When retired NHL agitator Sean Avery reached out to his 136,000 Instagram followers Sunday night and all-but-threatened to put an Ancaster dentist out of business for making an online racial slur, the predictable response arrived.

By Monday morning, social media had erupted with many people labelling the dentist a racist, calls to his office offering opinions on him were flooding in and online review platforms were being swamped with scathing feedback of him and his work.

Just one problem. The dental practice isn’t owned by Raymond Fortino, who wrote the comment, but by his brother, Joseph.

“Joseph was not affiliated at all with this,” their mother, Ivana, says. “He is suffering, but this is not him at all.”

Want a glimpse into the worst of modern social media? Here you go.

Not long after a particularly physical and highly charged Game 2 between the Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs, Avery posted a not-suitable-for-family-viewing Instagram video criticizing some of the actions of Bruins winger Jake DeBrusk and defending Nazem Kadri, who’d been kicked out of the game for a cross check to DeBrusk’s head.

Longtime Bruins fan Raymond Fortino responded to him through a direct message that included a comment with a racially insensitive epithet. Avery says he gets thousands of direct messages and happened to open this one.

“You’ve decided to come to my page ... and spew racial hate,” a clearly offended Avery says.

At this point he responded, “Bro if I put you on blast you go out of business with your racist b-s-” and said Fortino had 30 minutes to send proof of a donation to a charity of his choice to avoid having his words made public.

“The moment I read that, I proceeded to click on the bio of this individual,” Avery says.

On that bio, the account of Fortino Dental was tagged, he says.

“In the world of Instagram, you don’t tag a business unless you’re affiliated with it.”

When Avery then posted @fortinodental to show the business to which he was referring, Fortino wrote, “It’s not my business it’s a friends.”

“Nice try. Tick tock,” Avery responded.

“It’s my brother. Not his fault.”

“Tick Tock,” Avery responded again. “Clock is ticking. Try me.”

“I will do it for sure,” Fortino responded.

“You have 22 minutes.”

By this point, the 25-year-old had let his parents know what was going on, apologized profusely for his actions and quickly made a donation using his father’s credit card. Then posted proof.

End of story? Not close.

“I changed my mind,” Avery wrote moments later. “F- you.”

He then posted the whole exchange online for public view.

You want a mess. Here you go.

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Raymond Fortino screwed up. His mother makes no bones about that. She calls the comment derogatory and racist. She says it was stupid. She says it was “a grave error in judgment.” The passion of the game and Avery’s commentary got to him and he responded poorly. He’ll be sending an apology to Kadri somehow.

“It’s absolutely not acceptable,” she says. “We don’t condone it in our home. It was just a glaring, glaring mistake.”

You have to know that’s tough for a mother to say publicly about one of her sons. Good for her for speaking plainly and not dodging the issue.

While her son’s comment was indeed improper, Avery’s response — exposing a business and its innocent owner to ruin without properly checking to see if the writer of the comment was connected to the practice he calls out — is no better. It’s reckless, colossally shameful and plain wrong.

By Monday morning, after Ivana Fortino says the family spoke to their lawyer and Joseph sent Avery a text explaining that this post had nothing to do with him, the post was taken down. Still, damage done. Nothing ever disappears in the social media world. Screen grabs of the exchange were easy to find and were being reposted.

Meanwhile, the one-year-old dental clinic was still taking an online pounding with a number of the commentators pointing out this was the brother of Team Canada women’s hockey star Laura Fortino. Who also had nothing to do with this.

“Fortino Dental has no involvement or association with any of the comments made,” said a statement from the dental office issued Monday afternoon. “Fortino Dental has been wrongly and inappropriately targeted. Dr. Joseph Fortino and all those at Fortino Dental work tirelessly to maintain a commitment to providing a safe, inclusive and respectful environment. Fortino Dental has been misrepresented on social media, to its detriment. Raymond Fortino does not work for and is not associated with Fortino Dental.”

Ivana Fortino says he has never worked at the clinic.

Prove it, Avery says.

“I have no idea whether they’re telling the truth about whether he’s worked there,” he says, suggesting Raymond produce his T4 slip.

If he did and if it showed what the family says it does, then what?

“I don’t talk in hypotheticals,” he says. “Let’s see then.”

In the meantime, Ivana Fortino says they aren’t talking about a lawsuit against Avery at this point, but will likely be looking for a public apology.

Ultimately none of the direct participants come out of this episode looking good. Worse, an innocent bystander who did absolutely nothing wrong has found himself caught in the crossfire and now has to fight to save his business.

That’s unfair.

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