graham ovenden sentencing and lord mcalpine

Any social worker who convinces themselves they are doing their job to its full potential has not got a full workload. It's a job that is often impossible to do well. All of those working (retired from) the caring/controlling side of the public sector have experience of standing their corner and arguing with managers and other agencies about how dangerously near to breakdown their service is getting, and that people, children, could be harmed or die, if action isn't taken. The acid test is aways 'can you imagine what the public would say if they knew about this?'

No, social workers are not infallible, they are only too painfully aware that something might get missed. Check out your local local services offices and you will see a few lights still on at night - social workers working very late. Emails get sent after midnight. Or they are working at home. Like lots of private businesses, I imagine - people trying to keep their head above water because so many depend on them.

If you think the public are critical of social services when the wheel comes off, it doesn't compare with the anger and frustration of the workers who get burnt out from trying to do their job/vocation, and are expected to make sure they have done all their paperwork, dot i's and cross t's in case the worst happens. That's no way to manage a working day. Preventative work with families who are at risk would be ideal.

They get pilloried for recommending to judges that children should be removed from abusive parents who tell the Sun or the Mail that they love their kids, and they get pilloried if they aren't successful in removing children to safety. Child protection is the responsibility of all of us.

Oh and when I was enjoying your input and learning from it before the pot was royally stirred.

I presume that many posters on here have worked in a professional capacity with children and had personal experience of child abuse (wrongly phrased but I'm rushing!).

Whilst I'm content to admit you have that experience you also have to admit that there have been many instances where child protection delivered by Social Services has been sadly lacking and children have died as a result - at the hands of abusive parents for example and the sight of professionals busy washing their hands and passing the buck hardly inspires respect. Yes, I do know many do sterling work and it must be a more than difficult job but Social workers are not infallible in the eyes of the general public I'm afraid. That will no doubt be an unpalatable view but so be it.

No one here who was questioning the censorship by GN of j08's post was in any way approving or advocating child abuse and that deviation from the OP caused conflict not our opinions on child abuse or abusers.

A great observation.

The term 'politically correct' and the sneering way it is used makes me furious. It is usually used by people who are losing an argument and do not have the intellectual capacity to argue their case rationally.

Good post 64. And indeed politically correct is an unhepful term employed by those who feel it is their right to be narrow minded, uncharitable and rude.

Just catching up on this thread, Just to confirm that wheni'm and Iam are different people, but found we had a lot in common when we met recently at a very enjoyable north west gransnet get together.
I realise that those of us with many years experience of working with children and adults who have experienced/perpetrated sexual abuse of children, or who have direct personal experience of it, may have views that some see as "politically correct", a dismissive and unhelpful term.
Ovenden continues to deny the offences for which he was convicted. He abused young girls, exploited the trust the children and their parents put in him. It is classic perpetrator behaviour, he sees no harm in what he has done, and would continue this behaviour if the opportunity presented itself
Sexual abuse of children isn't a new phenomena. I believe that most people are so appalled by the idea of it that there is a tendency to minimise both the extent and impact of it
The publicity around Jimmy Saville etc and the recent dreadful cases involving Tia Sharpe and April Jones have raised the profile of child sexual abuse. This thread reflects the conflict it raises in people.
Someone earlier in this thread suggested a separate thread to discuss the issues linked to art, raised by the Ovenden case. That's a good idea.

It's a beautiful painting.

I would think so.

Do you think he painted the younger boy as a way of immortalising him in case he lost him also?

would soon be sent to the battlefields of the first world war

I read that Henry Tuke's elder son died whist still a boy, and it was then that he began painting first his younger son, and then boys on Falmouth beach where he lived. I wonder if that would be acceptable now? I guess not. We live in different times.The more I look at his pictures, the more I like them. Perfect boyhood. (and some of them remind me of my son about fifteen years ago.

I have no objection to paintings or photos of naked adults, who presumably knew what they were doing. We are talking about paintings of naked children by a man who is known to have been an abuser. Some of us would prefer that such images, where the models may be recognisable, and were possibly victims of his abuse, should not be disseminated anywhere, and certainly not on this forum.

When I walk round an art gallery I don't stop and look at every painting [not enough time to do that], just pause in front of the ones that catch my eye, and that can be because of style, or empathy or just the colour.

Yes; would I have thought that 20 years ago? As with the Balthus paintings, I just liked the style in which they were painted; at the time it never crossed my mind that he was painting pre pubescent girls.

I would prefer it if art did n' t make me uncomfortable. I like to feel an empathy, if that is the right word. Or at least an appreciation of the beauty in the painting.

That was in reply to Tegan.

The possible homeoerotic element?

Did everyone see the Winterhalter portrait of Queen Victoria that Albert had done for his private rooms? It's quite sexy but she's fully clothed. Looks startlingly like Princess Beatrice. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/queen-elizabeth-II/8931869/Secrets-of-Queens-greatest-treasures-to-be-revealed-in-major-new-BBC-series-The-Art-of-Monarchy.html
Should we object to art that makes us feel uncomfortable? Should art make us feel uncomfortable?

I haven't been following the case [out of touch with everything at the moment] so had no idea of how this man had behaved. But do think we need a thread discussing what is or isn't acceptable in art. For example, in the film [and the book as well, I assume] Girl with a Pearl Earring it was implied that the painting was meant for someone to own and keep for their own personal titilation. So, when does a painting cease to be acceptably erotic in some way? Is it all down to the reason for the viewer looking at it? And, are many painting open to different interpretations? Other than Rothkos, Jackson Pollocks et al I would imagine that they are. There are plenty of painting of nude women [think Botticelli] so why do the Henry Tuke ones make me feel so uncomfortable?

Fortunate that you do not hold diametrically opposed views then

No, pure coincidence, Gracesmum, but found we have much in common when we met at the north-west get-together last week.

Obviously not - my mistake!

Am I being dense here - (don't answer that) iam64 and whenim64 - same person? or not?

bluebell I suppose I should say thanks to you and when for deciding not to report the 'mucky photos' remark which I assumed was ironic!!

j08 thanks for posting the photos.

I bet the gnome is a Private Eye one. I always wanted one of those!

'She's old enough to know better' is the one I mentioned earlier as being used on the 1960s (or thereabouts) paperback version of Lolita. It's absolutely staggering that the image and attitude demonstrated by the title was thought to be generally acceptable in those days. I don't remember noticing at the time.

I agree the Tuke paintings are beautiful. I don't find them particularly disturbing.

I finally had a look at the Ovenden ones and I think they are also beautiful - but very disturbing, offensive even.

Incidentally, how I yearned to look like that when I was a chunky 11 year old. Instead, I was 'omicky' as my mother used to like to say.

It's nerve-wracking posting on this thread as you never know when something is going to be reported and deleted before you've had a chance to have a look.