The Spectator

Three people to ask about free speech in Britain

Not Charlie Some cases which make Britain a pretty poor champion of free speech: — In 2005 Bristol pub landlord Leroy Trought was given an Asbo and told to remove a sign for his car park, calling it ‘the porking yard’, after complaints to police that it was ‘racially and sexually offensive’. — In 2006,

David Cameron has a very strange idea of freedom

Last Sunday, David Cameron marched through Paris in solidarity, so it seemed, with those who stand up for free speech. Anyone who thought he meant it must now be crying out, ‘Je suis un right Charlie!’ Hardly had the march finished than the Prime Minister had rediscovered his other side: the one which reacts to

The Spectator at war: War music

From ‘Music and the War’, The Spectator, 16 January 1915: The war, so far, has not thrown up any supreme musical product. It would be an affectation to pretend that the taste of the average British soldier is elevated. As in the Boer War, his repertory is confined to music-ball tunes and songs of an

From the archives | 15 January 2015

From ‘Music and the war’, The Spectator, 16 January 1915: The war, so far, has not thrown up any supreme musical product. It would be an affectation to pretend that the taste of the average British soldier is elevated. As in the Boer War, his repertory is confined to music-ball tunes and songs of an

The Spectator at war: Senior service

From ‘The Windfalls of Soldiering’, The Spectator, 16 January 1915: This war is unlike all our previous wars, in that it was known from the very beginning that a vast number of men would be required. Thus it was plain at once that the only speedy way of reaching the front for the civilian of