Telegraph columnist Alison Pearson received a knock on the door on the morning of Remembrance Sunday from Essex Police informing her that she was under investigation for allegedly stirring up racial hatred in a tweet last year;[1] one of many she had posted concerning the Hamas massacre of Israeli civilians on 7th October, the consequent bloody assault by Israel on the Gaza Strip and the weekly demonstrations it generated of pro-Palestinian and anti-war protestors in London and [2] other major UK and European cities.
The offending post was a retweet by Pearson of a photograph put up several months ago showing a group of people of colour posing with flags on a British street, flanked by three police officers. An angry Ms Pearson tweeted this condemnation of the London Metropolitan police:
How dare they. Invited to pose with lovely peaceful Friends of Israel on Saturday police refused. Look at this lot smiling with the Jew-haters.[3]
She later asserted in a post on X, that she had deleted her “fairly innocuous” tweet a year ago and complained that despite advice from senior lawyers that her tweet did “not come near the threshold for criminal prosecution”, Essex Police upgraded the accusation from Non-Crime Hate Incident (NCHC) to offence under the Public Order Act. (3).
So far, so outrageous for those who have made careers out of and banked so much populist capital about the snowflake, speech code tyrants and the ‘two tier’ policing arrangements that have been in situ since the far-right inspired riots in the aftermath of the Southport triple child murders. For Ms Pearson and her employers, the “Kafkaesque” process that she has had to endure represents an affront to free speech and freedom of the press. An issue that is also in the in-tray of the new Conservative Party leader, Kemi Badenoch who has previously told the Telegraph that hate crime laws must be reviewed to protect free speech.[4]
Except that the truth is rather less straightforward than the free speech warriors against woke would have everyone believe. Firstly, the picture is from Manchester and the police officers in question are from Greater Manchester Police and not the Met. Second the flag displayed in the photo is not supportive of Hamas or any Palestinian resistance group but instead it is the green and maroon flag of the Pakistani political party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), founded by the imprisoned former PM of that country, Imran Khan. The word “Pakistan” is clearly written on it. In the words of the complainant, not a Muslim or one of those in the photo but a public servant with training in criminal law, Pearson’s implications that those in that photo are Hamas sympathisers and antisemitic are “racist and inflammatory” due to their skin colour. His motivation in making the complaint was every time a person of influence:
So far, so outrageous for those who have made careers out of and banked so much populist capital about the snowflake, speech code tyrants and the ‘two tier’ policing arrangements that have been in situ since the far-right inspired riots in the aftermath of the Southport triple child murders. For Ms Pearson and her employers, the “Kafkaesque” process that she has had to endure represents an affront to free speech and freedom of the press. An issue that is also in the in-tray of the new Conservative Party leader, Kemi Badenoch who has previously told the Telegraph that hate crime laws must be reviewed to protect free speech.[4]
Except that the truth is rather less straightforward than the free speech warriors against woke would have everyone believe. Firstly, the picture is from Manchester and the police officers in question are from Greater Manchester Police and not the Met. Second the flag displayed in the photo is not supportive of Hamas or any Palestinian resistance group but instead it is the green and maroon flag of the Pakistani political party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), founded by the imprisoned former PM of that country, Imran Khan. The word “Pakistan” is clearly written on it. In the words of the complainant, not a Muslim or one of those in the photo but a public servant with training in criminal law, Pearson’s implications that those in that photo are Hamas sympathisers and antisemitic are “racist and inflammatory” due to their skin colour. His motivation in making the complaint was every time a person of influence:
makes negative comments about people of colour, I as a person of colour, see an uptick in racist abuse towards me and the days after that tweet are no different.[5]
Furthermore, Essex Police have stated that at no stage in their investigation was Ms Pearson informed that this was a NCHI. Having taken the unusual step of releasing body-worn video image of their encounter and part of their conversation with her, the Police do make it clear that “It’s gone down as an incident or offence of potentially inciting racial hatred online. They are liaising with the Crown Prosecution Service in connection with “an alleged offence and also complained to the media regulator IPSO over false reporting.[6]
Free Or Hate Speech?
Contemporary debates around free speech are fiercely contested across numerous terrains: ‘cancel culture’; sensitivities around race, gender and sexuality; the relationship between ‘hate speech’ and the incidence of violence; the role of clerical and other gatekeepers in policing what is acceptable speech and artistic expression in their communities; ‘safe spaces’ in universities and their role in hindering the critical faculties of students; diffused complaints that one cannot say what one thinks and feels for fear of ‘causing offence’ or falling foul of Political Correctness enforcers.
