Activist who quit Sinn Fein vows not to rejoin the party

A YOUNG Balrath woman said she resigned from Sinn Fein over the way she was treated when she tweeted criticism of controversial remarks by the party’s Deputy Brian Stanley and because of its failure to deal with bullying complaints, racism and homophobia.

She said she was uncomfortable when a party member called to her home recently to tell her to take down a tweet critical of the controversial TD who has come under fire over what have been described as homephobic tweets in 2017 about the Tanaiste Leo Varadkar.

“A party member came to my house when I was upstairs in the middle of an online lecture. He told my parents that he got a phone call from head office about my tweet and I can’t be criticising the party. He wanted me to delete my tweets immediately and contact him.”

He was not an elected representative. She also received a lot of online abuse over her stance.

Ms O’Mahony said local TD Darren O’Rourke had apologised to her on behalf of the party and he had promised to deal with the online abuse directly.

The UCD student has been a member of Sinn Fein since January although she attended Sinn Fein events prior to that and had canvassed for Deputy Darren O’Rouke.

“My first problem with the party came when Paddy Holohan was nominated for the Mayor of South Dublin County Council despite remarks he had made.

“I tweeted that he should resign, but was contacted by the party who told me not to talk abut him online as we didn’t want the party’s enemies bashing us.”

When Brian Stanley’s tweet from 2017 about Leo Varadkar was raised again recently, Ms O’Mahoney tweeted “can we please sort homophobic language out.”

This led to a party member calling to her home and telling her parents to get her to delete the tweet.

“I was uncomfortable. He could have contacted me by phone or email. I also received a lot of online abuse abuse of my comments as well as personal insults.

“I have resigned because the party is not dealing with bullying, racism and homophobia and as a mixed race bisexual member of the party, I feel very uncomfortable.”

She was pleased that Darren O’Rourke and others had reached out to her, and thanked all the members who messaged her and said they will pressure the party to change the way they deal with genuine criticism/complaints.

She has also asked Fine Gael to retract their “heavies” comment.

“I was uncomfortable with what happened but no there were no shadowy figures, there was no threatening behaviour, no thugs.”

Ms O Mahony says she would not join the party again, but would support Deputy O’Rourke in an election.

Deputy O’Rourke said the incident was really regrettable and he was sorry for the way in which things had unfolded in the last few days.

He said the party like any other organisation - such as a GAA club or residents association has a code of practice and a social media policy.

“The way it operates is self regulation. We reach out to each other online and contact each other and party officials with good ideas we want to share, and on whether we are doing good or bad on social media.”

He said that in this case a long standing party member who was Christine’s neighbour called to her home.

“There was nothing untoward in a neighbour calling to talk about something like this, but in this instance it made Christine feel uncomfortable and it is something I apologise for on behalf of Sinn Fein.

“It is something we need to learn lessons from and we have to see the best way people can receive correspondence.

“We don’t want to make a young woman, or anyone feel uncomfortable and this is the way it has been perceived.”