Hadley Freeman Article About Graham LInehan

[Igneococcus]

Not actually read it yet but here for anybody who'd like to read:

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/6f23ce7c-596a-11ee-a62b-d21c2c8f0b9b?shareToken=3adab3e87e06a1d37788d0b2482f02b6

If Hadley had been at his Comedy Unleashed gig earlier this month, she'd have seen that there was A LOT of love, admiration and gratitude for Graham. It was sold out, and most of the people in the venue were there for him.

I am not as big a fan of his as some, I have thought a few of the ways he's gone after people cruel and spiteful and not always in women's best interests. He's abrasive online but in person, on stage, he had a really charming vulnerability.

He was visibly chuffed and humbled by the support. He announced his book and it very much felt in the air like he was turning a corner, so the timing of this does seem callous. I mean, give the man a full month at least to enjoy the support for his book before putting this out.

Re Mengele. I don't think anyone is accusing GI medics of being exactly like him. I certainly didn't but I think it's fair to say they're Mengele adjacent. Why? They know that the treatments they offer will have adverse effects on the children they're giving them to. Puberty blockers are known to be problematic if given in the short term. The longer they are given the more problematic they become. They KNOW that. They know that the results of puberty blockers are not reversible. It was claimed that they were with no real evidence. There was none because this use of them was experimental. The claims about suicide were also a lie. Sterility was and remains underplayed. That sort of treatment of vulnerable young people is egregious. Of course it's not the same as what Mengele did but there are definite parallels that it's difficult not to see. Of course the doctors and medics using these treatments aren't doing so because they fundamentally don't see their patients as human or worthy of care and compassion but there are many who don't care enough to stop and think about what it is that they are doing and it's impossible to look at all of this and not be aware that these young people face a life of medical treatment which means a lot of money for those involved in their "care" and for big pharma. All of this makes what they are doing highly questionable at the very least.

Tl;dr. No one thinks these people are exactly the same as Mengele but it's hard not to think about him or the whole lobotomy scandal.

I don't understand the constant comparisons between kjk and Graham. Graham was very successful and lost it all. Kjk was a nobody and has made a successful career for herself over trans.

That is an interesting and pertinent point @WanderinStar about the different trajectories of the 'careers' of Graham and KJK over this. Although obviously KJK has put her head above the parapet at the risk of her personal safety, which is huge.

I wonder @TommyNever . Will there really be a reckoning? I suspect the ' influencers' and ' content creators ' will just return to more mundane wittering. Until the next big thing comes along.

Who among them has the profile of their victims ? A couple of comedians maybe.

I agree with this except I do think it’s admirable. I very much admire it. This is the material whistleblowers are made of. I heard people explaining once why they didn’t listen to a whistleblower of a terrible scandal. ‘Oh well, he was such a difficult person’ they said. Well, of course. Whistleblowers are people who are prepared not to be liked, to destroy their careers, to do what their conscience mandates them to. They wouldn’t be whistleblowers if they were affable people pleasers!

we absolutely need these people and we should admire them. We owe them a huge debt.

I love KJK and admire her greatly. But she had the fortune of a devoted husband who finances the household. She had no job to lose, no living to lose. GL did.

I admire Glinner too. Courage like that is exceptional. Regardless of any perceived missteps he may have made in how he expressed himself (or so I hear, I’m not aware of it as I don’t follow twitter much) it’s a consistent and unwavering commitment to the truth.

I heard people explaining once why they didn’t listen to a whistleblower of a terrible scandal. ‘Oh well, he was such a difficult person’ they said.

Translation - she or he said something that they didn't want to hear and/or constantly asked questions and/or did not follow the herd. The whistleblower challenged the status quo and their place in it. Sh/e made them consider hard truths and remove the masks from their eyes and fingers from their ears. S/he made them uncomfortable.

That's a very interesting view, and one with which I find myself agreeing (from personal experience). There's a whole script in the human repertoire of defensiveness that's used to undermine whistle-blowers, that swings the dial from accusations of naivety through problemmatic behaviour to a state of madness.

S/he doesn't really understand the complexities like we do;
Someone's put them up to it;
S/he is after money;
S/he has got a drink problem;
S/he has got family problems and that's all their fault for making a big fuss;
S/he is a bit of a slag - probably jealous;
S/he may well have been vindicated, but fuck me it's left them bitter;
S/he went mad in the end, didn't you know? Very sad.

