Is it just me or have SF vanished?

For Forks Sake

A right charmer this lad:

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/sinn-f%C3%A9in-apologises-as-member-resigns-over-social-media-abuse-1.4326902

A Sinn Féin member in Wexford has resigned from the party after using false social media profiles to abuse businessmen, politicians and celebrities.

Fianna Fáil senator Malcolm Byrne said he was on the receiving end of derogatory online messages from an account created by Paul Heffernan.

Wexford businessman Derek Webb was also subjected to derogatory comments from an anonymous Twitter profile, which used the name “P O’Neill”, a code-name often used by the Provisional IRA to sign statements.

The same profile also sent abusive messages to model Claudine Keane about her husband Robbie Keane.

In one message, the anonymous account wrote to Mr Webb and asked “are you that fat pig that cycles around Gorey in the Lycra with your man tits hanging out.”

Other tweets called him a “fat sloth lookalike clown.”

In another tweet, he was asked “did special school bring you up to Dublin for the day.”

Mr Webb investigated the anonymous account and eventually confronted Mr Heffernan, before complaining to Sinn Féin.

Many politicians remaining silent over online personal abuse
Fine Gael Senator is threatened with violence on social media following canvassing post
Mr Webb said he examined the tweets on the @peeoneill account on Twitter and cross referenced them with posts on Mr Heffernan’s other account, which was registered in his real name. He found both accounts tended to tweet about the same things on the same days.

“I went to the guards and they told me it could take a year to get the IP address from Twitter so I decided to confront him myself,” Mr Webb said.

He said he arranged to meet Mr Heffernan and confronted him with the evidence, leading to Mr Heffernan admitting to being behind the account.

“My tweets were at the lower end. They were water off a duck’s back. But the stuff against Malcolm Byrne was different,” he said.

In a letter to Mr Webb, the party said the messages were “not orchestrated or encouraged” by Sinn Féin.

“Our county board have recently been made aware of an allegation regarding a false social media profile operated by a party member that we understand has caused you distress to date.

“On behalf of County Wexford Sinn Féin, I would like to take this opportunity to express our condemnation of this type of behaviour and to reassure you that the actions of the individual involved were of their own doing and were no way encouraged or orchestrated by our party.

“By extension we also wish to express our regret of this individual’s actions and would like to extend our apologies to you for any distress caused.

“Sinn Féin at both local and national level is actively opposed to cyber bullying or any form of discriminatory behaviour. As you may be aware the individual in question has now offered their resignation to the party which I can confirm has been unanimously accepted by our elected county board.”

The letter was signed by Roger Kiernan, the chairman of the Wexford Sinn Féin branch. It is understood the letter was sent last Friday.

Mr Byrne said that Mr Heffernan admitted to using social media, particularly an anonymous Twitter account, “to direct abuse at politicians in parties other than Sinn Féin and others.

“I was one of those whom he attacked. The abuse went well beyond criticism of policy and was personalised and in many cases, nasty. I blocked the fake account and reported it to Twitter but the company did not take action.

“It was only the work of a local businessman and community activist, Derek Webb, who also suffered abuse from the troll, who uncovered the person responsible. Derek confronted Paul Heffernan about his online activities. He also raised it with Sinn Féin.

“I would welcome the statement by Sinn Féin in disowning the online abuse by one of its now former key activists in Wexford. The party has rightly made clear that this anonymous trolling is not acceptable.”

Mr Heffernan said he had no comment when contacted on Monday. The @peeoneill account is no longer active on Twitter.

For Forks Sake

Violet-Ann Wynnes social media misadventures continued this week with a spot of plagiarism

https://twitter.com/CathalCroweTD/status/1292444491643838466

JohnnyFlash

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

Where did they get this fella?

https://twitter.com/davidcullinane/status/1292796598901190659?s=21

Man tries on a pair of ‘fashion shoes’ and another man thinks it’s an opportunity to make a point.

Tweet has since been deleted, hilarious really. Poor Waterford giving this guy a mandate.

For Forks Sake

Deleted User wrote: »

Tweet has since been deleted, hilarious really. Poor Waterford giving this guy a mandate.

He got absolutely roasted (and rightly so).

jm08

Yeah_Right wrote: »

What's wrong with spending €150 on a good pair of shoes? I would have thought that's the minimum you'd want to spend.

Because, you can get a very nice pair of Tommy Bowe's shoes for under €100 that are available in shops all over Ireland. Since Leo says he is hard on shoes, he might be better off not buying those soft Italian leather fashion shoes that cost an arm and a leg in Thomas Patrick.

blackwhite

Deleted User wrote: »

Tweet has since been deleted, hilarious really. Poor Waterford giving this guy a mandate.

Cullinane won’t even attempt to defend it himself - but the loyal foot soldiers on here still made a hash of trying to defend it :pac:

celt262

blackwhite wrote: »

Cullinane won’t even attempt to defend it himself - but the loyal foot soldiers on here still made a hash of trying to defend it :pac:

What's he done now?

blackwhite

jm08 wrote: »

Because, you can get a very nice pair of Tommy Bowe's shoes for under €100 that are available in shops all over Ireland. Since Leo says he is hard on shoes, he might be better off not buying those soft Italian leather fashion shoes that cost an arm and a leg in Thomas Patrick.

