I was planning a Private Eye pastiche for today’s column, of a type that would have been familiar to readers of that pugnacious organ. Unfortunately, the Eye itself beat me to it.
Every so often, the satirical fortnightly pokes fun at the dead-tree press when a perennial foe acts out of character and does something the reactionary papers approve of.
The latest Eye carries a piece headed: ‘The Daily Telegraph: an apology’. The newspaper is reported to be contrite for ‘giving the impression that the European Court of Human Rights is an interfering bunch of Eurofanatic judges who should keep their lefty liberal meddling noses out of British politics’. In fact, ‘we now realise’, the ECtHR ‘is a noble institution that upholds the universal values of law and justice’.
Why the (fondly imagined) ‘reverse ferret’? Because the ECtHR threw out businessman Sir Philip Green’s claim that naming him in parliament violated his right to privacy.
In 2018 Green slapped an injunction on the Telegraph pertaining to his identification in connection with serious allegations of sexual harassment and bullying (allegations he vehemently denies). That prompted Labour peer Lord Hain to rely on parliamentary privilege to name the Arcadia boss in the Lords.
My subject was to have been ‘The Supreme Court: an apology’. Last week, the justices found favour with conservative media by ruling that the legal definition of a woman is based on biological sex. (Note to Fleet Street sub-editors: better spike the latest bench-bashing op-ed demanding that their ‘lefty lordships be put out to grass for flouting the settled will of the British people’ (sic).)
As a politics graduate, I’ve always considered the identity crusade a curious cause for the left. Fetishing the individual over the collective looks right-wing to me. But I digress.
What was notable in this instance was that elements of the left fell into precisely the same trap. That is, calling for the Supremes to be forcibly retired on the ground that one of their judgments was ideologically uncongenial.
We also saw the same dismal lack of comprehension on display. One well-known pundit lamented a terrible day for trans rights, but expressed hope that the judgment would be overturned on appeal. Go figure.
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