Comment Warriors, and How to Spread Bile

I have at last been honoured. No, not some bauble or title, but my first ever hostile demonstration, personally directed against me. Alas, I cannot properly thank the solitary person involved because, although I assured him that I don't normally sue over defamatory lies, he still lacked the courage to tell me who he was.

It happened in Southampton on Sunday, as I was leaving the King Edward VI school, from which the BBC programme 'The Big Questions' had been transmitted live that morning. Very unusually, I was in a car provided by the programme makers, as I had to hurry to a distant railway station. As we turned into the main road, I glimpsed a large banner. Vain as I am, I can usually spot my own name in a piece of small print at about 50 paces, so it was no hard matter to see it in six-inch letters on a bedsheet hung on a wall. I was thrilled.  Forgetting the train, I asked the taxi-driver to turn round and go back so that I could take  a proper look.

There it was -  a large, apparently unattended, off-white piece of cloth, bearing the words, in block capitals : 'Peter Hitchens is a hypocritical racist alcoholic. Spread your bile elsewhere. No-one cares what you have to say'. (I'll analyse this message later)

Not having a camera, I thought I would take it home as a souvenir, but as I approached it I realised that a middle-aged woman was taking a picture of it, and asked her to send me a print.  I was going to give her my address, but didn't in the end,  because as I inspected it, a person appeared at my elbow, growling 'Do you have a problem with free speech?'

I said that no of course I didn't, and explained my desire to take it home as a souvenir. By then it was plain that it was far too big (and wet)  for this to be practicable, and in any case this person was obviously its guardian, judging by the smirk of pride on his features. So I offered to pose in front of it, while he took the picture.

So far , so jolly and tolerant. Then I asked him who he was. I explained that the banner was actually libellous, but that though I could certainly sue him if I chose, and pursue him for quite a lot money as I would undoubtedly win, I did not usually do that (I have only once made a serious threat to sue, but only when the defamation was committed on a wide scale by the official of a large organisation, and only to secure the apology and retraction that I swiftly and rightly received. I never sought any money, but it was probably the only way to correct the record.  On that occasion too I had been described as 'racist', a simple and total untruth).

He wouldn't tell me his name. Now, it seems to me that there's nothing specially brave about attacking public figures if you're not prepared to put your name to it, especially once you've had an assurance that you won't be sued.  I thought this contemptible. So I called him a coward. I then pointed out that two of the statements on the banner were untrue (I have no doubt that I am sometimes a hypocrite. No fallen creature with a moral code can escape this charge).

He affected not to understand this.   The person involved was the stuff of nightmares, exactly what you would expect an abusive commenter on the internet to be.  Beneath a woolly hat sat a podgy face, as starkly pale as 1950s British ice-cream used to be. Large sunglasses obscured the eyes, as if their owner seldom saw daylight. All this surmounted a body that was plainly an efficient machine for converting sugar into lard. I mention these characteristics as they all seem to me to be matters of choice. He had chosen to look like that.

And it came to me, that if he wanted to tell lies about me, then I could tell the truth about him. So I told him with some force, but without swearing,  that he was a coward and a liar .  I never offered him violence, or contemplated it.

Then,  confidently expecting to hear more of this on the internet, where such people are over-represented, I left him to it. As I was driven away, he gave me an American one-finger salute – why has this awkward gesture replaced the good old British two-fingers?  I waved and smiled, regally.

This morning I turned to our old friend UK420.com,  a seething bog of semi-literate declamations about the wonders of cannabis, which rather emphasise my point that, whatever this drug may or may not do, it certainly doesn't sharpen the mind or increase intellectual curiosity and acuity.

And, not to my surprise at all, I found my new acquaintance posting, oh so humorously, as 'Osama bin Laden'(Bin Laden, for all his faults,  was much better-looking, as it happens) , Full member Number 65799,who has posted 387 times on UK420 since May 2011. The picture of me standing by the banner, taken as I was saying something, is also there for those who wish to see it.  Now, when I republish other people's writings I normally correct mis-spellings and typographical errors. None of us is immune to them. But I have left them in this effusion, because I think they are part of its rather pathetic character.

