Reply To: Disunity group mouthpiece

[Siderite]

64’s comment is fair and balanced. Repeating what my first sentence said in my original post, but I can see why Positivity Dave felt annoyed with some of the harsh comments. That said, there is no need for him, like others, to treat Bru as a monolith where no-one has anything different to say. I found his style cringeworthy, but harmless, though his cancer comment was below the belt. The problem is he gives the impression that calling him ‘cringeworthy’ would be seen as some massive slight akin to horrendous abuse. He is in the public sphere and that will get some fans of him, but also those who aren’t so keen. Sometimes those comments can tip to the harsh and cruel, but that’s the price we pay for free speech; so long as it isn’t defamatory or inciting violence against him, it can’t reasonably be censored. The melodrama to what was a handful of people commenting negatively also did him no favours. He made out a whole legion were against him, but it was just a few being really negative, and if that drives him away, maybe a public persona was never the right thing for him.

There have been some deragatory remarks from here towards the Facebook and Unity groups on here, so that won’t endear. Sometimes, like when calling them the ‘cult page’, it will understandably cause or escalate dislike against Bru, and I won’t claim to be innocent. However, it’s their whiter than white attitude that gets me, when they were more than happy to pile on Bru and others who were critical of Hilton. They wanted to attack others and make slanderous remarks, while playing innocent victims of bullying whenever they got it back. As 64 says, there were death threats and doxxing, amplified by that page and members of Unity, saying nothing against it and making out the trouble causers were those who dared to say anything against Hilton. This gave the impression that they thought criticising Hilton as something that deserved retaliation and that the nasty remarks made by some of them and the responses by Hilton were deserved. I lost track of the times critics were called ‘club killers’ or ‘parasites’ for what was questioning of Hilton or being critical.

Post-Hilton there was talk of a need to unite, and by and large I agree (though people like Herbert I find impossible to reconcile with, given their behaviour was worse than just being duped), but it has to be both ways. Some on there seem to think they can hold on to their grudges with Bru, from false claims of being Swann lovers, while expecting others to not feel badly over how they acted, when they were far more backing of Hilton than Bru ever was with Swann (I remember Swann getting angered by Matt Ellis making out he was like Fenty at Grimsby). It’s always others who have to adjust for unity, and never them. Yes, I am generalising, I don’t want to tar everyone by the same brush, and realise Bru hasn’t always been perfect with them, but any kind of division can only be healed if they make the effort too. Maw’s and others’ recent comments make me think they don’t think they have to and responsibility is for everyone else.

I did see Marco from Iron Hour say animosity between them and Bru is a thing of the past, so hopefully that is the case, and would be a positive. Time for Maw and others to do the same thing and accept that they have caused division over antics (which doesn’t make them bad people, necessarily), and maybe we can all do the same.