Christopher Owens ✍ “A people come to this/Beyond the age of reason/A people fed on famine/A people on their knees, and/A people eat each other/A people stand in line/Waiting for another war and/Waiting for my valentine.” - The Sisters of Mercy
On Monday 11th March, it was announced that a settlement had been reached between Douglas Murray and Guardian News & Media Limited.
It was in relation to a column penned by Kenan Malik that was published on 11th August. Discussing the recent riots that had engulfed Britain, Malik drew upon an interview that Murray gave to John Anderson in 2023 where he laid out his thoughts on Muslim and pro-Palestinian groups organising a demonstration for Remembrance Day. The predictable rhetoric used by Murray will be familiar to anyone who has read his numerous columns over the years.
Unfortunately, because the clip that Malik drew upon had been uploaded on the 6th August, Malik made the critical (albeit understandable) error of thinking that
...the clip, which was on...John Anderson’s site before being deleted a couple of days after it was uploaded, was a teaser for a current interview, the full version of which had still to drop" and that "...after digging around, I realised it was from a previous iv, I rewrote the opening to my column before it was published online. It was, though, too late for the print version. My mistake & I put my hands up.
As a result, the print version of the Observer carried the original column which read that the interview had been recorded not long after the riots and the implication was that Murray was voicing support of the racist attacks.
Unquestionably a bad mistake to make and, seemingly, an open and shut case for Murray. After all, the Guardian (of which the Observer is the sister paper) has not had a good reputation over the past decade: from insisting that Covid critics be silenced through to spreading misinformation and allegations of staff writers being linked to IRA activities and bullying, its lofty reputation belies these sordid elements. As a result, the paper is considered a joke publication in certain circles and the chance to see it taken down a peg would undoubtedly be of great satisfaction to those people. Likewise, the Guardian can't claim to be a defender of free speech when it takes legal action to shut down parody headline generators.
Still, let’s look a little closer at this case.
One of the key lines in the joint statement was that print column “…has caused Mr. Murray considerable distress."
Normally such a statement would be laughable as Murray is a public speaker and should be well used to less favourable interpretations of himself and his views, especially when you consider how he has written about how, in the modern era, "...truth is less important than feelings and that feelings can ordered into hierarchies of legitimacy." Seemingly, it’s not just enough to be incorrectly labelled a racist rabble rouser. You have to feel stressed about it as well.
Indeed, Murray has been at the centre of controversy for years: his appearance at the Belfast Book Festival in 2017 saw calls for the event to be cancelled and the person scheduled to interview him was subjected to variations on the phrase "how dare you give a platform to someone like Murray". Therefore you would think that he and, by extension, the publications that he writes for would be well used to such pressure.
However, this article in the Spectator categorically states that the paper was put under pressure to drop Murray. Obviously, such tactics that are used in an attempt to drum anyone out of their line of work are wrong and thus (I would presume) Murray was able to show that there was potential financial damage from Malik's erroneous claim in the printed version of the Observer.
This puts me in mind of the Katie Hopkins/Jack Monroe libel case where, according to Dominic Ponsford, "...Monroe did not have to prove actual damage (such as financial loss or psychological harm) it was enough that she believed the harm to her reputation was severe". Which has led to criticism of the reformed libel laws where, it has been alleged, the bar to proving damages is incredibly low.
One of the many complaints about the Guardian over the last number of years is that it lies by omission. Yet, with Malik admitting that he had got it wrong and amending the online version of the column accordingly, it would seem that this was an issue that could have been resolved without the need to resort to litigation as, after all, Murray didn't deny that the quotes attributed to him were correct. Considering his column from last year where he wrote in defence of forgiveness, wouldn't it have been more appropriate to use a right of reply to not only deny the claim but also to take the moral high ground on the matter?
Sadly, Murray doesn't have a great track record for this.
Just look at the case of Sunny Hundal.
In 2009, he wrote a blog post about the English Defence League where he quoted another blog that referenced Murray having dinner with Robert Spencer (well known for his anti-Islamic views) and some unnamed English Defence League members who (it was implied) were involved in street level violence and had been invited by someone else.
Clearly a provocative claim, which led to Hundal writing if Murray could “…perhaps confirm or deny any of this?" This was a clear invitation for Murray to set the record straight. Instead, he brought in the lawyers and, a few months later, Hundal was forced to print an apology/clarification. Interestingly, for the blog that Hundal referenced, Murray supplied them with a clarification and that seemed to be end of that.
