John Rentoul – apology accepted but you must be held to account.

John Rentoul went too far last night. The ‘Chief Political Commentator’ for the Independent on Sunday had this to say as people were being murdered in Paris last night:

No solidarity, no using a Twitter account with over 50k followers to tweet helpful numbers, just a hateful response when people needed hope.

It was an opportunistic, point scoring tweet that enraged twitter as people desperately tried to understand the unraveling situation and to share information on how those affected could get to safety.

I picked the tweet up and was so shocked that I took a screenshot and then discovered it had been deleted.

The tweet went viral and outrage was felt among Twitter users with some indicating they would no longer buy the Independent as a result:

Rentoul has now published an apology via the Independent website.

Whilst we should accept apologies, when they are genuine, we should hold people to account who have influence.

Rentoul’s persistent and quite frankly hateful attacks need to be addressed by the Independent. Last night have been an extreme moment for Rentoul but it has become a massive recurring problem.