Timmy Thomson is preparing a new blog concerning the 25 journalists that have been threatened by the "Rangers underclass". Our intrepid hero and all round good guy Chris Graham decided to get his digs in first. Chris Graham ‏@ChrisGraham76 I see @alextomo has been battering on about an "RFC threatening underclass"? Sure Phil and Greenslade are delighted with him. #haveacookie Expand Reply Retweet Favorite 1h alex thomson ‏@alextomo @ChrisGraham76 actually I haven't yet Chris, so don't worry you haven't missed it. May do soon though. Expand Reply Retweet Favorite 1h Chris Graham ‏@ChrisGraham76 @alextomo You're a disgrace Alex. You are doing the bidding of a group of bigots at the NUJ now. Pathetic stuff. Expand Reply Retweet Favorite 1h David Chalmers ‏@DavidJChalmers @ChrisGraham76 @alextomo If you saw what he did to Kelvin McKenzie, you'd see he's the complete opposite of a disgrace. Expand Reply Retweet Favorite 1h Chris Graham ‏@ChrisGraham76 @DavidJChalmers @alextomo I saw what he did. I also saw the things he did mocking the Ibrox disaster. He's absolutely a disgrace. Expand Reply Retweet Favorite 1h alex thomson ‏@alextomo @ChrisGraham76 how you wish you did! Hide conversation Reply Retweet Favorite If in doubt, throw out hackneyed ****e. Graham is a mental spastic.
i must have missed the bit where he had a dig at the victims of the ibrox disaster. anyone care to enlighten me?
Take yer pick. Either: A. Retweeting the gif of John Greig walking away or; 2. Saying that wasps sound like daleks. Seriously.
That surely can't be the case Rebel. You'd need to be a particularly paranoid group of ****nuts to believe that...
In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king. As one well respected member of this forum put it;
He is such a smart arsed ****. I like him. It is marginally safer than a war zone and infinitely easier for him. He must be loving it.
Thomson should summarise all responses he's had from the stupid huns into a book ... it be ****ing hilarious!
http://blogs.channel4.com/alex-thoms...gers-fans/2873 Friday 12 Oct 2012 Threats and silence: the intimidation by Rangers fans 22Rate this As I’ve said before my interest in Rangers stems purely from the standpoint of it being a spectacular example of a corporate omnishambles: British mismanagement so profound and bewildering it veers between performance art and social car-crash. With the loyal Rangers fans left mugged in the middle. It’s still happening. Past mismanagement matched by the odious behaviour of a no-doubt small minority of Rangers fans apparently hellbent on proving the new Rangers will be like the old. An element of the Rangers customer base remains out of order and neither Rangers, nor Scotland’s football authorities, nor the police appear willing or able to do much about it. I’m talking intimidation. Of the legal profession. Of football’s governing bodies. Of football club executives. Of publishing. Of bookshops. Of newspapers. Of TV stations. Tellingly, in Glasgow this will come as news to nobody. Which should tell anybody half awake how sick things are in this singular aspect of that great city. Outside Scotland people may legitimately wonder how or why this is tolerated? Or simply gawp in astonishment that such things go on almost daily this year. And it is arguably getting worse. Consider the following brief summary of just some of what’s happened in Glasgow since Rangers’ downfall began, not a year ago. THE LAWYERS In April a 3 man Scottish FA Tribunal dared punish Rangers for bringing the game into disrepute (so seriously it was deemed just short of match-fixing). Gary Allan QC, Raith Rovers director Eric Drysdale, and former commentator, Alastair Murning had their identities disclosed as well as private details with threats so serious the police advised all three on security measures. Their identities became public after the Rangers manager no less, Ally McCoist said: “Who are these people? I want to know who these people are.” The Scottish FA was left, not for the first time, wringing its corporate hands, saying: “We are deeply concerned that the safety and security of judicial panel members has been compromised by a wholly irresponsible betrayal of confidential information.” And: ” all three panel members have reported intrusion into their personal and work lives, including abusive and threatening communication”. Yet the manager of Rangers itself, a man steeped in the ways of Glasgow football, was instrumental in this chain of events, knowingly, or not. Hardly an episode of corporate social responsibility. It has continued. In the past few weeks Scottish Law Lord and former Supreme Court Judge Lord Nimmo-Smith actually had to put out a statement pleading for his independence to be recognised