BARE FACTS

I said I would write something about THOSE pics that appeared on TMZ.  I have only just got round to it.  But there are issues here that are worth discussing.

I think it's fair to say that, outside of Britain, comments were mostly jokey and dismissive.  There were some who thought that the #3 to the Throne might behave better, but, frankly, the children of the Heir to Throne (and particularly siblings out of the real running) have traditionally behaved badly.  That might partly be because they have nothing to lose; it might partly be because they have lots of money and lots of time; it may be because everybody wants to party with Royalty and there is a good chance they might get to do so with a sibling (as opposed to the better protected Heirs); or it may just be an indolent descent into louche society, since they don't really have a role (once they've risen through the military ranks and done a bit of charity).  That's not to excuse Harry necessarily, but it is probably why most people here seemed merely to shrug their shoulders and raise their eyes heavenwards.  Even TMZ's capture of the photographs had an oddly jubilent note about it and was not at all judgemental or even salacious.  I therefore thought the incident was going to die a death.

Over here, the Palace alerted the Press Complaints Commission to the fact that publication of the photographs here might infringe Harry's privacy.  The press were informed of this contact through the normal procedures (not warned off, as some arch liberals asserted) and the press as one decided to publish the story but not the pictures.  Again, it seemed as though that would be it.  Nobody showed a great deal of interest in the story.  But then The Sun newspaper broke ranks and published.  They said they had done so, both in the public interest and because, since everyone had by then seen the photographs, there was no point anymore in holding them back.  They didn't say so, but the inference was that Harry's privacy had already been infringed and further propagation of the pics could not constitute an infringement by The Sun.

Although no one showed much interest in the affair before this, there have so far been several thousand complaints to the PCC about The Sun's actions.  It seems that the British public does feel that publication of private or intimate photographs of celebrities is an infringement of privacy.

I say 'celebrities', even though the term is much misused these days, because the whole point about the Leveson Inquiry is that the media overstepped the mark in trying to obtain and publish private information about famous people with a claim to celebrity.  Sometimes such gossip is justified and of public interest, such as when the celebrity's public stance is shown to be a fraud; sometimes it is merely self-serving, such as photographs of celebrities deliberately exposing themselves to gain publicity; and sometimes it is of no real interest at all, such as 'celebrity dumps boy/girlfriend and goes to party with someone else'.  Well, I suppose someone somewhere might find that last example really interesting, but the question is whether the newspaper with the biggest circulation in Britain should be bothering with such fluff.  Of course it is the accumulation of such fluff that probably sells The Sun, but that's another matter.

The point is that the Harry story became something much more here than a tale of naughty goings-on by a celebrity.  The Sun clearly took the view that, post-Leveson (or at least, since the Inquiry hasn't yet reached a conclusion, post-The Sun's evidence to Leveson) the media had to reassert its independence.  Not publishing photographs that were freely available, just because a possible infringement of privacy might occur, was clearly a step too far for the free press.  Having said that, it was only The Sun (and one assumes the slightly bruised Rupert Murdoch) that took that view.  Now we have to see whether the PCC has any teeth post-Leveson in the face of several thousand complaints from the public.  But, frankly, I'm not sure it matters either way.  The Palace has since not complained and said that the decision to publish is ultimately one for the editors.  Quite right.  And several thousand complaints is not actually so many from a population of many millions.  But none of those complaints has come from the Palace, Harry's legal representatives or anyone connected with the Royals at all.  So, bully for The Sun for showing that the press in Britain is still free.  But have they really done so in fact?
 
Do these photographs really shine a light on anything important?  We all knew of the story.  Many of us had looked in on TMZ's website. The decision smacks rather of Murdoch's continued power games.  He more than anyone suffered from the phone hacking and related scandals.  He clearly didn't want to remain cowed.  Yet publishing something that no one involved complains about seems to me not much of a bold disclosure nor much of a brave revelation by an unbowed campaigner.

But was privacy really an issue here?  There are two angles to this - one, should Harry have expected anything happening in his private suite to remain private?  Well, yes, he should.  And, two, in inviting up to his room a bunch of people he had just picked up in the bar, especially with everyone having a camera in their pocket these days, should he have accepted that he was giving up his right to privacy?  Actually, no, I think.  It is an unfortunate fact that almost any pic of Harry that night would have fetched a fair price from the gossip press.  So, if he insists on cavorting with strangers, he is putting his privacy on the line and must expect it to be infringed.  I think it is a sad reflection on today and I feel sorry that he can't really guarantee privacy, but that's the way it is.  What the newspapers decide to do about it is another matter.  He still has a right to privacy when he is off duty, but it's not a right that can be easily maintained.  No other British newspaper felt the need to flex its muscles in the way The Sun understandably did and they all presumably took the view that not publishing showed sympathetic restraint, if not a view that there was a lack of interest or even that publishing was a pointless gesture, once the story was out.  Personally, especially since the photographs were such poor quality and so unrevealing, I think they added nothing at all to the story.  And since the story was such a non-story, I think it was adequately dealt with on the first day, by referring to TMZ.  I'm not aware whether The Sun sold vastly more copies of its newspaper that day, but I suspect not.

