Well, first of all I personally call it St. Patrick's Day and would never call it Paddy day or Paddy's day or whatever. Secondly, you need to have a better understanding of the Irish American experience. This has all been going on way before Disney. It is real for what it is, and that is a battered and sometimes broken people getting together in defiance and for fun and for many reasons. For many the extent of their cultural heritage was back-breaking work as serfs. I don't know how much of the culture they had in those days...some to be sure..stuff was passed down. Many were illiterate and of course there was a strong oral culture.

Anyway, it is still not nice to put them down. Some of what you see is quite real, the desire for shamrocks everywhere etc...painting a green stripe etc. These Irish Americans were not very sophisticated, very well educated, knew next to nothing about the heritage. They did what they could. mg