Kingdom Of The Keyboard Cowards

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    From top: an internet troll; Terry McMahon

If you want insight into the undertow of our poisoned culture then look no further than the comments section of Broadsheet.ie.

A fearless website, Broadsheet also seems to attract the ugliest kind of anonymous cowards.

Soon as the site posted a short personal piece celebrating the courage of [Medicinal cannabis campaigners] Vera Twomey, and her husband Paul, this was the first comment:

Wow man i’m like so real, I get to use bad language in my screeds
I’m the street, man, I’m the life itself
You better recognise

This was followed by the usual litany of insults and sneers from a long line of nameless faceless keyboard warriors waiting in the wings.

I can take their malignancy but is it not disturbing that when these people read about a heroic mother and father protecting their beautiful daughter, their immediate and only response is to ignore that heroism and attack the hack who penned the piece?

Who are you? On the streets, or in bars, or restaurants, or playgrounds, or in any aspect of day to day life, I never seem to meet you. The vast majority of the folks I meet are good people. Fighting to stay afloat. Looking after each other. Being brave. Being kind.

Where are you emotional, psychological, political, intellectual parasites? Where do you go during the day? Or at night? Are the innumerable good people I meet not part of the real word? The real Ireland? Am I just naive?

Are they just a bubble of decent people surrounded by you bilious bastards?

Where does your scorn come from? Your cowardly rage. Your articulate rabies. What might happen if you redirected the cancer of your collective cowardice into positive and pragmatic action?

What might happen if your keyboard-stained sticky-keyboard-stained-fingers were used to build something? What might happen if you used your privileged intelligence to attract rather than attack?

These are genuine questions. An attempt to understand you. To empathise with you. To rehumanise you.

Then again, you’ve probably been too busy composing your next contemptuous comment to have even gotten to the end of this piece.

Terry McMahon is a filmmaker. Twitter:@terrymcmahon69

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101 thoughts on “Kingdom Of The Keyboard Cowards

    1. Charger Salmons

      Indeed.
      He makes some valid points.
      Hatred is an awful curse of the internet.
      You only have to look at who has crawled out of the woodwork to make the comments below.

      1. Killian G

        Obviously it’s not ‘sophisticated’, but that’s a higher level of comedy than you’ve achieved so far. One-dimensional, but at least it’s approaching ‘adult’. Kind of a suburban dad joke. Well done, though.

          1. Killian G

            Oh dearie me.

            I note you have not yet commented on your wet dream May’s performance yesterday! That went well! Not even Trump to fall back on now.

          2. Charger Salmons

            Performance on what ?
            Is she a new contestant on Strictly ?
            Theresa May was in the Middle East yesterday drumming up even more trade from our friends and allies.
            You really are making a tit of yourself now lad.
            For your own sake step away from the keyboard,go for a stroll to clear your head and have another try.

          3. Charger Salmons

            Performance on what ?

            I’m beginning to think you were dropped on your head shortly after birth.

          4. Charger Salmons

            So let me get this straight – you think Number 10 issuing a statement saying Trump was wrong to retweet those videos was an act of diplomatic stupidity ?
            And what would you have said if Theresa May had avoided criticising Trump ?
            I do try to engage with you at a reasonable level but you really don’t help yourself much with these asinine comments.
            I understand that I’ve embarrassed you by asking you to clarify what you meant by her ” performance ” but your wounded reaction can only make an independent observer of these posts feel you’ve rather been hoist by your own petard.
            Seriously,have a rest for a while.
            Deep down you know it makes sense.

          5. C

            Well on the most vexed issue facing the UK at the moment,namely Brexit,the country now appears to be approaching the point where the first stage of the complicated negotiations will be passed.
            If the rumoured £45billion is the agreed Brexit bill most Leavers except the really hard core will accept that as being quite reasonable.
            And the Brexit Bill is still making its way through parliament with the support of the Labour party.
            So even though she was a Remainer during the referendum campaign I think she’s done pretty well with the hand she was dealt.
            Of course none of that will make up for the dreadful general election campaign she mounted.

          6. Keith

            Why do you think he’s trying to hard? Or is it not hard enough? He’s been involved with the Apollo house movement from it’s beginning, he was face to face with Simon Coveney, and called him on his bull poo. What would satisfy you?

          1. Charger Salmons

            If it had taken you any longer to think up a witty response you would have needed to send it by An Post.

          2. Nigel

            Don’t hover so dashed close waiting for a chap to pay attention to you like that, Spode, you’ll get accidentally poked in the navel with a banjolele.

          3. Charger Salmons

            My response to your post was 22 minutes later.
            Yours to that was 17 minutes later.
            The irony …

          4. Nigel

            PG Wodehouse. He’s the wittiest of them all.
            “The trouble with you, Spode, is that just because you have succeeded in inducing a handful of half-wits to disfigure the London scene by going about in black shorts, you think you’re someone. You hear them shouting “Heil, Spode!” and you imagine it is the Voice of the People. That is where you make your bloomer. What the Voice of the People is saying is: “Look at that frightful ass Spode swanking about in footer bags! Did you ever in your puff see such a perfect perisher?”

  1. mildred st. meadowlark

    What would happen, Terry, I wonder, if you were to write something without that chip on your shoulder or your own ego getting in the way of the point you actually want to make?

    The piece might actually be worth reading.

