SBS sacks football reporter Scott McIntyre over series of ‘disrespectful’ Anzac Day tweets

Scott McIntyre’s twitter bio was written firmly identifying himself with SBS. 99.999% of his tweets are work-related i.e about soccer. He has 30k twitter followers. They follow his feed because he’s a journalist working on soccer for SBS, the soccer channel in Oz. They want breaking soccer news from SBS’s Scott McIntyre.

He doesn’t have 30k twitter followers because he’s just some private individual named Scott McIntyre.

Journos should understand they’re not popular on social media because of their personalities and wit. They’re only popular on social media because of the industry they work in and their access to breaking news. Every journo’s twitter feed is always work-related. They always represent their employer.

McIntyre is not worth yelling at. After all, it is because of the soldier, that he has the right to free speech.

In relation to the very disparaging and tasteless (also baseless) comments/ideals/views he displayed….I do not agree with them.

We will remember them, Lest we Forget.

Duty First

And now Scott has discovered that you are not allowed to have a view which is contrary to the politically correct, even if it is fact based. He probably should have known that.

To the remaining footballers, journalists, celebrities and hacks who have still not sunk their careers: give up Twitter NOW!

Bravo TJC you are 99.999% correct. Couldn’t have said it better.

I don’t agree with his comments, but what happened to freedom of speech? He is entitled to it regardless of whether he’s a journalist or joe public.

I’d place bets on a workplace lawyer wanting to test this case.

As bad as burning our flag, he should be jailed

Someone needs to read up on his history too.

Guess he struck a nerve or two.

Haha Australia.

So insecure, any challenge to the official history gets a bunch of panties in a bunch.

Good of the guy for standing up to the culture bullies and their stupidly simplistic narrative.

It’s funny how right-wing journalists and media commentators are permitted to laugh about rape and advocate for genocide of entire people. You know, do so and keep their jobs.

Yet this guy gets pilloried for having a strong aversion to war. On Anzac Day. Because that’s just sacrilegious, right?

He didn’t necessarily say anything that was incorrect.You cannot remove British imperialism – and all the horrors it perpetrated – from Australia’s military history. We are not the blameless victims that many want to believe us to be.

Fair enough to be sacked. In this current climate where free speech is out the window he’d be gone too if he made similar comments about sexuality/gender/race/religion (unless it was about straight white christian males then its fair game)

If you’re going to accuse ANZACs of “summary execution, rape and theft”, their level of activity is dwarfed by what the invading Imperial Japanese forces did in mainland China. I have no problems with a discussion of this nature but IMO, Scott McIntyre’s portraying of Japan as a victim is seriously misguided and an insult to the millions who perished at the hands of the Japanese.

Scott is an open minded individual, he writes alot about the how australian football should embrace the football and cultures of our asian neighbours. Don’t understand how a worldly person, of who scott is, can be treated with such disrepect. I’m sure he is proud of his heritage and culture, but he is not insular and shutoff.

Getting sacked has not silenced him or anyone’e right to free speech. He can tweet that stuff as much as he wants, now. Read your social media policies, media folk.

@TJC (comment 1) It’s ‘football’, not ‘soccer’.

@Chris (comment 12) Considering the fact that people do hold Anzac Day so close to their hearts, perhaps his delivery could have been a little more considered? Delivering those tweets, on Anzac Day, on the 100th anniversary, was a little like shoving a red hot poker down an ant hill. Perhaps he could have asked a few questions about what people thought and then facilitated a debate..? A little more tactical to his approach, could have enabled him to share both sides of what is often a very emotional story, especially in the Australian public domain.

Lastly, what happened in 2011?

Global trnds: https://www.google.com.au/trends/explore#q=Anzac

Aussie trends: https://www.google.com.au/trends/explore#q=Anzac&geo=AU&cmpt=q&tz=

Finally, My two great grandfathers both served in the 1st World War. Their message to their sons and daughters and my parents, (to their family), was to do everything in our power to prevent any more wars. They were all about remembering and equally passionate about a warts and all understanding of war; it is devastating for both sides; there is nothing good about war.

Lest we forget.

Scott’s tweets irritated me for a variety of reasons…

To start with, the subject of how ANZAC has become mythologised and increasingly nationalistic IS worth discussing, but bigoted, ignorant and frankly morally inconsistent tirades from a poorly educated sports journo has just made that harder.

Has ANZAC day become overly nationalistic? Yes. But if you want to raise that point, calling most people commemorating the day “poorly read” white trash is a pretty inflammatory way to go about it… and frankly, if you’re gonna have a go at their levels of education, don’t illustrate your own gaping ignorance of the war by pinning Hiroshima and Nagasaki on Australia. That’s a little like telling the Japanese off for the Holocaust.

That comment did quite irritate me to be honest, because it’s an area of the world and history I’m extremely familiar with. It seems Scott spent a weekend in Japan, and now thinks it ok to put “via Tokyo” on his bio, but that comment demonstrated he knows nothing about Japan, it’s politics and the history of the War. The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were dreadful, but it’s a fraught area of history, and in reality the Japanese government – so desperate to maintain the imperial system at all costs (including of the lives of its people) – were plenty culpable.

