Racists, I’m sick and tired of the stupidity you show in your haste to incite hatred against those who don’t fit your notion of ‘pure Maltese blood’. Pure Maltese blood indeed – if  there ever was the perfect place to insert a ‘LOLZ’, this would be  it.

Racists, you are fooling no-one when you latch on to any sort of misbehaviour, criminal or not, committed by someone whose skin is not white enough for you, as an excuse to attack specific races/nationalities. Criminal behaviour should always be punished, whatever the colour of the skin of the perpetrator. And it should never be attributed to the offender’s entire country, because that would leave us in a fine pickle now, wouldn’t it?

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The latest exhibition of stupidity – yes, I know calling people stupid is offensive, but I’m sure in this case those who harbour a love of human rights will forgive me – is as predictable as it is sad. A Libyan national gets arrested for allegedly stealing from a group of teenagers and the dams of ignorance and intolerance burst open. Read the story here.

The ensuing wave of social media stupidity was way too vast to reproduce here in its entirety, but one particular comment took the biscuit: apparently, according to this purveyor of logic and love, “NGOs and the refugee commissioner should be held responsible for every crime committed by migrants”. Thus implying, of course, that every nation, every race is collectively responsible for any crimes/illegality/general silliness committed by one of its members.

Oh really, madame? Please, allow me to take your argument to its logical conclusion, will you? If, whenever someone commits a crime, their whole nation is tarred with the same brush, that would pretty much mean that the Maltese would be welcome in no country. Sadly, it only takes a handful of examples to prove this.

Last year, outlaw biking group founder Alex Vella was kicked out of Australia. Not for stealing some paltry €20, mind you, but for being the brains behind a wave of organised crime that terrorised entire neighbourhoods. Mr Vella is so Maltese (in case his surname wasn’t hint enough) that his nickname is ‘the Maltese falcon’.

Despite this, there was a distinct lack of Australians baying to have all Maltese kicked out of their country. Which is just as well, because if the Australian government had decided to take a leaf out of the logic of Maltese racists, I really don’t know where the hell we’d be putting all the Maltese evicted back to their country of origin.

Then there’s Cory Galea, currently residing in Toronto and facing attempted murder charges.  The man was walking along, when some poor sod  whose eyes were on his mobile phone inadvertently bumped shoulders with him and got the beating of a lifetime. Did the Canadians rise en masse against “those savages the Maltese”? Well, no, because you see they’re not a nation of stupid racists and they knew perfectly well that one Maltese prize ass doesn’t make an entire nation of asses, as it were.

The Philippines showed similar admirable restraint when Joseph Cardona decided to bump off his former partner, a Filipino fashion designer called Joy Bernaldez, before proceeding to also remove himself from the planet. Astonishingly, no reports of anti-Maltese statements followed, maybe because – yet again – Filipinos are not stupid racists.

I could go on with several other cases across the world, but it gets boring fast. I really wish Maltese racists would think before they shoot off their mouths every time someone hailing from South of Malta breaks the law in our country. These people – like all others who break the law – should get the full force of the law on their doorstop, of course, just like everyone else, regardless of race or colour.

But to try and sell it to us that one Libyan thief makes thieves of all Libyans is beyond stupid. It’s intentionally irresponsible.  Incidentally, I’m not fond of criticising colleagues in other sections of the press, but how about exercising a tad more common sense and less sensationalism in our headlines when reporting certain offences?