It is alleged that sometime in the not-too-distant past, in the distant land of Japan, a most terrible and gruesome murder occurred. A young woman was supposedly kidnapped by an older man, and held against her will in the bowels of his home. The aggressor then supposedly amputated every one of his victims limbs before wiring her jaw shut. Following this gruesome ordeal the young lady was then repeatedly raped before being dumped in a dustbin and set on fire; thus burning her (barely) alive. OK, so I don’t believe this story for one second, but let’s suspend our disbelief for a second and imagine that not only is it true, but the details have recently been reported and released to the world. The international media would disseminate the news and people around the world would hold a morbid curiosity in the story, accompanied by a sense of mild horror and futile sympathy for the deceased. A fitting response to an horrific crime. However there is a crime that our Japanese villain could have committed that would have truly caused a stir, whipping the national press and public into an insatiable frenzy. A crime far more severe than dismemberment, rape and murder. A crime reviled and fetishised in equal measures across the nation. The crime of sexual infidelity.
If we are to believe the recent and escalating furore; the sexual antics of a bunch of people we don’t know or particularly care about, is the most important thing that ever happened. Moreover these antics are at the heart of the debate over the legitimacy of superinjunctions; which is depressing beyond belief.
Essentially, the attempt to raise the issue to a highbrow plane posits the debate as a pitted battle between the individual’s right to privacy and the responsibility of the media to disclose information within the public interest. It should be; but it’s not. If the general public and national media were interested in this debate, more would have been made of the Wikileaks affair, which passed by without too much general interest. David Hemmings; the MP that dropped the Giggs-bomb in parliament today, came out with some guff along the lines that ‘someone had to speak out’ against these rich celebrities that could threaten legal action against the common man and whose ‘indiscretions’ should be made available to the public as a matter of urgency. He’s obviously been shedding a tear for poor Imogen Thomas who hasn’t been able to cash in on her heartwrenching story nearly as much as she would have, had the full details been exposed. I tend to side with the Speaker of the House of Commons who basically ruled that Hemmings’ outburst was ‘stone cold’ and implied that he was a wack little attention seeker.
It seems that there’s a general misconception operating with regards to public knowledge and the availability thereof: what is interesting to the general public is not often (if barely ever) in the general public’s interest to know. In one sense we have interest as a general will to know something, and on the other hand, interest as in something to which you owe your wellbeing and security. Fuckin’ homonyms, innit? It would be within our interest to disclose details of internal police investigations; to ensure that fraudulence and corruption are not occurring. It is not in the public interest to find out that someone you’ve never met had relations with someone else you’ve never met which in turn caused emotional distress to another person you’ve never met.
What’s worse is the fact that people who have already committed fairly serious crimes are having their deeds overshadowed by this petty gossip. Case in point; Sir Fred Goodwin; responsible for grave economic damage; damage that has affected untold people. It is now revealed that he is also none other than a ‘love rat.’ Now I would consider being a ‘love rat’ almost insignificant to being a feckless gambler of other people’s economic security but maybe I’m just old-fashioned; certain sections of the media certainly went to town on his infidelities. Imagine if they discovered that Saddam Hussein, aside from being a mass murderer by proxy, also fingered his best friend’s girlfriend in a Basra nightclub. We’d probably dig up his rotting remains and hang him all over again; the bastard!
So the point of all this isn’t really to pick through the issues surrounding the principles of injunctions. (For one thing; social networking has this week proven injunctions on national media to be pretty worthless; I hope for the sake of all the as-yet-unamed ‘celebs’ that they came with a money-back guarantee.) Conversely, the real sad issue is that few will make a fuss over unmasking the holders of superinjunctions unless it concerns some trivial gossip or other bullshit that’s really no one’s damn business.
We all know people who have been on both sides of infidelity, and it’s cool to care about your nearest and dearest. At least you will have the facts of a situation, some context, and maybe even a vested reason to stick your beak in. But Newspapers need you to be interested in other people’s superficial shit; because it’s easy to report (read: speculate) on, and it sells rags.
And so the Newspapers this morning triumphantly blare out the name of some guy that cheated on his wife as though it were the biggest potatoes in the universe; smugly flaunting the fact that their muzzle has been released. And well might they be smug; they’ve won – not in any battle of noble journalistic integrity but merely the right to cash in on peddling softcore filth stories to masses of desperate voyeurs whose only interest outside of their own lives is in the hidden locations of various noteworthy penises. Congratulations everyone.
Now please leave me alone; forever.
Tags: celebrity, censorship, cheating, crime, david hemmings, giggs, gossip, infidelity, media, MP, papers, phone-hacking, piers morgan, ryan giggs, scandal, silence, super injunction, superinjunction, worst crime
