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'Sorry' to many other scribblers out there, but when a citizen joins the legal profession he/she gives up the right to post offensive and/or threatening messages, even under 'provocation' from similar coming first from other people.

It's a condition for being a legal practitioner (under our Code of Conduct and any worthy of its name) that publicly visible conduct - and so even 'personal conduct' if it's publicly visible - must be law-compliant.

There may be private realms where we can break rules without it being contrary to the Code of Conduct but (abusing) social media under the same identity that we use for legal practice isn't one. Some 'freedoms' are given up by being a practising lawyer. This is nothing new.