First thing in the morning, I reach for Twitter. Yesterday, within minutes I had learned that next year’s World Economic Forum at Davos will be “co-chaired by seven women and zero men”; read an extract from a Heaney poem; squinted at a Northern Ireland budget sheet posted by a UUP man wondering why the Executive Office was getting a 32.2 per cent increase when there is no Executive; gasped that a Bewley’s “kids sausage roll” costs €6.50; inferred a deeply intimate relationship between Wikileaks and the Trump campaign; watched a rich man turning up on America’s Fox News, WITH HIS ACTUAL TAX RETURN, to explain why Trump’s tax cuts are a huge giveaway to the richest of the rich.
That’s the good Twitter. A jumble of comments and facts from a tapestry of mostly decent sources and experts, richly interspersed with links to articles in the global mainstream media, often posted by tweeters who otherwise claim to “NEVER read the MSM rags”.
The bad Twitter is where Donald Trump goes and he wasn’t there because I choose not to follow him. I also do not follow people who bang on about being in desperate need of a coffee, wine or a bath, who moan about being tired for any reason, or subsist in a state of abusive, bigoted, spittle-flecked outrage. Most of them can be avoided. Never Trump. He will pop up by way of retweets or quote-tweets, with his sinister swarms of #maga bots on one side, and on the other, all who believe that a man who calls other people “fools” should learn the difference between “they’re” and “there”.
Managed to get photobombed by a llama in Kildare today. pic.twitter.com/elmIESFrD8
— Leo Varadkar (@campaignforleo) November 13, 2017
Llama
The snarky quote-tweet – a retweet with a comment – is how many will also come upon the Taoiseach on Twitter. On Monday, he was posing in a well-cut suit, laughing, in front of an exotic, entertainingly boggle-eyed animal: “Managed to get photobombed by a llama in Kildare today.”
Would that make you smile? You may need to see the bug-eyed animal before you decide, but think about it for a moment. Does it depend on your politics, your pedantry, your concern for animal rights, or a sense that no public servant or elected representative should be seen having a laugh in these times?
Twitter: “It’s not called photobombing when you stand in front of something to take a photo,” sniffed FF Senator Lorraine Clifford Lee. “It’s an alpaca not a llama,” said BBC environment correspondent Paul Murphy. The rest was entirely predictable for anyone still choking at the disclosure that the “cost neutral” strategic communications unit (SCU) – dubbed the Taoiseach’s “person spin operation”, by Brendan Howlin – will cost €5 million next year.
Twitter: “We are paying 5 million quid for this daily crap...” “Why post these ridiculous photos? I don’t get it. It’s like it’s all a bit of a joke to him,” said a mature-looking educationalist from Monaghan.
The problem is that even well-wishers will hesitate to be cheered by the alpaca/llama now, since all the poor creature represents is a big wedge of scarce money, time and talent being harnessed by an apparently skittish SCU.
Novelty socks
A glance at the Taoiseach's recent Twitter feed is a carefully curated record of events, meetings and conferences between Jersey, France, Wexford and San Francisco. A chronicle of a serious, energetic young leader talking to employers, announcing jobs, arguing for "context" about homelessness figures (though on the worst possible forum for context or nuance, note, even with the ruinous, 280-character allowance). In between, however, come the pictures of the llama/alpaca, a pack of novelty socks, a pose in a movie studio with a Star Wars storm-trooper (caption: "finally tracked down @Paschald in his Halloween costume"); a shout-out at the FG conference to TD Noel Rock, "conference birthday boy", swiftly followed by a "Whoops" and a correction to Rock's twitter handle.
Twitter: “€5m and you can’t even handle a handle.” “Maybe start acting like a Taoiseach and get off social media for a while.”
Gravitas
But what does a young, social media-conscious Taoiseach act like, as opposed to say, one weighed down with gravitas, self-importance and some ignorant snidery about social media ? Sometimes, this one fools around, acts unthinkingly, lacks much of the empathy and wisdom that often come with age and experience and makes mistakes. Presumably he has been made aware that tweeting pictures from meetings of the Government’s national security committee – as he did last week – is childish and that objections to it do not equate with wanting the Government “to conduct business behind a brick wall”.
Does it have to be either/or, though? The llama/alpaca picture made me smile; the carelessness implied in the security committee picture says reckless and slippery slope.
Some years ago, when asked why he didn’t use Twitter, David Cameron replied: “The trouble with Twitter, the instantness of it – too many twits make a twat.” Too right.