There were 3 posts about this which were surprisingly popular - until I took them down.
I took them down because I heard Lord McAlpine (who I hadn't mentioned in them)'s solicitor talking about the law of defamation on the PM programme last night. The thing that upset me is that he said repeating rumours could result in legal action. Now, I didn't write about Lord M, and the man I wrote about hasn't been mentioned much - although there has been a prodigious bit of rumour swirling around him. Perhaps he is lying doggo - hoping it will all blow over and there will be another D-notice or injunction supported cover-up like last time.
I spent yesterday evening in a gloom (there was another factor) and woke up this morning feeling very angry. How dare I be told what I could and couldn't write? This has never happened to me before. I wasn't writing anything salacious, or giving any details - because I didn't know any. I did want to discuss more widely why these rumours arise and why we are so interested in them and what we want out of them. It is also true that I deeply dislike, distrust and despise the Tory party (pace individual "good Tories"). I would be delighted to discover that the abuse and the cover-ups were enough to bring them down. But, solipsistically, what really upset me was being told that there were limits to what I could write publicly - and that I certainly could not write my inner thoughts in public if they concerned a public person.
I can see that were I a well-known writer I would not want rumours of my sexual pecadilloes (historic) to be revealed in the press - even though I've done nothing that any sexually adventurous woman of my generation probably hasn't done or tried. But would I take out an injunction (if I were wealthy enough)? I don't think so. I'd do a frank public interview and discuss the rumours and what I thought about them and hope to be convincing enough to change people's minds about me, and if that didn't work, I'd have to live with it.
Lord M has finally given the interview (I had forgotten the rumour about him, because he doesn't register on my radar much). He has been distressed and disgusted, and on the whole, I think if he'd come out and said this twenty years ago it might have had more effect, or indeed if someone had tried to get Messhams to identify his abuser earlier this might have helped too...it should have quashed the rumours at the time. So why don't public people adopt this tactic? Why do they think lying doggo is a better one? Perhaps it does work most of the time - it seems to work for the man I wrote about, but arguably it may work well for him because he may be completely innocent.
I do know one thing about Lord M though - during the 80's when I worked at Lazards, his family firm were clients. One of our directors was quite chummy with him. Lord M used to invite said director to (charity?) boxing matches at the Cafe Royal I think. Well, to be accurate I know he did this on at least one occasion. This is all legal and above board, but perhaps I won't be the only person who thinks the glorious tradition (dating to Byron and beyond) of upper class men watching young fit working class men beating 7 bells out of each other, is not entirely attractive or without an element of the homoerotic/paederastic. The Ancient Greeks would have understood this very well, English people are shy of admitting it.
I took them down because I heard Lord McAlpine (who I hadn't mentioned in them)'s solicitor talking about the law of defamation on the PM programme last night. The thing that upset me is that he said repeating rumours could result in legal action. Now, I didn't write about Lord M, and the man I wrote about hasn't been mentioned much - although there has been a prodigious bit of rumour swirling around him. Perhaps he is lying doggo - hoping it will all blow over and there will be another D-notice or injunction supported cover-up like last time.
I spent yesterday evening in a gloom (there was another factor) and woke up this morning feeling very angry. How dare I be told what I could and couldn't write? This has never happened to me before. I wasn't writing anything salacious, or giving any details - because I didn't know any. I did want to discuss more widely why these rumours arise and why we are so interested in them and what we want out of them. It is also true that I deeply dislike, distrust and despise the Tory party (pace individual "good Tories"). I would be delighted to discover that the abuse and the cover-ups were enough to bring them down. But, solipsistically, what really upset me was being told that there were limits to what I could write publicly - and that I certainly could not write my inner thoughts in public if they concerned a public person.
I can see that were I a well-known writer I would not want rumours of my sexual pecadilloes (historic) to be revealed in the press - even though I've done nothing that any sexually adventurous woman of my generation probably hasn't done or tried. But would I take out an injunction (if I were wealthy enough)? I don't think so. I'd do a frank public interview and discuss the rumours and what I thought about them and hope to be convincing enough to change people's minds about me, and if that didn't work, I'd have to live with it.
Lord M has finally given the interview (I had forgotten the rumour about him, because he doesn't register on my radar much). He has been distressed and disgusted, and on the whole, I think if he'd come out and said this twenty years ago it might have had more effect, or indeed if someone had tried to get Messhams to identify his abuser earlier this might have helped too...it should have quashed the rumours at the time. So why don't public people adopt this tactic? Why do they think lying doggo is a better one? Perhaps it does work most of the time - it seems to work for the man I wrote about, but arguably it may work well for him because he may be completely innocent.
I do know one thing about Lord M though - during the 80's when I worked at Lazards, his family firm were clients. One of our directors was quite chummy with him. Lord M used to invite said director to (charity?) boxing matches at the Cafe Royal I think. Well, to be accurate I know he did this on at least one occasion. This is all legal and above board, but perhaps I won't be the only person who thinks the glorious tradition (dating to Byron and beyond) of upper class men watching young fit working class men beating 7 bells out of each other, is not entirely attractive or without an element of the homoerotic/paederastic. The Ancient Greeks would have understood this very well, English people are shy of admitting it.
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