In case you missed it, over the weekend Ireland got a new superhero in the form of Spar Guy, and now the man at the centre of the incident has spoken out about what happened and how he has dealt with all the attention it got.
The incident took place in a branch of Spar, where Colm (who does not want his second name to be revealed) had gone to buy some items, when he was called "a faggot" by another customer in the queue. However, when that man, who was accompanied by a woman, went to pay for his items, the employee behind the counter said that he wouldn't serve him as he'd heard what he said. Colm then posted about the incident on his Facbeook page, and a screengrab of it went viral causing #SparGuy to trend.
Speaking to The Outmost, Colm said that the whole incident took place very quickly, and he just considered it something small until the staff member refused to serve the man in question. "I was so impressed by the Spar guy and I thanked him and bought my stuff."
"I was in the queue and there was a guy and a girl in front of me buying a bottle of wine. The guy turned to the girl and said, ‘Look at that faggot in his shorts.’ And laughed in my face. I just looked away because I didn’t want to make a scene, you know?"
"When they got to the top of the queue, the guy who was working at the til said, ‘Sorry I heard what you said, and I’m not going to serve you,’ and took the bottle of wine and put it under the counter."
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Colm admitted, however, that he chose his words badly when he created the status on his Facebook page using the terms "D4 head" and "scaldy hun" and that he had never intended for it to be made public, as his updates are private and can only be seen by his friends.
"A lot of people are saying that my position is delegitimised because I made a misogynist comment. I chose my words badly. I wrote that status when I was walking out of Spar, and hadn’t given too [much] thought to it. My Facebook feed isn't even public".
However, since the incident, Colm has said that he's been getting abuse on Facebook and has had to change his privacy settings on his social media as a result. He has also gotten messages from "strangers saying that I was 'oversensitive', I 'brought it on myself’, that I was 'making the story up'. Some were threatening violence and suggesting that I kill myself."
The company themselves have tweeted their support of #SparGuy too, and they've gotten some great publicity out of it too, so many Twitter users are calling for him to get a nice Christmas bonus for his actions.
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What did you think of the #SparGuy incident? Do you think he should get a big fat bonus in his festive pay packet?
