Lord Browne: Victim of Homophobic Persecution

I don't normally read the Alphaville IM transcripts, but today's is spot on. Paul Murphy, at the FT, brings up the newspaper coverage about Lord Browne:

I couldn’t believe just how nasty and homophobic the Mail’s coverage was this morning. Made me want to vomit.

He's quite right. This really is, in Liz Gunnison's words, an attack on Browne's sexuality. That's not spin, that's fact. The so-called "allegations" against Browne, which Gunnison considers "salacious" and "tawdry", are really nothing of the sort. Browne and Chevalier were together for four years, during which time they spent a lot of Browne's money and had dinner with some important people. Browne sometimes talked about his job, but there's no indication that he ever told Chevalier anything that he wouldn't tell any journalist or analyst who asked to talk to him. In fact, the only remotely salacious revelation is the one thing that the Daily Mail still isn't allowed to publish – and I'm not going to publish it either, although it's hardly difficult to find. Suffice to say it has no bearing whatsoever on BP shareholders.

Browne is very much the victim here. The Daily Mail, which paid over $100,000 to Chevalier for his kiss-and-tell story, is the homophobic persecuter, using the flimsiest of excuses to out the former BP chief. Browne shouldn't have tried to suppress publication. But that doesn't for a minute excuse what the Mail has done to him.

Back to the FT's Murphy and Neil Hume:

NH: Hmm. Tend to agree. All these allegations are just so petty.
NH: I noticed you put a little Markets Live promo post up earlier – and you said we were going to be making some revelations about journalists’ private lives.
NH: Who’s that – people from the Mail or Mail on Sunday.
PM: No, you!
NH: Eh?
PM: FACT: Neil Hume used his computer at work to order a Tesco’s shop online, citing the spurious excuse that his wife was seven months pregnant. The computer was owned by Pearson, which is a publicly listed company.
PM: FACT: Neil Hume allowed his three year old son Morgan to play Brick on his Pearson-owned Blackberry for THREE HOURS – his excuse being that he was driving back from Northampton at the time and was trying to keep the kid quiet in the back of the car. With the Blackberry’s battery consequently run down, Hume then proceeded to recharge the device on company property
PM: FACT: Neil Hume LIED to FT admin boss Martin Nielsen when claiming that his Blackberry had fallen in the bath when in fact Hume had drowned the device when he spilt a Martini on it.
NH: it was actually a bannna that did the damage to my Blackberry
PM: FACT: Neil Hume CHEATED his employer last month when he claimed £80 for “lunch with a contact.” In fact this was not a lunch. There was NO FOOD involved. Hume was DRINKING with four brokers and he LOST the spoof for the bill.
PM: FACT: Neil Hume REVEALED damaging internal information when he discussed the state of the FT’s technology with the chief executive of a medium-sized investment bank. “It’s just crap,” Hume is alleged to have said at a secret lunch in St James’ arranged by a friend who used to be in journalism. Hume vehemently denies this.
NH: Well, I am not denying that last one
PM: It’s HUBRIS Neil. It’s LIES.
PM: Your glittering career is in ruins