Tag: Instagram

Warped Walker vs. Magnificent Markle

Kushner-Trump mouthpiece Andre Walker’s attack on Meghan Markle was an utter disgrace; it is time that this warped weirdo was called out for what he truly is

Unsurprisingly yesterday, the self-declared “fat Northern bruiser” turned Jared Kushner’s London based mouthpiece Andre Walker appeared on Sky News to defend Donald Trump’s “right” to retweet far right fake news shared by Britain First’s deputy leader Jayda Fransen.

Elsewhere on Tuesday, slug-like Walker – an extremely sad excuse of a man who’ll forever be linked to his associations with the scandal linked to the ‘Tatler Tory’ Mark Clarke, the suicide of a Conservative activist named Elliott Johnson and his previous position at Steve Bannon’s bigoted Breitbart – decided to brand Prince Harry’s fiancée “a black woman in Buckingham Palace… [who] will have to bite her lip rather than supporting her old acting friends in the causes they love” in an article for the Kushner owned New York Observer.

Going further and referencing those describing Meghan Markle as “just another Hollywood liberal who will speak out on a few issues she cares about while ignoring the needs of the country,” Walker argued “she will face the merciless wrath of the British public” over having once tweeted “lamenting the resignation of David Cameron as Prime Minister” and declaring her “opposition to Brexit.”

Bizarrely referencing how “no one wants another Royal [sic] divorce” and stating: “After all, she did not make her first marriage work,” truly negative Walker plainly illustrated his belief that this is a union that will not last. He bizarrely also concluded: “In their first television interview [Prince Harry and Miss Markle]… It felt like the two of them had been sent to remind the world that the British Royals [sic] like all black people, especially the ones they rule!” He is wrong and the world should celebrate the fact that Prince Harry is to marry Meghan Markle, a lady of conviction and stature.

Follow The Steeple Times on Twitter at @SteepleTimes.

Meghan Markle shared an image of a poster that read: “If EU leave me now, you take away the biggest part of me” after the Brexit referendum in Britain in July 2016

November 30, 2017
Zach Tinker – What’s on your mantelpiece?

A 20-question interview with American actor and star of NBC’s ‘Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders’ Zach Tinker

The Steeple Times shares “wit and wisdom”. What’s your guiding force?

My gut and my heart.

“Don’t get even, get medieval” is, in our humble opinion, a great motto. What’s yours?

“Kill ‘em with kindness.”

Kerry Katona was considered unacceptable in 2007. Who or what is unacceptable in 2017?

To be frank, I had no idea who Kerry Katona is so I looked her up. I also searched “Kerry Katona 2007,” but couldn’t find anything besides some stuff about her being on drugs and held up at knifepoint: I feel like I’m getting off track here.

I would say bigotry is unacceptable in 2017. It’s a distraction. There is so much going on right now that could end really badly and that’s where our focus should be, not on looking for someone else to blame because of their colour or gender or religion.

Tony Blair misses being Prime Minister. What do you miss most in your life?

Only at certain times, but I miss being a little kid: Ignorance is bliss.

What might you swap all your wealth for?

More wealth. I’m kidding: Probably the ability to fly.

Donald Trump was once a case of: “If you owe the bank a thousand, they close you down; but if you owe the bank a billion, you own the bank”. What’s your view on the state of the financial system?

I am probably not the one to ask: I’m 23 and just starting to deal with the state of my own economy. But it seems logical that the world is a better place if more people can participate, when we all feel like we have a stake in the outcome.

What phrase or word do you most loathe?

“The proof is in the pudding” – I’ve never understood what the hell that means. On a more positive and sort of related note,my favourite word is “goop.”

In the UK, some people consider charity to “begin at home”. What’s your view and what causes do you personally support?

I think: “Charity begins at need” – That seems more relevant, especially with the horrible string of natural disasters that have occurred around the world recently.

