Given Northern Ireland's complicated political history and the fact that it has not had a particularly large cultural footprint compared to the rest of the UK, there's a tendency for characters from the area to be disproportionately shown as aggressive or violent. If they aren't carrying out acts of violence directly connected to The Troubles (which may or may not involve explosives), then they're shown as being blunt and in-your-face, if not outright verbally abusive.
Much like the Violent Glaswegian, this trope is the product of a confluence of historical and social factors. Outside of anything to do with the history of the region, Northern Irish accents are often perceived as harsh-sounding and particularly difficult to understand by people who aren't from the area.
The trope tends to be more noticeable to audiences in works that aren't set in their specific region. You might have a Police Procedural set in New York where the Mystery of the Week involves a violent crime committed by a Northern Irish character. However, you can also have media set in Northern Ireland where this trope comes into play to exert a greater influence on the overall subject matter and tone of the work in question.
It should be noted that this characterisation isn't inherently restricted to one particular side in The Troubles. However, it may be possible to draw inferences about an author's opinions and possible biases if one contingent is depicted as being more violent or aggressive than the other.
Whether or not this trope overlaps with Fighting Irish, or even if it should be considered a full-on Sub-Trope, has the potential to be a contentious issue. Unionist characters who fit the trope may not identify as Irish at all and may be even regard being viewed as such as a form of erasure of their Britishness. At the other end of the spectrum, you could have a character from Northern Ireland who would push back at any suggestion that their Irish identity differs from that of someone over the border in the Republic of Ireland.
That said, this trope is still distinct from Fighting Irish. Glancing at the examples on that trope's page, many of them come from American media and may have their roots in stereotypes about The Irish Diaspora there, where nuances about the cultural and historical differences between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland are flattened out or ignored altogether. This can sometimes occur alongside characters having a highly idealised vision of the entire island of Ireland in general.
Northern Irish and Nasty, on the other hand, is more often found in British Media. It assumes that viewers are able to tell the difference between a Northern Irish accent and one from the Republic, which British audiences are generally able to do. It also assumes that audiences understands the broad strokes of The Troubles even if the details are fuzzy.
Examples
Advertising- James Nesbitt arguably built his early career around subverting this trope, particularly as affable ladies' man Adam in Cold Feet. As the face of a 2003 campaign for the Yellow Pages, one of the adverts leans into this aspect of his screen persona. After his character botches a home haircut for his niece and his sister finds out about it, the next scene shows him appearing to yell angrily at a hairdresser he's found in the phonebook. Although he appears to be loudly berating the staff, he's actually explaining that he's just putting on a show for his sister, who's watching from her car outside, and that he'll pay them double if they agree to fix his niece's hair.
Film — Live-Action
- The Crying Game: Jude is the most willing of the IRA members we see to dish out violence. Fergus is a subversion of this trope, as he's a low-level grunt who's initially characterised by his reluctance to harm Jody, the British soldier his superiors in the IRA have taken hostage.
- Gangs of New York: The viciously bigoted, Hair-Trigger Temper gangster McGloin, one of the nastiest characters in the film, has a pronounced Belfast accent.
Literature
- The Butcher Boy: Francie Brady lives in a small town in Northern Ireland and his parents had never really gotten along. He becomes jealous of his neighbors the Nugents and started doing nasty things on them. For example, he stole Phillip Nugent's comic book collection. Another time Francie broke into their house and messed it up. Then the most horrible act Francie Brady had done was he killed Mrs. Nugent for taking his best friend Joe away from him.
Live-Action TV
- The Catherine Tate Show: Played for Laughs in a series of sketches about a hard-talking Belfast mother who is aggressively supportive of her gay son.
- Chewin' the Fat: One brief sketch featured two Northern Irish hard men, Frankie and Johnny, talking tough to each other in a manner that's so terse their statements take on a kind of comedically gnomic quality.
- Coronation Street: Expat Northern Irelander Jim McDonald committed bank robbery and murder, ending up in prison where he soon became the King Rat of his wing, dominating the other cons and running the alcohol racket.
- Harry Enfield and Chums: One sketch from a Christmas episode featured William Ulsterman, a character clearly modelled on Ian Paisley, loudly berating a party host for failing to provide cheddar cheese and pineapple on a stick as part of the selection of nibbles.
- Judge John Deed: One episode sees John trying a case of a Real IRA informant who also happens to be a serious domestic abuser.
- Peaky Blinders: Inspector Campbell, the main villain of the first two seasons, is a brutal copper brought in from Belfast to break the Birmingham gangs.
- Spitting Image:
- Ian Paisley is depicted in the show as belligerent to a fault with No Indoor Voice. He even goes so far as to berate God directly for failing to see that the Pope did not survive his assassination attempt.
- The song "Our God's Bigger Than Your God" features a puppet in a balaclava standing in front of an Irish tricolour singing the line "My god says that it's fine to kill" in a Northern Irish accent. This is then followed up with Ian Paisley responding to him with the song title.
- The song "Let's Blow the Whole World Up" has two balaclava-clad Northern Irish puppets, one Republican, one Loyalist, singing in chorus about how different they are.
Music
- Kneecap (Band): Kneecap are a Northern Irish band, but paint a pretty bleak picture of the province and its people. "Fenian Cunts" centres around Unionist bigotry towards Republicans, "Get Your Brits Out" is a Political Rap portraying the DUP leadership as pretty unpleasant, "Gael-Gigolos" and "Your All Legitimate Targets" feature Republican extremists and "Guilty Conscience" and "H.O.O.D." portray the band members themselves as violent thugs. Subverted when some songs dig deeper into the poverty and divisions that fuel drug use and violence within the province.
Radio
- Conversational Troping in one episode of Jeremy Hardy Speaks to the Nation. When Jeremy comments that he loves hearing Pauline McLynn talk even when she's berating him, because of the Irish accent, she comments that British people aren't so keen on Northern Irish accents, and Jeremy agrees that they all sound like Violent Glaswegians who are particuarly beligerant because they haven't had a drink. Pauline says that, broadly speaking, that's basically the history.
Theatrical Productions
- Parodied by the Irish comedy group Foil, Arms and Hog in their "Regional Accent Discrimination"
sketch. The Northern Irish character is offended that he keeps being stereotyped as belligerent due to his accent and mannerisms.
Foil: [bellowing at the top of his lungs] I'm not aggressive! I'M AN AROMATHERAPIST!