Herself got me a pair of the Tommy Bowe shoes for Xmas this year. V nice shoes, and comfortable - but already falling apart 7 and a half months later.

Surprised that Varadkar didn’t choose somewhere local to his own constituency - but then no doubt the usual gang would be criticising him for parish pump politics if he did that

blackwhite

celt262 wrote: »

What's he done now?

Made a moderately stupid comment in a tweet - and then deleted it like the coward he is instead of either defending it, or owning up to a mistake

FrancieBrady

blackwhite wrote: »

Made a moderately stupid comment in a tweet - and then deleted it like the coward he is instead of either defending it, or owning up to a mistake

You'll be telling us next that nobody ever deleted a tweet

jm08

blackwhite wrote: »

Herself got me a pair of the Tommy Bowe shoes for Xmas this year. V nice shoes, and comfortable - but already falling apart 7 and a half months later.

Surprised that Varadkar didn’t choose somewhere local to his own constituency - but then no doubt the usual gang would be criticising him for parish pump politics if he did that

It would have been a better look if he didn't use one of the most expensive shoe shops on Grafton Street.

blackwhite

FrancieBrady wrote: »

You'll be telling us next that nobody ever deleted a tweet

He couldn’t even be bothered defending the stupidity of it himself - and yet here you are still toiling away :pac:

It’s like a parody at this stage. Tell us again how you never voted SF before 2020 🤣🤣🤣

blackwhite

jm08 wrote: »

It would have been a better look if he didn't use one of the most expensive shoe shops on Grafton Street.

Live in Dublin myself - but I wouldn’t know how expensive, or otherwise, it is. The only place I’d peg as an “expensive” shoe shop is Loake on Wicklow St (got the wedding shoes there, still in good nick as well).

Normally get my own posted up from EJ in Sligo - gotta support the home town

FrancieBrady

blackwhite wrote: »

He couldn’t even be bothered defending the stupidity of it himself - and yet here you are still toiling away :pac:

It’s like a parody at this stage. Tell us again how you never voted SF before 2020 ������

Where did I defend it?

It was an innocuous enough tweet made special by the 'how dare you criticise Leo' crew piling on board to thump thier chests in high dudgeon.

He is not the first to delete a tweet that causes that kind of hissy fit. Nor is he the first to have second thoughts about what he tweeted.

Hulk Hands

Tweets been deleted

Cullinane reminds me of a line from Father Ted to Dougal.

"Think about what you're saying....and then don't say it. And then just run away somewhere"

jm08

blackwhite wrote: »

Live in Dublin myself - but I wouldn’t know how expensive, or otherwise, it is. The only place I’d peg as an “expensive” shoe shop is Loake on Wicklow St (got the wedding shoes there, still in good nick as well).

Normally get my own posted up from EJ in Sligo - gotta support the home town

Loake shoes are more suitable for an Irish climate (UK company) than the Italian shoes which are made for a much dryer climate.

blackwhite

For Forks Sake wrote: »

A right charmer this lad:

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/sinn-f%C3%A9in-apologises-as-member-resigns-over-social-media-abuse-1.4326902

Small beans. They’ve a TD who “resigned” from his previous party for the same shenanigans. Fairly obvious for a long time that it’s standard procedure for SF at this stage. SFOS hasn’t gone away you know

JohnnyFlash

There was another doozy as well over the weekend from Patricia Ryan (the newly elected Sinn Féin TD for Kildare South - the lady who went on her holidays during the general election) who came out and said she had written to the housing minister to ask him to extend rent freezes and the ban on evictions during the lockdown in Kildare. Turns out her party had voted for it earlier in the the week.

Deleted as well now of course.

You'd think at least a few of the 200 employees would be tasked in ensuring quality control on the posts being fired out by their TDs.

Rodney Bathgate

The 200 staff would be too busy posting on here, Twitter and Reddit etc to bother with that sort of thing.

FrancieBrady

blackwhite wrote: »

Small beans. They’ve a TD who “resigned” from his previous party for the same shenanigans. Fairly obvious for a long time that it’s standard procedure for SF at this stage. SFOS hasn’t gone away you know

No more than deleting tweets or thinking better of them is there a party in the country that hasn't had issues with member (Senior members in some cases) abusing people on Twitter.

The guys a tool obviously...and good to see SF unequivocally condemn it and disown it.

Rodney Bathgate

FrancieBrady wrote: »

No more than deleting tweets or thinking better of them is there a party in the country that hasn't had issues with member (Senior members in some cases) abusing people on Twitter.

The guys a tool obviously...and good to see SF unequivocally condemn it and disown it.

Yes, Reada Cronin come to mind. Last time I checked her Twitter is still private. It takes a while to sanitize 30,000 plus Tweets / retweets.

