Max Mosely's proclivities

[kalniel]

Originally Posted by Stewart

The problem is that he is a man in a very important position, and as such needs to keep his **** together and put on a good public face.

'MOSELY HAS WELL WEIRD S&M ORGY ROMP THING WITH 5 DIRTY WHORE BAGS' plastered all over some tabloid is not a good public face.

Even if they were not pretending to be Nazis.

You can't humiliate yourself like that and expect to carry on as Mr Big Bollocks in the world of Motor Sport.

He has to go, doesn't he?

Random bloke off the street can shag 5 hookers while his balls are in a vice if he wants, but if you are the President of the FIA you need to make sure YOU DON'T GET FILMED DOING IT.

True, especially if anyone dealing with him has accused him of being a bit of a control freak...

[b0redom]

What I'm surprised about is that given he's just been awarded damages, the article is still up on the NOTW website!

[Saracen]

It really is about time we had a proper privacy law, with properly defined limits, in this country. Among those limits needs to be some guidance as to where the freedom of the press ends and a right to privacy starts, because there'll always be conflict between those two.

As for this particular case, assuming the judge is right and that there's no evidence that this was actually about acting out as Nazis, then what disappoints me is that there were no exemplary damages. The reason is that if there was no evidence that they were acting as Nazis, then given who (and more relevantly, what) Mosley's father was, then it seems the paper have created that precisely because of who his father was.

And if they've created such an obnoxious and at least potentially damaging slur as that, then it's hard to see how their intention was anything other than just to create a scurrilous slur to sell papers. And if so, they ought to be punished right in the bottom line.

We need newspapers, and investigative journalists. They're a fundamental part of at least trying to hold the establishment to account with the harsh glare of publicity. But we need responsible journalism, not cheap sensationalism, and certainly not when it involves dragging people's reputations though the mud.

If a paper is going to publish this type of story, it ought to be able to prove it's case, and if it can't, don't publish. Because if they publish, regardless of the outcome of any subsequent court case (assuming you can afford the several hundred grand it'll cost to bring this type of defamation case) some of the mud will always stick. There'll always be a fair few people wondering about whether this was a play-acting about Nazis or not, and no doubt a fair few that will always believe it was, regardless of the judges comments, and that Mosley just slithered clear of it via slick lawyering.

There will also be those who will wonder if the fact that the damages weren't MUCH larger isn't a subliminal message. After all, £60k is, really, peanuts to either Mosley of a national newspaper.

[Skii]

Only in the UK could someone of such important and respected standing be caught out in such an embarrassing and frankly laughable situation and come out of it wealthier.

[Saracen]

Originally Posted by Skii

Only in the UK could someone of such important and respected standing be caught out in such an embarrassing and frankly laughable situation and come out of it wealthier.

Did he come out wealthier, though?

There have been plenty of stories about F1 sponsors threatening to pull out, about the German government not wanting to meet with him, and so on. I don't know how many of these are true, and we certainly don't don't what business or money-making opportunities he may have had have vanished because of this story, and may well stay vanished because of the 'no smoke without fire' principle.

Personally, I rather suspect he's far from wealthier because of this, and just because he's won the court case doesn't mean it's all okay now, either.

Personally, from what I read about him, and I don't mean this story, I don't like the man at all. But that doesn't mean he's fair game for newspaper attack dogs, which seems to be the inference of the judges ruling that there was no evidence of Nazi-ism. I mena, given what we've seen of the facts, you perhaps could put that interpretation on what was being done, but you could equally well put the prison guard interpretation on it. If it had been clear it was the latter interpretation, would it have been anything like the explosive story it was?

Would it, under the right to privacy in private life in the HRA, even have been publishable if it had been clear it was prison guards? I doubt it.

It seems, at least, 'convenient' that the very interpretation that makes this an explosive front-page story is the very one the newspaper chose to take when, from the judgement, there's no clear evidence it actually was that.

It suggests, re: the newspaper's motivation ... if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck ...... publish and be damned, regardless of the consequences to the individual.

[DavidM]

<snip>

[mooo]

Im glad he Max won the court case
Because it means that newspapers will have to be a bit more responsible in future

[Rave]

Originally Posted by Skii

Only in the UK could someone of such important and respected standing be caught out in such an embarrassing and frankly laughable situation and come out of it wealthier.

What he was up to may be 'embarrasing and frankly laughable' to you, but then you are not (one assumes) someone who enjoys BDSM. To those who do, what he was up to would seem entirely normal. If he enjoys being whipped, then that is up to him.

What Mosely was up to in his own private residence was entirely legal. If you think it's fine for the NOTW to show pictures and video shot in private purely to hold him up to ridicule, then by extension I assume you would also think it was fine if they published shots of you (or me) in your (my) own bedroom under the headline "Look At This Loser's Crap Technique" or similar?

