Thundercracker posted:

I mean, look, your point of view is the same one bigots use to denounce Muhammed for being a pedophile because he married a 13 year old. To us it's wrong, as it should be, but back then child marriage was NORMAL.

All these things are wrong of course, but human moral evolution is a serious of enlightenments that make what was normal, into unacceptable.

Otherwise then every single people in the history of humanity was a participant in some monstrous evil, and deserve to be denounced.

No one cared because back then in Britain it was normal to abuse kids in instutional care. Some of the other cases you can read about that happened in Great Britain make this look mild by comparison.

Understanding isn't the same as condoning. Just as understanding the Roman Empire isn't the same as condoning slavery and imperialism.

Ktb posted:

Just to clarify, nonce has specific implications of paedophilia. Wouldn't want anyone to use it out of context.

kuddles posted:

Okay, I'm confused. How can someone abuse hundreds of people and an inquiry doesn't occur until after he's dead?

davestones posted:

I think a large part of it is that he was around for something like 4 decades and donated so much/did so much for charity, everyone kind of had it in the back of their heads but ignored it.

DrVenkman posted:

For those that know about psychology etc and the behavior of paedophiles, wouldn't it be strange behavior if a man who abused countless kids during his time at the BBC was able to just stop suddenly?

Pipski posted:

This might come as a shock, but geriatrics tend to have lower sex drives than they did when they were younger.

DrVenkman posted:

I still don't know what to make of it all, and I think the idea that Saville abused upwards of 300 kids is frankly ludicrous. Oh and he liked to gently caress corpses too, and now it looks like he has links to the IRA as well.

So let's tackle a couple of issues.

1) Was Saville banging girls of questionable age?

More than likely, but then so was everyone's musical hero John Peel, who wrote about such things in his autobiography where he admitted to getting blown by girls as young as 13 because they were literally lining up to do it (The justification seemed to be that because the girls wanted to do it that it didn't make it predatory).

The 70's were an incredibly promiscuous time and a vastly different era. That doesn't put the actions of Peel, Starr and Saville (Doubtless that there's countless others too) in the right at all. But you need to put these things in context.

2) Everyone knew about it but did nothing.

gently caress this. If this is true then really just gently caress all of those who turned a blind eye, and that goes for Paul Gambaccini and Ester Rantzen and the ilk who all said they knew the rumours and did nothing.

I get how hard it would've been to report it at the time, I'm sure abuse wasn't high on the police's radar at the time. But if you were afforded countless occasions to report it, even if it was anonymously, and didn't do it. Then you're a terrible human being. Coming out and saying it now is nothing but putting your own conscience at ease.

3) "There was a funny look about him"

Of all the statements uttered by people, this is the worst one. Is this what we're like as a society now? "He looks like a Pedo" is literally what Brass Eye was making fun of. He didn't really, it's just filtered through this weird prism.

4) Jimmy Saville was the Scarlet Pimpernel of child abuse.

Just the sheer number of allegations against him are ludicrous, and that they're presented as 'fact' is astounding to me. There's been a few occasions now where people have gone directly to the papers instead of going to the police first. There was a guy interviewed on the radio who had the story that Saville hosed him in his dressing room, then a BBC staff member came in and did nothing, complete with ominous warning from Saville that no one will believe him.

Furthermore, there's just no proof. And the truth is there won't be. Instead we got a guy who isn't here to defend himself while countless people come out of the woodwork. At this rate there's going to be more kids in the 70's and 80's who weren't hosed by Saville than ones who were.

For those that know about psychology etc and the behavior of paedophiles, wouldn't it be strange behavior if a man who abused countless kids during his time at the BBC was able to just stop suddenly? It seems odd that all the allegations against him are from his time there. It reminds me of the Satanic Ritual abuse during the 80's.

Now having said all that, I wouldn't be surprised if those initial stories about Saville from 2007 that the police looked at had something to them. But all this bandwagon jumping does now is greatly diminish any legitimate claims that people had.

I get this is a gently caress loads of words but I'm generally fascinated by these sort of mass hysteria cases.