as he embarks on yet another investigation of the fallen club. Again – the sheer weirdness of this to outsiders, passes almost without comment in Glasgow. THE FOOTBALL AUTHORITIES Like anybody prepared to challenge or ask questions or charged with passing judgement on Rangers, both Scottish Football Association and Scottish Premier League directors have had a torrid time of it. In the case of SFA boss Stewart Regan, there were death threats. The SFA have said publicly this year that private details of SFA directors have been published online. The SFA Chief Executive Stewart Regan has said: ” At times, that does make you wonder whether it is going to impact on your family and your personal life. But it’s never once made me think about walking from the job.” Incredibly, to those outside the Clyde Cauldron, the SFA boss said he’d had to speak to Counter-Terrorism officers over the nature of the threats and the security response. Yes – Counter-Terrorism police officers. This revolting behaviour from a minority continues to spike in activity when those running the game are forced to take action to try and clear up the Ibrox mess. Nobody, but nobody, should have to put up with this in the course of doing their job. But in Glasgow football it is dangerously close to being accepted as part of the job. THE PUBLISHER There has been just one book published on the Rangers. As you’d expect it’s gone through several print runs in the few weeks it has been out. But for daring to print a factual account of the Ibrox meltdown, the publisher, Bob Smith of Frontline Noir speaks of having to deal with a catalogue of abuse. It had a potentially serious affect on customers and shops buying the book ‘Downfall’ he says: “There was definitely pressure applied and there were certainly some wobbles along the way from shops and customers. But we got through and in the end people were supportive.” Material was published online to identify where at least one person lived who worked on the production of ‘Downfall’. The abuse I received for simply writing the forward to this factual account of the Ibrox debacle was routine for me – for publishers unused to it, the experience was frightening. THE BOOKSELLERS Those outside Scotland will find this hard to credit, but several shops including major chains like Waterstones and WHS were unable to display the book openly in some shops because of reported threats and actual abuse of staff. For selling a work of non-fiction and journalistic enterprise! In at least one store copies were ripped up. In another Glasgow shop an angry individual wearing a Union Jack repeatedly entered the bookshop to scream at staff to send the offending tome back to the publishers. THE BROADCASTERS As I write a colleague at STV in Glasgow has received threats for successfully doing his job. This person wishes to keep a low profile on police advice and is constrained to say nothing at all about it. NUJ officials say currently around 25 journalists have been threatened recently for attempting to tell the truth about Rangers. Understandably most feel they cannot discuss it openly. As one told me in a Glasgow hotel this summer: “I’m not paid enough and I don’t feel I have bosses who’d back me up if it came to it.” Silence…hoping it will all go away…totally understandable when you live in Glasgow. But it isn’t going away, is it? THE FOOTBALL CLUB Enter Raith Rovers and their redoubtable chairman Turnbull Hutton. For Turnbull it was who was somewhat thrown into the limelight this summer as a champion of sporting integrity. As the SPL set about making itself a laughing stock in its tangled efforts to defy fairness, reason and morality to try and keep Rangers up in the Premier League, it was club chairmen like Mr Hutton who said no, Rangers must be treated like any other club. But why, exactly? Yesterday Turnbull Hutton told me: “We had to circle our wagons at Raith given what had been done to us by Rangers fans.” And he listed the endless abusive phone calls – some from Belfast – to Raith staff, theats, heavy-breathing, silent calls and so forth. The day Fife police passed on credible information from the Strathclyde force that two men has been paid to burn down Raith’s stadium is a day Mr Turnbull and Raith Rovers will remember. And all of it because that Raith man Eric Drysdale had dared sit on that SFA Tribunal and pass judgement and sanction upon Rangers’ gross mismanagement. After all that Raith and Turnbull Hutton would lead the charge to stop Rangers remaining anywhere near the SPL, whatever it took. The would-be intimidators didn’t tame Turnbull, their cowardice only making the club bide its time and help Rangers down into the fourth tier of Scottish football. THE NEWSPAPER It seems an