by Cam Wakefield, Reclaim The Net:
A comedian once celebrated for absurdity is now caught in Britain’s most absurd reality.
There are many ways to return to Britain after a long-haul flight. Maybe you get a cup of tea, a mildly annoyed customs agent, and a taxi driver who tells you London’s gone to hell. Or, if you’re Graham Linehan, you’re met at Heathrow by five armed officers who then take you into custody over things you wrote on the internet.
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The man who created Father Ted and The IT Crowd, shows that helped define British humor, was arrested, detained, and taken to hospital, all because of three tweets.
He wrote later: “I was arrested at an airport like a terrorist, locked in a cell like a criminal, taken to hospital because the stress nearly killed me, and banned from speaking online.”
The Metropolitan Police confirmed that Linehan was arrested on suspicion of inciting violence, related to posts he made on X. Armed officers from the Met’s Aviation Unit escorted Linehan off of a flight from Arizona and into custody.
The tweets in question included one joke suggesting that if a “trans-identified male” is found in a women-only space, people should “make a scene, call the cops and if all else fails, punch him in the balls.”
Another tweet featured a photo of a transgender rally with the caption: “A photo you can smell.” A third read: “I hate them. Misogynists and homophobes. Fuck em.”
Linehan says he was taken to a holding cell, stripped of his belongings, and interrogated in detail about the tweets.
This isn’t satire. This is modern Britain.
At some point, Lineham’s blood pressure spiked high enough that he had to be taken to the hospital. Not exactly how most comedy writers picture the fallout of posting online.
He suspects the arrest wasn’t spur-of-the-moment. It was planned. Before he even left the US, something odd happened.
At the gate in Arizona, he says, airline staff told him his seat was suddenly unavailable and he needed to be rebooked.
At the time, he chalked it up to airline chaos. But later, reflecting on the timing, he wrote: “At the time, I thought it was just the sort of innocent snafu that makes air travel such a joy. But in hindsight, it was clear I’d been flagged.”