Hammerite posted:

Maybe the odd one or two out of those 300 will turn out to have been made up by attention-seekers. I say maybe. It's a big number, statistically some small proportion will be weirdoes. But the idea that some enormous proportion of them are liars is pretty insulting to the guy's victims and positing that it's all just a bunch of crazy hysteria is kind of a classless thing to do. I'm not sure why you felt you needed to make this post. I mean, the weight of evidence is hardly on Savile's side here.

Extra Smooth Balls posted:

I'd imagine that since he stopped doing so much charity and TV work he had less opportunities, too.

Pipski posted:

This might come as a shock, but geriatrics tend to have lower sex drives than they did when they were younger.

DrVenkman posted:

Also, we still don't know the actual nature of the complaints made against him yet. Just a vague idea of how many there are. As far as I'm aware they can run the gamut of "He abused me" to "Well I think he touched me on my backside one time".

DrVenkman posted:

My point isn't that all these people are lying and that Saville is innocent, it's that there are absolutely people who are faking it, or have looked back some thirty years and thought "Oh hey, he put his arm around me once - maybe I need to tell the police too".

DrVenkman posted:

I still don't know what to make of it all, and I think the idea that Saville abused upwards of 300 kids is frankly ludicrous. Oh and he liked to gently caress corpses too, and now it looks like he has links to the IRA as well.

So let's tackle a couple of issues.

1) Was Saville banging girls of questionable age?

More than likely, but then so was everyone's musical hero John Peel, who wrote about such things in his autobiography where he admitted to getting blown by girls as young as 13 because they were literally lining up to do it (The justification seemed to be that because the girls wanted to do it that it didn't make it predatory).

The 70's were an incredibly promiscuous time and a vastly different era. That doesn't put the actions of Peel, Starr and Saville (Doubtless that there's countless others too) in the right at all. But you need to put these things in context.

2) Everyone knew about it but did nothing.

gently caress this. If this is true then really just gently caress all of those who turned a blind eye, and that goes for Paul Gambaccini and Ester Rantzen and the ilk who all said they knew the rumours and did nothing.

I get how hard it would've been to report it at the time, I'm sure abuse wasn't high on the police's radar at the time. But if you were afforded countless occasions to report it, even if it was anonymously, and didn't do it. Then you're a terrible human being. Coming out and saying it now is nothing but putting your own conscience at ease.

3) "There was a funny look about him"

Of all the statements uttered by people, this is the worst one. Is this what we're like as a society now? "He looks like a Pedo" is literally what Brass Eye was making fun of. He didn't really, it's just filtered through this weird prism.

4) Jimmy Saville was the Scarlet Pimpernel of child abuse.

Just the sheer number of allegations against him are ludicrous, and that they're presented as 'fact' is astounding to me. There's been a few occasions now where people have gone directly to the papers instead of going to the police first. There was a guy interviewed on the radio who had the story that Saville hosed him in his dressing room, then a BBC staff member came in and did nothing, complete with ominous warning from Saville that no one will believe him.

Furthermore, there's just no proof. And the truth is there won't be. Instead we got a guy who isn't here to defend himself while countless people come out of the woodwork. At this rate there's going to be more kids in the 70's and 80's who weren't hosed by Saville than ones who were.

For those that know about psychology etc and the behavior of paedophiles, wouldn't it be strange behavior if a man who abused countless kids during his time at the BBC was able to just stop suddenly? It seems odd that all the allegations against him are from his time there. It reminds me of the Satanic Ritual abuse during the 80's.

Now having said all that, I wouldn't be surprised if those initial stories about Saville from 2007 that the police looked at had something to them. But all this bandwagon jumping does now is greatly diminish any legitimate claims that people had.

I get this is a gently caress loads of words but I'm generally fascinated by these sort of mass hysteria cases.

DrVenkman posted:

I said in my last post I'm sure that he is guilty, I just can't see it being to the extent that it's reported as.

OldTennisCourt posted:

Holy poo poo.

"Guys maybe he was loving kids, but A LOT of people did it in the 70's!"