FrancieBrady

Rodney Bathgate wrote: »

Yes, Reada Cronin come to mind. Last time I checked her Twitter is still private. It takes a while to sanitize 30,000 plus Tweets / retweets.

She the only one 'springs to mind'?

I seem to remember some high profile members from other parties getting in hot water on the tweet machine.

Couldn't be bothered going looking for links. But almost every party have had trouble.
Somebody should propose a charter to moderate behaviour on social media.

JohnnyFlash

Rodney Bathgate wrote: »

Yes, Reada Cronin come to mind. Last time I checked her Twitter is still private. It takes a while to sanitize 30,000 plus Tweets / retweets.

There's nothing private on the internet, Rodney. Anyone with a tick has had multiple copies of their tweets archived.

I don't want to sound like a broken record, but the Sinn Féin party owning upwards of 50 properties is where the more 'nosey' of journalists are focusing their attention these days. :eek:

Pay for your subscriptions to the Irish Times and The Currency if you want proper investigative journalism.

:cool:

Rodney Bathgate

FrancieBrady wrote: »

She the only one 'springs to mind'?

I seem to remember some high profile members from other parties getting in hot water on the tweet machine.

Couldn't be bothered going looking for links. But almost every party have had trouble.
Somebody should propose a charter to moderate behaviour on social media.

Not many had thousands of problematic tweets/retweets. She was certainly the one with the most to sanitize, so yes she was the first to ‘spring to mind’.

If someone mentioned misuse of ink cartridges for example then Aengus O Snodaigh would obviously spring to mind with his EUR 50,000 printer fetish.

FrancieBrady

Rodney Bathgate wrote: »

Not many had thousands of problematic tweets/retweets. She was certainly the one with the most to sanitize, so yes she was the first to ‘spring to mind’.

If someone mentioned misuse of ink cartridges for example then Aengus O Snodaigh would obviously spring to mind with his EUR 50,000 printer fetish.

There must be something big about to break in FG/FF world, they're talking about print cartridges again.

Rodney Bathgate

FrancieBrady wrote: »

There must be something big about to break in FG/FF world, they're talking about print cartridges again.

No, just a simple example to illustrate a point.

JohnnyFlash

FrancieBrady wrote: »

There must be something big about to break in FG/FF world, they're talking about print cartridges again.

50 properties, and upwards of 200 employees, Francie.

I know you're a first time SF voter, but maybe ask your local rep at the next clinic who the hell is paying for all this, and where the money came from......

Rodney Bathgate

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

50 properties, and upwards of 200 employees, Francie.

I know you're a first time SF voter, but maybe ask your local rep at the next clinic who the hell is paying for all this, and where the money came from......

I wouldn’t have had Francie down as a SF voter.

I’d have said he was one of the ‘I didn’t vote for SF and I don’t support SF, but ....’ types.

FrancieBrady

Rodney Bathgate wrote: »

I wouldn’t have had Francie down as a SF voter.

I’d have said he was one of the ‘I didn’t vote for SF and I don’t support SF, but ....’ types.

I freely said that I voted for them in the last election. The first time in a GE having voted for them at local and in a presidential election before.

This drives the FG and FF people on here mad for some reason. It used to be that I would vote for one of them...maybe it's sour grapes?

hatrickpatrick

FrancieBrady wrote: »

I freely said that I voted for them in the last election. The first time in a GE having voted for them at local and in a presidential election before.

This drives the FG and FF people on here mad for some reason. It used to be that I would vote for one of them...maybe it's sour grapes?

For the record I'm the same, anyone who's seen my posting history on Boards or interacted with me over the years knows that I always ruled out voting SF on the basis of the party whip and the fact that their record in Northern Ireland didn't gel with the manifestoes they were pushing here. I voted for them #2 in this election after PBP for the simple reason that in the four years since the previous election, many, many of my friends have seen their lives travelling backwards as hyperinflation of rents forced people to forgo the independence they'd attained in their twenties and move back with their parents as their thirties approached. SF are the only large party which claims to want to fix this, ergo most people my age - regardless of socioeconomic background - voted for them.

This really seems to infuriate many people here, the issue of the first-time SF voter who voted based on political ideology and not the issue of a United Ireland. In fact, as I've said before, the very concept of voting based on ideology seems to alarm many posters here, which I find bizarre. I guarantee you that these newfound SF voters would desert the party in as quick a heartbeat as they joined if SF suddenly dropped rent control and massive social housing investment as policy planks.

There is absolutely no party loyalty or interest in party history among most newfound SF voters, there is a genuine anger at an establishment whose answer to a housing crisis which is destroying peoples' lives was to force councils to sell public land to private developers, and allow those developers to waste that land building glorified hostels instead of proper apartment blocks.

The idea of the first time SF voter who previously opposed the party is really touching a raw nerve among some around here. Perhaps those who support neoliberal economic policies are finally realising that when you f*ck an entire generation over in order to benefit those higher up the generational ladder, that generation will turn around and tell you to f*ck yourselves instead?