    1. scottser

      yup. i just read back on those comments, most of them are in support of vera, the rest are the usual broadsheet booboology that you take with a pinch of salt.
      old tel could do with a draw on a fat blunt himself i reckon.

  2. Pluto

    it’s the same on the Journal – “Fred Coyne” etc.

    They’re like the Iona Institute. No one knows who they are and how many of them there are. They make their numbers appear greater than they actually are – most likely that these cretins are 2 or 3 people with multiple accounts.

    Best thing is like with all trolls – ignore and shut them down.

  3. wellness

    I have a genuine question for you, Terry .Why do you scream “ladyparts” at those that attend your acting classes?

    1. Know1

      I’d love to meet and confront Terry myself
      He sounds like a terrible bully and I bet in real life he crumpled like a cheap suit when he meets his own type

  4. Joe Small

    Terry, we mock you because you come across as pompous and self-important. Surely you’ve heard this before? Surely this isn’t news to you?

  5. Cherley

    I’ve attended his class, that was never uttered once. Terry McMahon is one of this country’s finest acting coaches, writers and directors. Taking his class was the best investment in my craft I’ve ever made.
    Love and Light to the naysayers.

  6. Cloud

    For me, kitten, it’s your ill-advised allegiance to alliteration that makes me allergic to your allegory, and alleviates your allegations.

    Honestly, it gets in the way of whatever point you’re making; you’re not impressing anyone but yourself.

    1. Keith

      In your estimation, who’s he trying to impress by highlighting the plight of the homeless in Ireland? It’s not very cool is it.

      1. Cloud

        I’m saying his silly sounding sentence structure saps the significance of his subjects, and stirs not a single soul but his own.

  7. Bruncvik

    Anyone’s actually reading the comments? I thought we were all just writing what we want, without actually engaging into a discussion. Similar to the one-sided conversations we all have in front of Kehoes on a warm sunny Thursday.

  8. snowey

    I can’t add anything more to the digs thrown at terry above.
    he is a pompous fellow – hark he has spoken all must bow down.

    as said above – you being an a8s has nothing to do with support of Vera Twomey or not

    If I recall my comment was reasonable….a question nonetheless….

  9. Barry the Hatchet

    Terry, when you write articles, people will comment on their quality as well as their content. This is perfectly normal. Your articles are not very good because you come across as being very self-important. You write about important issues, but you make everything about YOU. You really need to grow a thicker skin or stop writing articles online.

    1. b

      …..in which the anoymous commentator EK calls other commentators ignorant, cowards, cruel, small minded, gobpoops…

    2. A person

      My sentiments entirely. Terry is always the centre of the story. The bit about the camera is what exactly?

  10. Jocky

    “Where does your scorn come from? Your cowardly rage. Your articulate rabies. What might happen if you redirected the cancer of your collective cowardice into positive and pragmatic action”

    You pompous twit.

    Some people have different opinions to you so get used to it.

  11. Boj

    Terry, I think you should come online and engage, then you will understand. Even better, go onto Broadsheet on the Telly and express yourself freely there? It’ll bring the viewer figures up at least? I’m sure there are many warriors who would love to write an article about your good self in response also. Have a nice day :-)

    (hopefully terry will be ok reading this…is it too aggressive or cowardly? Hmmm, I’ll wait and see, I just hope he validates me with a response…praying that he’s not annoyed)

  12. francis almond

    Terry like most ‘right on’ thinkers who believe they’re free thinking liberals is in fact a boo boo. If a person wants to foster some kind of ‘contrary to the crowd think’ opinion for whatever reason. Let them. We can’t all be bullied into holding the same view as much as Terry would like us to think the same as him. Like all bullies Terry wants to exert control to the extent he wishes to patrol the streets much like Edward Woodward in the Equaliser cleaning up the injustice in society one troll at a time. Celebrate the rich tapestry of humankind Tel

  13. Andyourpointiswhatexactly?

    “Where are you emotional, psychological, political, intellectual parasites? Where do you go during the day?”

    We’re on here, obviously. Who do you think you’re directing this at?

  14. Andy

    Some people can’t accept that others just don’t like you or the way you behave or your opinions.

    Point 2 – Cursing is not cool. Name calling is also not cool. You’re an adult.

    Grow up.

  15. Queen of the Kingdom of Keyboard Warriors

    I Love The Internet

    Feic
    I am so randy right now that Chat-Pit tonight might be the end of all of us

    Terry is Broadsheets’ Porn King
    Long live the King!!!!

  16. dav

    Terry the abuse is symptomatic of the rise of the alt-right on this and other sites. Like all sociopaths they lack even basic empathy towards other human beings and the worse that humans’ plight the darker the comment towards them. See how some blame the current homelessness crisis on the charities trying to help the homeless,
    another post showing the golden-circle protection afforded to the paedophile george gibney is dismissed with jokes at the journalists’ expense. It’s what these people do, it is all they know

    1. Know1

      Well all you ever write on here dav is the most negative thing that decries the worst in people and most reasonable people consider your work a dark fantasy,
      So those people you call out are in good company

  17. Biggins

    Saw himself there stomping down the quays and burning the ears off some fella snarling about nihilists

  18. rotide

    “Where does your scorn come from? Your cowardly rage. Your articulate rabies. What might happen if you redirected the cancer of your collective cowardice into positive and pragmatic action”

    Something a lot better than Charlie Cassanova, that;s for sure

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