To try to come to a conclusion in the curious case of Alison Pearson and her tweets, it is best focus on what exactly is meant by hate speech and what are its dimensions. Since it figures so prominently in Ms Pearson’s protestations, we need to understand what a non-crime hate incident (NCHI) is. Under the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, NCHIs are recorded by the police to collect information of “hate incidents” which while not constituting criminal offences have the potential escalate into more serious harm or into inflammation of community tensions. They are defined as an incident entailing an act perceived to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards persons with particular ‘protected’ characteristics e.g. race religion, disability, sexuality, and transgender identity. They are below the criminal threshold but are kept on file. Personal data on the alleged transgressor should only be included in the reports if the incident in question poses “a real risk of significant harm” to individuals or groups with the afore mentioned protected characteristics.[7]
The writer, broadcaster and satirist Andrew Doyle begins his polemical defence of free speech by citing another ‘not crime hate incident’ episode that occurred in 2019. It concerns Harry Miller, a fifty-three-year-old entrepreneur and former constable, who was contacted by Humberside Police following a complaint by an offended party about a poem that he had shared on social media which was deemed to be transphobic. In the course of the conversation, Mr Miller sought clarification as to why he was being investigated for something that was not criminal. The seemingly Orwellian response was ‘We need to check your thinking.’[8] It should be noted that this investigation occurred before the clarification of NCHIs in the afore mentioned 2022 Act of Parliament.
Doyle then goes on to develop his argument that the experience of Harry Miller:
is one of many stories in which the principal of free speech has been casually disregarded for the sake of what is perceived to be a higher social priority.
He bemoans the emergence of a ‘new identity-based conceptualisation of social justice’ which ‘has brought with it a mistrust of unfettered speech and appeals for greater intervention from the state.’ He raises the spectre of ‘the well-intentioned authoritarian.’[9]
Doyle problematises the concept of hate speech by stating that ‘Hatred is an emotion that we learn to resist through the process of socialisation in youth’ and that acknowledgement of the perils of hatred ‘cannot eliminate the instinct and that, it many cases it may be warranted’ for example for the perpetrators of genocide, rape and torture, or, allowing for their supposed status as victims of a failed system, merely the cruelties on their own. It therefore follows, on Doyle’s account, that ‘hate speech’ as a concept and phenomenon ‘is not something that can be meaningfully defined;’ a reality that both UNESCO and the European Court of Human Rights accept,[10] he gleefully trumpets.
But all European countries have hate speech laws and ‘their continued use, abuse and expansion are having a profound effect on freedom of speech across the continent.’[11] Doyle furthermore poses the question as to who gets to define ‘hate speech’ in the first place. He critiques the “subjective perception” of the “victim” in the Crown Prosecution Service’s definition of ‘hate crime’ as ‘any criminal offence which is perceived by the victim or any other person to be motivated by hostility and prejudice, based on the protected characteristics listed earlier. The concept of the ‘victim,’ in his opinion, bypasses due process and presupposes guilt on the part of the accused, and he cautions that “law enforcement should not be in the business of auditing our emotions”.[12]
Related to Doyle’s concerns about the definition of hate speech is the definition of incitement or the distinction between words and violence. He points out that incitement to violence has always been an offence under English common law, but that the definition has also been open to subjective interpretation.[13] In a broad sweep of the effects of propaganda, the influence of mass media consumption, moral panics around “video nasties”; Mary Whitehouse’s ‘Clean Up TV campaign’; in the 1960s; the 1996 film “Trainspotting” accused of glamourising drug use and the 2019 film ‘Joker’ accused of facilitating the incel movement, he asserts that six decades of research into ‘media-effects theories has proved no secure evidence of a general correlation between public behaviour and mass media consumption.' [14] His basic stance in relation to hate speech is:
Doyle problematises the concept of hate speech by stating that ‘Hatred is an emotion that we learn to resist through the process of socialisation in youth’ and that acknowledgement of the perils of hatred ‘cannot eliminate the instinct and that, it many cases it may be warranted’ for example for the perpetrators of genocide, rape and torture, or, allowing for their supposed status as victims of a failed system, merely the cruelties on their own. It therefore follows, on Doyle’s account, that ‘hate speech’ as a concept and phenomenon ‘is not something that can be meaningfully defined;’ a reality that both UNESCO and the European Court of Human Rights accept,[10] he gleefully trumpets.
