Was the Ben Walsh Facebook post about refusing Serco a hoax?

Lefties have been all asquitter on Twitter about a Facebook post from a coupla days back. It purported to be by some guy called Ben Walsh.

In it he said that he worked for one of Victoria's biggest fencing companies. Apparently an order from Serco for fencing mesh came in. Ben twigged the material would be used in a detention centre. He objected to the sale and told his boss, who agreed with his stand. So Ben called Serco back and refused the sale. Some time later the Serco bloke rang again pleading for them to reconsider because he'd been given similar treatment elsewhere.

You can read it here: Post by Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (ASRC).

Lefty cartoonist First Dog on the Moon used the text in a strip that was shared on Twitter and retweeted by Scott Ludlam and others.

We all need to be a little like Ingrid the Grapefruit RT @SenatorLudlam:and @firstdogonmoon has done it again pic.twitter.com/F8lXHJDgLK #auspol
— Peter Tonoli (@peter_tonoli) February 26, 2014

Some tweeps have pondered whether the cartoon came first and the FB post was mocked up afterwards. But it seems likely the FB post was inspiration for the cartoon and not the other way around.

Not surprisingly some lefty tweeps have taken the post as dinkum and touted Ben as a hero for his actions. Others were not completely convinced but hoped it was real.

I'm pretty sure it's a hoax, and felt that way when I first read it last night. Firstly, most people just wouldn't take that stand at work. They'd be out of a job quick smart.

It wouldn't happen at one business let alone several, regardless of the political beliefs of employees (and employers for that matter). Business is about sales, not politics.

Anyway, there's no real popular groundswell of support for the green-left position on asylum seekers. If anything it's the opposite.

Also, I couldn't find the original post, or this Ben Walsh character on the social network.

I think maybe he's real and wished it to happen then wrote it as if it did. Then he freaked out when it went viral and increased his privacy settings. Or it was an outright hoax to start with.

The whole post is about having the courage of your convictions, right? So if it were dinkum he'd be glad about the exposure and jump at the chance to publicly proclaim its validity wouldn't he?

Another case of the Left being duped, I reckon ...

UPDATE: Tweet claims it was a hoax with pic of new Ben Walsh post in which he admits to deception. But that's clearly a hoax itself.

labor troll Ben Walsh confesses about faking a major post is this the new Labor we expect to see #pmlive #auspol pic.twitter.com/zh01qUsuIH
— Miney (@BigMiney) February 26, 2014

Duelling dupers? Or all concocted by this one guy?

UPDATE: This tweet linking to an image of a post infers that Ben Walsh is a real guy, Ben Smith.

Did trolls kill Charlotte Dawson?

It goes without saying that the death of Charlotte Dawson was a sad event. Suicide is always depressing. Of course when something like this happens lots of people look for something, someone, or some group to blame. Not surprisingly social media trolls have been seen as the major culprits here.

I don't think there's any doubt that the massive amount of abuse she copped online was a contributing factor in her death. But can you say they killed her, as many people on Twitter and elsewhere have been claiming?

No way. She killed herself. If you believe that adults are responsible for their own actions then you have to accept that it was she who made the final decision to end her own life.

Yes, there were many factors that brought her to that point. And we can argue about the extent to which one or more of them contributed to her death. But if you say that she had no power whatsoever in this equation and it was all due to the actions of others you're just deluding yourself.

I'm no shrink but it's pretty obvious from recent coverage of the tragedy that several factors were at play. There was Dawson's ongoing struggle with depression. There was the fact that almost everyone in the country knew about her parlous emotional state for years thanks to ongoing mainstream media attention. More specifically there was the recent stress of a 60 Minutes report about former partner Scott Miller and his drug problems. This clearly dredged up many deeply painful memories for her. There was the fact that her career was floundering. And there were the trolls.

