What are your thoughts on the Ian Wright/Patrick O'Brien situation?

ByTheSea2019 wrote: »

Saying you forgive someone and coming back saying they haven't been punished harshly enough makes it look like the "forgiveness" was just for PR. If you don't forgive them, fine, stick to your guns and say you want to go through the trial and see them punished. But don't try to look forgiving if you're not.

No it doesnt.

It means you forgive them.

It doesnt mean you think they should not be punished for it. Two different things.

Would the same apply in a murder trial?

The parents of the victim say they forgive the killer. Will the judge say, thats grand so, out you go?

Would the “outcome” have been different if Wrighty had forgiven the perpetrator after the trial?

To a large extent this has nothing to do with Ian Wright. His "forgiveness" is of no relevance. It's bigger than that.

silverharp wrote: »

on the scale of things I'd rate a serial bike thief worse than what I will call a mistake this lad made. I dont get the whole puritan head on a stick attitude though, its just a classic manufactured outrage story and people are playing their parts.

It was racism not a mistake.
I can agree that on a scale of criminal activity it is at the very low end but it is racism not a mistake.

RobbieTheRobber wrote: »

Yeah seems an ok interpretation to me

Wonderful, you completely ignored the rest of my post and removed the context that statement was made within.

The oddest thing is how could a teenager living in a place that would only have a few black people developed such racist, ideas, and beliefs and then decide to target an English footballer with them someone he never met and was unlikely to ever meet.

mariaalice wrote: »

The oddest thing is how could a teenager living in a place that would only have a few black people developed such racist, ideas, and beliefs and then decide to target an English footballer with them someone he never met and was unlikely to ever meet.

Because there is an undercurrent of low level racism that is quite acceptable in much of Irish society.
Incidents like this show it up. Many posters in this thread have tried to excuse it and try to talk around the subject rather than admit that what happened here was a racist incident.
He could have sent messages to Ian wright saying he is a bad footballer. That would have been abuse and still wrong over a computer game sprite but instead he sent racist abuse and now we have so many people in this thread who try to talk around that fact.
Sending Ian wright abusive messages over a computer game would have been a stupid mistake this was racism.

coinop wrote: »

^^^ This guy gets it.
If his target was wearing glasses, he would call him four eyes.
If his target had acne, he would call him pizza face.
His target in this case was black so he called him a monkey.
The young lad is obviously a twat but the mob condemning racism as the worst possible crime ever need to get a grip. Is bullying a ginger a lesser crime than bullying an African?

He wished death on him because of his skin colour. You really cant excuse that away and pretend its not racism with ridiculously stupid ginger whataboutery..

tdf7187 wrote: »

This Ian Wright character strikes me as a very unforgiving type. He claims to have suffered racist abuse non-stop all his life. Even if that's true, which I doubt, he cannot put all the blame on one young adult who made a fool of himself on social media over a relatively brief period of time, and put his hands up and acknowledged he was in the wrong - as the court system has, quite properly, taken allowance of, along with the youth of the perpetrator.

Made a fool of himself? He made racist death threats.

EmmetSpiceland wrote: »

Another sad byproduct of an angry young man playing games and living his life “online”.

Indeed, because there was no racism till the internet arrived.

Patrick O’Brien should have been made to wear a sign in Harlem that says ‘I HATE Ni**ERS!!!!!!!!’

2ndcoming wrote: »

No, he tweeted disgraceful racist abuse to Ian Wright himself via twitter, who saw it, made a complaint to the police, and it has now been acted upon.

You can say whatever you want to computer game characters, although if you're saying anything like this kid did you'd probably want to take a look at yourself.

Not condoning the comments one nano second but seems to me he lost at a computer game where “Ian Wright” was on his team - this led to his comments.

Not excusing them but it was in very specific circumstances that he made those comments.

Just as a comparison the UK Crown Prosecution Service have sentencing guidelines on conviction for
s.18 - using threatening/abusive/insulting words or behaviour or displaying written material with intent/likely to stir up racial hatred

Maximum penalty for this in the Magistrates' court is 6 months imprisonment. They do suspended sentences over there too and a first time offender of the above would be given one and not serve time unless it was other offences like assault on top. But they would be unlikely to get away altogether without a conviction. Its the minimum Ian Wright would have been hoping for, have to say I would agree with him.

Muahahaha wrote: »

Just as a comparison the UK Crown Prosecution Service have sentencing guidelines on conviction for
s.18 - using threatening/abusive/insulting words or behaviour or displaying written material with intent/likely to stir up racial hatred

Maximum penalty for this in the Magistrates' court is 6 months imprisonment. They do suspended sentences over there too and a first time offender of the above would be given one and not serve time unless it was other offences like assault on top. But they would be unlikely to get away altogether without a conviction. Its the minimum Ian Wright would have been hoping for, have to say I would agree with him.

Yeah. I agree. I think 1 months prison for this would be perfectly reasonable.

Joeytheparrot wrote: »

Yeah. I agree. I think 1 months prison for this would be perfectly reasonable.

It isn't.

We can't send violent criminals to prison in this country never mind teenage boys calling people names on the Internet.

The taxpayer is supposed to foot the bill every time an idiot spouts some racist nonsense online?

We don't have the capacity in our prisons to even entertain this but yeah send him to prison to satiate the needs of some people on the Internet.

Before anyone says it, I'm not defending the guy, what he did was wrong, but a bit of perspective is required.

nullzero wrote: »

It isn't.

We can't send violent criminals to prison in this country never mind teenage boys calling people names on the Internet.

The taxpayer is supposed to foot the bill every time an idiot spouts some racist nonsense online?

We don't have the capacity in our prisons to even entertain this but yeah send him to prison to satiate the needs of some people on the Internet.

Before anyone says it, I'm not defending the guy, what he did was wrong, but a bit of perspective is required.

Your points dont make sense
A) we never argue in other cases about the taxpayer paying etc so not sure why thats relevant
you seem to be minimising the issue as a throwaway comment with no victims involved; Ian Wright is a victim here of a serious death threat
C) the internet is real life; a real persons life was threatened because of the colour of their skin; this isnt about satiating peoples needs - it is about addressing real life serious issues where people are sent death threats and targeted racially.

Joeytheparrot wrote: »

Your points dont make sense
A) we never argue in other cases about the taxpayer paying etc so not sure why thats relevant
you seem to be minimising the issue as a throwaway comment with no victims involved; Ian Wright is a victim here of a serious death threat
C) the internet is real life; a real persons life was threatened because of the colour of their skin; this isnt about satiating peoples needs - it is about addressing real life serious issues where people are sent death threats and targeted racially.

My points don't make sense?

Do you believe some stupid kid making racist remarks should be locked up before the scores of violent offenders who receive suspended sentences from our judicial system?

I never minimized the issue in any way. I stated that what happened was wrong but not as serious as other cases brought before the courts in Ireland.

It's clear that you have no idea what you're talking about in relation to sentencing. There are plenty of cases where more substantive threats are made to people in person where the defendants walk away with a Slap on the wrist or less.

If you had the first notion of how the Irish legal system works you would know why I said expecting the young man in question to receive a custodial sentence is demonstrably unrealistic.

Does he morally deserve to be locked up? Yes.
Are there more egregious cases before the courts that are more deserving of custodial sentences that also see the defendants walking away to walk our streets? Definitely.
That's why locking him up is a nett loss to the Irish taxpayer, we simply get more value for locking up those more deserving of being locked up.

That's the perspective you need to consider.