CLAIRE LEHMANN: Thiel vs Gawker: Why a Defensive Media is the Real Threat to Free Speech.

The lengths to which some writers have gone to defend Gawker’s behaviour cast doubt of whether the industry is capable of recognising unethical or illegal actions in its own ranks. . . .

Read enough of these flaccid excuses for bullying from media types and one comes away feeling vaguely sick. The real threat to freedom of expression is not a lawsuit funded by Peter Thiel. It is a vampiric industry that is ready to suck the blood of the public in an effort to cope with its economic stresses.

The media’s response to the Thiel vs Gawker affair has been to make much of Thiel. But the paramount issue is the conduct of the media itself. Journalism fails as a profession when it cannot adequately police itself. Thiel vs Gawker demonstrates the blindness of the press to the unseemly excesses of those within their ranks.

You don’t have to be an amoral narcissist to work in journalism — but it helps!