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Of course, there is no cancel culture

A data specialist who joined the Government after answering Dominic Cummings’ job advert seeking ‘misfits and weirdos’ was sacked after saying that police should use live rounds against Black Lives Matter demonstrators.
Will O’Shea, 57, posted the comment about BLM protests on July 5, when marches were being organised across Britain following the killing of George Floyd by police officers in the US, The Guardian reported.
Responding to a social media post suggesting that Metropolitan Police officers had been chased out of a housing estate in London by demonstrators, and another post that called the police cowards, Mr O’Shea reportedly replied on Twitter: “Time to get out the live rounds.”

As a lawyerly friend who reads this blog has pointed out things that have been said here – whether in jest or not – rather rule out any such sorta employment for me.

17 thoughts on “Of course, there is no cancel culture”

  1. Don’tcha just love how The Guardian describes this as “nasty racist gets sacked” instead of the rather more honest “two civil servants collude to doxx one of their colleagues to get him fired just because they don’t like him”. All in the name of ‘diversity’.

    Woke people may feel warmed by this story, but they too should be horrified. Nobody is ideologically pure, and this is a beast that can be unleashed upon anybody. The only defence is “that’s his/her private account and we dgaf”

  2. They do this is the name of diversity, but they’ve actually reduced diversity. They’ve gone from a mix of people from ‘shoot the basterds’ to ‘how fast can I grovel’ to just grovellers.

  3. Note also the use of “the killing of George Floyd by police officers” – he died while in police custody, but whether or not they killed him or were even a factor in his death (Fentanyl OD perhaps) hasn’t been established legally or practically. Funny how journos forget words like “allegedly” sometimes.

  4. So Much For Subtlety

    rather more honest “two civil servants collude to doxx one of their colleagues to get him fired just because they don’t like him”.

    +10

    I don’t want to further reduce TW’s chance of employment with Boris (well OK I am relatively OK with that, but would be gutted if it cost him a job with PM Farage – it could happen you know), but the police should use live rounds.

    Maybe flamethrowers.

  5. Esteban: “Note also the use of “the killing of George Floyd by police officers”…”

    Listen to Radio Two talk show at midday (Vanessa or Jeremy) and you’ll hear ‘murder of George Floyd’ going totally unchallenged by either presenter.

  6. Dennis, He Whose Floatilla Fills The Tub

    As a lawyerly friend who reads this blog has pointed out things that have been said here – whether in jest or not – rather rule out any such sorta employment for me.

    Perhaps… But I don’t think you’ve gone on Twitter and advocated for an escalation of violence, either.

  7. Would these be the peaceful protests that saw 27 police injured?
    Could be say he posed it as a question rather than a statement and as such he made no demand for police to fire upon anyone, but was merely speculating if rioting had escalated to the point where the police might deploy more extreme tactics. Twitter being what it is the lack of a question mark, punctuated sentences, grammar, spelling etc surely can’t be held against someone.

  8. Perhaps… But I don’t think you’ve gone on Twitter and advocated for an escalation of violence, either.

    Does anyone genuinely that is what the guy in the story was doing either? You’d have to be fabulously naive or as autistic as Rain Man to think he was actually salivating at the idea of other people being shot dead by the police.

    And anyone who claims he was is clearly not acting in good faith.

  9. Dennis: Oppressor, Warmonger, Capitalist and Consumer of Petroleum Products

    Does anyone genuinely that is what the guy in the story was doing either? You’d have to be fabulously naive or as autistic as Rain Man to think he was actually salivating at the idea of other people being shot dead by the police.

    And yet here we are, talking about the fact that he’s been fired. So either there are more naive and/or autistic types out there than you’ve imagined, or a certain percentage of people took advocating arming British police with firearms and ammunition as being provocative and counterproductive.

    And anyone who claims he was is clearly not acting in good faith.

    Even if one grants you your claim, since when has Cancel Culture operated on the basis of good faith? Talk about naive…

  10. The Civil Service Code of Conduct is quite strict on what you can and cannot say on social media. Although none of the lefties, bien pensant or, up here, the mass of SNP drones, are ever held to it.

    One reason why I (although not currently bound by it) post anon.

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