I don’t know but it seems like there are a lot of people who love to find any reason to shout at @OwenJones84. On the list of ‘villains’ I’ve been drawing up here, he wouldn’t even get into the top 10 million.

I feel shameful that I even stopped myself from tweeting that for a moment for fear of getting attacked by them myself. If you’re not on a particular team in the UK media, it feels like there’s always the risk of getting utterly swarmed.

There was a time when I was much more inclined to trying to fit in with the dead centre of the British media and I indulged in fighting with Owen and writing pieces that criticised things he said. Look, no one is ever always right…

… but there are so many reasons he gets attacked so much on here and in print. One is that he’s a figure who will get you traffic from people who dislike him.

I can’t imagine being in his position where *every* utterance or action will be dissected in bad faith.

There is basically a set of received opinions that you’ve got to sign up for if you want to be successful in the British media — yes, there are some outliers like Owen, but people tend to look at them like they’re dogs that can play cards.

If you don’t adhere to those received opinions, you’ll either get nowhere or be framed as a crank or a troll. The notion that there is any plurality or views in mainstream column writing is a fiction. The window of topics and takes is SO narrow.

And when the say, “Oh we call him squealer because of Animal Farm, that’s it!” they have some fucking front. It’s abundantly clear why.

I’ve lost so many ‘friends’ for drifting away from what are considered de trop positions among broadsheet people. And for not being able to just keep my gob shut up things that are wrong with the journalism industry.

I let myself be such a sacrificial beast when I wrote opinion stuff for The Telegraph. Writing things about when I got beaten up and about my mental health when I really shouldn’t have.

It’s really sad to realise that people I thought liked me actually only liked me when they thought we were politically in lockstep. But that’s a good reality check.

I do feel a bit shot by both sides — the right wing columnists think I’m a prick (if they think anything of me at all) and lots of people on the left and the irony wing of the Vice world thing I’m ludicrous.

I had a manic depressive period where I was just writing constantly trying to make a dumb website idea work and they loved ripping me apart. I’m still terrified they’ll do it again.

I mean, a writer — very popular with people who talk a lot about mental health and kindness — loved pushing me to the brink here. He emailed me to mock me. I was depressed and kept responding to him. He loved it. It broke me.

I’ve been struggling to shake the idea that I’m a shitty writer and a shitty person ever since. And there he is, lauded widely and ‘brilliant’. I nearly let it totally break me. If I had, he would’ve laughed.

Oh and I noticed him tweeting Owen today to offer his support. So that’s particularly hilarious.

Incidentally, all of that stuff happened in 2015 and it still haunts me. So that’s fun, isn’t it?

He popped back up three years later to mock me again.

And before anyone starts — I have mocked people myself and I’m not a saint, and I deserve the piss ripped out of me for lots of things. But they wouldn’t stop. And they laughed at my family. And at me being attacked. And at the thought of me killing myself so... it’s not the same