I am all for a free press, but......."

[Arachnophobic]

Sienna Miller having 10 men chase her down the road in the dark with their wide-angled lenses?

JK Rowling's 5 year-old having a journo's details planted into her school rucksack?

Madelaine McCann's siblings being scared in their own home due to the journos peering through their ground floor window?

WTF!!

Surely the problem here is that some sectors of the press can't tell the difference between "in the public interest" and "of interest to the public". Nancy66 brought up the MP's expenses thing, which the Torygraph broke the law in obtaining as they paid for stolen information. The thalidomide case back in the 1960s/70s was broken by the Times after some unlawful activity by its journalists. I don't think anyone can say that breaking the law to publicise these matters and get them addressed is wrong. It was totally in the public interest to uncover and publish these stories.

Who a celebrity is sleeping with or what colour knickers they are wearing isn't a matter of public interest. Sure, some members of the public will be interested in the information but that isn't the same. Certain sectors of the press need to have this point driven home to them, but not through draconian legislation.

I am surprised that there aren't contemporaneous records kept of why journalists have acted unlawfully and their reasons for doing so. Surely it would make sense to have an internal register at each newspaper or similar where the journalist has to make a representation to his seniors of what s/he did to obtain the information and if they broke the law what their reasons for doing it were. If they have to justify their actions I think that activities like the phone hacking by NOTW journalists would decrease substantially.

afishyweddingfairy makes some very good points.

Surely the real problem is the public's voracious appetite for pureile stories?

I have absolutely no interest in the secrets of footballers, actresses, politicians, hangers-on or any other so-called 'celebrity'. The Mcanns are old news. Max Moseley's sordid habits are his own affair.

I know that the balance between freedom to publish and sensitivity is always going to be difficult but - and I may be pilloried for writing this - I hardly ever buy newspapers now because as far as I am concerned even the 'qualities' try to pass opinion and gloss as fact.

Much of the evidence at the Leveson inquiry has been shocking, particularly from the McCanns. What I don't understand is how or why this stuff is legal. Why is it legal to bang on someone's window so you can take a photo of them looking shocked? Why is it legal to publish the contents of someone's private diary? Why is it legal to pursue someone in a car down the street, just because you want a photo of them? Why is it legal to persistently harass them with phone calls? Why is it legal to put a camera up someone's skirt to take a photograph? This baffles me, though not so much as it baffles me that people justify this in the name of a "free press".

But you can't judge whether the end justified the means until the story's published. If you try to define limits, your double-dealing Minister could claim the papers were investigating his private choices rather than his dereliction of duty (indeed, this is what they tell themselves), and the story would be strangled by the law even more than it is already.

I happen to think that people who cock up their marriages don't deserve public protection. Anybody, regardless of station, who engages in extra-marital shenanigans, tries to keep it secret because they are being dishonest. When the media find them out, it simply means they were too dishonest and didn't keep it secret enough.

The McCanns' children have not sought public attention, but their mother has. She knows the risks and, having chosen to take them, should have guarded her DC better imo. (Talking about the photos, not the abduction.)

I think afishyweddingfairy has it spot on. It's the difference between 'in the public interest' and 'of interest to the public'. If you can't tell the difference then you shouldn't be a journalist, or at the least should have an editor who can tell the difference.
The press undoubtedly do a lot of public good in exposing certain corrupt practices, like the MP expenses stuff.

But at what point does any decent human being think to themselves 'I know - I'll interefere in the search for a missing child.' As someone else posted, rights come with responsibilities. If you can't act responsibly, then you lose your rights. Clearly the code of conduct meant less than nothing to some individuals, so what next? Those individuals who stooped to unbelievable lows (I'm thinking the McCann situation and the Dowlers) have to be stopped - it is not just the individual journalists but, for example, editors, who failed. There needs to be a much tighter control on this because clearly self-regulation has gone badly wrong somewhere.

"The McCanns' children have not sought public attention, but their mother has. She knows the risks and, having chosen to take them, should have guarded her DC better imo."

Wtf? Why is the onus on her to protect her children rather than on the journos and photographers to behave like decent human beings? Exactly how is she supposed to protect her children when photographers are banging on her windows, following her down the street etc?

And anyway, why does "seeking public attention" (ie asking for help in finding your missing child) mean that you then deserve any shit that happens to you? I find this attitude completely mind-boggling.

Why are there no real uncovered stories like tobacco firms being corrupt or rape and abuse of women worldwide? Why are we bombarded with stories about slebs and families of victims? News used to inform it now thinks of profit over content. I want to read something that gives me news and insight. And sport is never front page.

How would you guard your kids then, garlic? I'm just trying to think myself into her position. Child goes missing, and you move heaven and earth to try and find her including going to the papers? Well, so would I. If splashing her face all over everything meant that there was a better chance that someone recognised her and could get her back to me, then I'd do it. Especially in the emotional turmoil that having your daughter gone must bring.
Now, fast forward a year or so. People are banging on your car windows to get pics of your kids - how exactly do you guard against that? Short of never ever letting your kids leave the house? The younger children should never go anywhere or have a normal life because their older sister went missing and their mother did everything she could think of to get her back?
Do you not think that there is a difference between courting media because you want to be a celebrity, and courting the media because you think there might be an outside chance that it might help find your child?

Kate McCann needed publicity so we would talk about her little girl. That shouldn't mean that she is then under such scrutiny that her remaining children are frightened. How many names of missing children do you remember? I only know Maddie's.

