# Leaving Neverland- Michael Jackson Paedophile Doc



## D'wards (Jan 26, 2019)

Due to be shown on Channel 4 in near future.

The fallout from this will be fascinating- if there's a celebrity who has been deified by his fans it's MJ. 

This is post #metoo and after the push towards believing victims, so it may be viewed differently from his trial.

After reading the evidence they seized from Neverland I'm sure he's guilty. I read that the mother of Gavin Arvizo was a very arrogant and aggressive woman during the trial and turned the jury against her.

Look at how a documentary has brought down R.Kelly. 

'Secrets will eat you up' – inside the shocking Michael Jackson documentary


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## Sasaferrato (Jan 26, 2019)

I've just read the Guardian article, and am really not surprised.


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## SpookyFrank (Jan 26, 2019)

For all this talk of Kelly having been 'brought down' he still seems to be a free man and a very wealthy one at that.


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## FridgeMagnet (Jan 26, 2019)

SpookyFrank said:


> For all this talk of Kelly having been 'brought down' he still seems to be a free man and a very wealthy one at that.


One might almost think there was some sort of bias towards excusing rich sex criminals despite there being incredible amounts of evidence against them.


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## skyscraper101 (Jan 26, 2019)

Easy to say now but Wacko was clearly not all right, yet these parents let their kids sleepover at his place anyway. 

Whether they knew at the time he was sharing a bed with them and whether they’d have been ok with it even if they knew, is hard to call. But his outright weirdery would’ve raised alarm bells with me.


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## D'wards (Mar 2, 2019)

It's on channel 4 this Wednesday and Thursday 6/7 March. 

Oprah Winfrey appears to have nailed her colours to the mast by having the two victims on her show, getting her a lot of grief from the usual tossers


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## beesonthewhatnow (Mar 3, 2019)

Michael Jackson Stans React to 'Leaving Neverland' with Bus Ads and Death Threats


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## krtek a houby (Mar 3, 2019)

beesonthewhatnow said:


> Michael Jackson Stans React to 'Leaving Neverland' with Bus Ads and Death Threats



Stans?


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## Mr.Bishie (Mar 3, 2019)

Terrible typo! Fans/Stans


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## Shippou-Sensei (Mar 3, 2019)

krtek a houby said:


> Stans?


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Always thought Michael Jackson was a damaged person. An exceptionally talented, sad, abused guy who had never grown up. There is no doubt that he suffered as a child. Bullied, physically abused and who knows, maybe he was sexually abused too. 
The allegations made by the two men in the film are the final nail in the coffin of his reputation and legacy. How many others were abused too? And what the fuck was wrong with parents? Were they all so caught up in the celebrity moments that they didn't think....wtf is an adult man doing having young boys sleep over in his bed?


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## tim (Mar 3, 2019)

D'wards said:


> It's on channel 4 this Wednesday and Thursday 6/7 March.
> 
> Oprah Winfrey appears to have nailed her colours to the mast by having the two victims on her show, getting her a lot of grief from the usual tossers



It's a couple of decades too late for her to declare her position. We've all known the reality since the 1990s.


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## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

krtek a houby said:


> Stans?


Stans seems have entered internet parlance meaning "nutty fanboy/girl"


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## Mr.Bishie (Mar 3, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Stans seems have entered internet parlance meaning "nutty fanboy/girl"



So it wasn’t a typo! I’m really not down with da yoot!


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## Micro (Mar 3, 2019)

I’m dreading watching this. 

If this is a proper tipping point, will people be able to stop listening to him? It’s not going to be as easy as it was with Gary Glitter.


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## two sheds (Mar 3, 2019)

Mr.Bishie said:


> So it wasn’t a typo! I’m really not down with da yoot!



Rhyming slang for Stanley Unwins


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## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

I only really like pre-accusation-allegations-Jackson anyway, so I won't stop listening to the Jackson Five or Off the Wall.


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## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

Micro said:


> I’m dreading watching this.
> 
> If this is a proper tipping point, will people be able to stop listening to him? It’s not going to be as easy as it was with Gary Glitter.


'Too big to cancel': can we still listen to Michael Jackson?

'Too big to cancel': can we still listen to Michael Jackson?


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

You can't separate the abuser from their talent or good works....no more in this case than in any pedophile case.

Fact is....a sexual predator and abuser is that *before* anything else.

I was a massive MJ fan. Believed he was an honest, kind, caring soul who wanted to help others and save the planet. I believed his charitable work with underpriveledged kids was from a place in his heart...of kindness.
His music was truly fantastic.
But ... all along he was grooming and abusing little boys? ...that eliminates who he presented as. 
He was a lie. A fabrication. Carefully manufactured from a young age. Quite possibly a victim of sexual abuse himself...who knows? Most definitely a victim of manipulation and physical abuse.
A very damaged human being who found friendship amongst children for his own pedophilic purposes.

No. I won't listen to MJ music again. Ever.


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## clicker (Mar 3, 2019)

Wasn't it the Martin Bashir interview, where MJ categorically denied having ANY plastic surgery? Never believed a word he said after that, about anything.


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## farmerbarleymow (Mar 3, 2019)

tim said:


> It's a couple of decades too late for her to declare her position. We've all known the reality since the 1990s.



This is true.  I thought this was pretty much settled back then - but I suppose there is no reckoning on the behaviour of obsessive fans. The Vice article is sad - presumably these people are mostly adults who should be able to judge evidence to a reasonable standard.  

I remember watching the outcome of one of the trials back then and seeing a fan release a cage of white doves when he got away with it.  Delusional.


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## kebabking (Mar 3, 2019)

There was a thread on here many years ago asking why it was acceptable to play Michael Jackson records on the radio but not Gary Glitter ones - and although pretty much everyone on the thread thought he was a wrong'un to some degree or other - there were a number of people who took they view that his talent and the impact he'd made on pop music was simply more important than him being a child rapist.

In effect, Glitter could be banned because he was naff and his music was no loss to the world, but Jackson was different because he was good.

If I have represented anyone unfairly then I apologise, but that's certainly my recollection....


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## Yossarian (Mar 3, 2019)

There's a thread comparing Jackson to Jimmy Savile but didn't see a Glitter one.

https://www.urban75.net/forums/threads/double-standard.308338/


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

MJ's been granted some kind of special pass for years on this. He admitted to having 12-year-old boys sleep in his bed, but we were supposed to believe that he was just a boy too and it was all innocent. That was always total bollocks, and would have been called as such if it had been anyone else.


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## DotCommunist (Mar 3, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> MJ's been granted some kind of special pass for years on this.


I seem to remember that before his death he was a figure of ridicule and shunned by most? IIRC it was after his death that he was OK again


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## Manter (Mar 3, 2019)

Micro said:


> I’m dreading watching this.
> 
> If this is a proper tipping point, will people be able to stop listening to him? It’s not going to be as easy as it was with Gary Glitter.


I genuinely don’t see why it’s harder.


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## Yossarian (Mar 3, 2019)

DotCommunist said:


> I seem to remember that before his death he was a figure of ridicule and shunned by most? IIRC it was after his death that he was OK again




Yeah, there were a lot of Michael Jackson paedo jokes around many years before he died and they didn't go away after he was acquitted.

"What's the difference between Michael Jackson and Neil Armstrong? Neil Armstrong walked on the moon and Michael Jackson fucked kids."


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## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

Leaving Neverland: Michael Jackson music 'dropped' from BBC Radio 2 amid child abuse claims | The Independent Michael Jackson's music has been 'dropped' by BBC Radio 2


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## Spymaster (Mar 3, 2019)

kebabking said:


> There was a thread on here many years ago asking why it was acceptable to play Michael Jackson records on the radio but not Gary Glitter ones - and although pretty much everyone on the thread thought he was a wrong'un to some degree or other - there were a number of people who took they view that his talent and the impact he'd made on pop music was simply more important than him being a child rapist.
> 
> In effect, Glitter could be banned because he was naff and his music was no loss to the world, but Jackson was different because he was good.
> 
> If I have represented anyone unfairly then I apologise, but that's certainly my recollection....


David Bowie is the one that's always surprised me. He gets a massive pass on here because of some links to Brixton, despite being well known to shag 14 and 15 year old groupies back in the day.


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## Micro (Mar 3, 2019)

Manter said:


> I genuinely don’t see why it’s harder.



because it’s easier to stop listening to shit music.


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## andysays (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> You can't separate the abuser from their talent or good works....



I'm not a fan of Michael Jackson's music, but I think it is, or should be, possible in many/most cases to separate the talent and the artistic creation from their behaviour or actions.

The problem in many cases with 'celebrity' it that it effectively transforms or seeks to transform a human being with some talent in a particular area into some sort of flawless hero without any human failings.

Maybe a more mature approach would be to realise that celebrities, however talented, are just human beings like the rest of us with human failings like the rest of us, sometimes, like MJ and those whose names will be and have been brought up as points of comparison, with really serious failings like sexual abuse of children.

But knowing that, eg, David Bowie slept with 14 and 15 year old groupies doesn't make me like his music any less or, IMO, reduce his talent and importance as an artist.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> I'm not a fan of Michael Jackson's music, but I think it is, or should be, possible in many/most cases to separate the talent and the artistic creation from their behaviour or actions.
> 
> The problem in many cases with 'celebrity' it that it effectively transforms or seeks to transform a human being with some talent in a particular area into some sort of flawless hero without any human failings.
> 
> ...




MJ is alleged to have groomed kids based on his celebrity and his massive musical appeal.  He is alleged to have systematically abused them. Just like the paedophile priests who are reviled worldwide.
You think he will get a pass because of his music? Why? It was not lifesaving or socially progressive...was it?
He wasn't a brain surgeon saving lives...or a ground breaking physicist who discovered how to save the planet....
His music and his lifestyle were intrinsically linked. His life was a fucked up mess and it's ok to feel sympathy for his messed up childhood...but as an adult he knew what he was doing.
And ANYONE who grooms kids and abuses them no matter what "good" they do ... is still a paedophile and has messed with a child's life and fucked with their development through to adulthood and beyond.


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## andysays (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> MJ groomed kids based on his celebrity and his massive musical appeal.  He systematically abused them. Just like the paedophile priests who are reviled worldwide.
> You think he gets a pass because of his music? Why? It was not lifesaving or socially progressive...was it?
> He wasn't a brain surgeon saving lives...or a ground breaking physicist who discovered how to save the planet....
> His music and his lifestyle were intrinsically linked. His life was a fucked up mess and it's ok to feel sympathy for his messed up childhood...but as an adult he knew what he was doing was fucked up.
> And ANYONE who grooms kids and abuses them no matter what "good" they do ... is still a paedophile and has messed with a child's life and fucked with their development through to adulthood and beyond.


I suggest you go back and read my post properly.

I never said he or anyone else "gets a pass", because of other stuff they've done.

What I said was that it should be possible to separate the art from the artist, and to appreciate the former even while recognising that some of the actions of the latter are indefensible.


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## Micro (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> I suggest you go back and read my post properly.



Actually, I think you need to go back and read Lupa’s post.



Lupa said:


> His music and his lifestyle were intrinsically linked.



I think she gets what you’re saying (it’s not very hard), but is saying that it’s not that easy because of the above.

I was a huge Louie CK fan but can’t bring myself to watch him now, and I think it’s for the reason Lupa makes; his work and his lifestyle were too closely linked.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> His music and his lifestyle were intrinsically linked. .


Yeah there isn't a neat way of dividing them. I would think listening to Earth Song knowing he was a predatory paedophile is pretty hard.


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## Spymaster (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> What I said was that it should be possible to separate the art from the artis ...


I disagree. That certainly hasn't happened with Gary Glitter has it? You and I may not think much of his music but he sold 20 million records and was one of the UKs most successful acts ever. His music was extremely popular but you never hear it now. The main difference between Glitter and Bowie is just that Bowie fucked older kids.


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## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> Yeah there isn't a neat way of dividing them. I would think listening to Earth Song knowing he was a predatory paedophile is pretty hard.


Listening to the awful Earth Song is pretty hard, no matter what.


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## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

Micro said:


> Actually, I think you need to go back and read Lupa’s post.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I don't see how Jackson's life and music were that closely linked. He didn't write pop songs about the joy of raping kids.

Louie CK on the other hand made comedy out of the awkwardness that ensues in male/female relationships, frequently dealing with sexuality. He often thread a thin line of what was acceptable but always stayed just on the right side. When it was revealed that in his private life he overstepped that line, that was like a betrayal of trust when it comes to his work. As he didn't commit a crime as bad as what Jackson is alleged to have done, there could have been a point where he's forgiven but unfortunately he's been courting right wingers since.


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## Wilf (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> I suggest you go back and read my post properly.
> 
> I never said he or anyone else "gets a pass", because of other stuff they've done.
> 
> What I said was that it should be possible to separate the art from the artist, and to appreciate the former even while recognising that some of the actions of the latter are indefensible.


Depends what you mean by 'separate'. If that's some recognition that the actor, musician, novelist or whoever did good films, music and the rest, that's one thing. Actively buying it, listening to it, reading it is another. Suppose we will all have different 'red lines' depending on what crimes they've committed or how they've been unpleasant in other ways. Polanski made some great films, but I won't be watching any of them... but then I've not _quite_ got to the point of never listening to Black Sabbath again now that 2 of them have been accused of dv.


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## DotCommunist (Mar 3, 2019)

Morrisey went racist _after _he left the Smiths, which is a relief. And his solo stuff is shit anyway


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## Argonia (Mar 3, 2019)

Didn't the woman who released the doves appear in Time Trumpet?


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## tim (Mar 3, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> David Bowie is the one that's always surprised me. He gets a massive pass on here because of some links to Brixton, despite being well known to shag 14 and 15 year old groupies back in the day.



His defenders will be out after you in a little while like a phalanx of angry Army ants. It's a good job you didn't mention Bowie employing Max Clifford as a pimp.

And of course sticky fingered restraunter and retired musician Bill Wyman married the 13 year old he groomed, which seems socially acceptable here in the UK.

Sticky Fingers, London - Restaurant Reviews, Phone Number & Photos - TripAdvisor

Review time?


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## Rosemary Jest (Mar 3, 2019)

I'm disappointed every Christmas that we no longer get to hear the holy trinity of 'Rock n Roll Christmas', 'I Wish it could be Christmas Everyday', and 'Merry Christmas Everybody.' 

The Wiizzard and Slade songs just aren't complete without the final piece of the 70's pub rock puzzle.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> What I said was that it should be possible to separate the art from the artist, and to appreciate the former even while recognising that some of the actions of the latter are indefensible.



Michael Jackson is not and never will be a historically remarkable artist. He wrote and performed 3 minute songs that possibly ran to 6 chordal variations with massive musical backing and orchestral accompaniments written by others. 
He was not Mozart....or Michelangelo...He wrote and performed songs. Thats it. 
He will not be remembered in 500 years time let alone 100 yrs time. Sorry. 
Don't get me wrong...pop music is something people grow up with and become attached to...because music links to experiences. But if ...Michael Jackson is remembered it will probably for abusing little boys and the moonwalk. And in 100 yrs time nobody will remember him.


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## andysays (Mar 3, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> I disagree. That certainly hasn't happened with Gary Glitter has it? You and I may not think much of his music but he sold 20 million records and was one of the UKs most successful acts ever. His music was extremely popular but you never hear it now. The main difference between Glitter and Bowie is just that Bowie fucked older kids.


I would suggest that an important difference is that Bowie stopped before he was caught, whereas Glitter kept on with it for significantly longer.

Not that I'm seeking to excuse Bowie in any way


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## andysays (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Michael Jackson is not and never will be a historically remarkable artist. He wrote and performed 3 minute songs that possibly ran to 6 chordal variations with massive musical backing and orchestral accompaniments written by others.
> He was not Mozart....or Michelangelo...He wrote and performed songs. Thats it.
> He will not be remembered in 500 years time let alone 100 yrs time. Sorry.
> Don't get me wrong...pop music is something people grow up with and become attached to...because music links to experiences. But if ...Michael Jackson is remembered it will probably for abusing little boys and the moonwalk. And in 100 yrs time nobody will remember him.


Again, I don't actually care about MJ and I have e never claimed that his music has any value as art, I replied to you to tale issue with your general assertion that you can't separate the art from the artist.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> Again, I don't actually care about MJ and I have e never claimed that his music has any value as art, I replied to you to tale issue with your general assertion that you can't separate the art from the artist.




I get that. 
And I don't believe you can separate the artist from the person. They are intrinsically linked. The person is the artist. Not the other way round.


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## Spymaster (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> I would suggest that an important difference is that Bowie stopped before he was caught...


Well we don't know when or if he ever stopped, do we?


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## DotCommunist (Mar 3, 2019)

his ghost could still be at it


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

I was never an MJ fan but he was massively talented and influential. I wouldn't understate that.


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## beesonthewhatnow (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Michael Jackson is not and never will be a historically remarkable artist. He wrote and performed 3 minute songs that possibly ran to 6 chordal variations with massive musical backing and orchestral accompaniments written by others.
> He was not Mozart....or Michelangelo...He wrote and performed songs. Thats it.
> He will not be remembered in 500 years time let alone 100 yrs time. Sorry.
> Don't get me wrong...pop music is something people grow up with and become attached to...because music links to experiences. But if ...Michael Jackson is remembered it will probably for abusing little boys and the moonwalk. And in 100 yrs time nobody will remember him.


No significance whatsoever, other than the biggest selling album of all time


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

DotCommunist said:


> Morrisey went racist _after _he left the Smiths, which is a relief. And his solo stuff is shit anyway


Southpaw Grammar's an amazing album. Not sure if he was racist yet or not...


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

beesonthewhatnow said:


> No significance whatsoever, other than the biggest selling album of all time



It won't be played in 100 years.


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## andysays (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> I get that.
> And I don't believe you can separate the artist from the person. They are intrinsically linked. The person is the artist. Not the other way round.


Not sure if you're deliberately misrepresenting my posts or if you're genuinely incapable of distinguishing between two different things, but either way I have no interest in continuing to discuss this with you.


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## Yossarian (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> It won't be played in 100 years.



In 20 years, people will be saying albums are for old people. Or wait, maybe that's now...


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

andysays said:


> Not sure if you're deliberately misrepresenting my posts or if you're genuinely incapable of distinguishing between two different things, but either way I have no interest in continuing to discuss this with you.




No. I just don't accept that the person and the artist are separate. But it wasn't a row..


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Yossarian said:


> In 20 years, people will be saying albums are for old people. Or wait, maybe that's now...



Ha.. true. 

I really liked MJ and Bowie and many artists. But I can't look up to them in any way including enjoying their music once I know they fucked kids. 
Others may feel differently.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> It won't be played in 100 years.


You might be right about that. The stuff that endures is the stuff that gets rediscovered by each new generation, who find there to be something fresh and new about it. Jackson's 80s pop still sounds pretty fresh to me, but I guess you'd have to ask a 15-year-old to know how it's faring with the new generation. Gary Glitter, on the other hand, someone else who sold mountains of records in his day, sounds very dated to me. Would probably have died a death anyway.


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## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

I don’t see how anybody can state with certainty what music will survive. Frank Sinatra still gets played 70 years later and he would have been the Michael Jackson of his time.Motown was considered disposable pop and 50 years on is going strong.


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## andysays (Mar 3, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> Well we don't know when or if he ever stopped, do we?


The master troll always makes one fatal mistake...


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## Yossarian (Mar 3, 2019)

Reno said:


> Frank Sinatra still gets played 70 years later and he would have been the Michael Jackson of his time.



I thought Mia Farrow only _looked_ underage.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Reno said:


> I don’t see how anybody can state with certainty what music will survive. Frank Sinatra still gets played 70 years later and he would have been the Michael Jackson of his time.



If I asked 15yr olds who Frank Sinatra is they'd more than likely say they've no idea. We are living in a time where music tastes change rapidly. 
Ed Sheerin is king at the moment in many teenagers minds. He has broken records all over.  Beat the Beatles...yeah I know that's really wrong.... but does anyone over the age of 30 think he will be remembered in 100 years?