This is what he says:
'I turnt on my tv this morning, onto "the big questions" on bbc, and was greeted by the odious little tossers face, staring back at me. I very quickly realised that he was in Southampton, at a school not too far from where I am.. 
WAY too good an opportunity to miss I thought, so I grabbed a dust sheet and a spray can and nipped over there..
i knocked up a quick banner, and draped it over a wall near the school so he would see it when he left, and waited on the other side of the road.
10 mins later his taxi leaves the school, drives past the banner, turns around, and out gets the arch oxygen thief!
by this time a lady is next to it taking a picture of it, and he actually tells her to stop so he can pull it down!
No way I think, so over I go. "you'd best leave that alone" I say, to a visably bristling hitchens.
he asked my name, I refused, so he called me a coward! "Do cowards put up signs like that?" I said..
he said he didnt sue for defamation, but could as 2 of the 3 things I said were incorrect? When pressed he wouldnt say which one was correct, tellingly.
He then started on the personal abuse, which to me is a sign he has lost the arguement. I have been toe to toe with him now, and it took all my self restraint not to headbutt him, or worse, but I did give him a body shove when he got "in my face" at which point he retreated to the cab.
im SO glad I went, im looking forward to his version of events in his blog.'

(Mr 'Bin Laden' here utters two other straightforward falsehoods. It is not true that I asked the woman to stop taking a picture so I could take the banner down. I asked her if she would take a picture of me with the banner, before explaining that I wanted it as a souvenir. I am not sure where she went. Nor did he 'give me a body-shove'. As he perfectly well knew, that would have been assault. Nor was I 'bristling'. Until the person's cowardly refusal to tell me who he was, I was quite prepared to have a civil conversation with him, and treat the matter as an amusing encounter, hence my willingness to have my picture taken by him. He also didn't say 'You'd best leave that alone', not least because I never touched it). I mention these small things not because they matter much, but because my failure to correct them might otherwise be taken as confirmation.

I think the event was in fact amusing in its way, and post my own version here in case, as these things sometimes do, the matter attracts more interest. I thought from the wording of the banner that its author was almost certainly angered above all by my campaign to have proper laws against cannabis properly enforced.

On a similar and related subject, I'd like to reproduce two items from a well-known pro-cannabis website which have been drawn to my attention. These, I think, help to explain why any anti-drug articles or Internet postings are so swiftly besieged by hostile comment. And I think they give sensible people a reason to discount such comments

'Dan Ford appointed head of CLEAR 'Comment Warriors' Campaign'
 (2nd Feb 2012)
'The CLEAR "Comment Warriors" campaign has drawn a line against misleading and unthinking reporting of cannabis stories.
Every time cannabis is mentioned in the press, wherever it is possible to leave comments in an online forum, the CLEAR comment warriors will be there.  Our aim is to inform, to tell the truth, to redress the balance against the misinformation and prejudice which is so often evident in reporting of cannabis stories.
In cases of serious inaccuracy, a Press Complaints Commission complaint will be made but every day there are stories about the police raiding cannabis farms.  Sometimes these are major organised crime operations with trafficked gardeners and violence involved.  On other occasions they are quite clearly about someone growing for their own use, frequently for medicinal reasons.  Often the police seem incapable of distinguishing between these extremes and so are the media.  That is when the comment warriors are at their very best.  That is when they are performing a vital service to society.
Every day though, we will be there.  We shall never let a story pass without confronting the real issues behind it, without ensuring that the truth is told.'

At another part of the site we find this: 'Every day there are stories in the British press about cannabis.  Most concern yet another police raid on a "cannabis factory", usually involving victims of human trafficking and organised crime.  Such are the horrendous costs of cannabis prohibition.  Innocent lives are destroyed, property is wrecked, electricity is stolen, neighbourhoods are ruined – all because of an inane, pointless and irrational government policy.
Every day the CLEAR Facebook page points to such stories and calls for comment warriors, people who can post polite, well-informed, persuasive comments.  This is an excellent way of driving opinion from the grass roots.  Over time we can influence newspaper editors, local opinion formers, those people who are prominent in local society.  It is a long game and requires patience, persistence and politeness – but also passion.
So follow the Google news service for stories and keep an eye in the  CLEAR Facebook page. Watch out for calls for "Comment Warriors" when we find a story that's really worth complaining about and  feel free to add any you notice!    Please take the time to leave a comment, express your point of view and use some facts to counter the lies and propaganda that are published about cannabis. If you can't write a comment to the newspaper's website, then write to the editor.
To be most effective, your comments should be polite and refer to scientific evidence.  Please do not use bad language, however angry you feel at the content of the story.  Please feel free to copy any information you find on this website to use in your comments.  Over time, you will be able to build up some standard comments or paragraphs that you can save on your computer and copy and paste as you need them.
In most cases you will need to register in order to leave comments. This can be frustrating to begin with but soon you will be registered everywhere. Of all the local newspapers published in Britain, most use one of only three or four standardised comment systems.  Once you've registered once, you'll be able to comment on all papers that use that system.
The most important thing is to keep going.  It can become tedious but invest just 10 minutes a day and you can be part of making an enormous difference.  Working together we can have an enormous impact from the grass roots.  Become a comment warrior today!'

Well, they're right about it becoming tedious, anyway.