Crocodile tears over phone hacking

The media dam has burst on phone hacking. And the waters of condemnation are gushing freely from those organisations who had previously ignored the story.

Commentators who were once  as silent as Trappist monks on the business of hacking now seem to be trying to outdo each other in their expressions of revulsion.

But I detect something less than pure, or honest, in these outpouring of outrage.

Here’s the point: why are these individuals and institutions speaking out now, when we have known of the outlines of this scandal for months, if not years?

We are told that the revelation that the phones of murder victim families, terrorism survivors and grieving military relatives might also have been hacked changes the nature of the offence in a fundamental way.

Let’s consider this for a moment. The implication here is that the hacking of the phones of actors, footballers and politicians – allegations we have known about for a long time – were not of great importance and unworthy of condemnation.

The moral and intellectual bankruptcy of this position is plain. Why should it be a gross offence to illegally hack the phone of Milly Dowler, but not Chris Bryant, or Hugh Grant?

There’s another point here. Without the campaigning of hacked celebrities and politicians the truth about what the News of the World had been up to would probably never have come out.

After The Guardian broke the hacking story in July 2009, the police were doing nothing. The Crown Prosecution Service was asleep. The Press Complaints Commission was useless. Downing Street had hired one of the prime suspects as press secretary. The Labour leadership was afraid of upsetting News International.

What really shattered the cosy establishment conspiracy of silence (as well as the heroic journalism of The Guardian’s Nick Davies) was civil litigation by celebrities such as Sienna Miller which forced the police to reveal the incriminating information that they had been suppressing for so long.

Those right-wing commentators and newspapers who are now shedding copious tears over the distress of ordinary families hacked by the Screws should be thanking those celebrities and politicians for the role they have played in bringing this disgrace to light.

Or do they still regard these individuals as essentially fair game for whatever dark arts Fleet Street might have up its sleeve? I suspect that the fresh media tears being shed over phone hacking are of the Crocodilian variety.

Recent Posts on Eagle Eye

• What Focus Groups Say About Ed Miliband
• Cameron's possibly winning position
• "Clearing the Battlefield"
• UKIP Surges to Record High
• Poll alert

• thierrytt

  Im getting a bit hacked off with B list celebrities coming out as being hacked.Most of those who have come out have careers in serious decline. I’m waiting for Jordan and Reid claiming to be hacked.
  Nothing is new in hacking- telephone operators did  it for decades. Paying coppers has been going on for decades.
  There is a bit of hypocrisy in the great british public complaining when they have been buying a paper set up to sell ” violence , sex  and scandal” and  really not caring how the journalists arrived at their story.

• http://pulse.yahoo.com/_IIA4BCC5OZ23KXFM7KNWARYFZU Adrian

  the reason for the silence is obvious ,the other papers particularly the daily mail were even more prolific in their use of private detectives than the news of the screws.  dacre must be a worried man. i’d love to see him behind bars.

• pearson

  You are confused about the law as well 

• Guest

  I am appalled, with another story on this site about how the journalists want to save the News of the World in a bid to save the dead news paper.  The pit bull has left the news room and this allows me to see the sudden burst of bravery and regard for the freedom of the press.  Trouble is that a hidden skunk has also been removed from the news room and the journalists have a stench that won’t come off. Are the journalists who have joined the unemployed trying to save their jobs or do they really care about public welfare?  The new editors are going to have to ask themselves, “who do I hire back?” Who was not guilty of phone hacking and paying for tips? Who can I trust?  With questions like this, I would suggest to let the News of the World( titanic) sink once and for all, and call the animal protection society to rescue the bit bull and skunk that now roam the corridors of power to be put down as well.