It ' s also a great narrative to start more aggressive censoring inggeneral gotta protect people from getting confused by these fake , unaccredited news sources , of course . <| sep |> In this case , Irish is not being used to mean nationality but ethnicity . The Irish Americans might be Americans in terms of nationality , but in terms of ethnicity they are Irish . If you are born on the island of Ireland or have citizenship of Republic of Ireland , then you are bonafide Irish . The way we see it , this is nationality . Someone who meets these conditions is nationally Irish . However , if your descendants arrived in the U . S . , Australia or wherever 100200 years ago from Ireland , you are not Irish , you are of Irish descent . The way we see it , this is ethnicity . Someone who meets these conditions is ethnically Irish . No IrishAmerican is trying to claim Irish nationality when they say they are Irish , they are trying to claim an ethnic heritage . In more formal contexts , this is said as IrishAmerican or of Irish decent but in less formal contexts the modifiers are dropped . If you are talking to other Americans , then the American part of IrishAmerican is understood in the context and redundant . Similarly , in the phrase of Irish decent the words of and decent are understood in the context and considered redundant so they are removed .