"I am Spartacus"

[fpb]

Right. This is a bit late, now that Wikipedia is in on the act, but I still want to do it:

Ryan Giggs, the Manchester United football star, committed adultery with Imogen Thomas and then tried to forbid anyone from hearing about it by the use of a "super-injunction" - one of the corrupt British judiciary's worst outrages against freedom of speech. Now sue me, you spoilt, overindulged, cowardly little bully.

Comments

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

I know I'll get a sensible answer from you. I have not from anyone else I've asked about this.

Why do you think we have a right to know about this? The public being interested s not the sam as being in the public interest. Do you think there is any right to privacy? You may be quite accurate in your description of Giggs, but he is not the only person who would have felt pain had this been plastered over the front pages of the papers.

The press wax lyrical over freedom of the press and the fact that only the rich and famous can get super-injunctions. Their outrage is not about freedom of the press it is about MONEY, and to be blunt only the rich and famous need super-injunctions because the press don't write about the the foibles of anyone else.

I have little sympathy for Giggs, but I do for his family and his kids and lets face it, its takes two to tango and there is something offensive out of Miss Stubbs using her 'indiscretion' to try to make money.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

It is not about pain. When Giggs and his likes say that they want to avoid giving pain to their families, what they mean is that they want to avoid pain themselves - from a rolling-pin massage to a divorce with shark lawyer sauce. In other words, they are trying to do the deed and avoid the punishment. And is there a single reason why an adulterer should not be publicly known as such?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

P.S: mean Miss Thomas. Miss Imogen Stubbs is an actress and I don't know that she has been involved in any such shenanigans.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

Yes sorry about the error - my point about Miss Thomas stands.

Is there a single reason why an adulterer should be rewarded (paid) for telling the world about their deed? And do we really need to know all the detils? Lets not pretend that there is any moral aspect to what the papaers do, once you go beyond the words Miss Thomas and Ryan Giggs committed adultary the only purpose is to tittilate the public and make more money.

I don't care about Giggs and any pain he might suffer - its the added humiliation and sadness that his family would be put through as a result of the type of stories that would be written that concern me. Frankly its none of our bleeding business.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

Just to say, didn't realise how much I'd missed this....

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Well, this is a vigorous re-introduction, then.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

You are arguing from an incorrect premise. Any pain and humiliation suffered by the family arise from Mr.Giggs being unwilling to keep his trousers where they belonged. Everything else is rubbish got up by the ruling classes to defend themselves from the press; including the wholly false notion that the tabloids only go after celebrities - open any one at random and you will find shock-horror stories about complete unknowns. Should it be the case that the tabloid had it wrong, the woman would not feel pain or humiliation - she would feel vindictuve fury at the tabloid's expense. it is the truth that hurts. And to use something called "justice" to suppress truth is to use Orwellian language.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

I am certainly arguing from a different premise. I would perhaps accept your argument if the story read - Ryan Giggs committed adultery with Imogen Thomas and stopped there and that one party to the adultery was not being paid for their dalliance.

Anything else is surplus to requirements and I do not think the journalists can claim that they have no responsibility for the impact of their story on the innocents involved.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

You want to be careful of this kind of traps. By making an issue of the behaviour of tabloids, you are handing the scum-on-top a free pass to do what they like and muzzle their critics. The tabloids are part of the landscape in this country: if you start (like the judges do) from the premise that their vulgarity and pruriency makes them unworthy of protection, you have as good as allowed the Giggses of this world to do what they like. They can always claim that their families need protection from the nasty tabloids. Look at France to see what that gets you.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

However, they do exist and their behaviour is an issue. I say again, my concern is not for the 'scum-on-top' but for their kids who are innocent of any crime but who suffer. Change the bahavious of the tabloids and the need for protection is not justified in any ay. You can claim that they have a right to know certain information, but they then have a responsibility not to abuse that information.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

In my view rights should almost always come with responsibilities and that is true in this case.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Your argument seems to be that rights cease to exist if they are used irresponsibly.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

I'd put it very differently, I'd say tht we have to recognise that sometimes rights are in opposition. It isn't possible to have complete freedom of speach and a complete right to privicy. The two are incompatable.

The reason for this fudge in the Uk is that we try to have both, in the USA freedom of seach is protected under the constitution. In Ireland the right to privacy is enshrined in the constitution. In the UK we try to find a balance and use 'Public Interest' as the fulcrum.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I did not realize that Ireland had such a bad a law. But it is to be expected in a country which was long, whatever it is now, cradled in the worst kind of clericalism, with the inevitable corollary that the image of the Church and of "good" Catholics, whatever the reality, must be shielded. I find it strange that you should find it acceptable.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

I don't. I think the struggle to find a balance between two competing rights is probably the best position to take.

And that is the Republc of Ireland, not Northern Ireland - just to be quite clear.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Exactly. What "Church" and good Catholics in inverted commas did you think I was talking about?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

To repeat myself (for the third time): the children wouldn't suffer if their father had seen fit to keep his genitalia to himself. Once he has done otherwise, thanks to old man Murphy's law, sooner or later the matter will get around to his children. It makes no difference if it is tabloids, "candid friends" or surprise discoveries in old drawers; the pain is the same. And anyone who thinks they can do the one and not cause the other is also guilty of wishful thinking - a fool as well as a knave; and stupidity is the one sin that God punishes, and punishes always, right here on earth.

[elegant-bonfire.livejournal.com]

Sort of a branch-off from a similar convo on FB, so I can comment to both of you over here.

