Pros and Cons - Debbie Newman, Ben Woolgar 2014

Privacy of public figures
Section F. Culture, education and sport

The ’tabloid’ press has a particular reputation for relishing the details of the private lives of public figures. The death in Paris in a car crash of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997 refuelled calls for restrictions on the paparazzi (press photographers) from whom she and Dodi Al Fayed had been fleeing. In 2012, The News of the World was shut down after it emerged that its journalists had been hacking the phones of some politicians and celebrities. The private lives (and particularly the sex lives) of politicians, actors, singers and sports personalities are constantly subjected to media scrutiny. In France, the media respect privacy much more. Is it fair that every aspect of the lives of public figures and celebrities should become public property, or should something be done to protect these figures’ privacy? The arguments vary slightly if the debate is narrowed to just politicians or just celebrities. The debate may be argued in principle, or the definition may specify a privacy law, self-regulation or an independent regulatory body.

Pros

[1] Public figures and their families deserve privacy and protection from media intrusion. What they do in their private lives, unless it has implications for national security, for example, should not be investigated and reported by the media. The distress caused to politicians and their families by revelations about sexual indiscretions is unjustifiable.

[2] What a politician does in private has no bearing on his or her ability to do the job. Throughout history there are examples of effective leaders who have had affairs. They may well have been forced to resign with today’s media intrusion.

[3] Politicians are public servants, entrusted with running the economy and the public services in an efficient and responsible way. They should not be seen as moral paragons. Religions are there to provide moral leadership. We should follow the example of France where there are strict privacy laws and the people accept that their politicians are not saints. The hounding of politicians by the press could be putting off many talented individuals from running for office. If you have to be ’whiter than white’ and willing to put up with constant intrusion into your life, you have narrowed the pool of possible representatives.

[4] Giving public figures a right to privacy is not a form of censorship. Investigative journalism into immoral and criminal activities with a demonstrable element of public interest (rather than seedy gossip) will still be allowed.

[5] We should condemn the media for printing intrusive photographs of celebrities and ’kiss and tell’ stories from their alleged lovers. Everybody should be allowed to be off duty sometimes. Stories are often unchecked, untrue or exag- gerated. They may harm third parties (such as children) more than the celebrities themselves, and they have not chosen the spotlight. The bodies that regulate the media should take the lead in banning the printing of such material, and if that does not work, privacy laws will have to be introduced.

[6] Libel and slander laws are not good enough. People will assume that there is no smoke without fire, and so a politician or celebrity’s name can be permanently smeared even if they subsequently win a libel suit or an apology is printed. Distress has already been caused to politicians and their families by revelations and the damage to their reputation has already been done.

[7] We are catching up with regulating new technologies. Twitter has taken down tweets which have gone against privacy injunctions and bloggers have been prosecuted. It is not perfect, but we cannot give up because of this. Any individual tweeter still has a small readership compared to The Sun in the UK or the National Enquirer in the USA, so it is still worth regulating the media even if an occasional blogger slips through the net.

[8] The hunger for salacious details about celebrities’ lives has led to unacceptable behaviour from journalists. Many celebrities, including those who do not themselves court the media, have journalists camped outside their homes 24 hours a day and are intimidated by paparazzi who pursue them ruthlessly when they step outside. The incentives have also become high enough to encourage law-breaking, and the phone hacking scandal in the UK in 2012 revealed the appalling depths to which tabloids had sunk.

Cons

[1] Public exposure is one of the prices of fame and power. Politicians and celebrities realise this from the start, and if they do not like it, they should not enter the public sphere. These figures rely on the media for their fame and wealth — they cannot then complain if their lives become, to a large extent, public property. If a person goes into politics, has sexual affairs, and is caught, it is s/he who is to be blamed for the distress caused to his/her family, not the media.

[2] It is in the public interest to know whether a politician is unfaithful to his or her spouse. If someone cannot be trusted to keep a promise in their personal life, then it is to be doubted if they can be trusted more generally with important matters of state. The public have a right to take into account character when they elect their leaders.

[3] In an increasingly secular world, we need politicians to be the moral leaders that they claim to be. Hence it is right that the media scrutinise their personal life to reveal the all-too-frequent cases of hypocrisy (such as secretly gay politicians speaking out against the gay community, or a politician cheating on his wife and preaching ’family values’). The media perform an invaluable task as moral and political watchdogs and investigators. Public figures may well feel invulnerable to charges such as sexual harassment, and in these cases, it is the victims who need the protection of the press, not the powerful.

[4] Giving public figures a ’right to privacy’ is in effect condoning media censorship and gagging the press. There is no clear line between what is in the public interest and what is not, so valuable investigative journalism will suffer. For example, when investigating the bogus expenses claims of British politicians, various personal details emerged, including secret relationships and the use of pornography.

[5] Interest in the private lives of public figures is an inevitable part of the modern media world. And as long as we keep on buying, in our millions, the newspapers and magazines that dish out the salacious stories and pictures, it is hypocritical to feign outrage at each new media intrusion. These stories sell because of our fascination with fame and celebrity.

[6] Libel and slander laws already exist to protect public figures from unfair press coverage. There is no need to introduce any more legislation.

[7] The Internet and the profusion of individual bloggers and tweeters have meant that giving public figures protection in the media is meaningless. In 2012, the UK press may not have published topless pictures of the Duchess of Cambridge, but the pictures were online for everyone to see. When Manchester United footballer Ryan Giggs took out an injunction to stop details of his affair being reported, it did not stop the Internet from reporting it and so created a ludicrous two-tier system.

[8] It is possible to regulate the behaviour of journalists without censoring the content of articles. Believing in the freedom of the press does not mean supporting any means of gathering information. Phone hacking, in particular, is always wrong and members of the paper involved are facing criminal charges.

Possible motions

This House believes that public figures have a right to private lives.

This House condemns the paparazzi.

This House believes in the right to privacy.

Related topics

Censorship by the state

Politicians’ outside interests, banning of

BBC, privatisation of

Homosexuals, outing of

Press, state regulation of the