Jimmy Savile

'with' his mother?

There is mention in the press of his somewhat odd relationship to his mother.

No Ana all the research over many years and in different countries has found that abusers were abused and/or neglected themselves, but with this level of corruption, stories of targeting disabled and vulnerable children, his alleged interest in necrophilia, and the sheer investment in his abusive lifestyle, any professional involved in the treatment of sex offenders would say the same - this was a man whose earlier years must have been highly sexualised and distorted to the extent that he normalised sexual abuse, never settled into an intimate relationship that lasted, gravitated to children/teenagers, groomed everyone around him to accept his bizarre behaviour, and was able to separate children from their carers and the authorities.

Imagine any of us trying to take children away without being challenged. He clearly had no empathy for his victims, something we all usually develop in a nurturing, loving family home. I wonder what prevented him developing empathy, and would guess its because he was corrupted.

I wouldn't have allowed my daughters anywhere near this deeply weird individual - Jimmy Savile. Surely it was obvious to many there was something very wrong going on - so many pointers and obviously many people knew - I wish articles written about him and obviously this is going to continue for quite a while, could omit his photograph which is usually grinning smugly with a look that says "I've got away with it"

Is it always the case? Aren't there any foul and depraved individuals who were not abused as children, and were brought up within an ordinary family environment?

Don't want to throw a spanner in the works, and I have always despised Savile, but I'm conscious that he must have been horribly abused and corrupted as a child to turn out like that.

Just catching up with all the conversation about this. My heart really goes out to all the victims and I hope those whose perpetrators are still alive will get justice. But really I am happy that someone is finally listening to them and believing them at last. It is terrible to not be believed and possibly even worse to know you won't be believed and therefore not to even try. We are slowly developing a more open and compassionate culture that enables children to speak out when adults behave I appropriately. Back then, many adults thought they could treat children just as they liked and some crossed the line and abused their power - sometimes in a sexual way. Horrible and disgusting, but it happened and we have to listen to the stories of these survivors so that we can learn how to prevent it happening again. Teaching our children how to recognise inappropriate touching and how to speak out when something doesn't feel right is a huge part of that

Yes Bags they seem to be searching for every different, revoltingly lecherous picture of that creep that they can find. It's disgusting and must make those poor women feel sick every time they see one.

Yeah, I know. Freedom of expression. Freedom to be nauseated.

I wish the news media would stop publishing pictures of Savile. Thought it was just me who minded, but I noticed similar calls on Twitter this morning. Pity the victims.

specki I sometimes wonder how one of these macho men who think it is OK for girls /boys/women to be molested would feel if it could be engineered that they wake up one day to find themselves enlisted while they were asleep into a unit of super-fit, musular, seven-foot predatory homosexual commandos, and as the smallest and weakest of the unit they were the one who was touched intimately all day and raped every night. And if they tried to complain to the CO they were either not believed or told to report to him at nightfall with the frilly knickers on.

BTW I am not suggesting that any existing commando unit would be anything like this - merely showing the inequality of strength and authority.

Young brides, rather than return to their family homes, are sometimes taken to be unpaid domestic servants in the in-laws' homes. But it would be wrong to generalise and I am sure it's only the worst cases you get to hear about.

Absent it gets worse as these child brides go on to have horrendous births which many do not survive (fine for the husband as he can procure another young bride, ). For those who do survive, subsequent/frequent pregnancies become a nightmare.
The lovely Karen Woo had highlighted the plight of these young women, in Afghanistan, and was running clinics when she was murdered.

I have just read Ann Atkins' appalling article. I was glad to see that the huge majority of comments told her that she had probably allowed many more young people to be harmed by this man and that her 'explanation' was
unacceptable. She seems to think that if a man is 'respectable' and in a position of power she cannot risk being accused of spreading 'malicious gossip'. What a dreadful woman.

