I felt compelled to contact The Sun after that bloody ridiculous report & will happily edit & send onto any other newspaper who thinks its fine to make a poor attempt at journalism like that until it is actually PROVEN that someone made racist comments at the ground last night. Very angry - and if there was a racist at the ground I will be equally as angry with them. As I say below I was stood nearby the alleged incident and I would have, as I have done before, pointed out any muppets in the ground who would make such comments. There is no place for racism ANYWHERE, and equally no place for liars.
Rant over
Macc 0-5 Barrow on the 29th!!!
To whom this may concern,
Following the publishing of your article "Race Abuse Hell for Macc Skipper" I felt compelled due to you pointing out in a further quote on your website that your "journalists strive for accuracy" - to contact yourselves and point out a number of inaccuracies with your attempt at a report on the events at last nights FA Cup match between Barrow AFC & Macclesfield Town.
Firstly I would like to point out I do not in any way condone racist language or behaviour and therefore believe you, as a national newspaper, most definitely have the right to publish and highlight to the public any matters involving such disgusting behaviour, be it at a football match, or any other walk of life - which, I am sure you will agree should not even be making it into the newspapers as it should most definitely have been stamped out by now.
However I would like to point out that I also consider one of a journalists main goals when reporting should be to ensure that those who are to read the articles are to be presented with truthful information, from which we, the reader, can then go on & form impressions on the importance of the matter. The 'news' which journalists should put into print should be based on fact and honest information - the legitimateness of which can be checked and authorised. I considered a journalists job in general to be to report news as it is; in a factual manner rather than in a biased or opinionated form - therefore giving us facts which have not been distorted in any way, enveloped in a well written article which has been well balanced to represent both sides of the story.
Also, I furthermore believe that as a journalist you should have the moral impetus to actually point out to readers that information you might have included in an article is actually unconfirmed - thus actually bothering to mark rumours and conjecture as such.
It is this last point that drove me to contact yourselves today. Returning to the article in hand I recommend you reconsider some of the 'facts' you have chosen to print. In light of the recent Leveson enquiry and the case of referee Mark Clattenburg having been falsely accused of racially abusing a player I find it highly unorthodox that you find it absolutely fine to point out that Mr Brown playing for Macclesfield 'was called "a monkey" by several Barrow fans'. This is a rumour. At the current moment in time neither club has investigated the incident - as I am absolutely positive in the future they both will, and therefore by printing this you are being, in my opinion, unethical and implying that Barrow AFC and its associated fans should be tarnished with reputations as being racist.
I attended the match last night & was stood very close to where the alleged incident took place. There was booing from the Barrow fans, and categorically I will not deny that that occurred, however, I find it disturbing that national newspapers as yourselves find it acceptable to jump on the bandwagon and instantly label the Barrow fans as racist. Mr Brown seemed to notice something a fan had allegedly said or chanted before the second half resumed, I find it rather ironic however that during and before said 'discussions' it seems that nobody else in that region of the ground, other than Mr Brown & Mr King, seemed to hear this 'abuse' and 'racial hell' you talk of in the article. Of course this doesn't mean it did not happen, however I felt compelled to point this out, as similarly the journalist who wrote the article for your newspaper similarly felt compelled to print Mr Brown's views of the incident and his opinion's that it, in fact, did happen.
I thank you for taking the time to read this email of complaint, and hope that next time you decide to print something of this nature your journalists will have the gall to point out when something is correct, and when something is a spineless attempt from your journalists to stir up unfounded rumours about what I consider to be a very serious matter. Don't hesitate to get in contact if you'd like someone to point out the best way to do this; I'm confident my three year old cousin who cares more about Batman than about football could write a better article on this matter than some of your reporters. I don't expect a reply; I'd prefer you to spend your time highlighting to your journalists the error of their ways.
Yours sincerely, and a very Merry Christmas
HB.
We need to get these people out of Holker Street because it undercuts the positive things that our fans do, such as the support at the Darlo match, and that we can be proud of
