Anti-Cornish sentiment

Anti-Cornish sentiment means hatred or fear of Cornwall or the Cornish people.
It may be compared to Cymrophobia, Anglophobia, Anti-Scottish sentiment or Anti-Irish sentiment.
Stereotypes
The issue of stereotyping and how people are viewed by others is complex in itself.
For at least half a century Cornwall has relied heavily on external tourism in order to sustain the local economy and so many stereotypes of Cornish people are based on ideas of fishermen, pirates, rustic people, rural backwaters and many stereotypes that many rural communities throughout the United Kingdom probably encounter in some form or another. Within the broader context of the West Country it has been remarked in Bristol that "The people of the South West have long endured the cultural stereotype of 'ooh arr'ing carrot crunching yokels, and Bristol in particular has fought hard to shake this image off".
Historical notes
* Athelstan - AD 936. Ethnic cleansing against the Celtic Britons of Exeter. The twelfth century chronicler William of Malmesbury, wrote Urbem igitur illam quam contaminatae gentis repurgio defaecaverat... describing the event, which was translated by H. P. R. Finberg as "having cleansed the city of its defilement by wiping out that filthy race".
* Documenting mutual hostility between English and Cornish people, the French ambassador in London, Gaspard de Coligny Chatillon wrote in 1538 that "The kingdom of England is by no means a united whole, for it also contains Wales and Cornwall, natural enemies of the rest of England, and speaking a language."
* The history of the English Civil War reveals anti-Cornish sentiment in the 17th century. Roundhead propagandists drew on old prejudices and stereotypes in order to demonize the King's Cornish followers.
Contemporary Issues
* Giles Coren, journalist, wrote in The Times on August 13th 1999:
"I hate the Cornish. I hate their poxy language which they make such a fuss about. I hate their fancy foreign food - like clotted cream- which makes the place stink, and I hate their fatuous demands to be treated as a nation".
The article caused offence and was quoted by John Angarrack in his book as offensive to the Cornish people. The opening quote is quoted also in Working Papers 21: Cornish: Language and Legislation by Dr. Davyth A. Hicks at Mercator Linguisitc Rights and Legislation.
It may however be noted, that Giles Coren has been called "abrasive", and that the Cornish are not the only ethnic group he has referred to in ways that have been criticised.
*1999: In the Western Morning News, 7 September, A.A. Gill, a Sunday Times journalist described the Cornish as "mean" and "stunted trogldytes" who were "easily bribed". When this was challenged, Gill's editor shrugged off complaint as "the basic tools of a jobbing humorist".
*2000: Petronella Wyatt in The Spectator, 24 June 2000 wrote an article called Cornish Loathing, complaining that "The Cornish loathe everything but sloth. They heartily dislike the English whom they regard as foreigners. The Cornish have no desire to work possessing less ambition to better themselves than a rich woman's poodle, the rich woman being the E.U. which keeps them going by way of outrageous farm subsidies... I love Cornwall (because) it must be the only seaside destination in Western Europe which has avoided Disneyfication.
*2000: Carlton Television broadcast a programme called The Most Deadly Sin of Pride, on Friday, 7 July (22:30). The sin of pride was represented by several subjects including Cornish rugby supporters, Cornish Bards, Cornish Romanies, and French Can-Can dancers. Each of these was intercut with black and white archive footage from the 1930s, including Hitler at the Nuremberg Rally.
*2007: Western Daily Press (Bristol) 28 November 2007 - South West Columnist of the Year, Chris Rundle wrote an article entitled "Saints alive! Pasty eaters demand new bank holiday" and goes on to describe his contempt for the "pasty eaters", their Cornish indigenous language, Saint Piran's day and describes Cornwall as "one of the most depressing places one can find oneself, with an economy barely more buoyant than that of Romania". The article begins with the question "When is someone going to put the Cornish in their place?" and describes the Cornish language as sounding "like someone speaking Urdu with a mouth full of nails".
*2007: Leo Benedictus, in The Guardian in January, listed the following reasons not to move to Cornwall:- "Niche nationalism, Darkie Day, everyone's a Lib Dem, the missing generation, terrible football and cider."
*June 2008: Students from Imperial College London were condemned for branding people from Cornwall as "inbreds" by Kerrier District Councillor Graham Hicks after he discovered a website in which was quoted, "The Royal School of Mines Hockey Club follows in a long line of RSM sporting prowess but most of all its about fun, drinking and beating the pulp out of little Cornish inbreds who like to call themselves miners. The comments were removed from the website promptly."
*Mebyon Kernow Novemner 2008: On his webpage, the Mebyon Kernow leader Dick Cole reported that in response to Peter Tatchell's article on the “Comment is Free” section on The Guardian newspaper’s website , entitled “Self-rule for Cornwall”, over 1,500 comments were received and that he was "disappointed" "to see so many negative, inaccurate and offensive posts". One such post is quoted as follows: “The Cornish wurzels deserve nothing but contempt and should be sent back to where they belong, labouring down the bottom of a deep hole, the deeper the better … heads full of pasties and rotten clotted cream … inbreds all.” Dick Cole went on to say that Peter Tatchell himself had described many of the comments as “anti-Cornish vitriol” and “bigoted stereotyped anti-Cornish posts”. In fairness Dick Cole also pointed out that some of the comments intended to support the Cornish had been "unwise" .
'National Minority' Recognition Campaign
There has been a campaign to recognise the Cornish as a 'national minority' within the context of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities

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