5 Oct 2012 | Uncategorized
Allegations about the late Jimmy Savile’s abuse of young girls have led to a curious binary set of reactions. On the one hand, we are shocked and appalled. On the other hand, we knew all along.
There were always rumours, of course. Journalist Lynn Barber, in a 1990 interview, put the allegation to Savile: “What people say is that you like little girls.”
But a mixture of fear of privacy and libel laws, and the censorious pressure that prominent, well-connected figures can impose not just on weak and insecure young girls and their families, meant the rumours were never properly confronted. Even the BBC’s Newsnight would not broadcast the allegations .
Former tabloid editor Brian Hitchen wrote yesterday that England’s libel laws “too often help make those like Savile untouchable.”
Even now, the threat of libel suits could hang over newspapers seeking to further investigate allegations made by women who testified in ITV’s documentary about Savile.
The law should not be a tool for the powerful to silence the weak. And this is all about power: men over women, celebrity over the unknown, rich over poor.
As more stories emerge about the likes of Savile and Gary Glitter, I cannot help but compare it with the widespread clerical abuse that gripped the state of Ireland for many years. The enormity of this child Gulag has been revealed in a series of official reports in the past few years, with grim testimony given as victims finally found a space where they could speak of their experiences.
The reaction to those reports was revulsion. But it came from that same place of knowing and not knowing as the reaction to the Savile story. There cannot have been a person in Ireland who did not know that the church covered up child abuse. But we were reassured that they were bad apples, and it felt wrong to complain when there were so many good priests who did so much for our spiritual and physical wellbeing.
Savile pulled the same trick. How could you attack a man who did so much for the community?
In even the worst totalitarian regime, rumours about the rulers can circulate below the censor’s radar. But it’s only when we can proclaim, on the record and with confidence, our doubts about the rich, famous and powerful, that we can actually bring about change.
Padraig Reidy is News Editor of Index on Censorship
More on libel:
Why it’s vital that the government act to protect free speech
Five ludicrous libel cases
Last chance to sign our petition to reform libel laws that stifle debate, curtail criticism and even endanger lives
10 Aug 2012 | Uncategorized
Index on Censorship has not exactly been shy in its criticism of the control-freakish atmosphere of the Olympics. Nor have we held back criticisms of the misuse and abuse of the UK’s Public Order Act.
So you would have thought that the story of Mark Worsfold, allegedly arrested for looking a bit glum at the Olympic cycling road race would have been something we would have jumped on. Mr Worsfold, a martial arts instructor, has difficulty moving his facial muscles due to Parkinson’s disease.
But there seemed something not quite right about the national papers’ reporting of the whole thing — partly down to Worsfold’s own apparent hesitance to criticise the police — the local paper reported that despite his five hours in custody, Mr Worsfold was keen to see the “funny side” of the incident.
Over at Harry’s Place, blogger amie has an interesting take on what happened, claimed to be based on a chance meeting with Mark Worsfold’s brother at the Olympic Park in London. Amie says the following is Worsfold’s brother’s account of the arrest:
Mark had served in Northern Ireland and appreciates full well the stresses involved in assessing responses in tense situations. He was concerned that the newspaper reports (It was in the Guardian as well) were reflecting this as a case of police brutality which, if the full background were known, it would be apparent it was not.
The group of protesters near where he was standing were from Fathers 4 Justice [groan from my Family Law lecturer sister sitting alongside me]. To make matters worse, a woman protester next to him trying to join the other demonstrators and who was haranguing the police as imperialist lackeys, etc, looked as if she was with him.
“This is all going to kick off” he thought, and he needed to get to his daughter’s birthday. With that he jumped off the wall to leave. Bad move, worse timing, open to misinterpretation. When he was jumped on, he tried to say he had been to a Taekwondo demonstration and needed to get to his daughter. What the police heard, in the presumably noisy environment, (said the brother), was “demonstration” and “getting to his daughter” — a reasonable impression of a Father 4 justice with access issues.
He would be grateful if I could convey to others a more rounded perspective.
This version of events certainly doesn’t mean Mr Worsfold isn’t owed an apology, or that our Public Order Act is not misused ridiculously and sometimes disturbingly. But it’s useful, nevertheless, to put reporting of the exercise of Public Order powers in context.
26 Jul 2012 | Uncategorized
An appeal decision in the Twitter Joke Trial is to be handed down by Lord Chief Justice at the Royal Courts of Justice tomorrow morning [27 July].
Last month Paul Chambers appealed his conviction for having jokingly tweeted in January 2010 that he would blow Nottingham’s Robin Hood airport “sky high” if his planned flight to Northern Ireland to visit his now-fiancee would be affected by the weather.
He was found guilty at Doncaster magistrates court of sending a message via public electronic communications that was “grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character, contrary to the Communications Act 2003”. Chambers was fined £385, and ordered to pay £600 in costs. He also lost his job.
The trial has become a landmark case for freedom of expression in the UK, highlighting the tension between the legal system and advances in social communication. Chambers has had the support of some leading British comedians, including Graham Linehan, Stephen Fry and Al Murray.
Writing for Index on Censorship in November 2010, comedy writer Graham Linehan said:
This is the kind of case that would make me refuse jury service. It obliterates my confidence in the judicial system. Why should I let people who don’t “get it” have any power over me or anyone else?
We’re trying to evolve here, and the people who don’t get it are slowing us down. If they can’t keep up, they need to get out of the way.
Comedian and broadcaster Paul Sinha added:
The irony is that all over the worldwide web, anonymous internet warriors are only to happy to incite hatred and murder, and surely this is where the appropriate resources should be directed.
David Allen Green provides some useful background to the two-and-a-half year saga here.
Follow the story on Twitter using the hashtag #TwitterJokeTrial
19 Jun 2012 | Comment, Digital Freedom, News
While the internet and social media facilitate democratic instant global discourse, they are also tools of control, says Kirsty Hughes
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