From elementary school through college, charity and volunteering was built in to the education curriculum, so that made it easy and I was very involved in with Camp Harmony. It is a well-run programme to support under privileged children from inner cities, the homeless and troubled families. They host summer camps, winter camps, holiday events, do food drives, back to school drives, support mentorships… I volunteered there for five or six years and it’s one of the most incredible and rewarding experiences I’ve ever had. Sadly, I haven’t been very active in that community for the past few years because of my schedule, but to anyone living in Los Angeles, I couldn’t recommend the programme enough.

The judge in Law Abiding Citizen states: “I can pretty much do whatever I want” before being blown up whilst answering her mobile phone. What’s your view on the appropriate use of such devices?

If the question is: “What is my view on the appropriate use of cell phones that explode?” I would probably say, never. They are crazy dangerous, plus I heard their network coverage is terrible.

When it comes to regular old mobile phones, I think in general, just don’t be a dick. I know that sounds flip, but most of us know when phone use is not okay: Don’t text and drive; don’t talk on the phone in a movie theatre and don’t FaceTime at a funeral.

If you could fill a carriage on The Orient Express, who would be your fellow passengers?

Michael Jordan, Lincoln, Marlon Brando, Will Smith, Paul McCartney, Frank Sinatra, Eminem, MLK, Louis CK, Dave Chappelle and my mother’s father. He passed away when my mom was seven and I’d like to meet him and say thank you.

If you were unfortunate enough to end up on death row, what would be your last meal and where would you eat it?

A bucket of Ben & Jerry’s half-baked half-twisted ice cream, my grandma’s Italian chicken cutlets, a jar of Skippy Peanut Butter, a box of Captain Crunch Berries with 2% milk, a PB&J sandwich on whole wheat, and a slice of Susie Cakes’ red velvet cake for dessert. Oh, and a big bottle of lemon-lime Gatorade to wash it down. I would eat it in prison, presumably, since I’m on death row.

What time is it acceptable to consume the first drink of the day?

I don’t drink regularly, but that’s mostly about fitness. I’m not judging, but first thing after you wake up is probably not the best idea. Otherwise, sometimes a drink is just what the doctor ordered; I get it.

A Negroni, a martini or a cup of tea?

Tea, but I’ll need two packs of Stevia in there first.

Whose parties do you enjoy the most and why?

Small ones: I like when gatherings are intimate, where I can have conversations with people and get to know them.

Who is the most positive person you know?

Probably my step-dad, Ken Karman.

What’s your most guilty pleasure?

The TV show My Strange Addiction. That show is insane. All those kinds of shows: Intervention, Cops, etc. They’re trash TV, I know, but God are they entertaining to watch.

If a tattoo were to sum you up, what would it be of?

Hmmm… A piece of chocolate candy, maybe: Sweet with a slightly hard exterior and a soft and gooey inside.

If you were a car, what marque would you be?

I’d like to say a Ferrari or Lambo, but I’m probably more like a 2005 Mazda Miata or something.

Cilla Black presented Surprise, Surprise. Tell us the most surprising thing about you.

I almost bit my own tongue off as a child and had to have it sewn back on while conscious and awake.

What’s currently sitting on your mantelpiece?

There is no actual mantelpiece in my tiny studio apartment, but I do have out on display an award my grandfather received from the NBC television network, a book about Marlon Brando, the graphic novel, Watchmen and a bottle of acne medication (left that out, unintentionally).

Actor Zach Tinker was born in New York in 1994 into a family of directors, writers and producers. He is the first of his family to work in front of the camera and currently appears in the NBC series ‘Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders’ as Craig Cignarelli, a classmate of Erik Menéndez .

Follow Zach Tinker on Twitter at @ZachTinker and on Instagram at @zach_atticus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVcw6H2MA8E

October 15, 2017
Benjamin Lipari

East London based Benjamin Lipari was born in Italy, grew up in Australia and is described as a “digital comms guru.” Aside from working in marketing for a bank, he has 16,500 followers on Instagram, loves jazz and cocktails and blogs about menswear and travel.

