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No, what you said before was that the term ""is not used in Ireland"".  You're now admitting it is used - if rarely (I happen to agree with you there!).  Government policy doesn't cover geography.  And as demonstrated, government policy doesn't appear to cover FF senators and TDs (but then, that's not new...).  AFAICR, the Dept of Education essentially said ""Not our problem"" when a teacher (?) complained to them about Folens using the BI term in its atlas and told the complainant to get in touch with the publishers directly.  To me, what smacks of a post-colonial inferiority complex is the drive by a vocal minority to expunge the term from every Irish-related article.  I rarely if ever use the term myself in everyday life (I prefer Ireland and Britain or Britain and Ireland), but if it does get used - meh!  Big deal!  I don't think it as a conspiracy to undermine sovereign Ireland, put us down, offend us, somehow claim our territory or subsume us back into the union, the way some people on here seem to take it.  Britain and Ireland, though, isn't a geographical term - its two different islands! I'd rather just say the Shannon is the longest river in Ireland than the longest in B & I - though my preference would still be to use the worldwide common name for the island group. BaStun not BaTsun "