Piers Morgan

Piers Morgan (aka Piers Stefan Pughe-Morgan, born Piers Stefan O'Meara in 1965) is a British TV presenter and former newspaper editor. He has hosted the high-profile ITV current affairs program Good Morning Britain since 2015; he made a number of controversial remarks about race, women, LGBT issues, veganism, and other topics both on the show and on social media.

You gotta spin it to win it
Media
Stop the presses!
We want pictures
of Spider-Man!
  • Journalism
  • Newspapers
  • All articles
Extra! Extra!
  • WIGO World
v - t - e

Previously he edited the Daily Mirror at the time when press phone hacking was a common practice; there are persistent claims he was involved in that illegal practice, as well as in insider share dealing where he bought shares being boosted by his paper's financial correspondents.[1]

Recent controversies

He took a strong dislike to Meghan Markle, wife of Prince Harry, repeatedly attacking her on Good Morning Britain, including saying she was a liar when she said she had contemplated suicide.[2][3] He angrily denied that hostility to her had anything to do with her race, claiming to know more about racism than several BAME[note 1] people.[4][5]

He also took a bizarre dislike to vegan sausage rolls, which he later admitted was trolling because he was bored.[6] It certainly fits in with his disdain for anything characteristic of Britain's youth (or under-50s).

He appeared to be an admirer of Donald Trump, going back to an appearance on the celebrity version of Trump's TV show The Apprentice. Despite saying he wouldn't vote for Trump, he defended Trump's Muslim ban. In 2018 he interviewed Trump for British TV and was accused of sycophancy.[7] He also criticised the Women's March on WashingtonFile:Wikipedia's W.svg held on 21 January 2017 in misogynistic terms, referring to "rabid feminists".[1]

Transphobia
See the main article on this topic: Transphobia

He has been critical of transgender rights, going back to an on-screen argument with Janet Mock on his TV show Piers Morgan Live.[8] He also got upset over trans people in the youth group the Girl Guides, comparing trans people to rapists (the Guides welcomes trans girls).[9] And he ridiculed trans people by making jokes about identifying as a penguin.[10][11]

At Daily Mirror

He had a controversial time as editor of British left-leaning national tabloid the Daily Mirror from 1995-2004.

In 2000 he invested all his savings to buy £67,000 worth of shares in computer company Viglen, just before his paper's "City Slickers" column promoted it as a stock to buy. As a result, the stock price rose and he made a big profit. He was found to have broken a code of conduct on financial journalism but cleared of criminal charges (possibly in part because he lied to regulators by claiming to have bought many fewer shares than he did), while the journalists Anil Bhoyrul and James Hipwell were convicted of conspiracy to breach the Financial Services Act.[12][13][14]

He has been accused of authorising or turning a blind eye to illegal phone hacking while at the Mirror. He was questioned by police in 2013 and 2015 but never charged.[15] Although he denies being involved in hacking, in his 2005 book The Insider he explained how newspapers were able to access celebrity voicemails, indicating he certainly knew about it well before the full extent of tabloid phone hacking became apparent around 2010-11.[16] In 2018 the actor Hugh Grant won a lawsuit against the Mirror for hacking his phone while Morgan was in charge.[17] Morgan's only defence is total ignorance of what his staff was doing.

Ian Hislop, editor of Private Eye magazine accused Morgan of trying to get dirt on him, having Hislop followed by private detectives and offering money to readers in exchange for salacious stories.[1] There is a long-term feud between the Eye and Morgan, with Hislop's paper habitually using the nickname Piers Moron.[18][19]

In 1996 he was criticised over the football-related headline "Achtung Surrender! For You Fritz Ze Euro Championship Is Over".[20]

He eventually lost his job in 2004 after publishing fake photos of British soldiers allegedly abusing Iraqi prisoners, in the aftermath of Abu Ghraib and similar scandals. Sadly the Mirror's exclusive pictures were shown to be an obvious deception.

Other feuds

He is reputed to have had feuds with:

  • Jeremy Clarkson, motoring journalist and right-wing columnist, with Clarkson emptying a glass of water over Morgan and the two getting in a fistfight, after Morgan published a photo of Clarkson with a woman who wasn't his wife.[21]
  • Ewan McGregor, accusing the actor of being a "paedophile-loving hypocrite" for supporting Roman Polanski, after McGregor criticised Morgan's misogyny.[1][22]
  • Hugh Grant, the actor annoyed Morgan by calling for greater curbs on the press to prevent invasion of privacy.[23]

