Has David Starkey gone mad?

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Discussion

Vanden Saab

14,111 posts

75 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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bhstewie said:
With the caveat I haven't heard the entire interview this seems like crazytown taken at face value yikes

Darren Grimes under police investigation after David Starkey interview
Why crazytown. This is just the natural progression from the crap you have been posting for years. Welcome to your brave new world.

bitchstewie

51,295 posts

211 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
Vanden Saab said:
Why crazytown. This is just the natural progression from the crap you have been posting for years. Welcome to your brave new world.
I know you live in a world where everything is about leftists and woke and the MSM and all the usual cliches but I don't think you'll find anywhere where I've advocated for this sort of thing.

It's the equivalent of Andrew Neil interviewing Gerard Batten and being held responsible for his views if taken at face value.

BlackLabel

13,251 posts

124 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
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"What you in for"?

"I interviewed David Starkey"

Dr Jekyll

23,820 posts

262 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
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Not so long ago New Statesman journalist interviewed Roger Scruton and quoted him as saying 'every Chinese person is a replica of the next one and that's a very frightening thing'. Causing Scruton to receive the same kind of opprobrium as Starkey received. Will that journalist be questioned under caution? If not why not?

Murph7355

37,747 posts

257 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
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BlackLabel said:
"What you in for"?

"I interviewed David Starkey"
He'll be in solitary. Such a heinous crime warrants it and he'd be a danger to the rest of the prison community.

i4got

5,659 posts

79 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
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Surely every newspaper that covered the Starkey/Grimes interview is equally culpable?

longblackcoat

5,047 posts

184 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
i4got said:
Surely every newspaper that covered the Starkey/Grimes interview is equally culpable?
I suggest you read up on the law.

Why do you think Pistonheads doesn’t let racist/sexist/homophobic comments stand? Primarily it’s because, as a publisher, you can be prosecuted if you’ve not made every effort to remove, refute or, at the very least, contextualise those comments.

Darren Grimes didn’t exactly challenge Starkey, did he, or the other right-wingers he’s had on his podcast. It may be a fine line, but it’s there.

CPS said:
Racial hatred is defined in section 17 of the Act. The prosecution must prove that hatred was intended to be stirred up or that it was likely to be stirred up. "Likely" does not mean that racial hatred was simply possible. We therefore have to examine the context of any behaviour very carefully, in particular the likely audience, as this will be highly relevant.
Ultimately, it comes down to Grimes’ behaviours. If he’s seen as facilitating the broadcasting of views with the intention to cause offence, he’s in trouble. This is why all journalists are extremely careful to demonstrate, where racist language is used, that they are challenging it and that it’s only there to demonstrate how far the interviewee’s opinions vary from what’s considered acceptable.

People can huff and puff about this, but it’s the law, and has been since the 1980s. Strangely, journalists don’t seem to being prosecuted for this, so either they’re all doing it right and poor ickle Darren’s being picked on or, and I say this purely as a hypothetical, Mr Grimes went over the line on this on an attempt to be a right-wing free-speech martyr. Perhaps it’s Occam’s Razor - he’s not half as bright as he thinks he is and simply didn’t do his job properly.

Whether there’s grounds for him to be charged is entirely another matter. But behaviour matters, and Grimes didn’t seem to show much regret, saying only that he was a bit inexperienced which is why he didn’t challenge Starkey. Fair enough, but he had another highly controversial right-wing historian on the following week, and although he put up a video disassociating himself from Starkey’s view, he didn’t take down the Starkey video.

Given his fondness for certain topics, his seeming inability to deal with them as virtually every other journalist does, and his unwillingness to take down the offensive video, it’s hardly surprising that someone’s complained. The police have to take this seriously, and they’ve carried out their part entirely correctly.




i4got

5,659 posts

79 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
longblackcoat said:
i4got said:
Surely every newspaper that covered the Starkey/Grimes interview is equally culpable?
I suggest you read up on the law.

Why do you think Pistonheads doesn’t let racist/sexist/homophobic comments stand? Primarily it’s because, as a publisher, you can be prosecuted if you’ve not made every effort to remove, refute or, at the very least, contextualise those comments.

Darren Grimes didn’t exactly challenge Starkey, did he, or the other right-wingers he’s had on his podcast. It may be a fine line, but it’s there.
Thats the point I'm making. Newspapers which reported the exchange and/or linked to the youtube interview are doing the same thing.

longblackcoat

5,047 posts

184 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
i4got said:
longblackcoat said:
i4got said:
Surely every newspaper that covered the Starkey/Grimes interview is equally culpable?
I suggest you read up on the law.

Why do you think Pistonheads doesn’t let racist/sexist/homophobic comments stand? Primarily it’s because, as a publisher, you can be prosecuted if you’ve not made every effort to remove, refute or, at the very least, contextualise those comments.