Then finally of course is the fact that he’s so happy to stick the boot in over the crimes of the ADF and how disgusted he is with it all, but we don’t hear a peep from home during last year’s soccer world cup despite there being reports out that FIFA is culpable in the murder of slave workers in Qatar, that are currently projected to exceed 4000 by the time the tournament is ready. Given the way he carried on about ANZAC Day, he ought to have boycotted the World Cup on principle…

Ultimately all his comments ended up achieving was making the conversation about nationalism in Australia HARDER to have by showing himself to be a bigotted, poorly educated man who doesn’t seems happy to turn a blind eye to atrocities when they’re committed by a group he partially earns his living off following.

It is great to read some of the letters of support for Scott. I was discussing some of the craziness around this and the previous few years of ANZAC day celebrations and the increasing willingness of political contingent and the public to go along with the message. The day seems to have become a celebration and overly commercial celebration rather than a cause for reflection on the horrors of war. The brutal murder of another s citizens, the theft of property, the psychological damage to all both victim and victor.
We should not be narrowed in thought that Australians and it’s allies all were squeaky clean in every contest both 1914 and since. War is war, bad things happen and are happening right now in parts of the world with Australians and it’s allies still at war.
I commend Scott for having the courage to post what he did, albeit that he may have been able to do it a little better (He’s a journalist after all). The courage to challenge the status quo, the willingness to poke his head above the collective journalistic trenches, the courage to take a hard knock and hopefully get back up. These seem like familiar traits worthy of celebration??
On another note, I would also suggest he get a decent industrial lawyer and run a most successful case on the basis that any termination must pass a test of being , not harsh, unjust, unreasonable course of action. I am sure he will win and that will cost SBS plenty to defend and payment in compensation. 🙂

Jonathan King, Australian historian has written: On 25th April the nation should remember the words of our last Anzac, Alec Campbell, who pleaded, “For God’s sake don’t glorify Gallipoli – it was a terrible fiasco and best forgotten…”

Soldiers didn’t give us freedom of speech, lawmakers did. Scott’s comments are understandably offensive to some, but I think his tweets are born out of frustration from the excessive exploitation of the ANZAC legend and the way it has literally taken over our lives recently. Australia’s past is becoming its future, and I think it wouldn’t hurt to forget and move on. Lest we forget the paramedics, carers, firemen, police, humanitarian workers and all those volunteers and (unarmed) workers who put their lives on the line to create a better future for everyone, the people who rightfully protested against the great wars but were silenced by the government (read Industrial Workers of the World), and innocent civilians caught in the crossfire. Trouble is, we have forgotten, and instead of one day where we celebrate these people, we spend all year dwelling on the loss of a few soldiers lives, men who signed up to kill other humans. Scott’s comments have been labelled blasphemy, but it’s just a wake up call to a country in a state of ANZAC fervor.

I don’t agree with his comments, but he has the right to make those comments.

Sacking him for having a view that is opposed to the majority is ridiculous. We are so worried about offending people in this country. We all have a right to offend. Its part of free speech.

We wonder why our political leaders are ‘vanilla’. Its because you cant have a view and not get punished for it.

I am an ex serving Army Officer, and I still support his right to say whatever he wants and not have his employer sack him for it.

Re comment # 22 – he has the right to make offensive comments, but freedom of speech does not mean freedom from the consequences of speech.

In the US, freedom of speech means the government can’t imprison you for something you say. Doesn’t mean you ain’t gonna get a lot of push back.

Japan was absolutely evil during WWII and the pre-war years in Manchuria and China. To compare some theft, rape and summary execution by allied troops to the organised and officially condoned unbelievable brutality of the Japanese in WWII is comparing apples and oranges.

What an absolute loss of reality. How dare you tarnish the impact of my ancestors. My Grandfather lost his arm and probably the rest of his life due to trench warfare, he was 15. They did what they were told to do. The absolute arrogance and aquiescense and aceptance of genocide abhors me. You are not Australian and this quasi celebrity/wanker, looking for a profile should be pitiied, but not to the extent of me paying his salary.

Jim Quinn, Scott McIntyre did not merely express a view that is “opposed to the majority”. Nor did he “question the orthodoxy”, as the SMH put it. He would not have been sacked or even reprimanded for that. After all, considered critiques of British military planning in the First World War and Australia’s involvement in that war are a dime a dozen.

No, what McIntrye did was launch a series of near-hysterical abusive attacks on the Anzacs, and he chose the centenary of Gallipoli to do it.

McIntyre could hardly have been more damaging to his employer if he had been embedded in SBS like some Antipodean Bennett Marco with the sole purpose of bringing it down. So he was out. Don’t be too concerned about his summary dismissal. I expect that the free publicity for this “brave young journalist”, as John Pilger has now dubbed him, will be priceless.