Hugh Grant

I love him, even more after he did horrible things like throw baked beans at a dude.

Anyway he testified about the paparazzi's treatment of his baby's mother and holy shit. Its scary.

Oh wow. I'm not a fan of Hugh Grant, but that testimony is horrifying.

I honestly can't believe that kind of harassment is legal. Seems like they're breaking stalker laws, at minimum. Gawd, I'd never leave the house under those circumstances.

It also seems like they stepped it up because of his recent crusade which makes it even scarier.

They'd love to nail him for something super sleazy. They're probably beyond frustrated that his daughter's mother hasn't sold her story to the highest bidder and prefers to have a private life.

Even with this story they are acting like it's some sort of "scandal," despite the fact that both are adults and unmarried.

That is just gross. Someone posted in that thread that idiots like Piers Morgan are commenting; he tweeted I do hope Nelson Mandela was watching Hugh Grant today, so he now understands what real persecution is all about." Fuck off, Piers Morgan. What poor new mother deserves to put up with harassment because she dared have a kid with an actor, one who decided to speak against bullying press. Crazy.

Piers Morgan is a douche and considering how close his ties are to the Rupert Murdoch scandal, he has no room to talk.

A few years before Piers Morgan became editor of the News of the World, they hired a private investigator on Freddie Mercury to discover whether he had AIDS, and persecuted him pretty much up to his dying day (which, coincidentally, is 20 years ago today). So playing the innocent is a bit much. The Daily Mail is just the new NotW.

I understand how when you put yourself in the public eye, and rely on the public to "like" you in order for them to buy your product or see your film or whatever, that you do give up a certain level of privacy. People recognise you, your photograph will get taken on the street depending on where you are and who you're with. But the level of intrusion that Hugh Grant and Sienna Miller are talking about? There is no justification for that kind of thing.

I was just listening to the radio about the hearings that are being held. JKR is testifying today about how a "journalist" slipped a letter to her in her five-year-old's schoolbag.

That testimony is horrifying.

It does make me think quite highly of him, though, for testifying at all, and for showing such obvious concern and care for the mother of his child.

Yeah, Lainey is giving him shit for the statement he released at her birth and not staying longer at the hospital, but I think under the circumstances he did the best he could.

Lainey gives me the pip with with the way she goes on sometimes. If you're not one of her favourites, she goes all out to sit in judgement. And she does meet a lot of these people for her TV show, right? It seems a bit two-faced to me to be posting speculative fiction with her own judgey footnotes and then be all nicey nice to them to their face.

And while I don't condone throwing baked beans at people (waste of some nice beans if nothing else), if that constant harrassment and doorstepping is something he's been putting up with for years, then I'm surprised it was only beans he threw.

Yeah I have a love/hate thing with Lainey. Her site has some of the best gossip but she herself is crazy and horrible. And shes a correspondent for E!Talk in Canada and yes shes totally two faced. She never says any of that shit to their face.

Lainey is Nancy Grace lite, if you ask me. That shrill, unrelenting way she goes on about celebrities she doesn't like is like when Nancy gets a big bee in her crazy bonnet about whatever crime she's harping on about. It's fucking aggravating in both instances.

I really don't understand how that kind of behaviour by the so-called press is legal either. If it was some schmo on the street with a camera doing that shit, they'd be arrested and charged with stalking and harassment, at the very least. But somehow a press pass or affiliation allows you to do whatever you want to anyone in the public eye, including their friends, family, passing acquaintances, someone you stood next to in line at a club, whatever. That these low-lifes would hide their faces and run away when the celebrity would try and take their picture is just pathetic.

I mean harassing his daughters grandmother? Really?

JKR is testifying today about how a "journalist" slipped a letter to her in her five-year-old's schoolbag. .

That is fucking terrifying. If I knew a stranger had been so close to my child that they could put something it his or her schoolbag I would do whatever if took to keep that person away from my family.

I don't really know how I ended up there but, if you have a lot of Sitzfleisch, you can actually watch Hugh Grant' testimony on the site of the Leveson Inquiry. It is really long, and what he talks about is horrifying, but in the parts I watched, I think he himself comes across really well -eloquent and sharp (especially considering the pressure he's under) and also well prepared; and when something is speculation or a theory on his part that he doesn't have any proof for, he makes that clear.

(He talks about his choice of words in the announcement of the birth at minute 64).