Why is there so much hate for gypsies?

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I just moved to the UK, so I'm sort of confused and lost as to why pretty much everyone in my area hates the gypsies so, and with all the prejudiced hate against them, it's hard to decipher what is true and what is just plain prejudice.

We're in the process of buying a house that's right behind a gypsy camp, and my mother-in-law (and pretty much all of my fiance's family) is totally up in arms about it, saying that we're going to have loads of trouble with them because they're petty scumbags who will steal anything they can get their hands on. When I first moved here, I had never really heard of modern gypsies. Everyone told me that they stole things a lot, but then I started hearing more things, like they don't want to mingle with "our" culture, they don't like people who aren't their own, they kill people's animals just for fun, etc etc. It really disturbed me how much rubbish people talked about them, and how completely irrational they were being. Like last night, we went over to see a photographer for our wedding, and my mother-in-law mentioned the house and how it was so close to the gypsies, and so ensued a huge rant between my mother-in-law and the photographer about how horrible gypsies were. The photographer said that he did a wedding for them once, and said that he caught them behind the church peeing on the church walls, and then drinking each other's urine once they were done, and how one guy during the ceremony went right up to the alter during the vows and rested his video camera on the priest's shoulder to get a better view, all of which was so blatantly untrue. Then my mother-in-law started talking about how they all looked funny, and how they all must be inbred because of how they all look the same. Then the photographer joined in that they "mix and match" there all the time, and then started talking about how he knew someone who knew someone who caught two of the men who live in our local gypsy camp having sex with each other out in the open. So they're inbred homosexuals who enjoy drinking each other's urine....how am I supposed to take what they say about them seriously?

It makes me so mad because 1) I think it's totally inappropriate and not right at all to talk about any group of people that way. Most people realise it's not alright to talk black people that way, or people of any other race, so why is it okay to do it to these people? and 2) because I want to know actually how much trouble we are going to have with them, and I want to hear it from people who aren't being prejudiced jerks who will say anything and everything about the gypsies to soil their name. Why do people hate them so much anyway? Can't people see how rude and offensive they must be to them, I mean if they really do steal as much as people say, it's no wonder seeing as how little regard everyone has for them. What are your thoughts on this?

It's just a long standing that gypsies are troublemakers.
(not that i personally think that, it just seems to be the general thing for some reason?)

I have no idea, my parents have the same prejudices against them. I have no problems with gypsies and travellers, in fact I wouldn't mind living like that myself.

What on earth? There are people hating gypsies? What? This sounds so random. There are gypsies and there are people who hate them? What?

Because they're not really gypsies in the true sense but simply itinerant yobs with a penchant for violence and thievery. Different set of ballgame to true gypsies - who we have met before and are lovely.

Oh that's very true - what do they call them? New age travellers? They're the ones people dislike. Yes.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8C7ZTbsF-E[/youtube]These are the sort of people that your parents and the photographer are referring to.

My great grandfather was a gypsy.

Racism against Roma ("true" gypsies) goes back centuries and has changed faces a lot over the years. As stated above, I'm pretty sure the prejudice against "gypsies" in the UK isn't actually against gypsies and the word is being misused.

Yeah, it's not the same thing at all. We're referring to 'Irish travellers' and the like. They're disliked even more in Ireland itself than in Britain - they absolutely hate them.

Alright, I suppose they're technically Irish travellers then but I still don't understand why everyone hates them. There are good people and bad people in every group. I don't understand what that video has to do with the Irish travellers as a whole, it's just two people making a fool of themselves in the middle of the street. I've seeing your average Brit do equally stupid things.

Locally, the experience of travellers we've had is that they bought some land for a pittance and tried to illegally camp there. Given the nuisance and inconvenience for which they are known for (thievery, harrassing local folk and victimising vulnerable people, burglary, laying complete waste to large areas etc) a couple of rare birds magically appeared from nowhere on the land, making it unsuitable for habitation. They took the hint and left.

You can also take a look here.

I don't consider myself Racist, but at some point you have to drop the egalitarianism and just draw the correlations. I've encountered maybe a hundred travelers in my life; The odd family are decent, law abiding people. Every other traveler I've met is either slightly unpleasant, or completely intolerably violent. I've been held at knife point by an entire family of travelers in my town, twice. For doing absolutely nothing, just walking along, minding my own business. I've had four footballs actually stolen off me and my friends by a group of travelers in a nearby town. We've been mugged twice by another group. We've been in a fight twice with travelers, and happy slapped a few other times.

The reason for this is, their parents are complete f*****g scumbags, who couldn't care less what these kids do. They stir s**t, and due to the ridiculousness of "multiculturalism" they get away with the "they called me a knacker!" card (knacker being the prejudicial slur used). I've seen that card been used a few times. I don't blame genetics, I blame the unbelievable amount of tolerance and leeway they are given.

I don't fit people into ready made mental boxes, but all to often travelers fit preconceptions.



Yup. Racism is unacceptable in Ireland, as is anti-homosexuality for the most part. But people despise travelers. The filth and dirt of their halting sites is reason enough to.



You REALLY don't want to do that. Trust me. If you do, make sure you have camera's installed. This might sound like I'm insighting hatred, but I am giving you sound advice. Check the crime statistics on Police.Uk near halting sites if you want quantitative evidence.



There are good and bad in every group, but proportions do vary. There are good prisoners, They're brought up in bad environments, the police let them rob and fight, and they carry on the cycle after they marry at sixteen. That kind of behaviour would be typical of what I have seen of travelers, but of course not all.

Last edited by ryan93 on 22 Feb 2011, 11:20 am, edited 1 time in total.

It is often said that crime rates rocket when travellers set up camp and then magically fall again when they are chased out.

Think of it this way:

They are a traveling culture which are highly insular in nature. Culturally speaking they do not adapt to the host culture or in many cases, laws. Yes, there is a high crime rate associated with them because as a traveling culture they have very few if any chances of receiving an education... if anything the education they receive from their culture is a 'street smarts' education. This causes chronic poverty which directly turns into crime rate.

For the cultures that own the territory the Roma/Gypsies move into its a direct threat to their well being... nobody likes crime rates to go up nor having their land occupied by people who do not want to be part of their community. The most efficient way cultures have of 'protecting' against these 'invasions' is gossip and rumor campaigns.

In the US there is an axiom: You can take the girl out of the trailer but you can't take the trailer out of the girl.

I like gypsy weddings, the brides have outlandish dresses and I like outlandish dresses. It's just tacky, cheesy, over the top craziness and I love it.

Well I'm an American so I don't have any first-hand experience with travelers, but I do have to say that I am mildly fascinated with Roma people and I would like to meet some in person one day.