Quote: Renegade Carpark @ October 4 2012, 12:27 PM BSTDid they tear the statue down with ... peasants hitting it with their shoes?
Please! We use Buckfast bottles here.
Jimmy Savile Page 4
Quote: Badge @ October 4 2012, 12:20 PM BSTSo the likeness was close, but...
>_< 
Quote: keewik @ October 4 2012, 2:48 PM BSTPlease! We use Buckfast bottles here.
As shoes?
Quote: Badge @ October 4 2012, 12:20 PM BSTSo the likeness was close, but...
That one nearly passed me by in it's subtlety. 
Quote: Aaron @ October 3 2012, 4:18 PM BSThttp://timesopinion.tumblr.com/post/32804536645/jimmy-saviles-affections-laid-bare-by-jimmy-savile
What a great choice of photo by the journo That's fantastic.
There's something about Savile that makes me laugh all the time, the man was so eccentric he creases me up. That Louis Theroux interview thing was hilarious. These things have always happened, with far more celebrities and public figures than we'll ever know, Savile indulged himself it seems, but very probably had friends in Parliament, the NHS, the music industry and definitely in the BBC who did the same.
So in his defence I'd say it wasn't all that uncommon back then, the 50s, 60s and 70s for bods in his profession, with his celebrity and money to be indulging in that sort of thing fairly quietly, and for it to be secretly known and tolerated. Nowadays it's shock horror heinous tabloid headlining stuff but back then it just wasn't anything like as big a deal. In 1974 no one even bothered question those very frank passages in his book. That's the way it was then.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ October 4 2012, 4:25 PM BSTSo in his defence I'd say it wasn't all that uncommon back then, the 50s, 60s and 70s for bods in his profession
Well that's okay then, because other people were doing it, it must have been okay. I'm surprised they even had prisons or a police force.
Of course, when you hear stories about the psycho in Dunblane who shot loads of kids dead and only got his Firearm License because the local chief of police was also part of the same child molesting gang, it does tarnish the somewhat golden reputation of these much beloved classic paedophiles from days of yore.
Dude, get real.
If it was as widespread as you suggest there should be a major investigation and any surviving abusers should be sent to jail for their crimes. This "different times" mentality doesn't lessen the crimes.
You're (willfully) misreading my point, the way you do. I'm not saying it's right or not harmful, but that the era he did it in, in the job he was in, in the company he kept, in the less media led, less rabidly judgmental culture of the time, he wasn't alone in indulging, and he found he could get away with it with very little comeback.
Now, of course, the world is very very different and such things aren't tolerated at all whatever your position in the world. You have to put the era he was at it in perspective, my reactionary friend.
To RC.
Quote: Bob Hicks @ October 4 2012, 4:41 PM BSTIf it was as widespread as you suggest there should be a major investigation and any surviving abusers should be sent to jail for their crimes.
We don't have enough prisons. I'd guess that this sort of thing was much more widespread than it is now.
Watched the programme and it's obvious the girls involved were starstruck by this knobber, yuk, how could this have gone on and no one seems to have made anything of it until now?
Seems to me he was an inadequate who could not form adult relationships, and not even a hint a a 'relationship' with any of the girls, just groping, fumbling and forcing himself, he was truly a sick weak man with little or no emotional capacity who managed to get away with it simply because of who he was.
Quote: Bob Hicks @ October 4 2012, 4:41 PM BSTThis "different times" mentality doesn't lessen the crimes.
Not to us of 2012, no. But to many of 1974ish or before I'd say it possibly generally did. If kids we're visibly hurt or killed or violently raped then of course, big crimes were committed like today and media fuss was made like today, but I do reckon that if glamorous DJ or looked up to doctor or judge up the road was a bit too friendly with teenagers on occasion, then no, in general terms, I don't think such things were viewed as being the real crimes they're seen as today. Perspective and historical insight need to be deployed in past cases like these. A lot has changed in how we view the world in the last 40 or so years.
I think Alfred has a point, but there is a hole in it, I don't believe it was more acceptable back then, rather more it took place in a fairly unscrutinised way. Today we are more aware and have endless means of exposing such behaviour, via Twitter etc. Sexual abuse of the kind Savile et al were involved in were just Chinese whispers in the 70s, and could easily have been buried and kept out of the papers by knowing the right people.
Historic retrospection is justified if you are studying the circumstances and causes of any given situation. It does not and cannot give it any moral justification, we know that the catholic church and many other institutions knew and condoned such behaviour. It was not acceptable then, it just was not talked about or sadly believed most of the time. Things have moved on thank God. Saville was a vile pervert and it wouldn't matter if it was in the twentieth, twenty first or Nineteenth century. The real tragedy is the lives he ruined and the trust he betrayed. It is a shame that he was not unmasked in his lifetime, but I would imagine any charitable trusts he was involved in have some serious thinking to do.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ October 4 2012, 5:07 PM BSTA lot has changed in how we view the world in the last 40 or so years.
Very true, I can't imagine any song today being successful with the lyrics:
"You come on like a dream, peaches and cream, Lips like strawberry wine. You're sixteen, you're beautiful and you're mine."
Quote: Bob Hicks @ October 4 2012, 4:41 PM BSTThis "different times" mentality doesn't lesson the crimes.
Quote: Alfred J Kipper @ October 4 2012, 5:07 PM BSTNot to us of 2012, no. But to many of 1974ish or before I'd say it possibly generally did.
And I would disagree. I went to a boarding school in the 1970s...
Apparently the third celebrity molesting girls with Savile and Glitter was only after their pet hamsters.
Quote: Bob Hicks @ October 4 2012, 5:55 PM BSTAnd I would disagree. I went to a boarding school in the 1970s...
I know what you mean I went to catholic boarding school, I'm amazed I'm not more of gibbering wreck than I am.