September 30, 2017
Leanne Ratcliffe (AKA ‘Freelee the Banana Girl’)

A somewhat loopy YouTube ‘star’, Australian Leanne Ratcliffe moved from promoting veganism to “living sustainably” in February 2017. Known for what she terms “call out” videos – in which she controversially mocks others on their diet and lifestyle habits – Ratcliffe shares such information as how she has just one pair of socks and five sets of underwear and publishes eBooks with titles such as Go Fruit Yourself. She has 40,000 followers on Twitter and claims to be “saving the planet, one banana at a time.” Okay…

September 8, 2017
Axing Anti-Social Media

Matthew Steeples suggests the director of public prosecutions is right to seek “uplifted” sentences for online abusers but argues she does not go far enough

I have been targeted by online trolls for years. As a writer, I accept I am ‘fair game’ for criticism but when that tips over into the kind of vicious abuse I get from unhinged keyboard warriors, it moves into a realm that is unacceptable.

On a personal level, my recent involvement in the case of the Viscount St Davids – a convicted online hate criminal and all round dimwit returning to court this week to again face the repercussions of offering a reward on Facebook to anyone prepared to run over the anti-Brexit campaigner Gina Miller – not only resulted in negative articles by such oddities as the one-time male escort and Big Brother 11 contestant Benjamin Duncan on the blog of the anti-gay, pro-repatriation of immigrant Traditional Britain website, but also in threatening messages online and a physical attack upon my person. Such abuse has not only taken up considerable amounts of my time and distressed me, it has also caused considerable nuisance to friends and business acquaintances. Now, to her credit, the director of public prosecutions, Alison Saunders, has finally also come to the conclusion that “online abusers must be dealt with harshly” and thankfully it looks as if the laws relating to such will be toughened up.

In an article, published in this morning’s The Guardian, Saunders argues “the criminal justice system are ready to listen” with regard to calls for stronger sentences for online abusers. She references “new guidance” and a need for “stiffer ‘uplifted’ sentences” but what she ignores is that the Communications Act 2003, under which the likes of the aforementioned errant peer was prosecuted, does not have any understanding of Facebook (which came into existence one year after the creation of that law in 2004) and Twitter (launched 2006).

Saunders’ acceptance that “an increasing proportion of hate crime is now perpetrated” online is a definite start and her acceptance that they should be treated “just as seriously as those experienced face to face” is certainly positive. Hitting “report abuse” on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, however, gets no one anywhere. It is in fact our government that must go further and introduce stronger regulation that actually holds social media providers themselves to account for the content they allow to be published on their sites.

August 21, 2017
Andrew Warren

New York socialite Andrew Warren is known primarily as the best friend of Donald Trump’s daughter, Tiffany. With 100,000 followers on Instagram and the creator of the Just Drew fashion brand, he is the son of a real estate investor and also counts fellow trustafarians Kyra Kennedy and Gaia Matisse amongst his ‘Snap Pack’ entourage.

In August 2017, after bizarrely breaking his right arm in an incident in a Fort Pond, Montauk swimming pool involving an inflatable flamingo, Warren exclaimed: “It is especially hard because I use my right hand to design and for social media.”

Previously, in 2016, he modestly remarked: “I don’t I should be judged for posting a photo like eating caviar at Claridge’s in London while it’s okay for someone to post a picture at McDonald’s… In the Hamptons, I’ll have McDonald’s. I’ll have days where I go to Six Flags. I venture to Coney Island. I’m not grossed out by anything. My mom likes to go to Ohio. We do things that people wouldn’t expect us to do.”

August 15, 2017
Moron of the Moment – Sir Philip Green

‘Sir Shifty’ filmed in debauched incident in Mykonos; he would do better to sip rather than spray his beverages

Sir Philip Green will forever be remembered as a man whose former company, BHS, collapsed with the loss of 11,000 jobs. At that time, in The Steeple Times, the actor and producer Steven Berkoff compared him to both Shylock and Al Capone, but now ‘Badly Behaved Boozy Brit Abroad’ can add be added to this slug-like individual’s roster after he was spotted dousing fellow diners with champagne in Greece.

