Off The Ball - Is it good?

[Bonksy+HisChristianParade]

1 minute ago, Ric said:

The very fact you have to make that point shows it was in doubt in the first place. Very telling...

 

Given I wasn’t even commenting on the OTB incident, not really. 

[Ric]

2 minutes ago, Alert Mongoose said:

That's probably fair.  Humans seem to be programmed to scream louder as they, and their opinions, get more marginalised.  I think that sometimes incidents of racism appearing to get worse might actually be a symptom of it dying out.  I hope it is anyway.

This is a much broader point, but I think the whole mess, especially with things like Trump/Brexit and extending onto the nutter butter stuff on Twitter and the plethora of other right wing comfort zones there are, is more a symptom of them realising they are in a losing battle with time.

So, while "progressive policies" may fall far from their intended aims, in regards to its detractors I am like you and hope that what we see now is the last high tide moment of such hate. It's never be gone forever, of course.

 

[diegomarahenry]

34 minutes ago, paranoid android said:

Anything involving racism is a hot topic these days - add that to TC's previous sexist comments, and it's uncomfortable for the BBC.

Sometimes 'comedians' are on the edge of controversy for comedic effect - that was probably the case with his comments about women's football - in this case he jumped on an opportunity to get on his high horse, and it backfired - oops. 

I don't think TC or SC are really bad guys, but Cowan has fucked up a few times - hearing him shouting at a female colleague because she had inadvertently talked over one of his 'jokes' was an uncomfortable listen.

I haven't listened for ages, but will probably listen tomorrow - no such thing as bad publicity. 

The comments about womens football were in column he wrote accompanied with a picture of him photoshopped on to the policeman from Life on Mars which was on at the time and was supposed to be a pastiche of the show where the humour was from the 70's. 

Much like his calling out of Bartley, it was tone deaf to the issue, in this case, women's football trying to get a foothold in the public realm and to be taken seriously. Cowan playing up to tired old stereotypes for an attempt at a laugh was pretty bad.  

[Ric]

5 minutes ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

Given I wasn’t even commenting on the OTB incident, not really. 

Yet, this is the thread for discussing OTB, so.. you know...

 

Listen, nobody should need to make a comment saying that they support people to call out racists, as it should be a given from the start, it's the equivalent of "I'm not a racist, but..." post.

Now, you might think I'm a fanny, and let's be honest, you know I don't really care for your content either, but I would never start from the position that someone is racist (casually or overt) and I will be happy to state for the record that I wouldn't expect you to be.

As for Cowan, I don't think he is a racist, per se, I think he leans into that generational ignorance and contrarianism while needing to stroke his ego online. I just think he's too fucking stupid to know.

[Clown Job]

5 minutes ago, diegomarahenry said:

The comments about womens football were in column he wrote accompanied with a picture of him photoshopped on to the policeman from Life on Mars which was on at the time and was supposed to be a pastiche of the show where the humour was from the 70's. 

Much like his calling out of Bartley, it was tone deaf to the issue, in this case, women's football trying to get a foothold in the public realm and to be taken seriously. Cowan playing up to tired old stereotypes for an attempt at a laugh was pretty bad.  

Or maybe he just believes some of the things he says

[Ric]

11 minutes ago, Highland Capital said:

Edit - I see Cosgrove has said on Twitter that Cowan should apologise but I'm not sure I'm a fan of his 'talk to Tam' retort he's made more than once.

Considering Cosgrove, outside of OTB, has been seen as someone willing to call out injustices, it's somewhat "sloppy shouldered" of him to give that response. A bit mealy mouthed imo.

[diegomarahenry]

6 minutes ago, Clown Job said:

Or maybe he just believes some of the things he says

Neither of us know that

[carpetmonster]

14 hours ago, 8MileBU said:

Who was it on here that trolled the crap out of Tam Cowan about something? Was it on Twitter or am I right in thinking Tam appeared on here to have a pop?

It was @DA Baracus but I don’t even know if he went at Cowan particularly hard. Cowan I think went off about it on OTB. 

[Ric]

1 minute ago, carpetmonster said:

It was @DA Baracus but I don’t even know if he went at Cowan particularly hard. Cowan I think went off about it on OTB. 

Cowan has regularly used his national broadcasting platform to attack those who have no ability to reply, I genuinely believe he does this specifically because he knows he can without rebuttal. It strokes his ego and his contrarianism, while sticking it to us "weirdos who sit in our bedrooms using the Internet", which only goes to show how out of touch he is when considering the modern online userbase.

He even used the fact that I had an avatar featuring a 1970s film that somehow I couldn't call out his anachronistic views.

[Clown Job]

36 minutes ago, diegomarahenry said:

Neither of us know that

I tend to believe if they’re saying it they are believing it 

[Clown Job]

31 minutes ago, Ric said:

Cowan has regularly used his national broadcasting platform to attack those who have no ability to reply, I genuinely believe he does this specifically because he knows he can without rebuttal. It strokes his ego and his contrarianism, while sticking it to us "weirdos who sit in our bedrooms using the Internet", which only goes to show how out of touch he is when considering the modern online userbase.

He even used the fact that I had an avatar featuring a 1970s film that somehow I couldn't call out his anachronistic views.

