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Child Item

Are you a paedophile sympathiser?

Snickers Man

[EDIT: YOU DON'T HAVE TO READ BEYOND THE YOUTUBE LINK TO GET THE POINT. DON'T LET TLDR PHOBIA PUT YOU OFF]

Trigger warning!!

Reading the pasted article, or clicking on the link to the YouTube audio file, might incur feelings of guilt and shame, especially if you feel yourself moved or entertained by the content because the authors of both have since been exposed as child sex abusers.

I have not named either (most unecessarily, I suspect) but the writer of the song performed by Imogen Heap is now dead and his reputation, such as it was, has recently been besmirched by allegations--widely believed--of paedophile behaviour with young boys. He was nevertheless one of the best selling recording artists of all time and although I was never much of a fan of his music, I really do like Ms Heap's version of his biggest hit.

As for the sports journalist: he was once one of Ireland's finest exponents of the genre but is now currently serving time having pleaded guilty to the "Defilement of a minor", namely a young girl who played for a sports team he coached.

The issue I have is what should be one's attitude to the high-quality creative output of people who are subsequently exposed as deviant, perverted or criminal? Several radio stations have announced they will no longer play the music of the deceased pop superstar. The catalogue of writing the sports journalist produced for his main employer, a leading Irish daily newspaper, is similarly no longer available on its website, even to subscribers to its paywalled content.

Is this acceptable? Are we better people for shutting out our ears and minds to content that was once widely and highly praised as being among the finest of its type?

The article, published on the funeral day of the daughter of a leading GAA manager, is touching in its appreciation of the family relationship between father and daughter. Bear in mind that as it was written, the author probably knew that he was about to be exposed as a criminal by his own daughter who had discovered evidence of his wrong doing (phone texts) and informed her mother and consequently the police.

Of course you may feel unable to consume either piece of content. The baying of the mob demanding commonality of outrage set at the lowest common denominator is hard to resist. What Cork Hurling fan would dare today to wave the Confederate flag that was once popular because of its "rebel" association for fear of being condemned as a racist apologists for white supremacy marchers in Alabama?

I am not an apologist for paedophilia or for grooming young teenagers 30 years my junior. Nor is it any part of my case that said journalist should be excused punishment. (The singer/song writer is beyond retribution) He transgressed, he was caught, convicted and is doing the time. Quite right.

But just as being a talented person does not absolve people of crimes, nor do those crimes devalue the quality of their work. Do they?

What do you think?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFzHv53UVXI

Let's hope Mickey can return to his gift
Irish Times, Monday, January 17, 2011

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Snickers Man

Wow! Just came across this with the great Joan Rivers. And I think it's from 2005!!!

Yeah. Nobody knew.

is_that_so

Murray TheDemonic TalkingSkull wrote: »

If we were serious about shunning the work of artists who became criminals why havent we banned Roman Polanski or why does he seem to get a free pass from the Hollywood elite.

Because he's made some very good films? Chinatown is brilliant.

donkeykong5

Delighted that Phil hoban and predator exposure team got off in court this morning. They are all heroes protecting innocent children from paedophile bastards. They are doing the job that the police and government are paid to do. !

suicide_circus

Paedo Sympathizer

Paedothizer

is_that_so

donkeykong5 wrote: »

Delighted that Phil hoban and predator exposure team got off in court this morning. They are all heroes protecting innocent children from paedophile bastards. They are doing the job that the police and government are paid to do. !

Until they get it wrong or one of those undesirables top themselves. But you won't care because it doesn't suit your brand of justice.

Spleerbun

While I haven't read the infamous article that seems to have everyone in a tizzy I have read the OP and I'm glad I did, great post.

I am fully in favour of the separation of the music/art or whatever from the person. Whether the allegations are true or not in the case of MJ for example, and there will always be those who believe them and who don't, I will continue to listen to his music whenever the mood strikes me. Because it is truly great music, some of the greatest music of all time, even if the allegations were true.

If people disagree with that and would never listen again I can fully understand that.

