When you bring up a child, what you are aiming at is self-regulation.
The parents want to bring good moral principles in a firm, reasonable and loving way such that the youngster eventually sees the basic sense of them, imbibes them for himself / herself and so begins to moderate / manage his / her own behaviour accordingly.
Self-regulation is also obviously the only way to maintain a free press in a civilised, democratic society. But it has all gone awry in Britain, as we have lost our moral moorings as a nation. The phone hacking scandal, in which some journalists and editors have behaved disgracefully and brought great hurt on a number of vulnerable people, has blown it. Lord Justice Leveson’s enquiry is recommending some kind of statutory regulation of the press.
The re-emergence of heavy shepherds
What would you think if you received a letter from your church leaders that read like this? ‘Are church …