I was visiting a friend the other day and her daughter was also there. She laughed and said her husband had sent her some 'brilliant' (?) jokes through his phone about JS. She didn't comment further when one of us had commented, "That's no joke", or something similar. No doubt there will be loads of these sick 'jokes' being passed around, but how anyone can think of doing so should surely be thinking about how they'd feel if their own child had suffered at this vile person's hands.

I don't think all child brides go to live with their husbands immediately after their marriage. I think in some places they stay with their own families until they are at least teenagers. I still think it's an appalling custom and one I should like to see die out.

Well done for speaking up, Specki! I got into a discussion at a dinner party last night - not really acrimonious just a debate, but one man said he thought it was all right for 9 year old girls to be married to much older men in certain parts of the world because it is their 'culture' . I had just read an article in National Geographic about child brides in India which was heart-rending. Most of the girls have no knowledge of sex so we can only guess their pain and terror when they are legally raped by their husbands.

I wonder how these men would feel about their children, sisters and wives being groped and molested? It's never been normal to assault women and children. It riles me when some men make these comments, and other men don't challenge them

I am so angry and have got to get this off my chest. The subject of JS cropped up recently in conversation and 'a man' began expounding his theories. His take on the issue was that, "in those days, it was normal for these kinds of things to happen, to girls and to boys..just look at all the stories about paedophile priests and the casting couches of film producers..its all a big fuss about nothing". When they had scraped me off the ceiling, I turned on this man with such venom. I couldn't believe that someone I knew could hold these views. I said, "these were not starlets hustling for film parts, they were the vulnerable dispossessed; hospital patients; young children unable to defend themselves and to whom no-one would listen, what on earth are you thinking?!!!" He responded with more idiotic comments which roused me even higher. Eventually, he skulked off with a sigh, saying "women!" under his breath. Is it any wonder these things happen when so many, seemingly, normal men hold such views?

is very hard, but I do think t he worst of all is that a grandmother covered up abuse of her grand daughter Savilles great niece so as not to lose her house, money etc from him.

It seems dreadful going by her article in Saturdays paper.

The whole thing is very strange, especially the people who were aware of it, and did nothing, shame on them.

Agree Greatnan is very sad when I worked in play group years ago we still were not supposed to cuddle or pick the little ones up, is so sad. There was a little girl who kept crying but I was told not to pick her up tho her little arms were out stretched!!

My grand-daughter had shared a locker with Megan Russell on the day she was murdered, along with her mother, Lynne - her sister Josie was left brain damaged. All the children and staff at Goodnestone School were offered counselling. My daughter had an extreme reaction - her husband was working abroad, and she took to making all four children sleep in her bedroom and pulling the wardrobe over the door. My five-year old grandson began obsessive hand-washing and developed strange attitudes - only his mother was allowed to touch his food.
I have always felt that it was their mother's reaction, rather than the actual terrible event, which had such a bad effect on my grandchildren

Many children do not understand the significance of inappropriate touching and I feel it is better to leave them .in happy ignorance providing they have just been made to feel uncomfortable by it. We have now reached the ridiculous position where a teacher cannot put an arm round a distressed child, or even put a plaster on a wound. We are loading our own fearful attitudes onto children.

As for Ann Atkins - the most smug, patronising contributor to Thought for the Day, and now, apparently, a hypocrite as well.

Spot on nanaej. Compassion for those children who were harmed, in whatever way, is needed. No amount of compensation can make things better.

I am not sure it should make any difference, when considering the culpability or otherwise of the BBC & other institutions in ignoring complaints against JS, if the young people were 'just' sexually assaulted or raped.

Both assault and rape are unacceptable. The only person who is totally to blame is the person who perpetrated the acts not the youngsters or the institutions where they took place. The institutions may well be guilty of not taking the victims seriously and of deliberately hushing up/not investigating rumours but they did not abuse a child.

Do not let this argument detract from finding the truth about the allegations of sexual assault.

I find it appalling that some are suggestions that people are only making claims of assault for compensation in an attempt to try to undermine what may turn out to be very genuine cases of sexual abuse.

We have to wait and see as the law takes its course.

Almost certainly more than inappropriate touching. Sorry -can't reveal my source!