# Gypsy / Romani discussion (spun off from GQ thread) **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 26, 2021, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074 "2021-06-26T16:34:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/141 "2021-07-04T05:54:38Z")
> [@kevlaw](#): > > Irish Travellers are not Roma. They refer to themselves as Gypsies. (I acknowledge that hibernicus has a different account of the situation in Ireland.) Note that that is more of a lifestyle or culture, not a ethnicity. ---
**Author:** ![kevlaw](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kevlaw/32/2281_2.png) [@kevlaw](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kevlaw)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/142 "2021-07-04T07:22:46Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Note that that is more of a lifestyle or culture, not a ethnicity. [Wikipedia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Travellers): > Genetic analysis has shown Travellers to be of Irish extraction, and that they likely diverged from the settled Irish population in the 1600s, during the time of the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland. The centuries of separation has led to Travellers becoming genetically distinct from the settled Irish. Traveller rights groups long advocated for ethnic status from the Irish government, succeeding in 2017. The centuries of separation has led to Travellers becoming **genetically distinct from the settled Irish**. Traveller rights groups long advocated for **ethnic status** from the Irish government, succeeding in 2017. ---
**Author:** ![alovem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@alovem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alovem)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/143 "2021-07-04T17:00:58Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I remember when i was a kid a friend who had visited (lived in) Ireland told me about the tinkers, and i was very confused, because to me that was a slightly obsolete word for a profession, or a verb. (I might tinker with my leaky faucet to try to fix it.) And yes, value-neutral, or ever-so-slightly positive. (Someone who tinkers with stuff is likely handy.) My understanding is that tinker comes from tin and that it means (or was supposed to mean) a kind of itinerant tinsmith. Hey, i- **tin** -erant. Never noticed that before. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/144 "2021-07-04T17:25:51Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Note that that is more of a lifestyle or culture, not a ethnicity Travellers are formally recgnised as an ethnic group in Ireland (having campaigned for such recognition). Travellers have the protections afforded to an ethnic group under the equality act in England and Wales. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/145 "2021-07-04T17:32:59Z")
Yes, my grandfather told me that Travellers would make or repair buckets for the local farmers and householders, and were called tinkers because of their trade. However the trade became obsolete and the word became an insulting way to refer to travelling people. Or an insulting way to refer to settled people by comparing them to “dirty” travelling people. Another legitimate trade, that of rendering animals, was and is the basis for an even more insulting name, the Traveller equivalent of the n-word. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/146 "2021-07-04T17:36:45Z")
I had to look this up. Apparently the word is “knacker” which I’ve never heard of except in the sense of being knackered. Is that expression considered passé now, I assume? ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/147 "2021-07-04T17:53:06Z")
No “knackered” meaning “worn out” is still in use. “Knacker” is a very hateful word used against Travellers (or against settled people to insult them by comparing them to Travellers) and is unfortunately also still in use. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/148 "2021-07-04T17:55:34Z")
> [@alovem](#): > > > [@puzzlegal](#): > > > > I remember when i was a kid a friend who had visited (lived in) Ireland told me about the tinkers, and i was very confused, because to me that was a slightly obsolete word for a profession, or a verb. (I might tinker with my leaky faucet to try to fix it.) And yes, value-neutral, or ever-so-slightly positive. (Someone who tinkers with stuff is likely handy.) > > My understanding is that tinker comes from tin and that it means (or was supposed to mean) a kind of itinerant tinsmith. > > Hey, i- **tin** -erant. Never noticed that before. Yes, i don’t think the original meaning of tinker includes “itinerant”, i think it was just a word for a tin smith, someone who worked with tin. And i think itinerant comes from the Latin, “iter”, referring to a road or to travel. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2021, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/149 "2021-07-04T20:10:50Z")
Interesting. ---
**Author:** ![alovem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@alovem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alovem)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2021, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/150 "2021-07-05T09:56:45Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Yes, i don’t think the original meaning of tinker includes “itinerant”, i think it was just a word for a tin smith, someone who worked with tin. > > And i think itinerant comes from the Latin, “iter”, referring to a road or to travel. I wasn’t saying that about tinsmiths in a historical sense but about the (perceived) figure of the gypsy who comes around and repairs pots and pans and whatnot. And I _really_ wasn’t saying that tinerant has anything to do with tin. It was just an amusing observation. Back on topic, I never even heard the word “roma” until later in life (I’m from the US) and still find objection to the word “gypsy” to be a little odd. If someone of that group objjected to “gypsy,” I wouldn’t use it in their company, of course. ---
**Author:** ![SanVito](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sanvito/32/2805_2.png) [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2021, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/151 "2021-07-05T14:12:39Z")
> [@hibernicus](#): > > No “knackered” meaning “worn out” is still in use. “Knacker” is a very hateful word used against Travellers (or against settled people to insult them by comparing them to Travellers) and is unfortunately also still in use. And then of course we have ‘pikey’, an offensive term which apparently derives from ‘pike’, meaning road. I’m not sure if that one is purely used in the UK, or Ireland as well (or beyond). ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2021, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/152 "2021-07-05T14:15:49Z")
> [@kevlaw](#): > > In a separate section, the report says that there are estimated to be[…]and 100,000-300,000 Irish Travellers. Where does it say that? All I can find is where it says “The Government acknowledges that this is likely to be an undercount, with estimates of between 100,000 to 300,000 Gypsy/Traveller people”, but we’ve already established that that’s _ **not** _ the same as “Irish Travellers”, but also, depending on when the counting was done, could include other groups like **Romanichal** and Scottish Travellers etc. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2021, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/153 "2021-07-05T14:28:24Z")
> [@alovem](#): > > Back on topic, I never even heard the word “roma” until later in life (I’m from the US) and still find objection to the word “gypsy” to be a little odd. If someone of that group objjected to “gypsy,” I wouldn’t use it in their company, of course. As I mentioned above, I learned the word “Roma” from the first person I met who was in that group, a young man in one of my college classes. I live in the US. He found “gypsy” offensive. So I stopped using that word to refer to people – not a hard thing to do, as I can’t say I used it very often before that. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2021, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/154 "2021-07-05T17:30:57Z")
> [@alovem](#): > > Back on topic, I never even heard the word “roma” until later in life (I’m from the US) and still find objection to the word “gypsy” to be a little odd. If someone of that group objjected to “gypsy,” I wouldn’t use it in their company, of course. Why use it at all now that you know? Here is the thing - you can’t tell a person is Roma or a Traveller or anyone else associated with the word by looking at them. So you risk opening up your mouth and sounding like you are either unknowledgeable (and as a Doper, we never want to appear unknowledgeable when we have the knowledge) or rude. (And I miss Kal as well…as I said, my family completely integrated. So I know very little other than what I have searched out and have no firsthand experience.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2021, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/155 "2021-07-05T18:07:15Z")
It seems to me that a group would have to be extremely insular, to have recognizable genetic markers after a mere 400 years or so since divergence. How much of that insularity, I wonder, is due to outsiders not welcoming them, vs. due to them not welcoming outsiders? ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2021, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/156 "2021-07-12T14:31:15Z")
Relevant, I think: > **[Insect Experts Will Change The Name Of The 'Gypsy Moth' And 'Gypsy Ant'](https://www.npr.org/2021/07/10/1014787096/insect-experts-will-change-the-name-of-the-gypsy-moth-and-gypsy-ant)** > > The Entomological Society of America says the common names for the two insects include a pejorative for Roma people. It's part of a wider effort to replace names that are inappropriate or offensive. All the time I was earlier reading this thread, I was well aware of a publicized outbreak of the moth _Lymantria dispar_ in this area, and had been seeing a few (though not many) of the caterpillars myself; and had been thinking of them, as well as seeing them referred to by, their common name. And, until today when I saw this article, I never once made the connection. The walls in one’s own head are the hardest ones to see. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2021, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/157 "2021-07-12T14:42:19Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > Since being updated to eliminate ethnic, racial, religious and other bigotry, Dungeons & Dragons has made all kinds of changes to old products. In the horror setting of Ravenloft, the Vistani are stereotypical g\*psies based on old horror movies. Though I have copies of a lot of old Ravenloft books, I haven’t yet read Waking Dream- A Guide To The Vistani. I have a hunch if you remove all the offensive stereotype from the Vistani, there will be nothing left. There was some anger over the portrayal of the Vistani in the _Curse of Strahd,_ the newest adaptation of the original I-6 _Ravenloft_ module from 1983. I personally didn’t think they were all that bad, certainly no worse than most other groups in the game, but I think I’m in the minority. At least in online discussions. > [@DocCathode](#): > > Romani are also featured in the old World Of Darkness line by White Wolf. Some of it is offensive. Some is not. I’ve read reviews of the book G\*psy by actual Romani. The reviews are filled with anger that a company that should know better published such a book. It was an ill advised book though I don’t remember if it was particularly contentious when it was published in 1994. But, yeah, it’s pretty bad. When you start assigning magical powers and abilities to a real life people based on the purity of their blood it might be a good time to reassess your intent. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2021, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/158 "2021-07-12T15:17:33Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Relevant, I think: > > ['Gypsy Moth', 'Gypsy Ant' To Be Renamed By Entomological Society Of America : NPR](https://www.npr.org/2021/07/10/1014787096/insect-experts-will-change-the-name-of-the-gypsy-moth-and-gypsy-ant) > > All the time I was earlier reading this thread, I was well aware of a publicized outbreak of the moth _Lymantria dispar_ in this area, and had been seeing a few (though not many) of the caterpillars myself; and had been thinking of them, as well as seeing them referred to by, their common name. > > And, until today when I saw this article, I never once made the connection. > > The walls in one’s own head are the hardest ones to see. Good move, but it may take a long time for that name to change in popular parlance. The linked article says the insect has been called by that name since at least 1908, and an awful lot of people know it by that name. (The ant is more obscure, and it may be a lot easier to change it’s popular name, since the name isn’t all that popular.) But as an example of the persistence of language, Worker’s Compensation was called “workman’s compensation” until 1978, and I STILL hear people call it by the old name. > **[Workers Comp, Workmens Comp or Workmans Comp? - Cantrell Green - Workers Comp...](https://workercomplaw.com/workers-comp-workmens-comp-or-workmans-comp/)** > > About The Original Workmen’s Compensation Law – In 1910, representatives of various state commissions met at a conference in Chicago and the Uniform Workmen’s Compensation Law. Although this innovative new law was not overwhelmingly adopted, the... > Of course, by 1978 women were now comprising a much larger segment of the work force. So – finally – Workmen’s Compensation Law was renamed Worker’s Compensation Law. ---
**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:** [July 12, 2021, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074/159 "2021-07-12T16:26:05Z")
Well dang, one must be right on the ball here among the well-informed Doper community! I just came here to post about renaming those various “Gypsy” bugs, only to find that two Dopers have beaten me to it by mere hours! The early bird (or those in the more Easterly time zones) catches the headlines! Those of us who sleep late (or in the more Westerly time zones) get to read all about it right here on the Dope! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gypsy-romani-discussion-spun-off-from-gq-thread/945074.md?page=7)