Using a focus group MO, Irish undergraduate students' attitudes towards their daily faced Irish, reveal 4 themes: ‘performance’, ‘by-purpose’, ‘singularity’, and ‘increased culture’. Respondents' metapragmatic comments mark high inconsistency as to Irish language use, and intricate language-ideological stances. Irish linguistic prestige as both unnamed and true variety is defied by that of allochthonous Irish languages, like Polish. Qualitative or in depth attitude inquiry may offer a more complete grasp of this ostensible antinomy.