Larry, I'm going to contradict you on something else, which is that PhDs who do research on Irish Travellers are in agreement that they are law-abiding citizens. In fact, one such PhD scholar, whose name you would all recognize as he has folk music connections, has told me privately that many South Carolina Irish Travelers--among whom he has worked--definitely pride themselves on their ability to defraud people. This certainly has to do with the history of oppression; why would you feel it is immoral to defraud people who, you believe, have systematically or individually stolen from you in the past? Indeed, whether ripping off the housewife with a roofing scam constitutes immorality of justice is a legitimate question. (I still believe it's immoral, BTW.) But this is different from saying that "only the police" and Midwestern housewives believe that Travellers are more likely than average to commit certain crimes.
Why does this not get reflected in the research? An anthropolgist or other fieldworker working in today's University milieu simply cannot accuse the community he studies of wrongodoing of this sort for a number of reasons, among which are the PC nature of Universities and funding institutions and the fact that the Travellers would never allow him to do research among them anymore. Therefore, he has sensibly said that he will never publish anything impugning Travellers in this way. Privately, it's another matter.
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