The author and journalist, Peter Hitchens has pulled out of a debate at the Cambridge Union after refusing to be on the same side as Stephen Fry. The regular contributor to the Mail on Sunday has had a public and long-standing feud with Fry, during which Fry has called Hitchens a “joyless Daily Mail clod”.  

The debate, set for Week Three, is titled ‘This House Would Disestablish the Church of England’. Speaking exclusively to Varsity, Hitchens, a Christian, said that he “leapt at the chance of opposing Stephen Fry on this” as Fry “has many times been publicly hostile to the Christian religion”. Hitchens claims that himself and the Union officer who approached him “assumed that I and Mr Fry would be on opposite sides”, but when the termcard was published last week it became apparent that Fry is also arguing against disestablishment.

Hitchens went on: “I can't believe he's serious about this. He's an assertive, active atheist. Perhaps he just intends to patronise the Established Church as a picturesque survival, or will say it's a 'harmless frippery'”. Hitchens has therefore announced that he has “reluctantly withdrawn.” 

Hitchens has a self-declared history of being “rude about [Fry] in print”, but the two clashed most publically in the aftermath of a memorial held for the journalist and author Christopher Hitchens, Peter’s brother, in 2012. Fry claimed that he had taken “pity” on Peter Hitchens and had tried to talk to him, but that Hitchens responded “so rudely, so vilely and with such a lack of human decency” that he was compelled to tweet about the incident. Fry called Hitchens a “joyless Daily Mail clod”. The tweet was later deleted.

Writing in 2013, Hitchens said of the encounter: “I was not overjoyed to have Mr Fry’s company forced on me” and had told Fry that “I didn’t like the way he behaved”. He described the circumstance as being “approached at a close relative’s memorial event by someone he despised.” Fry has since referred to Hitchens as a “slug”.

As outlined in his blog yesterday, Hitchens “had very much hoped to be able to argue against Mr Fry on a substantial issue in front of an audience” as “the best possible answer to the various personal insults he has directed at [Hitchens]”. The mix-up instead presented the two as allies, an idea that “did not appeal in the same way.” He has expressed a desire to debate against Mr Fry in an important matter, such as freedom of speech, in the future.

These developments come after it has already been reported that Buzz Aldrin, the second person to walk on the Moon, has pulled out of the Lent Union lineup, the first term of their Bicentenary year. These details were confirmed by the President of the Cambridge Union in the aftermath of a press release which incorrectly included him in a preview of the Lent termcard.