Now, another question.  Did Harry do anything wrong?  Did that over-ride any claim to privacy and justify publishing the photographs?  OK, he's a senior Royal and maybe could be more stayed in his behaviour.  According to his friends, when the camera appeared, he was in fact gallantly, but probably foolishly, trying to shield the naked girl.  The two quickly left the room at that point to avoid further embarrassment.  But, whether that's true or not, he's single; he was understandably letting off steam before returning to arduous and dangerous military duty; he certainly wasn't doing anything illegal; I don't even think he let anyone down really.  Boris Johnson's Tweet was probably the view of most people here - "The real scandal would be if you went all the way to Las Vegas and you didn't misbehave in some trivial way.'  So, again, had there not been a freedom of the press issue, imagined or otherwise, the pics were best kept private and the story hardly ought to have deserved so many pages.

But the final point (at least it is one made by The Sun) is whether the public interest was really served by publishing the photographs.  I think we ought to distinguish here between 'the public interest' and 'public interest'.  I think these are different things.  I don't rush out and buy The Sun when I hear that there is a scandalous pic published in it.  But if there is a story (or maybe even a photograph) in the newspaper I buy, which refers to something I didn't know about or which sheds light on something currently being debated publicy, I think it's fair to say that there is public interest in that item.  And I guess I am interested in seeing pics of famous people doing silly things, even if I don't rush out to get hold of them (the pics, not the famous people).  But the public interest is served only when the newspaper reveals something that has been kept from public knowledge - a revelation about secret or illegal activity, the real reason for a Government policy, a new tax that has an effect not publicly announced, etc.  I might actually rush out and buy a newspaper carrying that story.  But I don't think a pic of a naked Prince is in that league at all.  I don't even think that publishing the pic against requests for privacy is in the public interest.  I do think that having the courage to publishing something that has been suppressed, in the face of some sanction or legal action, is a noble and legitimate act.  The Sun's action was about something else.

In fact I think it's a great pity the story is still being written about and given airtime.  Oh . . .

WHISTLES, TRUMPETS AND HORNS

There have been interesting developments lately involving secrecy.  I give some of my time to the local District Council, by chairing a committee which examines complaints against Councillors.  Of course, I start from the position that the Councillor is not guilty unless proven otherwise.  But it wouldn’t occur to me to look critically at the complainant for revealing sensitive information about the activities of the Council or the proceedings of the committee on which he sits.  In fact, when we wrote our Code of Conduct some while ago, we inserted a clause which says that we will respect and not punish whistleblowers, or something along those lines.

The situation in America seems to be becoming less tolerant than that.  Of course, terrorism has become the new neurosis.  But there have been a number of cases recently of investigation of citizens for espionage or inappropriate use of position or ‘exceeding authority’, etc, when what they have actually done is shed some light on the hidden activities of the administration.  This smacks a little of authoritarianism, if not guilt.  I do believe that there should be some limits on such revelations, but I also think we should know what our democratically elected representatives are actually doing.  This illiberal trend certainly won’t help the case of Bradley Manning.  I don’t expect him to be given the death sentence, but I don’t suppose the ‘no criminal intent’ defence will get him off either.

In this country, at another level, we had the fascinating period of the super-injunction, when celebs (mostly footballers it seemed) would obtain a court order preventing anyone (usually the press and a woman they’d shagged) from saying anything in public about their nefarious activities.  The justification was that disclosure would harm their family life, as though it was the whistleblower that caused the harm, rather than the shagger himself.  What was really interesting was that the press were not even permitted to reveal that a super-injunction had been granted.  That too was secret.  I think all that has stopped now.  But, who knows?  I haven’t been told.

One of these cases sort of came to court the other day, when the subject of a super-injunction had to apologise for words spoken about the object of a super-injunction.  We’re not allowed to know that there was a super-injunction of course.  Isn’t the law wonderful?!  So we’re not to know the name of the footballer (or it might have been a film star or a politician) who was granted the super-injunction, but because he said some disparaging words about the alleged object of the super-injunction, he was taken to court and had to apologise publicly, even though there might not have been a super-injunction.  Are you with me so far?  In court, the shaggee was known as ‘CTB’ to protect her identity and the shagger was known as ‘RJG’ to protect his family.  After the case, Imogen Thomas made a public statement outside the court saying that she was relieved (which was probably the point of the alleged incident in the first place) and vindicated, but of course couldn’t say who she was or what she was relieved about.  The press then reported the whole story with the real names of those involved (since there is no injunction on this subsequent case).  Well, at least secrecy was maintained, the super-injunction wasn’t broken and Ryan Giggs name didn’t come out as the shagger in the woodpile.

