Jimmy Savile

There WAS a lot of it going on in the days of the pop tours. And the same girls would come back for more, often as not, travelling to the next town on the tour.

The jazz men tended to prefer the older, very warm-hearted female fans - read George Melly's books for the details!

Yes, Crimson, I loved to listen to John Peel on Saturday mornings.

I'd imagine that anything that happens to us as we're growing up shapes us in some way, but in greater and lesser degrees and also depends on the individual. I [stupidly] lost my virginity at 15 to someone a couple of years older [y'know, the usual ultimatum; never saw him again ], but don't think of him as a paedophile; just a cad of the highest order . Don't feel 'damaged' by it [although would have been if I'd found myself pregnant]. Probably no lasting damage other than a loss of confidence. What about the allegations about John Peel now? Am I biased in that I adored him [still do] and feel that seeing a 15 year old girl for 3 months is a relationship of some kind. I'm pretty sure that all groups at that time had girls of all ages going to their dressing room after shows [bet the Beatles weren't all that squeaky clean, either, or Hermann's Hermits]. This seems to have opened the floodgates of a witch hunt, which could overshadow the awful behaviour of this dreadful man, Savile.

glitabo, that is monstrous! A good telling off, preferably by a lot of girls, should have been enough.
Now a charity is demanding the head of Esther Rantzen.
I think as much, if nor more, damage can be done to a child by being interrogated about suspected abuse if it is just a one-off and not very serious. The children in the false Satanic abuse cases were wrenched from their homes and subjected to intrusive intimate examinations.
I believe the police do not pursue couples where they are both young and of similar ages and the sex was consensual. A bit of common sense.

JessM Food for thought there.
I do know 1 boy (15 years old) who was put on the sex offenders register for twanging a girl's bra strap in the school playground. It started off as a joke but the girl's father demanded that further action was taken. So it was.

Here's a thought/question.
We seem to have moved, during my adult life, from a slightly jovial approach to JS and others groping teenaged kids to the other extreme:
Everyone who engages in a sexual act with anyone of 15 and 3/4 is a "paedophile". Despite that fact that in many cultures, including our own in the past, this was considered a marriageable age. (bear in mind that 16 year old boys could find themselves on the sex offenders register for life if they have sex with a 15 year old girl)
and
Everyone who has ever suffered any kind of abuse in childhood is a "victim" a "survivor" and there seems to be an assumption that their life has been "devastated".
Now I will grant you that living with an abusive family member for years is probably psychologically damaging. But we probably don't know whether it is always damaging - just because therapists see lots of people with this background - are there maybe equal numbers that are fine and don't end up in therapy/ prison etc?
And is there any evidence at all that a one-off event of being groped by an adult (and for most of JS's victims it could have been a one-off) inflicts long term damage in everyone who experiences this?

Too serious to joke about.

i thort it was very tame kast night they held back not the normalhave i got news for you

Yes, Flickety brushing aside rumours with bluff was very effective for JS. I remember when a group of vigilantes gathered outside a hostel where a sex offender had been outed. Two of the men shouting abuse and carrying banners were registered sex offenders themselves. When police pulled them aside discreetly, to warn them to keep a lower profile, they both had petitions that they were getting people to sign. A good way to divert suspicion.

While I agree Ian Hislop did look uncomfortable he was right to say rumour alone is not enough to convict someone and it must be remembered most of the reported incidents happened thirty years ago or more. I am sure that as attitudes changed Savile became more discreet and, of course, he was getting older.

But Graham Linehan was right to talk of hiding in the open. Most people make jokes about what they may or may not do when opportunity arises. DH travelled a lot on business and we used to joke with each other and others at the opportunities this offered. I would be horrified if anyone had thought there was any element of truth in our light-hearted banter. If Savile was making remarks like that, it would justify the rumours but also neutralise them on the basis that if he plays up to them he cannot be worried by them therefore they are probably not accurate.

For a while HIGNFY looked like it was turning into Question Time. Like glitabo said, you can't wring any humour out of this while the cameras are rolling.

absent I agree!!

Ian Hislop surprised me Jane. Private Eye and HIGNFY are used to taking calculated risks, and coolly claiming 'it is alleged.' I thought they would have been a bit braver in the circs. He did look uncomfortable. I guess quite a few celebs are anxious about being dragged into the dirt just because they were on the periphery at the time.

Thanks glitabo and when
The thing that grated with Ian Hislop's defence of the BBC, was indeed his suggestion that the newspapers were just as culpable as the BBC because they didn't publish anything.
The difference of course, which he conveniently ignored, was that JS wasn't actually working for any newspapers (at least as far as I am aware) and so they had no duty of care.
And Ian Hislop, as editor of Private Eye, should be more aware than anyone of the risks of publishing unsubstantiated accounts.
I feel a letter cancelling my subscription might be coming on!