Yeah Tam would 100% dox someone using his instagram or on the radio 

 

[Ric]

7 minutes ago, Clown Job said:

..dox..

He probably thinks that's where you pick up 'ladies of the night'.

[Gibby82]

Bartley probably steamed in a bit before the full facts were known but the idea he should have apologised for flagging up potential racism was absurd. Was surprised at the time Cosgrove didn’t pull him up about it or at least offer a counter argument.

[NorthBank]

1 hour ago, Alert Mongoose said:

Probably been said already but, not withstanding the fact Bartley is on the right side here, I'm a little uncomfortable with someone who has a conviction for threatening an ex partner parading around social media in this way.

Unedifying behaviour from all parties here in my unqualified opinion .

The issue was there had been a report of racist language towards a Hibs player during the game. Bartley said racist language was unacceptable which he was right to do in his role as SFA Equality Advisor as well as a human being. Before a proper enquiry took place and with several sources saying the language was 'misheard' and no racist comments were made Cowan went off on one and repeatedly demanded that Bartley phoned into the show and issue an apology. Cowan was way, way over the top in his condemnation of Bartley with his repeated calls for him to go live on air and apologise (and why should he issue an apology if one was due,  on OTB when it had nothing to do with them?). Cowan followed this attack up via social media. 

Bartley is quite right in calling out Cowan for his sustained attack on him now that he has been proven right and not responded before now. But Cowan cannot even personally apologise to the man. Shows what a shit Cowan is. The BBC should dump this misogynist and petty dinosaur.

 

[Alert Mongoose]

2 hours ago, NorthBank said:

The issue was there had been a report of racist language towards a Hibs player during the game. Bartley said racist language was unacceptable which he was right to do in his role as SFA Equality Advisor as well as a human being. Before a proper enquiry took place and with several sources saying the language was 'misheard' and no racist comments were made Cowan went off on one and repeatedly demanded that Bartley phoned into the show and issue an apology. Cowan was way, way over the top in his condemnation of Bartley with his repeated calls for him to go live on air and apologise (and why should he issue an apology if one was due,  on OTB when it had nothing to do with them?). Cowan followed this attack up via social media. 

Bartley is quite right in calling out Cowan for his sustained attack on him now that he has been proven right and not responded before now. But Cowan cannot even personally apologise to the man. Shows what a shit Cowan is. The BBC should dump this misogynist and petty dinosaur.

 

No issues with any of that*.

I probably do have a slight issue over whether Bartley was a suitable candidate for that position though. Were anti-racism charities (and similar equality organisations) asked for their opinion on whether someone with his convictions a suitable candidate for such a position? I can think of another, more controversial granted, situation in football where they certainly were and large weighting (rightly imo) given to their responses.  

My personal opinion would be a 'no', but an opinion is all it is and it's probably moving away from Cowan's guilty part in this.  

I guess this leaves me open to the '..cast the first stone..' question but people still seem to forget that the cohort without a criminal conviction still vanishingly outweighs those who do.

* other than a grievance about the authority given to social media 'attacks' but probably my issue having been from the 'sticks and stones' generation.

Edited December 16, 2022 by Alert Mongoose

[Alert Mongoose]

3 hours ago, Highland Capital said:

privileged white man

Superfluous here.

[blackislekillie]

I predict an upturn in audience numbers tomorrow only to switch off en masse as the shitebag phones in sick.

[Bonksy+HisChristianParade]

1 hour ago, Alert Mongoose said:

 

I guess this leaves me open to the '..cast the first stone..' question but people still seem to forget that the cohort without a criminal conviction still vanishingly outweighs those who do.

*

This is probably what I found most bizarre about that VincentGuerin post that somehow has gained double figure upvotes. The implication that ‘who amongst us hasn’t been convicted of threatening a woman?!?!’ or similar acts. I’d hope most people tbh. I wouldn’t be comfortable with my daughter or sister dating someone with a record such as that, clearly I differ from the majority on P&B with my opinion on that.

[King Ian]

42 minutes ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

This is probably what I found most bizarre about that VincentGuerin post that somehow has gained double figure upvotes. The implication that ‘who amongst us hasn’t been convicted of threatening a woman?!?!’ or similar acts. I’d hope most people tbh. I wouldn’t be comfortable with my daughter or sister dating someone with a record such as that, clearly I differ from the majority on P&B with my opinion on that.

He was referring to cheating on your partner, and actually addressed the subject of threatening women differently.

[craigkillie]

10 hours ago, Hendo said:

This is absolutely a fair point about rehabilitation. However, has he learned from it? Has he been on awareness courses, spoken publicly of his remorse, done work with Womens Aid? If any of that has happened, he seems to have kept it very quiet. 

You might ask why does he need to do this publicly - he perhaps wouldn't if he didnt claim he would challenge discrimination everywhere while not talking about his own past. This is the issue - hypocrisy.

As far as I know, he hasn't done any of these things, indeed I heard him speak about it a couple of years ago and his response was basically along the lines of "don't believe everything you hear", even though he was literally convicted.

It doesn't make him any less right here, but it's always going to give racists an opportunity to undermine his (correct) points.