Wow! It’s all happening! Jon Henley’s Guardian article on paedophilia yesterday has provoked an immediate and massive reaction.
The piece itself drew over 900 comments on the paper’s website before the no doubt exhausted moderators closed the thread: they had been kept very busy reading and deleting abusive posts. In general, though, the exchanges, though passionate, included a lot of thoughtful if not always very well informed material. There were inevitably those who said they had been abused as children, and there were others who said they had enjoyed being sexually engaged with an adult, without later ill effects. I was pleasantly surprised by the number of contributors who welcomed the article as a fresh and – in an ironic phrase – “grown-up” discussion of children’s sexual expression with themselves, their peers and with adults.
The debate exploded into something much wider this morning, though, with extensive coverage in the Sun and the Daily Telegraph. Every blogger and tweeter in the UK has probably been on it since, including a piece by Tom Watson MP, a member of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee of Parliament, who received widespread coverage for his likening of media mogul Rupert Murdoch to a mafia boss. He is also a notable anti-child “abuse” voice, and this time he was having a go at the Guardian. Back in October 2012, Watson claimed in the House of Commons that a paedophile network may have existed in the past at a high level, protected by connections to Parliament and involving a close aide to a former Prime Minister. A former Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE) executive committee member, Peter Righton was said to be implicated. I knew Peter pretty well as I served on the PIE committee myself. I don’t know the full allegations, but basically I think the story is rubbish.
There’s probably no need for me to bang on too long about all this. You can check out the links for yourself. I don’t even need to put all the links here because an excellent blogger in New Zealand, Peter Hooper, has beaten me to it and his latest blog is well worth reading.
All I would recommend is that you check out a totally crazy story in the Sun by Dr Sara Payne* and Shy Keenan, called “Shame on The Guardian for giving paedo a voice”. Columnist Richard Littlejohn’s famous catch phrase is “You couldn’t make it up”. No? He should read this column: it’s made up from start to finish! There are lies, damned lies and the Murdoch press. This could make an interesting test for the new press complaints body that is in the offing in the UK.
Enjoy “what the papers say”.
*I understand that Dr Sara Payne is the mother of child murder victim Sarah (with an “h”) Payne. While rage towards anyone perceived as a threat to children is eminently understandable in view of this background, and of course fully justified as regards child rape, abduction or murder, I do not think the strength of her views absolves her from the need to write honestly.
Tom, your positive comment about my blog item is valued. I do see the Guardian piece as significant, and what unfolds from here is hard to predict. If I was to compare the 1990s to now (2013) I would have to include a moderate amount of positive features about it. The personal attacks against you are I think not surprising but less effective that a couple of decades ago.
Shades of Rind et al. in 1998-99!!!
I have neither the time not the inclination to run a survey on the positive/neutral/negative fractions of the ~900 responses, but at least there were a few of the former. And, of course, the people who attacked that “pediatrician’s” office back in 2000 ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2000/aug/30/childprotection.society ) are regrettably still with us.
So where will this hullabaloo lead us? Will it fizzle in a day or two? Or dare we hope that some rare rational discussion will ensue?
I am on unfamiliar turf when it comes to these mass media discussions – I tend more toward the academic, although I hasten to add that I have at best only minimal academic qualifications. But academia tends to raise the same questions that Jon Henley did, so these two areas have a propensity to reinforce one another. It will take everything that can be mustered to counter the ingrained hysteria about consensual sexually expressed boy/older male relationships, but at lease the issues have been brought out into the open one more time.
I am not at all certain that the hysteria is ingrained, rather more conditioned, and then only among identifiable sectors while the rest typically sit back awaiting their cue, their turn to speak.
I refer to the vast numbers affected by the collateral damage, families and friends gagged until now by court orders and media hysteria and as often real threats of violence, like the rest of us for due process to be restored.
We do live in democratic societies. Look forward for new voices to emerge.
What I will do myself is collect the responses and write my own blog here on Sniffer Dog from that perspective.
Maybe wait a couple of days to see what else emerges from the rubble of fundamentalist backlash.