Media On Trial: Innocence Denied

Michael Hedges December 1, 2011 Follow on Twitter

Hacks and paparazzi, they are to blame. Scurrilous media bosses, blame them too. Forget not the politicians and celebrities with secrets. Tar and feather them all!

British media is on public trial. There is no precedent. It’s been coming since the death of Princess Diana or the beginning of the Iraq War or anything else widely reported, often conspiratorial and massaged for maximum impact. Testimony to the Leveson inquiry, named for presiding Lord Justice Brian Leveson, has continued into its second week.

The public inquiry – televised, blogged and tweeted – granted celebrities and fellow travelers significant rant time. The famous and infamous, with well-honed theatric aplomb, called out the tabloid press as evil. 

“The idea that it is the job of the tabloid journalist to pillory people whose tastes may be unusual is completely outdated,” said Max Mosley, once famous mostly for ruling Formula 1 auto racing or being the offspring of infamous UK Fascist Oswald Mosley, to the Leveson inquiry (November 24). It was UK tabloid News Of The World (NOTW) that “revealed” video purportedly of Max in the presence of five ladies of the night. Max successfully sued NOWT in 2008 for privacy infringement. He later brought to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) a demand that news organizations inform in advance of publication the subjects of investigation. The ECJ declined.  At the Leveson inquiry Mosley implicated a NOTW journalist for “instructing” one of the hookers in how to properly frame the picture, which later graced the NOWT cover.

Mosely is now suing Google in France and Germany, certainly to protect his image or remove the images, whichever the case might be. “The fundamental thing is that Google could stop this appearing but they don't or won't as a matter of principle,” he said in his Leveson testimony. “The really dangerous things are the search engines.” Mosley also took after Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre; “completely naive, obviously, about sex.” Perhaps it’s his roots, but there’s so much to hate.

The famous and nearly famous have come forward to plead for their privacy. Harry Potter author JK Rowling felt “under siege” by reporters and photographers. “It is incredibly threatening to have people watching you,” she told the Leveson inquiry. Former child star singer Charlotte Church told of waiving a £100,000 fee for performing at Rupert Murdoch’s last wedding in exchange for a promise of “good press.”

The most tawdry statements to the Leveson inquiry came from those seemingly least prepared for celebrity status. “I think every time we went out the front door, it’s like you had to be on guard because someone might be there and they would come up to you when you’re least expecting it, so as you’re sort of lifting stuff in and out of the car or something, and then they’ll fire a question at you without introducing themselves, and so you have to train yourself not to answer,” said the mother of murdered teenager Milly Dowler. The revelation that Milly Dowler’s mobile phone had been hacked by a private investigator employed by NOTW with voice mails deleted giving the appearance the child might have lived, elevated public condemnation of that tabloid, its owner News International and, eventually, the entire UK system of news media accountability.

And it’s not that the UK tabloids haven’t had their supporters. “Circulation defines the public interest,” said former NOTW reporter Paul McMullan to the Leveson inquiry (November 29). “In 21 years of invading people's privacy I've never found anybody doing any good. Privacy is for paedos.” McMullan also said News International “didn’t have a right” to close NOTW. It’s no surprise the journalism schools are turning out press flacks.

Damning the entire industry and self-regulation as a concept was Guardian journalist Nick Davis. “You have got a huge intellectual puzzle here,” he told the inquiry (November 29). “How do you regulate a free press? It obviously doesn't work. We're kidding ourselves if we think it would because it hasn't.” Davis and Guardian colleague Amelia Hill doggedly chased the NOTW ethical lapse through to the tabloid’s closing.

This inquiry, formed on political demand to look into UK media’s standards and practices following damning evidence of ethical breaches in the former and illegality in the later, intends to gather views from the aggrieved to the implicated. The inquiry’s end result will hardly be the end. Legislation will almost certainly be drawn from it.

The “huge intellectual puzzle” is whether or not the media sector will continue to exist simultaneously as a public trust and private enterprise.

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