Heretic TOC

Not the dominant narrative

Tom O'Carroll

Malice against Alice in cyber-land attack

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Today Heretic TOC features a guest blog from Eric Tazelaar, a name that will be familiar to many here as a contributor of articles to NAMBLA’s website – which as many will also be aware by now has been under attack in the last couple of days from “hacktivists” along with numerous other sites engaging with attraction to minors. NAMBLA’s website now appears to be fully back in action and Eric has reacted very promptly with a piece on the theme of cyber-vigilantism. So well done, both NAMBLA and Eric! However, there is a danger that the site, or some of […]

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A rearguard battle for evidence-based justice

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Sentencing Council consults the public: that means YOU! Ring any bells? The topic did not make for the most memorable of blogs but it was on an important matter. This was back in December, just after an announcement from the Sentencing Council in the UK that under new draft guidelines sentences for rapists and other sex offenders in England and Wales “could become tougher”, in order “to recognise the long-term psychological harm they cause”. A three-month public consultation period was announced on the proposals and Heretic TOC suggested that heretics here might like to respond. I don’t know if anyone else

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When the moderator becomes immoderate

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Am I a fascist? I fear I might be when it comes to the crunch. Even bigger shock horror, I suspect I could be about to rationalize some deeply suspect, callous, ruthless thinking of mine, right here and now. I’m not sure how this is going to pan out. By the end of the blog I may be appalled by what I have said, and so may you. No doubt you will let me know if that is the case, and I might find it painful. It is just that, as the moderator of Heretic TOC over the period of nearly

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Midwest garage stories

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David Kennerly, in this guest blog, vividly recalls childhood freedoms we have lost. As Heretic TOC was unfortunately unable to use the piece at the time first proposed, it was offered by mutual agreement for first publication at the excellent website You Are Your Story. Now it is reproduced here with the approval of webmaster Jay Edson, who has posted here as “Jedson”. It’s very strange for me to hear today’s parents, and other oddly obsessive adults, nattering on about sexual “acting out” in children, convinced that an external, malign, influence must be responsible. They insist, without any evidence to support

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Is truth, beauty? Is beauty truth?

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“Beauty is truth, truth beauty” – that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. From Ode on a Grecian Urn by John Keats Do we agree with Keats? Can we even say what he means? I am inspired at least to attempt it by Jedson’s thoughts on how we should judge art, an issue we are moved to ponder now that artist Graham Ovenden‘s work is being condemned and censored. Jedson said,  “I question the idea that aesthetics is the only criterion by which we should judge art (which I suspect is your position [i.e. Heretic

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Police are the only art critics who count

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News that the Tate gallery was removing the work of a leading artist from public view following his conviction for child sex offences made headlines globally a week ago. The sense of shock in the art world was palpable following the downfall of renowned painter and photographer Graham Ovenden, whose sensuous images of prepubescent girls have been critically acclaimed but also the subject of suspicious police attention for decades. No wonder the arty types are stunned: suddenly, they find themselves rudely demoted by the Tate’s implicit acknowledgment that when push comes to shove the police and the courts are the only

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Masters of our fate, captains of our soul

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Power. That’s what it’s all about, insist the bad-mouthers these days. The abuse of power. At one time they would bang on about the “innocence” of childhood, but that doesn’t play too well when talking about kids into a double-figure age or their early teens. Bullshit. It’s not about power, it’s about the physical dimension of love, which inspires benevolent and nurturant feelings. That’s always been my response, based mainly on my own introspection and knowledge of really nice guys who are attracted to children, and a few women too. But a few inconvenient realities have been insinuating themselves into my

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History by numbers from Sir Diarmaid

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In response to Silence and shame at the Sheldonian, Clovernews commented: …it seems to me that Church teaching was historically more about the preservation of the virtues of unmarried girls rather than ‘child sexual abuse’ as such. Those challenged to quote anything about the matter from the Bible usually fall back on the one about people having millstones hung around their neck and thrown into the sea if they ‘offend one of these little ones’ [Luke 17:2] – clearly ‘offend’ can mean anything you want it to, especially after 2000 years, and in any case scholars think that passage refers to recent

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Silence and shame at the Sheldonian

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Is silence in the face of great wrongs always shameful? If so, Heretic TOC should plead guilty. By that demanding standard I should have howled the house down at the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford last week. I should have “caused a scene”, “demonstrated”, hurled thunderous, passionate execrations, pointing an accusing finger at the stage, and at one man who occupied it: Sir Diarmaid Ninian John MacCulloch, University of Oxford Professor of the History of the Church, winner of numerous prizes for his many books, presenter of the “landmark” BBC TV series A History of Christianity. Ironically, he was there to talk

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Bring me the head of Meirion Jones

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                                                                                                                                                                      “I “I want to see heads roll at the BBC. Not trustees, or the Director-General, token sacrificial lambs. I’ll start with the despicably dishonest Meirion Jones. On a pike. Outside BBC headquarters.” – Anna Raccoon blog, 26 October, 2012 When Meirion Jones emailed me early last month, asking for an interview, I was intrigued. Here was a guy, as I soon discovered, with a big reputation as a top flight TV documentary maker, winner of the Daniel Pearl Award for his investigation of Trafigura’s toxic waste dumping in Africa and star of numerous other genuinely important exposés. Yet he was the

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