So how did the man who approvingly quoted Hannah Ardent on the idea of forgiveness reflect on this case? Here’s how:
The smugness and contempt for the plebs (i.e. people who aren’t career journalists) emanating from that quote is truly sickening and rich coming from someone who has derided Sinn Fein for their litigious attitudes.
But is it surprising that this is the same person who called for the University of Southampton to be defunded because they were scheduled to hold a conference on Israel that he didn’t like (which was scrapped) and wasn’t happy that arrests weren't made over repugnant responses to 7th October?
Not at all but it is ironic coming from a director of the Free Speech Union.
One of the refrains from Murray’s followers has been that free speech doesn’t cover lying.
Let’s break that down.
Firstly, as Malik freely admitted the error was his fault, it cannot be stated that he was deliberately lying. He was mistaken.
Secondly, libel laws are an area oft debated among free speech advocates. Andrew Doyle makes an eloquent case for them here while Anthony McIntyre (who faced two actions from Allison Morris over columns she didn’t like) has quoted Grayling’s famous remark that if we . . .
Unquestionably a bad mistake to make and, seemingly, an open and shut case for Murray. After all, the Guardian (of which the Observer is the sister paper) has not had a good reputation over the past decade: from insisting that Covid critics be silenced through to spreading misinformation and allegations of staff writers being linked to IRA activities and bullying, its lofty reputation belies these sordid elements. As a result, the paper is considered a joke publication in certain circles and the chance to see it taken down a peg would undoubtedly be of great satisfaction to those people. Likewise, the Guardian can't claim to be a defender of free speech when it takes legal action to shut down parody headline generators.
Still, let’s look a little closer at this case.
One of the key lines in the joint statement was that print column “…has caused Mr. Murray considerable distress."
Normally such a statement would be laughable as Murray is a public speaker and should be well used to less favourable interpretations of himself and his views, especially when you consider how he has written about how, in the modern era, "...truth is less important than feelings and that feelings can ordered into hierarchies of legitimacy." Seemingly, it’s not just enough to be incorrectly labelled a racist rabble rouser. You have to feel stressed about it as well.
Indeed, Murray has been at the centre of controversy for years: his appearance at the Belfast Book Festival in 2017 saw calls for the event to be cancelled and the person scheduled to interview him was subjected to variations on the phrase "how dare you give a platform to someone like Murray". Therefore you would think that he and, by extension, the publications that he writes for would be well used to such pressure.
However, this article in the Spectator categorically states that the paper was put under pressure to drop Murray. Obviously, such tactics that are used in an attempt to drum anyone out of their line of work are wrong and thus (I would presume) Murray was able to show that there was potential financial damage from Malik's erroneous claim in the printed version of the Observer.
This puts me in mind of the Katie Hopkins/Jack Monroe libel case where, according to Dominic Ponsford, "...Monroe did not have to prove actual damage (such as financial loss or psychological harm) it was enough that she believed the harm to her reputation was severe". Which has led to criticism of the reformed libel laws where, it has been alleged, the bar to proving damages is incredibly low.
One of the many complaints about the Guardian over the last number of years is that it lies by omission. Yet, with Malik admitting that he had got it wrong and amending the online version of the column accordingly, it would seem that this was an issue that could have been resolved without the need to resort to litigation as, after all, Murray didn't deny that the quotes attributed to him were correct. Considering his column from last year where he wrote in defence of forgiveness, wouldn't it have been more appropriate to use a right of reply to not only deny the claim but also to take the moral high ground on the matter?
Sadly, Murray doesn't have a great track record for this.
Just look at the case of Sunny Hundal.
In 2009, he wrote a blog post about the English Defence League where he quoted another blog that referenced Murray having dinner with Robert Spencer (well known for his anti-Islamic views) and some unnamed English Defence League members who (it was implied) were involved in street level violence and had been invited by someone else.
Clearly a provocative claim, which led to Hundal writing if Murray could “…perhaps confirm or deny any of this?" This was a clear invitation for Murray to set the record straight. Instead, he brought in the lawyers and, a few months later, Hundal was forced to print an apology/clarification. Interestingly, for the blog that Hundal referenced, Murray supplied them with a clarification and that seemed to be end of that.
So how did the man who approvingly quoted Hannah Ardent on the idea of forgiveness reflect on this case? Here’s how:
...some years ago Sunny had to pay out and publish a wholesale apology to me after libelling me on his website. On that occasion he published outright falsehoods, though his more typical style has been to settle for selective quotation, misquotation and misrepresentation. In what must have been a highly embarrassing process for Sunny, as I remember it he then had to declare current and future earnings to me in order to reach some reasonable financial settlement. During that process it became entirely clear that Sunny did not have a career. His main organ of distribution was a pointless self-published website which earned him no money. He occasionally earned small fees for intermittent blogs for the Guardian. But in no way did this add up either to a salary or a funded career.