It seems to me that "blaming the media" for her death would be just as rational as blaming trolls. The way they cynically exploit the suffering of well known individuals such as Dawson and Miller for ratings while simultaneously wringing their hands about it just makes you wanna puke. The fact that these reports are done with the full cooperation of the vulnerable individuals concerned is not an ameliorating factor. Maybe such troubled souls are doing it for the cash or the attention, or both. This just makes the whole thing even more creepily predatory in my opinion.

As well as compounding her humiliation, the ongoing media coverage of Dawson's struggle with mental illness made her even more of a target for trolling. We've all heard the term "don't feed the trolls". Well, a lot of that food was being supplied by the shows that made piles of filthy lucre from "documenting" her battles with them.

The same can be said of a lot of this hand-wringing in the wake of her death as well as the campaign by nanny-statists to make her into a martyr and increase censorship of social media. Rather than landing a powerful blow against trolls in general, all these things will embolden them further.

It's pretty clear that trolls genuinely wished her dead. So by arguing that their harassment of her was the main cause of her demise, you're basically saying: "You won trolls." (Actually, I read several tweets that used almost those exact words.) All that'll do is ensure that they'll redouble their efforts to emotionally destroy their next target.

Much better to just ignore these pathetic people in my opinion. Don't give them the power they don't have by telling them that their putrid online harassment actually succeeded.

Van Badham vs Tim Blair

Gawd. I've seen a lot of infantile, egocentric behaviour from the censorious squawkers of Artsville. But one recent reaction has really taken the bloody cake. It comes from nascent socialist squealebrity Van Badham.

Appalled and offended that she's been mocked by Tim Blair for a grotesquely self-indulgent anti-Abbott rant in which she included details about her late father's unseemly behaviour while he was unemployed, she tweeted this to one of her fellow sneering hipsters.

OMG! The insult to my *dead father* actually was published by THE DAILY TELEGRAPH. My god! What is this?! pic.twitter.com/odHnuZtGK1
— Van Badham (@vanbadham) December 20, 2013

It's called a fair crack, Vanessa.

It could also be said that using your dad's death to score cheap points against your main political hate figure constitutes an insult to his memory. We've all got dead relatives and loved ones. But only the most shameless and selfish use their deaths to slime those they detest -- and so soon after their passing. (It's not unlike Bolt-obsessed bloviator Mike Carlton and others like him using the death of Nelson Mandela to slime conservatives.)

Then there's the sheer irony of the potty-mouthed termagant demanding that everyone bow in sympathy to her fine feelings and respect her in her grief. Just take a look at the petulant princess's Twitter stream and you'll see what I mean. You'll be picking your jaw up off the floor.

She's gotta be one of the most abusive lefties on the site -- and that's saying something. She goes out of her way to provoke and offend people, verballing them at every opportunity.

Is it because she's as batshit insane as she appears to be, or is it just a cynical ploy? Maybe even a bit of both ...

She's certainly cottoned onto the fact that to carve a niche in the the leftoid media too much vile abuse is just never enough. As well as endless adulation from absolute idiots, there are well-paying meeja gigs and grants galore to be had if you can out-crazy your fellow feminist moonbats. To the "victim" the spoils!

Vanessa Badham is what I call a blushing violent. Vicious, aggressive, happy to make the most vile and knowingly false accusations when it suits. Then at other times when it suits she hides behind her gender, and plays victim. It's an amazingly cynical tactic. And sooo typical of the primitive, vindictive, cowardly Left.

My advice to the spoiled brat: Listen, baby cakes, if you don't wanna be mocked because you're still grieving then don't put that sensitive info into the public realm -- let alone for the purpose of a mean-spirited sliming.

Frankly petal, your feelings aren't that important. You show no respect for the feelings of others, so why should they respect yours? You were askin' for it.

Kate Ellis on Q and A and the feminist double standard

It's so ironic that Labor are now trying so relentlessly to demonize Tony Abbott as an eeevil misogynist, when the Government's very existence depends on the support of Craig Thomson and Peter Slipper.

