I can take abuse. As a professional footballer for 19 years in one of the game’s darker periods, I learned to accept abuse as part of the job. In the eighties, while fighting the good fight against racism oozing down from the terraces, I took my fair share of stick from the far right.
But that vitriol was nothing compared to the torrent of hatred, bile and threats I received when I had the audacity to upset one group while working in the media. My crime – and I know it is a grave one – was to suggest that everyone should stop saying and singing nasty things about each other. The worst of that crowd on Twitter felt that my wife and my family were fair game too.
If the majority of those who actually responded to my brief visits to the Twittersphere represented the people of this country, their views and their language, I think I’d want to live elsewhere. Actually I do not think they are a fair representation, they frequently provide a skewed, more extremist view than that of the general population. Unfortunately large areas of the media haven’t sussed that yet.
But what really shocked me is what happened after the worst abuse towards my family. When I tried to contact Twitter for help, they suggested I should block the abusers and – wait for it – send a fax to their headquarters, to register my displeasure.
If I were king, I would make all large multinational companies pay for the consequences of their actions; and Twitter is at the top of my list. If sold on the open market, Twitter would fetch millions, not least thanks to the free advertising it now gets in large parts of the media, including the BBC.
I was once a guest on a long, live TV production (not the Beeb this time) and two minutes into what was a well-prepared opener, I heard a desperate production voice: “Why the fuck are we not trending yet?” The numbers on Twitter trumped any consideration of quality control.
Given its wealth and ubiquity, Twitter must be held to account. Everyone else is, from the BBC all the way to Jeremy Clarkson. For children bullied on social media, some to the point of suicide, where are the effective checks and balances? Where are the reasonable attempts to provide checks and balances? Where is the team of employees at least trying to sift through the most dangerous, vile and offensive abuse on their platform?
Some may say it isn’t a platform, just a medium. That’s tech-speak nonsense: They are churning vast sums of money – they should spend more of it trying to help those being victimised.
I would use my royal powers to banish Twitter’s executives from their ivory tower in San Francisco; make them take some of the flak to see how it feels. They could play one half of a Premier League match – in goal, in front of opposition supporters, to learn what abuse can feel like, especially when the fifth goal flies in. I’d make them talk to a referee, to understand that social media needs someone who can wield the red card now and then.