DrVenkman posted:

Odd one or two? There's a lot of cases that were brought to the papers before they were even reported to the police. An abused doesn't think "Oh how much cash can I make from this". And apparently there's a lot of these victims that are going to sue both the BBC and the NHS.

quote:

And as for the guy who thought I was excusing his behavior because it was the 70's? That's not what I was saying at all.

DrVenkman posted:

I said in my last post I'm sure that he is guilty, I just can't see it being to the extent that it's reported as.

DrVenkman posted:

My point was trying to understand why, at the time, people could wave it off so blithely as they clearly did. And when that culture is there, which it was, it's easier to see why. The same way people would laugh off casual misogyny or racism at the time because "That's just how it was".

Pipski posted:

Well, when you've got something to substantiate that, get back to us.


So, on the one hand you can't see how he got away with it, but at the same time you think it would just have been laughed off because of the era?

DrVenkman posted:

My point isn't that all these people are lying and that Saville is innocent, it's that there are absolutely people who are faking it, or have looked back some thirty years and thought "Oh hey, he put his arm around me once - maybe I need to tell the police too". I'm not in any way shape or form saying that Saville is totally innocent

DrVenkman posted:

I suppose I just find it hard to believe that countless acts of abuse can go on for that long and the perpetrator not get caught.

VoodooSchmoodoo posted:

I watched the Panorama episode on Sunday and it was just... ugh. I'm a bit puzzled why everyone is coming down only on the beeb when it seems like it was the police that made the crucial failure.

Leon Einstein posted:

Are you loving serious? Just because it happened in other cases doesn't mean it was "normal".

FiftySeven posted:

Nah, Just that Jimmy Carr's humour tends to involve plenty of jokes involving topics like pedophilia.

And to be fair, The audience at the show I was at were hardly very sophisticated as a whole.

quote:

Was there a paedophile ring in No 10? MP Tom Watson demands probe

A powerful paedophile network may have operated in Britain protected by its connections to Parliament and Downing Street, a senior Labour politician suggested yesterday.

Speaking from the back benches of the House of Commons, Tom Watson, the deputy chairman of the Labour Party, called on the Metropolitan Police to reopen a closed criminal inquiry into paedophilia.

Indicating his anxiety that there had been an establishment cover-up, Mr Watson referred to the case of Peter Righton, who was convicted in 1992 of importing and possessing illegal homosexual pornographic material.

Righton, a former consultant to the National Children’s Bureau and lecturer at the National Institute for Social Work in London, admitted two illegal importation charges and one charge of possessing obscene material. He was fined £900.

At Prime Minister’s Questions, Mr Watson said the evidence file used to convict Righton “if it still exists, contains clear intelligence of a widespread paedophile ring”.

He told a hushed Commons: “One of its members boasts of a link to a senior aide of a former Prime Minister, who says he could smuggle indecent images of children from abroad.

“The leads were not followed up, but if the files still exist, I want to ensure that the Metropolitan Police secure the evidence, re-examine it, and investigate clear intelligence suggesting a powerful paedophile network linked to Parliament and No 10.”

In the aftermath of Mr Watson’s remarks, media outlets speculated that he was referring to the late former Prime Minister Sir Edward Heath – who was the subject of unsubstantiated rumours about sex with under-age boys – or to Sir Peter Morrison, a former Downing Street aide who died in 1995.

However, The Independent understands that Mr Watson’s comments were not aimed at either Sir Edward or Sir Peter, but at a living person associated with Margaret Thatcher’s administration.

They are thought to involve the activities of the Paedophile Information Exchange, a pro-paedophile group in existence between 1974 and 1984, which believed there should be no age of consent.

Responding to the remarks, David Cameron said the MP had raised “a very difficult and complex case”, adding he was unclear which former Prime Minister Mr Watson was referring to.

Criticising the BBC’s record on Savile – who was never caught and died last year aged 84, the Prime Minister said: "These allegations do leave many institutions - perhaps particularly the BBC - with serious questions to answer - I think above all the question, 'How did he get away with this for so long?'.”

