The Celtic Model for Cultural Survival & Dixie

The Irish had no statues to their native heroes in 1921, when they won their independence from Great Britain.  The Scots and the Welsh had none for generations, either.  There were no flags that identified their unique ancestral heritage, other than those flags allowed by the occupying English invaders, typically as a means to organize conscripts or volunteers during wars on behalf of the British Empire.  Yet, today, it would be impossible to deny that the Irish, Scots, and Welsh are unique peoples with their own languages, history, customs, and sense of identity.  It is time for the South to learn from her Celtic genetics.  It is time for the South to employ the Celtic Model for Cultural Survival.

To begin, this piece is not intended to bash the English.  Our Anglo-Saxon brothers are the product of invasions and conquest, ultimately leading them to conquer their neighbors.  Unlike many of my Gaelic compatriots, I do not hold any ill-will toward the English.  At one point, the English did that which is natural: they built an Empire for the betterment of their own people.  Had the Irish and/or the Scots gotten their act together after the Battle of Clontarf (1014: Ireland), the Battle of Stanhope Park (1327: Scotland), or through common union by means of the Remonstrance of the Irish Chiefs (1317), it may have been the Crosses of St Patrick or St Andrew flying over the Tower of London. That simply did not happen. 

The Irish and the Scots, however, did get conquered by the English and yet, they never surrendered their unique cultural identity simply because an occupying force denied them the privilege of monuments to their heroes.  Rather, both peoples endured – as did their Welsh Celtic cousins – centuries after their respective defeats.  They did so by means of the fireside chat and the home.  The parents ensured the survival of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales in the hearts and minds of their children. 

When Americans hear the term “fireside chat,” they associate it with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s attempt to reinvigorate the United States through the Great Depression by means of the radio.  That is not the meaning I apply.  The common fire was once the center of Celtic life in the countryside.  It was an important gathering place for the Irish, Scots, and other conquered Celtic peoples.  There, fathers told stories to their sons who listened to heroic tales of men long passed.  It was also there that women interacted with men in a manner suitable for cultural traditions between the two genders.  Food and drinks were served; more specifically Irish or Scottish food and drinks.  It was a frequent gathering place where the native tongue dominated discourse for generations.  Although there is some controversy regarding the historical accuracy of British bans on Gaelic, it is true that English became the official language of all that was within the United Kingdom.  Yet, at the fire, stories were told in “the Irish,” and because of that, the Irish language (as with other Celtic languages) survived into the modern era.

Additionally, Irish and Scottish women played a critical role in the survival of these ethnic peoples.  In part, that was due to the pastoral responsibilities of the men, many of whom herded cattle or sheep for long distances, leaving the women to care for the family.  In part, the importance of women rose due to warfare.  The long absences of the men required that women fulfilled a crucial role in the preservation of a people, beginning with their young children.  Thus, it was not simply a matter of teaching an Irish or Scottish child about the ‘ABCs’ or ‘123s.’  Women taught their children the language, food, and culture.  Mothers taught their children common prayers, frequently in the original tongue.  Women reinforced stories of bravery at home, as their children nestled their heads, often on a singular mat spread across the floor of a cottage.  Most importantly, these wives and mothers taught their sons that which they should expect from their future wives, while simultaneously teaching their daughters how to be a great wife and mother.  The good wife did not disparage her husband for going far away for long periods of time.  Rather, these Celtic women ensured the children knew their father was on a noble project – whether to bring the family food or to fight an invading enemy.

Together, the Celtic parents, with the help of the Celtic clan and the broader Celtic community, ensured the survival of the Celtic peoples.  It would have been easier to just give up and surrender to the overwhelming command of the English invader, but they did not do that.  These peoples persevered.  All of which brings me back to the South.

Today, the South is enduring an unprecedented attack on her ethnic identity.  It has been relentless, and it is coming from multiple sides.  Some of the attacks on the South have come from sociopaths who have rewritten history to achieve political agendas.  Some have been led by vile Marxist trash or transgender psychopaths who wish to destroy the South in attempt to transform the United States and the world into a demonic dystopia.  Some of the attacks on the South have come from so-called White Nationalists who lack roots of their own and cannot conceive of the reasons the South would want to remain unique.  Still, some of the attacks on the South come from her own people who do not truly understand the downstream consequences of a world without Dixie. 

Through all this, the South endures, but tragically, barely.  There are pockets of pro-Southern resistance.  These communities refuse to waiver on the preservation of Southern identity.  Of course, there are groups like the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the League of the South, who although very different in their respective approaches, their pro-Dixie hearts are in the right place.  The Abbeville Institute provides a critical role to the survivability of Southern Identity by safeguarding historical records through thoughtful discourse, education, and analysis.  Finally, there are the unpaid volunteers who contribute to this blog, despite the relentless assaults, doxxings, etc., we receive simply for sharing our pro-Southern sympathies. 