Curriculum vitae
  • 1988 — started work at The Sun, using the less posh name Piers Morgan rather than his legal name Pughe-Morgan.
  • 1994 — becomes editor of Rupert Murdoch's News of the World.
  • 1995 — leaves News of the World after publishing photos of Princess Diana's sister-in-law Catherine Victoria Lockwood leaving a clinic for addictive disorders, viewed an unacceptable invasion of privacy. He claims his departure was voluntary, others suggest Murdoch felt he had gone too far.[24]
  • 1995 — becomes editor of the Daily Mirror.
  • 2004 — sacked from Mirror.
  • 2005 — becomes co-owner of UK newspaper trade publication the Press Gazette.
  • 2006 — starts work as a judge on America's Got Talent, the first of several such talent show roles on both sides of the Atlantic, most notably Britain's Got Talent.
  • 2010 — replaces Larry King as a host on CNN; his show was axed in 2014 due to low ratings.[25]
  • 2015 — after a stint as guest-host of Good Morning Britain, is taken on permanently kicked off/resigned in 2021 after making inflammatory comments about Markle and receiving 41,000 complaints about the program[26]

Notes
  1. BAME = Black, Asian and minority ethnic, used in UK demographics
gollark: I think this is at least partly because of the fear that they *might* be.
gollark: And there's the *possibility* of all kinds of fun backdoors.
gollark: Computers have exciting security problems.
gollark: I don't want anything computery interacting with my brain.
gollark: * brainwaves to UTF-8

References
  1. See the Wikipedia article on Piers Morgan.
  2. Piers Morgan torn apart for ‘hateful’ takedown of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry on Good Morning Britain, The Independent, 8 March 2021
  3. Piers Morgan ‘doesn’t believe’ Meghan Markle’s suicidal revelation in Oprah interview: ‘I’m sickened by what I just watched’, The Metro, 8 March 2021
  4. Trisha Goddard Shuts Down Piers Morgan During Discussion About Racism Towards Meghan Markle, Huffington Post, 8 March 2021
  5. Lisa Nandy clashes with Piers Morgan over Meghan racism claims, The Guardian, 22 Jan 2020
  6. Piers Morgan says criticism over Greggs vegan sausage rolls was mostly because he was 'bored out of my brains', The Independent, 10 May 2020
  7. 88% of viewers say Piers Morgan was too soft on Donald Trump in “sycophantic” ITV “love-in” interview, Radio Times, 2018
  8. Transgender Advocate Janet Mock: Piers Morgan "Sensationalized" My Story, Buzzfeed News, 5 Feb 2014
  9. Piers Morgan slammed for transphobic comments on 'Good Morning Britain', Attitude (UK), 25 Sep 2018
  10. Emmerdale actor hits out at Piers Morgan for 'transphobic' gender rant, Cornwall News, 12 Sep 2019
  11. Labour’s Lisa Nandy clashes with Piers Morgan over trans rights on Good Morning Britain, The Independent, 10 March 2020
  12. Mirror editor 'bought £67,000 of shares before they were tipped', The Guardian, 23 Nov 2005
  13. What Piers Morgan told investigators about the City Slickers scandal, The Guardian, 13 Jun 2012
  14. Previously Unpublished Documents Show Piers Morgan Under Fire, The Daily Beast, 13 Jun 2012
  15. Piers Morgan questioned for a second time over phone-hacking allegations, The Guardian, 21 April 2015
  16. What Even He Can't Deny, Brian Cathcart, Byline Times, 21 Jan 2020
  17. Hugh Grant wins Trinity Mirror hacking case and names Piers Morgan as guilty editor, i News, 5 Feb 2018
  18. Has Piers now got news for Ian?, The Guardian, 1 Sep 2002
  19. Ian Hislop: 'How did I celebrate Piers Morgan getting axed from CNN? I'm still celebrating', The Independent, 10 April 2014
  20. Piers Morgan: The man with no moral compass who found his destiny in a steadfast opposition to war, The Independent, 10 Oct 2011
  21. Inside Jeremy Clarkson and Piers Morgan’s feud – from a Concorde spat to a punch in the face, Metro, 2 November 2020
  22. Ewan McGregor snubs Good Morning Britain interview following Piers Morgan row, The Guardian, 24 Jan 2017
  23. Piers Morgan Slams 'Disgusting' Hugh Grant Over 'UK Is Finished' Comments, Huffington Post, 26 Jan 2020
  24. Where is Piers Morgan today on Good Morning Britain?, The Metro, 23 May 2018
  25. CNN axes Piers Morgan Live after collapse in ratings, The Guardian, 24 Feb 2014
  26. Piers Morgan leaving 'Good Morning Britain' after storming off set over his attacks on Meghan Markle by Oliver Darcy (Updated 2:13 PM ET, Tue March 9, 2021) CNN.
This article is issued from Rationalwiki. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.