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## FridgeMagnet (Mar 3, 2019)

Teenagers are not the best people to ask about what music is likely to survive long term.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> If I asked 15yr olds who Frank Sinatra is they'd more than likely say they've no idea. We are living in a time where music tastes change rapidly.
> Ed Sheerin is king at the moment in many teenagers minds. He has broken records all over.  Beat the Beatles...yeah I know that's really wrong.... but does anyone over the age of 30 think he will be remembered in 100 years?


Is that the test, though? Isn't a better test to play them some Sinatra and see what they think of it?


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## tim (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> It won't be played in 100 years.




80 years on George Formby can still get  nearly 3.7 million views on YouTube



Despite being banned from THE BBC by Lord Reith himself



> . "if the public wants to listen to Formby singing his disgusting little ditty, they'll have to be content to hear it in the cinemas, not over the nation's airwaves";[3]



When I'm Cleaning Windows - Wikipedia


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

FridgeMagnet said:


> Teenagers are not the best people to ask about what music is likely to survive long term.




MJ was "made"  famous by teenage fans .. who now think he will be remembered in 100 years. 
My point is that teenagers and young people attach to the music of their youth. 
It doesn't mean that music is going to live forever.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> Is that the test, though? Isn't a better test to play them some Sinatra and see what they think of it?



I've done that... 
The music they appreciate is their own generational music.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> MJ was "made"  famous by teenage fans.


The same is true of The Beatles, surely.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

tim said:


> 80 years on George Formby can still get  nearly 3.7 million views on YouTube
> 
> 
> 
> ...



George Formby and Frankie Goes to Hollywood... 

Didn't do either any harm.


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## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

I bet teens today know who Elvis is


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## spanglechick (Mar 3, 2019)

D'wards said:


> I bet teens today know who Elvis is


Mnn. Not generally, though most will have heard the name.  They all know Michael Jackson, though.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> The same is true of The Beatles, surely.



Yes. Absolutely.

But MJ has one extra reason to be forgotten....he was a paedophile.


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## DJWrongspeed (Mar 3, 2019)

This is still a great record for all Glitter's crimes. Like Glitter's music Michael Jackson's wasn't all his. It was as much the producers and musician's music. Do we through away Quincey Jones' great work just because MJ was a paedo?

Sadly the stories of stars and sexual abuse always turn worse than first thought. I'm sure it would have been handled differently today.


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## Treacle Toes (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> MJ was "made"  famous by teenage fans .. who now think he will be remembered in 100 years.
> My point is that teenagers and young people attach to the music of their youth.
> It doesn't mean that music is going to live forever.


I don't agree. MJ became famous as part of the Jackson 5. Their appeal spanned the generations. That appeal stuck .He had his share of you young fans but a majority, nah. He had cross-family appeal.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

DJWrongspeed said:


> This is still a great record for all Glitter's crimes. Like Glitter's music Michael Jackson's wasn't all his. It was as much the producers and musician's music. Do we through away Quincey Jones' great work just because MJ was a paedo?
> 
> Sadly the stories of stars and sexual abuse always turn worse than first thought. I'm sure it would have been handled differently today.



He did the same song over and over again. And he looked like a dirty old man even then.

That said, it's the kind of thing I could imagine being played in snippets at cricket matches to get the crowd going if it weren't for its problems.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Rutita1 said:


> I don't agree. MJ became famous as part of the Jackson 5. Their appeal spanned the generations. That appeal stuck .He had his share of you guys fans but a majority, nah. He had cross-family appeal.




Sure...they were big...as the Jackson 5. He was the cute  talented brilliant little child singer/dancer and he definitely drew more fans to the Jackson 5.
But...He made it in his own rite as "Prince of Pop", in the 80s...on his own. And he was absolutely transformed from anything resembling a Jackson 5 member by then.

Don't get me wrong. I loved MJ s music. And I thought he was a phenomenal entertainer.


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## FridgeMagnet (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> MJ was "made"  famous by teenage fans .. who now think he will be remembered in 100 years.
> My point is that teenagers and young people attach to the music of their youth.
> It doesn't mean that music is going to live forever.


Teenagers have no idea _now_ what is going to persist. They're the worst people to ask about it. They only know what they love right at this moment in time, and they have nothing to compare it with.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

FridgeMagnet said:


> Teenagers have no idea _now_ what is going to persist. They're the worst people to ask about it. They only know what they love right at this moment in time, and they have nothing to compare it with.




And that's exactly how The Beatles and Elvis did so well. And MJ and Gary Glitter and Bowie. Teenagers made them. Without teenagers they would not have made it. That was my point


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## FridgeMagnet (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> And that's exactly how The Beatles and Elvis did so well. And MJ and Gary Glitter and Bowie. Teenagers made them. Without teenagers they would not have made it. That was my point


If you'd asked teenagers at the time you wouldn't have thought they would persist at all. Lots of other people were also really popular. The teenagers didn't know then.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

FridgeMagnet said:


> If you'd asked teenagers at the time you wouldn't have thought they would persist at all. Lots of other people were also really popular. The teenagers didn't know then.




Teenagers just know what and who they like.


----------



## FridgeMagnet (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Teenagers just know what and who they like.





FridgeMagnet said:


> Teenagers are not the best people to ask about what music is likely to survive long term.


----------



## Argonia (Mar 3, 2019)

When is it on channel four? I want to watch it.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Well... if you think these two quotes equate, then grand. 
I see them as two very separate points. 
Teenagers love Ed Sheerin. Thats why he's so popular right now. 
In 25 years time the teenagers of today who loved Ed Sheerin will have memories attached to their favourite singer. And they will no doubt still think he was fantastic. 
He isn't...in any way comparable with the people you or I might think are amazing.... but we are living with associated memories too. 

And my point .. is that in 100 years time none of them will be remembered in the same way because general popularity during their lifetime is not the gauge of how long an artist's legacy lasts historically.


----------



## littlebabyjesus (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> And that's exactly how The Beatles and Elvis did so well. And MJ and Gary Glitter and Bowie. Teenagers made them. Without teenagers they would not have made it. That was my point


I agree with fm, though. Teenagers make lots of people, many of whom eventually fade from view. A relatively random example that pops into my head from when I was young would be the Thompson Twins. Briefly they were very popular, made so by teenagers. Now?


----------



## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

The "do they know" videos on YouTube are very good, where they play kids, teens and oldies different music and see if they know it.
Coupla examples...




These videos are great, I have many a time got lost in a rabbit hole and an hour flies by


----------



## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

Argonia said:


> When is it on channel four? I want to watch it.


Wednesday and Thursday 9pm


----------



## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> If I asked 15yr olds who Frank Sinatra is they'd more than likely say they've no idea. We are living in a time where music tastes change rapidly.
> Ed Sheerin is king at the moment in many teenagers minds. He has broken records all over.  Beat the Beatles...yeah I know that's really wrong.... but does anyone over the age of 30 think he will be remembered in 100 years?


You argue as if everybodys tastes are fixed in their teens and then forever stay the same. People still discover music later in life, I have. There also always is a minority of people who seek out retro stuff.

The teenagers I know think Ed Sheeran is naff. So much for anecdotal evidence.


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 3, 2019)

Thriller didn't sell 60m copies to just teenagers


----------



## Celyn (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> ...
> He was not Mozart....or Michelangelo...


 Well, to be fair, Michelangelo wasn't really good at the songs.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Celyn said:


> Well, to be fair, Michelangelo wasn't really good at the songs.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Reno said:


> The teenagers I know think Ed Sheeran is naff. So much for anecdotal evidence.



Thank goodness for small mercies...


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 3, 2019)

Eric Morecambe's estate is on the phone for you, Celyn


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> I agree with fm, though. Teenagers make lots of people, many of whom eventually fade from view. A relatively random example that pops into my head from when I was young would be the Thompson Twins. Briefly they were very popular, made so by teenagers. Now?



That is exactly my point. 
Only roll it on 100 years...and even Sinatra will be a footnote.


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> That is exactly my point.
> Only roll it on 100 years...and even Sinatra will be a footnote.


Nonsense
Sinatra's one of the few who WILL go down through the ages.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

S☼I said:


> Thriller didn't sell 60m copies to just teenagers




What age group would you think bought it? I'd say predominantly teens to twenties...possibly early thirties.

It would be interesting to see if there is any one here in their 70s who bought Thriller in 1983?


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

S☼I said:


> Nonsense
> Sinatra's one of the few who WILL go down through the ages.




Meet me back here in 2119...and we shall see.


----------



## Celyn (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Teenagers just know what and who they like.


Whom.


----------



## Celyn (Mar 3, 2019)

S☼I said:


> Eric Morecambe's estate is on the phone for you, Celyn


Eek. Sorry, what have I done?


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 3, 2019)

Celyn said:


> Eek. Sorry, what have I done?


Oh, I apologize

Was Tommy Cooper


----------



## Wookey (Mar 3, 2019)

I was a huge Jackson fan as a kid and teenager, so I've watched his public undoing with close interest. I've had my all-time hero switched for a dirty, perverted child-rapist, and that's not easy to get used to.

I think that post-mortem judgments on MJs work is kind of missing the point; you can separate the art from the artist, and we have to if we're not to retrospectively delete all kinds of art made by people who did bad things, or respect the relationship we have with art independent of it's source.

Michael Jackson broke all the records, he was an utter phenomenon in his world of performance. His music means something to me and my life story, and will continue to do so for as long as I have a working memory. So it's not going to be deleted from my soundtrack.

So loving the art, separate from the artist, which is the ethical balance I've struck ever since Jordy Chandler, means I will listen to his music if it comes on the radio, I won't turn it off. But I won't ever BUY anything from him again. I think that continuing to financially support the artist's estate knowing what we now know to be true is morally repugnant for as long as his estate denies his crimes.

Michael Jackson has earned £2.1 Billion since he died. That's record sales, downloads and streams, catalog sales - his estate is raking it in.

The Immortal Tour, which ended a few years back, was the 8th most successful tour of all time. It beat the income for the Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge Tour of the 90s, making £340million - and Michael Jackson _IS DEAD_. A dead Michael Jackson makes more money than an alive Rolling Stones.

This can only happen with the willing collusion of his family, fans and share holders. It's really, really sick. Because it means to protect their interests in maintaining this empire, they are forced to call his victims 'liars", and deny what we all know to be true. That adds insult to injury, and perpetuates his crimes.

I'd like to see some of his billions going towards a global network of anti child-abuse charities. Perhaps could hope to lessen the scourge of child rape, and challenge the powerful who think that children exist as their sexual playthings. It might go some way towards "healing the world" - and I'm sure it's what Jacko would have wanted.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Celyn said:


> Whom.



Actually I think it's who...but I'm not a native speaker...
Who do they like? 
They like x.

He , she and they for who
Him, her and them for whom... 

I'm open to correction  ... 
....


----------



## kebabking (Mar 3, 2019)

Wookey - when his stuff comes on the radio and you _don't _turn it off, you're buying his stuff.

That's how commercial radio works. If you don't want to give his estate money, and continue to validate his music as being legit, then you have to switch it off.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 3, 2019)

Thing is about Michael Jackson, people tend to forget that he was only great for a short period of time.
Off the Wall- fantastic 
Thriller - Superb
Bad - quite good
Everything else- Pony

Imho of course


----------



## Wookey (Mar 3, 2019)

kebabking said:


> Wookey - when his stuff comes on the radio and you _don't _turn it off, you're buying his stuff.
> 
> That's how commercial radio works. If you don't want to give his estate money, and continue to validate his music as being legit, then you have to switch it off.



I see your point. I don't listen to commercial radio to be fair. But if it came on TV, or was in a bar or down the gym - it could be anywhere, it's all commercial.


----------



## clicker (Mar 3, 2019)

D'wards said:


> I bet teens today know who Elvis is


I just asked one...

ELVIS  : "the singer who died on the toilet?"

THE BEATLES : "the men walking over the zebra crossing?"

SINATRA : "the opera singer?"


----------



## nyxx (Mar 3, 2019)

The death of the author is a concept I sometimes find useful and sometimes struggle to grapple with. 

I think to be honest when I don’t feel such a great attachment / identification with / liking of an artist, it’s easier to separate the things they’ve done from their work. MJ is a case in point - there’s a few tracks that were in the charts when I was a kid that I like, I’ve downloaded them off of a torrent at some point, and the music to me feels completely separate from the entity who sang it. 

Other times when a band member in a scene that’s closer to my life has turned out to be a rapist I’ve found it impossible to listen to their stuff anymore. 

And I have no answers when it comes to Roald Dahl. I loved his stories as a kid and I can still appreciate the art he made with words. 

I agree with the principle of not putting another cent towards the artist or their estate once their vile actions are known about.


----------



## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

clicker said:


> I just asked one...
> 
> ELVIS  : "the singer who died on the toilet?"
> 
> ...


I don’t think randomly asking teens is much proof. Music gets passed on in families. I still listen to music my dad listened to, which was long before my time. If a parent or grandparent really liked Elvis and played him a lot, even a teenager now will know who that is.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

It's all very fine saying you can separate the artist from their work. But.. MJ didn't do that himself.

Just watched the Oprah interview with Michael Jackson again.
In the first 12 minutes you can see how completely fucked up his childhood was. He had no childhood. He was not allowed to be a child by his family, recording studios and the public.



He was no Gary Glitter pedo.
He was a victim who sought solace amongst kids...and never developed adult relationships.
What he did to kids was so messed up. Manipulating them and giving them gold rings...marrying a ten year old boy in a fake ceremony. It's hard to compare him with an opportunistic paedophile like Saville. He's not the same. But he fucked up the little lives of the boys he sexually abused...and that's not something anyone can forget for the sake of his music.

I see BBC2 has pulled all his music from air. More will follow suit...


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 3, 2019)

S☼I said:


> Nonsense
> Sinatra's one of the few who WILL go down through the ages.


The mafia will see to that


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 3, 2019)

Wookey said:


> Michael Jackson _IS DEAD_.



I knew we'd all been going wrong somewhere


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 3, 2019)

Radio 2 have banned his music, apparently.  I find most of his music utterly shit anyway, but I do love Billie Jean for the bassline. I won't delete it from my ipod.


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> He was no Gary Glitter pedo


He was one of the good paedos, bless him, aww


----------



## Celyn (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Actually I think it's who...but I'm not a native speaker...
> Who do they like?
> They like x.
> 
> ...


"Whom", in the way you used "who" in a post that seems to be ages ago now. The ONLY reason I made fun with it is you being a school teacher.  I haz dun lolz. 

"Whom do they like?"   They like X. X is the object of all this friendly liking business. 

"Who likes "X" ?"  is fine, because that way "Who" is the subject of the sentence and "X" is the object.

How about "Do you like Bloggs? No, I don't like he" as opposed to "Do you like Bloggs? No, I don't like him".

Or "Bloggs who was murdered by the evil Celyn" as opposed to "Bloggs whom the evil Celyn murdered"?

 I want to be quite clear that I have no plans whatsoever to murder the non-existent Bloggs. Dear me no.   Or dear I.


----------



## Wookey (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> He was no Gary Glitter pedo... It's hard to compare him with an opportunistic paedophile like Saville. He's not the same...



How is comparing paedophiles useful? Is it like Top Trumps?!

To be clear, he gave drugs to children and had penetrative sex with them. Seemed a bit missing from your post!


----------



## Celyn (Mar 3, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Thing is about Michael Jackson, people tend to forget that he was only great for a short period of time.
> Off the Wall- fantastic
> Thriller - Superb
> Bad - quite good
> ...


WeIl, it is all a bit strange. I mean, he obviously sold many many records but is there anyone here who liked him and did buy his music? Or even anyone whose second cousin once removed was a fan? The whole "Michael Jackson as great musical superstar" thing somehow passed me by.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Wookey said:


> How is comparing paedophiles useful? Is it like Top Trumps?!
> 
> To be clear, he gave drugs to children and had penetrative sex with them. Seemed a bit missing from your post!




It isn't useful. 
I think I posted my thoughts on Jackson's Pedophilia  already at least 3 times in this thread.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

Celyn said:


> "Whom", in the way you used "who" in a post that seems to be ages ago now. The ONLY reason I made fun with it is you being a school teacher.  I haz dun lolz.
> 
> "Whom do they like?"   They like X. X is the object of all this friendly liking business.
> 
> ...






Lupa said:


> Teenagers just know what and who they like.



This was what I wrote. 

Break it down..
"Teenagers know who they like"
What is wrong with that?
You're saying it should be "Teenagers know whom they like".

Would you say "whom do you like?" Or "Who do you like?"

As for my English...it isn't bad for someone who learned everything through Irish.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

twentythreedom said:


> He was one of the good paedos, bless him, aww



Did I say that?
For the record ...I'm saying he's as shit as every other fucked up celebrity crock of shit paedophile who idolised their mother and hated their abusive violent fucked up father.


----------



## PursuedByBears (Mar 3, 2019)

Celyn said:


> WeIl, it is all a bit strange. I mean, he obviously sold many many records but is there anyone here who liked him and did buy his music? Or even anyone whose second cousin once removed was a fan? The whole "Michael Jackson as great musical superstar" thing somehow passed me by.


Yes, it passed me by too. I first remember being aware of him in his rubbish plastic surgery Earth Song phase being mooned at by Jarvis Cocker and am a bit baffled that people seemed to like his music. Before I consciously heard a Michael Jackson song all I knew about him was that he was a weirdo with a chimp who seemed to be trying to turn himself from a young black man into an approximation of Diana Ross . And then he died and loads of people overlooked all the rumours... Very dodgy.


----------



## Celyn (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> This was what I wrote.
> 
> Break it down..
> "Teenagers know who they like"
> ...


Yes. The people or things that they like are the object in that sentence.

I am inventing an extra teenager now:

"My friend 'phoned. Will we all go to visit she?" Or "will we go to visit her?"

Of course it's quite likely that a lot of these hypothetical teenagers will invent their own version of a language anyway.   



Lupa said:


> This was what I wrote.
> As for my English...it isn't bad for someone who learned everything through Irish.


   :


----------



## 8ball (Mar 3, 2019)

PursuedByBears said:


> Yes, it passed me by too. I first remember being aware of him in his rubbish plastic surgery Earth Song phase being mooned at by Jarvis Cocker and am a bit baffled that people seemed to like his music. Before I consciously heard a Michael Jackson song all I knew about him was that he was a weirdo with a chimp who seemed to be trying to turn himself from a young black man into an approximation of Diana Ross . And then he died and loads of people overlooked all the rumours... Very dodgy.



Yeah, there was a definite change when he died. It was like a mass unspoken consensus was settled on that went  “well, that draws a line under things and we can just enjoy the music now”.


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 3, 2019)

PursuedByBears said:


> Yes, it passed me by too. I first remember being aware of him in his rubbish plastic surgery Earth Song phase being mooned at by Jarvis Cocker and am a bit baffled that people seemed to like his music. Before I consciously heard a Michael Jackson song all I knew about him was that he was a weirdo with a chimp who seemed to be trying to turn himself from a young black man into an approximation of Diana Ross . And then he died and loads of people overlooked all the rumours... Very dodgy.



Pretty much the same for me.  It was difficult not to be aware of him but he always came across as a weirdo.  There was always something deeply odd about him, leaving aside the paedophile aspect.


----------



## Spymaster (Mar 3, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> Pretty much the same for me.  It was difficult not to be aware of him but he always came across as a weirdo.  There was always something deeply odd about him, leaving aside the paedophile aspect.


Same. As far as I remember there were a few good songs and quite a fuss made about the Thriller video, but otherwise he was mostly ridiculed for being very odd looking, weird, and having a pet monkey.


----------



## Reno (Mar 3, 2019)

PursuedByBears said:


> Yes, it passed me by too. I first remember being aware of him in his rubbish plastic surgery Earth Song phase being mooned at by Jarvis Cocker and am a bit baffled that people seemed to like his music. Before I consciously heard a Michael Jackson song all I knew about him was that he was a weirdo with a chimp who seemed to be trying to turn himself from a young black man into an approximation of Diana Ross . And then he died and loads of people overlooked all the rumours... Very dodgy.