Unfortunately, however, the family and clan dynamic that was critical to the survival of the Irish and the Scottish during their times of occupation, seems to be dying in an increasingly modernized Dixie.  All of the SCV-sponsored reenactments cannot keep the Southern ethnicity alive if no one is teaching their children how important it is to be Southern.  If recipes from mother to daughter stop being shared… if sons stop learning about Southern heroes from their fathers… if clans fail to gather together to promote and celebrate Southern heritage, the South disappears as a unique entity.  As more transplants move to the business-friendly South (and destroy it like locusts), ethnically Southern children are being washed out.  If their kith and kin do not step up to teach them why their Dixie roots are so special, they will learn from others that being Southern is no more important than being from the Midwest.

All my life I learned the importance of being Irish.  It was crucial to my very being.  In my adult life, I read books on Irish history, tried to learn the language (hard without nearby fellow speakers), cooked the foods, and imparted on my children how special they are for the Irish blood that courses their veins.  I learned this from my grandmother, my parents, and the thousands of family members whom I met over the years that comprise my clan – in the United States, Australia, Canada, Great Britain, and, of course, Ireland.  It would be hard for me to even fathom the idea of having a rootless existence, predicated on a generic “American” identity. 

Yes, I am an Irish-American.  Yes, I have some Southern roots.  Yes, I was raised in Florida until I was thirteen years old.  But, most importantly, I am genetically Irish and I have an obligation to ensure the integrity of my ethnicity as my ancestors did before me.  Southerners have that same obligation. 

Most of the Southerners with whom I interact feel the same way about the South and Southern Identity, but what are they doing to save it?  Unfortunately, not much.  The roughly two dozen contributors to this blog and the hundreds or even thousands who contribute to other groups are merely a fraction of the millions of Southerners throughout Dixie who are doing very little or nothing at all. Those who may not necessarily contribute to groups dedicated to Southern preservation often have a warped perspective on Southern culture.  For many, “Southerness” is defined by the Confederate Battle Flag, Daisy Duke shorts, and country music.  These Hollywood interpretations of the South have been fed through generations of television and movies.  But Dixie is so much more.

Being Southern does not begin and end at the War of Northern Aggression.  The South had her own unique ethnic identity forming before Lincoln chose to invade, murder, and rape innocent sovereign people.  Thus, the very reason thousands of volunteers marched from their farms in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia to defend their sister-state, Virginia.  Southerners knew they were unique before that war.  There is so much from which Southerners can draw from their own history, culture, and traditions, to pass down to future generations – including the shared experiences of the South during the invasion and its brutal reconstruction. 

All of this begins with you, the Southerner.  It begins with using vernacular and terminology in your daily discourse, rather than flattening accents to appease Yankee work colleagues and managers.  It begins with teaching your children the totality of their Southern history.  Whereas Stonewall Jackson and Nathan Bedford Forrest are important to the South, men like Nathaniel Bacon, Colonel Francis Marion, and Commodore John Rodgers, were Southern heroes in their own right.  The Regulators of North Carolina did more to spark Revolutionary sentiment in the 1770s than a rabble of snowball throwing Bostonians.  The South is replete with men of great character and bravery, along with Robert E. Lee.  These Southern heroes and many more must be part of the stories told to our children.

While I look at the assault levied upon my Celtic cousins – Southerners – I see a beautiful people enduring demoralizing assaults to her very being by foreigners.  This injustice is an outrage to my Gaelic heart.  The South is too important to be lost.  I despise the fact that monuments to braver men than those who walk today are torn down to please rootless locusts from the North.  I am enraged by the surrender of a Celtic flag – the Confederate Battle Flag and her beautiful Cross of St. Andrew – because it was used as a familiar banner to rally Dixie’s Irish, Scottish, and Scots-Irish people to stop an illegal invasion.  But these things are happening and being mad about it does nothing.  Nor, for that matter, does ignoring these events, either. 

It is time for Dixie to dig deep into her Celtic soul and survive the cultural onslaught the way her Celtic forefathers did before her.  It is time for families to teach their children the importance of being Southern.  It is time for clan gatherings – at the community and extended family level – where camaraderie meets character and builds Southern esprit de corps.  It is time to organize benefits for those in need, and when such giving is done, it should be from Southerners to Southerners.  Mothers must not only teach their own daughters Southern foods, but also those other daughters who may not have a guide in the Southern kitchen.  Those foods should be served at gatherings throughout the South – where monuments to Southern heroism is built in the heart, mind, and soul.

Now is the time, Dixie, to rebuild your sense of Southern-self and that of your children, as well.  With that foundation the South will survive.  Eventually, from Heaven, you will look down upon a Free Dixie and see that beautiful saltire flying high above her buildings, next to the monuments that have been rebuilt alongside the new ones that began with you.