IS there nothing that can't be turned into a bad social media story for the SNP? Following Thursday's 10-hour Westminster debate on air strikes, as British jets flew off to attack Syria, a tweet from SNP MP George Kerevan hit the headlines shortly after the bombs began dropping.
Kerevan's great slight – later echoed by Alex Salmond in a radio interview – was that Tony Benn would be "turning in his grave" after son Hilary Benn's pre-vote House of Commons speech, a speech which drew rapturous applause in the House – something Twitter was quick to point out was considered unparliamentary behaviour when SNP MPs did it only months ago – and appeared to mesmerise the social media commentariat.
While Benn's oratory was adored and most UK MPs voted to take the country to war, attention swiftly turned to the Twitter comments of SNP MPs, all of whom opposed the bombing.
Before Kerevan's remark hit the headlines, John Nicolson MP had been lambasted for tweeting: “Labour, Conservatives and LibDems #BombingTogether.”
Duncan Hothersall, serial tweeter and editor of the Labour Hame blog, called on him to withdraw the comment and claimed it brought "shame" on him and the SNP. Others clearly disagreed, and the hashtag dig at the Better Together campaign caught on.
Then there was Kerevan's apparently outrageous outburst – it's Twitter after all, where would we be without the outrage? – and it didn't help him that fellow SNP MP Stewart McDonald took to the social media platform to describe the use of the term "spinning in his grave" as "repulsive".
MPs should be well aware that everything they utter on social media is being watched, and perhaps it just didn't occur to Kerevan that the phrase – which, in truth, is commonly used in everyday conversations without so much as a flinch – would actually cause offence to Benn's family. Indeed, Emily Benn, granddaughter of Tony, called on him to retract it.
But how “repulsive” is it to use an expression that many others, a quick Twitter search will reveal, uttered in the minutes following Benn's speech? Is it a disrespectful, outrageous slight on a dead man – or is it just a turn of phrase?
Less outrage was expressed about a tweet from Anne McLaughlin, another SNP MP, declaring: “In the lobby waiting to vote now. Just passed 3 Tories having a bet of £1 on how big their majority would be. Jolly japes. Sorry #Syria.”
Which is more repulsive: an insensitive turn of phrase or three Conservatives betting on a parliamentary majority for war?
There was also less attention devoted to questions raised by John Baron MP, who sits on the Foreign Affairs Committee, during the Syria debate about what the Government is doing to combat Daesh on social media, where it has had significant success in both spreading its message and global recruitment.
Not only is Daesh employing a skilled social media strategy, it has its very own app and media/production operation – Al Hayat – creating action videos, caked in glamour and purpose and posted on YouTube, aimed at snaring disillusioned minds looking for something to belong to.
Indeed, the US government has even tried exchanging directly with Daesh recruits on Twitter in a bid to outwit their propaganda, a surreal public display you could watch – and take part in – from the comfort of your own home with a cuppa.
A relatively innocuous tweet from George Kerevan seems comparatively trivial, in the context of a debate about a brutal terror organisation attempting to convince minds across the world, right under our Twitter noses, that it has more to offer than our own societies. Strangely, only one of these social media stories hit the headlines after Thursday's debate on air strikes.
Unsurprisingly, perhaps, Scotland’s national question also re-emerged on Twitter in the aftermath of the vote as the gulf between the will of Scotland’s MPs and those of the rest of the UK was highlighted. Comedian Brian Limond (Limmy) was one of those to describe the situation as “unreal”.
How ingrained the Syria campaign becomes in nationalist positioning on social media remains to be seen, but the SNP, it seems, certainly rattled some cages.
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