I don’t think it’s that people overlooked the rumours. What everybody here seems to have forgotten is that were two trials which were widely reported on. The first one got settled out of court and after the second one, Jackson was acquitted. So it wasn’t entirely unreasonable to believe that Jackson was innocent at the time of his death. Several of the witnesses for the prosecution appeared deeply unreliable and there are so many conflicting reports as to what went down. I long thought Jackson was guilty because he was so fucked up and weird. After the second trial I was far less convinced that he was guilty. Several of the parents of the alleged victims appeared dodgy and like they had something to gain from a guilty verdict. Being weird is no proof of being a child molester.

One of the two men who the documentary is about, spoke in Jackson’s defence at the trial. He changed his story later, after the Jackson Estate didn’t give him permission for a tribute show to Jackson and his career fell apart. After that he tried to sell a tell-all book about Jackson’s abuse of him. Apparently in the film the two men make a convincing case for having been abused due to their graphic descriptions of the abuse, but the documentary presents no new evidence. 

Just saying that because everybody here claims to always have been known Jackson was 100% guilty because he was a weirdo. Maybe after the documentary there is a better case to be made for that, but it’s not 100% clear and I’ve gone back and forth on it myself. Until there is irrefutable evidence of the abuse, there has to remain reasonable doubt.


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 3, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Did I say that?
> For the record ...I'm saying he's as shit as every other fucked up celebrity crock of shit paedophile who idolised their mother and hated their abusive violent fucked up father.


Care to name any of these celeb paedos with that family history? 

What was Gary Glitter's relationship with his parents like?

Just seems all a bit weird doing compare / diagnose the paedo


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 3, 2019)

twentythreedom said:


> Care to name any of these celeb paedos with that family history?
> 
> What was Gary Glitter's relationship with his parents like?
> 
> Just seems all a bit weird doing compare / diagnose the paedo




Glitter was convicted of child sexual assault and rape.

Jackson....was acquitted of sexual abuse. Thats one difference


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Glitter was convicted of child sexual assault and rape.
> 
> Jackson....was acquitted of sexual abuse. Thats one difference


Oh ok I see the difference between good paedos and bad paedos now


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

twentythreedom
I wasn't excusing him of any wrongdoing by discussing his childhood. I was just pointing out how fucked up his childhood had been.
If you watch the interview you can see that he was a complete mess.
An 8 yr old boy forced to work with no time to play or do normal childhood things.

That does not mean he was not guilty of abusing young boys. The problem is that he was acquitted in the past and he is now dead. He can't own up to it. Those accusing him now, defended him in the past and denied they were ever abused, in court. They did this both as teenagers and again as adults. I would hope that if there are other victims they will speak up...
I will watch the documentary. From what I have read the two men who claim Jackson abused them have come out now because they have children of their own. Their descriptions of what happened to them are similar...they were groomed, made feel extremely special, their families were involved in Jackson's life and brought to live nearby, they were discarded and replaced once they became teenagers and they felt hurt and jealous of the new younger boys Jackson started seeing. 
It's obvious there are more victims who have not spoken up. 
Hopefully they will.


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 4, 2019)

Still sounds a bit like you're excusing him there


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

twentythreedom said:


> Still sounds a bit like you're excusing him there



Ok.. I'll state it for you then. 
There is and was no excuse for him molesting and sexually assaulting kids.


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Ok.. I'll state it for you then.
> There is and was no excuse for him molesting and sexually assaulting kids.


Fair enough


----------



## maomao (Mar 4, 2019)

Gary Glitter never knew his father and was taken into care at the age of 10.

Poor Gary. I think he might have been one of the good paedos too.


----------



## Manter (Mar 4, 2019)

This is being posted on Facebook by Wacko-Jacko fans. Complete with a picture of a child wrapped in black gauze who was separated from their mother in bizarre circumstances, which rather puts the lie to the words


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

Manter said:


> This is being posted on Facebook by Wacko-Jacko fans. Complete with a picture of a child wrapped in black gauze who was separated from their mother in bizarre circumstances, which rather puts the lie to the words



That's his daughter, Paris. He covered his own kids faces when they went out.


----------



## maomao (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> his daughter, Paris.


Who was separated from her mother in bizarre circumstances as Manter said.


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> That's his daughter, Paris. He covered his own kids faces when they went out.



Which is a bit odd in itself.

Shame the other parents didn't keep their kids hidden from him.


----------



## two sheds (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> This was what I wrote.
> 
> Break it down..
> "Teenagers know who they like"
> ...



I have to check each time. If you'd replace the word with 'him' or 'her' or 'them' then it's whom. If you'd replace it with 'he' or 'she' or 'they' then it's who.


----------



## Micro (Mar 4, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> Which is a bit odd in itself



A _bit?!! _It’s pretty full-on weird. I’d kind of forgotten that part. Do you know whether they were covered in public like that over a period of years, or was it a fairly brief thing?


----------



## two sheds (Mar 4, 2019)

I don't think he did it when hanging them out the window.


----------



## Micro (Mar 4, 2019)

Yeah, he was thoughtful like that. Balance.


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 4, 2019)

two sheds said:


> I don't think he did it when hanging them out the window.



Forgot about hanging children out of windows.  What a fucking weirdo - the more I remember about him the more fucking weird he becomes.


----------



## two sheds (Mar 4, 2019)

Which of us hasn't wanted to hang a child out of a window though?


----------



## Mumbles274 (Mar 4, 2019)

The 'Peter Pan of Pop'

Or calculated manipulative child molester as he really grew up to be. 

Not so much Wacko Jacko as Sicko Micko


----------



## Micro (Mar 4, 2019)

two sheds said:


> Which of us hasn't wanted to hang a child out of a window though?



I’ve got some good news for you:


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 4, 2019)

Micro said:


> I’ve got some good news for you:



Battery farm babies.


----------



## cupid_stunt (Mar 4, 2019)

two sheds said:


> I don't think he did it when hanging them out the window.



He did.

 

Fucking weirdo.


----------



## Micro (Mar 4, 2019)

Fucking hell.


----------



## two sheds (Mar 4, 2019)

Difficult to get even weirder than just hanging a baby out of a window.


----------



## tim (Mar 4, 2019)

Reno said:


> I don’t think it’s that people overlooked the rumours. What everybody here seems to have forgotten is that were two trials which were widely reported on. The first one got settled out of court and after the second one, Jackson was acquitted. So it wasn’t entirely unreasonable to believe that Jackson was innocent at the time of his death. Several of the witnesses for the prosecution appeared deeply unreliable and there are so many conflicting reports as to what went down. I long thought Jackson was guilty because he was so fucked up and weird. After the second trial I was far less convinced that he was guilty. Several of the parents of the alleged victims appeared dodgy and like they had something to gain from a guilty verdict. Being weird is no proof of being a child molester.
> 
> One of the two men who the documentary is about, spoke in Jackson’s defence at the trial. He changed his story later, after the Jackson Estate didn’t give him permission for a tribute show to Jackson and his career fell apart. After that he tried to sell a tell-all book about Jackson’s abuse of him. Apparently in the film the two men make a convincing case for having been abused due to their graphic descriptions of the abuse, but the documentary presents no new evidence.
> 
> Just saying that because everybody here claims to always have been known Jackson was 100% guilty because he was a weirdo. Maybe after the documentary there is a better case to be made for that, but it’s not 100% clear and I’ve gone back and forth on it myself. Until there is irrefutable evidence of the abuse, there has to remain reasonable doubt.




Given that every media report, I read it saw, went on about how the rich could more or less buy an acquital in the USA and that the witnesses in the first trial were bought off, it was never reasonable not to assume innocence


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

LaToyas interview stated outright what was going on and that Jackson's family knew. Mind you she says nobody ever saw the abuse happening. But even the family thought it was very weird the way young boys were constantly staying over sleeping with him.

She also claims her father sexually abused her...


----------



## Reno (Mar 4, 2019)

tim said:


> Given that every media report, I read it saw, went on about how the rich could more or less buy an acquital in the USA and that the witnesses in the first trial were bought off, it was never reasonable not to assume innocence


That's what I though at the time, just going by media reports. Then you look into the civil lawsuit, which was the first trial and it gets a lot more complicated. His accusers, the Chandlers, started this with an extortion attempt because the father was deep in the red. They never even went to the police or pressed criminal charges.Their evidence in regard to Jackson's genitals didn't stack up, even though initially it was wrongly reported that it did. Apparently Jackson wanted to go to court, but was talked out of it by friends due to his failing health. The second trial was the first that was a criminal trial and in that Jackson was acquitted. The Chandlers refused to testify in that even thought the settlement would not have prevented them from testifying.


----------



## Reno (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> LaToyas interview stated outright what was going on and that Jackson's family knew.



LaToya later retracted her allegations, claiming she had been forced to make them by her abusive husband and manager to make money.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

Reno said:


> LaToya later retracted her allegations, claiming she had been forced to make them by her abusive husband and manager to make money.




Yep. I know. But....she may have been forced to do that too.


----------



## Reno (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Yep. I know. But....she may have been forced to do that too.



You are making a lot of statements on behalf of unfounded presumptions in this discussion and I'm not sure what that is supposed to prove. I assume you aren't too familiar with LaToya Jackson and her publicity seeking antics. Nobody should ever take any of her claims as proof for anything.

I'm not advocating for Jackson being innocent, I'm advocating for there being doubt. Most people here have been discussion the case as if there was no doubt that he was a child rapist but when you start looking a little beyond the headlines it all gets a lot stranger and more  complicated. I come down on that there probably is something to the accusations. I also feel I can't be 100% sure, considering how many people with potentially self-serving agendas are at play.

I'm not even that invested in Jackson as an artist or whether he is or isn't guilty. What does disturb me is how simplistic and black and white these discussions about abuse allegations are on the Internet. It's more about wanting to be seen to be on the right side, than trying to get of the bottom of the truth. People making sure they are seen to be condemning child abuse over and over, when this is something which shouldn't even have to be stated. In regard to the accused there is a mob mentality, which I find deeply unsettling.

That's the last from me till I've seen the documentary, I can't really spend more time on this now.


----------



## TopCat (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> It's all very fine saying you can separate the artist from their work. But.. MJ didn't do that himself.
> 
> Just watched the Oprah interview with Michael Jackson again.
> In the first 12 minutes you can see how completely fucked up his childhood was. He had no childhood. He was not allowed to be a child by his family, recording studios and the public.
> ...



Poor fucking diddums.


----------



## butchersapron (Mar 4, 2019)

Things that you never thought you'd read #147



> marrying a ten year old boy in a fake ceremony. It's hard to compare him with an opportunistic paedophile like Saville.


----------



## Athos (Mar 4, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Yep. I know. But....she may have been forced to do that too.


----------



## Glitter (Mar 4, 2019)

Reno said:


> I'm not even that invested in Jackson as an artist or whether he is or isn't guilty. What does disturb me is how simplistic and black and white these discussions about abuse allegations are on the Internet.



I remember this time. I’m not sure about the way this makes me feel...I don’t think we can be black or white about it. It’s dangerous. 

I dunno if he was a smooth criminal or someone who wanted to heal the world. 

I’m not sure I wanna be starting something on the internet though. I’ll just beat it.


----------



## TopCat (Mar 4, 2019)

Fuck.punning.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

I had a lot of time for Michael Jackson. Was a fan of his music. Believed he did a huge amount of work for children's charities etc. 
But 5 boys have accused him of sexually abusing them in the past 20 or so years. He settled the first case and another was dropped and he was acquitted of another. 
Now there are two men accusing him of sexual abuse who already came out in his defence both as children and as adults. These men stated not so long ago that he had never sexually interfered with them. They stated this as children and again as adults. They are now saying he abused them...and they are opening this up for geir children.
You may not like Latoya but she pointed out some truths. She was right to say that it was really weird for an adult man to want to sleep with little boys. And Ive no doubt she didn't lie about she herself being abused. 

The truth here is going to be hard to find and prove, because the one person who does know *exactly* what went on is dead. I would have thought that more victims would have shown up by now if there was widespread child abuse by MJ.  Maybe they will speak up in the months to come.  Who knows. ... 




butchersapron said:


> Things that you never thought you'd read #147




Fair point. 
I was on a shitloads of meds last night. My brain was farting for Ireland.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

Having said all that....if you asked me what my gut instinct is?
10 years ago I'd have been in the Michael Jackson as innocent camp.

Right now...I would say that I think his behaviour was beyond weird. That it would not surprise me that the allegations that he sexually abused a number of kids, are based on truth.


----------



## FabricLiveBaby! (Mar 4, 2019)

This interview is came out in Australia last week.

I believe her.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 4, 2019)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> This interview is came out in Australia last week.
> 
> I believe her.




I believe her too.


----------



## Reno (Mar 4, 2019)

I watched the first part of the documentary. The two men interviewed are very credible, really doesn’t look good for Michael Jackson’s legacy.

As a documentary I don’t think it is very good though, really hated the manipulative music throughout.


----------



## Maggot (Mar 5, 2019)

Interesting article about the accusers in the documentary. Backs up what Reno was saying. 

What You Should Know About the New Michael Jackson Documentary


----------



## 8ball (Mar 5, 2019)

What a sad vortex of utter fucked-upness.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 5, 2019)

Maggot said:


> Interesting article about the accusers in the documentary. Backs up what Reno was saying.
> 
> What You Should Know About the New Michael Jackson Documentary




From this ^^

When Michael Jackson died in 2009, Wade Robson—the former choreographer whose allegations of abuse are at the center of a controversial new documentary, _Leaving Neverland_—wrote in tribute to his friend:

"Michael Jackson changed the world and, more personally, my life forever. He is the reason I dance, the reason I make music, and one of the main reasons I believe in *the pure goodness of humankind*. He has been a close friend of mine for 20 years. His music, his movement, his personal words of inspiration and encouragement and his unconditional love will live inside of me forever. I will miss him immeasurably, but I know that he is now at peace and enchanting the heavens with a melody and a moonwalk."


Not sure how a 27 year old man can write that and change his mind and history so completely. Is that a statement someone would voluntarily write about someone who abused them who has died?   I don't know... I guess if you had looked up to and in some way you had loved your abuser you might feel massve grief.

It's very sad and whatever the outcome people's lives have been fucked up.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 5, 2019)

Old news story before the latest allegations 

Michael Jackson 'kept photos of naked children and pornography stash'


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 5, 2019)

Lupa said:


> It's very sad and whatever the outcome people's lives and legacies have been fucked up.



MJ's legacy is entirely beside the point in this though - people are people, and some people are vile.  If there is evidence MJ abused kids - as seems extremely likely to be the case - then his legacy will be exactly that, as a child abuser who happened to make records.  

Regardless of the truth or otherwise of the two men in the documentary, the very fact that an adult male slept in the same bed as totally unrelated children is evidence enough that he was an abuser.  It just isn't normal behaviour by any stretch of the imagination.

(I'm not having a go at you by the way)


----------



## Reno (Mar 5, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Old news story before the latest allegations
> 
> Michael Jackson 'kept photos of naked children and pornography stash'



This has long been disputed by the police themselves. Relying on media reports which are prone to sensationalise everything, is exactly the problem with digging out "proof" with one bias or another. Reports like that then being disproven, is exactly what made it appear it plausible that Jackson was innocent, if you followed the case rather than cherry picking information.

For every article which claims that Jackson's bedroom was stacked with kiddie porn you'll find an article which claims that there was erotica but nothing you couldn't find in any art book store not exclusively focused on children.


The Truth About What Michael Jackson Had (And Didn't Have) In His Bedroom | HuffPost


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 5, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> MJ's legacy is entirely beside the point in this though - people are people, and some people are vile.  If there is evidence MJ abused kids - as seems extremely likely to be the case - then his legacy will be exactly that, as a child abuser who happened to make records.
> 
> Regardless of the truth or otherwise of the two men in the documentary, the very fact that an adult male slept in the same bed as totally unrelated children is evidence enough that he was an abuser.  It just isn't normal behaviour by any stretch of the imagination.
> 
> (I'm not having a go at you by the way)



Yes I know. Which was why I edited my post.....before you posted. 

And yes...I completely agree with all your points


----------



## Reno (Mar 5, 2019)

Lupa said:


> From this ^^
> 
> When Michael Jackson died in 2009, Wade Robson—the former choreographer whose allegations of abuse are at the center of a controversial new documentary, _Leaving Neverland_—wrote in tribute to his friend:
> 
> ...


Both of the men in the documentary came to understand relatively late in life that what was done to them. What is quite interesting is that they speak more like lovers who eventually got cast aside when a new underage boy entered Jackson's life. That appeared to them more painful than the sexual abuse. I think when a child gets abused they normalise that behaviour and only far later they become aware of the psychological damage caused by the sexual abuse. Unlike many abusers Jackson wasn't ever threatening or violent, so they could rationalise the abuse as acts of love by someone who was their idol. There also are some particular issues to do with masculinity when admitting of having been sexually abused as a male and not wanting to go public with that.

What they are saying is psychologically too plausible to be dismissed as lies. The documentary has convinced me that Jackson was an abuser. "He's an abuser because he's weird" really didn't quite cut it. And the issue got muddied by family members on the victims' side trying to financially gain from the situation rather than going to the police.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 5, 2019)

Interesting that Jackson's estate is worth a lot more than it was at the time of his death.  Guess it's been well-managed and they cleared his debts.

Corey Feldman's continued defense is a tricky one to square with things, seeing as he has spoken out about abuse and obviously has been able to process a lot of things.

Claims and counter-claims all over the place.

Whichever way up it is, it's not an edifying display of human nature. 

Disclaimer:  I still think Thriller is a great album, then from there it went increasingly wtf


----------



## Numbers (Mar 5, 2019)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> This interview is came out in Australia last week.
> 
> I believe her.



She's about as credible as Jackson himself IMO.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 6, 2019)

Heads up - doc on at 9pm tonight (wed 6th March) on channel 4.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 6, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Heads up - doc on at 9pm tonight (wed 6th March) on channel 4.



Started watching a little to get a feel for the witnesses and a subjective sense of their credibility (or otherwise), but it’s too sick-making to stick with for long.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 6, 2019)

It is a bit of an unpleasant watch.


----------



## Plumdaff (Mar 6, 2019)

Reno said:


> Both of the men in the documentary came to understand relatively late in life that what was done to them. What is quite interesting is that they speak more like lovers who eventually got cast aside when a new underage boy entered Jackson's life. That appeared to them more painful than the sexual abuse. I think when a child gets abused they normalise that behaviour and only far later they become aware of the psychological damage caused by the sexual abuse. Unlike many abusers Jackson wasn't ever threatening or violent, so they could rationalise the abuse as acts of love by someone who was their idol. There also are some particular issues to do with masculinity when admitting of having been sexually abused as a male and not wanting to go public with that.
> 
> What they are saying is psychologically too plausible to be dismissed as lies. The documentary has convinced me that Jackson was an abuser. "He's an abuser because he's weird" really didn't quite cut it. And the issue got muddied by family members on the victims' side trying to financially gain from the situation rather than going to the police.



This. What's often forgotten about CSA is that the children often don't know it's wrong, sometimes get emotional and physical pleasure from it at times, can be literally seduced. It's often the shame and guilt of that which is most difficult to overcome. It often take victims many years to process that they _were_ a victim because of that manipulation and the feelings it produces. That's why children may defend their abusers and only come to realise what had been done to them later in life.

It's a very difficult watch. I believe them.


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 6, 2019)

What a lovely light hearted watch

Tough viewing


----------



## Maggot (Mar 6, 2019)

Didn't see anything tonight that convinced me they were telling the truth.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 6, 2019)

One seed of doubt in my mind is that if Jackson was purely interested in young boys for sexual reasons, after he traded in Wade for Macaulay Culkin, why did not he sexually assault him?
He had a well and truly "groomed" young boy in wade.


----------



## Reno (Mar 6, 2019)

D'wards said:


> One seed of doubt in my mind is that if Jackson was purely interested in young boys for sexual reasons, after he traded in Wade for Macaulay Culkin, why did not he sexually assault him?
> He had a well and truly "groomed" young boy in wade.


The other boys who weren’t famous, Culkin was the biggest child star in the world. Jackson took a lot of care about not being discovered, he wasn’t going to risk actually making a move on the most famous child on the planet. He still was fucking the other kids anyway.

