# Black Irish on St. Paddy's Day.

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [March 17, 2012, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087 "2012-03-17T23:10:58Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 8\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2012, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/1 "2012-03-17T23:10:58Z")

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I nominate Barack O’Bama as the poster boy.

Sorry. All the St. Paddy day jokes I"ve been exposed to over the years, this one seems fresh.

Bonus points-I made it up.

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**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2012, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/2 "2012-03-17T23:56:34Z")

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Sorry, you were scooped a couple of years ago. 🙂

[There’s no one as Irish as Barack O’Bama](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HplZ_taHXLM)

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**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2012, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/3 "2012-03-18T00:09:16Z")

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> [@pravnik](#):
>
> Sorry, you were scooped a couple of years ago. 🙂
> 
> [There’s no one as Irish as Barack O’Bama](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HplZ_taHXLM)

What exactly is the joke that OP claims to have made up? Putting the apostrophe in O’Bama? If so, **pravnik** is right – that’s been around a while (and is fairly obvious anyway).

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**Author:** ![Corcaigh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Corcaigh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corcaigh)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2012, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/4 "2012-03-18T10:30:11Z")

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😕

I don’t get it, what’s this thread supposed to be about?

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**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2012, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/5 "2012-03-18T10:41:53Z")

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> [@Corcaigh](#):
>
> 😕
> 
> I don’t get it, what’s this thread supposed to be about?

There is an ethnic(?) group of Irish people called the ‘Black Irish’ who aren’t black at all. They are white, dark haired Irish people with some combination of other traits that people can’t seem to agree on.

Irish people often have names that start with O’ as in O’Hare or O’Henry.

Barack Obama is a black man whose last name starts with a pronounced ‘O’.

Combine those things and TA-DA!, it’s joke time baby.

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**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2012, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/6 "2012-03-18T11:54:10Z")

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> [@Shagnasty](#):
>
> Combine those things and TA-DA!, it’s joke time baby.

It was joke time several years ago. Now it’s lame time.

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**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2012, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/7 "2012-03-18T11:58:06Z")

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Wow, tough crowd.

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**Author:** ![Enola\_Gay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ab097/32.png) [@Enola\_Gay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Gay)\
**Post date:** [March 18, 2012, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-irish-on-st-paddys-day/616087/8 "2012-03-18T17:32:59Z")

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I thought it was funny…then again, my mom is ‘black Irish’, so I got the joke. Not sure that term is well known among most Americans.