That is a very scary route to go down, to say malice wasn’t meant but it was felt. So they should be punished because someone took offence where it wasn’t meant? Chuff me, we really are in a sorry state if that’s the case, a very scary and sorry state.

Why didn’t the player when the bloke said that turn around and say “What do you mean by that mate?” and then the bloke would have either apologised or put his foot in further but they could have sorted it there and then. But posting it on social media is just doing it to gain publicity in my opinion.

Free speech isn't freedom to spread hate speech, if you do you take the consequences. Anyone who thinks freedom to write or say discriminatory things is ok gives liscence to the terrorists and violent abusers further up the line.

Jose is a really good guy and he has every right to go public with it when the 'right channels' saw no action taken.

I agree.

Your posts suggest otherwise?

It is complicated. I’m for freedom of speech but not freedom to talk about committing acts of terror/murder/assaults and other crimes, that’s completely different, that’s like freedom to act like a d1ck. That’s for all sides from the religious nutters to the EDL type and the ANTIFA mob.

Would you see the problems that say someone writing racist abuse on Facebook brings or do you believe it shouldn't be taken down?

I believe they would lose friends on Facebook as a result and isolate themselves further if they were to post racists views. If they were threats then it should be reported to the authorities and dealt with as a threat.

You can’t change opinions through censorship, only education.

In my view if you allow racist language to be left on social media platforms and not censored then they don't just alienate themselves and lose a few friends they perpetuate racism and further it's growth. Your average dim witted racist feels more supported in their views and the ones teatering on racist crime start to believe that they're right in their beliefs and actions.

Maybe you can't change opinion by censorship but you can certainly cultivate more of the same views by leaving it out there. Especially in this day and age.

That's were education would be needed. By banning the use of certain words gives them power for the dim witted racist to use as a weapon, that’s just a theory IMO. Certain social media platforms are toxic bubbles anyway, to preach hate online about anything needs to be dealt with.

But you can't leave racist language on a social media platform or to be said without being censored and punished because that leads racism to be more of a social norm, something that's accepted. Education also exists in setting a precedent that it's unacceptable and censoring it.

He did!!! Or at least told him it wasn’t acceptable to say what he did! And Argyles reaction was to laugh and hand him a drinks token.
Exactly as you say it COULD have been sorted there and then. But Argyle didn’t think he was worth an apology at the time. It was only when he got a bit of bad publicity he suddenly saw the error of his ways- funny that!

He said that what Argyle said wasn't acceptable and Argyle just laughed and gave him a drinks voucher......I'd classify that as putting his foot on it further, but you seem hell bent on allowing latent racism slide...........which in itself may not be 100% damning, but it's not shining your stance in a very good light on this matter.

What I’m doing is playing devils advocate, not advocating casual racism. Argyle is Australian and over 50 and rich so to me that automatically says he’s going to be arrogant, brash and rude. And by playing devils advocate I’m asking if it’s being made out to be a lot worse than it was. My thoughts on Argyles comment was “What a f**ing d**k head” and then move on. Thinking him to be more
obnoxious than racist.

Not allowing casual racism but it’s going down the political correctness route whereby people will stop speaking to other people who are not of the same sex, race, age, religion for fear of upsetting them with a ham fisted throw away comment not meant to cause offence but offence was taken. By going down that route all you do is sow more division because people don’t speak to each other (different races/religions/sexual orientation), don’t become friends, people fear what they don’t understand and hate what they fear so drives the racism, sexism, ageism wedge further into society and we become less tolerant as a result. Would you agree?

This stuff never bothers me, because I'm not in the habit of 'accidentally' saying racist, sexist or misogynistic things; so I can speak to all those scary categories of people you mentioned, without fear of causing offence. It's much easier than this mythical "you have to watch what you say nowadays" outrage - which seems to come from people who want to preserve their right to say offensive and hurtful things, with no repercussions.

Just don't be a dick - it's pretty easy when you try.

Yeah, don’t be a dick is good advice. Probably good to tell that Argyle fella.

Nonsense. If a chairman of a 'heartlands' club had made the comments, he would rightly have been condemned. This isn't an argument of 'Expansion vs Flatcappers', it's right v wrong. And his comments were by his own admission, unacceptable.

The biggest disgrace of this is seemingly lack of action when first reported. He should've been fined pretty quickly after it was reported, which in addition to an apology could've been the end of it.

Argyle is minted . The only way the RFL could learn him a lesson is points deduction . Which they won’t do , not even sure if they could legally do this .

Anyone apologising for Mr Argyle is part of the problem.

Costing him money might not have much impact on him, but costing him his time would. Any sort of action that leads to him having increased awareness of racism, unconscious bias etc... will be much more productive than a points deduction.

Indeed.

Stewart Lee
These days, if you say your English, you'll be thrown in jail.

Not sure if allowed to post a link, but brilliant.

Middle class comedian.....there's a perfectly serviceable night buss between Waterloo and Hackney

What, just for saying you're English?

Best comedian around, he does spoil other comedians for me though



Edited You can't post that on here. AUP is clear. PopTart.

Indeed - that's exactly what I was thinking of as I typed it; he's a genius.

No offense, but that's rubbish.
How can you be sure?

There are so many words, phrases, symbols, actions, etc that someone could deem offensive or racist that we don't know about based on culture, religion, geographical location, etc. It's impossible to know all of them, so very easy to accidentally offend someone. Someone who thinks they've offended no one is either ignorant or stupid. We've all offended someone at some point in ways we probably don't know because not everyone speaks up about it.

Context and intent are very important. The phrase "zero tolerance" is not always helpful because it makes things like this seem (for lack of a better term) "black or white". It's not. Not every comment about race is racist, and because some people cannot understand context and intent, the racist card or offence card gets thrown around too often. Everyone has the right to be offended, but not everyone that is offended is right.

The context of Argyle's comment was about race. That cannot be misconstrued. It was also derogatory (I took it more as a slur on the people of Swinton being less progressive then as a slur on black people). The intent wasn't to offend IMO, but be jocular. The fact it did and the fact that the context was racial and derogatory means he was very ignorant to do it and should certainly have apologised. Good on Kenga for bringing it up at the time. It's a shame wasn't sorted at the time. Maybe he'd had a few too many and couldn't comprehend how his joke was offensive? I don't believe for a second that Argyle is a racist person, just ignorant and certainly being unprofessional in his behaviour, and deserves the publicity it got.