South Lakes Wild Animal Park head honcho, David Gill, forgot Social Media rule 1 when he ventured online last weekend: If you’re posting something controversial, you’d better be prepared for a whole heap of very unreasonable abuse.
Mr Gill rather foolishly decided to state his opposition to same-sex marriage online, typing “The end of the world is certainly nigh when nature is twisted and society accepts totally abnormal and anti-natural behaviours in humans.”
“Am I on my own in feeling so disgusted at same-sex marriage? Keep it off my TV and out of my sight.”
Wow. Ignoring for a second the fact that marriage is purely a social/religious construct, and nothing to do with nature being in any way twisted, at least he’s not being ambiguous about his feelings. Strangely, despite the inflammatory statement (which, considering his fairly high profile in the local community, he must have know would be widely seen), he appears to have been surprised and shocked by the unfriendly response.
Had he uttered his views on an intellectual programme on Radio 4, he might reasonably have expected a considered response from those opposed to his viewpoint. Instead, he posted on Social Media, and the only thing you can expect from the most incendiary folks on the ‘net is an abusive and threatening reply.
A veteran of controversy thrives in these conditions, and David skilfully attempted to divert attention from his outburst (which he’s deleted) saying ”sadly I feel that if the supporters of same sex marriage were more engaging in dialogue then differences can be eroded, but from the approach 99 per cent of responders had clearly a wall is built higher and thicker between the two sides of yes or no”.
Or, to paraphrase, “We could figure this out, if you same-sex marriage fans wanted to talk about it instead of being nasty”. Does he really believe that? This would appear to be an argument with absolutely zero middle ground. And if he’s trying to make me believe that a medium largely known for pictures of kittens and Justin Bieber fandom contains a representative cross-section of the ‘pro’ lobby, then he’s got more neck that one of his zoo’s giraffes.
People that are threatening, or use abusive language, online are to be condemned, whatever side of an argument they are on. They’re attempting to counter one point of view by basically shouting angrily at the person making it.
People who express strong viewpoints, then attempt to wiggle out of the storm they provoke by twisting the argument to make the opposition appear unreasonable, when both are using a medium renowned for less-than intellectual dialogue, are little better.
But I won’t be staying away from David’s zoo because of his views. I’ll be staying away because he seems to be a manipulative self-publicist with an overwhelming desire to crassly divert attention away from his own foolish error of judgement.
This post first appeared as my "Thank grumpy it's Friday" column in the North West Evening Mail, on the 4th of April 2014, where it was was retitled by the paper as 'No place for a calm debate'. You can read the version used by the paper here
Apart from a very minor three word trim, my text was used in it's entirety... apart from the whole last paragraph. I'm unclear as to why this occurred. Was it too controversial? Seeing as it is an 'opinion' column, that would seem an unreasonable cut. Maybe it was just that bit too long, and they felt it worked without the final section? Hmmm. Maybe it was because I offered an alternative title in a large font, and the final paragraph was pushed on to a second page in the Word document...
The other suggested title was "Flamed for same-sex marriage rant? Well zoo hoo, Mr Gill".
I was careful not to actually reveal my own views on same-sex marriage in the article, as I didn't want that to cloud my irritation at Mr Zoo attempting to claim a reactionary micro-slice of society represented all those who opposed his view.
This was, remarkably, my 100th column for the North West Evening Mail. Blimey.
(Amazing 80s mash-up playing tonight, by DJ MXR - an hour+ mash of 80s bits, but over 100 of them squidged together in rapid-fire fashion. Must have taken bloody ages to put together!)
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