The smugness and contempt for the plebs (i.e. people who aren’t career journalists) emanating from that quote is truly sickening and rich coming from someone who has derided Sinn Fein for their litigious attitudes.
But is it surprising that this is the same person who called for the University of Southampton to be defunded because they were scheduled to hold a conference on Israel that he didn’t like (which was scrapped) and wasn’t happy that arrests weren't made over repugnant responses to 7th October?
Not at all but it is ironic coming from a director of the Free Speech Union.
One of the refrains from Murray’s followers has been that free speech doesn’t cover lying.
Let’s break that down.
Firstly, as Malik freely admitted the error was his fault, it cannot be stated that he was deliberately lying. He was mistaken.
Secondly, libel laws are an area oft debated among free speech advocates. Andrew Doyle makes an eloquent case for them here while Anthony McIntyre (who faced two actions from Allison Morris over columns she didn’t like) has quoted Grayling’s famous remark that if we . . .
Give any government, any security service, any policing authority, any special interest group such as a religious organisation or a political party, any prude or moraliser, any zealot of any kind, the power to shut someone else up…they will leap at it . . .
. . . as a motto that TPQ lives and breathes every day.
Spiked have written extensively about opposing libel laws, with Brendan O’Neill pointing out that the likes of Thomas Paine and William Lovett were tried for seditious libel: expressing an opinion. Looking to America, O’Neill writes:
Unfortunately, Britain’s libel laws do not take any of this into consideration and it’s worth remembering that Lance Armstrong, Sonia Sutcliffe and Jeffrey Archer are three prominent examples of people who have won libel cases against various newspapers only to be uncovered as liars and hypocrites later on.
So yes, free speech absolutists would agree that lies should not be subject to court proceedings and, as already stated, Malik has admitted the error so no lying went on.
To conclude, I consider the libel case instigated by Douglas Murray to have been unnecessary. Not only has it led to demonisation of Kenan Malik by numerous people who are clearly unfamiliar with Malik’s writings. He is certainly not anti-white nor anti-working class nor woke. It suggests that Murray is more interested in scoring points in the culture war against the discredited Guardian Media Group than honest conversation and forgiveness.
But with Murray facing a lawsuit, maybe he’ll change his mind if the verdict doesn’t go his way.
This Reddit post served as a basis for some of the points raised in this article.
Spiked have written extensively about opposing libel laws, with Brendan O’Neill pointing out that the likes of Thomas Paine and William Lovett were tried for seditious libel: expressing an opinion. Looking to America, O’Neill writes:
In a 1964 Supreme Court ruling in the US, in which the New York Times and the Committee to Defend Martin Luther King had a libel ruling against them overturned, the justices defended difficult debate against the punishing, censorious instinct of libel law. They said political discussion should be ‘uninhibited, robust and wide open’ and will very often include ‘vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials’. There must even be the ‘breathing space’ for ‘erroneous statement’, they said, because punishing erroneous statement too harshly could limit political expression in the round.
Unfortunately, Britain’s libel laws do not take any of this into consideration and it’s worth remembering that Lance Armstrong, Sonia Sutcliffe and Jeffrey Archer are three prominent examples of people who have won libel cases against various newspapers only to be uncovered as liars and hypocrites later on.
So yes, free speech absolutists would agree that lies should not be subject to court proceedings and, as already stated, Malik has admitted the error so no lying went on.
To conclude, I consider the libel case instigated by Douglas Murray to have been unnecessary. Not only has it led to demonisation of Kenan Malik by numerous people who are clearly unfamiliar with Malik’s writings. He is certainly not anti-white nor anti-working class nor woke. It suggests that Murray is more interested in scoring points in the culture war against the discredited Guardian Media Group than honest conversation and forgiveness.
But with Murray facing a lawsuit, maybe he’ll change his mind if the verdict doesn’t go his way.
This Reddit post served as a basis for some of the points raised in this article.
⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist.
Christopher - this is saying what needs said.
ReplyDeleteMurray displayed great moral courage in challenging the Bloody Sunday murder regiment but his commitment to free inquiry is not everything he makes it out to be.
Kenan Malik is a thoughtful writer and for him to face this from another writer who has access to ample media for addressing his concerns is wholly wrong.