The Children of The Revolution

That was the week that was for Operation Yewtree.

First Dave Lee Travis went to court to face 12 counts of sexual assault, then Rolf Harris was charged with 9, along with 4 counts of making obscene pictures of children.

Yewtree, in case you’d gone to the moon, is a police operation carried out initially to investigate reports of sexual abuse of children by Jimmy Savile, radio DJ, TV personality, tireless worker for charity, friend of politicians and royalty, loving son to his dear old mum, The Duchess.

As we now know the reports turned out to be true and for 40 years he preyed on the most vulnerable people in society.

Yes, we all knew the rumours but no-one had proof, other than his victims, who were so young, so alone, so traumatised that they could not speak out.

When Louis Theroux met him he denied being a pedophile when asked outright to camera, a denial that fooled no-one.

What’s more it seemed clear that he’d indulged in more than one bout of necrophilia with The Duchess’ corpse.

Now every shot of him has been expunged.

When the BBC run old Top Of The Pops episodes it’s like he didn’t exist.

But happen upon one on youtube and everything he said and did show him for what he was.

Once he was outed the rest of them began toppling like dominos, but there were already signs that all was not well in that world of weird men.

Jonathan King was an incredibly successful songwriter and record producer of such inane but huge selling hits as ‘Loop Di Love’ by Shag, and ‘Leap Up And Down And Wave Your Knickers in The Air’, and presenter of long running BBC TV show ‘Entertainment USA’ where he’d report on what was happening in New York, although what was really happening for him was not captured on film, or certainly not broadcastable.

In 1997 he was awarded the BPI’s Man Of The Year award, with a personal endorsement from Tony Blair.

In 2001he was arrested for sexually abusing countless young boys.

He was released on bail stumped up by Simon Cowell.

His innocence was protested by the likes of Simon Bates and Max Clifford.

He was found guilty on all charges, sentenced to seven years in jail, and put on the sex offender register for life.

The one thing we repeatedly hear from his and the others apologists is that in those days it was just how things were, it was in the culture, it was acceptable.

By those days they mean the 1970’s and dark days they were.

Men ruled everything everywhere, women were chattel, children slaves.

Misogyny and racism were institutionalised.

If in doubt watch any clip of TV show The Comedians for a stark reality check.

Whist Marc Bolan and David Bowie showed us that there was a new way, a light out of the darkness, we had to at first see through the glitter, Gary Glitter to be exact.

‘D'Ya Wanna Be In My Gang?’ he asked.

Not really, Gary.

‘Do You Wanna Touch Me There, Where, There?’

No, Gary, absolutely not.

In 1999 he put his computer in for repair at PC World and the tech servicing it found 4000 images of hardcore child pornography, for which he served time.

Since then he’s repeatedly offended and has miraculously escaped with his life. 

For example, in Vietnam, to where he once fled, there were allegations of rape of 11 year old girls, and had they lead to a conviction would have carried a mandatory death sentence.

He is currently out on bail having been arrested in London for sexually abusing 14 year old girls with Jimmy Savile in Savile’s ‘Clunk Click’ dressing room.

That dressing room was the setting for many of his conquests and it is said involved numerous TV personalities of the time, some of whom have been arrested lately, such as Freddie Starr.

Freddie Starr, like so many of his peers, pleads his innocence, yet they somewhat contradictorily say that the offences for which they are being accused were such a long time ago that they should not be pursued, or, fumbling, that they cannot remember that far back.

Scared shitless they ran into the arms of Max Clifford, solicitor to the stars.

Max Clifford has now himself been charged with 11 counts of sexual assault.

Is their assertion that the offences took place way back in the dark ages a defence?

No.

There is no statute of limitations.

Even if it was a defence how does that account for Max Clifford whose alleged reign of terror continued to the mid eighties, or Dave Lee Travis’ latest in 2007?

The argument that it was in the culture, that everyone was up to it, that it was acceptable, will just not wash.

At the same time as these men were sticking their dicks into every available orifice Esther Rantzen started Childline, and John Lennon no less said that after women’s rights must come children’s as children had none.

It is about power, and it is not just the preserve of celebrities.

My own mother was sexually abused by her father from the age of 8.

It was systematic, calculated, relentless.

He held court in the Magic Kingdom, where the secret potion that all good little girls drank was administered.

I had no idea.

He to me seemed a gentle, warm, caring man who occasionally touched me in a way I didn’t like, who died when I was a child.

It’s shocking when someone in the public eye who we revere is proven to be abhorrent.

It’s horrifying when it’s one's own family.

It makes us wonder how on earth we didn’t see it.

We didn’t see it because they are cunning predators who work hard sub rosa.

I don’t know anyone who was surprised when the revelations about Jimmy Savile started to appear, but we are all staggered by the scale of it, and by what we can now see as his and others brash hiding in plain sight.

But The Hairy Cornflake, our cuddly breakfast time DJ friend, or Rolf Harris, everybody’s grandfather?

Now when I think of DLT’s jingle ‘whack whack oops’ I don’t think of sunny breakfast mornings before gaily hopping off to school, I think of it being him whacking off over an 8 year old.

When I think of Rolf Harris I don’t think of him happily painting pictures on TV, the meaning slowly revealing itself, I think of him wanking his flaccid penis to an erect state and asking his victim “Do you know what it is yet?”

Of the others who’ve been arrested under Yewtree, Jim Davidson, well known racist, is not going to be prosecuted, not because he has been proved innocent, but because there was insufficient evidence, not none, to guarantee a prosecution.

Sure, he was not on everyone’s favourite person list from the get go, but what about Ken Barlow, aka William Roache, longest serving and most beloved star of Corrie?

Or Tarby?

I suppose I mustn’t forget Stuart Hall, laughing gnome on ritual humiliation TV show ‘It’s A Knockout’, but I’d like to.

There are a slew of outer circle people who have been arrested, TV show producers, staff drivers, all caught up in modern day Rome, a debauched, despicable coterie.

It’s big stuff, big ugly soul destroying stuff.

Is it an aberration or is it truly part of what we are?

It is undeniable that this behaviour was accepted back then, it is all there to see on youtube and no, it was not black and white but full blown in-your-face colour at prime time.

It is there today too and you don’t have to look far as in every issue of The Sun men are encouraged to leer over topless girls, or in The Daily Mail where they continually gush over 14 year old curves.

I have heard pedophiles proffering the argument that they have a right to be what they are in the same way as homosexuals.

Let’s be clear, homosexuality is a loving union in mutual appreciation, respect, and consent in exactly the same way as heterosexuality, whereas the likes of my grandfather raped children and scarred them for life.

He knew exactly what he was doing.

To call it pedophilia somehow excuses it, and listing it in the DSM as a mental health disorder somehow legitimises it.

I do not believe that any of the people mentioned here acted beyond their mental capacity to distinguish right from wrong.

They boasted, they swaggered, they felt it was their right, they lived by their own code of justice, they made up the rules in their own warped world.

But they are not aliens, they are human, and we feel it deeply as it defiles each of us.

They took our children, our beautiful loving children, who looked up to them for guidance, hope, security, protection, and fucked them.

With enormous strength and courage the victims are speaking out, they are the children of the revolution.

At last we are saying no, you will not do this anymore and you will you not get away with what you have done, as we evolve, open our eyes, and heal.

Julia Brightly

September 4th 2013