I have already discussed Niemoeller's prayer in a previous blog post, and it is now relevant to mention it again. Just a few days ago, on 4 January 2017, the Metro newspaper published its first ever editorial comment. It was on the subject of press freedom.
For many years the press in the United Kingdom was regulated by an organisation called the Press Complaints Commission. In September 2014 this was replaced by the Independent Press Standards Organisation. The government is now considering putting pressure on the British press to register instead with a regulatory body called Impress, which is largely funded by Max Mosley. Any newspaper which does not register with it would do so at the risk of financial ruin.
As an aside, in 2008 Max Mosley successfully sued a national newspaper which had reported on him indulging in a sex orgy with five prostitutes.
A few years ago I made numerous complaints to the Press Complaints Commission about factual inaccuracies in newspapers, one of which involved myself. Not one of these complaints was upheld, and in not one case did the newspaper in question even admit the possibility that they might be in error.
The Metro comment makes reference to the role of the press in reporting the Rotherham sex grooming scandal, but this is hardly their strongest card. Paedophile grooming gangs have been operating in the north west of England for far longer than the seventeen years in which the Metro has been in print. In which year did the Metro first report on it? In which year did any other national newspaper first report on it?
The truth is that it was almost entirely the efforts of the British National Party which dragged this sordid matter into the public domain, and yet I cannot think of a single British newspaper which has ever acknowledged this. In fact I cannot think of a single British newspaper which has ever said anything remotely positive about any patriotic political party.
On the one hand I do not want the British press to be cajoled into submission by an overbearing government, but on the other hand I wish that the people in charge of the British press would display at least some humility regarding their many failures.
Related previous posts include:
Britain First and Niemoeller's prayer
Of Jews and paedophiles
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