Then there's the obvious misandry and pettiness of the "handbag hit squad". They even try to portray that very appellation as evidence of pervasive sexism. But it was coined by a woman (Julie Bishop) anyway. And what about all the speedo and budgie smuggler jibes hurled at Tony Abbott? They're very gender-specific and demeaning yet the Labor women don't condemn them, and have even been known to repeat them on occasion.

Theirs is the classic politically correct double standard. And one of the most shameless, brazen and petty practitioners of it is surely Nicola "Don't Call Me Nicky!" Roxon. She freely admits to disliking Abbott, has been sliming him for years, yet is miffed that he ignores her in social settings.

Hey, Nicky, I thought you were against all that patriarchal chivalry crap? 

Listen, baby cakes. The reason Abbott doesn't like you is not because you're "capable". It's 'cause you're spectacularly incompetent, and a nasty, sanctimonious hypocrite to boot!

Speaking of hypocrisy: Kate Ellis was on Q and A last night. Now some claim she's part of the handbag hit squad, but I don't agree. She's not down on their level. She's been dutifully pushing the ALP's slimy line on Abbott, sure. But you can see she lacks conviction when doing so. Deep down she knows it's a crock.

Unlike the three scowling sisters Roxon, Plibersek and Wong -- who are all as hard as nails but hide behind their gender when it suits -- she's a more classically (and consistently) feminine woman.

And she actually lacks confidence when speaking publicly. That's why I had some sympathy for her when a few of the blokes on the panel talked over her. This was certainly impolite, but hardly unusual conduct for that show. And it was completely insignificant when you consider how the panel and audience are routinely chockas with lefties, many of whom are obnoxious themselves.

Yet the Twitter squitterati went absolutely spacko over it. This was like their own personal Pearl Harbor, an event that would live in infamy!

Again, that leftie-feminist double standard: They never arc up about a conservative (man or woman) being treated badly or even abused outright, but savour the spectacle instead. Hell, they'll even join in the kicking if they can.

And it wasn't just the online audience who were hypocrites. The studio audience were rude and raucous too. There was a classic moment when a young bespectacled bloke gave Ellis a lecture on what feminism meant. The look on her face was just priceless. She actually let out an audible gasp of incredulity!

Then the audience booed him. To his credit, Tony Jones admonished them for this.

But the cause of their displeasure (and Ellis's shock) was clear. They were dogmatic types who believed that only women (and preferably lefties) had a right to discuss what feminism meant. In their insular, divisive ideology males are expected to either toe the PC line or keep their bloody mouths shut! What a pathetically juvenile and sexist attitude that is.

The majority of Australians, male and female, have had an utter gutfull of this nasty gender war. Labor think they're onto a winner by prosecuting it so relentlesly. But it will backfire on them big time come election day, that's for sure.

Robbie Farah's trolling ordeal and the push to censor Twitter

Gotta feel sorry for Robbie Farah. Must be horribly upsetting to have such nasty things tweeted about his mother's death. But this crusade he's on is just pointless. He, like Charlotte Dawson, has made the mistake of feeding the trolls. And of course the abuse hasn't stopped.

Obviously, anyone who posts such nasty, vile hate messages is a waste of skin. But unless they're actually making physical threats then you should just ignore or block them. If a well known person acknowledges that the troll really landed a punch it makes him feel important somehow -- exactly the result he craves. 

Obviously, if someone is posting what seem like serious and repeated threats to kill or harm then that's another matter. Go to the coppers. And if someone is tweeting lies about you -- saying you're a crook or rapist or whatever -- and it's affecting your reputation, then maybe defo action is justified.

But this recent troll-hunting push is not about defamation or criminality on Twitter. It's something else entirely. It's more to do with taste, really.

It reminds me of the legislation that the complainants in the Andrew Bolt case used to silence him. It's Orwellian as all get out.

It's stupid in the extreme to enact and enforce laws to protect people from having their feelings hurt because by their very nature they are so subjective.

Then there's the slippery slope aspect: Firstly, how can you define when major snark crosses the line into intolerable trolling? Twitter is a seething maelstrom of bitchiness. If the wished-for crackdown were to occur the jails would be full in no time, and the authorities still wouldn't have put a dent in the problem.

