I disapprove of what you say ...
This week Jan Moir wrote a repellant piece in the Daily Mail, suggesting that pop star Stephen Gately’s death was as a result of his gay lifestyle. It provoked a firestorm on Twitter and elsewhere. The Daily Mail, succumbing to considerable pressure, removed all comments and all advertising from the page.
One of my clients was an advertiser on that site. Its Twitter feed was inundated with tweets and retweets calling on it to withdraw advertising from the Mail.
Last week, Waitrose withdrew advertising from Fox News after a presenter made offensive comments about Barak Obama. Yet Ocado still delivers a free copy of The Times, which is owned by the same organisation.
Thing is, where do you draw the line? Personally speaking, I don’t agree with anything I read in the Daily Mail. But it is a national daily newspaper that hasn’t broken any laws. How is bullying the Daily Mail (yes, I said that. Looks weird doesn’t it?) different from Carter-Ruck trying to silence the Guardian over the equally disgraceful Trafigura affair? Because we disagree with what’s being said? The Press Complaints Commission is there to deal with that. Otherwise, despicable as Jan Moir’s piece was, in the absence of proper debate Twitter becomes a virtual baying mob, calling for rough justice as decreed by those shouting the loudest.
“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”
Voltaire
One of my clients was an advertiser on that site. Its Twitter feed was inundated with tweets and retweets calling on it to withdraw advertising from the Mail.
Last week, Waitrose withdrew advertising from Fox News after a presenter made offensive comments about Barak Obama. Yet Ocado still delivers a free copy of The Times, which is owned by the same organisation.
Thing is, where do you draw the line? Personally speaking, I don’t agree with anything I read in the Daily Mail. But it is a national daily newspaper that hasn’t broken any laws. How is bullying the Daily Mail (yes, I said that. Looks weird doesn’t it?) different from Carter-Ruck trying to silence the Guardian over the equally disgraceful Trafigura affair? Because we disagree with what’s being said? The Press Complaints Commission is there to deal with that. Otherwise, despicable as Jan Moir’s piece was, in the absence of proper debate Twitter becomes a virtual baying mob, calling for rough justice as decreed by those shouting the loudest.
“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”
Voltaire
Labels: press freedom twitter
posted by Saturn Girl at 7:29 am
2 Comments:
It is a tricky one isn't it. I agree with you that we either have censorship of the press (in which case Trafigura were correct, and Jan Moir was not) or we allow total free speech in which case the opposite applies.
Twitter is a fast and furious medium, excellent for rapidly gauging public opinion. But any rapid medium will include a high degree of knee-jerk, unconsidered reaction. This is always an inherent problem with trial by the public.
On the Trafigura question, it was a logical, rational objection to the use of law. On Jan Moir, it seems to me that more emotion than logic has been brought to bear, and that public pressure has rapidly turned into a baying mob.
I hope people don't take offensive measures themselves - if I were Jan Moir I would be steeling myself to expect a wide range of hate activities to affect my family's daily life now.
You seem to be suggesting that it would be okay for Abu Hamza al Masri to have a column in a National Paper and air his abhorrent views.
A newspapers job is not a medium for free speech per se. It is a means to ensure that free speech is not abused or censored.
What would happen if I wrote on a wall in the High Street using similar vocabularly to Jan Moir, and then stood beside it, proud. Is that free speech? Or plain stupid?
I would expect to be verbally abused by passers-by and probably arrested for some homophobic crime.
The Twitter reaction to Jan Moir is what one would expect and one which the Daily Mail itself has actively encouraged in the past.
Obviously I would in no way defend any personal attack on Jan Moir or her family - but surely an editor must have read that article and warned her of the possible repurcussions, and probably thrown it in the bin.
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