I see uber-hypocrite Andrew Marr hasn't resigned Page 2

Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ May 8 2011, 1:11 PM BST

a free licence to naughty MARRIED boys and girls with high profiles and high earnings to do exactly as they please with absolutely no public critism of their behaviour, and no change to their status or fantastic earnings. It is morally VERY DUBIOUS at the very very least, I maintain.

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Well that is a very very odd stance. If they are not breaking the law simply having a bit of extra curricular you think they should be publicly pilloried and have their earnings taken away from them???

The problem with super injunctions is the principle not the practice; as far as I aware, and that under the circumstances is a big IF, the only occasions they have been granted is to protect celebrities from salacious intrusion into their private lives.

If the press had not recently been exposed as using all sorts of illegal practices to intrude upon celebrities their outrage over superinjunctions would be more credible.

As for Marr, yes he has been hypocritical in utilising a mechanism which as a journalist he in principle opposes, but the original story had not the slightest public interest element, and its exposure would have hurt others whom he no doubt wished to protect, including, as he thought at the time, his unborn child.

Blimey, you lot really have got your blinkers on today, 'aven't ya, and you know that's not what I'm insisting on Marc, but simply for the same treatment you and I would get. Tell you what, you conduct an affair with a married woman from your office, get found out and then see if it affects your career or not, or at the very least your reputation and day to day working life. It will be damaged and/or changed, okay.

All the many many critics of this mad craze for using court injunctions and denying freedom of speech are saying, is 'surely the same process goes for the rich and famous'! Why are they getting extra protection just because they are in the public spotlight? Why are they getting let off what would damage you and I? These are the main points in all this, not petty revenge, but having one rule that applies to all of us. Not special treatment because you just feel you are special and should be allowed to practise infidelity and adultery, free from any comeback. It's wrong old mate.

He is a hypocrite/ass wipe because he says he took out an injuction to 'protect his wife and family'. If he wanted to protect them why start boning some slapper in the first place?

Another very valid way of looking at it. I was taking the misuse of laws angle, which is a real threat to our way of life and the authority of the state, but Banana has a good point too.

Why oh why did he feel it was a good idea to admit to it, though?

He probably thought he'd be seen as a journalistic hero, but it has backfired.

I think he's been a little forced into it because the growing use of injuntions to protect footballers and the like has become a massive story in its own right. I think he was made to feel that his own practice of this really didn't sit well with his position. That's basically Hislop's main criticism of all this, I think.

Urgh....Hislop....if only there were to be some dirt on him.

Peoples' private lives are no ones business but their own, unless they wish to share it with the media- providing they are not in a position of trust/power and breaking the law. There should be no need for injunjunctions, but unfortunately us Brits love a good scandal. The main problem with injunctions is that they only protect the rich.

Peoples' private lives are no ones business but their own, unless they wish to share it with the media- providing they are not in a position of trust/power and breaking the law. There should be no need for injunjunctions, but unfortunately us Brits love a good scandal. The main problem with injunctions is that they only protect the rich.

Quote: chipolata @ May 8 2011, 1:01 PM BST

Is an affair, whether involving a politician or footballer or journalist, really a news story that should be covered? Or just titilating gossip that's really nobodies business?

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Of course it's a news story. Aldultery undermines marriage itself. You cannot have the head of state promoting marriage as the best way for its citizens to live, if married people in the public eye are constantly breaking their marriage vows. Now, like the institution or not, that is the case, until the state relaxes its stance on its importance, or rewrites the marriage laws to say that shagging anyone outside it is perfectly fine. But then why have a marriage contract at all, if this were to be the case? So yes, Chip and Marc, it IS important, and public affairs of married folk is news, not just gossip.

Sorry Archbishop I thought we were in the twenty first century

Quote: Nat Wicks @ May 8 2011, 2:15 PM BST

Peoples' private lives are no ones business but their own, unless they wish to share it with the media- providing they are not in a position of trust/power and breaking the law. There should be no need for injunjunctions, but unfortunately us Brits love a good scandal. The main problem with injunctions is that they only protect the rich.

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Precisely.

How about protecting those accused of vile crimes until they are proven guilty? Mud sticks.

I'm not certain I would categorise Andrew Marr as a hypocrite in professional terms, insofar that I've never heard/read him speak out on issues regarding "superinjunctions" or the importance of freedom-to-publish to the press (or how this is being threatened by the law courts).

However, on the broader point, who is it that should decide what is and what isn't in the public interest? On this issue I would broadly be against injunctions, as sooner or later they are used to suppress stories which most definitely are in the public interest.

Beyond (I'm afraid) mild natural human curiosity as to the personal lives of the rich and/or famous, I have no interest in reading about extra-marital affairs etc. However, I think these stories, tawdry though they may be, are the unfortunate-but-inevitable consequence of freedom of speech and freedom of information.

Andrew Marr certainly is a hypocrite and a fool in terms of his personal life and maybe deserves the embarrassment he must be feeling over these revelations. However, it does not follow that he is a hypocrite as a journalist, nor should he suffer any formal consequences in regards of his job. If we're going to start judging journalistic ability and trust on the basis of one's personal life then David Dimbleby's past would also count against him, if judged morally.

Quote: Griff @ May 8 2011, 2:22 PM BST

I think that's the most feeble justification for tabloid sleaze-peddling I've ever read.

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You know there's far more to it than that though, like underlying principles, which are being utterly trashed if you constantly have affairs when married and are in the public eye. It sends out the wrong message, according to the State. It's a fact.

Of course the sleazey press jump on it to sell their papers, but the damage has been done by the wrong doer. They must take responsibility for their actions.

Griff, if you have an affair and you're both married, people's lives get ruined, please stop trying to trivialise it just because it's commonplace now. Real people get hurt, it's not like having an extra slice of cream cake, it's serious stuff.