Roger Mitchell’s latest attack on Celtic and its fans was appalling, egotistical, hysterical rubbish.

Last night, as I was finishing up for the evening, I got a message saying that Graham Spiers’ latest podcast was out, featuring Roger Mitchell.

Apparently, Mitchell has been at the centre of some online debate and controversy over the past few days, which I’m sure suits him just fine. I have no idea what he’s been saying or stirring up—and there’s a reason for that, which I’ll get to near the end of this piece.

The podcast’s subject was the Green Brigade, and Mitchell’s very negative opinion of them: their politics, behaviour, level of intelligence, and the direction he believes they’re heading.

He accused the Green Brigade of being zealots and intolerant, claiming that this is why he feels adrift from Celtic and is moving away from being a fan—just as Spiers himself has moved away from the club across the city.

I’ve listened to quite a few of Graham’s podcasts over the years, and I’ve even been on a few myself. But I don’t remember ever hearing one guest say so many appallingly ignorant, arrogant, and foolish things in the space of just half an hour.

As someone who has spent the last six months listening to US political figures on the right distort truth, bend reality, and exaggerate wildly, I can say with complete confidence that Mitchell may have surpassed even their debased standards. That’s how terrible his contributions were.

Mitchell is one of those people who’s very hard to like, mainly because he constantly steers conversations toward showcasing his own intellect. It’s rare to hear him debate a subject and stay on point without veering into some form of self-justification or self-praise. This podcast was no exception—his ego repeatedly got in the way of any coherent point he was trying to make. Listening to it was genuinely numbing.

Now, let’s start at the beginning with his allegation that Celtic is “moving away from being tolerant.” Like some others, he’s tried to weaponize the expression “a club open to all” against us.

But let’s be clear here: Celtic has never been a club open to all in the literal sense, which is exactly how he intends to use it. And if he doesn’t know that it’s not literal, if he doesn’t understand that, then he’s even more foolish than I thought. And if he does understand it, he’s a charlatan using any convenient phrase to justify his viewpoint.

Celtic has never been a club open to everyone. You won’t see far-right extremists standing in the stands at Celtic Park. It simply won’t happen. You won’t find people in the Celtic stands indulging in racism either. Our club isn’t open to those people; it never has been, any more than it would be open to someone belting out songs about being “up to their knees in Fenian blood.” So no, we’re not a club open to all, and we never have been.

There has always been a streak of intolerance within our support, and within our club. It’s what we’re intolerant of, what we stand up for, that matters. Mitchell wouldn’t understand that because the only thing he’s ever stood up for is himself. The only opinion he considers sacrosanct is his own, and he demonstrated that in spades throughout the podcast.

He spoke about the intolerance within our fan base on several fronts: in relation to Israel, Palestine, and Rod Stewart’s political views to name but a few.

These, he claimed, were examples of an “ironclad” view by the Green Brigade, supposedly unwilling to tolerate dissent. Yet, I’d argue Mitchell’s own brand of intolerance is notorious—and I’m not alone in that regard. In fact, the reason I’ve heard so little from him in recent years is that he blocked me over a minor disagreement. He’s done the same to plenty of others.

Like many, he equates support for Palestine with extremism, which is nonsense. Support for a two-state solution is the established policy of the United Nations, the UK, the US, the EU, and countless countries worldwide.

The Green Brigade’s stance on Gaza isn’t extreme; it’s mainstream. The UN has condemned Israeli actions in Gaza, the Secretary General has called out potential war crimes, and many nations have demanded a ceasefire, which Israel has ignored. It’s the actions of Israel’s current reactionary and racist government that lie outside the mainstream.

Mitchell’s comments on Rod Stewart were equally absurd. Stewart wasn’t criticised simply for voting Tory. It wasn’t news that a wealthy celebrity leaned Conservative. The backlash came because he publicly fraternised with Boris Johnson—a man who lied us into Brexit, divided the country, and eventually resigned from the top job in disgrace after lying to Parliament … and these might not even have been amongst his greatest sins.

Even his own party has distanced itself from him. Supporting such a divisive figure isn’t a mainstream stance; it’s the opposite.

As I mentioned, Mitchell seems to struggle when his opinions are challenged. He demands the right to speak his mind but rails against anyone disagreeing, and on the show he went into full grievance mode bemoaning that his recent Twitter thread had been “attacked.”

In this thread, he claimed we were “becoming like Rangers.” Anyone who identifies as a Celtic fan and says something that ignorant is almost begging for criticism. If you’re going to make such a crass and foolish statement, you’d better be prepared for the fallout. But of course, Mitchell enjoys this sort of drama—he loves playing the martyr.

The truth is, I stopped taking him seriously a long time ago. Besides, it’s difficult to engage with someone of such profound arrogance that he blocks anyone with a contrary view.

He comes pretty close to admitting this when he claimed he went onto Spiers’ podcast because it was the only forum where he felt he’d find “common ground” with the host. That, in itself, reveals everything you need to know. He chose a platform he knew would be sympathetic to his views.

And yet, even Spiers seemed taken aback by some of his remarks. In fact, at times, Spiers sounded almost shocked by the things Mitchell was saying.

