Irish website removes 'unsuitable' soldier comments
AN IRISH website has been forced to remove obscene comments about Justin Cupples's death.
Following a complaint, the Politics.ie web forum on Friday wiped contributions which gloated at the Irish citizen's tragic death.
Within hours of the Royal Irish soldier sustaining fatal injuries in Afghanistan, many visitors to the web page were attacking him for joining the British Army.
One poster said "It doesn't actually say whether he was Irish or unionist/British. A silly boy anyway."
Some went much further in their abuse.
But other posters on the site were outraged and called for more respect.
"Show a bit of respect for crying out loud, we're talking about a dead Irishman," one wrote.
Another responded to the hate-filled comments: "Many of the posts on this thread are sickening to the core – a guy died, doing what he thought was a good job.
"If you would not say the things you wrote to the guy's mother in person, don't write them down to incite reactions from others.
"Whether he was Irish or not, acting for Bush or whoever, is irrelevant – he was a human being who deserves more respect than you ever will."
Shadow Secretary of State Owen Paterson, who has highlighted the change over recent years in Dublin's attitude to the role of Irish soldiers in the British military, said: "I do find these comments quite extraordinary because the people who are fighting us are absolutely indiscriminate and are not interested in the particular address in the west where people live – everyone is at risk.
"We saw the extraordinary number of nationalities who were killed in New York and know Al Qaida was based in Afghanistan at the time so people need to wake up to the reality of what this is about.
"It's so tragic because they were so close to coming home and I was thinking last week how remarkable it was that none of the Royal Irish had been killed."
David Cochrane, who set up Politics.ie, told the News Letter: "A complaint was made by a member of the website about the thread and once a moderator noticed the content of what was being posted the thread was deemed unsuitable for discussion on politics.ie and was removed."
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Tuesday 14 February 2012
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