Covering All Options
Posted: Mon 7 July, 2014 Filed under: 1BEM, Cynicism, Hypocrisy, News, People 3 Comments »Is *anyone* really surprised at the news over the weekend that it’s “fairly likely” that allegations of paedophilia by famous people in the 70s and 80s were hidden and denied by politicians? I know I’m not surprised at all.
What did amuse me (or made me despair, I’m not quite certain which) was the quote explaining how documents had gone astray…
The Home Office’s 2013 review found 527 potentially relevant files which it had kept, but a further 114 were missing, destroyed or “not found”.
Well, “Missing, destroyed or ‘not found’” pretty much covers every eventuality, doesn’t it?
I’m firmly of the opinion that some things are of their time, and best not reviewed/judged in the light of today’s more liberated views.
Can I go to the police/sue/get lots of money in compensation for all the ‘smutty’ comments and overly-familiar pats and ‘accidental’ closensses I’ve suffered at the hands (etc) of ‘men of power’ over the years? No, I thought not…
I agree fully – my mum has also said about how the 70s/80s were a very different time in their view of women in the workplace and so on.
Admittedly, having read the sentencing notes for Harris etc., there’s a lot of it that was still pretty unpleasant and went further than “a grope of the bum” (or however you wish to phrase it)
My other reservation comes with the knowledge that these events were 30/40 years ago, and memories and perceptions can change an awful lot in that time. Much as I’m no Yankophile, I do think that the Statute of Limitations on crimes like these has one hell of a lot of validity…
Yes. The psychology of ‘recovered memories’ and ‘eyewitness testimony’ seem to have been utterly ignored when considering the realiability/validity of testimony. Barristers defending accused men would be well advised to find some of the experts in this field to discredit evidence.
The police seem to think that because women from different areas come forward with similar stories, they must be true. Have they never heard of modern communications?
Interesting too that many of these women now claiming ‘assaults’ seem to be from a strata of society that is generally less well off than average. A fast way to make an easy buck maybe? 40 years ago being a ‘groupie’ was part and parcel of the music scence and one cannot help but think that what thrilled many of them at the time (and they queued up in droves outside stage doors) has now become an income stream (not just the compensation, but the pay-outs for stories from the gutter press and low-IQ thin-paper magazines).
“It’s ruined my life!” I read over and over again – no-one can make you feel a victim without your consent (to misquote).
I’m sure there are genuine cases out there, but the whole situation is very unfortunate.
There was some debate on R4 the other day about timescales allowed in this country, and reasoning behind them. I was only a quarter listeing so can’t remember when or what, sorry!