entire newspaper can be got at, when it’s Glasgow and it’s Rangers. Recent weeks saw one of the more bizarre editorial u-turns of recent newspaper history in the UK when a Scottish Sun double-page splash promoting the author of ‘Downfall’ prior to serialising the book – suddenly became a non-serialisation. In a somewhat embarrassed editorial The Sun admitted to receiving a large number of complaints about promoting the book, from Rangers fans. The paper denied it was bowing to threats. Yet the publisher of the book says the threat of a Hillsborough-style boycott was real and instrumental. It’s widely known the threats were real, nasty and yet again Strathclyde police were involved. Many – including the book’s publisher – express real sympathy with The Scottish Sun’s dilemma. It editor and staff are known to have been shocked at the level and fury of complaints. The difficulty here is that, whatever the paper’s reasons, in the end the mob got their way. The serialisation of a fast-selling factual book on Rangers never happened. They couldn’t get Turnbull Hutton, Lord Nimmo-Smith, Eric Drysdale, STV and many, many more – but many believe they did get the Scottish Sun. That should give us all pause for thought. Is this the reason why not a single Scottish newspaper has reviewed a book selling way beyond its publisher’s estimates? What kind of power does the Ibrox mob have still, in today’s Scotland? So against all this catalogue of attempted (and mostly failed) intimidation, the new Rangers owner Charles Green must surely take a stand and trying to kick this poison out of Ibrox and some of its support for good? Already in his short ownership Mr Green’s referred to the football authorities as ‘the enemy’ at fans’ meeting on many occasions and he faced formal disciplinary action for saying other clubs were motivated by ‘bigotry’ towards Rangers. Mr Green must lead from the top because if he fails to do so what chance has anyone got to stop the moronic element at the bottom of the Rangers food chain from lashing out with threats against anyone who dares speak truth unto Ibrox? Related posts: Rangers: Why I endorsed Downfall book Rangers fans have their say Fans look beyond scapegoats for the truth
One Hun that I'm friends with on facebook just retorted to that blog (without irony at all, by the way - this is a fairly standard response from him) with the showstopping
I asked him "are you being ironic there ya mentalist" and he retorted "naw, **** him, the **** is chasing us all over the shop and he wants sympathy cos people react. **** him, I hope some **** catches up wi' him" I left it at that. I got arguing with a well known person on twitter last night about Rangers fans harrassing journalists Last night was a mass doggystyling all over the place. Did you see Cwissy's brogues on Scotland Tonight?
The Zombie spastic ******s respond to Thommo with this piece of unbelievable spastic ****e talk. Threats, Damned Threats and Lies: A Response to Alex Thomson By Gordon James Alex Thomson's latest blog is a new low. Not only is it frighteningly inaccurate, but the motive behind writing it is dubious. I can see no reason other than demonising Rangers fans, a now depressingly familiar theme. It is a naive and ill-informed to say that one club has a problem of an "underclass" any more than another. It was unsurprising to see Graham Spiers jumping on the Thomson band wagon. “I have been threatened as well” he told us. Yeah, that is why you need protection when you report from Ibrox isn't it? The really galling thing is both Thomson and Spiers go out of their way to antagonise supporters. I heard Gordon Waddell talking about Spiers on BBC Scotland radio. He spoke about how Spiers, the wee devil, was deliberately putting out tweets to wind up supporters. Another recurring theme is "I have been threatened but no police action has been taken". We have seen it with Phil MacGiollaBhain, Donnecha DeLong of the NUJ and Alex Thomson. Let’s actually look at Thomson’s blog in detail. It is rhetoric that Chris Morris would be proud of. He speaks of the groups and people who have been intimidated. THE LAWYERS. Alex speaks about the furore that surrounded the original SFA findings against Rangers. I am not going to dispute that any of these gentlemen were abused or received threats and that is totally unacceptable. However, if anyone is threatened on social media and it is brought to the attention of the police, guess what they do? They advise on best practice and what to do. Not one single arrest has been made arising from these alleged threats and most importantly, as is so often the case, these gentlemen were left unmolested. This is not evidence that threats or unacceptable behaviour is prevalent in or