THE S*N STORY SCANDAL ISN’T GOING AWAY, DESPITE CELTIC BOARD INDIFFERENCE
- BY LIAM CARRIGAN
- Oct 9
- 3 min read
The more I think the fallout from Monday night’s meeting between Celtic fans and the Celtic Board, the angrier I feel.
The inadequacy of the answers offered, the apparent deceit of the contradictory statement which followed from Celtic’s media team, it is all highly infuriating.
However, I have to say, as a journalist, and as someone who has, in a previous job, had to contend with a supervisor who was a bully and a liar, the whole “S*n Rat” scandal and the Celtic Board’s seeming indifference to it is probably the one thing that irritates me more than anything else to come out of Monday’s meeting.
The Celtic Board Just Enabled Workplace Bullying, That Can’t be Allowed to Stand
Now Brendan Rodgers is certainly big enough, experienced enough and confident enough not to let such slander as that which The S*n newspaper chose to run get him down.
My concern though, is what precedent does this set for anyone working at Celtic now, or considering working there in the future.
Let me give you a brief rundown on my own experience and how it correlates to what the Celtic Board are doing now.
Back in 2008, I was working in a very rural part of Japan as an English teacher. Our boss was incompetent, arrogant, and fancied himself as a bit of a tough guy. I have never had much tolerance for such people, so suffice to say conflict was inevitable.
Anyway, much like Brendan Rodgers, I found out that this manager was badmouthing me to colleagues and other officials in the small city where we worked.
I made a formal complaint, and a disciplinary meeting was convened to hear my concerns.
Guess who was chairing the meeting. The person I had made the complaint about.
Yeah, Celtic’s strategy of “internal investigations” that lead nowhere is hardly unique.
Thankfully that individual was eventually dealt with and no longer works in the education sector, but that’s a story for another time.
We can debate over the minutiae of terminology, but, having experienced it personally, I consider public slander to be a form of bullying. That is what the “S*n rat” is. A coward and a bully.
Suffice to say, I expected better from Celtic. By allowing the slander of one of their most prominent employees, by a senior member of staff, to go completely unaddressed, they’ve basically said that not only is workplace harassment and bullying acceptable at Celtic Park, but that if the person doing it is considered important enough, we will actively enable such despicable behavior by choosing to turn a blind eye to it.
I would have thought a CEO with a legal background such as Michael Nicholson would have a better grasp of how this approach leaves the club wide open to potential lawsuits in the future. Because I doubt Brendan Rodgers will be the only person to have been slandered or demeaned by this individual.
Bullies seldom limit their behavior to a single target. More often such acts point to wider personality traits and deep flaws in their own character.
Celtic now have a workplace bully working amongst their senior staff. The Celtic Board have no interest in doing anything about it.
A club for all?
Somehow that doesn’t seem the case, not while this is allowed to stand.