Then again, I could imagine there being more boys out there who were abused, who have decided to cope with this by not going public.


----------



## Wookey (Mar 6, 2019)

Maggot said:


> Didn't see anything tonight that convinced me they were telling the truth.



You're fucked up mate. End of.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 7, 2019)

1996 deposition..
Asked about Jordy Chandler and 
Fast forward to 5.50 ..where he is asked about molesting Barnes.
Strange reactions... 
Arrogant and weird .


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 7, 2019)

Corey Feldman..."can no longer defend Michael Jackson "
He states the documentary is very believable. 

I watched some of it and couldn't watch the rest. Very disturbing and I think absolutely true. 
Really upsetting...


----------



## Wookey (Mar 7, 2019)

Lupa said:


> I watched some of it and couldn't watch the rest. Very disturbing and I think absolutely true.
> Really upsetting...




Really, profoundly disturbing accounts that I also believe 100%. Anyone who claims those two men are making this up needs to have a good long stare at themselves, anyone who think their mothers would admit on global television to letting their boys get raped because they were star-struck, and then think these mothers are making this up, needs to have a long hard stare at themselves.

Obsessive MJ fans are exactly that - obsessed. Many of them will deny and obfuscate and blame and try to carry on with their hero-worship. But the casual fans who buy the albums and see the tours, the ones with a grip on reality, need to have a long hard stare at themselves and stop funding his estate, as long as his estate denies this child abuse.

There was a little kernel of hope inside that old teenager MJ fan that was me back in the day, that I could see this deception and look past it.

It's not a deception. Those boys were raped, and countless others too we can assume.


----------



## Spymaster (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> He still was fucking the other kids anyway.


I didn't see the doc. Did he actually fuck them or was he a fiddler?


----------



## D'wards (Mar 7, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> I didn't see the doc. Did he actually fuck them or was he a fiddler?


Quite bad fiddling so far but part 2 tonight


----------



## Spymaster (Mar 7, 2019)




----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 7, 2019)

Maggot said:


> Didn't see anything tonight that convinced me they were telling the truth.


there are none so blind as those who will not see


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Corey Feldman..."can no longer defend Michael Jackson "
> He states the documentary is very believable.
> 
> I watched some of it and couldn't watch the rest. Very disturbing and I think absolutely true.
> Really upsetting...




Feldman comes over as very articulate and thoughtful there.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 7, 2019)

Taking Michael Jackson out of it, why would a man in his 30s seek the company of young boys? Engineering time alone with them and sleeping in the same bed?

Plus all the boys seemed similar- cute kids, all white or latino. He had a type clearly


----------



## clicker (Mar 7, 2019)

I think the documentary yesterday showed just how much time and effort he invested in grooming these boys and their families. It was as though he did view them as relationships almost, the fake marriage Etc... once the trust had been won he was able to use the boys until a fresher faced version appeared on the scene. He was still MJ and his real world was so closed that it took time for the boys to be an accepted part of his everyday life. I doubt there were 100's of victims, he didn't have the access to them in the same way Saville did for example. Perhaps the lack of victims strengthened his denials of all wrong doing. I think he totally knew what he was doing was wrong, he told the boys as much, but they were kids and didn't want to lose their new best friend.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 7, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Taking Michael Jackson out of it, why would a man in his 30s seek the company of young boys? Engineering time alone with them and sleeping in the same bed?
> 
> Plus all the boys seemed similar- cute kids, all white or latino. He had a type clearly




Also, if , as he and his defenders claim, his desire to surround himself with children was genuinely about loving kids and wanting to spend time playing with them and giving them fun and happy memories, where are the girls, the younger and older children, the less photo-perfect kids, anyone who is not his type.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 7, 2019)

clicker said:


> I think the documentary yesterday showed just how much time and effort he invested in grooming these boys and their families. It was as though he did view them as relationships almost, the fake marriage Etc... once the trust had been won he was able to use the boys until a fresher faced version appeared on the scene. He was still MJ and his real world was so closed that it took time for the boys to be an accepted part of his everyday life. I doubt there were 100's of victims, he didn't have the access to them in the same way Saville did for example. Perhaps the lack of victims strengthened his denials of all wrong doing. I think he totally knew what he was doing was wrong, he told the boys as much, but they were kids and didn't want to lose their new best friend.




I reckon he had some around that he didn’t actually abuse. Last night’s doc makes me think he believed he was having some kind of legitimate “relationship” or “love affair” with particular boys. 

It certainly does look like he put a lot of thought, planning, foresight, intention and consideration of possible outcomes into his grooming. That makes him deeply predatory to my mind. Creepily stalkerish.

Saville was an opportunist. He never had any thought for the victim as a person. His prey were entirely objectified. He was predatory in the sense that he was always, always, constantly as in every single moment looking for his next opportunity. But he didn’t groom.


----------



## 19sixtysix (Mar 7, 2019)

I sat on the jury of an abuse trial and we sent the defendant home innocent to rebuild his life. The media would have had him on top of the bonfire. TV documentaries are no place to provide justice or a balanced view, they can highlight issues being a medium of hype, opinions and audience figures but this matter demands judicial inquiry.


----------



## Reno (Mar 7, 2019)

19sixtysix said:


> I sat on the jury of an abuse trial and we sent the defendant home innocent to rebuild his life. The media would have had him on top of the bonfire. TV documentaries are no place to provide justice or a balanced view, they can highlight issues being a medium of hype, opinions and audience figures but this matter demands judicial inquiry.


I generally agree with that, but Michael Jackson is dead and can't go to court any more and he has no life to ruin. If he's guilty of child abuse then his aquittal in the the last criminal trial was a miscarriage of justice. That is worth reporting on and no different from the many other investigative documentaries or podcasts about potential miscarriages of justice. Only his legacy can be damaged, his life can't be any more. If guilty then basically, he got away with it.


----------



## Micro (Mar 7, 2019)

Might rewatch The Execution of Gary Glitter later. I think I remember it being quite good.


----------



## Rosemary Jest (Mar 7, 2019)

Micro said:


> Might rewatch The Execution of Gary Glitter later. I think I remember it being quite good.




That was one of the most ghoulish things I've seen on telly, watched it at the time. I mean, I've no sympathy for nonces, but making a programme about the execution of someone who is still alive and potentially watching the programme is in the poorest of taste, despite the 'message' it may have been trying to portray.


----------



## Micro (Mar 7, 2019)

Rosemary Jest said:


> That was one of the most ghoulish things I've seen on telly, watched it at the time. I mean, I've no sympathy for nonces, but making a programme about the execution of someone who is still alive and potentially watching the programme is in the poorest of taste, despite the 'message' it may have been trying to portray.



I watched it at the time as well. Took it as an examination of how society’s need for justice can spill over into bloodlust quite easily, especially if public figures push the right buttons. 

If he was watching, fuck him.


----------



## Rosemary Jest (Mar 7, 2019)

Micro said:


> I watched it at the time as well. Took it as an examination of how society’s need for justice can spill over into bloodlust quite easily, especially if public figures push the right buttons.
> 
> If he was watching, fuck him.



I wouldn't have minded so much, but it was shit. The fella who played Glitter did a great job though.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Rosemary Jest said:


> I wouldn't have minded so much, but it was shit. The fella who played Glitter did a great job though.



I never saw it at the time, just watching now since off sick from work.

Must say Miranda Sawyer is incredibly impressive and convincing as one of the “talking heads” and could surely have easily got some proper acting work off the back of that.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

FridgeMagnet said:


> If you'd asked teenagers at the time you wouldn't have thought they would persist at all. Lots of other people were also really popular. The teenagers didn't know then.


I agree - "persist" has no meaning to a teenager. We're talking about a group of people who operate on microscopic timescales compared to many adults - when you're in your teens, what happened 2 months ago is ancient history, and what's going to happen in 6 months might as well be speculative science fiction.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

D'wards said:


> One seed of doubt in my mind is that if Jackson was purely interested in young boys for sexual reasons, after he traded in Wade for Macaulay Culkin, why did not he sexually assault him?
> He had a well and truly "groomed" young boy in wade.


Um. Because someone abuses some children, it doesn't necessarily follow that they will abuse *any* child. It may not even be for the reasons Reno mentioned, but for any of a million others - availability, or even perhaps that he had a "type", and Culkin wasn't it. There was a perv teacher in my school, and he definitely seemed to go for particular boys more than others.

Not least of it all is that some kids are abuse-proof - probably something to do with how well-resourced they come across, but the grooming process is all about the potential abuser figuring out what the likelihood is of the kid complying, or of telling someone, or of telling him to fuck off, etc. Perhaps Culkin was just one of the kids that would have come across as one that it wasn't worth MJ bothering with.

This stuff is a lot more nuanced than people think it is, and it's also worth remembering that a lot of child sexual abuse is compulsive - ie, the thought processes being used to engineer it are not conscious or fully in awareness. Which isn't in any way to excuse it, just to clarify the fact that what might seem straightforward and obvious to us, looking at it from the outside, may well not be nearly as clear cut in practice.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

The thing that struck me about the documentary was how polished and crafted it was, and how the testimonies felt like very well constructed performances.  There were so few of those distracting tics and mannerisms that most people have (and which can be misinterpreted as “tells”) and the posture and countenance of both men was so consistent in this regard that I was close to mixing them up at times.

Perhaps these similarities could be just  something correlated with why Jackson chose them, I suppose.

It is also possible of course, that these men were terribly abused AND this is a very slick means of extracting money from the Jackson estate.

It’s always tempting to put all of the evil in one place, and Occam’s razor makes it the path of least resistance  here. 
Something about it felt too smooth and textureless, though.  Like a pebble made to look polished by the sea, but which actually had been very exactly and painstakingly made in a lab.

I think, given the previous acquittal, if the second part doesn’t reveal something in terms of evidence as opposed to mostly testimonies from a pretty tight circle, the chances of a major payout might not be good.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> The thing that struck me about the documentary was how polished and crafted it was, and how the testimonies felt like very well constructed performances.  There were so few of those distracting tics and mannerisms that most people have (and which can be misinterpreted as “tells”) and the posture and countenance of both men was so consistent in this regard that I was close to mixing them up at times.
> 
> Perhaps these similarities could be just  something correlated with why Jackson chose them, I suppose.
> 
> ...


The trouble with child sexual abuse, especially historical CSA, is that there is very rarely much in the way of objective evidence. It usually relies on lots of testimony from a variety of victims who cross-corroborate about aspects of the abuse, or an admission from the perpetrator, which clearly isn't going to happen in this case.

And, particularly in this case, there's so much vested $ interest $ in $ denying $ the $ allegations $, that I suspect the bar for any kind of definitive outcome is unreachably high. It's going to be a real court of public opinion case...


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

existentialist said:


> The trouble with child sexual abuse, especially historical CSA, is that there is very rarely much in the way of objective evidence. It usually relies on lots of testimony from a variety of victims who cross-corroborate about aspects of the abuse, or an admission from the perpetrator, which clearly isn't going to happen in this case.
> 
> And, particularly in this case, there's so much vested $ interest $ in $ denying $ the $ allegations $, that I suspect the bar for any kind of definitive outcome is unreachably high. It's going to be a real court of public opinion case...



Yeah, sure.  Part of it in this case was that there seemed less of that cross-corroboration than I would have expected, except for that within a group of people intimately connected with the film.
The consistency that was there was all internal (from what I saw), and oddly seamless in a way that reality tends not to be.

I agree with you about the court of public opinion being the medium here.  I think that’s the point.

I hope I’m not being too cynical (or
maybe I hope I *am* being too cynical).


----------



## littlebabyjesus (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> Yeah, sure.  Part of it in this case was that there seemed less of that cross-corroboration than I would have expected, except for that within a group of people intimately connected with the film.



Isn't part of the problem that that is also to be expected, though? People will have experienced different things but will also have very different memories of the same events from years ago. Contradictory statements from people supposed to have been at the same event aren't necessarily evidence that either is lying.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> Isn't part of the problem that that is also to be expected, though? People will have experienced different things but will also have very different memories of the same events from years ago. Contradictory statements from people supposed to have been at the same event aren't necessarily evidence that either is lying.



I think you misread me.  It seemed that cross-corroboration was *all* within that group (as opposed to using other sources that could bring in muddying elements), and rather *too* perfect. 
It made me feel like I was being manipulated very carefully.

But these are just impressions, and I really don’t want to watch it again for points to back this up.

None of this is material to Jackson’s guilt or innocence, of course.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

In a way, because Jackson is dead, his guilt or innocence is a bit of a side-issue, given that it's fairly likely to be unprovable.

What really matters is how many, and what sort of people, think there's enough suggestion of guilt to find it intolerable to continue to promote his music. Of course the diehard fans, and the $estate, are going to insist on his innocence, in the knowledge that there isn't really a way in which he can be *proven* guilty. But he doesn't need to be proven guilty, if the possibility of his guilt is high enough to cause a significant proportion of his posthumous market to want to hold their noses against the stench of it. Which seems likely - I really don't think the estate and the diehards are going to win this PR battle.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

existentialist said:


> In a way, because Jackson is dead, his guilt or innocence is a bit of a side-issue, given that it's fairly likely to be unprovable.
> 
> What really matters is how many, and what sort of people, think there's enough suggestion of guilt to find it intolerable to continue to promote his music. Of course the diehard fans, and the $estate, are going to insist on his innocence, in the knowledge that there isn't really a way in which he can be *proven* guilty. But he doesn't need to be proven guilty, if the possibility of his guilt is high enough to cause a significant proportion of his posthumous market to want to hold their noses against the stench of it. Which seems likely - I really don't think the estate and the diehards are going to win this PR battle.



Yeah, I get the feeling that this all primarily about money too.

I expect to see some spirited attacks on the characters of the witnesses in the coming weeks. 

I also think your last point about the balance of power is likely right if Jackson’s backers fail to find anything that gives them any traction. 

Jackson is almost certainly about to undergo cultural erasure.  Had he not
died I think this may have happened some years ago.

That’s going to be the real damage to the estate, as opposed to a direct payout as the result of a court case.


----------



## Orang Utan (Mar 7, 2019)

Maggot said:


> Didn't see anything tonight that convinced me they were telling the truth.


But what convinced you they weren't telling the truth?


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Orang Utan said:


> But what convinced you they weren't telling the truth?



You’re inferring something that wasn’t said.


----------



## Maggot (Mar 7, 2019)

Orang Utan said:


> But what convinced you they weren't telling the truth?


I don't know if they were telling the truth or not. I'm just saying there was nothing which made me think that is definitely what happened. 

If Wade Robson was telling the truth then he must have been lying all the times previously when he said he hadn't been abused, including the 2005 trial.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 7, 2019)

Check out @AlysiaStarnes’s Tweet:


----------



## kebabking (Mar 7, 2019)

Maggot said:


> ...Wade Robson was telling the truth then he must have been lying all the times previously when he said he hadn't been abused, including the 2005 trial.



Groomed children almost always lie on behalf of their abusers, it's an outcome of the child's (mistaken) understanding of the nature of the relationship, _and _a method by which the abuser consolidates control over the child.

For me the details of it are pretty irrelevant - the swinger is the _grooming: _repeated grooming following the same pattern time and again with different children and families. That's the real evidence that he was up to no good.


----------



## Maggot (Mar 7, 2019)

kebabking said:


> Groomed children almost always lie on behalf of their abusers, it's an outcome of the child's (mistaken) understanding of the nature of the relationship, _and _a method by which the abuser consolidates control over the child.


He was 23 years old at the time of the trial.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 7, 2019)

Maggot said:


> He was 23 years old at the time of the trial.


It took him years to accept he was a victim of grooming


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

D'wards said:


> It took him years to accept he was a victim of grooming



Allegedly.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

Maggot said:


> He was 23 years old at the time of the trial.


Irrelevant. I was in my fifties before the full implications of what had happened to me dawned. And he pleaded guilty (eventually )


----------



## Thora (Mar 7, 2019)

I am so confused by the people saying they don't think it's true 

He's an adult man who has a preference for little boys of 9, 10, 11 years old. When they get too old he dumps them and gets a new little one. Then he lavished attention and gifts on them, and takes them alone to his home and has them sleep in his bed. He has a constant stream of little boys the right age through his whole adult life. 

So, all that is accepted as true. But all perfectly reasonable  And he's clearly not a paedophile, just a nice man who likes to have children who fit a very specific age/gender profile sleep next to him.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 7, 2019)

We’re in not in the more private part of the forum so I’m going to go carefully here...

I know someone who was groomed and exploited and trafficked as a youngster. They were adamantly and vociferously supportive of their abuser for a long time. They refused to turn against the abuser. Even when the police threatened to reclassify them as a co conspirator when they turned 16, they refused. They would have gone to jail to defend their abuser. It took several years and a lot of hard horrible peeling back of layers for them to understand they’d been badly abused. When it finally happened, the flip from “I love him” to “he raped me” was shattering.

If we assume the men in the doc are telling the truth, they were groomed extensively, thoroughly and comprehensively. It makes perfect sense to me that they would have felt special, chosen, part of the gilded inner circle, connected in some special singular way to an extraordinary person, and thus protective, loyal, and actually, perhaps even not feel/ understand that they’d been abused.


It really is quite common for the abused child to protect their abuser. It’s one of the tricks abusers play in order to get their way.



Also, this polished seamless quality that 8ball talks about. I recognise what you're saying here. It’s a thing I used to do when I was talking about the abuse I experienced. It continues to be painful, humiliating, searing, just an awful thing. So you kind of slip into a script. You have a set of phrases or expressions that you know are useful for conveying the facts and detailing the narrative. You need to do this, you need to say it out loud; but if you have to revisit it emotionally every time you say it, you have to go through the shock, the horror and the recovery every time  too. So you resort to the script. And you can sound very pat, very rehearsed.


----------



## Dandred (Mar 7, 2019)

This is fucking evil.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> Also, this polished seamless quality that 8ball talks about. I recognise what you're saying here. It’s a thing I used to do when I was talking about the abuse I experienced. It continues to be painful, humiliating, searing, just an awful thing. So you kind of slip into a script. You have a set of phrases or expressions that you know are useful for conveying the facts and detailing the narrative. You need to do this, you need to say it out loud; but if you have to revisit it emotionally every time you say it, you have to go through the shock, the horror and the recovery every time  too. So you resort to the script. And you can sound very pat, very rehearsed.



It's a good point you make here, and I must admit it threw me because I'm used to reading people and was just getting blankness with these guys.  And they do go more 'dead' when actually describing the abuse, which makes sense in that context (as opposed to remembering being chosen out in a dance competition etc., where they actually seem to regress to a starstruck state).

Also, it's very hard to discern the truth in a rehearsed (by whichever means) situation as opposed to when someone is speaking off the cuff (as evinced by R Kelly's recent tantrum-laden interview, where he was leaking more data than Facebook).


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 7, 2019)

I’m always surprised by automatic disbelief.  So many children experience sexual abuse and exploitation, and the perpetrators are from all parts of society.  

But in this case, we know that men who choose not to engage in or sustain adult sexual relationships (qv. catholic priests) have a higher than average correlation with perpetrating CSA.  

And as Thora says, there’s a whole load of inappropriate behaviour that isn’t contested.  Sleeping in bed together.  Giving children booze.  Mock weddings.  Seeking out the unchaperoned company of cute, fair-skinned, pre-pubescent boys - most of whom wanted to make it big in showbiz and would be receptive to his professional influence*. All that adds up to serious child protection concerns.  Regardless of whether he raped them, Michael Jackson groomed little boys into pseudosexual relationships.  Abusive scumbag.  


* it strikes me that neither Culkin nor Feldman needed Jackson’s help with their careers.  They were already famous when he met them.


----------



## IC3D (Mar 7, 2019)

Abucted in plain site on Netflix is a doc that shows how a victim and their family can be manipulated by a strong personality for a long time.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

IC3D said:


> Abucted in plain site on Netflix is a doc that shows how a victim and their family can be manipulated by a strong personality for a long time.



