Time to reclaim the internet from #GAAdopes

There is a great story from a few years back of a memorable character on the club management scene. At half-time he assessed the performance of his first 15.

A good portion of his players got a similar message, the same line in the same tone delivered individually, "You are a dope". The few that were omitted from this assessment were given a question and an answer "What do you not do with a dope? Don't pass them the ball".

Face-to-face communication styles have evolved in the decade or so since. Unfortunately, we do a lot less face-to-face communication now than we did even then. We do a lot more social media communication.

Social media communication, while relatively new, has rapidly devolved into some of the most despicable nonsense imaginable. Exaggerated anger and vitriolic personal attacks are commonplace.

The microphone that is the internet, omnipresent in our hands, has provided people with a tool to highlight their ignorance to the masses, in perpetuity.

This microphone of ignorance is too often overused by Irish adults to personally belittle our sportspeople.

GAA supporters are not alone but it hits a little different given how we like to congratulate ourselves on our wholesomeness.

In general, sports followers in Ireland like to tell ourselves what great supporters we are (*when our team is winning and there is a bandwagon to be jumped on). At the same time, we, adults I remind you, will lazily fulfil sporting stereotypes.

"The self-congratulatory moral superiority of the GAA fan needs to be checked. We need a kick in the backside"

LOI fans have a go at Premier League fans for not supporting their local teams. Premier League fans born and raised in Ireland having a go at each other for being Manc or Scouse scum.

Rugby fans preaching about rugby values while tearing down the ability, personality, even family of Sam Prendergast or Jack Crowley, based purely on the province they come from.

GAA fans having a go at others because they are so civilised that they can, wait for it, sit or stand beside each other on the terraces.

The self-congratulatory moral superiority of the GAA fan needs to be checked. We need a kick in the backside.

I picked up my phone last Sunday evening. After a madcap weekend of enthralling football, logic would suggest that social media would be in raptures at the scores, blocks, tricks and flicks that built a brilliant crescendo to the football championship group stages.

Nope. Not the case.

Instead there was exaggerated bile flying back and forth between followers of different counties, a large amount of it between followers of counties who hadn’t even played each other. The target? More or less everyone that did anything.

Like life, the only ones to escape critique were the ones who did nothing only sit in the background. Opposition supporters, opposition management, fixture makers, referees, supporters of non-opposition counties, management of non-opposition counties, own county’s supporters, own county’s management... all got personal attacks.

The most common target were of course players, the ones who push themselves for most of the year to give you 70 minutes of entertainment when you decide to flick on your TV or go to a game.

The guff that caught my eye was that directed at Donegal’s Michael Murphy. The apparent, completely contrived, alleged issue was that he may have tried to get to the dressing room after the final whistle. This, for some, made him a particularly terrible human.

The same man that has spent weeks of his life signing autographs and chatting to fans from all counties, was being personally attacked for (important to note - based primarily on the limited but apparently bullet-proof evidence of a few TV images only) not hanging around for an hour or so with supporters on the pitch.

In the name of Jaysus. What a nonsense.

If Murphy did commit this apparently heinous crime, did anybody consider the context it was committed in? That he may not have wanted to be the one to hold up a coach load of his team-mates from starting their three-hour journey home at 7pm on Sunday evening, having left their homes and families on Saturday morning?

Michael Murphy on the field of play for Donegal against Mayo at King & Moffatt Dr Hyde Park

That he may have had an early Monday morning work meeting abroad that he had to catch a flight for? That he may have had an injury he wanted to get assessed so his ancient 35-year-old body may be ready to go again for a knockout game six or seven days later?

Or, a multitude of other things he and all the players in action last weekend may have had going on in their real lives away from the screens of people waiting to have a go at their personalities or qualities as humans?

As GAA supporters we need to park the self-righteousness and call out this increasing trend of mindless abuse before it spikes into normality.

For me, social media is a tiny minority at extremes shouting, as loud as possible, hyperbolic and deliberately spiteful diatribe back and forth at each other while the silent majority sit silently in the middle scrolling past but subconsciously absorbing their hate.

We know in the GAA that most supporters are sound. Go to a game and the hate is not thrown around between supporters. If anyone oversteps the mark with their attempted comedy or overly passionate support the reaction of those around them shows them up enough to shut them up.

Caution is required. For a few years hatred related to politics, race, creed, sex, nationality was confined to the loud online shouting. Allowing it flourish online has seen it become more prominent on our streets. Keep it away from our GAA pitches.

As GAA supporters we need to park the self-righteousness and call out this increasing trend of mindless abuse

The people spraying personal abuse to GAA people online fall into two categories.

Category one, dopes who are looking for a cheap laugh from their friends for how brave they were to publicly attack someone.

Category two, dopes who crave attention and attempt to say something so insulting that others will give them the attention they crave by biting back at their personal jibes.

When these dopes were 14 and sat down the back of the classroom performing their routine with smart remarks their ignorance was witnessed by only a few. The others in the class were quickly laughing at them not with them. The worst remarks were quickly forgotten because they weren’t written down and shared with millions.

While the dopes' audience has increased their ignorance is now recorded for all to see forever.

If you have read this and are a dope, then stop. If you are thinking of being a dope, don’t.

If you see or hear a dope on social, well this is the one we struggle with. Like in the classroom, learn to ignore them where possible. If they have gone too far, maybe we can start to call them out but without getting into a conversation.

Use '#GAAdope' to check our behaviour and start to dampen and in time eliminate the hate. The club manager at the start has evolved but maybe there is still an occasional need for his curt communication style.

Follow a live blog on the All-Ireland Football Championship on Saturday and Sunday on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app. Listen to updates on Saturday Sport and Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1. Watch highlights on The Saturday Game at 9.15pm and The Sunday Game from 9.30pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player.

Watch the Tailteann Cup semi-finals, Wicklow v Limerick and Fermanagh v Kildare, on Sunday from 1.30pm. Follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app. Listen to updates on Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1. Watch highlights on The Sunday Game at 9.30pm.

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