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Frankie Boyle sues Mirror over 'racism' claim

Comedian Frankie Boyle is suing the Mirror newspaper for libel, over an article which labelled him racist.

He is complaining about a story published on 19 July 2011, saying he was in talks for a new Channel 4 show.

The first sentence read: "RACIST comedian Frankie Boyle could soon be returning to TV despite upsetting thousands of viewers".

The Mirror said it will defend itself "on the basis of truth and fair comment".

The trial, which is taking place at the High Court in London, is expected to last a week.

Boyle's lawyer told the court that the newspaper had also defamed his client, by asserting he had been "forced to quit" the BBC comedy show Mock The Week.

His barrister, David Sherborne, said that to call someone "racist" was "obviously defamatory".

Mr Sherborne said Boyle's humour was "deliberately challenging".

Controversial humour

He said the comic did not object to being criticised but did object to being described as racist.

"Saying 'vile' or 'offensive', or his material is 'vile' or 'offensive', is one thing," Mr Sherborne told the jury.

"He realises that that goes with the territory, so to speak. But accusing him of being a racist is an entirely different matter."

Mr Sherborne added: "You can call him 'offensive', you can call him 'tasteless'. That's fine. But he is not racist."

The Glasgow-born comedian's humour has often proved controversial with audiences.

Last year, broadcasting watchdog Ofcom upheld more than 500 complaints about his Channel 4 show Tramadol nights, during which he joked about Katie Price's disabled son, Harvey.

Ofcom ruled that the joke appeared to "target and mock the mental and physical disabilities" of the then eight year-old.

In 2008, the BBC apologised when Boyle made a joke about Palestine on the Radio 4 comedy show Political Animal.

Break from Twitter

A year after that, BBC Two's Mock The Week was criticised by the BBC Trust over comments Boyle made on the show about swimmer Rebecca Adlington's appearance.

As yet, The Mirror has not removed the article about Boyle from its website.

A paragraph added to the top of the story reads: "Frankie Boyle is taking legal proceedings against us for the description of him as a 'racist comedian'. He claims it is untrue and defamatory. We are defending this claim on the basis of truth and fair comment.

"We are also defending his claim that we libelled him by suggesting that 'he was forced to quit Mock the Week' in 2009."

Boyle's lawyer said any suggestion his client was forced to leave the show was "completely untrue".

Boyle has taken a temporary respite from Twitter, telling his followers: "I'm afraid I must disappear from Twitter for a while. See you on the other side of this thing."

BBC News

I think the bit in bold is particularly true...

Frankie Boyle: 'Racism at heart of UK government policy'

Frankie Boyle has today said that racism is ''at the heart'' of British Government policy, and claimed that his Channel 4 show Tramadol Nights was meant as "ridiculous, over the top nihilism".

Boyle said that he felt it was "important" to highlight the issue of racism in society by mocking the racists that he "despised" in comedy routines.

He said that his jokes about immigration were meant as a parody of "racism at the heart of British policy", and claimed that they had been taken out of context by the papers.

"I think one of the things about comedy is it's easy to read stories in the papers and think it's a terrible thing for someone to have said but when you see it in the context of the show it can be more easily explained," he said.

Boyle is suing Mirror Group Newspapers, publisher of The Mirror, over an article in the paper last year about Channel 4 considering commissioning a new show featuring the comic.

However, lawyers for MGN have denied that he was defamed by being described as a "racist comedian", and claimed that Boyle exploits negative stereotypes of black people for ''cheap laughs''.

Jurors in the case were today shown footage of an episode of BBC Two show Mock the Week in which Boyle discussed immigration.

In response, the comic said that he was "pretending" to have racist views for the episode, and insisted that he felt it "important" to mock people who actually think like that.

''I don't think British people are racist. I think it is a top down thing. I think you have a lot of rich and Conservative people who control our country who are racist and their views trickle down through things like tabloid papers," he said.

He added: ''I think there is racism at the heart of British policy and has been both in Labour and Conservative times.''

Asked about why he used the word "n***er" on an episode of his Channel 4 show Tramadol Nights, Boyle replied: "Context is everything. If you use this at a dinner party to insult someone that would be a terrible hate crime. It's not a word I would use lightly."

Boyle has consistently denied claims that he left Mock the Week after making a controversial joke about swimmer Rebecca Adlington.

In court today, he expressed his surprise at the reaction, which included 75 complaints being lodged with the BBC, leading to an official rebuke from the BBC Trust.

"There was no malice in the jokes [about Adlington] in particular," he said. "I was really surprised by the Rebecca Adlington thing."

Later, Boyle added: "I had no idea Rebecca Adlington was as famous as she was or that she had been a huge success."

However, he again insisted that he was not sacked regarding the incident, a claim that was repeated in the Mirror article at the heart of the libel case.

"Absolutely not," he said when asked. "The idea you would be forced to quit the show for saying someone looks like they are looking in the back of a spoon, it just seems ridiculous because they just don't sack people on those panel shows."

The trial continues.

Digital Spy

I hope he wins it. The fact that a comedian has to go to court to defend his jokes is quite frankly absurd.