Filmed by someone named Sarah Nazari and shared on her Instagram page, the minute long clip shows Sir Philip at a beach bar-restaurant named Nammos Mykonos. Alongside other revelers, the business tycoon was pictured hosing other guests down with £109 ($141, €120 or درهم517) per bottle “spraying champagne.” He didn’t look like he had a care in the world and perhaps, just maybe, his daughter’s new jailbird boyfriend, Jeremy Meeks, had provided him with inspiration to behave like a reprobate.

Of antics more befitting of a 20-year old than a 65-year old, an unnamed source told The Times: “You couldn’t be in this club if you aren’t rich, so he wasn’t impressing anyone. He just looked like a sad old man trying to play with the pretty people.” Spot on: ‘Sir Shifty’, at his age, would do well to sip rather than spray.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ep_PrxAZE4

August 15, 2017
Calmed Down Cameron

David Cameron snapped ‘Hugging a Corbyn’ after he’s revealed to have a ‘Calm Down – It’s Only a Recession’ in his kitchen and a £25,000 shepherd’s hut in his garden

David Cameron is plainly enjoying life to the full. Not only has he been rewarded with a huge literary advance after walking away after calling the disastrous and divisive Brexit referendum, but now he’s got time to sit in a shepherd’s hut in his garden and attend posh music festivals.

Not for ‘Call Me Dave’ will it be necessary to put in a presence in a wheat field in Norfolk to support Theresa May and her garden gnome-like hubby at the forthcoming ‘Conservative Ideas Festival’, but instead him and ‘Sam Cam’ are now able to find time to attend parties at Christie’s and holiday in Miami, Florida.

Cameron – who was widely criticised for having a sign in his kitchen that reads: “Calm Down Dear, It’s Only a Recession” – spent time this weekend at the Wilderness Festival at Cornbury Park in Oxfordshire. He was spotted drinking, smoking and even got snapped with his arm casually wrapped around an art consultant named Lucy Edwards. For him it seems, it’s no longer “Hug a Hoodie” but now instead “Hug a Corbyn.” In the picture, Ms. Edwards sported a ‘glitter coat’ emblazoned with a heart complete with the Labour leader’s name.

David Cameron pictured in his Oxfordshire kitchen; the ‘Calm Down – It’s Only a Recession’ sign is circled to his right

In purchasing the sign, Cameron, shown here with his £25,000 shepherd’s hut, was plainly inspired by the late, great Michael Winner

August 7, 2017
Anti-Social Media

The law needs to be updated with regard to what is acceptable on social media; businesses such as Facebook and Twitter need to equally be held to account

Social media, as we’ve already reported, was proven to be anything but sociable in a London courtroom this week. With the jailing of the tweed gilet clad racist Viscount St Davids for 12 weeks for malicious communications came acceptance from the country’s most important magistrate, Senior District Judge Emma Arbuthnot, that “Facebook is not private” and that it is no longer a place where anything can be posted without repercussions applying.

Elsewhere, on Friday, outside of the realms of the law but again very much illustrative of the perils of posting without consideration of impact, the Mirror reported that Stella McCartney is said to be furious with David Beckham – a man known to use European privacy laws to have his own home obscured on Google – after he posted an un-pixelated image of a group of children at his daughter’s birthday party that included amongst others her six year old daughter on Instagram. Ms McCartney, a woman reportedly very protective of her child’s safety, is said to be “spitting feathers,” yet, as the paper concluded: “David Beckham has not taken the [liked by 900,000 individuals to date] post down.”

Previously decisions in civil cases – such as that of freelance journalist Dennis Rice vs. the crowdfunded news site Byline and media personality Katie Hopkins vs. blogger Jack Monroe – have highlighted that irresponsible and defamatory posts can be costly to the parties involved, with damages and legal bills awarded against Hopkins alone said to total some £130,000. Equally, as a contrast, such outcomes as Paul Chambers’ successful appeal against his conviction for tweeting about blowing an airport “sky high,” have also depressingly shown that regulation of what is acceptable is confused and in need of reform.