unique to Rangers fan is it? This blog is about threats but, for some reason, Lord Nimmo-Smith is mentioned. "It has continued. In the past few weeks Scottish Law Lord and former Supreme Court Judge Lord Nimmo-Smith actually had to put out a statement pleading for his independence to be recognised as he embarks on yet another investigation of the fallen club." What has continued Alex? Rangers fans questioning the impartiality of the process? Is that a threat now? Are you not getting mixed up with democracy here? Has anyone read anywhere or suggested that Lord Nimmo-Smith was threatened? Alex is grasping at straws here. THE FOOTBALL AUTHORITIES If it is Stewart Regan allegedly being threatened by Rangers fans it is worth a mention in his blog - not that there is any proof this even happened. If it is Jim Ballantyne of Airdrie and the SFL, it is not. Perhaps the abuse that members of the SFL took when some thought they were going to enter Rangers into Div 1 has slipped Thomson’s mind? Perhaps he is not aware of the campaign Celtic ran against the SFA and refs that resulted in refs being threatened with injury and death? It got so bad that the refs went on strike. Who perpetrated those threats? Rangers fans? It seems it is only Ally McCoist who has to act responsibly. In Thomson’s world, McCoist should be ashamed but Turnbull Hutton is a hero for saying that the SFA are corrupt, bullies and liars on the steps of Hampden. Could Hutton not be putting the SFA officials in danger by stirring up hatred? THE PUBLISHER This would be my old Twitter sparring partner, Bob Smith. Bob loves retweeting anything disparaging about Rangers and has no problem calling Rangers "Sevco" and "cheats". I have not seen Bob retweet any threats he has received and alas, it seems Bob is another who the police don't want to help. Anyone arrested for threatening Bob? “There was definitely pressure applied and there were certainly some wobbles along the way from shops and customers. But we got through and in the end people were supportive.” I thought there were threats? They now seem to be downgraded to "wobbles". What pressure? I have no idea what Bob's issue is and it seems neither does he. THE BOOKSELLER It is simply not true that the book had to be hidden away in stores. I did an article on the Rangers Standard about the truth about the book sales. In East Kilbride Waterstones, for example, the book sold 30 in its first week. It may have sold reasonably well in some Glasgow shops and if it made local charts then its prominence increased. The simple reason it was not prominently displayed is because it wasn’t a major book. The stories on twitter even included Rangers fans setting fire to books in stores. Surely no one would believe nonsense like that, would they? Oh, hold on:- "In at least one store copies were ripped up. In another Glasgow shop an angry individual wearing a Union Jack repeatedly entered the bookshop to scream at staff to send the offending tome back to the publishers." Comedy gold. Now even if this was true, how do a couple of isolated incidents prove the case that Rangers have a particularly bad problem with its "underclass fans"? But it is not true. It is not true because if Alex had taken the time to contact individual Waterstones and WH Smith stores and contact the HQ of both businesses, like I did, he would have been told that they have no reports of staff or branch intimidation. Alex is unwilling to divulge which shop the Union Jack shouter appeared in but guess what, no arrests. Why is Alex unwilling to tell us where this occurred and when? THE BROADCASTERS Well I will leave the STV ‘colleague’ out of it for the moment except to say his idea of a low profile must be different from mine. But the rest of Alex's comments are really stretching it:- "NUJ officials say currently around 25 journalists have been threatened recently for attempting to tell the truth about Rangers." Well actually they don't. Phil Mac Giolla Bhain said that he was shown a bit of paper that had the names of 25 colleagues that had been threatened by Rangers fans. That was Mac Giolla Bhain's usual spin and was not in any way officially linked to the NUJ. He was speaking at a motion that specifically mentioned him and his book. Let me tell you that the branch of the NUJ who put up this motion were the New Media Industrial Council boasting members including MacGiollabhain and the lovely Donnecha DeLong, the Rangers and poppy hating president of the NUJ. So again Alex is intentionally misleading his readers. THE FOOTBALL CLUB This is Alex returning to the Eric Drysdale affair. Separating the two issues gives Alex another point to list. Usual hyperbole applies:- "The day Fife police passed on credible information from the