Retailer Topman has faced pressure to withdraw a shirt some believe refers to the Hillsborough disaster.
The red shirt with a large number 96 is being seen by some Liverpool fans as a reference to the club’s kit and number of victims killed in the 1989 disaster.
To which the rational response should be, “so what?” If you don’t like it, don’t buy one and if enough people don’t buy it, then it will fade away through lack of interest. Again, so what?
Ah, but, no, in our ever ready to take offence at the slightest slight we get the usual demands by the usual suspects to dictate what people may make and sell and what others may choose to buy.
Louise Brookes, whose brother Andrew was killed, and MP for Wirral South Alison McGovern are among those calling for it to be removed from sale.
So what? It’s none of your business what other people buy and sell. If you don’t like it, then no one is making you buy it. Your sensitivities are irrelevant here. You have no business demanding anything, as it is none of your concern. Hillsborough happened over twenty years ago. Time to move on, don’t you think? (At the very least you can desist from shoving it down our throats at every opportunity). But, no, again one of the hallmarks of modern society is that grudges are nurtured through decades (especially if it involves twenty-two prima-donnas chasing a pig’s bladder around a muddy field for ninety minutes) and the rest of us are expected to walk on eggshells around the aggrieved. Well, sorry, but no. If people want to buy this shirt, then in a free society they should be allowed to do so. If you find it tasteless, then that’s fine, you are free to do so and say so. You are also free to suggest that people refrain from buying it. Where you cross the line is demanding that it be withdrawn from sale.
In a tweet, Labour MP Ms McGovern said the shirt was “very unfortunate” and should be “discontinued ASAP”.
Just to remind us if we needed reminding that the Labour benches are filled with vile authoritarian fuckwits.
Ms Brookes, whose 26-year-old brother died at the stadium, said the phrases “karma” and “what goes around comes around” were used by some rival fans who claimed Hillsborough was “God’s punishment” for the Heysel disaster in which 39 mostly-Juventus fans died at a match against Liverpool.
Jeebus, get over yourself. These things were a long time ago. You may think this shirt tasteless and I’d agree with you, but it’s just a shirt and likely as not if you hadn’t drawn attention to it, the sales would have been sufficiently low so as to be irrelevant. Now everyone knows about it. Well done.
Ms Brookes said: “I really do believe it is something to do with Hillsborough.
“I would like it removed from sale and I do want (Topman) to explain how this shirt came about and what the thinking was.”
Who do you think you are? Seriously, Topman do not answer to you and they owe you no explanation. Although I am fully expecting the usual craven apology as is the pattern these days when an offendatron gets on their high horse.
Some Twitter users have expressed their “disgust” and called for a boycott.
Of course they did. Twitter = fuckwit city. Home of the permanently aggrieved and hard of thinking.
Others called it “disgraceful“, “in really bad taste” and “offensive“.
Yawn. Twatter appealing to the moronic mob again. Liberty if it is to mean anything at all is the liberty to offend. Grow up and get over yourselves.
So, how long before the craven apology? Three… Two… One…
Topman issued a hasty apology and the item is no longer available on its website after Hillsborough relatives and survivors said it insulted the memory of the 96 Liverpool fans who died in the 1989 stadium disaster.
Sigh… So the next offendatron will merely feel encouraged. Has no one the backbone to stand firm and tell these people where to stick their offence?
Just change the numbers around. Liverpool supporters are more likely to identify with that.
Ouch.
What was quite amusing was watching Brookes waving her victimhood flag on the BBC today lecturing away that (to paraphrase) ‘if these people don’t know about Hillsborough then they need to go and read up on it and learn’
To which the response, presumably is ‘if Brookes doesn’t know about Bob Marley then perhaps she needs to go away and read up on it and learn a bit’
Triggered by a shirt – somebody needs to tell these people that they’re either ridiculous and mawkish or they need professional help.
Both, perhaps?
Surely what these people are doing is dishonouring the very dead they are invoking?
Let the poor people rest. Don’t use them as a shield whenever you get triggered by mental associations you can’t handle.
I have a Swedish Mauser Model 96 rifle, introduced into service in 1896 (hence the Model 96) and manufactured in 1942. Shall I change the number in case it offends too? I’d hate to be politically incorrect … Oh, wait …
British “Labour” Party offends and insults Females
I’m offended that the private and intimate process of an individual female giving birth to a child has been stolen and is used as the name of left-wing political party which dislikes individuals and privacy.