Still, it was a safe setup for him: a two-person discussion with no counterpoint. I’d bet Spiers would have welcomed a third voice, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Mitchell made his participation conditional on having the floor to himself. That’s exactly how he operates: choosing an echo chamber where he can spout invective, speak down to others, and act as though he’s performed some grand public service. It’s hypocritical, pure and simple.

He even quoted The West Wing’s Aaron Sorkin. Now, I’m a fan of The West Wing myself, but it’s a liberal fantasy, written by a man with a large ego and a very narrow world view. I don’t confuse The West Wing with reality. In real life, the United States just elected Donald Trump—a man convicted of crimes, known for misogyny, racism, and authoritarian tendencies.

Mitchell even offered his own half-baked, surface level explanation for that, suggesting that the American elite somehow “deserved” Trump because they’d “talked down” to ordinary people; hey, it’s those “ordinary people” themselves who are getting Trump and all the damage that comes with him. Who exactly does Mitchell think will bear the brunt of his policies? Not the liberal intelligentsia safe in their own ivory towers. Mitchell’s simple-minded view of such a colossal issue is astonishing.

And he had the cheek to lace this tirade throughout with his open contempt for “ordinary” Celtic fans, suggesting we’re too dim-witted to grasp his intellectual insights. He claims to have devoured countless books, but his woeful misinterpretation of Animal Farm alone exposes a questionable understanding of what he actually read in them.

Even his recall of famous quotes is laughable; he misquoted John Stewart Mill, using the alleged Edmund Burke bastardisation – the one about “the triumph of evil” – rather than the actual quote that “bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing”, and at that point, misquote or not, Spiers interjected to ask if he was really suggesting the Green Brigade was “evil.”

Mitchell, given a chance to climb down from such a lunatic perch, undeterred, confirmed it with the absolute conviction of the true moron, then launched into a bizarre rant equating the Green Brigade with Italian ultras linked to the mafia, in which he made the utterly false claim that all Italian ultra groups are. His point was that this is the road the Green Brigade is headed down, presumably after they get done with running their food-bank drives.

Honestly, someone who makes such a suggestion is more to be pitied than scorned, in my view. Not that I am suggesting he doesn’t deserve the scorn, which he’s earned in triplicate here.

At one point, he insisted that his criticism was for the club’s benefit—that he was saying all this out of love for Celtic. It was a twisted proclamation: in Mitchell’s world, what’s best for Celtic is everyone bowing to his vision, adopting his sanitized, risk-averse, and uninspired view of what the club should stand for. The “ideal” Celtic, according to him, is one that conforms to his list of acceptable values and bans anything or anyone that diverges from his rigid standards.

Spiers, thankfully, brought a level-headed perspective, noting that the Green Brigade could argue they respect differing views but “take sides.” There was nothing controversial in that—simply a statement of reality. Mitchell, however, snorted, “Who asked them to take sides?” His response was steeped in the privilege of someone who likely hasn’t ever had to pick a side on anything consequential, nor face consequences for holding a belief others might disagree with.

In another surreal twist, Mitchell demanded to know who among Celtic fans has ever criticised the Green Brigade, which reveals a colossal ignorance of the ongoing debates within the fanbase. Many of us—myself included—have openly criticised them. I’ve taken issue with their displays, like the PFLP banner and pyro antics that have cost the club fines. The club itself had initiated actions against them more than once, and last year even closed their section … and I wrote numerous pieces which were in wholehearted agreement with that stand.

When they act out, there’s no shortage of fans ready to call it out. The notion that Celtic supporters are intimidated into silence or that the club has “lost control” of the Green Brigade is fantasy.

Spiers, then, turned the focus back to the events at the weekend and repeated the popular sentiment that those wanting a silent observance should be free to do so, missing an essential point. Forcing silence on those who don’t agree with it is as oppressive as disrupting it for those who do. The answer is clear and simple: get this stuff out of football grounds entirely and return it to what it was before; a private, voluntary thing done freely or not at all.

Mitchell has long believed himself to be smarter than other people; who knows what his actual educational level is? But calling others “intellectually inferior”, which he did in relation to the Green Brigade is the surest way to sound like a pompous dickhead, regardless of one’s actual smarts.

And Mitchell has no problem with people thinking that; he relishes it. This was evident when he launched into a bizarre anecdote, appearing to claim that the Green Brigade had once asked him to be some kind of spokesman-cum-leader. I suspect that event exists solely in his imagination, but he trotted it out confidently, assuming no one would challenge him.

Spiers finally suggested that Mitchell might come off a tad patronising, which the latter took as a compliment, even laughing about it. He’s an unapologetic egoist, completely at ease with looking down his nose at the rest of us. And fine, I know plenty of ego-driven people. But most of them at least know better than to take a moral high ground they’ve no right to occupy. Most know that to preach tolerance while being intolerant is hypocrisy of the highest order.

Yet Mitchell, without a hint of irony, thinks he can get away with it, and last night on Graham Spiers, with no-one to openly challenge him on it he did.

Those who do challenge him elsewhere, he’ll just block them as he’s always done.

How are any of us supposed to have the slightest shred of respect for such a moral coward, hypocrite and hysterical fool prone to such behaviour?

Easy answer; we’re not, and we don’t.