Easiest if you quote the post you're responding to.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 7, 2019)

Check out @theJeremyVine’s Tweet:


----------



## friedaweed (Mar 7, 2019)

I see the name and the price of his former sleaze pit has been slashed.

Neverland Ranch's Price Has Been Marked Down 70% — & Still No One Wants To Buy It



70% cut in price and even a name change wont change it's sordid past. Time for a scouser with a digger me thinks.


----------



## FabricLiveBaby! (Mar 7, 2019)

I wanted to echo what Sheila said. I was halfway through typing the same thing. 

Very often, for child abuse victims, it takes an incredibly long time to process what happened to them, not just process, but to *accept* it as manipulation and abuse.

Victims often feel like they were complicit, ney even _consenting_, and often display Stockholm syndrome too.

They often feel love, infatuation and attraction for their abusers much in the same way a young adult holds a torch for their first love. 

Moreover, the human brain doesnt actually mature until the age of 25: meaning you have no idea who you are until that age.

The fact is, that to the abused, your abuser loves you and more importantly the narritive that you've been groomed into is that you are in love with the abuser. And _that love is special. _

It's not surprising that an abused victim would protect an abuser way into legal adulthood, especially now knowing what we know about brain development, child psychology and adult psychology.

I would even say it's rather callous to say "well they protected their so-called abuser as a young adult and denied any wrongdoing".  OF COURSE THEY WOULD! Why wouldn't they?

The behavioir described in the documentary is  classic grooming and, for me, is damning in and of itself. It's a textbook description of the profile of a  predatory pedophile, and a textbook reaction to abuse by one.

Not only that but we also know that pedophiles are in love with kids the same way consenting adults become in love with each other--only at the same time they are fighting for self protection as what they see as a gross misunderstanding and an unjustly villifying legal system (you only need to look at PIE and NAMBLA). They are legit infatuated with and in love with their victims.

We also know that pedophiles are likely victims of abuse themselves. 

Likelyhood is MJ never believed he was abusing those kids, but showing them love, and was in denial that it was consentual. Wouldn't  surprise me if he was a victim himself, too.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 7, 2019)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> Wouldn't  surprise me if he was a victim himself, too.


A colleague told me today that whilst touring with the Jackson 5 the older brothers would bring women back to the room they were sharing and tell Michael to close his eyes whilst they had sex in the next bed.


----------



## Reno (Mar 7, 2019)

I'm not on board with always presuming that sex abusers must have been sexually abused. I'm pretty sure it's more complicated than a theory which makes it sounds like vampirism, this inevitable fate of the abused. Some abusers were, many weren't abused and most of those who were abused, don't go on abusing.

There has been recent research which proposes that paedophilia is a sexual orientation, which paedophiles can do little about.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> I'm not on board with always presuming that sex abusers must have been sexually abused. I'm pretty sure it's more complicated than a theory which makes it sounds like vampirism, this inevitable fate of the abused. Some abusers were, many weren't abused and most of those who were abused, don't go on abusing.



This "some" and "many" talk is far too blunt.
It's well documented that victims of abuse are statistically heavily over-represented among abusers compared with the general population.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> Not only that but we also know that pedophiles are in love with kids the same way consenting adults become in love with each other...



I have serious difficulty with this bit.


----------



## FabricLiveBaby! (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> I have serious difficulty with this bit.



I'm not surprised. A lot of people do. That's what a sexual orientation is. And as reno says, there's research pointing to pedophilia as a sexual orientation.


----------



## planetgeli (Mar 7, 2019)

A sexual orientation it may well be, but it's one that _conveniently _ignores the power dynamic taking place.


----------



## Reno (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> It's well documented that victims of abuse are statistically heavily over-represented among abusers compared with the general population.


They are overrepresented but whether that's heavily so, is not known. Much of it relies on self-reporting by the accused. This incentivises child sex abusers to claim in court to have been abused, to claim mitigating circumstances for instance. 

Every time the subject of paedophilia comes up, people start arguing that the perpetrator must have been abused, absolving them of personal responsibility to some degree. A large enough percentage of people who sexually abuse children have not been abused themselves. Unless the facts are known, its not a claim that not should be made.

Child sex abuse doesn't create paedophiles


----------



## Reno (Mar 7, 2019)

planetgeli said:


> A sexual orientation it may well be, but it's one that _conveniently _ignores the power dynamic taking place.


A sexual orientation can't ignore a power dynamic, only actual child abuse does. There are paedophiles who live without abusing children.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> I'm not on board with always presuming that sex abusers must have been sexually abused. I'm pretty sure it's more complicated than a theory which makes it sounds like vampirism, this inevitable fate of the abused. Some abusers were, many weren't abused and most of those who were abused, don't go on abusing.
> 
> There has been recent research which proposes that paedophilia is a sexual orientation, which paedophiles can do little about.




“They can do little about it....” This is the basis of the aruguments posited by organisations like PIE.

It’s natural...

Bollocks.

It’s “natural, in the sense that it’s a compulsion, for psychopaths and narcissists to harvest and exploit everyone else. So.... Let it happen. Allow and celebrate their eccentricity?

They *can* do something about it. There are documented peadophiles (few though they are) who try to control, contain and resist their compulsions.  Why they have this compulsion is another question. A big and important question, similar to “why psychopaths”.




8ball said:


> Easiest if you quote the post you're responding to.




I think it was a general point. That’s how I understood it anyway.


----------



## Reno (Mar 7, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> They can do little about.... This is the basis of the aruguments posited by organisations like PIE.
> 
> It’s natural...
> 
> ...



I take serious offence in misrepresenting what I said in that way. Nobody has said paedophiles should be left to abuse children. What they should get is support and counselling so they don't abuse children. Being a paedophile is not the same as being a child sex abuser. There are plenty of paedophiles who do not abuse children.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> They are overrepresented but whether that's heavily so, is not known.



It's heavy enough, going by the last 40 years of research, from what I can see.  
It *is* a small minority of the total numbers abused, though.

The problem is when it is considered a simple causal factor as opposed to a risk factor among many.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> I think it was a general point. That’s how I understood it anyway.



Which is understandable.  However, there was one post (and only one that I can see), to which it was perfectly applicable, so it seemed better for the discussion that it was attached.  It would have been pretty presumptious and rude for me to put them together myself, though.


----------



## Reno (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> The problem is when it is considered a simple causal factor as opposed to a risk factor among many.


That's exactly what I was arguing


----------



## planetgeli (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> A sexual orientation can't ignore a power dynamic, only actual child abuse does.



Maybe that's why I put conveniently in italics eh?


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> I'm not surprised. A lot of people do. That's what a sexual orientation is. And as reno says, there's research pointing to pedophilia as a sexual orientation.



I'm not sure I agree with your analysis of what a sexual orientation is, or to whether paedophilia is a sexual orientation in the manner we usually describe them.

For example, almost all paedophiles seem to have a secondary "normal" sexual orientation.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> That's exactly what I was arguing



Fair enough, I was arguing about the existence of the link, as opposed to its nature. 

By "heavy" meant that the effect is relatively small in magnitude, but is statistically solid (as opposed to, say, a very strong effect attested to by weak data).

But I think you are wise to question those elements of the dataset that rely on self-reporting.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 7, 2019)

Reno said:


> I take serious offence in misrepresenting what I said in that way. Nobody has said paedophiles should be left to abuse children. What they should get is support and counselling so they don't abuse children. Being a paedophile is not the same as being a child sex abuser. There are plenty of paedophiles who do not abuse children.



I think we’re broadly in agreement.


----------



## FabricLiveBaby! (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> I'm not sure I agree with your analysis of what a sexual orientation is, or to whether paedophilia is a sexual orientation in the manner we usually describe them.
> 
> For example, almost all paedophiles seem to have a secondary "normal" sexual orientation.



All fair enough. It vall comes down to definition. There's also a big debate by sexologists atm between the difference of kink, sexual orientation, and sexual deviation. 

Like with everything there's a fuzzy line. I think it deserves its own thread tbh.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> All fair enough. It vall comes down to definition. There's also a big debate by sexologists atm between the difference of kink, sexual orientation, and sexual deviation.
> 
> Like with everything there's a fuzzy line. I think it deserves its own thread tbh.



It's certainly messy.  I find the subject matter a bit depressing for a thread, myself.
Since we've been discussing this, I've been watching a good bit of the second part tonight.

The (now grown up) boys' wives have been the most striking thing for me in their testimonies being so much more "warm" and believable in an immediate (as opposed to "factual" way).  SheilaNaGig's point explaining that "dead" element of the boys' (and to some degree, their mothers') body language and presentation feels even more pertinent now.

The wives were never groomed, and the difference in manner is astonishing.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Well, that was a tough watch.


----------



## Spymaster (Mar 7, 2019)

I got home tonight having recorded both parts. Mrs Spy has watched them and said "_you _shouldn't watch this".

Is she right?


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> I got home tonight having recorded both parts. Mrs Spy has watched them and said "you shouldn't watch this".
> 
> Is she right?



Same answer as so many questions.

It depends.


----------



## Spymaster (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> Same answer as so many questions.
> 
> It depends.


She is very visibly shocked and seems quite out of sorts about it.

He was a nonce, right?


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> She is very visibly shocked and seems quite out of sorts about it.
> 
> He was a nonce, right?



I had some doubts about the testimonies, going by the first part and my reading of it.
Some posts on here gave me a different take on it, and the second part meshed with all of that, for me.

Maybe read back a bit and also watch it and make up your own mind if you're interested.


----------



## Spymaster (Mar 7, 2019)

Ok.


----------



## Wookey (Mar 7, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> I got home tonight having recorded both parts. Mrs Spy has watched them and said "_you _shouldn't watch this".
> 
> Is she right?



It's not easy by any stretch, I woke up this morning with it first thing on my mind. I feel a bit disturbed.

BUT still glad I watched it. These guys who tell their story are incredible, brave and courageous and I was inspired by them putting the record straight and struggling to understand themselves what happened and the effect on their lives. But they did it, they told the truth, it's out there, and I hope they're healing.

The veracity of their stories is just clear to see. It all adds up, cross-references and holds water. And I say that as a former mega-fan. Needs watching imo.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Wookey said:


> The veracity of their stories is just clear to see. It all adds up, cross-references and holds water. And I say that as a former mega-fan. Needs watching imo.



What is your feeling about this with regard to his music, your feeling about it now, and your future approach to it?


----------



## Wookey (Mar 7, 2019)

Oh, aside from the fact that yes, Michael Jackson was a child rapist, this doc is also the most detailed film footage of Neverland I've ever seen - and I've seen a lot. There were flybys and landscape shots I've never seen, the wigwam village I'd never seen, the other little house in the grounds (his second lair)...it's a fucking shocker what tat a few million squid and the taste of a kleptomanic toddler will get you.


----------



## Wookey (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> What is your feeling about this with regard to his music, your feeling about it now, and your future approach to it?



Funny you should say that, it happened the other day I went into the Spa, and they were playing "I'll be There" by the Jackson 5. And I said to the lad at the till (for there was a human...) "Is this the radio, or a playlist?"

He said "It's a playlist, they send it in..."

I said "That's Michael Jackson, I'm surprised...!"

And he smiled with a knowing smile, we both knew what we were referring to.

So I don't think I'll ever hear a Jackson track again without thinking of the type of man he really was. Which means I won't enjoy it in the same way again I expect. I don't know.

I threw away my MJ collection some years ago, not so much in disgust as unease. Now I'm not uneasy, as I can see exactly what he was and what he did to people.

When I say collection, I mean the postcards and magazines, and mugs, and concert tickets, and T-shirts and calendars and videos and sticker albums, you know.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Wookey said:


> Oh, aside from the fact that yes, Michael Jackson was a child rapist, this doc is also the most detailed film footage of Neverland I've ever seen - and I've seen a lot. There were flybys and landscape shots I've never seen, the wigwam village I'd never seen, the other little house in the grounds (his second lair)...it's a fucking shocker what tat a few million squid and the taste of a kleptomanic toddler will get you.



I'd have expected more tat for that much wedge tbf.

Then again, my taste is odd and I'd probably have got a nuclear bunker and done it all out art deco style.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

I've had a pretty good weird-dar for much of my life - Savile always creeped me out, Glitter felt massively phoney, and there was something definitely not four-beats-to-the-bar about MJ. It wasn't my style of music, which helped, but I can recognise a conflict between some incredibly well-produced pop and a very nasty (Jaws-music-in-the-background) sense of something not-quite-right about him. For all I know, I was just keying in to the whole abusive childhood victimhood thing, but whatever it was, I do not now find myself struggling with any cognitive dissonance between his music and what seems to be emerging as the reality behind who he was. Which is, whatever else he may or may not be, one seriously fucked-up human being, at the very least.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

Wookey said:


> I threw away my MJ collection some years ago, not so much in disgust as unease. Now I'm not uneasy, as I can see exactly what he was and what he did to people.
> 
> When I say collection, I mean the postcards and magazines, and mugs, and concert tickets, and T-shirts and calendars and videos and sticker albums, you know.



I think the _Thriller_ album is still at my folks' house.  In the cassette tape rack.

I was never a fan on the level you were, but I love that album.  As well as being brilliant, I have a whole bunch of memories attached to that time in my life, and it forms the soundtrack.

Those are *my* memories, anchored to that soundtrack.  I struggle with whether I have some kind of duty to give that up because of the crimes of the man who created the substrate.

I guess that feeling could change.  Associations change over time.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I've had a pretty good weird-dar for much of my life...



And where does Ed Sheeran land on that scale?

There are a lot of people who are a bit odd, and totally sound, and there are people who come over plausible and slick as you like, and are total wrong 'uns.  I was always cautious about demonising people purely on the basis of being eccentric.


----------



## Wookey (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> I think the _Thriller_ album is still at my folks' house.  In the cassette tape rack.
> 
> I was never a fan on the level you were, but I love that album.  As well as being brilliant, I have a whole bunch of memories attached to that time in my life, and it forms the soundtrack.
> 
> ...



That's very much how I felt before I watched this doc - I could keep the art separate from the artist. Thriller is me at 7, Bad me at 13, Off the Wall me at 15 (yes, it goes backwards...) it was my soundtrack.

But that doc was powerful, don't think that'll leave me.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> And where does Ed Sheeran land on that scale?
> 
> There are a lot of people who are a bit odd, and totally sound, and there are people who come over plausible and slick as you like, and are total wrong 'uns.  I was always cautious about demonising people purely on the basis of being eccentric.


I'm being quite careful *not* to demonise them. I don't *know* if MJ was a child sex abuser or not. I don't know if the related history of his childhood is true or not. All I really know is that, along with the others I named, he comes over to me as someone who, if I met him or someone like him, I'd have all my barriers up around. And it's not just about being "eccentric" - fuck, for all I know, and a bit more than that, *I* come across as eccentric to quite a few people who know me (including, quite possibly, some Urbanites). I suspect I don't tend to come across too much as someone who poses much of a threat, though...or at least, I hope not 

ETA: I've not seen very much of Ed Sheeran, but what trivial amounts I've seen don't happen to press any buttons for me.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I'm being quite careful *not* to demonise them. I don't *know* if MJ was a child sex abuser or not. I don't know if the related history of his childhood is true or not. All I really know is that, along with the others I named, he comes over to me as someone who, if I met him or someone like him, I'd have all my barriers up around. And it's not just about being "eccentric" - fuck, for all I know, and a bit more than that, *I* come across as eccentric to quite a few people who know me (including, quite possibly, some Urbanites). I suspect I don't tend to come across too much as someone who poses much of a threat, though...or at least, I hope not
> 
> ETA: I've not seen very much of Ed Sheeran, but what trivial amounts I've seen don't happen to press any buttons for me.



Most people have a tendency to attack anything that does not conform.  Jackson was part of the background of my childhood, so I don't really know how I might judge things anew now as an adult.

I guess the bit that interests me, really, is the negotiation about the correct response to such revelations.  
Do we stop listening to songs we like?
Delete or amend history?

There is a lot of potential to do harm by lying to ourselves, or airbrushing our past associations, or burying information we could learn from.

What if we suddenly found out Mozart or Shakespeare was a paedophile (or a similar kind of contemporary "beyond the pale").

Whenever something is seen as truly obscene, we seek to disassociate ourselves from it.

I was just mentioning Sheeran because he's somehow a megastar in a massively superficial world, despite looking like Edd The Duck.  I have nothing against the lad.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 7, 2019)

I should also say, that despite the powerful effect the documentary had on me, it was effectively two sets of testimonials (somewhat buttressed by those close to them) as opposed to a balanced journalistic endeavour.

If we're going to continue discussing this, it's really important that those who dissent from the story as presented are not immediately dismissed as supporters of child abuse.  The subjects of this documentary could have been dismissed in equal measure until pretty recently.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 7, 2019)

8ball said:


> Most people have a tendency to attack anything that does not conform.  Jackson was part of the background of my childhood, so I don't really know how I might judge things anew now as an adult.
> 
> I guess the bit that interests me, really, is the negotiation about the correct response to such revelations.
> Do we stop listening to songs we like?
> ...


I had a response all ready to write to this, but it's all a bit close to home, and I've had a few glasses of wine, so I don't think I am going to be able to do it justice right now...

Which is not to see I disagree with what you're saying.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

Check out @louistheroux’s Tweet:


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Check out @louistheroux’s Tweet:



I don't think acting to deepen this polarisation is the best thing at this point.


----------



## Athos (Mar 8, 2019)

Deffo a nonce.


----------



## izz (Mar 8, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I've had a pretty good weird-dar for much of my life - Savile always creeped me out, Glitter felt massively phoney, and there was something definitely not four-beats-to-the-bar about MJ. It wasn't my style of music, which helped, but I can recognise a conflict between some incredibly well-produced pop and a very nasty (Jaws-music-in-the-background) sense of something not-quite-right about him. For all I know, I was just keying in to the whole abusive childhood victimhood thing, but whatever it was, I do not now find myself struggling with any cognitive dissonance between his music and what seems to be emerging as the reality behind who he was. Which is, whatever else he may or may not be, one seriously fucked-up human being, at the very least.


Thank you for putting my thoughts into words, I have a very strong weird-dar as well so these 'revelations' are not so to me. I have similar weird issues with some slebs still living (which I obviously won't mention here).


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 8, 2019)

The After Neverland interviews are also out.


----------



## Reno (Mar 8, 2019)

I finished the second part of the HBO documentary last night. The two men and their families testimonies are very convincing as are their reasons as to why the men denied the abuse for so long, which is what most of the second part gets into. Now I don't think I'll ever want to see anything on this again.


----------



## FabricLiveBaby! (Mar 8, 2019)

Full. Interview here:


----------



## mojo pixy (Mar 8, 2019)

wrong thread


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> And where does Ed Sheeran land on that scale?
> 
> There are a lot of people who are a bit odd, and totally sound, and there are people who come over plausible and slick as you like, and are total wrong 'uns.  I was always cautious about demonising people purely on the basis of being eccentric.




It's not about their eccentricity though. It's about some kind of... uncanny valley feeling of just.... something odd in a particular way that makes you just.... "Nope".

I've made the mistake of overriding that feeling, giving the benefit of the doubt where it turned out that my instinct was correct. I couldn't categorise my suspicion, so I dismissed it. Turned out my instinct was right and my rational brain was wrong.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> I don't think acting to deepen this polarisation is the best thing at this point.




The thing that I found most persuasive that they were telling the clear truth, and thus confirming that MJ was a nonce, was how honestly they explained how they were in love with him, and how hurt they were when they were cast aside.

Just as not all rapists are the strangers in a mask with a knife, we need to understand that some peadophiles will work deliberately to create a mythos where they are in cahoots with the child, the child is their special partner, they have something sublime and beautiful together that no one else will understand.

(Shit, some of them, MJ included, may really "believe" that on some level, even whilst knowing they're perpetrating a hideous crime.)

The two men in this doc seemed most cruelly hurt by the way MJ had cast them aside and broken their heart. Imagine going through the exquisite pain of a broken heart, a lost romance, when you're , like, 10 years old and your romance is a total secret. It seems that it was only later they came to understand that they'd been sexually abused by a paedophile.