He told MPs: "The most important thing is that the police investigation is properly resourced and is allowed to continue.”

Pipski posted:

Well, when you've got something to substantiate that, get back to us.

ApexAftermath posted:

Okay??? There might be some lying/embellishing going on. Who cares? It's loving obvious at this point he is responsible for a shitload of human misery. Why even bring it up that "some of them might by lying" as a counterpoint? Just makes you sound like some kind of Glen Beck "just asking questions" weirdo playing devil advocate at a highly inappropriate time.

DrVenkman posted:

Because it forces the whole thing to become parody as the newspapers become even more willing to print anything. "Nurses used to bring him disabled kids", "He was a necrophiliac", the latest one printed today is that he was at the centre of a child porn ring via 10 Downing Street. The more outlandish the claims get the more it overshadows any legitimate claims people might have, and the more it impedes an actual police investigation.

You can tell the press has got bored with the initial allegations now and are instead just looking for the sickest thing they can print. That's what "some lying" does. It drives the story away from the real issue (And means the press can stick the boot into the BBC while ignoring their own culpability).

DrVenkman posted:

I still don't know what to make of it all, and I think the idea that Saville abused upwards of 300 kids is frankly ludicrous. Oh and he liked to gently caress corpses too, and now it looks like he has links to the IRA as well.

So let's tackle a couple of issues.

1) Was Saville banging girls of questionable age?

More than likely, but then so was everyone's musical hero John Peel, who wrote about such things in his autobiography where he admitted to getting blown by girls as young as 13 because they were literally lining up to do it (The justification seemed to be that because the girls wanted to do it that it didn't make it predatory).

The 70's were an incredibly promiscuous time and a vastly different era. That doesn't put the actions of Peel, Starr and Saville (Doubtless that there's countless others too) in the right at all. But you need to put these things in context.

2) Everyone knew about it but did nothing.

gently caress this. If this is true then really just gently caress all of those who turned a blind eye, and that goes for Paul Gambaccini and Ester Rantzen and the ilk who all said they knew the rumours and did nothing.

I get how hard it would've been to report it at the time, I'm sure abuse wasn't high on the police's radar at the time. But if you were afforded countless occasions to report it, even if it was anonymously, and didn't do it. Then you're a terrible human being. Coming out and saying it now is nothing but putting your own conscience at ease.

3) "There was a funny look about him"

Of all the statements uttered by people, this is the worst one. Is this what we're like as a society now? "He looks like a Pedo" is literally what Brass Eye was making fun of. He didn't really, it's just filtered through this weird prism.

4) Jimmy Saville was the Scarlet Pimpernel of child abuse.

Just the sheer number of allegations against him are ludicrous, and that they're presented as 'fact' is astounding to me. There's been a few occasions now where people have gone directly to the papers instead of going to the police first. There was a guy interviewed on the radio who had the story that Saville hosed him in his dressing room, then a BBC staff member came in and did nothing, complete with ominous warning from Saville that no one will believe him.

Furthermore, there's just no proof. And the truth is there won't be. Instead we got a guy who isn't here to defend himself while countless people come out of the woodwork. At this rate there's going to be more kids in the 70's and 80's who weren't hosed by Saville than ones who were.

For those that know about psychology etc and the behavior of paedophiles, wouldn't it be strange behavior if a man who abused countless kids during his time at the BBC was able to just stop suddenly? It seems odd that all the allegations against him are from his time there. It reminds me of the Satanic Ritual abuse during the 80's.

Now having said all that, I wouldn't be surprised if those initial stories about Saville from 2007 that the police looked at had something to them. But all this bandwagon jumping does now is greatly diminish any legitimate claims that people had.

I get this is a gently caress loads of words but I'm generally fascinated by these sort of mass hysteria cases.

Phisty posted:

This article even mentions that in his own drat autobiography he talked about how he was questioned by the police about a missing teenage girl and responded, “If she comes in I’ll bring her back tomorrow but I’ll keep her all night first as my reward.”

usb teledildonics posted: