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Celtic Fans And Joey Barton: The Final Word.

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I am angry writing this. Angry with myself. Angry with people in our support who haven’t yet learned what the “block” button is for. Here I am giving air to an oxygen thief. Here I am writing about someone more than capable of generating his own controversy and who doesn’t need me giving him more free publicity.

That’s why as angry as I am I am trying to remain focussed, and disciplined, and make this article not actually about him at all.

What is wrong with some of our supporters that they allow themselves to be endlessly trolled by this scumbag and others like him? I have lost count of the number of cretins I’ve blocked on Facebook and Twitter, because life is too short to bother with them.

I have a general rule on Twitter which some feel is arrogant; if someone wants to argue with me I will not engage with them if they have less than 1000 followers. Because otherwise that’s someone trolling, an attention seeker trying to bait you into an argument for their own ends.

Barton has far more than 1000 followers, but that’s kind of the point with him; he’s spent his entire Twitter existence saying stuff that is too ridiculous for words and he’s parlayed it into big numbers. Others, I block because they’ve been trolling a long time and it’s all they do.

Because Barton is not alone. There are people out there who thrive on controversy, and I’m betting that 99% of their engagement on social media comes from people telling them how much crap they talk or how idiotic they are or just how nasty they come across.

These people love it. Their comments and views don’t frustrate me half as much as those who give them credence by engaging with them. Some people will anyway, but I am astounded at how many Celtic fans haven’t yet worked out what these folk are about.

Joey Barton is one of those people who is impossible to take even remotely seriously. He is a goon. He thinks reading Kierkegaard makes him an intellectual, and yet he authors some of the worst nonsense you will ever read. This guy was extolling the virtues of Celtic and even the Republican movement a couple of years ago. Overnight he tweeting WATP and reinventing himself as a Sevconite. How can you treat that with other than contempt?

Why bother to engage with that at all? Every single day on Twitter some scumbag tries to bait with me talk about scandals at Celtic Park; do you think I debate those points with even a single one of them? Even 5000 followers doesn’t get them a discussion; there’s a block button for a reason and I don’t feel a thing when I use it to shut that stuff down.

Barton knew exactly what he was doing when he made his now notorious crack the other day; anyone who wasn’t blocking him was a mug. Anyone who engaged him for a second longer was just begging to be trolled even further. I cannot understand people who complain about idiots like him when there’s a simple, even elegant, solution to it.

Earlier, Barton was comparing Scottish football to a Sunday league; he should know because that’s the level the players up here reduced him to. He came up here on holiday and was frankly embarrassed. Only a complete eejit would draw attention to his own failure in such spectacular fashion. A guy like that … he’s not worth your time.

This is the Last Word on this halfwit. Anyone who doesn’t like him has the means of dealing with his nonsense so that it never bothers them again. I cannot understand why they don’t take it, instead of getting involved in arguments that give him exactly what he wants.

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