This doc explores, in ways I've not seen before, the emotional rape that can also happen in this dynamic.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 8, 2019)

I had that prickly alert about a few celebs as a kid.  These included saville, Rolf Harris, and Michael Barrymore.  And one other who has never been accused of anything untoward so it probably isn’t infallible...  

But there is something in our subliminal reactions.  It’s not completely without meaning or value.


----------



## Orang Utan (Mar 8, 2019)




----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

Orang Utan said:


>




Does he also have an entry for “virtue signalling”?


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> I had that prickly alert about a few celebs as a kid.  These included saville, Rolf Harris, and Michael Barrymore.  And one other who has never been accused of anything untoward so it probably isn’t infallible...
> 
> But there is something in our subliminal reactions.  It’s not completely without meaning or value.



A *lot* of people were surprised about Rolf.

Anyway, who was the undeclared fourth one, I’m sure they’ve been up to something...


----------



## Orang Utan (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> Does he also have an entry for “virtue signalling”?


They (who are all shes) don't. Why?


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

Orang Utan said:


> They (who are all shes) don't. Why?



See above pronoun pedantry.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> A *lot* of people were surprised about Rolf.
> 
> Anyway, who was the undeclared fourth one, I’m sure they’ve been up to something...


Probably not reasonable to say, but what they had in common was that they spoke to children by making them embarrassed.  Like “So you’re Sarah and you come from oxford and you’re eight years old.  Sarah, tell me - do you have a boyfriend?” (Child giggles nervously) “so I’m in with a chance then?” (Child is totally squirming).


----------



## existentialist (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> I had that prickly alert about a few celebs as a kid.  These included saville, Rolf Harris, and Michael Barrymore.  And one other who has never been accused of anything untoward so it probably isn’t infallible...
> 
> But there is something in our subliminal reactions.  It’s not completely without meaning or value.


If there's one big thing I learned training for this new career, it was "trust your gut".


----------



## Orang Utan (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball 
I am beginning to infer that you think believing abuse victims is virtue signalling.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 8, 2019)

existentialist said:


> If there's one big thing I learned training for this new career, it was "trust your gut".


By the way, I also had these squirmy feelings about my aunt’s husband, who used to “nosh” our ears.  Which was a weird playful but maybe dodgy “pretend to eat but lick and slobber on” game.  Afaik my uncle never hurt any children, but he and my aunt were only married until I was five or six so I don’t know. V


----------



## existentialist (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> By the way, I also had these squirmy feelings about my aunt’s husband, who used to “nosh” our ears.  Which was a weird playful but maybe dodgy “pretend to eat but lick and slobber on” game.  Afaik my uncle never hurt any children, but he and my aunt were only married until I was five or six so I don’t know. V


Sounds like you had quite good boundaries, and were good at spotting when people were violating what you considered to be appropriate boundaries for adult/kid interactions. As you say, it doesn't make them all sexual predators, but it's a pretty good early warning system, IMO.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 8, 2019)

But as we know, not all those with a tendency or proclivity to pederasty/paedophilia (or whatever term we’re now using) will actually carry through to act on it. So spanglechick ’s uncle in law may have given her the squirms for exactly the right reason, without ever acting in a criminal fashion.


When I think of it, I know at least three men who I’d not allow to be alone with children. So far as I am aware, not one of them has actulally acted on the tendencies I - and others - have witnessed in them.

I’m saying that you can get that nasty alarm even when someone isn’t actively dangerous. And perhaps it’s that alarm they set off in others that keeps them checking their own behaviour. They might just be borderline, just able to keep it together enough.


----------



## Wookey (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> I had that prickly alert about a few celebs as a kid.  These included saville, Rolf Harris, and Michael Barrymore..



Barrymore was gay, not sure why you'd put him in the same sentence as Jimmy Saville and Rolf Harris.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

Orang Utan said:


> 8ball
> I am beginning to infer that you think believing abuse victims is virtue signalling.



Lovely example of both cognitive dissonance and virtue signalling there.

You should go help those people out with their definitions.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> When I think of it, I know at least three men who I’d not allow to be alone with children. So far as I am aware, not one of them has actulally acted on the tendencies I - and others - have witnessed in them.



I always wonder how these instincts work.  When you refer to others, do you mean exclusively women?  Or have men you know also picked up on something?


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

Wookey said:


> Barrymore was gay, not sure why you'd put him in the same sentence as Jimmy Saville and Rolf Harris.


Barrymore is guilty of being an idiot, and fleeing after he saw the body in the pool.
And didn't he pay for it...

He dint do nuffin to nobody, to quote Public Enemy


----------



## existentialist (Mar 8, 2019)

Wookey said:


> Barrymore was gay, not sure why you'd put him in the same sentence as Jimmy Saville and Rolf Harris.


I think she was only saying that he gave her the same dodgy vibe that they did. I didn't like him, although he didn't give me the creeps like Savile did.

But, as I recall, there were some rather dubious goings-on with him, weren't there?


----------



## FabricLiveBaby! (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> I always wonder how these instincts work.  When you refer to others, do you mean exclusively women?  Or have men you know also picked up on something?



There's a great way book about trusting instincts wrt sexual abuse and "not quite right" behaviour. 

It's very good, I'll try to dig it up.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I think she was only saying that he gave her the same dodgy vibe that they did. I didn't like him, although he didn't give me the creeps like Savile did.
> 
> But, as I recall, there were some rather dubious goings-on with him, weren't there?


Really nothing with any evidence at all


----------



## planetgeli (Mar 8, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I think she was only saying that he gave her the same dodgy vibe that they did. I didn't like him, although he didn't give me the creeps like Savile did.
> 
> But, as I recall, there were some rather dubious goings-on with him, weren't there?



Only in the same way there were dubious goings-on with Pete Doherty. Like he might have been very close by when someone died. Very close. But that's nothing comparable with Savile and Harris.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Really nothing with any evidence at all


In that case I withdraw my suggestion that he was actually weird.  I got the impression that the bloke who died in his spa had been subjected to something unpleasant.  But I freely admit I might be wrong.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> In that case I withdraw my suggestion that he was actually weird.  I got the impression that the bloke who died in his spa had been subjected to something unpleasant.  But I freely admit I might be wrong.


Oh he possibly had, but it was a party and Barrymore was up in the bedroom


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Oh he possibly had, but it was a party and Barrymore was up in the bedroom


Ok.  I didn’t know that was the truth of it.


----------



## UrbaneFox (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> Probably not reasonable to say, but what they had in common was that they spoke to children by making them embarrassed.  Like “So you’re Sarah and you come from oxford and you’re eight years old.  Sarah, tell me - do you have a boyfriend?” (Child giggles nervously) “so I’m in with a chance then?” (Child is totally squirming).


 I went to see a TV programme being recorded and the Star of the show did that with several kids from the audience.
I felt embarrassed watching it.
Thank you for reminding me.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> Ok.  I didn’t know that was the truth of it.


The press crucified him cos he was a beloved family entertainer who turns out was gay and liked recreational drugs, and was quite generous with his recreational drugs and opening his big house to parties after nights out and letting people get on with it.

Fleeing his house before the police came was idiotic though


----------



## existentialist (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Really nothing with any evidence at all


We're not trying to convict him in a court of law - just exploring that gut feeling some people seem to get about some people...


----------



## existentialist (Mar 8, 2019)

planetgeli said:


> Only in the same way there were dubious goings-on with Pete Doherty. Like he might have been very close by when someone died. Very close. But that's nothing comparable with Savile and Harris.


No, quite - I wasn't intending to suggest anything of the sort.


----------



## HoratioCuthbert (Mar 8, 2019)

andysays said:


> Maybe a more mature approach would be to realise that celebrities, however talented, are just human beings like the rest of us with human failings like the rest of us, sometimes, like MJ and those whose names will be and have been brought up as points of comparison, with really serious failings like sexual abuse of children.



How does having a visceral reaction to paedophiles indicate that you’re an immature person that doesn’t realise celebrities have failings just like the rest of us? And I’m not liking your robotic approach here, I feel you should revisit this paragraph. Really serious failings like um sexual abuse of children. I am fair and balanced!


----------



## HoratioCuthbert (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> I had that prickly alert about a few celebs as a kid.  These included saville, Rolf Harris, and Michael Barrymore.  And one other who has never been accused of anything untoward so it probably isn’t infallible...
> 
> But there is something in our subliminal reactions.  It’s not completely without meaning or value.


I had this with Bowie, and quite a few of those 70’s creeps.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> I always wonder how these instincts work.  When you refer to others, do you mean exclusively women?  Or have men you know also picked up on something?



Yes. The others in these cases were women. My sister also felt very weird about our mother’s third husband. We didn’t speak about it at first but then I told her something and she told me she’d had the same experience with him, so from then on we compared notes fairly often.

The other was the wife of the man in question. She divorced him not long afterwards.

I don’t know if men also pick up on this. We can only talk about this in general terms and I’m sure the there are lots of exceptions to any generalities...  so.... I’d speculate that on the whole, women are conditioned from an early age to be more wary, more alert and cautious about being sexually objectified than men are. But of course, anyone who’s been subject to abuse of any kind, be that latent or blatant, is going to be more vigilant and aware, and that’s going to include males too.


----------



## planetgeli (Mar 8, 2019)

Loving all the hindsight dressed up as foresight. 

Let's have a Celebrity Nonce Pool 2019 thread.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

existentialist said:


> We're not trying to convict him in a court of law - just exploring that gut feeling some people seem to get about some people...


Hmm I'm not sure. Remember Colin Stagg and the Landlord man, who's name escapes me.
Everyone had a gut feel about those lads, well the fucking newspapers anyway, and look at how their lives were destroyed as a result. Totally innocent men. 

Look at Paulsgrove too in the wake of Sarah Payne


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

planetgeli said:


> Loving all the hindsight dressed up as foresight.
> 
> Let's have a Celebrity Nonce Pool 2019 thread.


I'm going **** **** from *****


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> Hmm I'm not sure. Remember Colin Stagg and the Landlord man, who's name escapes me.
> Everyone had a gut feel about those lads, well the fucking newspapers anyway, and look at how their lives were destroyed as a result. Totally innocent men.
> 
> Look at Paulsgrove too in the wake of Sarah Payne



That’s the thing.  Sometimes people take against people because they are a bit ‘odd’.  

I think in retrospect that Savile and Jackson benefited from a degree of reverse-psychology cover here.


----------



## Micro (Mar 8, 2019)

Wookey said:


> Barrymore was gay, not sure why you'd put him in the same sentence as Jimmy Saville and Rolf Harris.



Yeah, I don’t get the connection at all. People OD at parties all the time, unfortunately. Just cos he was gay doesn’t mean it was anything more than that.


----------



## planetgeli (Mar 8, 2019)

planetgeli said:


> Loving all the hindsight dressed up as foresight.
> 
> Let's have a Celebrity Nonce Pool 2019 thread.



And yet, there is truth in black comedy. We are all waiting for the next one. Because we know there will be a next one.

Because celebrity and riches, particularly super-riches, breeds opportunity. For all sorts of things. Including _this.
_
But you don't get to be Jackson, living like he did, and be able to keep this between you and the child. You don't make all your own phone calls. You pay people to arrange things for you. Those people are complicit, those in the know. And some would be in the know. At this level it goes beyond one individual. And you can guarantee it's going on somewhere, right now, with some other super rich celeb we'll have hindsight/foresight about in years to come.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

Micro said:


> Yeah, I don’t get the connection at all. People OD at parties all the time, unfortunately. Just cos he was gay doesn’t mean it was anything more than that.



Spangles just said he set of her spider sense.  It doesn’t mean anything more than that.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> In that case I withdraw my suggestion that he was actually weird.  I got the impression that the bloke who died in his spa had been subjected to something unpleasant.  But I freely admit I might be wrong.



He could still be weird without necessarily being bad-dodgy.


----------



## kebabking (Mar 8, 2019)

There are people who ping my spidey-senses, whether for things I see or just because I get a feeling - I couldn't give a mouse-sized shit if I have wrongly judged them, whether they are people I knew or met in real life, or people on the TV.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

kebabking said:


> There are people who ping my spidey-senses, whether for things I see or just because I get a feeling - I couldn't give a mouse-sized shit if I have wrongly judged them, whether they are people I knew or met in real life, or people on the TV.



When it’s people in real life, there’s a tangible downside to misjudging them.


----------



## keybored (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> the Landlord man, who's name escapes me


Christopher Jefferies. Guilty of "looking a bit odd".


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> I'm going **** **** from *****


**********, presumably. He should go to prison for having shit hair, if nothing else


----------



## kebabking (Mar 8, 2019)

8ball said:


> When it’s people in real life, there’s a tangible downside to misjudging them.



Not for me...


----------



## D'wards (Mar 8, 2019)

twentythreedom said:


> *********, presumably. He should go to prison for having shit hair, if nothing else


He bought a house next to a girl's school at the height of their fame. That's more than enough for me and The Sun thank you very much


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

kebabking said:


> Not for me...



Not just a river in Egypt..


----------



## 8ball (Mar 8, 2019)

D'wards said:


> He bought a house next to a girl's school at the height of their fame. That's more than enough for me and The Sun thank you very much



Fuckin’ ell.  You’d think that would be the last place you’d want to be.


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 9, 2019)

Speculation and naming living persons in connection with crimes they haven't been convicted of is the sort of thing Editor gets sued for. Not helpful IMO, should be removed.


----------



## Part 2 (Mar 9, 2019)

I've only watched the first one. I'm finding it bizarre that James Bulger's mum has weighed in to defend MJ.

e2a" actually maybe not


----------



## Celyn (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> Probably not reasonable to say, but what they had in common was that they spoke to children by making them embarrassed.  Like “So you’re Sarah and you come from oxford and you’re eight years old.  Sarah, tell me - do you have a boyfriend?” (Child giggles nervously) “so I’m in with a chance then?” (Child is totally squirming).


Remember that "Top of the Pops"  clip with Sir James Savile and the youngest Nolan sister?


----------



## Celyn (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> But as we know, not all those with a tendency or proclivity to pederasty/paedophilia (or whatever term we’re now using) ...


Not a case of "whatever term we're now using". They are definitely not synonymous.


----------



## Lazy Llama (Mar 9, 2019)

I’ve edited out the name - really not wise to risk the site by making accusations/ insinuations about living people.


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 9, 2019)

Lots of people out there saying he is innocent and lots of the stuff is faked.


----------



## izz (Mar 9, 2019)

Some people can stick to their beliefs irrespective of any evidence to the contrary. I suspect that as we move forward into a yet more web-based world this trait will become more entrenched.


----------



## tim (Mar 9, 2019)

izz said:


> Some people can stick to their beliefs irrespective of any evidence to the contrary. I suspect that as we move forward into a yet more web-based world this trait will become more entrenched.



No, it will just remain as entrenched as it's always been.


----------



## maomao (Mar 9, 2019)

Part 2 said:


> I've only watched the first one. I'm finding it bizarre that James Bulger's mum has weighed in to defend MJ.
> 
> e2a" actually maybe not


She's entitled to her opinions. What's bizarre is the tabloid press think they're worth reporting on in this case.


----------



## Manter (Mar 9, 2019)

Thora said:


> I am so confused by the people saying they don't think it's true
> 
> He's an adult man who has a preference for little boys of 9, 10, 11 years old. When they get too old he dumps them and gets a new little one. Then he lavished attention and gifts on them, and takes them alone to his home and has them sleep in his bed. He has a constant stream of little boys the right age through his whole adult life.
> 
> So, all that is accepted as true. But all perfectly reasonable  And he's clearly not a paedophile, just a nice man who likes to have children who fit a very specific age/gender profile sleep next to him.


This ^^


----------



## tim (Mar 9, 2019)

maomao said:


> She's entitled to her opinions. What's bizarre is the tabloid press think they're worth reporting on in this case.


They're entitled to their circulation.


----------



## Manter (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> We’re in not in the more private part of the forum so I’m going to go carefully here...
> 
> I know someone who was groomed and exploited and trafficked as a youngster. They were adamantly and vociferously supportive of their abuser for a long time. They refused to turn against the abuser. Even when the police threatened to reclassify them as a co conspirator when they turned 16, they refused. They would have gone to jail to defend their abuser. It took several years and a lot of hard horrible peeling back of layers for them to understand they’d been badly abused. When it finally happened, the flip from “I love him” to “he raped me” was shattering.
> 
> ...


Brave and insightful post SheilaNaGig


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 9, 2019)

Looking at reddit and similar platforms it's looking like a 50:50 split.

Really surprising.


----------



## Manter (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> I had that prickly alert about a few celebs as a kid.  These included saville, Rolf Harris, and Michael Barrymore.  And one other who has never been accused of anything untoward so it probably isn’t infallible...
> 
> But there is something in our subliminal reactions.  It’s not completely without meaning or value.


I attended a talk by Suzi Lamplugh’s mother years ago. She said women that survived violent attacks often talked about a feeling of unease or that someone ‘wasn’t right’ but they ignored it because we are taught that isn’t rational and therefore of value


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

joustmaster said:


> Lots of people out there saying he is innocent and lots of the stuff is faked.


That's always the case. Most of us flatter ourselves that we're more logical than irrational, but - as countless psychological experiments show - if we're wedded enough to a particular belief, we can (and will) bend our reality quite dramatically to accommodate that.


----------



## Manter (Mar 9, 2019)

joustmaster said:


> Looking at reddit and similar platforms it's looking like a 50:50 split.
> 
> Really surprising.


Jackson superfans are working hard. Any post I have seen expressing concern/revulsion is carpet bombed with attacks on the victims’ credibility and ‘evidence’ of what an all round stand up gent MJ was. One said her superfandom meant she was ‘more informed and educated’ than anyone else to talk about it. And when someone pushed back played the trump-card ‘I have a child!’ 

Hmm.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> Yes. The others in these cases were women. My sister also felt very weird about our mother’s third husband. We didn’t speak about it at first but then I told her something and she told me she’d had the same experience with him, so from then on we compared notes fairly often.
> 
> The other was the wife of the man in question. She divorced him not long afterwards.
> 
> I don’t know if men also pick up on this. We can only talk about this in general terms and I’m sure the there are lots of exceptions to any generalities...  so.... I’d speculate that on the whole, women are conditioned from an early age to be more wary, more alert and cautious about being sexually objectified than men are. But of course, anyone who’s been subject to abuse of any kind, be that latent or blatant, is going to be more vigilant and aware, and that’s going to include males too.


I think it's probably less about gender, and more about the value that having (or responding to) that instinct gives someone. Someone who has been vulnerable to exploitation, regardless of gender, is quite possibly going to be sensitised to signs of it happening elsewhere; someone for whom it has never been an issued, which probably includes quite a lot of males, but relatively fewer females, is not quite so likely to have that sense, or at least not have the incentive to recognise it.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

Manter said:


> Jackson superfans are working hard. Any post I have seen expressing concern/revulsion is carpet bombed with attacks on the victims’ credibility and ‘evidence’ of what an all round stand up gent MJ was. One said her superfandom meant she was ‘more informed and educated’ than anyone else to talk about it. And when someone pushed back played the trump-card ‘I have a child!’
> 
> Hmm.


It'd be interesting to ask the question, "So what *would* constitute incontrovertible proof that someone had abused children?", to see if they'd either make a special case for MJ (ie the standard of proof for your average child sex abuser would be lower than that for Jackson), or whether they'd come up with some ludicrously impossible scenario which could never arise in reality.


----------



## Looby (Mar 9, 2019)

Someone on my friends list has just shared a long attack from a music exec on the men from the documentary. The jist is basically that they used Jackson for money and help with their careers and now they’re just cashing in again. What’s worrying is the career this person is about to embark on. 
I want to respond but can’t go on the attack with her, I need to stay quite passive and professional.


----------



## Manter (Mar 9, 2019)

existentialist said:


> It'd be interesting to ask the question, "So what *would* constitute incontrovertible proof that someone had abused children?", to see if they'd either make a special case for MJ (ie the standard of proof for your average child sex abuser would be lower than that for Jackson), or whether they'd come up with some ludicrously impossible scenario which could never arise in reality.


I’ll ask. 