But all European countries have hate speech laws and ‘their continued use, abuse and expansion are having a profound effect on freedom of speech across the continent.’[11] Doyle furthermore poses the question as to who gets to define ‘hate speech’ in the first place. He critiques the “subjective perception” of the “victim” in the Crown Prosecution Service’s definition of ‘hate crime’ as ‘any criminal offence which is perceived by the victim or any other person to be motivated by hostility and prejudice, based on the protected characteristics listed earlier. The concept of the ‘victim,’ in his opinion, bypasses due process and presupposes guilt on the part of the accused, and he cautions that “law enforcement should not be in the business of auditing our emotions”.[12]
Related to Doyle’s concerns about the definition of hate speech is the definition of incitement or the distinction between words and violence. He points out that incitement to violence has always been an offence under English common law, but that the definition has also been open to subjective interpretation.[13] In a broad sweep of the effects of propaganda, the influence of mass media consumption, moral panics around “video nasties”; Mary Whitehouse’s ‘Clean Up TV campaign’; in the 1960s; the 1996 film “Trainspotting” accused of glamourising drug use and the 2019 film ‘Joker’ accused of facilitating the incel movement, he asserts that six decades of research into ‘media-effects theories has proved no secure evidence of a general correlation between public behaviour and mass media consumption.' [14] His basic stance in relation to hate speech is:
the idea of a passive public acting mechanically on cues from politicians, journalists and artists appears to have little basis in reality.[15]
Conclusion: The Case for the Prosecution
What is clear is that, at the outset, Alison Pearson has failed to carry out a basic duty of all journalists – to fact check. Had she done so, she would have established the true provenance of the photograph which attracted her ire. She weaponised antisemitism in the manner of many on the right of the political spectrum to delegitimise the bona fides of the majority of those who participate in Gaza War protests (granted that some of the fringe banners and slogans at these events are problematic). The combination of both then produces the context of the racial slur or perception of a racial slur on behalf of the complainant. Had the complainant the right to feel offended in this case? The answer for me is that the fear and anxiety borne out of probable lived experience of racism felt by them justifies his complaint and trumps any “offence” factors. As it stands, Alison Pearson does face the possibility of prosecution for a hate/incitement to hatred offence. Should she have her day in court, she might reflect that allowing her prejudices against certain othered groups to override her professional obligations to protect the integrity of facts and objective journalism would have landed her in that predicament not any weapon of the Woke.
[1] ‘Racist tweet. Telegraph columnist Pearson at heart of row with police.' Guardian 16th November 2024
[2] Ibid
[3] PM says police should focus on ‘what matters most’ amid Pearson tweet investigation. Guardian 18th November 2024
[4] Ibid
[5] Guardian, 16th November.
[6] Guardian, 18th November.
[7] Caroline Davies Explainer. What is the Pearson tweet incident all about? Guardian 18th November.
[8] Andrew Doyle (2021) Free Speech. And Why It Matters London: Constable p.1
[9] Ibid, p.2
[10] Ibid, p.87
[11] Ibid, p.87
[12] Ibid, pp.88-89
[13] Ibid, p.77
[14] Ibid, pp.78-84
[15] Ibid, p.84
⏩Barry Gilheany is a freelance writer, qualified counsellor and aspirant artist resident in Colchester where he took his PhD at the University of Essex. He is also a lifelong Leeds United supporter.
Cutting through the hyperbole and snarkiness, Barry's argument is the same one that those who wish to curtail speech always give: it is always wrong to give offence. This idea must be challenged.
ReplyDeleteA few thoughts:
1 - She deleted the tweet, presumably because she realised her mistake. A while ago, Tim Brannigan posted a picture from a parade on the Shankill Road where someone was wearing a t-shirt saying "And on the 7th day, God created Murphy." Tim immediately assumed it was a reference to Lennie Murphy and went on a tirade. It turned out it had nothing to do with the Shankill Butchers. So does that mean Tim should be prosecuted for casting aspersions on someone's character.
2 - The complainant's pious attitude assumes that all people of colour are easily offended and must be protected because of this. Infantilising, professionally offended crap. The sort of person who, after Salman Rushdie was nearly killed, tried to excuse it on the basis that The Satanic Verses "offended all Muslims".
3 - The case of Päivi Räsänen demonstrates how stupid hate speech laws are, especially in Europe.
"Free speech as long as I like what you say".
DeleteI'd rather those who want to use "hate' speech are free to do so, so we can identify exactly who they are.
Any attempts at curtailing free speech or opinion is to be abhorred, and those who use speech to incite hate should be ridiculed by the same proviso.
I think Pearson had her finger on the scale here and knew what she was doing. I didn't find her particularly honest in her account. The cops outmaneuvered her over that.
ReplyDeleteBut if these matters are not crimes why should the police be investigating? In the North Jim Wells faced police questioning over his opinion and Pastor McConnell was prosecuted for expressing his during a sermon but found not guilty.
Always good to see Larry Hughes commenting ( on the Jim Wells blog), always made me laugh. Hope he's keeping well.
Deletehttps://news.sky.com/story/allison-pearson-no-further-action-to-be-taken-against-journalist-over-social-media-post-13257987
ReplyDelete"Essex Police were investigating an alleged criminal offence of inciting racial hatred, but on Thursday confirmed the Crown Prosecution Service had decided not to bring any charges."