However it's the idea of completely banning things/whitewashing history and telling others what they can and cannot do or watch or read or listen to that irks me. We've seen other examples of similar behaviour recently with the defamation of statues (and indeed campaigns to take down statues) of historical figures who were perceived to have done something "non-PC". (The fact that their perceived transgressions may have been perfectly PC at the time of doing them seems to be incosequential!). Granted the statue stuff was in the nut house of the USA but we do unfortunately have a tendency to try and imitate them over here.

Anyway, they point being that whether you can separate the art from the person or not it's not up to you to decide that for others as well.

buried

When anybody creates a piece of art, its a two way street because the moment you create an artistic work and put it out to a wider audience, the audience effectively now 'owns' the work as well, as it may affect them in whatever way it may do. That's the great thing about art. And you can't limit any artistic works existence on the supposed high or lack of morality of the person who created it. That's just plain utter daft stupid. May as well ban everything. Gaius Julius Caesar wrote books, that's art too. Read 'The Conquest of Gaul', its on penguin classics for f**ks sake. He was responsible for murdering and slaughtering possibly hundreds of thousands of people including kids during his brutal conquests of Europe. He glees in the fact of it. Better ban that stuff too I suppose?

donkeykong5

is_that_so wrote: »

donkeykong5 wrote: »

Delighted that Phil hoban and predator exposure team got off in court this morning. They are all heroes protecting innocent children from paedophile bastards. They are doing the job that the police and government are paid to do. !

Until they get it wrong or one of those undesirables top themselves. But you won't care because it doesn't suit your brand of justice.

If ciaron craven had been caught in Ireland instead of Leeds by Phil hoban and predator exposure team you know as well as I do that sweet FA would have happened to him. He would have got either a suspended sentence or a friendly warning in court.

BalcombeSt4

Do I sympathise with paedophiles? No.

They actually used to be a lot more brazen then they are now.

A year or two ago, I was reading an article about Dr. Morris Fraser, who was a child Doctor in Belfast and appeared in several documentaries between 1970 - 1975 about the effects of The Troubles had on children. Fraser was convicted of child sexual abuse in 1971 with a boy from Belfast who he brought to London for a weekend, two years later he was busted in New York as part of a international paedophile ring, but the trial collapsed, even with this knowledge he was allowed to work with children alone in private until the mid/late 70's in Belfast. In the 1980's he was a founding member of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE) in Britain and one of it's main finacial backers. One of PIE's objectives was to lower the age of consent to four years of age. Also in the 80's he helped to distribute child porn around Britain, bringing young boys out on boating trips were he would take naked pictures of them, this was part of his Azimuth Trust charity. As of 2015 he was posting child sex fantasy stories he had written to the internet.

I'm not one for conspiracies but between this & Kincora Boy's Home were children were abused in a strikingly similar manner, taken from Belfast to London on weekends were they were abused by well of & powerful people in high society.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GddyL0u24G0

listermint

Tune in next week for the next outrage we can all get outraged about.

I'm outraged right now thinking about the outrage.

Let's call it outrage anticipation

Grrrr

donkeykong5

BalcombeSt4 wrote: »

Do I sympathise with paedophiles? No.

Do actually used to be a lot more brazen then they are now.

A year or two ago, I was reading an article about Dr. Morris Fraser, who was a child Doctor in Belfast and appeared in several documentaries between 1970 - 1975 about the effects of The Troubles had on children. Fraser was convicted of child sexual abuse in 1971 with a boy from Belfast who he brought to London for a weekend, two years later he was busted in New York as part of a international paedophile ring, but the trial collapsed, even with this knowledge he was allowed to work with children alone in private until the mid/late 70's in Belfast. In the 1980's he was a founding member of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE) in Britain and one of it's main finacial backers. One of PIE's objectives was to lower the age of consent to four years of age. Also in the 80's he helped to distribute child porn around Britain, bring youngs out on boating trips were he would take naked pictures of them, this was part of his Azimuth Trust charity. As of 2015 he was posting child sex fantasy stories he had written to the internet.

I'm not one for conspiracies but between this & Kincora Boy's Home were children were abused in a strikingly similar manner, taken from Belfast to London on weekends were they were abused by well of & powerful people in high society.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GddyL0u24G0

Ffs. Seriously!