Romanian Gypsies attacked in Belfast

[JSojourner]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iDji7_Kp0M1B_ADrZ0T9-dBi-xpwD98SI4HG0
Now in most cases I'm sceptical about claims of persecution against Gypsies, but here I have to take their side. It seems that for many in Northern Ireland that if they can't have religious conflict, they'll have racial conflict instead.

Mantis,

Thanks for posting it.  I have heard very little coverage of this here in the states but NPR and the BBC have run a few good pieces.

I understand very little of the Gypsy-Romany culture or history...despite the fact that 100% of my maternal lineage is Hungarian.  I know they can be found as far east as the former Soviet Republicans of Central Asia, all over Europe and throughout the U.S. and Canada.

What is perplexing is how to reckon various groups that are called "gypsies".  Around here, we are regularly visited by "The Irish Travelers"...who have no ancestral ties to the Romany people that I know of.  Yet people often refer to them as "gypsies".  I've heard some Spaniards refer to the Basque people as "gypsies", but are they?

I should probably get a good book on the subject and bone up.