A war that has been brewing for a long time has finally fully emerged into the open. A large range of conflicts are evidence of a growing global battlefield but one might say that U.S. President Donald Trump has escalated matters to all out war.
His defamation lawsuit against ABC news and their $15 million settlement together with his repeated threats to “deal with” journalists are headline news.
Speculation continues to raise questions about why ABC settled so quickly and about what Trump plans to do once he is installed in the White House. One theory would support criticism of the media were it to be true.
In the wider context press freedom is increasingly under threat across the world. Journalists are dying or condemned to prison in the hundreds.
In this week’s journal of the UK Chartered Institute of Journalists the front page leads on a Westminster meeting of the Anti-SLAPP Coalition with lawyers, lobbyists and journalists. The problem is that wealthy and powerful people are using the Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation to restrict free expression and inquiry.
The Council of Europe has approved a set of minimum standards for member states but only as a recommendation.
In 2022, according to the CIoJ the UK was found to be “claimant friendly as a state where libel and defamation litigation leans in favour of those suing”.
In another article this week in the CIoJ Journal Professor Tim Crook highlights how journalists are being denied freedom of information in Britain. The article, in this reporter’s view, highlights a major threat to democracy. However, fault is on both sides and it is a ‘war’ that democracy is losing.
To repeat earlier comments it should be noted that standards of journalism have fallen drastically and appallingly. Social media is blamed – including by Professor Crook but whoa – hold on!
Social media is not exempt from the rules of this war. People who post, those who facilitate the posts and directors and owners are as liable to legal action as what I would call established media. A while back someone posted a highly libellous rant on my local community Facebook page and so far as ws know no action was brought against them. Perhaps a series of defamation actions in the courts would bring social media into line.
More importantly Trump’s action or actions could bring back some old fashioned standards of reporting. One of those would be to ban AI generated articles. On this point I am struck by an article in Saturday’s Daily Telegraph about the judge who made a controversial anonymity ruling in the murder trial of Sara Sharif. Mr Justice Williams would not allow the identities of the judges who made a decision to allow Sara, aged 10 when she died, to be returned to her parents care to be made.
And this is a highly relevant point. As the Telegraph reported: “Explaining his decision yesterday the judge said he did not believe the media could be trusted to report matters in a fair and accurate way.
“In his ruling, he said: Experience regrettably shows that some reporting is better than others and that it is not a reliable end point…”
He went on to condemn social media and the dangers of the internet. His point highlights another that once was drilled into trainee journalists’ minds. In the light of all the commentary and speculation relating to the Magdeburg Christmas Market incident – and many other like events – it is a fundamental legal point, certainly under British law – and therefore American et al – law.
Once someone is arrested and charged all comment and speculation must cease as such matters become exclusively for the courts and juries to decide on. While Professor Crook is right in one of his articles that media contempt laws have been used to conceal facts about suspects and defendants accused of heinous crimes it is, frankly, alarming that arguments are being put forward that would allow the public to know prior to trial and finding of guilt that someone had committed a previous crime.
Imagine having to appear in court innocent of the crime being tried and having the jury fully aware that one had been convicted of an unrelated offence. Under the British Constitution and all others that I know of a citizen is “…entitled to a fair trial before a jury of his (sic) peers.”
As the professor states with regard to the murder of three young girls at Southport in England information about the killer’s terrorist training were concealed.
The fact that media, especially social media, broadcast – in the broad sense of the word – false information that stirred up riots that led to a lot of people being jailed surely enhance the need to keep information and reports about people due to appear in court very private.
Here is an even more important point arising from the current war of words and falsehoods: last week a prominent political figure appeared on the BBC News to be asked about an issue that had appeared on the front page of a national newspaper. She refused to discuss the issue and spent a considerable time raging that the headline was false and that the story was embellished and inaccurate.
First Trump and now politicians across the globe are attacking the press, broadcasters and social media. War has been declared and Elon Musk has described the far-right Alternative for Germany (AFD) as the country’s saviour. Journalism has been held to be the fourth pillar of democracy, now in all its modern forms, it might rightly be held to be the enemy of it.
Have a good and happy Christmas and make the most of it because the New Year is likely to be very depressing. A lot will depend on who wins this war and how soon.
