It was only a week ago that the big water-cooler story across Australia was the Charlotte Dawson vs Internet Trolls saga and I was under the impression that we’d all decided that this sort of grimy, cowardly, and faceless bullying was not cool. It turns out that there will always be a minority as some anonymous bogan targeted West Tigers star Robbie Farah by posted a disturbing and sexually explicit tweet about Farah’s recently deceased mother. The ugly indecent has gone on to involve our own grieving PM Julia Gillard, NSW premier Barry O’Farrell, and a host of NRL players, journalists , and fans offering support for Farah and calling for tougher internet laws.
So this is how it happened. Yesterday afternoon Farah was watching the Raiders vs Sharks semifinal, as his twitter feed indicates, when he received the unprovoked tweet from @maxpower118*. Thankfully the offending account and tweet has been deleted but Farah’s response was swift and more eloquent than anything I would have offered in a similar position.
And who better to reach out to when you need to shake up the system?
Originally I was like “Robbie, bro, ease up, that’s a little insensitive” considering the news that Gillard was grieving her own loss but I guess you don’t take note of the days headlines when some douche is ripping on your deceased mother.
So yeah, nice dignified recovery Robbie. From this point twitter blew up. Barry O’Farrell entered the fray and gave the most solid indication that something practical was being done to catch offenders of this kind of attack.
As O’Farrell points out, it doesn’t matter who it is, but sports stars and prominent public figures, shape as the perfect target for the not-so-fans to anonymously launch hurtful attacks. And despite their muscle bound exteriors and propensity to dish out and receive pain in equal measure on the field, this kind of off field cyber bullying gets personal. Former early 90’s Rugby League star Jacin Sinclar was a victim of such bullying and eventually passed away in late 2010. The cause of death was inconclusive but pain killers, anti-depressants and other tablets are believed to have played a part. In England, this kind harassment has led to the development of laws that govern what can be posted on social media sites. British diver Tom Daley was targeted in a similar fashion to Farah, with Daley’s deceased father used as motivation in the attack. Through the new laws, Daley’s teen attacker was arrested before being released with a warning. English Premier League star Patrice Mumba was the butt of a series of racist jokes in the wake of his near fatal mid-game heart attack, with the culprit, 21 year old Liam Stacy jailed for 56 days. These arrests indicate that measures can be taken to make people accountable for what they say online. I’m yet to see how such legislation couldn’t be implemented in Australia.
Give a dickhead a computer and a forum to anonymously post their thoughts and shit will turn sour from time to time but it’s not like Twitter is eviiiiiil. For the most part it’s used as another avenue for sports stars to firm their ‘brand’. Whether it be Quade Cooper teeing up FIFA matches, John Daly telling the world what he’s having for dinner, or Robbie Farah beefing with fans (about a game so that’s cool), Twitter is generally just a fun voyeuristic/narcissistic social experiment and our collective moral compass ensures things remain civil for the most part. It’s for those yokels off the map that we need social networking laws. Maybe then we could all get back to using the internet for what it’s good for.
* It’s bad enough that you’ve amassed a skill set that allows you to turn on a computer and communicate your thoughts but don’t bring the Simpsons in on this you fucking jerk!.
Picture by Matt Roberts at Getty Images
