As of today the fate of Liam Stacey, the student from Swansea University who tweeted racial abuse about Fabrice Muamba as he lay on the football pitch struggling for his life has lost his appeal against the 56-day jail sentence he received on Tuesday. While many accept that his comments were vile and morally abhorrent, a considerable number of people have been shocked by the severity of his punishment; a punishment which has undoubtedly ruined his career prospects, cut short his education and even barred him from playing a little rugby with his local club. Whether you’re for or against the sentence, it is undeniable that the decision taken in Swansea Magistrates’ Court has changed Stacey’s life for the worse.
Yet this is where I have a bit of a problem. Because as much as I try and think of myself as a liberal and fair-minded person – someone who is usually appalled by harsh sentences that are given to make a point (such as those in the riots) – I can’t help but think that this sentence was not only justifiable, but also incredibly necessary. 56 days in prison is a substantial period of time, and I’m sure I could find a long list of more malicious crimes that have received less time, but what Stacey did by racially abusing Muamba is just one instance in a growing trend of problems, problems that inevitably find their root on the Internet.
This problem is one of accountability. It seems that nowadays, anyone can log onto a forum, write in a comment section or tweet exactly what they want to, with little fear of repercussions. ‘Trolling’, as it has come to be known, has become an endemic concern within cyberspace that allows the bored, cowardly nut-jobs out there to say the most revolting things to people without ever being found out. Someone once remarked to me that the ‘information revolution’ was the wrong term for what the internet has done to society, and instead should be called the ‘opinion revolution’ due to the simple fact that people now have more freedom than ever to say what they want, when they want, and to who they want.
While we might try to ignore the comments and shrug them off as a sadistic cry for attention, we can’t ignore that this issue is worsening. Recently, a law student tweeted racist abuse at Stan Collymore, the football commentator. He, like Stacey, at first claimed his Twitter account had been hacked before admitting that he had done it to provoke a reaction from Collymore. I’m sure that this is the reason that people troll, because they crave attention and know they can only get it by saying something hurtful and unkind. It is this sad depravity that makes me even less sympathetic to people such as Stacey; they leech off of other’s emotions so that they can have their five minutes of fame.
Of course, I don’t want to say that the huge increase in freedom of speech that the internet has provided is a negative thing, and I accept that the very fact that I am sitting here spilling my (sometimes uninformed) opinions onto the web is a great privilege that not all countries have. However, this exciting new opportunity has come with a rather horrific downside; the ability for people to cause pain and suffering without any resulting consequence.
If Stacey had been there, on the pitch at the time, shouting to Muamba the comments written on his Twitter, we would consider the act as even more loathsome and despicable and no one would be calling for a less punitive sentence. Yet Twitter, Facebook and other social networking sites now offer us the ability to view celebrities, victims of crime, politicians, whoever to be seen in that capacity, knowing exactly what we think as if we were standing right in front of them. We can now make people think and believe whatever we want from the comfort of our own home, something that is not really seen as a responsibility or a worryingly powerful position, yet.
Stacey’s life has been altered by this event, and even if the sentence was harsh I truly believe it had to be done. We finally have shown that there is a line that can be crossed, and that we, as a society, are willing and able to act when people cross it. It may take a while for the message to get through, but eventually we may see people showing a bit more caution with what they post online, once they realise that it shouldn’t and can’t be used as an acceptable place to emotionally and verbally attack people. Hopefully, Stacey’s sentence will go some way in doing some good.
Hang on! People clearly have a choice about which tweets they read and which ones they do not read. This makes tweeting a whole different ball game from shouting abuse at someone to their face at a football game or in the street.
Anyone who chooses to go on a social networking site or an internet forum and read the comments and opinions of total strangers, ought to realise that they are taking the risk of reading something they don’t like. If they don’t like what they are reading, they can stop at any time they like! What is there to complain about?
Max could you give a few examples of what that guy liam tweeted? It’s hard to tell if the punishment is appropriate when i don’t know what was said
@Curious: The first tweet was ‘LOL. f**k Muamba he’s dead #haha’. After that there was quite a few tweets using the c-word and the n-word. A lot of it was also directed at people who tweeted at him telling him to leave Muamba alone.
@Robert Jameson: I think trying to avoid some comments can be harder than you make out. As with the racist abuse directed at Collymore, it was actually tweeted ‘@’ him, making it quite hard to avoid. Unless you become a hermit and shut down any internet access you might have, it is still very easy for people to say such things to you. I agree that some things on the internet you should try not to read but doesn’t that seem wrong? Surely if everyone knew they were accountable for what they said we wouldn’t need to ignore or avoid comments like Stacey’s?
@Max Sugarman: Thanks for replying Max! My concern is about Freedom of Speech. I’m not encouraging people to avoid anyone’s comments. I’m just saying that, if you go on a public forum, you will find the comments and opinions of complete strangers. Some of these strangers are bound to have opinions you find objectionable – so if you don’t want to take the risk of reading such comments, don’t go on a public forum site. Tweets are, in fact, very, very easy to avoid – no-one is being forced to go on Twitter! If you only want to hear ‘acceptable’ views, then there are plenty of moderated, politically-correct websites to choose from. As to your last question – if the state ‘holds people to account’ for expressing their opinions, then what sort of Freedom of Speech would we have left?
“As much as I try and think of myself as a liberal and fair-minded person…I can’t help but think that this sentence was not only justifiable, but also incredibly necessary”
I’m afraid that if you consider a custodial sentence for abusive language justifiable and necessary, you aren’t as liberal as you think. I’m not sure it matters if it is avoidable or not – it should not be illegal to behave like a d*ck. Make no bones about that, he was abusive, he was offensive, he was appalling. It is just as appalling, however, for his words to result in incarceration.
Perhaps we differ on this matter of opinion. I think it’s disgraceful that “as a society” we should impose such sentences on people for speaking, however abhorrent their words.