I suspect the answer will be something like ‘you’ll never find proof because he never did it’


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

Looby said:


> Someone on my friends list has just shared a long attack from a music exec on the men from the documentary. The jist is basically that they used Jackson for money and help with their careers and now they’re just cashing in again. What’s worrying is the career this person is about to embark on.
> I want to respond but can’t go on the attack with her, I need to stay quite passive and professional.



Someone on my friend's list shared probably the same thing.  I asked her whether she believed he was innocent and she does.  I really don't know enough about it - is there no way this could be true?


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 9, 2019)

Looby said:


> Someone on my friends list has just shared a long attack from a music exec on the men from the documentary. The jist is basically that they used Jackson for money and help with their careers and now they’re just cashing in again. What’s worrying is the career this person is about to embark on.
> I want to respond but can’t go on the attack with her, I need to stay quite passive and professional.


This music exec, I don't suppose they've an interest in jackson's music continuing to sell


----------



## Looby (Mar 9, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> Someone on my friend's list shared probably the same thing.  I asked her whether she believed he was innocent and she does.  I really don't know enough about it - is there no way this could be true?


I don’t believe for a minute he’s innocent but that’s not why I posted and I’m not getting into a debate about it. 
I’m more interested in challenging why someone who will be working with children and young people making disclosures of abuse thinks it’s ok to attack these men and defend Jackson. 

Maybe I should just ignore it.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

joustmaster said:


> Looking at reddit and similar platforms it's looking like a 50:50 split.
> 
> Really surprising.



What Manter said.  The split in internet fury does not reflect the real split in underlying opinion imo.


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 9, 2019)

Manter said:


> I attended a talk by Suzi Lamplugh’s mother years ago. She said women that survived violent attacks often talked about a feeling of unease or that someone ‘wasn’t right’ but they ignored it because we are taught that isn’t rational and therefore of value


I've had the same feeling about people who I'm convinced (and others are too) were spycops

I ignored it and thought I was being mean to this guy, but I wouldn't ignore it again


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

I’m watching the doc in chunks. It’s too hard to watch it all at once.

To my mind, the story itself as told by these men strongly supports the notion that they’re telling the truth.

It seems to me highly unlikely that a liar would be able to invent these details about their own emotions and perceptions, the details and intimacy of their own internal feelings and reactions. Most of the story being told here is not actually about MJ, but about their own process through the events.

It has a veracity that, it seems to me, would be almost impossible to invent.

So either it was MJ who made them experience this internal stuff, or some other abuser.


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 9, 2019)

Tbh everyone knew years back there was something about mj but he bought silence while he was alive.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

Looby said:


> I don’t believe for a minute he’s innocent but that’s not why I posted and I’m not getting into a debate about it.
> I’m more interested in challenging why someone who will be working with children and young people making disclosures of abuse thinks it’s ok to attack these men and defend Jackson.
> 
> Maybe I should just ignore it.



My friend eventually took her post down, as it lead to a fair amount of debate.  As long as your friend follows the procedure for disclosures at work, I'm not sure what the issue is.  I work in a field where I could potentially have to deal with such disclosures and my reaction to the Jackson case is I don't know enough about it.  I really think the place for stuff like this to be settled is a court.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Pickman's model said:


> I've had the same feeling about people who I'm convinced (and others are too) were spycops
> 
> I ignored it and thought I was being mean to this guy, but I wouldn't ignore it again




I once ignored an alarm that was going off inside me because every time I turned around to see what was going on, it was a lovely family group with a charming toddler. When my alarm finally stood down, they snatched my bag. Afterwards I was able to pinpoint all kinds of specific physical things that had also fed into the alarm (e.g. the mother kept pulling her collar up to cover the lower part of her face) but I excused and explained everything away to myself (e.g. she’s shy, she’s cold...). I always heed that alarm since then.


----------



## Looby (Mar 9, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> My friend eventually took her post down, as it lead to a fair amount of debate.  As long as your friend follows the procedure for disclosures at work, I'm not sure what the issue is.  I work in a field where I could potentially have to deal with such disclosures and my reaction to the Jackson case is I don't know enough about it.  I really think the place for stuff like this to be settled is a court.


The issue is that she is showing contempt for people disclosing sexual abuse and I think that shows poor judgment. 

I’m not saying this will be the case in her professional life with children she works with but at this stage of her training I think she should at least show a little bit more restraint from what she chooses to post online.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> My friend eventually took her post down, as it lead to a fair amount of debate.  As long as your friend follows the procedure for disclosures at work, I'm not sure what the issue is.  I work in a field where I could potentially have to deal with such disclosures and my reaction to the Jackson case is I don't know enough about it.  I really think the place for stuff like this to be settled is a court.




It was settled in court though. The court acquitted him.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

Looby said:


> The issue is that she is showing contempt for people disclosing sexual abuse and I think that shows poor judgment.
> 
> I’m not saying this will be the case in her professional life with children she works with but at this stage of her training I think she should at least show a little bit more restraint from what she chooses to post online.



That's fair enough.  I get your point.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> It was settled in court though. The court acquitted him.



As I said, I don't know enough about it.  It's not something I followed closely.  I assumed that some allegations had been tested and others hadn't.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> It was settled in court though. The court acquitted him.



Not of these particular allegations, though.

Also, the fact that these guys previously testified in MJ's favour is providing grist for the mill, as well as the fact that other high profile witnesses continue to do so.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

Manter said:


> I’ll ask.
> 
> I suspect the answer will be something like ‘you’ll never find proof because he never did it’


Quite


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

Manter said:


> I attended a talk by Suzi Lamplugh’s mother years ago. She said women that survived violent attacks often talked about a feeling of unease or that someone ‘wasn’t right’ but they ignored it because we are taught that isn’t rational and therefore of value


I knew the Lamplughs - they were passionate about this idea of trusting your instincts, and if stuff wasn't OK, then do something about it. Suzy's disappearance destroyed Diana, in particular, but both she and Paul did some amazing work - which continues - on the Live Life Safe project. Though not specifically to do with this thread, obviously.


----------



## izz (Mar 9, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I knew the Lamplughs - they were passionate about this idea of trusting your instincts, and if stuff wasn't OK, then do something about it. Suzy's disappearance destroyed Diana, in particular, but both she and Paul did some amazing work - which continues - on the Live Life Safe project. Though not specifically to do with this thread, obviously.


I concur, if anyone registers on the weird-dar and you don't need to be around them, remove yourself. It won't do anyone any harm.


----------



## maomao (Mar 9, 2019)

Because people are always right about weirdos:


----------



## Manter (Mar 9, 2019)

maomao said:


> Because people are always right about weirdos:
> 
> View attachment 163995


I don’t think anyone is saying ‘shun anyone different and lead witchhunts’. But I have certainly been in situations that have gone very badly wrong (mostly around violent men...) and I had actually started to feel uncomfortable beforehand and had done nothing. It’s a prey response I think, not a social exclusion response.


----------



## maomao (Mar 9, 2019)

Manter said:


> I don’t think anyone is saying ‘shun anyone different and lead witchhunts’. But I have certainly been in situations that have gone very badly wrong (mostly around violent men...) and I had actually started to feel uncomfortable beforehand and had done nothing. It’s a prey response I think, not a social exclusion response.


I meant it more as 'careful how far you take that' than 'that's a load of bollocks'. People are entitled to put their safety first in any situation


----------



## scifisam (Mar 9, 2019)

twentythreedom said:


> Care to name any of these celeb paedos with that family history?
> 
> What was Gary Glitter's relationship with his parents like?
> 
> Just seems all a bit weird doing compare / diagnose the paedo



It is, but if you look up Glitter he was a child of an unmarried Mum - a big deal back then - and he was put into care when he was ten then sent to a Catholic school despite not being Catholic (unparented kid who isn't even a real Catholic, bet the priests did not treat him well), frequently ran away from care (I wonder why, and what to) and then started performing in clubs from about 15. 

I'm not making any excuses for him here because the vast majority of abused kids don't go on to abuse other kids, and every adult has choices that they bear responsibility for regardless of their childhood. But you asked, and it seems the answer is "terrible." And not just on a "my parents didn't like me much" terrible either, but likely really awful. 

Again, it's no excuse at all, especially for his later offences, but I suspect there were many helpers along his route to monsterdom.



Thora said:


> I am so confused by the people saying they don't think it's true
> 
> He's an adult man who has a preference for little boys of 9, 10, 11 years old. When they get too old he dumps them and gets a new little one. Then he lavished attention and gifts on them, and takes them alone to his home and has them sleep in his bed. He has a constant stream of little boys the right age through his whole adult life.
> 
> So, all that is accepted as true. But all perfectly reasonable  And he's clearly not a paedophile, just a nice man who likes to have children who fit a very specific age/gender profile sleep next to him.



Yeah. The thing is, even if you accept every single one of the excuses for his behaviour and think it wasn't sexual, he was still a grown man who groomed young boys to be his best friend for a specific period: when they were about 9-12 years old and tanned and pretty. He encouraged them to sleep in his bed and spend extended periods of time with him without any parents present, and then dropped them as soon as puberty got in the way. And none of that is contested. Even without the sex that would be abusive. But people still defend him. 

I've seen people say things like he didn't touch them sexually, he was incapable of that, he was in love with them, because he felt like he was a child too - I don't care. He wasn't a child. He was a grown man making complex business decisions.

But he was also a grown man whose life was, to a great extent, controlled by the people around him. They could have stopped him. Quincy Jones could have stopped him. MJ's Mum could have stopped him. Even if they thought nothing sexual was actually going on, they could have stepped in and said no, Gavin needs his own bedroom, that's what happens when a child hangs out with a grown man who's already been accused of child molestation and it's not like we don't have the space. None of them ever did that. Why? Because he was a money-maker whose paedophilia made him easy to exploit.  



D'wards said:


> The press crucified him cos he was a beloved family entertainer who turns out was gay and liked recreational drugs, and was quite generous with his recreational drugs and opening his big house to parties after nights out and letting people get on with it.
> 
> Fleeing his house before the police came was idiotic though



I think he was a victim of the AIDS scare combined with the crusade against drugs in the 80s. How dare a beloved entertainer who does light entertainment also be into gay sex and drugs! 

I mean, in 1997 Brian Harvey was forced to leave East 17 because he admitted taking ecstasy. Can you imagine that happening now? But it did. 

I think we forget, sometimes, how different life was "back then" because we all lived through it. But it was different. There weren't the abuse scandals we're all aware of now, and coming out as gay was much, much more difficult - section 28 was brought in in 1988 - and priests being paedos was still an occasional joke rather than a recognised problem.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

scifisam said:


> He wasn't a child. He was a grown man making complex business decisions.



Is it not possible to be able to make complex business decisions (if he indeed made them himself?) while being totally fucked up psychologically and emotionally?


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 9, 2019)

maomao said:


> Because people are always right about weirdos:
> 
> View attachment 163995


Oh.  How many small boys did he admit to having sleep in his bed? I must’ve missed that bit...


----------



## scifisam (Mar 9, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> Is it not possible to be able to make complex business decisions (if he indeed made them himself?) while being totally fucked up psychologically and emotionally?



Yes. That was my point.


----------



## ginger_syn (Mar 9, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> Is it not possible to be able to make complex business decisions (if he indeed made them himself?) while being totally fucked up psychologically and emotionally?


Yes it is, but his emotinal and psycholgical state does not absolve him, it just explains some of the reasons he did those things.


----------



## maomao (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> Oh.  How many small boys did he admit to having sleep in his bed? I must’ve missed that bit...


I was responding to the conversation immediately preceding my post not the OP. MJ was fucked up and should have been locked up but no-one knew that just from looking at him. As a lifelong weirdo (AS) I'm entitled to take it personally.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> Oh.  How many small boys did he admit to having sleep in his bed? I must’ve missed that bit...



I started to search back and then realised that even if you count all his accusers (who he never denied sharing a bed with) plus the really famous ones who denied sex, then it's seven up till the mid-90s. The sharing a bed thing has never been denied.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 9, 2019)

scifisam said:


> I started to search back and then realised that even if you count all his accusers (who he never denied sharing a bed with) plus the really famous ones who denied sex, then it's seven up till the mid-90s. The sharing a bed thing has never been denied.


I was responding to @maomao’s picture of Christopher whassisname. The landlord who was falsely pilloried in the media over his tenant’s murder.


----------



## maomao (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> I was responding to @maomao’s picture of Christopher whassisname. The landlord who was falsely pilloried in the media over his tenant’s murder.


Me and the poster you're responding to have each other on ignore


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Lupa posted these on another thread but I think they need to be on this thread too.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

[/QUOTE]


----------



## Thora (Mar 9, 2019)

Watching the doc it really struck me how similar MJ was to Saville in the way he cultivated that weirdo public image - he's a harmless eccentric, he's not hiding anything, he's there in plain sight. The little boy voice, and the childish interests. 
I can even remember my parents, I guess during the first molestation trial (early 90s?) talking about him being a 9 year old boy in a man's body - that line was repeated by several participants in the doc.
Everyone knew about the "new boys", the relationship with Macauly Culkin was celebrated in the media.
Michael Jackson’s young friends
And then he bought some babies to raise as his own too.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

I was also struck by certain similarities, Thora

People defended Savile with the endless “But he’s raised so much for charity!” i.e. he’s a force for good, he’s made a significant contribution to the advancements of humanity, he deserves our respect.

Cf. MJ “But he’s made so much great music! His songs are about love and peace!” which is similarly a cipher for “He’s made a significantly good  contribution to the sum total of the human endeavour”.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


>


[/QUOTE]
These, and pt 2 of the documentary, removed all doubt for me.  

The harm that has been done to those families, the raw blame that their mothers are absolutely being hit with, the pain to all involved is far greater than any benefit of inventing it all.


----------



## twentythreedom (Mar 9, 2019)

All the celeb paedos have their superfans / apologists / deniers etc but Jackson's do seem to be of a level of craziness beyond all others.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> The harm that has been done to those families, the raw blame that their mothers are absolutely being hit with, the pain to all involved is far greater than any benefit of inventing it all.



It struck me quite hard (in the film - I haven’t looked at those interviews yet) how the pain and tension directed within the families seemed so much more intense than any negative feelings towards MJ.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 9, 2019)

spanglechick 
Exactly how I felt...
The very final one of the After Neverland interviews (part 6) ...I was crying through it. You could see the little child in them... and the dreadful impact the abuse had on them.
It was very hard to watch and disturbing. It reinforced how children who are abused try to cope. How they can love the abuser and be so conflicted that they bury their hurt and feelings.
But these resurface repeatedly until they are dealt with openly and therapeutically.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 9, 2019)

I wonder if Quincy Jones knew. *Legal disclaimer that I'm absolutely not saying he did*, just that I'm wondering to myself.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

Favelado said:


> I wonder if Quincy Jones knew. *Legal disclaimer that I'm absolutely not saying he did*, just that I'm wondering to myself.



Relatedly, even if every member of Jackson’s family and associates had totally and completely believed there was no chance at all that MJ was abusing these kids, there *must* have been conversations about how it would look, the conclusions that many would draw, and the potential for malicious legal challenges both from the “chosen” children and from other kids that were there.  And possibly even involving kids who had never been to the ranch.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

Favelado said:


> I wonder if Quincy Jones knew. *Legal disclaimer that I'm absolutely not saying he did*, just that I'm wondering to myself.


I am (obviously) making no comments in regard to Quincy Jones himself, but it is definitely a fact of this kind of situation that people can be remarkably good at not-knowing. I came across a case recently where the stepfather would daily order the stepdaughter upstairs for some infraction or another, whereupon he would go up after her and rape her. With the mother downstairs. Now, I'm not saying that the mother knew what was going on, but I think it takes a certain kind of careful ignoring of the reality not to start to smell some sort of rat.

And it is depressingly often the case that, when an abused child goes to the other parent, the response is incredulity and flat denial - a denial which lasts sometimes all the way through investigation, trial, conviction and sentence.

People use all kinds of tricks to avoid having to make uncomfortable decisions or interventions, and they make perfect sense to them at the time. And then, of course, if they've had to invest a lot in maintaining that ignorance, a sunk cost fallacy operates, and they are bound to continue to invest a lot in keeping it going, because admitting that they were wrong, and careful to stay that way for so long, is intolerable.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 9, 2019)

Does anyone remember that documentary about a lad who was Michael's "best friend" when they were kids or teens. He was a Scottish lad I think. I don't remember how they met. Presumably the boy went to a Jackson 5 gig.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I am (obviously) making no comments in regard to Quincy Jones himself, but it is definitely a fact of this kind of situation that people can be remarkably good at not-knowing. I came across a case recently where the stepfather would daily order the stepdaughter upstairs for some infraction or another, whereupon he would go up after her and rape her. With the mother downstairs. Now, I'm not saying that the mother knew what was going on, but I think it takes a certain kind of careful ignoring of the reality not to start to smell some sort of rat.
> 
> And it is depressingly often the case that, when an abused child goes to the other parent, the response is incredulity and flat denial - a denial which lasts sometimes all the way through investigation, trial, conviction and sentence.
> 
> People use all kinds of tricks to avoid having to make uncomfortable decisions or interventions, and they make perfect sense to them at the time. And then, of course, if they've had to invest a lot in maintaining that ignorance, a sunk cost fallacy operates, and they are bound to continue to invest a lot in keeping it going, because admitting that they were wrong, and careful to stay that way for so long, is intolerable.




One of the denial stories thats coming out is that Wade Robson was apparently "dating" MJ's niece during the time of the allegations.

Wade expressed some kind of liking towards her, so MJ arranged for them to meet, and then Wade asked her to be his GF and she accepted. And they "had a relationship" for almost a decade. The niece has confirmed this on twitter. 

But here's the thing : apparently this bf-gf relationship started when Robson was 7 or 8 years old. And it happened because MJ facilitated it.

Pointing to this as some kind of proof that Wade was having normal relations elsewhere so MJ couldn't have abused him just seems absurd.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Here's the story. 

Michael Jackson 'couldn't have raped Wade Robson because dancer was dating his niece' | Daily Mail Online

It's in the Fail, so I've taken the "reader view" and pasted it below so no need to click through.



*Michael Jackson couldn't have raped Leaving Neverland accuser Wade Robson because the child dancer was dating the icon's niece at the time, according to singer's nephew*
Leaving Neverland accuser Wade Robson was dating Michael Jackson's niece for a decade and therefore couldn't have been abused by the singer, it's been claimed. 

Taj Jackson, the icon's nephew, claims dance choreographer Robson was in a relationship with Brandi Jackson at the time of the alleged molestation. 

Taj slammed the makers of the explosive documentary and claimed they've twisted the facts to suit their story.






Taj Jackson, the icon's nephew, claims dance choreographer Wade Robson couldn't have been abused by his uncle because Robson was in a relationship with Brandi Jackson 





Robson (pictured with Michael as a child) claims in Leaving Neverland that Jackson abused him from aged nine

Michael Jackson's nephew 'felt betrayed' by Wade Robson's accusations


In the damning two-part film, which aired this week on Channel 4, Robson claims Jackson began sexually abusing him from the age of seven and grooming him to 'hate women'.

But Taj has jumped to his uncle's defense, saying Michael set up Robson with Brandi, which 'throws the whole narrative of the film off'. 

He said: 'He dated my cousin for over seven years and it's really interesting because they left that out of the story - and he dated her during the time period that he's getting supposedly molested by my uncle Michael.

'I think it's ridiculous especially since my uncle Michael was the one that basically brought them together. And so it throws off the whole narrative of Michael Jackson only wanting him [Wade] for himself or teaching him to hate women.'

Leaving Neverland: 'He was larger than life and then he likes you'






Robson also claims in the documentary (pictured) that Michael groomed him to 'hate women'





Brandi (pictured), now 37, confirmed their relationship on her Twitter page in February

'It's something they've conveniently left out of the documentary because it coincides with Wade saying [the abuse happened] from the age of seven to 14. But he was dating Brandi from nine to 18.

Taj added: 'They met at the LA Gear thing and they were also in the 'Black and White' video.

'So after Wade had said he liked her, Brandi and my cousin Siggy came up with Wade and his sister, Chantal, to spend the week at Neverland.

