A town called sue (part 2)

How the best journalism is punished while the worst prospers

A few days ago, I sent out a Lowdown podcast discussion on David Hooper’s new book on legal intimidation in the London courts. I have campaigned against it throughout my career. In 2013 I wrote my own book on censorship which I wittily entitled (even if I do say so myself) You Can’t Read This Book I included a whole chapter on the menace the English law posed. I used every trick I knew to convince readers that it needed reform. In the second part I looked at how it was often the best, not the worst, writing the law punished.

This is the second of a three-part series. It is for paying subscribers I am afraid. But worry not. It only cost £1.15 a week to subscribe, and there is a free trial.

Part one is here

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Robert Maxwell, father of Ghislaine, and employer of a small army of libel lawyers

Writing in Stilted English

Nothing destroys clichés about the gentle temperament of the British so thoroughly as reading what the British read. In political journalism, the British pick their side and line up their targets. Right-wingers inflame prejudices against gypsies, immigrants and all public-sector workers except the police and the armed forces. Left-wingers inflame prejudices against social conservatives, Jews, and all members of the upper and upper-middle classes except the public-sector great and good.

Both suspect the white poor. The right regard them as scroungers, who steal the money of the middle classes, either by breaking into their homes or by taking their taxes in benefit cheques. The left regard them as sexist and racist homophobes.

The chavs or the toffs, the niggers or the yids – the thuggish British journalist never forgets that hate sells better than sex.