Peadophile Circus

I keep hoping that this Jimmy Savile business and everything connected with it will go away soon.  Don't get me wrong, I think that if it is found that Savile abused underage women (and maybe boys), then it should be properly investigated.  I also think that if it is found that anyone else is involved, they should be prosecuted.  I've also been happy to exploit the scandal (or, to be accurate, the media circus surrounding it), both here and over at The Sleaze, in order to create traffic. However, the hysteria, stoked up by the media, which has resulted from the scandal is counter-productive.  The police investigation into Savile seems to be designed purely to provide the tabloids with further salacious headlines as it teases us with the possibility that other celebrities might be involved, yet arrests only clapped out has beens, at least two of which are already convicted peadophiles, (Gary Glitter and Ray Teret).  Worst of all, it perpetuates the idea that there are hordes of predatory peadophiles roaming Britain, ready to snatch children at the drop of a hat, and that theses peadophiles are organised into 'peadophile rings', including wealthy and powerful people who protect them all from prosecution.  A bit like medieval ideas on witches and witchcraft. 

The truth is that most child abuse takes place within the family unit, with the perpetrator known to the victim.  But this isn't what the public want to hear.  They don't want to believe that peadophiles are 'just like us', that they can live outwardly normal lives, get married, bring up families.  So, not wishing to alienate their readership, the press instead demonise peadophiles, make them into monsters by portraying them as the evil 'other', completely inhuman.  To explain why such obvious monsters aren't detected until it is 'too late', they give us the 'peadophile ring' and the idea that powerful members of such groups are abusing their wealth, power and influence to keep their activities secret.  Of course, when somebody as weird and flamboyant as Jimmy Savile is implicated, it seems to vindicate their version of peadophilia. Which is precisely why they are reluctant to let the story go.

All of which brings us to the latest chapter in this seemingly ever-expanding peadophile circus: the so-called 'cris at the BBC' following the apparent discrediting of the Newsnight story accusing at least one Thatcher-era Tory politician of being involved in child abuse in the 1970s and 80s at a North Wales childrens' home.  Amidst all the furore whipped up by the BBC's rivals about 'journalistic integrity' and the like, it is worth remembering that the BBC story in question didn't name the politician allegedly involved.  He did that himself, when Lord McAlpine admitted that he was the unnamed politician, but that he was entirely innocent.  Apparently, despite not being named (and most people not having a clue who the report was referring to) he felt that he had to act because his name was being linked with the report on the internet.  Now, this is where I have a slight problem:  the North Wales child abuse story isn't new, it, and the allegations concerning an unnamed Tory politician, has been covered in various media for well over a decade.  During all of this time, McAlpine has been consistently linked, by name, with it online.  Indeed, I seem to recall that the now defunct Scallywag magazine even named him in print.  So why didn't he act before?  Why allow a decade of innuendo and defamation to pass before taking action?  Why choose this particular story to take action over?  I'm not saying that his failure to act previously implies any guilt on his part, I'm just curious about the timing, especially as this time he wasn't named.  If I was a conspiracy theorist, (which I'm not), then I might suspect that it is all part of a Tory-backed plot to destabilise the BBC and neuter its impartial news reporting...