We have also seen the US military withdraw from Iraq.  No secrecy was involved here of course, but one interesting outcome of all the secrecy that had gone before was that the military had signally failed to win over hearts and minds, which, as we all know, is the second most important role of the military overseas.  The debate about whether we should have invaded Iraq or whether the cost was worthwhile I leave to history.  But, since they have been in Iraq, the US has improved electricity generation and transmission, improved irrigation and drainage and increased the amount of land under agriculture, created a new sewage collection and treatment system, increased civil aviation capacity and upgraded airports, repaired the fibre-optic network and built a new telephone exchange, increased oil production and reduced import dependence, built prisons, barracks, entry points, and equipped and trained the military, security forces and police, not to mention establishing local administrative committees and democratic elections.  It’s not perfect, but it’s not a bad state to leave the country in. 

But somehow this information has not permeated down to the Iraqi population.  If there’s one thing that needed not to be kept secret, surely it was this.  Now's the chance to get Wikileaks to leaflet the population.  Ask any Iraqi what they think about the US withdrawing and they will say ‘good riddance’, ‘they didn’t do anything for us, except maybe kill my brother’, ‘things were better under Saddam’, etc.  What a waste.  All that expense and cost and all that has been created is resentment and maybe hatred.  If ever there was a need for whistleblowers!  Or at least blowing one’s own trumpet.  Or is it tooting one’s own horn?

GOON FISHING

OK, there's an irony about the Assange camp complaining about being forced to give up details of his private communications.  But, whatever we thought about Wikileaks, I think we should all feel uncomfortable with the latest US Government subpoena.

As things stand, Assange has not committed a crime.  We may believe that publishing classified information that is already in the public domain is a crime; we may think that making publicly available sensitive military information received from a whistleblower is a crime; we may hold that publishing information without checking its source is somehow a crime; we may suspect that a rape of two women has been committed in Sweden and that that makes him a criminal anyway.  But, at the moment, the courts do not recognise any of this as a proven crime. 

Assange’s whereabouts are known and he is on bail.  He is not yet a criminal and he is not charged with any crime relating to Wikileaks.  In fact, whistleblowing is a legitimate, non-criminal activity.  I don’t know what happens in America, but many government organisations here have to spell out that they will not prosecute whistleblowers.  And publishing the information received from whistleblowers is not necessarily criminal either, especially when, as in the Wikileaks case, it so blatantly didn’t affect national security and merely exposed the shocking over-classification of material and the enormous public expense needed to protect it. 

So, gathering enormous amounts of data to try to find evidence of some criminal activity is extraordinary.  The manpower to be used in collecting all this information and pains-takingly sifting through it will be an incredible drain on government resources.  The cost to tax-payers of pursuing this is incalculable.  But it goes further than that.

Every message to the Assange operation will be scrutinised too.  I managed to restrain myself from writing to him saying, jolly good show, or whatever, but maybe you said something to him?  There are at least 2m followers of Assange on Facebook and Twitter alone.  But now I’ve commented here (I don’t remember whether I Tweeted about him), all my personal details will presumably be combed through.  And what have I blogged about that might offend the US or UK Governments?  And what crime will be found to prosecute me for my views?  Or will ‘free speech’ prevail?

The only official comments on all this seem be that the trawl is part of ‘an ongoing criminal investigation’.  There is no explanation of what the crime might actually be, although it seems as though retaliation, embarrassment about the leaked material and the resulting reluctance of other countries now to tell America anything confidential are the most important triggers for this obsessive reaction.  And one official suggested that the subpoenaed material will help show where Assange has been and where his operations have been.  Well, we know where he is and, except for making it possible to disrupt his operation (though it seems not to be illegal) or target his supporters (who don’t appear to have committed a crime), where he has been won’t contribute much to the investigation.  Of course Assange is probably only the excuse.  There are many more whose records will now be available for examination and we may eventually see prosecution orders made against others who have engaged in ‘anti-American’ activities.  Normally, it would be illegal to gather evidence in this way without concrete reasons to suspect a criminal offence.

I suppose this might seem like the investigation of Al Capone, whom no one much seemed to mind being prosecuted for tax evasion, even though he was head of a mass murdering gang.  But I don’t know that people feel the same way about Assange.  He’s hardly a mass murderer.  But there will be many of us whose normally private affairs will now be closely examined on the back of this ‘ongoing criminal investigation’.  We might even turn out to have committed some offence.  But, whatever you think about Assange, if we justify an entirely arbitrary trawl through our affairs to check whether any crimes have been committed, we have lost the freedom of the Internet and are one giant step nearer a Big Brother society, not just in America, but worldwide..  I wouldn’t have expected that from a liberal administration.