[donall]

> Catholic church that pushed people to reproduce without limits

[Citation needed]

It's hard not to interpret this as just garden variety bigotry, of the same sort that caused the famine in the first place.

Let's assume it's correct, though. The Catholic church had been one of the most powerful organisations in Europe for well over 1000 years by the time if the famine. Why did it take until Ireland in the 19th century for their population mismanagement to become truly problematic? Also why did this not also happen in a country like Spain? Hard to find many more enthusiastically Catholic countries than Spain in that time period.

The population density of Ireland at the time of the famine was comparable to England (it is now much lower). Ireland produced enough food to feed itself and millions of people in English cities at the time of the famine. The issue was not a lack of food but the "ownership" of the food.

The account of capitalism emerging from the black death is a fine theory for continental Europe. At the time of the black death, Irish society was controlled by Irish people. After the 1600s it was increasingly run as a colony, with the indigenous culture outlawed and intensive resource extraction for export to England (timber, food, etc).

You might as well ask why industrialisation didn't take off among the Choctaw or the Cherokee. Or maybe they also just have the wrong religion?

[anovikov]

Easy peasy, famines were commonplace in Spain during the Middle Ages (not sure how about part of it that was controlled by the Muslims though, but i don't think it was much different). During the Middle Ages, famines (and epidemics) were the natural regulator of population and were seen as a normal thing. By the XIX century of course, things were very different....

In Spain at the period, there were no famines because people kept emigrating to the colonies. Ireland was itself a colony. That's the difference. In Eastern Europe where countries didn't have colonies, famines were a norm.

Irish one is seen as something special because it happened in the West, and because overpopulation there built up for a considerable time being allowed by potatoes farming that for the time being, provided plenty of food allowing population to build up. Then it backfired.

As for local populations pre-existing in the colonies, sure they almost all died out. To a much larger proportion than the Irish, and sometimes, went entirely extinct. That is the normal part of absorbing new lands. It's just that Ireland was Christian almost since Christianity became a thing, and was never "discovered", that made it special. But we shouldn't pretend like it wasn't normal or in any way exceptional overall. Genocide is a natural way in which nations interact.

[donall]

> Irish one is seen as something special because it happened in the West, and because overpopulation there built up for a considerable time being allowed by potatoes farming

There was no overpopulation problem in Ireland! It was _less_ dense than England, while having similar climate and agricultural capacity. The reason for the famine was that the food that was abundantly produced in Ireland was transferred to England to support their cities (which did have an overpopulation problem). There was more than enough food produced in Ireland to feed everyone in Ireland. That is not what overpopulation looks like.

It's also easy to say no major famines happened in Spain because of her colonies, except that by the time of the famine she had very few remaining. Spanish people had the same capacity to emigrate to the Americas as the Irish did. Your argument was that Irish people were too Catholic to control their population but you haven't addressed the fact that that wasn't a problem in any of the other Catholic countries. The same should be true of Italy, who didn't even have a former empire to call on.

[9rx]

> [Citation needed]

What, exactly, indicated to you that the above is a quote from elsewhere?

[epistasis]

That does not indicate that it's thought to be a quote, [Citation Needed] indicates that it needs a supporting source to validate the statement. It is commonly used on Wikipedia to denote statements on a page that do not have proper supporting information, and should therefore not be uncritically accepted.

[9rx]

> That does not indicate that it's thought to be a quote

So you are indicating that a summons is necessary? That makes even less sense...

> [Citation Needed] indicates that it needs a supporting source to validate the statement.

But, logically, the person making the comment is the supporting source. That is, after all, why you are taking time to speak to them instead of some other source. If you find another source is more valid to what you seek, why not go directly to it instead? A middleman offers nothing of value.

> It is commonly used on Wikipedia to denote statements on a page that do not have proper supporting information

Sure. The entire purpose of Wikipedia is to aggregate information about topics from external sources. Citations are needed. It would not serve its intended purpose without them. But a wiki is quite unlike a discussion forum. A discussion forum is a venue to speak with the primary source...

...which is what ended up happening anyway, making the "[Citation Needed]" of any interpretation even stranger.

[epistasis]

I don't understand much of your comment.

Maybe this page will help us come to common understanding: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/citation-needed

[9rx]

> I don't understand much of your comment.

I'd have offered you a citation, but repeating what someone else said seems rather silly.

> Since gaining its catchphrase status, "citation needed" has been used in online discussion forums to humorously point out biased or baseless statements made by others.

So what you are saying is that someone thought could be funny by posting a tired meme? That may be true, but still doesn't make sense.

[donall]

The original post was arguing that there were too many Irish people in Ireland because of the predominant religion. The implication, as I surmise, is that Catholics believe that only those who are constantly reproducing can be real BFFs with Jesus in the afterlife. Also, Catholics are seemingly too stupid to realize that Ireland is incapable of supporting more than 5-6 million people (apparently?) and therefore their mortal sex-cult doomed them and they have absolutely nobody to blame but themselves for a million people dying of starvation. The fools!

This is, at best, very fucking stupid. At worst, it is fairly bigoted and more than a little bit offensive. It is in the same category of Victorian pseudo-science that gave us phrenology and eugenics.

"[Citation needed]" was merely meant as a shorter and much more polite way of implying all of the above. I can be much less polite if that's something you're interested in.