Darren Grimes didn’t exactly challenge Starkey, did he, or the other right-wingers he’s had on his podcast. It may be a fine line, but it’s there.
Thats the point I'm making. Newspapers which reported the exchange and/or linked to the youtube interview are doing the same thing.
Crucial difference is that they’re reporting Grimes and Starkey as the subject(s) and are not the publishers of the original material.

The allegation seems to be that Grimes published the interview with the intention of causing offence; those commenting on it could not, reasonably, be accused of the same thing.

JagLover

42,428 posts

236 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
BlackLabel said:
How do the police find the resources to investigate what someone said on a podcast or what some so called transphobic person said on Twitter given many forces have even stopped routinely attending the homes of people who have been burgled etc?
Because they have become politicised

AJL308

6,390 posts

157 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
Ayahuasca said:
The UN definition of genocide is:

...acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
Killing members of the group;
Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

_____-

The purpose of American / Caribbean slavery was to work the tobacco, cotton and sugar plantations. A totally different sort of evil.

Starkey must have had a senior moment if the best argument he could come up with to make that point - especially in the current situation where eggshells are being trodden on - is that so many damn blacks survived.
Ok, the way he put it was unpleasant but it from that definition slavery in the US was not genocide.

Dr Jekyll

23,820 posts

262 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
longblackcoat said:
Crucial difference is that they’re reporting Grimes and Starkey as the subject(s) and are not the publishers of the original material.

The allegation seems to be that Grimes published the interview with the intention of causing offence; those commenting on it could not, reasonably, be accused of the same thing.
How is that different from the New Statesman publishing Roger Scrutons remarks about the Chinese?

longblackcoat

5,047 posts

184 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
Dr Jekyll said:
longblackcoat said:
Crucial difference is that they’re reporting Grimes and Starkey as the subject(s) and are not the publishers of the original material.

The allegation seems to be that Grimes published the interview with the intention of causing offence; those commenting on it could not, reasonably, be accused of the same thing.
How is that different from the New Statesman publishing Roger Scrutons remarks about the Chinese?
Why ask me? I haven’t read the New Statesman article and really can’t be bothered.

All I can reiterate - having reproduced the law verbatim - is that this is about the intent to offend. Did Grimes do this? Possibly. Was this the intent of the New Statesman? Almost certainly not.

Dr Jekyll

23,820 posts

262 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
longblackcoat said:
Why ask me? I haven’t read the New Statesman article and really can’t be bothered.

All I can reiterate - having reproduced the law verbatim - is that this is about the intent to offend. Did Grimes do this? Possibly. Was this the intent of the New Statesman? Almost certainly not.
Oh I see, because Grimes supported Brexit he must be racist and because and the New Statesman is the house paper for fashionable lefties they can't possibly have meant any harm.

FiF

44,101 posts

252 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
Dr Jekyll said:
longblackcoat said:
Why ask me? I haven’t read the New Statesman article and really can’t be bothered.

All I can reiterate - having reproduced the law verbatim - is that this is about the intent to offend. Did Grimes do this? Possibly. Was this the intent of the New Statesman? Almost certainly not.
Oh I see, because Grimes supported Brexit he must be racist and because and the New Statesman is the house paper for fashionable lefties they can't possibly have meant any harm.
Could be because certain factions think that a young quietly spoken Conservative supporter of Brexit got away with it despite their last disgraceful attempt to get him using Electoral Commission, so he deserves all he gets and here's another round of spite.

One thought, if the complaint has originated with Durham Police, why have the Met now taken it up. Never had any respect for Met since miner's strike days.

Red 4

10,744 posts

188 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
FiF said:
One thought, if the complaint has originated with Durham Police, why have the Met now taken it up. Never had any respect for Met since miner's strike days.
You don't hold a grudge for long then ? smile

FiF

44,101 posts

252 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
Just one further thought, presumably Chris Harris will now be prosecuted for tittering with his motoring journalist mates over some of the highly illegal speed road trips and exploits they got up to during the back in the day times at Autocar and Evo?

Agree with Stewie, crazy day times.

longblackcoat

5,047 posts

184 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
FiF said:
Just one further thought, presumably Chris Harris will now be prosecuted for tittering with his motoring journalist mates over some of the highly illegal speed road trips and exploits they got up to during the back in the day times at Autocar and Evo?

Agree with Stewie, crazy day times.
Not sure where Harris incited racial hatred, but I’m sure you know what you’re talking about.

Derek Smith

45,672 posts

249 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
longblackcoat said:
i4got said:
Surely every newspaper that covered the Starkey/Grimes interview is equally culpable?
I suggest you read up on the law.

Why do you think Pistonheads doesn’t let racist/sexist/homophobic comments stand? Primarily it’s because, as a publisher, you can be prosecuted if you’ve not made every effort to remove, refute or, at the very least, contextualise those comments.

