Take A Stand Against Bullying (2018)

Just a few days ago, for some unknown reason, an alleged journalist with Fairfax’s Financial Review, by the name of Joe Aston, decided to write an asinine article full of hate speak, ignorance and petulance about Rugby League and the Bulldogs club.

The abhorrent tripe carried tones of racism, leant upon class warfare, stereotypes and worst of all, used rape as a form of mockery, when he referred to Rugby League as ‘rapeball’.

This ingrate is clearly endorsing bullying by writing such a childish and pathetic piece. The fact his employer read this disgraceful steaming pile of excrement and saw it fit to publish clearly shows that they endorse such commentary. His freedom to write such despicable matter is thanks to the many men and women who served and died for this country, including a large number of Rugby League players and officials from all over the country.

Whether this was done purely for the response is beside the point. This is clear bullying, plain and simple. There’s no reason for it, no purpose, no point, no value, nothing. It’s just the shameful unprompted and unprovoked bullying of a small minded fool.

The media in Australia has for decades been quick to defecate on the game at the slightest opportunity, with the mentality worsening with every year. And every time the game has adopted the approach of “ignore it and it will go away.”

Well no.

Ignoring it is not the answer anymore. Taking the moral highground may keep the games integrity in check, but unfortunately, staying quiet only serves to perpetuate more of this ugly attitude towards the game. When the NRL refuses to defend itself against these bullying antics, they are validating the behaviour, comments and perspective of the bullies.

And that encourages them to continue with their antiquated hate speak.

It’s time the game stands up and starts publicly putting these bullies in their place. Demand retractions. Demand public apologies and in severe cases of unprofessionalism, like this, demand the author is punished. This is slander and is blatant vilification.

So come Todd Greenberg, Peter Beattie, Bulldogs officials, NRL players, ex-players, media personalities. Defend our game! Stand up for our game!

What Is Disgraceful Telegraph's Ulterior Motive For Bulldogs Reference? (2017)

This week a news story broke about Australian Khaled Khayat, who was arrested and subsequently interrogated in relation to an alleged plot to hijack a plane.

That’s the story.

But that wasn’t good enough for the people who claim to be journalists at the Daily Telegraph covering the story. They intentionally then chose to link Khayat to the NRL, where zero links exist between the man, the alleged incident and his interrogation.

They found a picture of Khayat in happier times wearing a Canterbury Bulldogs jumper. They then made the headline feature the fact he’s a Bulldogs fan.

Why? It has zero to do with the story.

What is the motive for such a spurious act?

Is it to get Bulldogs and NRL fans to click on the link? If so, it was quite deceptive. Surely the News Limited conglomerate is a widely enough known organisation to the public that they don’t need to resort to such pathetic measures to increase readership of their articles.

The link made was done so deliberately, otherwise it woudn’t have been made at all. The same story could be run without any mention of the Bulldogs and it would make zero impact on the facts in the article.

In fact, apart from the opening three words of the article, which were “Canterbury Bulldogs fan” there is absolutely zero reference to how his passion for the club or the game of Rugby League, has anything to do with the crime.

So why mention it? What’s the point? Why stop at his jumper? Why not mention his favourite drink, his favourite shoe company, his passion for a particular sock brand? That stuff is all just as relevant as the fact he supports the Bulldogs.

They didn’t talk about how big a fan Talal Alameddine was of Adidas when he was arrested wearing one of their shirts, charged with the shooting of Curtis Cheng. Why the inconsistency?

Why does one man’s apparel have such a significant amount of importance that justifies adding it to a story while another man’s t-shirt doesn’t?

One could argue that Adidas has more fans that use the internet than the NRL and the Bulldogs have combined.

Which can only lead one to draw the conclusion that there was an ulterior motive, other than clickbait, which in this case was slanderous towards the Bulldogs and the NRL, as it linked both organisations to the acts of a man who is being questioned about an alleged terror attack plot.

What is the ulterior motive of News Limited in this situation? Are they suggesting that terrorists support the Bulldogs? Are they suggesting that supporting the Bulldogs draws people to terrorism?

 
These are legitimate questions that need to be asked and answered. Whether the decision to link the Bulldogs to this story was intentional or accidental, it’s sloppy and disgraceful journalism and they need to be made to answer some of these serious questions.

****This article appeared on Commentary Box Sports website on August 1, 2017****

Woods' "Exit Interview" Reveals Gross Contradictions (2017)

Yesterday Wests Tigers captain Aaron Woods move to Canterbury at the end of the year was finally confirmed. He also gave a brief interview with James Hooper, detailing his decision.

The interview isn’t very long, and considerably shorter if you remove all the times he ‘ummed’ and said “ya know”. He made a few statements that went a long way to showing that he’s something of a hypocrite and not much of a leader.

He made mention of the controversies at the club taking their toll.

“We’re forever in the media,” Woods told Hooper.

“You wanna go in there and pay footy, but there’s always something happening outside of the club that’s out of our control.”

The silly thing is, that giving this interview has only worsened that problem and not helped to minimise it. He also stated how he was disappointed with the leadership at the club – but the fact he took pot-shots at the club in this interview shows a complete lack of leadership on his behalf.

Rather surprisingly, he also said, “If you had’ve asked me at the start of the year, I would’ve said ‘mate, I’ll be a one club player at the Wests Tigers.’”

What makes this surprising is that prior to that he said, “We didn’t know who the long-term coach was going to be and they want us to sign a three- or four-year deal.”

The thing is though, Aaron, your new, long-term coach was appointed two weeks prior to your offer from the Tigers being removed. So you did know. He introduced himself to you and you stated at the time that you couldn’t believe how much he looked like his son.

The fact you did actually knew who the long-term coach was all but proves that this comment is bollocks.

This is also further proven given that you said you’d be willing to be a Tiger for life at the start of the year, despite knowing that then-coach Jason Taylor would likely have his contract end at the completion of this season anyway.

So you were keen to stay a Tiger under a coach whose contract was ending in a few months’ time, but couldn’t commit when you got what you wanted, a long-term coach. Come on Aaron, pull the other one mate.

You ended the interview by saying you just wanted to put all of this behind you. Well, giving that interview surely hasn’t gone any way towards ensuring that will happen. Genius.

So let’s tell it how it is.

You could have signed an extension to your contract last year. You could have signed an extension this year when you were allegedly willing to stay a Tiger for life. You could have also accepted the offer the Tigers had on the table for you, after you got confirmation of your new long-term coach.

This all points to you having decided, in your own mind, that you were leaving the club long ago.

All of this drivel in your interview was just a pathetic swipe at the club. You claim you’re tired of all the drama around the place, yet you just heaped more on it.

That’s not the actions of a leader, but rather the actions of an immature man.

 
That is why you get booed – and why you deserve to be booed – by your own (soon-to-be former) club’s fans.

 ****This article appeared on Commentary Box Sports website on  May 1, 2017****