Social media has an important role to play in ensuring the peace process remains on track, but many keyboard warriors need to think before they spew out their guff.
Tensions can be raised through the roof by our elected representatives, and that's bad enough without some of the unelected social media slabbers upping the ante with inflammatory statements.
In recent columns, I criticised Belfast county Orange Order boss George Chittick for urging Protestants not to learn the Irish language.
I also advised Shinner boss and Louth TD Gerry Adams that he should consider direct talks with the Royal Black Institution rather than the Orange Order because the latter was divided between the more militant 'townies' and the more laid-back 'country folks'.
Here's what I said to Adams: "Maybe the bold bearded one was being cynical? Maybe – like many in Sinn Féin – he knows the Orange Order is riddled with internal rifts over what policy to adopt with nationalist residents' groups?"
That remarks seems to have sparked quite a stir, prompting one blogger to write directly to me with this bizarre opinion.
"John – 'he knows the Orange Order is riddled with internal rifts' Who caused those internal rifts. The Orange Order needs riddled from top to bottom."
Riddled from top to bottom? Is this blogger seriously advocating a Tullyvallen-style massacre against Orangemen with such an insensitive, provocative and grossly sectarian statement?
I am a staunch defender of the democratic freedom of speech, but a line has to be drawn somewhere against people on social media who appear to be promoting genocide against a section of the Irish community. They need brought before the courts and jailed.
The phrase 'needs riddled from top to bottom' smacks of the worst kind of ethnic cleansing and would be the type of tactic would have sat well with Hitler's henchmen when they were implementing the Holocaust.
This blogger clearly has no conscience for the Orangemen who were massacred by Provo gunmen at the Tullyvallen Orange Hall near Newtownhamilton. Four were killed in the attack with a fifth dying two days later.
It happened on my birthday – 1 September, 1975 – and next year will see 40th anniversary commemorations to remember the slain.
While two IRA gunmen sprayed the inside of the hall with machine-gun bullets, others stood outside and fired in through the windows.
The death toll would have been higher but for an off-duty member of the security forces attending the meeting who fired his pistol, hitting one of the Provos and forcing them to flee.
My dad was a Deputy Imperial Grand Chaplain in the Orange Order and as a schoolboy, I accompanied him to the Tullyvallen for a memorial service.
The lodge allowed me to sit in the Worshipful Master's chair and I could see the bullet marks on the lodge table.
It was a very unnerving and emotional experience to sit at a table where another human being had been murdered.
While this republican blogger is entitled to his sick opinion of the Orange Order needing to be "riddled from top to bottom", I urge the leaderships of both Sinn Féin and the SDLP to condemn such blatant racism.
Hopefully, it was not a member of their respective ranks who made this disgusting remark.
Stormont needs new laws to crack down hard on these social media cranks.
