Graham Linehan: I don’t regret my online posts

Father Ted co-creator Graham Linehan has told BBC News he stands by his posts on X which led to his arrest last week, over his views on challenging “a trans-identified male” in “a female-only space”.

“I don’t regret anything I’ve tweeted – sometimes I’ve tweeted a bit more out of anger, because of the frustration that no-one’s paying attention to this issue,” he told BBC special correspondent Lucy Manning.

Speaking about his arrest, he said: “I got very, very angry, because for eight years now, I’ve been standing up for women’s rights and trying to get people’s attention about what’s happening to kids in gender clinics.”

Last week the writer was arrested by five officers after arriving at Heathrow on a flight from the US.

The arrest sparked a backlash from some public figures and politicians, and prompted a fierce debate about policing and free speech.

Recalling his flight, which landed in the UK on 1 September, he said he “realised something was up” when no one on the plane was allowed to stand up.

“I didn’t expect it to be what it turned out to be. And then they called my name out and I think I immediately knew what was going to happen,” he said.

He was then met by five armed police officers, who explained he was going to be arrested because of his online posts.

He said he had a strong reaction to being arrested because “for eight years I’ve been harassed, often by the same small group of men, but also by a wider community online”.

When asked if the tone he took in his posts could be described as “vicious and personal to trans people” and if he had tried to “lower the temperature a bit” in what he writes, he said: “I’ve tried several times, but you always get met by a slap in the face.

“So if people come to me in good faith, I will speak back to them in good faith. If people insult me, I will insult them.”

Last week Linehan shared screen shots of the three X posts from April he said he was arrested for on Substack, the subscription-based online platform.

The first post, from his X feed, said: “If a trans-identified male is in a female-only space, he is committing a violent, abusive act. Make a scene, call the cops and if all else fails, punch him in the balls.”

It was put to him that what he wrote was insulting and violent, and he agreed, but said: “Women have a right to defend themselves from strange men in their spaces.”

Linehan said he would be suing the police “for wrongful arrest and false imprisonment.”

On 3 September the head of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Mark Rowley, defended the officers involved, but said he recognised “concern caused by such incidents given differing perspectives on the balance between free speech and the risks of inciting violence in the real world”.

He called on the government to “change or clarify” the law following Linehan’s arrest, while Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said police must “focus on the most serious issues”, when asked about the arrest.

Green Party leader Zack Polanski called the posts “totally unacceptable”, saying the arrest seemed “proportionate”, while Shami Chakrabarti, a Labour peer and ex-director of Liberty, a civil liberties group, said “the public order statute book and speech offences in particular do need an overarching review”.

“But inciting violence must always be a criminal offence,” she added.

Linehan told the BBC he did not feel he had a future in the UK.

“I find the UK culturally a desert. I am disgusted with all my old colleagues in comedy and theatre who have just watched as I’ve been beaten up in the dark by these people,” he said.

“So I don’t really want to have anything to do with them, I don’t think there really is anything for me here.”

He said the US “really feels like it values free speech”, adding: “It just feels like I can relax a little bit more in America. I know I won’t get my collar felt for telling a joke.”

The Irish comedy writer, who also created TV comedies The IT Crowd and Black Books, spoke about the impact of being “cancelled”.

“I had my career destroyed, I had my [upcoming Father Ted] musical taken away, I had my marriage taken away. I don’t know why people expect me to be all sunshine and roses,” he said.

Linehan is also facing a separate charge of harassment – which he denied in Westminster Magistrates Court last week.

The prosecution alleges he “relentlessly” posted abusive comments about Sophia Brooks, 18, on social media last October, before throwing her phone in a road.

But the writer told the court court his life has been “made hell” by transgender activists, including one he is accused of harassing.

The case was adjourned until 29 October, with Linehan released on bail.