To give JS keys at Broadmoor is not as it appears. Locked areas are centrally governed, as in prisons, and an electronic switch is released by a watching officer via CCTV to allow a key to be used. This is so prisoners/special hospital patients cannot overpower staff by taking keys to get out of locked zones. If a worker has been vetted and officially cleared, they might have keys that fit specific zones, but not all areas, and not the key that unlocks every area.

I noticed that the house JS was given was outside Broadmoor's perimeter, where the main building and entrance is approached through the gatehouse and has high fences. Like many prisons and the two other special hospitals, Rampton and Ashworth, there are lots of specially built houses, originally for staff accommodation, that have been adapted for use by volunteer organisations. To refer to JS as having been in charge at Broadmoor is nonsense. Probably self-promotion. I can envisage him arranging to sleep in that house to save more travel time when moving around the country, and exploiting any opportunities he created for himself. He epitomises the way sex offenders can groom people and the immediate environment so that all appears 'normal.' Look at Michael Jackson.

Yes, Jane, risk to children can be reported anonymously, and concern about children is assessed, always has been, and will depend upon the quality and detail of the concern expressed as to how far it is investigated. These TV personalities might well look uncomfortable. They could be remembering their own attitudes and behaviour back then, which might look iffy in the cold light of day.

There will be plenty of damage limitation propoganda being dispersed by individuals and organisations that have been involved. The papers are having a field day. It's not all going to be true. I take lots of it with a pinch of salt. JS will have operated with craftiness and guile, amongst professionals who would have said 'you have him on your ward but he's not helping out in mine.' He wouldn't have fooled everyone, but he did fool enough people to get what he wanted. Like a sex offender I worked with who once remarked 'if I target 100, I'm bound to get 1.' His lifestyle was so dodgy that people didn't see the wood for the trees.

JS's response on HIGNFY when asked what do you do in your caravan was anybody I can lay my hands on. I thought that Ian Hislop's response was well rehearsed stating the press should not criticise the BBC for not doing anything about it as the press didn't either. Paul Merton was also on the defensive about alleged out takes which he said did not happen.
The subject was not a good one for HIGNFY because there is no humour to be found in it and everyone is carefully watching what they are saying.

Nanadogsbody That's only fair as so have lots of women over many years.

Like gracesmum I can't face reading everything on this thread, I just wonder how many more names are gong to emerge. Some people must be losing sleep over this.

Did anyone see HIGNFY last night?
Ian Hislop said that the reason collective whistles were not blown was that no-one knew JS did those things. They only heard rumours. The only people who could report him were those who knew not those who suspected.
I suppose that may have been true in the 70s and 80s but Child Protection Policies now I am sure allow for the 'raising of concerns' without evidence - please correct me if I'm wrong when and others.
They showed a clip of JS on HIGNFY about ?12 years ago. JS was asked what he got up to in his trailer.
"Anything I can get away with," he replied.
Yuk!!
I couldn't help wondering whether the inclusion of this item was a sort of damage limitation exercise by the BEEB. I've never seen Ian Hislop look so uncomfortable.

I have to say I am astonished that he was apparently given keys to all the wards at Broadmoor. Why? It is also contradictory that he worked as a "porter" at Leeds Hospital where he had his own office and bedroom, unless, of course, all porters there… Every day when I listen to the news there seems t be yet another revolting revelation.

The BBC and the NHS are falling over themselves to get their apologies out - what a bunch of hypocrites. The amount of freedom he was given at Broadmoor beggars belief.

Found on the Twittersphere: a prescient 'judgement' of Savile, made by a comedian in.... wait for it..... 1987! Do not listen to this recording of Jerry Sawowitz if you are easily inclined to take offence. It contains what is called 'strong' language.

I can't face 14 pages of posts about this appalling case so I will apologise now if I am restating what others have said. It is staggering how widespread this abuse has been - and even more so when people in positions of responsiblity knew what was going on but turned the proverbial blind eye. JS is no longer with us - but these people's consciences should be aflame, they should be racked with guilt that they could have blown the whistle and helped to stop it but didn't. I hope they can sleep at night (well actually I don't, it's just a turn of phrase) becasue I certainly couldn't.

I can vouch for that when as he came to the dance halls in Manchester quite often.

Yes, absent very bizarre, but that was in more recent years. In the 60s and 70s he usually dressed in slacks and fashionable cardigans with Chelsea boots.