. Patrick as the one who committed cultural genocide on the Celtic people. One of the most interesting articles I read that questions this connection is a piece by Jason Pitzl-Waters on his blog The Wild Hunt: A Modern Pagan Perspective. One of the most popular legends about St. Patrick is that he drove the snakes from Ireland. And that, because the Emerald Isle doesn’t actually have serpents, those snakes were a metaphor for pagans. As a young pagan, I believed this myth and would don a temporary snake tattoo every St. Patrick’s Day. Or, I’d wear all black in an anti-St With this understanding, some modern Pagans view Patrick as a genocidal figure and have accordingly introduced new elements to the evolving holiday, such as wearing black and/or the image of a serpent, sometimes referring to the holiday as “All Snakes Day.” Proponents of this idea often see St. Patrick’s Day as a celebration of religious For some modern Pagans (whether Irish or not), St. Patrick’s Day isn’t a day of celebrations, as they see Patrick, famously attributed with converting Ireland to Christianity, as committing something akin to cultural genocide,” Pitzl-Waters began. St. Patrick committed a mass genocide of indigenous Irish pagans. We've already seen how snakes cannot be a metaphor for the indigenous religion of Ireland, now we come to the main myth of the saint and holiday for contemporary Pagans. To this day, there is no archeological evidence that demonstrates this 'genocide' is a possibility. What is the meaning behind St. Patrick's Day? Who is St. Patrick? Born in Roman Britain in the early 5th century, Succat was kidnapped by Irish marauders and forced on a pagan king's slave ship to be enslaved in Ireland at age 16. As sourced in his autobiography, he was malnourished, isolated, and turned to faith as his personal refuge. You are right it is a tangent in terms of St Patrick and genocide however the links above are a dubious source to say the least, and there is a lot of evidence that shows how Christians eradicated paganism and dealt with non believers. A girl I know gets indigant every St. Patricks Day, because she believes that St. Patrick conquered Ireland and forcibly converted them, committing genocide against the Pagan druids who lived there. So St. Patrick went around Ireland using his staff to turn shamrocks into leprechauns. The leprechauns ate all the snakes and the potatoes were able to grow again. The people rejoiced and thanked St. Patrick. And that is why we celebrate St. Patrick's day today. So we can see the kernel of truth behind the claim that Patrick committed some sort of pagan genocide – his hagiography definitely describes mass deaths caused directly by the saint, but as far as I know there is no historical, geographical or archeological evidence corroborating the claims that Patrick caused 12,000 people to die, the earth I'm Irish and pagan. I hate St Patrick's Day. I don't see the introduction of Catholicism to our beautiful island as anything worth celebrating. Very few people here celebrate it for religious reasons, its all an excuse to get drunk. Most Irish people I know (even non-pagans) don't celebrate it at all and are just happy to get a long weekend St. Patrick’s day is more a holiday for Irish immigrants to the USA than people from Ireland. It’s not really a religious holiday at all, but more of a celebration of cultural pride. It’s fine to celebrate if you’re an Irish immigrant or an Irish citizen or just someone who likes having occasions on which to drink, but I don’t really St. Patrick’s Day is a drunken celebration of the genocide of the Druids. The topmost 10 drinking holiday on this planet is St. Patrick’s Day (United States, Ireland). The US Irish do NOT even know that they landed as slaves in USA after a DELIBERATE POTATO BLIGHT introduced by Jews. The brighter the colours the better and more proud the girls were of them. The biggest horse fair in Munster used to be held on St. Patrick’s Day but was changed to the 18 th due to St. Patrick’s Day being a national holiday. A grandmother of a the collector used to go to the crossroads to watch all the horses galloping passed and it was
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