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Comments made in a private Facebook group by Sinn Féin supporters abusing other political figures have been described as “shocking” by the TD Eoin Ó Broin party.
Ó Broin, Sinn Féin TD and the party’s housing spokesman, said he believed the Facebook group had been closed earlier.
The group of supporters contained abusive and sometimes violent comments about numerous high-ranking politicians, including Taoiseach and Tánaiste.
The group is called “Sinn Féin” and has 16,000 members, including some DTs and party councilors as of this week.
Speaking Saturday, Ó Broin said the party “does not approve” of any of the posts and that he had been looking to get Facebook to shut down the group.
“I have said repeatedly that anyone who engages in online abuse is not helping the party and should stop,” he told RTÉ radio on Saturday with the Katie Hannon show. “This is not in the interest of our party, this is not what we want,” he said.
Under a photo of Tánaiste Leo Varadkar and Michael Collins, commentators for the group wrote that Collins would have either “slit Leo the liar’s neck, sure” or “I know what Michael Collins would have done with a snitch like Leo the leak, one round.” . , and a round well spent. “
Another said Collins “would shoot Leo in the face, like most Irish people would love to.” Other posts about Varadkar said that he should be “put in the swamp” or that he “badly needs a shovel belt”, “the bigger and heavier the better”.
People cannot find the group by searching Facebook and must be invited to join to view the content. The group was created in 2013 and lists three party activists who have appeared on local Sinn Féin Facebook pages as administrators.
‘Toxic culture’
“When this came to our attention more than a year ago, and we investigated it, there was a party member who was connected to this site. . . We urged that person to unlink from the site and they did, ”Ó Broin said.
“I spoke with the central office of the party this morning, we do not know who currently runs this site,” he said. “It was originally an open Facebook page, we actually thought Facebook closed it,” he said.
Neale Richmond, TD of Fine Gael, said comments in the group showed that there was “a toxic culture at the heart of Sinn Féin when it comes to social media.”
Independent Senator Michael McDowell, speaking on the same radio show, said Sinn Féin had “failed” to control the group of supporters.
“For a party that organizes things with such discipline. . . it’s surprising that this has lasted so long, ”he said.
Ó Broin said that the TDs or Sinn Féin councilors who were members of the group may have joined when it was a public page and may not have been aware of the abusive comment posted.
“Originally it was an open Facebook page and it had the name of the party. . . They may not have seen any of that, ”he said. “It’s not a Sinn Féin site, we don’t run it,” he said.
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