Justice has been served.
On Thursday, April 25, right-wing pundit Laurence Fox was officially ordered to pay £180,000 ($220,000) after losing his libel case against RuPaul's Drag Race UK season 1 star Crystal in January 2024.
Specifically, Fox must pay £90,000 ($110,000) to each of the two people involved in the case: Colin Seymour (Crystal's out-of-drag name) and Simon Blake (UK charity Stonewall trustee). The judge who presided over the case reportedly made the following statement (via Deadline):
"By calling Mr. Blake and Mr. Seymour 'paedophiles,' Mr. Fox subjected them to a wholly undeserved public ordeal. It was a gross, groundless, and indefensible libel, with distressing and harmful real-world consequences for them."
Crystal has taken to social media to share her immediate reaction to the news. The Drag Race UK star wrote in an Instagram story:
"If you just got this as a push notification from The Guardian: you're welcome."
Instagram (@crystal.will.see.you.now)
In October 2020, Fox shared a series of tweets (now X posts) accusing Crystal/Seymour and Blake of being "pedophiles." Crystal and Blake filed a defamation lawsuit in April 2021, which came to a close in January 2024 with the verdict that Fox had lost.
Conservatives have been actively targeting the LGBTQ+ community in the past few years, with a particular focus on trans people and drag entertainers. Thankfully, the U.K. courts saw this for what it is — and has always been — and reached a verdict in favor of Crystal and Blake.