I think that's why I'm so very discomforted by HF's choice of words in parts of her article. Perilously close to the script in places.

Lord, I'm not advocating starting a mob to hound her employers to force her to apologise or be sacked, for no-one to ever publish her work again.

I'm saying if you unintentionally hurt someone, and you can see legitimacy in why they are hurt, you apologise to them. That is what I do. Surely that is just what normal, decent people do?

Of course, if she 'wrote what she meant' and understood how it would be received and does not care, she should not apologise. But from my point of view, and many others, including the person it was about, it was a crappily toned and quite cruel article. And if she can in retrospect see that, and feels bad about it, she should apologise. That would just be the decent thing to do.

I hope we can still live in a world where most of us can see the difference between terrorising people into abasing themselves with insincere apologies and those who genuinely see they got something wrong, feel bad about it, and say 'I'm sorry'.

My post has gone so there's not much point pursuing it, Abhannmor.

The post didn't offend the Mumsnet Guidelines but it seems this place is policed by the TRAs and the mods are happy to do their bidding, so I won't be posting here again.

Good luck to those with more patience who persevere.

It's on par with the criticism of Kelly J. Keene as in there is a 'but' that they didn't oppose trans activism in the correct way, they should have done it in a nicer way, they should have done it less forcefully keeping everybody on board.

That he fought it so hard and lost his job is criticised as being the wrong way, he is brave but 'too brave' and this is seen as a character flaw.

She doesn't see that the fact that he has lost work and was asked to remove his name from his musical Father Ted is madness, is censorship, is THE PROBLEM and that she is looking at him implying that he has done wrong when she stopped writing to him - nothing, nothing if we had freedom of the press, nothing but express an opinion.

I agree, Molotovcupcakes. The pious, condescending tone of the article is really jarring when the gist of the article is that Graham Linehan should have been more craven and cowardly, as Hadley's friends convinced her to be.
I think she's also being deliberately deceitful about his supposed use of Nazis for comparison. I'll copy from a pp the link to the podcast where he explains what he actually said, what Pink News then said, the interview where they only gave him five minutes, etc:

God, the patience he shows with the podcast interviewer is astonishing.

Also, I hope Hadley Freeman is not intimidated or embarrassed into apologising. She said what she said, and it's up to the rest of us to respond or reflect on that, not to monster her.

well I for one haven't really got spare time in the week to monster anyone, so it won't be me doing it.

This is well said.

Agreed.

This ^. Having read the article I think less of Hadley Freeman than I did previously. Hadley played it carefully and covered her arse and hung on in there at the Guardian filing 'is she or isn't she GC?' articles for years. Meanwhile Graham came out fighting full-on for safeguarding and the protection of children and women years and years ago. I know which one of them I think most highly of.

Poorly played, Hadley.

It’s amazing how some people expect GL, the comedic genius, to be measured and conservative in his opinions! I have and am mightily impressed by his bravery and honesty …viva graham. At his most angry and pushed he has only ever stepped as far as ridicule unlike the truly hateful and dangerous TRA’s who regularly call for rape, abuse and murder.. you know the kind ones! Of course all trans people are not like that I always had a soft spot for anyone who wanted to be a transsexual but have equally always sensed the misogyny in over sexualized drag. Taking the p* out of extreme femininity, a disdain and hatred that is obvious.
Graham refuted all that he has an incredible insight into people’s minds as seen in his comedies and never vicious often teasing always funny. He could see potential abuse a mile off and called it out.

I compare KJK and GL because of their approach not their background.

They both absolutely live in this topic and speak plainly, and angrily. They are not 'nice', they are uncompromising and say what they think.

And like others keep saying, we owe them for saying publicly what we really want to, really going to the ugly nub of things but most of us haven't the nerve.

The difference is that KJK thrives in this, but GL has suffered. I think GL was born to do comedy but KJK was born to do this debate. Hats off to them both, we're lucky to have them.

Hadley, if you're reading this...

I saw the Motherland pilot on the BBC and a quick google tells me that the first series was also commissioned by the BBC, which is why I saw it on BBC2 IIRC. Not Channel 4. Father Ted and The IT Crowd were Channel 4.

Like PPs I would not want Hadley to make an apology especially if she feels she is in the right.
Better to give it a while and write a better , more honest piece.
Btw @molotovcupcakes is a brilliant user name !