this post was submitted on 19 Jan 2024
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[–] [email protected] 134 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I hope for him nobody says "We recognize Britain and that Ireland is part of Britain" 🤣

[–] Ghostalmedia -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

Technically, one third is.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)

Not technically.

The country's formal title is: The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland is not part of Britain

[–] Ross_audio 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

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[–] [email protected] -5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Britain is just England and Wales

Also, I don't see how he got that 16% is "technically" a third

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago (2 children)
[–] DillyDaily 0 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Britain is historically just England and Wales, though colloquially now used as a shorter way of saying "Great Britain", which is England, Wales, and Scotland.

The British isles is England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland (and all the smaller islands like the Hebrides, Orkneys, etc)

[–] Womble 4 points 10 months ago

I've literally never heard that or read anything suggesting that. Britain/Britons has been used to describe the islands and peoples of the north Atlantic archipelago since ancient times with great Britain simply referring to the largest island (i.e. England+Scotland+Wales), as per wiki

Written record

The first known written use of the word was an ancient Greek transliteration of the original P-Celtic term. It is believed to have appeared within a periplus written in about 325 BC by the geographer and explorer Pytheas of Massalia, but no copies of this work survive. The earliest existing records of the word are quotations of the periplus by later authors, such as those within Diodorus of Sicily's history (c. 60 BC to 30 BC), Strabo's Geographica (c. 7 BC to AD 19) and Pliny's Natural History (AD 77).[10] According to Strabo, Pytheas referred to Britain as Bretannikē, which is treated a feminine noun.[11][12][13][14] Although technically an adjective (the Britannic or British) it may have been a case of noun ellipsis, a common mechanism in ancient Greek. This term along with other relevant ones, subsequently appeared inter alia in the following works:

Pliny referred to the main island as Britannia, with Britanniae describing the island group.[15][16]
Catullus also used the plural Britanniae in his Carmina.[17][18]
Avienius used insula Albionum in his Ora Maritima.[19]
Orosius used the plural Britanniae to refer to the islands and Britanni to refer to the people thereof.[20]
Diodorus referred to Great Britain as Prettanikē nēsos and its inhabitants as Prettanoi.[21][22]
Ptolemy, in his Almagest, used Brettania and Brettanikai nēsoi to refer to the island group and the terms megale Brettania (Great Britain) and mikra Brettania (little Britain) for the islands of Great Britain and Ireland, respectively.[23] However, in his Geography, he referred to both Alwion (Great Britain) and Iwernia (Ireland) as a nēsos Bretanikē, or British island.[24]
[–] njm1314 -2 points 10 months ago

Jesus Christ what an exhausting people

[–] Squizzy -4 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Fuck off British isles is a term used by the occupiers to legitimize their occupation. The Republic is not a part of the British isles

[–] DillyDaily 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Makes sense, as a geographical location I imagine it has had many names over history based on who controls the narrative. Can I ask what other names there are for the area that isn't supportive of British colonialism?

[–] Squizzy 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You can call us the South Eastern Icelandic archipelago if you'd like. Or the British and Irish islands.

[–] DillyDaily 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Thank you, British and Irish Islands seems like it would be more easily understood by the general populous. When I hear South Eastern Icelandic Archipelago, I get a bit geographically turned around because I'm an idiot and I picture Iceland near Greenland which is near Canada, and I picture Ireland near England which is near France, so in my tiny brain Ireland and Iceland are a whole ocean apart (even though paleo-geographically, it's the same soil)

[–] Squizzy 1 points 10 months ago

I was more joking with that one to be fair but yeah just include Ireland in the terminology and you're good. It is better than the implication that we are a part of Britain.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago

The British Isles is a term used because Albion fell out of favor.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago
[–] Cicraft 7 points 10 months ago

How is 6/32 a third?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 49 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Pathetic. You’d think a country colonized by a foreign nation would be more sympathetic to their struggle for independence.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 10 months ago

What? Neither side represents the indigenous population of Taiwan.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 10 months ago

Taiwan is not colonized by the PRC.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Taiwan has never been colonized by a foreign nation, except by the ROC after the Chinese Civil War.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago

It was also colonised by Netherlands and Spain for few decades in XVII century and by Japan in 1895-1945.

[–] erranto 39 points 10 months ago (3 children)

He is not technically wrong, as the Taiwanese themselves haven't declared independence from China.

[–] erranto 23 points 10 months ago (1 children)

So they are not independent then. not even their staunchest ally (USA) recognizes their Independence, so I don't see where is the controversy with Irish PM's statement.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Was there a controversy?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago

Yes, but that stems more from the fact that the Republic of China (aka Taiwan) and the People's Republic of China both lay claims to be the real China.

You can't really declare independence from yourself.

Also the PRC would probably attack immediately if the ROC gave up their claim on being china.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Because the PRC has set this as a red line. The Taiwanese would do it in a heartbeat.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No, it's because they claim sovereignty over the whole of China + parts who already are independent from the People's Republic of China. They are not independent, just the old regime in exile. To them Taiwan is just a province of China just as it is for the PRC

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Interestingly China would also be quite upset if Taiwan stopped claiming sovereignty over the mainland. To them that would signal an end to the one China policy. So Taiwan maintaining its claim to the mainland is actually to keep China happy. I don't think the Taiwan government is under any illusion that they will someday take over the mainland.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It sounds extremely convoluted that a government considering itself "rightful" (ROC/Taiwan) who fought and lost a war with revolutionaries (PRC/"China") would continue the claim that led to a war to not piss off the revolutionaries?

Is this some homebrew theory or do you have a source?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Not some home brew theory. And it is very convoluted, but it's bascially more "one China" policy word games.

The Taiwanese president unofficially stated in 1991 they do not claim mainland China, but this was never affirmed by courts and there's no force of law behind it. They cannot officially do this currently without greatly antagonizing China. China's view is that Taiwan limiting its borders to include only Taiwan and not all of China, would signal the end of the "one China" policy and be a precursor to Taiwanese independence. If Tawain were to declare different national borders that include only the island itself, then China would view it as a violation of their anti secession law passed in 2005, which threatens military force in retaliation. In China's view, they are another government still within China and still in civil war, without the authority to re-define national borders.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Secession_Law

Continuing to claim mainland China as part of the same country is continuing the current status quo, any deviations from that would be viewed as an attempted separation of "indivisable" China. So the claim to the mainland at this point in history is primarily to not antagonize China and continue the status quo situation.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago

He must've mispoken - China is a part of Taiwan, as everyone knows.