My dad’s a boomer named (something similar to) Pádraig with a stereotypical Irish last name. My siblings and I have more common English first names, but everyone except for me is a redhead. In the 50s and 60s, my dad still faced real problems (in New England!), including getting jumped a couple of times and losing out on jobs/housing.

None of my siblings or I have ever experienced actual discrimination of any sort due to having Irish heritage (again, New England, so it could be different elsewhere). The closest I’ve ever come is being earnestly called a papist, and people (correctly) assuming that I have a bunch of cousins. The papist thing was very weird, and it might have felt different if I were at all religious, but I just told them that I was actually Jesus* and they were too shocked to say anything else.

Maybe the actual KKK still kind of cares if you’re Catholic (but not specifically Irish- they’d probably be fine with Irish Protestants and probably wouldn’t be with French Catholics), but they’re not actually aggressing Catholics, they just might not welcome you as a member… anyone for whom that’s an issue is in fact very much the problem.

/* I very much recommend giving proselytizers a benevolent smile, and calling them “my child,” if you want to get rid of them quickly. The less you resemble their mental image of Jesus, the better. It works best if you’re familiar enough with the bible to quote scripture to them, but if you’re too convincing, you might start a cult.

I have an Irish last name but the town I live in is extremely old school WASP. A former manager of mine told me I should be marking myself as non-white on EEOC forms because of my Irish heritage. I laughed thinking she was joking. She wasn’t. Bit of a shock that someone still holds onto those beliefs nowadays.

People care, Fenian.

/s