If most of the celebs behaving badly would own up to their behavior, the whole shitstorm would die a lonely death after a few weeks. David Letterman is a perfect example of this. When it came to light that he'd had affairs with his employees, he made a public acknowledgement and apology on his show one night and admitted he had a lot of amends to make. His TV ratings actually went up after that, and within a couple of weeks the whole thing was a non-issue because it was out in the open.

Compare that to Bill Clinton, who went on "lyin' and denyin'" when it was pretty obvious that the story was more than rumors. The press and the public were out for blood after that.

Yes, there are sleazy journalists, but I feel the main responsibility lies with the person who did the deed and how they handle the consequences.

[shezan.livejournal.com]

That is very, very true. There is very little I like about Max Mosley, including the outrageous damages he got from The Sun (not to mention the joke that indulging his sex games in German and in prison uniform had NUFFINK to do, M'Lud, with his family's history) , but his immediate admission that yes, this was was what floated his boat, was the only way to go.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

...and bear in mind that Letterman behaved a lot worse than Giggs. His abuse of employees was systematic and backed by his position as boss, with the implied consequences. But he played the system well, as one would expect a smart old media whore/fox like him to.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

BTW, if I am correct Miss Thomas is unmarried. That makes her a fornicator, but not an adulteress. She owed nothing to anyone; Giggs owed himself to his wife and children (and to umpteen kids who look up at him - I am thinking of my own soccer-loving childhood. To many young children of about ten, this will be their first painful initiation in the sleazier realities of life).

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

We won't agree on this. I think the core difference is that while I accept that the ultimate responsibility lies with Giggs, I do not believe that this absolve others (the press, Miss Thomas) from considering and being esponsible for the impact of actions they take subsequently.

All the same - nice to be be disagreeing with you again.
;)

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I shouldn't have allowed this to focus on Giggs. It's not about him, except in so far as he gleefully made use of a corrupt and repulsive system. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/may/22/nick-cohen-fred-goodwin-superinjunctions - I agree with every word. Reflect, in particular, on the catastrophic effect on the country and its people of the conspiracy between judges. lawyers and bankers.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

To quote from the article you linked

Despite the protests of tabloid editors, citizens have a right to privacy. No privacy and Google and Facebook could use your data as they pleased, police officers and prosecutors could force defendants to incriminate themselves and the state could spy on citizens without showing due cause. I doubt even the editor of the Daily Mail would welcome an "open society" quite as open as that.

But because the British are obsessed with and frightened of sex, we have reduced a complex legal debate to one question: who is pleasuring whom? I concede that the answers should generally remain private and that people have a right to keep their affairs to themselves, if and only if, there is no public interest in disclosure.

This seems closer to my position than yours? It now comes down to a discussion of what is in the public interest.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Google and Facebook DO use our data as they please, and it is only what the law allows of openness and investigation that even allows us to know that it is going on and do anything about it. You could not possibly have thought up a worse argument for a "right of privacy", and neither could Nick Cohen. And what on Earth is wrong with forcing a criminal to incriminate himself? I can see no moral objection against that, only a silly notion of criminal investigation as a gentlemanly game where everyone pulls up their stumps at the end, take off their shinpads and go home; but criminal investigation is investigation into evil things, and I see no reason why a criminal should shield himself behind a supposed right to privacy. As for the state spying on citizens without showing due cause, that is not corrected by another abuse, but by defining the rights and responsibilities of the State.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

I thought you agreed with every word of his article? I'm puzzled.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

So I was overenthusiastic.Have you never found an article that said so many things you agreed with, that you failed to notice one or two deadly items?

(BTW, Nick Cohen is one of the most fanatical and unreasoning atheists in the UK, so you don't have to think I agree with him on everything. But on freedom of thought, speech, expression and the Press, he is sound.)

[shezan.livejournal.com]

Nick Cohen is sound on quite a few things; and it's very difficult to find someone one agrees with 100%...

[shezan.livejournal.com]

I had not seen this on Fred The Shred! *hunkers down to read*

[fpb.livejournal.com]

And you a journalist, too. See how easy it is to suppress really significant stories?

[(Anonymous)]

good for you. The shabby deserve to be treated shabbily.

-mrmandias

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Actually, I'm not so much enraged at Mr.Giggs as the outrage against free speech being perpetrated by the whole legal profession in Britain. It is becoming easier and easier for any rich person to shut down discussion of their crimes or misdemeanours. This has to stop.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

Just to be clear. I would not defend anything that involved hiding a crime, that is when the public interest line has been crossed.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

AND HOW THE FUCK WOULD YOU KNOW THAT A CRIME HAS BEEN COMMITTED IF THE JUDICIARY CONSPIRE WITH THE CRIMINALS TO COVER IT UP??????????

Your confidence in the honesty and decendy of rich and powerful people is rather naive, and does not take into account the ways such people usually tend to become rich and powerful. Such men are always to be dreaded, and half of any properly democratic legislation must tend to break the weapons they inevitably have.

[stigandnasty919.livejournal.com]

A jury should decide when a crime is committed, not the editor of a newspaper

[fpb.livejournal.com]

You really are unwilling to believe that judges can be crooks. A jury? And when is a jury even going to hear what, according to the most recent outburst from the Bench, even Members of Parliament should not be allowed to say? And suppose the crooked judge in question just decided not to accept the jury's verdict, as they have been known to do?

[shezan.livejournal.com]

Who's the cookie? Wife or girlfriend?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Tart. (I would not call "girlfriend" someone who reportedly asked for £100,000 to shut up.)