Darren Grimes didn’t exactly challenge Starkey, did he, or the other right-wingers he’s had on his podcast. It may be a fine line, but it’s there.

CPS said:
Racial hatred is defined in section 17 of the Act. The prosecution must prove that hatred was intended to be stirred up or that it was likely to be stirred up. "Likely" does not mean that racial hatred was simply possible. We therefore have to examine the context of any behaviour very carefully, in particular the likely audience, as this will be highly relevant.
Ultimately, it comes down to Grimes’ behaviours. If he’s seen as facilitating the broadcasting of views with the intention to cause offence, he’s in trouble. This is why all journalists are extremely careful to demonstrate, where racist language is used, that they are challenging it and that it’s only there to demonstrate how far the interviewee’s opinions vary from what’s considered acceptable.

People can huff and puff about this, but it’s the law, and has been since the 1980s. Strangely, journalists don’t seem to being prosecuted for this, so either they’re all doing it right and poor ickle Darren’s being picked on or, and I say this purely as a hypothetical, Mr Grimes went over the line on this on an attempt to be a right-wing free-speech martyr. Perhaps it’s Occam’s Razor - he’s not half as bright as he thinks he is and simply didn’t do his job properly.

Whether there’s grounds for him to be charged is entirely another matter. But behaviour matters, and Grimes didn’t seem to show much regret, saying only that he was a bit inexperienced which is why he didn’t challenge Starkey. Fair enough, but he had another highly controversial right-wing historian on the following week, and although he put up a video disassociating himself from Starkey’s view, he didn’t take down the Starkey video.

Given his fondness for certain topics, his seeming inability to deal with them as virtually every other journalist does, and his unwillingness to take down the offensive video, it’s hardly surprising that someone’s complained. The police have to take this seriously, and they’ve carried out their part entirely correctly.
Nicely explained. It makes you wonder why some people just don't understand what proper journalists have done for years. If someone wants to make a political point near the cut-off point in order to be talked about, they take a chance.

The police have been given information by way of complaint. If they fail to act on it, they will be criticised. If they act on it, they are criticised, at least on here. We've got mentions of imprisonment when all we have is a request for him to attend a police station for interview.

I have every sympathy for journalists trying to help us make decisions on what's happening around the world. We seen them regularly on the front line, in war zones, or areas where there is risk from disease or violence. Bloggers/vloggers/podcasters are essentially commentators, a form of journalism that is normally criticised on PH, and one that lives off the work of those journos who go out to show us what's going on.

What Grimes did was interview. While the law is quite clear on the matter, journalistic exemptions are not. The police are empowered to make decisions to sleeve cases, and quite rightly. In certain cases they might prefer the CPS to make decisions of public interest, that sort of thing. However, either way, they need some form of evidence. An interview seems to me to be the intelligent option. If Grimes fails to attend, and therefore not take advantage of journalistic exemptions, they can make a decision on the facts as presented to them on the podcast. No one can criticise them for that. If Grimes does give reasons for his, what appears to be, on first sight, crass behaviour, then these will be probably pushed to the CPS for a decision. No one can criticise the police for that.

On the other hand, if they do nothing, despite a complaint coming to them, then they can be criticised by the complainant, and anyone affronted. In the old days, the police may well have assumed that the government might have supported a decision not to act, but those days, of help from above, have long gone. It's a case of covering their backs as if there's blame, they are vulnerable unless they, figuratively, gird their loins.

It’s a response to the current situation. It is not of the police’s making. All they can do is respond.

On the other hand, Starkey is an intelligent bloke and, one must assume, knew the likely outcome of his outburst. He normally chooses his words with care, although he does get flustered when confronted by intelligent people, especially intelligent women, who challenge his opinions. An interview is something that he normally controls, with his wonderful consideration for the feelings of others that he is renowned for.

It's a shame about his books not being published. I'm surprised by the move of his publishers. I've read a few of his books, although I've only bought one, and they do give one pause for thought. It's akin to burning them.

That apart, he got what he must have known was coming to him.

I hope this doesn't turn him bitter.

FiF

44,101 posts

252 months

Saturday 10th October 2020
quotequote all
longblackcoat said:
FiF said:
Just one further thought, presumably Chris Harris will now be prosecuted for tittering with his motoring journalist mates over some of the highly illegal speed road trips and exploits they got up to during the back in the day times at Autocar and Evo?

Agree with Stewie, crazy day times.
Not sure where Harris incited racial hatred, but I’m sure you know what you’re talking about.
Stop dancing on a pin, it's clear what I said, they were laughing and joking about highly illegal driving including average speeds well above maximum national limits in various countries. Are they going to be investigated for that? Nope. There is a parallel principle albeit nothing to do with racism.

But then you knew that but just wanted to be an argumentative deflecting prat. Jog on, you're better than that.