Black Irish

I can still remember that famous line from the movie The Commitments where the main characters explained why their band should be a R and B band . He said that R and B was the music of black people in America . He said since the Irish were oppressed in Europe like blacks, were in America, that the Irish were the blacks of Europe. Years after watching that movie, I have the tendency to believe him.
Norman Mailer said in his essay The White Negro  that the Negro is the most innovative of all America. Mailer's explanation of this is because black people in America have to be innovative to survive . In Mailer's words, the negro is the true hipster because he lives on the border between democracy and totalitarianism .  So it is safe to say that American popular culture was born and still resides in black America. Jazz, Rock and Roll, the Blues and Hip Hop were born of the African-American experience . Style, language and other things like science, engineering and design are also influenced by black America.
I once took a group of students through the high school that I taught at to show them the contributions of black inventors. From the cafeteria on the ground floor to the library on the top floor each floor had something that was invented by a black inventor. So it's not just entertainment that is influenced by black America every part of what we call America has the finger prints of black America.  The same can be said for Britain, the rest of Europe and the world.
From Literature to the Sciences to Popular culture, the Irish have used their oppression to create a world that is a lot easier to live in . In how the book How the Irish save Civilization  by Thomas Cahill, the Irish saved western culture from the Huns and the Visigoths . Writers like Jonathan Swift and James Joyce gave much to the creation of the western political style. Paul McCartney along with John Lennon created a musical style that has lasted for over 50 years .
The Irish came to America and created political dynasties in cities like Boston and New York and produced a President John F. Kennedy. Writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald chronicled the 1920s and became one of America's premier writer showmen like George M. Cohan produced shows that lauded America's Patriotism .
At the same time that the Irish were doing their thing in America, African Americans were creating the Harlem Renaissance and Jazz music as its' soundtrack. Out of WWII came swing and Rock and Roll in the Fifties . While JFK was in the house and the Senate preparing for the presidency , Dr. Ralph Bunche was negotiating the Arab-Israeli conflict and won the Noble Peace Prize and Richard Wright and James Baldwin were creating the voice of Black America and Charlie Parker was creating its' soundtrack.
All of this came from the oppression and marginalization that each group was subjected to. Each group took that oppression and turned it into gold . As oppressed groups African-Americans and the Irish have gone beyond oppression and have reached our goals. We are still marginalized by the mainstream but both of us have had one of our brethren in the oval office and at the height of cultural.
The Irish are the blacks of Europe but blacks are the Irish of America.