A most telling factor to consider is that the Communications Act came to statute in 2003 and as such really does not have any specific provision for activities conducted on mediums like Facebook – a for-profit company with revenues of £20.6 billion in 2016 and 2 billion active monthly users as of June 2017 – and Twitter – a for-profit company with revenues of £1.9 billion in 2016 and 328 million active users as of July 2017. Facebook was founded in February 2004 and Twitter in March 2006 and thus, though it is accepted that the Communications Act (2003) was appropriate back in the early noughties, it is now out of date and no longer fit for purpose.

An attempt to update the law with the Malicious Communications (Social Media) Bill in 2016 was likely going to be a step forward, but because of Theresa May’s decision to call a pointless General Election in May 2017, that failed due to it having not even yet reached the House of Lords prior to the 3^rd May. Now, with the ‘Wheat Field Wanderer’ in a position of being nothing but “weak and wobbly” in terms of her political influence, such laws will likely be forgotten. That is entirely wrong and we now call upon politicians of all parties to campaign to right the wrong that allows bullies and trolls to continue to prosper.

A pixelated version of the image David Beckham posted to Instagram of his daughter, Harper, and other children; the Mirror opted (rightly) to obscure the faces of the other children and we do the same here; shown: Princess Eugenie and Harper Beckham

July 16, 2017
Viscount Porridge

Thrice bankrupt bigot Viscount St Davids banged to rights and set to be jailed Thursday; he blames Gina Miller as “untruthful” and Matthew Steeples as “an eavesdropper” and accepts utterly no blame for what he did

On Thursday, if he doesn’t turn up at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on time, justice will come knock, knock, knockin’ on Baron Strange of Knockin’s door.

Donald Trump supporter and serial bankrupt Rhodri Philipps (AKA 4^th Viscount St Davids, Lord St Davids, Baron Hungerford, Baron de Moleyns, Baron Strange of Knockin and, to the public and no doubt his new jailbird chums, plain old Mr Philipps) – a bigot whose insistence on being called anything other than Mister sealed his fate as the real life representation of Paul Whitehouse’s Rowley Birkin QC – was found guilty Tuesday of two counts of sending menacing messages on a public electronic communications network. After convicting him, chief magistrate Emma Arbuthnot warned the aristocrat: “The first port of call will obviously be a prison sentence.”

She added:

“I have no doubt the first post was menacing, you were offering money to have [Gina Miller] killed. A reasonable person reading the post would have felt a sense of apprehension at least, if not fear.”

“I don’t accept you didn’t understand the post could be shared. On Facebook users share and have shared any number of others’ posts – nothing is private about a Facebook post.”

“They were not funny, not a joke, they were sent when Lord St Davids was infuriated – they were not meant to be light-hearted comment, they were intended to cause apprehension among some of your Facebook acquaintances, not all as some clearly shared his views.”

“I find you knew when you posted these messages they might create apprehension in a reasonable person reading them in the multi-racial country we live in.”

Represented initially by a chubby dimwit American and Conservative councillor for Kensington (yes, one of them, a member of the worst council in Britain) named Andrew Rinker – a curious creature commonly known as ‘Rinker The Stinker’ in even the most polite circles – Philipps proved himself nothing but a nasty piece of work and a fool in the dock. He tried to blame me for “stalking” and “trolling” him and referenced me “a professional eavesdropper.” He claimed his trial was “political” and motivated because of his multiple titles and whilst his scumbag chum and cohort Tariq Siddiqi targeted me also via social media throughout the period, he was ultimately convicted simply because the Crown was able to prove he is nothing but an inept racist incapable of covering his own vile tracks.

Of the result, Kate Mulholland of the Crown Prosecution Service commented:

“This threat caused extreme concern to Gina Miller and although Lord St Davids claimed his Facebook friends would have been tolerant of his views, they were open to the public.”

“No-one should have these kind of menacing comments made to them or about them and where there is evidence of an offence the CPS and police will bring a prosecution.”

As I said previously, the law must now change: What goes on social media, doesn’t stay on social media. We must all be held accountable for whatever we post.

July 12, 2017