And if mocking someone's death on Twitter is deemed a criminal offence, then what about other media? The Chaser gleefully making fun of Peter Brock's demise comes to mind here. Nasty, tasteless and offensive, sure. But criminal? (Actually, I thought it was one of the best things they did because it actually required some writing, musical and performance skill, unlike most of their other "work".)

If this taste push gets momentum, then will such sketches be deemed illegal? If they are, then that would be terrifying. And if they aren't, well, it would just show how silly and inconsistent this nanny statist campaign actually is.

I think you can make a strong case that the Chaser boys should be thrown in jail for crimes against comedy. But of course that would be ridiculous -- just a little more so than criminalizing nasty tweets.

Misogynists and nut-jobs smear a Labor favourite

Julia Gillard really thinks she's on a winner with this tactic of smearing anyone who has questions about her role in the AWU scandal as a misogynist, nut-job, or idiot. It's a typically cheap, nasty tactic that her party has used earlier  -- for example when Tony Abbott was snapped with a placard behind him saying she was "Bob Brown's bitch". Her ministers all went into overdrive equating this one little incident with ugly "American style" lunacy and hatefulness.

Cynical ALP spin doctors were right in thinking that Oz hacks would run hard with this angle. After all, lazy, sneering Aussie journos have been milking the cow of anti-Americanism for decades now. There's a ready made smear machine all fired up and ready to go!

And it's a powerful machine, considering how many in the press gallery are tragic, jelly-backed Labor luvvies. But the tide is turning. Huge numbers of Aussies have had more than a gut-full of the way the MSM are acting like spin doctors for the Government on this.

So they're turning to social media and the blogosphere instead. Larry Pickering's websites and Facebook page are getting eye-boggling numbers. Have a squizz at the comment threads and you'll get some idea of just how many people are fired up about this. Then there's Michael Smith's blog. It's only been up for a coupla weeks but it has already garnered over 200 000 page views.

There's a big shift happening now. No wonder Gillard is packin' death. She won't sue, though, because that would risk the whole sleazy affair being opened up and investigated even more thoroughly in the long term. Hence she's employing what she thinks is a tried and true tactic with the "nutjobs and misogynists" smear. But it's another error of judgement from someone who's made many already. 

Of course no one will end up being shot in the streets as a result of this unrest. But I can't help thinking this is a little bit like the recent Twitter and Facebook revolutions in the Middle East. Autocratic rulers tried to perpetuate their narrative through official mainstream media channels that they controlled completely. But it didn't work because everyone just turned to the internet and Twittered and Facebooked their way to freedom instead!

Campbell Newman fights unions on Twitter

Have just read that Campbell Newman is taking his differences with Queensland unions to Twitter:

Queensland Premier Campbell Newman has resorted to using a Twitter account to dispel union "myths" about his government's jobs and services cuts.

"We have set up a Twitter account called Queensland Mythbusters and people can Tweet a query to that and we'll come back with an answer," Mr Newman says.

Hmmm. Considering what recently happened to Charlotte Dawson, this could be very unwise.

I mean, we know how much the unions hate the likes of Newman. And terms like "bully" and "thug" -- often inaccurately used to label Dawson's trolls -- are much more appropriate when describing militant unionists. Those who've had to walk past a picket line can certainly attest to this.

So I think Newman's new online strategy could easily result in a vicious snark-spiral. Will we see him "pushed to the brink" like Dawson, only leaving his hospital bed to talk to 60 Minutes about his ordeal?

It's possible, readers ...

All I can say is, Campbell, if things start to get really nasty, just don't feed the trolls.

Stay away from your PC and turn off your iPhone. Remember that your family loves you. The haters don't matter. And the block and unfollow buttons are there for a reason. Don't hesitate to use them, okay!

Charlotte Dawson's Sixty Minutes interview was bizarre and revealing

I just watched Charlotte Dawson being interviewed on 60 Minutes. It was a truly bizarre experience, and for many reasons (only some of which I can list here).

