Fake Tweeters - Shoot The Messenger

After John O’Connell of Far Right Watch, a dedicated anti-fascist of some years’ standing, found a number of fake Twitter accounts which appeared to have been set up by someone at the DHSC, or on behalf of them or their marketing agency, some of those who responded to the revelation asked for more evidence. This is a perfectly legitimate request. There were, however, others who had no interest in discussing anything.

Put simply, O’Connell has been subjected to a campaign of direct and unquestioning abuse. None of those doling out the abuse are interested in entering into any kind of intellectual process, but just denouncing him, trying to silence him, or, worse, trying to bully others into not discussing his findings. Their problem is that they just got rumbled.

After O’Connell warned “Thank you to those who have tagged various media names regarding this story, but I reiterate : This is not ready yet for questions to be asked. Way too data-heavy for non-geeks. We are determined to gold-plate this and present as a fait accompli” (which means he’s still working on the data), the abuse began. “Haha, you've been found out, you utter crank” … “He’s a crank for many reasons”.

And these were mere sighting shots. Anyone from the MSM mentioning it? “No because it’s complete bollocks. Not a shred of evidence from this crank yet”. Peter Reid was interested in whether what had been discovered was illegal. “It would be illegal, if it wasn't utter bullshit spread by a crank Peter”. Lots of cranking going on here.

O’Connell told that he was taking legal advice. One helpful Tweeter mentioned a well-known lawyer. Cue more abuse: “John is a crank”. Original, aren’t they? Any advance on Crank? “It's time to turn off your social media accounts, you antisemitic crank!” Ah, now we have an anti-fascist being smeared as an anti-Semite. Magnificent.

One specimen tried to clinch an argument against O’Connell by frothing “He’s well known as a far left crank and defender of antisemites and antisemitism in the Corbyn Labour Party. I’m sure he has this ‘evidence’ tho”. Untrue, and actionably so. Bonus points for “Corbyn”, mind. Anyone else want to rope Jezza into it? And here it comes: “He's an antisemitic Corbynite crank. Don't hold your breath”. And it got worse.

“Another lefty celeb happily retweeting the lies of a far left Jew hating crank. Does Omid Djalili have a problem with Jews?” blustered one Tweeter, who followed up with an attempt to smear someone else Retweeting O’Connell as an anti-Semite. "Emma Kennedy has been told by many Jews she is retweeting a Jew hating far left crank, she won’t delete her tweet. I used to think she just suffered from Brexit Derangement now I think she’s infected by something much older”. All wrong, and just malicious.

There was yet more of the bullying, with one nonentity demanding “delete the retweet please. This is a crank with anti-Semitic history spreading bollocks”. It really isn’t. Tom Scott observed it all and concluded “Some very odd-looking accounts are now mounting what looks like a concerted attack on John O’Connell … They're trying to discredit him as an ‘anitsemitic crank’. Anyone looking at his timeline can see this isn't true”.

Why this is happening I know not, and care less. What is important is that a decent man is being smeared for no reason whatever. Someone out there needs to grow up and chill.

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