A woman who took to social media to criticise Manchester bee tattoos triggered a huge backlash from Britons across the country this week.
Joan Meiners, whose Twitter handle is aptly named 'beecycles', posted the tweet on December 31 (New Year's Eve), and it quickly gained a lot of traction online, generating over 17,000 likes and over 1,000 replies at the time of writing this.
However she has since deleted the viral tweet and responded with a new one, apologising for her actions...
Hi.
— Joan Meiners, PhD 🐝🚴♀️ (@beecycles) January 2, 2020
I’ve been offline. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend. I’ve seen a lot of bee tattoos gone wrong, but didn’t know the context behind this one. I’m glad to know now. It was a mistake, and I apologize.
The tweet reads: "I’ve been offline. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend. I’ve seen a lot of bee tattoos gone wrong, but didn’t know the context behind this one. I’m glad to know now. It was a mistake, and I apologize."
That’s terrible. I’m sorry anyone has to go through that.
— Joan Meiners, PhD 🐝🚴♀️ (@beecycles) January 3, 2020
Her apology tweet, obviously received a lot of replies, with twitter users demanding an explanation for her original post.
Responding to her own tweet, she wrote: "I literally just got out of the wilderness and found out about all of this. If I could take it back I would."
She continued: "I literally have been in the wilderness. I didn’t like any tweets. I just found out about all this."
There are several charities run by parents of children who died if anyone is genuinely interested.@chloeandliam24t @RememberingNell @Livs_Trust @eilidhstrust
— ThisManc (@CityBee22) January 2, 2020
All giving back to young people in the community.
I'm sure there are more but I can't remember the @
As well all know, the Manchester worker bee is an emblem of the City of Manchester and wearers of it in any context, be it clothing or tattooed skin, don the emblem proudly as an identifier of being Mancunian.
And as always, the solidarity around the emblem and what it stands for is as strong as ever – and the response to this tweet has proved that.