I know a lot of people think that her apparent attempt to kill herself was all just a cynical, calculating ploy to get heaps of publicity for her book. But she did appear to be genuinely emotionally exhausted. And even if there were subconscious motivations of this kind she seemed to sincerely believe what she was saying. 

I felt sorry for this woman, and not just because of the emotional roller coaster she's obviously been on. It was also sad that she seemed not to have the slightest clue about how vigorously she'd fanned the flames engulfing her -- not only in her recent public pronouncements, but also by doing the bloody interview (and so soon after her emotional meltdown).

There was mention of her depression. Obviously, that wouldn't have helped matters. And there were other aspects of her mental state that struck me as being more than a bit out of whack.

She clearly conflates the adulation that fame brings with genuine affection, and values it as such. That why she finds it so devastating when she gets the opposite reaction. (I know that a lot of public figures do this. But few take it to anywhere near the same extent.)

Actually, I think people who crave the limelight are all a bit nutty to start with. And those who seek it relentlessly, on a grand scale, and as something in and of itself, are often frighteningly unhinged. 

That's why whenever I hear that some celebrity whose face is plastered all over the joint is being stalked by some tragic loser I find it both grimly predictable as well as highly ironic. See, it's like the stalkee (celeb) is often a kind of stalker as well.

But they don't just fixate on one person. They stalk the entire population through various media. So it's hardly surprising that one of those masses winds up being so deeply affected by their desperate campaign of attention-seeking that they finally start stalking back!

Now, with social media, you've got a similar phenomenon at play. But it's intensified by the fact that people don't actually need to leave their living rooms to get their love-hate object's attention. They're also emboldened by the (seeming) anonymity that the net affords.

So they become trolls instead. And a lot of their trolling is aimed at those who could reasonably be called uber-trolls -- Charlotte Dawson being one.

In that context 60 Minutes just engaged in a bit of troll feeding itself. By interviewing Dawson about her ordeal they gave her the attention she desperately craves. They also gave her an opportunity to condemn, and thereby feed, her trolls all over again. Hell, they engaged in some of it themselves, using strong language to condemn the haters. (Bullies, sure. But "thugs"?)

The whole exercize has ensured that still more venom will be directed online at Dawson, surely not a helpful outcome. (It reminds me of the interview Matthew Newton did with ACA after his stint in hospital. He relapsed pretty soon after that and he seems to be in a worse state then ever.)

Don't know what will happen next in Charlotte Dawson's adventure in the troll-eat-troll world of Twitter -- and beyond. But it won't be pretty, that's for sure. 

Charlotte Dawson's apparent suicide attempt and Twitter trolling

Must say I'm a bit mystified about what actually happened to Charlotte Dawson in the wake of all that Twitter bullying. Particularly early on the event was strangely, perhaps carefully, described as her being "pushed to the brink" in many reports. 

Eh? Makes you wonder if she seriously, genuinely tried to top herself. Or did she pop some sleeping tablets, panic, then phone for an ambulance? In that case, it would have been more of a cry for help.

I know even that is serious, and I don't want to sound insensitive, but I think that's the more likely scenario. In any case, she was out of the hospital briefly to talk to 60 Minutes soon afterwards. So she clearly wasn't out cold and bedridden.

Another aspect of Dawson's reaction worth remembering is the fact that she's been known to snark up a storm herself. So she shouldn't be surprised when the, er, "tworm twurns" so to speak (or is that sptweak?).

Of course nanny nation advocates wasted no time in exploiting the incident, calling for greater controls and all the rest of it. But as Colin Barnett sensibly opined, there's no way you could ever enforce such laws.

Even if you could, they'd be far worse than the bullying itself, I reckon. The Dawson incident itself shows why. Not only was one of these Twitter "haters" suspended from her job, she's had her name -- Tanya Heti -- splashed all over the Oz and NZ meeja. Now for someone who seems not to want to live in the public eye (unlike Dawson) that must be devastating.