Free Press v Responsible Press.

BIG DIFFERENCE.

And hands up who HASN'T read gossip articles about X, Y, Z celeb.

Its all very well blaming the newspapers but if you are reading this shit, you are creating demand. Think about it every time you click on a gossip article online.

We all have a shared responsibility for what ultimately gets printed or reported.

Are you feeding the monster?

Guarded them how Garlic?

Not taken them out? Kept the curtains closed all day every day? Made them wear masks? Plastic surgery?

Her child went missing and she asked for help, gave interviews, wrote a book. That shouldn't mean the entire family have to be harassed for the rest of their lives for the sake of a photo the public don't really want to see anyway.

Slebs manage it. You seek the devil's assistance, you play by the devil's rules. The media do not exist to serve individuals on request.

I guessed the McCann comment would draw indignant fire, but what about the bigger point? If some pap took a photo of me accidentally flashing my knickers, I'd be very bemused and a bit cross - but it ain't gonna happen, because I'm not newsworthy. If I'd sought national attention for some reason, I'd be aware I couldn't control the level of that attention and take appropriate measures (like waxing regularly and buying new pants )

This is a bit of a sidetrack, but wrt to posie's point ... uncovered stories like tobacco firms being corrupt or rape and abuse of women worldwide ... I'm not in the habit of supporting Piers Morgan but, in the case of the Iraq torture pictures, he published knowing the story was true and also knowing the pictures were probably fake. He broke a code of conduct in the interest of telling the real story. With the resources he had available to him, that shows just how fiercely big stories are covered up. If we outlaw spying methods, even fewer of them will be told.

I am sort of with you but cameras and notepads should not be a shield to law.

agree with a fishyweedingday- great post.

Its not about as free press. Its about respecting people and offering them some dignity. As for "i'd laugh if a picture showing my knickers was published"- bullshit. You'd be humiliated, angry, ashamed. Everytime you went for a job interview that picture would come up when the interviewer googles you. Your parents would see it. Your children, when they grow up, would find it. Its no small thing.

No story is worth what some of these papers do. And the papers who REALLY expose wrongdoing- wrongdoing we should care about- guardian/ torygraph- don't indulge in this gutter shit anyway.

The PCC are a joke- funded by papers and well in their pocket.

How dare they ruin lives to sell papers? the line if not blurry, its common sense. MP fiddlign expnses= public interest. Mr Smith a school teacher from Bath indulging in wife swapping parties= never in the public interest.

But it irritates me when journalists say : "well if you knew half about so-and-so that we do, you wouldn't be saying that..." and I think well why don't you tell me this big horrific thing about so-and -so then? Why always treating the public like ignorant children?

Why shouldn't Sienna Miller complain about her treatment? Because she's fame hungry? Because she has limited talent but huge celebrity? Whose fault's that exactly?

It's just a huge game.

garlic - tbh, I think that attitude is why things need to be tightened up.

If I were to hound another person/family, my behaviour would be considered unacceptable and reported to the police. It does not change anything just because I call myself a journalist. Apparently, though, being a reporter/photographer makes you immune to behaving like a reasonable human being. In which case, you need outside regulation as you clearly can't be trusted to think for yourself about what is appropriate.

You're right - the media do not exist to serve individuals. But neither do the exist to harass people who don't deserve it. What did Milly Dowler do, exactly, to merit having her voicemail hacked? The media exist to tell us what we need to know, not to generate funds by stalking people to find out things that really don't benefit us at all to know.

And you are not newsworthy now. If your child is taken, you may become newsworthy though not through choice. So are you fair game then?

No, the Dowler thing was disgusting and unwise.

The McCanns asked for the media cover.

When journalists harass the weak and anonymous - which they do very rarely - public outrage gets them to stop. There is a natural balance check, imperfect though it can be.

I stand by the necessity of a free press and would rather they spied on the powerful than not.

Sienna Miller ... fame hungry ... huge celebrity? Whose fault's that exactly?

Umm, hers

How is sienna miller fae hungry? shes an actress, that attracts publicity. But how is she fame hungry? shes just doing a job

Indeed - but Sienna Miller would be unknown if it wasn't for the press, they feed off each other.

I don't quite get this attitude of "if you court the press then you're fair game".

If you give one interview to the Press, does it really give them carte blanche to doorstep you, go through your bins, take long-lens photographs of you when you're on a family holiday?

Sounds to me a bit like the vampire folklore - they can't enter your home unless invited when everything and everyone in it is theirs for the taking.

The really distressing story coming from this was the hope that the Dowlers had that their daughter must be alive because her phone records showed activity due to the papers phone hacking.

The Macanns managed to gag the press in the aftermath of the disappearance & are in another category altogether.

fantasticvoyages post

If you give one interview to the Press they will not be going through your rubbish & hacking your email, unless the Press have reason to believe you're dodgy in a big way. The benefits fraud team, however, or the tax office, might; even your local council might. And so will the Government if they don't like what you said in your interview (viz David Kelly inter alia).

Why shouldn't the democratic media - our voice - use the same measures as our rulers?

Re Sienna Miller (again) - I don't think you'll find many aspiring actors saying they want to be world stars but not have any publicity! How would that work?

There was a story a while ago about Madonna always stepping out in the same track suit. It meant any papped shots of hers were impossible to date because she was wearing the same thing in all of them.

I see the celebrity pact with the press more as a kind of Godfather thing - with the with James Murdoch in the Michael Corleone sociopath role. Andy Coulson as Sonny...