I'VE a lot of time for Owen Jones. The left wing political commentator and columnist is more often than not spot on in his analysis on social issues.
And while he was correct to point out the seeming inability of Sky presenter Mark Longhurst and columnist Julia Hartley-Brewer to call the Orlando massacre what it was - a homophobic terrorist attack against the LGBT community - he was wrong to walk off the set in protest.
The paper review on Sky quickly became a confrontation between Jones and the other two.
However, his protest has now overshadowed the debate and while I disagree with almost every word Hartley-Brewer writes, those who took to Twitter to harass her do nothing but undermine any cause they might have or point they were trying to make.
Jones is an impressive orator and regularly takes on political heavyweights in debates on shows such as Question Time, regularly emerging the victor.
As a gay man his anger in the aftermath of the Orlando attack was understandable, however his reaction was absurd. He should have stayed to the end and challenged the refusal to brand the attack homophobic not stomped off in a hissy fit.
Omar Mateen murdered 49 people and injured dozens more. The shooting at gay club Pulse was the biggest loss of life on US soil since 9/11 and the deadliest mass shooting in American history.
The killer called 911 during his murderous rampage to pledge allegiance to ISIS, but his reasons for committing mass murder seem to run much deeper than just being indoctrinated into a radical form of Islam.
It has now emerged that Mateer was a regular in gays clubs and had signed up to a gay dating website.
We may never know if his interest in Islam had made him hate and deny who he really was and in turn hate others like him. His true motivation for the mass slaughter has followed him to the grave.
The stories coming out of Orlando are heartbreaking, one eye witness told of a crying mother at police lines desperately trying to reach her son, her son's phone ringing as his body was removed from the club.
The Washington Post carried details of desperate messages from a man who was was shot dead hiding in a toilet. Eddie Justice sent a series of frantic texts to his mother Mina, his final message "he's coming, I'm going to die". She text him back "I love you" he never replied, killed in the final wave of shooting.
Dr Joshua Corsa who treated the victims at Orlando Regional Medical Center posted a picture on Facebook of his shoes soaked in blood from treating the dying and wounded. He said: "On these shoes, soaked between its fibers, is the blood of 54 innocent human beings. I don't know which were straight, which were gay, which were black, or which were hispanic".
The atrocity has rekindled debates on Islam, the growing problem with radicalised young men, gay rights and most prominently gun control - or the lack of - in America.
Mateen had been spoken to several times by the FBI and yet was able to arm himself with automatic weapons perfectly legally before using them to take so many lives and cause such extreme devastation.
Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton tweeted: "People can’t board planes with full shampoo bottles—but people being watched by the FBI for terrorism can buy a gun, no questions asked.''
We're no strangers to violent gun crime here in Northern Ireland, we also have more than our fair share of religious fundamentalists who continue to deny gay people equality.
Sinn Féin health minister Michelle O'Neill has finally overturned the ridiculous ban on gay men giving blood but the issue of same sex marriage may only be resolved by the courts.
While an extreme case the attack on Pulse nightclub should act as a reminder of how deadly discrimination or demonisation of any minority group can be.
Belfast has a thriving gay community who in spite of years of discrimination have managed to carry out a dignified campaign for equality and overcome many hurdles.
But it is an ongoing fight that cannot be won by storming out of the debate.
