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Calling Celtic Fans Conspiracy Theorists Is The Last Refuge Of A Desperate Media

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Yesterday, I read Tom English’s piece on the BBC website. After having congratulated some members of the press for calling for an inquiry, I was dismayed at the general tone of English’s piece. It was full of the usual allusions as to people’s motives, including what drives Celtic.

It is apparently too much of a stretch for Tom and others to simply accept that we see something wrong and want to have it righted.

I have asked Tom, repeatedly, on Twitter, on behalf of this blog and its readers – 188,000 of them last month – if he personally believes, based on what he knows and what he has seen, that Celtic are right to harbour suspicions.

Straight out, I asked him “Simple question Tom; do you believe something untoward has happened here?”

More than 24 hours later, he has ignored that question in spite of my repeated attempts to get him to answer it.

I couldn’t care less what these people think of me, but the contempt this shows for all of you is astounding. Tom English works for the BBC, which means he works for us. He is not there to cover for people or hide from taking a line. His job is to inform debate.

He doesn’t have to like me, he doesn’t have to respect me, to answer the question … he only has to respect you.

And he doesn’t. That much is manifestly clear.

Tom English supports a review, by the way. And I congratulated him on taking that line.

He’s not the only one who does.

Keith Jackson added his name to the list of journalists today, but in such a cowardly and contradictory fashion I’m not even going to bother congratulating him as I’ve done others. Because he wants a review just so long as it doesn’t involve Rangers … which kind of defeats the entire purpose of one, as the way they behaved and were treated is sort of at the heart of this, as well he and others know.

But his central point appears to be – once you get past all the fence setting – that he accepts that Peter Lawwell has bigger things in mind that titles which are already tainted. And that is the central thing that everyone better get clear … this is about governance and how the game here has been run, and that’s a drum the bloggers have been banging right from the start.

And despite that, the likes of English continue to label us “conspiracy theorists.”

Yeah, because that’s all we are, right? Craig Whyte’s dodgy past, which we highlighted well in advance of the mainstream media was a conspiracy theory. So too was when we said Charles Green would bring nothing but trouble to the game. Conspiracy theory. Which is kind of funny considering the first thing he did as Ibrox CEO was stand on a pitch-side and tell the hacks, some of whom agreed with him, that the decision to make Sevco start at the bottom was a conspiracy rooted in hatred for his club … a “theory” still pushed by the likes of Derek Johnstone and others today, and which Jackson echoed in his article this morning.

When we said Ashley was after the money, it was a conspiracy theory. That King would not bring transparency to Ibrox but would conceal everything, from everyone, and lie his way through every press conference when things got hot … conspiracy theory.

I could go on, but it labours the point.

Two stand out above all others though; the “conspiracy theory” that the SFA was not fit for purpose and which Tom English publicly said wasn’t worth consideration, as written in the report by the Offshore Game … which now looks as prescient as all those climate change warnings about the early impacts on the Southern United States … and the grand-daddy of all conspiracy theories, ignored by the entire media when it wasn’t being derided, the Rangers License Issue.

And what do you know, that turns out not to have been a conspiracy theory at all ….

None of the others did either.

How these people have the balls to call us conspiracy theorists when we’ve beaten them to the big stories and been right on the money again and again and again and again and again I really do not know. I take it as a compliment now, the same as I wear proudly the Internet Bampot tag which they once thought was a mark of contempt but we turned into a badge of honour.

You, me, and the other people who’ve stayed on these stories from the word go, who’ve kept this in the public eye when the media was too craven or corrupt to, we’ve been proved right time and again and our “conspiracy theories” have, one by one, come to be recognised as simple matters of fact.

And so will the one that says the SFA bent and broke rules, covered things up, lied to the media, the clubs and the fans, allowed corruption to go unpunished and were even assisting Craig Thomas Whyte in the liquidation of Rangers long before February 2012.

Those are serious charges.

And without the protection afforded to people like English, by virtue of our independent status, even as he and his colleagues are defended by expensive lawyers, myself and others have repeated them over and over again and will do so until this is resolved.

I don’t ask for respect for that from the mainstream press … they’ve been asleep at the wheel so long they’ve not even noticed someone else is driving the car. I only ask that they acknowledge that we’ve been right on other issues and concede that we might be this time.

And that requires a look at all the evidence and all of the facts.

We have asked for no more than that … and the difference between us and the media which has now twigged that this is big and not going away, is that we have been doing this right from the start. Since 2012 and everything that happened, what we know did, what we think did and what we as yet have no idea did.

Later today, I’m going to give you another brick from the wall.

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