Strathclyde force that two men has been paid to burn down Raith’s stadium is a day Mr Turnbull and Raith Rovers will remember." This story was also featured in The Herald some time ago. The Herald carried the story that a plot to torch Starks Park had been foiled. I had to check I was not reading the National Enquirer. So I asked Fife police to clarify via a FOI request. What they told me was that the on-going investigation may or may not have interrupted a credible threat and Raith Rovers were not the complainant. No arrests. Of course it could be that Strathclyde Police were given malicious information but that is not going to stop Alex using it to prove his point. I mean the police are not corrupt? Oh sorry, Alex thinks they are corrupt but only when it comes to investigating a small group of journalists who say they have been threatened. THE NEWSPAPER Alex seems baffled by The Sun's decision to pull the serialisation of the book. The simple explanation, of the author's document hatred and Ranger's fans mobilising to point this out, is not accepted. Despite barely being mentioned in the English press except by MacGiollabhain’s friend and fellow Republican writer, Roy Greenslade, this was apparently: "one of the more bizarre editorial u-turns of recent newspaper history in the UK when a Scottish Sun double-page splash promoting the author of ‘Downfall’ prior to serialising the book – suddenly became a non-serialisation" Again, Alex fails to mention that the double page splash feature has Mac Giolla Bhain lying in it, as he claims he does not hate Rangers. How can I say he is lying? Well, Alex told us. Here is Alex talking about MacGiollbhain in a previous blog: "He wishes to see Rangers FC obliterated as far as I can discern" and ''He writes about Rangers’ downfall with undisguised glee and mirth' Maybe the fact that Phil was shown to be a liar, and tried to do anything to paint himself as a victim who was only interested in a story of corporate failure, helped The Sun make its decision? "The paper denied it was bowing to threats. Yet the publisher of the book says the threat of a Hillsborough-style boycott was real and instrumental." So what? We did threaten a boycott of the paper. Is Alex saying this is a sinister threat? If anyone else does it, fine. When we do it, it is menacing. If Alex would like to check he will see that some Celtic fans are threatening to boycott The Sun today because of coverage of Rangers share issue. Can we expect Alex to condemn this threat soon?
There's ****in more: "The difficulty here is that, whatever the paper’s reasons, in the end the mob got their way." Many thousands of Rangers fans complained about Mac Giolla Bhain. We are now "the mob". At this point Alex has completely lost the plot. It is very similar to Phil's language and note he is now not talking about an “element”. Anyone who complained was part of “the mob”. All Rangers fans are now targeted. "The serialisation of a fast-selling factual book on Rangers never happened." There is that myth of a best seller again. "They couldn’t get Turnbull Hutton, Lord Nimmo-Smith, Eric Drysdale, STV and many, many more – but many believe they did get the Scottish Sun". Just read that again. How ridiculous is that? They? Get? Alex cites anecdotal nonsense and unproven accusations as justification for this assault on Rangers fans. In summary, this blog seems "hell-bent", as Alex would say, in tarring Rangers fans with a sinister brush. It is devoid of any real thought or analysis. The ‘evidence’ is based almost exclusively on the ramblings of a group of about 4-5 people who are all well documented as detesting everything about Rangers. Thomson is doing the work of a small group of pseudo journalists who are making it their business to attack our football club. He has made no meaningful contribution to a story which deserved much more. I’ll leave the final word on Thomson’s blog to Tom English of the The Scotsman – a man who often gets up the noses of Rangers fans - and who described it as “hysterical, attention-seeking nonsense”. ------------------------------- And for all you fans of podcasting, I think this should be ****ing hilarious: This should make for a good listen “@WATPPodcast: @alextomo Would you like to come on our podcast and set the record straight on all issues surrounding the RFC support and yourself?” “@alextomo: @WATPPodcast I'd be honoured” I am upset with myself for underestimating just how ****ing stupid this lot can be....the proof?.... willie fowler@fowler1690 13 Oct 12 @alextomo any plans to walk the streets of Glasgow again anytime soon? Let me know so I can punch the ****in life oot ye!! Prick! alex thomson@alextomo @fowler1690 thanks for the kind invitation. I rest my case.
