This woman’s riposte to the Sun after it said this about her efforts to learn Welsh is 10/10
A woman called Geordan Burress has gone viral after she launched a very satisfying riposte to a piece the Sun wrote about her and her efforts to learn Welsh.
And here’s a little bit of what it said.
An American woman who devoted eight years to learning fluent Welsh has got nobody to talk to because hardly anybody speaks it in the US.
Geordan Burress, 28, said: “I have only met one other American who speaks Welsh and he lives in Wales.”
And that’s, er, well there’s not much more than that.
It’s fair to say Geordan wasn’t entirely happy with the angle they took so decided to do something about it. Here’s what she said.
What a headline🤦🏾♀️🤦🏾♀️ When I agreed to share my story with an interviewer from a media group, I had no idea that it would end up being told in this way. The way it’s spun here basically implies that I was stupid to put effort into learning a language that’s “not spoken” https://t.co/xagGsFTafE
— Geordan 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
2. When I started learning Welsh, it was never with the expectation that I’d be able to speak it with a bunch of people in America. I started learning purely out of curiosity & because I thought it was cool, after being exposed to the language through music.
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
3. Thanks largely to the internet and social media, I’ve been able to use Welsh ever since I started learning it . I did decide to make a video of myself speaking it, so that I could connect with more people, but I’d been using Welsh long before I made that video.
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
The argument that there are just “not enough people” that speak the language for it to be worth putting effort into learning will never make sense to me. There are plenty of Welsh speakers, but even if there weren’t, it wouldn’t render the language “worthless”. Period.
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
5. Learning Welsh has changed my life in a number of ways. It’s hard to sum it up in tweets but, this entire 8 year endeavor has helped me to further realize that there’s a great deal of ignorance, bias, disrespect, and straight up hatred toward minority languages and cultures.
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
6. On a more personal note, having made many friends across the world has helped me tremendously to combat the depression that I’ve dealt with in the past, and being an inspiration to others has forced me to look at myself in a more positive light and be kinder to myself.
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
7. I’ve also learned something new today: how far out of context stories can be spun. But sharing my story again has worked in my favor really, because I now have dozens more people to speak Welsh with 😁😂 #irony So… thanks!✌🏾/rant
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
And there was heaps of praise and apologies in about equal measure.
They are awful, awful people and I'm so sorry they're doing this to you.
— Dr. Bethan M Jenkins (@dyddgu) July 10, 2019
I’m not too bothered by it, they’re just showing how ignorant they are 🤷🏾♀️
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
The S*n's entire take on this has been absolutely despicable. I cannot tell you how proud it makes me that you spend the time and effort to learn a language that means so much to me. You will be welcomed in Wales whenever and it's an honour to have you yn siarad Cymraeg with us!
— Becky Gillard (@bex6) July 10, 2019
I’m sorry about this Geordan. Ond diolch am ddysgu Cymraeg. Croeso!
— Elis James (@elisjames) July 10, 2019
sdim angen ymddiheuro! diolch iti 🙂
— G.B 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019
And it’s fair to say Welsh Twitter wasn’t taking it too Kindly either.
Can you imagine raising a child, nurturing them, getting through the hard times, putting them before yourself at all times and then having them grow up to become a writer for The Sun? It doesn't even bear thinking about.
— nicky 🏴 🇪🇺 (@nickysyddyma) July 10, 2019
If you’re wondering how she ended up talking to the Sun in the first place …
by the way, I never spoke directly to anyone from The Sun. I only spoke to a media group which then provided the content for the article. just wanted to clarify
— Geordan 🌼 (@grdnlyb) July 10, 2019