It may only be small cases, but small cases are by no means to be ignored. Much as I dislike Piers Morgan, I am pleased that Ofcom made the right decision here.
Piers Morgan’s ITV colleagues and a string of respected broadcasters today hailed Ofcom’s ruling confirming his right to free speech after the watchdog dismissed 57,000 complaints about his criticism of Meghan Markle including not ‘believing a word’ she told Oprah Winfrey.
As I say, I can’t stand the bloke, for he is an obnoxious oaf, but I defend his right to speak his mind and on this matter, I agree with him. I didn’t believe Markle either.
However, not all are pleased…
But Mr Scobie said he questioned the decision because ‘freedom of expression’ under the 1998 Act is subject to the restriction of ‘protection of health or morals’.
Oh, go fuck yourself. Saying that you don’t believe someone is a basic freedom of speech issue and we should be free to say it. Sure, I was a bit surprised at the ruling, but not for this reason, it’s because I expected wokery to win out. As it is, there are no health or morals issue – Markle is a narcissistic exhibitionist and like Morgan, I don’t believe a word that she says.
Meanwhile across the pond, openly political teachers are getting fired after going onto social media to boast of their exploits. One of them is now complaining about being bullied. No, sorry, this is what’s known as consequences. Consequences are the outcome of actions. These two (and one in Utah) were happy to abuse their position of trust to engage in the indoctrination of minors in their alphabet soup politics and now they are paying the price. Oh dear, how sad, never mind.
It does seem that the sleeping bear is awakening and starting to fight back. I do hope so.
Presumably the health caveat could be used to silence the anti vaxers, the real ones that is, not people who have doubts about the covid vaccines. Even though it is obvious that the best way to deal with them is to let them speak and refute them.
As I recall, it was Naomi Campbell that raised this whole matter of ‘protection of health or morals’ when she sued the Mirror for revealing that she had attended a Narcotics Anonymous clinic in February 2001. That case involved Piers Morgan too, albeit defending his editorial position at the Mirror.
The claim being made was that Ms. Campbell was a liar when she said she didn’t do drugs and attending a Narcotics Anonymous clinic demonstrated that fact. However, her right to privacy overrode all of that when it finally hit the Law Lords (pre-UK Supreme Court days)
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2004/may/06/mirror.pressandpublishing1
Aah, ‘Mr’ Scobie. The first time I saw this rather curious individdle I read it as an F2M (female trying to present as male). I’m not convinced I was mistaken.
Funny you should say that. I thought there was something a bit odd. You could be right.
“The UK’s broadcasting watchdog this morning called attempts to silence the MailOnline columnist a ‘chilling restriction on freedom of expression’…”
It is. And while there are no consequences for this sort of malicious complaint on the ones who make them, there will be more and more of them.
“But Mr Scobie said he questioned the decision because ‘freedom of expression’ under the 1998 Act is subject to the restriction of ‘protection of health or morals’.”
I would humbly submit that in questioning Princess Sparkles’s accusations against the Queen, protecting morals is precisely what Mr. Morgan was attempting to do.
That said, the HRA, based as it is on the ECHR, isn’t worth the paper it’s written on, especially on this issue. It boils down to, “You have the right to freedom of expression unless the government decides you don’t”.
I wonder if Markle’s plan is to bring down the monarchy.
Even Cromwell didn’t manage that.