[schmunk]

Originally Posted by Rave

If you think it's fine for the NOTW to show pictures and video shot in private purely to hold him up to ridicule, then by extension I assume you would also think it was fine if they published shots of you (or me) in your (my) own bedroom under the headline "Look At This Loser's Crap Technique" or similar?

What are you doing in Skii's bedroom?

[Steven.Michael]

Max Moseley is a legend, hes like 80 and still getting it on with several women. If they were dressed as nuns would you care... no not really. Let him get his end away

[Stewart]

Originally Posted by Rave

What Mosely was up to in his own private residence was entirely legal. If you think it's fine for the NOTW to show pictures and video shot in private purely to hold him up to ridicule, then by extension I assume you would also think it was fine if they published shots of you (or me) in your (my) own bedroom under the headline "Look At This Loser's Crap Technique" or similar?

Look, Rave, don't give us that crap. This was not a sneak photo of Max and his wife making sweet music in his bedroom, while some brainless NoTW hack films them. The dude is the Pres of the FIA, not some bloke off the street. And he was having an S&M sex orgy with 5 prostitutes.


Bloke of the street ----- President of the FIA.

Romantic love making with wife in bedroom ----- S&M orgy with 5 prostitutes.

Spot the subtle differences?

If you want to be a freedom warrior, then great.

Do you honestly think though, regardless of the nazi theme part not being true, that he should just carry on in his position? That he hasn't humiliated himself and the FIA? That noone is going to care?

Doubt it mate.

[jimborae]

Originally Posted by Stewart

Look, Rave, don't give us that crap. This was not a sneak photo of Max and his wife making sweet music in his bedroom, while some brainless NoTW hack films them. The dude is the Pres of the FIA, not some bloke off the street. And he was having an S&M sex orgy with 5 prostitutes.


Bloke of the street ----- President of the FIA.

Romantic love making with wife in bedroom ----- S&M orgy with 5 prostitutes.

Spot the subtle differences?

If you want to be a freedom warrior, then great.

Do you honestly think though, regardless of the nazi theme part not being true, that he should just carry on in his position? That he hasn't humiliated himself and the FIA? That noone is going to care?

Doubt it mate.

Much as I hate Max Mosely I'm afraid I have to agree with Rave on this one.

He didn't humiliate himself, the NOTW humiliated him. As for his position (excuse the pun), this has nothing to do with his presidency of the FIA. It wasn't done on company time or with company money or facilities. Granted because of this he may find that he is no longer as respected & feared as he once was. But by being the president of the FIA it doesn't automatically mean this was in the public interest or that the paper had the right to set him up in this manner.

[G4Z]

Originally Posted by Stewart

Bloke of the street ----- President of the FIA.

Romantic love making with wife in bedroom ----- S&M orgy with 5 prostitutes.

Spot the subtle differences?

Not really, no.

What the hell is the difference? Lets make a closer analogy, say you like some really dodgy table or bicycle action and you are getting your end away with inanimate objects, would that affect your job, should your employers have a right to know what you do in your own home? Then why on earth should this be of interest to the people who elected him head of the FIA. The other thing that is pissing me off is that you are equating being head of the FIA as some sort of position of standing in public and really it isn't, no more than president of the local squash league. Would the president of a local squash league be a valid target for a sting like this?

[TheAnimus]

lets take it one step further say your girl friends identical twin sister was in town. Your boss dosen't like you having 3somes, so would it be right to fire you for something that has no bearing on your work?

no. This was an invasion of someones privacy, granted my sex acts seam dull by comparision, but i still have many things i like to keep private and out of the public domain. If someone did leak them into the public domain i doubt they would have a bearing on my proffessional life, but i would get ripped on loads more i guess.

[Betty_Swallocks]

The guy wasn't doing anything illegal. He was indulging in admittedly unusual sexual practices but nobody was getting injured and all the participants were over 18 and doing it of their own free will. We have no right to even know about it let alone have videos published in order to increase the already huge profits of the newspapers.

His social position has no bearing on it whatsoever. If he was an MP paying for the prostitutes with his John Lewis allowance then there would have been a public interest angle to the story but we have to assume that it all came out of his own pocket.
Why is it more relevant because his line of work places him in the public eye?

Personally I think the damages were derisory. £60k is nothing to the newspapers. If anyone really thinks that will deter them from doing the same thing over and over again then I'm afraid they're wrong.
I think they should have been fined the entire takings from every edition of the paper that carried the story and all the follow up stories. That would make them think twice in the future.

[Stewart]

All of you lot have explinations, of course, for the calls for him to quit, by various F1 team bosses, and other people within the world of motorsport.

I find it strange that so many people are calling for him to go... after all, as you lot say, he hasn't done anything even mildly interesting, strange or humiliating to either himself or the FIA.

They must all just be jealous or something.