Inigo Wilson

As ever, the Avian Comestible deploys the best prose on it, Harry’s Place and Pickled Politics have long discussion threads on it, Robert Sharp is thoughtful, Nosemonkey is erudite, Guido and Iain are on the case and no doubt there are thousands of other blogs I know nothing about chewing over and adding to the story.

All is therefore normal in the British blogosphere. "It", the story, being this from Inigo Wilson at Conservative Home.

MPAC are trying to have him fired from his job at Orange as a result of the, ahem, humour in his piece.

Good luck to them say I.  MPAC, just like Inigo himself, have a perfect right to say whatever they wish, subject only to the laws of libel and incitement to violence. Just as Orange and any-, and every-, one else, have a perfect right to listen to and act on such sayings or not, as they please.

Those rules we have, about not having restrictions upon free speech, are meant for government: it’s very clearly spelled out in the US Constitution (which I know we don’t follow, but I do regard it as a good model in this specific instance) that Congress shall make no laws....there’s nothing and should not be to stop people listening, not listening, arguing or screaming back, as they wish, for to do so infringes their own rights of free speech.

Now as a personal matter I wish Inigo every luck in keeping his job, hope that Orange dismiss MPAC as the fruit loops they are and that they crawl back under the rock from whence they came. But none of that changes the legal and moral reality.

Inigo Wilson, in common with us all, has the right to say anything he damn well likes. He also has the duty to take the consequences. If those include enraged consumers petitioning his employer, well, it’s a free country after all, is it not?