Okay, so she said some nasty things. Big deal. What's that old saying? "Sticks and stones may break my bones but collections of words totalling no more than 140 characters will never hurt me."

And some of the offending tweets were just ridiculous, like "go put your head in a toaster". Now if that qualifies as a crime we're all doomed. Imagine having the plods rock up on your doorstep 'cause you told someone to "go jump in the lake".

Then there's the issue of intention. Some people tweet things that are clearly tongue in cheek. But when taken literally they can result in all kinds of bother for the tweeter. Take the case of Pommie Paul Chambers, who joked that he was gonna blow up Robin Hood Airport and was consequently convicted of sending a "menacing online communication". He had to take his case all the way to the High Court to finally be taken, er, humorously. 

But back to being bullied online: Sure, it wouldn't be nice if you got hundreds of such tweets in a massive pile-on. But the problem is easily solved by blocking or just logging out. And the storm will always pass. 
 
I don't mind at all when I get snark, 'cause it's fun throwing some back. Actually, I even look forward to it from some people, cause it's so memorably phrased. One particularly florid leftie called me "mediaeval nightsoil". Brilliant! You gotta give credit where it's due ...

Speaking of lefties: I know they aren't the only ones calling for online policing. But they should be very careful what they wish for. No one does a pile-on like the Left, after all. Just watch the reaction to Sophie Mirabella when she's next on Q and A and you'll see what I mean. 

Inside Facebook doco confirmed my perceptions about the site

Watched the documentary Inside Facebook last night. It was an interesting insight into the workings of the social networking site. Zuckerberg is clearly a technologically brilliant young bloke, as are many of the people who work there. But he struck me as being emotionally immature. And the whole enterprise seemed strangely soulless.

He kept talking about how he wanted to help people connect with each other more, but I think his site might be having the opposite effect.

If it's about keeping in touch with old friends, and making new ones, then why do people spend so much time looking at their stuff and checking their updates online? Why not spend time with them in the real world?

And the fact that so many people spend so much time playing games on there is a bit of a worry. In the doco an overly keen gamer happily bought a flashy container for the poop of one of his favourite characters. It was as sad as it was funny. 

Many pundits have said that spending so much time on the site -- almost as if it's a parallel life -- is damaging the psychological health of millions of Facebook addicts. I think they've got a point.

While you can also go overboard on Twitter I think it's a far better site. It's not a replacement for social interaction. It's all about connecting with others who have the same interests, and sharing information. It's much more serious and focused.

On Twitter you can learn heaps, connect with experts, promote blog posts and do a whole lot of other productive things. But on Facebook people seem to waste their time piss-farting around, playing stupid games and "poking" each other.

There's no contest as far as I'm concerned.

Julian Burnside's "paedos in speedos" Twitter smear

Hot on the heels of Geoff Clark's Orwellian claims that he hoped his legal censoring of Andrew Bolt would actually promote debate comes another little event that clearly illustrates the jaw-dropping hypocrisy of the PC left.

The foppish, latte slurping hand wringer Julian Burnside has beclowned himself quite splendidly with a nasty little tweet linking Tony Abbott to paedophilia.

To his credit he apologized for it immediately. But true to socialist form he combined this with some deft weaseling, denying that the tweet did actually refer to the Opposition Leader. 

Which begs the question: If it wasn't about Abbott, then why did he apologize to him?

Not surprisingly, Burnside is an assiduous of promoter of the "it's not about freedom of speech" line regarding Bolt, something that his fellow concerned aristotwat Derek Sapphire approves of immensely.

I find behaviour like this just so depressing. It really makes you wonder if these ridiculous people will man up and be honest about anything at all, ever? 

Sure, what Burnside did was pretty minor in the grand scheme of things. And it did serve a useful purpose. The infantile nastiness of it is sooo typical of the circles he moves in, and constitutes yet more proof of what a petty and prejudiced level these people are on. 

But just imagine if a prominent conservative were to make a similar online "mistake" about paedophilia in Aboriginal communities, playing on the media image of a prominent Indigenous politician or activist ...

I rest my case, Your Honour.