'It was then that Wade asked Brandi to be his girlfriend. That's what's so sick about this. Wade has a story that doesn't even coincide with reality.'

Brandi, now 37, confirmed their relationship on her Twitter page in February. 

LaToya Jackson alleges Michael Jackson is guilty back in 1993


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 9, 2019)

existentialist said:


> And it is depressingly often the case that, when an abused child goes to the other parent, the response is incredulity and flat denial - a denial which lasts sometimes all the way through investigation, trial, conviction and sentence.


This rings very true with me, where my mum was excused by the family from knowing/doing anything about my stepdad's abuse of me "because she's one of life's innocents". She also angrily denied my stepdad had been anything other than a good parent when upon leaving home I told her what he'd done to me.


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 9, 2019)

S☼I said:


> This rings very true with me, where my mum was excused by the family from knowing/doing anything about my stepdad's abuse of me "because she's one of life's innocents". She also angrily denied my stepdad had been anything other than a good parent when upon leaving home I told her what he'd done to me.


(((S☼I)))


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

That's some very tough stuff there S☼I


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> Here's the story.
> 
> Michael Jackson 'couldn't have raped Wade Robson because dancer was dating his niece' | Daily Mail Online
> 
> ...


Streisand Effect, anyone?


----------



## Favelado (Mar 9, 2019)

Jarvis Cocker at the Brits is now an even better protest. That sounds facetious but I mean it.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 9, 2019)

(((((((S☼I))))))))


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Favelado said:


> Jarvis Cocker at the Brits is now an even better protest. That sounds facetious but I mean it.




I was thinking that earlier today.

It was that song. That fucking song. 

I was trying to think through the kind of hubris that a criminal pervert might experience as they get away with it over the years. Earth Song, in which he presented himself as some kind of messiah.... ugh.


I can't bring myself to do it but I'm curious about the timeline of his hits, the songs he actually wrote, and what he was perpetrating in his private life. I'd be astonished if there wasn't some kind of narrative connection that would emerge.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> I was thinking that earlier today.
> 
> It was that song. That fucking song.
> 
> ...



The lyrics to Human Nature and Man in the Mirror would be good places to start. Especially the former. Urgh.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 9, 2019)

Earth Song is the worst ever case of whataboutery.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Favelado said:


> Earth Song is the worst ever case of whataboutery.




oh my god.. yes...


----------



## Pickman's model (Mar 9, 2019)

I have never heard earth song and have no intention of listening to it now


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Weirdly (or perhaps predictably) sales of MJ songs are both up and down.

Everyone in the biz is watching this very closely.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

What 'Leaving Neverland' Means For Michael Jackson's Business Empire


QUOTE -- While it's still too early to see how _Leaving Neverland _will impact overall consumption of Jackson's work, early indications are that the numbers are mostly flat or rising. "We haven't seen an uptick or downtick in album sales or song sales, but there has been an upward trend the last two weeks for streams," says Jim Lidestri, chief of Border City Media, the company behind the BuzzAngle music charts. Newer week-over-week numbers provided by rival outfit Nielsen for the period ending Tuesday tell a similar story. While Jackson's U.S. terrestrial radio spins dipped by 5%, on-demand audio and video streams ticked up by half a percent apiece while album sales increased by 3.4% and song sales grew 5.8%... end quote /]


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

Pickman's model said:


> I have never heard earth song and have no intention of listening to it now



Stick with that vibe.


----------



## SheilaNaGig (Mar 9, 2019)

Michael Jackson's Sales, Streaming & Airplay Decline After 'Leaving Neverland' Broadcast


QUOTE -- Breaking that down further, looking at just album sales, his total fell by 39 percent in that span (dropping to about 1,000, down from nearly 2,000). Conversely, his song sales increased by 6 percent (rising to nearly 7,000 up from 6,000).   end quote /]


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

Pickman's model said:


> I have never heard earth song and have no intention of listening to it now



You probably have, you know, without realising it.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 9, 2019)

Interesting that in the week this was shown, the Louis Theroux doc exploring sexual assaults on US campuses seems to have gone under the radar.  On iplayer and definitely worth a watch.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 9, 2019)

Thora - yeah, I heard lots of things like that in the 90s too. One of the accusers (Southchuck) said at the beginning of the documentary something like Michael Jackson was kind, charitable, generous, a wonderful friend, _and_ a child abuser. A lot of people find that hard to accept.



SheilaNaGig said:


> One of the denial stories thats coming out is that Wade Robson was apparently "dating" MJ's niece during the time of the allegations.
> 
> Wade expressed some kind of liking towards her, so MJ arranged for them to meet, and then Wade asked her to be his GF and she accepted. And they "had a relationship" for almost a decade. The niece has confirmed this on twitter.
> 
> ...



I did wonder about that. Given the age Wade Robson was when he got married it didn't seem like he could have dated the niece for long, so it's even weirder that it turns out people are using him supposedly "dating" her as a child as an excuse. He was a child, they weren't dating.  Bizarre.

The claim is that it means Jackson didn't teach Upchuck to hate women, meaning everything else Upchuck said was a lie, but that also doesn't follow at all.

WRT Quincy Jones given the amount of control he had over Jackson I'm fairly certain he not only knew but OKd it. It would have given him a lot of coercive power over Jackson, after all. And he does seem to have been viewed by his family as primarily a way of making money over and above everything else. I mention that not to excuse his behaviour - although you can feel sympathy for Jackson the fucked-up man-child at the same time as condemning him for being a manipulative paedophile - but because ISTM that the family didn't lose anything from his behaviour at the time, but gained from it.

There was also a sort of bizarre acceptance of it in a wider way. That Pepsi commercial James Upchuck was in, for example - the way Michael Jackson says "are you looking for me?" at the end was like they were scripting the beginnings of a romantic comedy. (And it actually was how Upchuck and Jackson met). How could anyone make that and not think it was wildly inappropriate at best? I'm not saying the makers of the commercial knew about the abuse but they did help normalise it.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> Lupa posted these on another thread but I think they need to be on this thread too...



Thanks for posting that interview - I just watched it.
Your previous response to my post and watching these have helped me understand this stuff a lot better.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

Pickman's model said:


> I have never heard earth song and have no intention of listening to it now


You aren't missing much beyond an arrant demonstration of hubris-to-a-fault and messianic self-belief.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 9, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> What 'Leaving Neverland' Means For Michael Jackson's Business Empire
> 
> 
> QUOTE -- While it's still too early to see how _Leaving Neverland _will impact overall consumption of Jackson's work, early indications are that the numbers are mostly flat or rising. "We haven't seen an uptick or downtick in album sales or song sales, but there has been an upward trend the last two weeks for streams," says Jim Lidestri, chief of Border City Media, the company behind the BuzzAngle music charts. Newer week-over-week numbers provided by rival outfit Nielsen for the period ending Tuesday tell a similar story. While Jackson's U.S. terrestrial radio spins dipped by 5%, on-demand audio and video streams ticked up by half a percent apiece while album sales increased by 3.4% and song sales grew 5.8%... end quote /]


I wouldn't be surprised if there isn't a bit of "buy/stream/request our way out of this" going on from the diehard supporters, to show that these revelations aren't making any difference to his "popularity". Thing is, they can only keep that up so long - and, if that is what's going on, against a general trend towards making his oeuvre irrelevant, then we'll see a peak, that will then start to tail off inexorably. And, as tends to be the way of these things, it's fairly likely that these revelations will be followed by those of others who now feel empowered to speak out (and who will no doubt be decried as "copycats" by the True Believers). Which will just reinforce the downward spiral.

I hope he was guilty of these offences, because otherwise a terrible injustice will have been done to his memory (and the financial welfare of his estate). But I don't think that what is happening is injustice. I think, on the balance of probabilities, he did exploit and abuse those children.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 9, 2019)

I think, in addition to what you just said, if any other voices emerge, we could be waiting a good long time if this docu is what prompts them to begin the long process of re-evaluating and healing.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 10, 2019)

8ball said:


> I think, in addition to what you just said, if any other voices emerge, we could be waiting a good long time if this docu is what prompts them to begin the long process of re-evaluating and healing.



Also there may not have been that many. He seems to have cultivated fucked-up pseudo-relationships, and that takes time. 

I feel for the parents in this (as well as the boys, obviously). One article I read said that we need to remember the time this was happening. Now we've all heard about sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic church, plus famous people like Glitter and Jonathan King, and there's in general a much higher level of awareness about childhood sexual abuse than there was in the 80s and early 90s.

Paedophiles sometimes groom the parents as well as the children (I've just seen that this is brought up in the Oprah interview). And Jackson did have Wade Robson's sister to stay sometimes too, plus kids it's unlikely he molested like Culkin and Feldman, and their own kids denied it when asked outright, plus he had that whole I'm-just-a-weirdo cover Thora mentioned. His bedroom was enormous and according to Culkin staying there was more like staying in someone's apartment than their own bedroom. Their kids were getting huge future career opportunities out of it, and very much they didn't want to stop seeing him, which for a lot of parents back then would indicate a lack of abuse rather than evidence there was abuse going on.

I think I probably would have said no, under no circumstances are you sharing a bed with a grown man, but that might well be because of my own experiences making me more aware of abuse. And maybe I wouldn't have, because of the way it happened and the time it happened.

Just seen the statement from the Jackson family saying Robson and Southchuck can't be believed because they're admitted perjurers. Well, that's weird, isn't it? They can't be both perjurers for lying about not being abused _and_ lying about their abuse now. If they're perjurers then their claims that nothing happened were untrue.


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 10, 2019)

IPlayer also has, or recently had - the R Kelly documentary from last year.  In which various people in his long term inner circle have to repeat, with a straight face, that they didn’t know about their golden goose’s sexual exploration of vulnerable young people.   

Some interesting cracks in an edifice that is no longer plausibly sustainable.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 10, 2019)

scifisam said:


> Just seen the statement from the Jackson family saying Robson and Southchuck can't be believed because they're admitted perjurers. Well, that's weird, isn't it? They can't be both perjurers for lying about not being abused _and_ lying about their abuse now. If they're perjurers then their claims that nothing happened were untrue.



*Very* nice logical takedown there - I hadn't even thought of it that way.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 10, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> IPlayer also has, or recently had - the R Kelly documentary from last year.  In which various people in his long term inner circle have to repeat, with a straight face, that they didn’t know about their golden goose’s sexual exploration of vulnerable young people.
> 
> Some interesting cracks in an edifice that is no longer plausibly sustainable.



I didn't see that - I just saw that interview.  Great technique from the interviewer - she just lets him incriminate himself by repeating allegations in exactly the right pattern.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 10, 2019)

spanglechick said:


> IPlayer also has, or recently had - the R Kelly documentary from last year.  In which various people in his long term inner circle have to repeat, with a straight face, that they didn’t know about their golden goose’s sexual exploration of vulnerable young people.
> 
> Some interesting cracks in an edifice that is no longer plausibly sustainable.



Do they claim not to have known about him marrying a 15-year-old when he was 27? I mean it was a legal marriage and all - later annulled due to them lying about her age - but it's incontestably true. Must be hard to try to explain that one away.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 10, 2019)

scifisam said:


> Do they claim not to have known about him marrying a 15-year-old when he was 27? I mean it was a legal marriage and all - later annulled due to them lying about her age - but it's incontestably true. Must be hard to try to explain that one away.



I was tempted to respond, but maybe we should port this discussion across to the R Kelly thread.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 10, 2019)

Remix to conviction


----------



## Rosemary Jest (Mar 10, 2019)

The Martin Bashir and Louis Theroux documentaries on Jackson from a decade or so back are revealing too, worth a watch if you've not seen them and want more on the subject.

The Theroux one has a particularly revealing interview with a British lad who befriended Jackson and spoke to him on the phone over a period of time.


----------



## Steel Icarus (Mar 10, 2019)

Both Bashir and Theroux docs 2003. Jackson's been _dead _a decade.

God, the years fly, don't they?


----------



## Favelado (Mar 10, 2019)

Rosemary Jest said:


> The Martin Bashir and Louis Theroux documentaries on Jackson from a decade or so back are revealing too, worth a watch if you've not seen them and want more on the subject.
> 
> The Theroux one has a particularly revealing interview with a British lad who befriended Jackson and spoke to him on the phone over a period of time.



That's the one I mentioned above. It was Theroux wasn't it? Cheers.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 10, 2019)

This shows his life from 5 on up to his death. In hindsight it is telling that people interviewed seemed to explain and normalise his love of children with such ease. It's actually shocking that they do so.

I watched this last night...just because it was a recent documentary and I wanted to see what the attitude and approach was like and if there was anything said that would show him for what he was....a predatory child abuser.
And there are clear moments that absolutely point to him being not who he said he was...but nobody stretches to paedophile. They circle around it and that's upsetting because some of them must have known.

There is no balance to be had about Michael Jackson the human being, when 2 people clearly had their childhood ruined by him. And it is likely that there are more kids who have been abused who will undoubtedly start speaking up.
The phrase, "Unable to go from boy to man"....is used about MJ in the documentary. This is what everyone believed about him in the 90s and beyond.  They believed that he was an asexual person stuck in childhood and not able to grow up. This is what he showed people. Was it an act that he kept up all his life? Some of these people in the documentary were very close friends of his throughout his life.
How they didn't see what was literally there right in front of them is unbelievable. They speak about him as if he was not quite human. As if he is a unique version of a human / manchild who never grew up. This is at a time when every celebrity in the US probably had a therapist. Did MJ have one? It would be interesting to hear their thoughts on him now.

One woman interviewed says "Michael was into children.. loved their energy"... wtf ? She didn't even bat an eye saying it. So blinded by the myth of his persona.
Lisa Marie, or rather an actress playing her, is shown storming out saying she had had enough after Michael arranges to go on a holiday with 2 kids. ... and nobody asks the obvious question? Wtf is a man doing going on holidays with 2 kids and leaving his wife at home?

What is very telling is how he dealt with the Pepsi fire. His hair went on fire and he was being rushed to hospital with what turned out were 3rd degree burns and before he is wheeled out on a gurney his one thought is to remain in character as "Michael Jackson" and he demands his silver glove is put on his hand. He wanted to stay "in character" for the public who would see photos of him being brought to hospital.
He was constantly "in character". He was devoid of anything resembling a true personality. Just a shell full of pain. A little child who stopped developing normally...did he hurt all his life?. Was he really not able relate to the adult world or relate in any sexual way with adults? He cultivated his character of childman and acted the part constantly...He used others to get to children...even to have his own children. They were  props in his life to make him look some way lile an adult. To make him look the part of an adult. His life was an entire lie. The image of him hanging his baby over a balcony in Paris showed just how warped he was. He knew people would see him as that eccentric exception to manhood. Michael is "Michael" was how the fans and the world saw him. And that's how he got away with what he did to kids. It's how families and mothers trusted him with their sons.

His childhood was a fucked up mess. But regardless of that he  owned the persona that he cultivated. We have to see the lie that he was. And it's so clear now that he controlled these kids and their inner lives. He controlled exactly how the media saw him and how everyone who met him saw him. He sold himself so well as that eccentric asexual childman. And the world believed it. Every one fell for it. We wanted to believe in this eccentric unique talented person who was soft spoken and seemed kind. It's no wonder the two men took so long to speak out about being abused as kids by him.. And it is no surprise that it took them so long to do so. Who wants to destroy the hero?

It's another lesson for every one that people can fool the world and get away with anything they want, including sexually abusing little kids, if they control their public image, and the people around them.


I wonder what those interviewed in the documentary above feel like now?


----------



## Rosemary Jest (Mar 10, 2019)

S☼I said:


> Both Bashir and Theroux docs 2003. Jackson's been _dead _a decade.
> 
> God, the years fly, don't they?



Crazy innit? Could have sworn it wasn't that long ago.


----------



## Mr.Bishie (Mar 10, 2019)

Kin ell 

Michael Jackson albums climb the charts following Leaving Neverland broadcast


----------



## spanglechick (Mar 10, 2019)

I’m not sure of how the abuse timelines fit together with his drug addiction... perhaps the addiction was a factor in risk taking.  

I think it’s worth remembering that the public persona of Jackson as asexual boy-child wasn’t there at all for Off the Wall or Thriller, where he behaves very much as a sexual young man.  I’m no expert on the later albums, but there seemed to have been sexualised stuff in Bad and Dangerpus too, I think.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 10, 2019)

Michael Jackson 'Annoyed' At Irish Doctor Over Children's Hospital Visit

Dr Treacy, met and treated Jackson between 2005 and 2009 when Jackson lived in Ireland for a few years. Treacy wrote about Jackson in his book....stating that Jackson was a very good father to his children.
Treacy said he didn't want Jackson to visit children in Crumlin Children's hospital. Jackson had wanted to visit two children who had been burned in an attack. And Treacy wouldn't let it happen because he wasn't sure about Jackson. He says Jackson asked him was it because he thought he was a paedophile.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 10, 2019)

Jackson's albums reviewed. 
Off The Wall - Off The Wall
Thriller - Thrilling
Bad - Dangerous 
Dangerous - Bad


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 10, 2019)

1980 interview with MJ...his on stage persona is very sexual. But his interview appears much more like the childman he portrayed off stage for all his life.


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 10, 2019)

Lupa said:


> 1980 interview with MJ...his on stage persona is very sexual. But his interview appears much more like the childman he portrayed off stage for all his life.



As ever youtube represents with comments


----------



## Favelado (Mar 11, 2019)

At 1.12.30 section of interview starts where Jackson looks like he's lying his arse off. He's so nervous and trying to cram in as many "sleep on the floor" references as possible. Fucking paedo.


----------



## Grace Johnson (Mar 11, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> I didn't see the doc. Did he actually fuck them or was he a fiddler?



What the fuck!?

So is there certain levels of child abuse that are more acceptable to than others? 

That is a bizarre comment tbh. What's the reasoning behind that?


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 11, 2019)

Mr.Bishie said:


> Kin ell
> 
> Michael Jackson albums climb the charts following Leaving Neverland broadcast



What the fuck is wrong with people buying his stuff after all this.  Jesus.


----------



## krtek a houby (Mar 11, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> What the fuck is wrong with people buying his stuff after all this.  Jesus.



Something similar for certain populists who's fan base seem to double down, no matter how much shit is chucked at their chosen one. Sadly.


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 11, 2019)

krtek a houby said:


> Something similar for certain populists who's fan base seem to double down, no matter how much shit is chucked at their chosen one. Sadly.



Yeah, I've seen that sort of obsessive behaviour before.  Many years ago I worked with a die-hard Cliff Richard fan.  Utterly obsessed with him.  It was quite bizarre - she was otherwise fine.  

Perhaps they should create a new top 40 for paedo artists.  That would keep it all nice and separate.


----------



## Favelado (Mar 11, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> Yeah, I've seen that sort of obsessive behaviour before.  Many years ago I worked with a die-hard Cliff Richard fan.  Utterly obsessed with him.  It was quite bizarre - she was otherwise fine.
> 
> Perhaps they should create a new top 40 for paedo artists.  That would keep it all nice and separate.


If you've invested so much in something, you can't risk it being true as you've based your life around it. Denial means you don't lose that percentage of your inner-self devoted to the obsession, nor the percentage of your life devoted to your hobby.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 11, 2019)

Favelado said:


> If you've invested so much in something, you can't risk it being true as you've based your life around it. Denial means you don't lose that percentage of your inner-self devoted to the obsession, nor the percentage of your life devoted to your hobby.



Sunk-cost bias.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 11, 2019)

Favelado said:


> If you've invested so much in something, you can't risk it being true as you've based your life around it. Denial means you don't lose that percentage of your inner-self devoted to the obsession, nor the percentage of your life devoted to your hobby.



These people would surely have all his music already?


----------



## farmerbarleymow (Mar 11, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> These people would surely have all his music already?



Perhaps the estate is pushing out new editions and remastered stuff to cash in?  But if they're not its a good question - who is buying this stuff?


----------



## Favelado (Mar 11, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> These people would surely have all his music already?


Not talking about that.


----------



## Micro (Mar 11, 2019)

Mr.Bishie said:


> Kin ell
> 
> Michael Jackson albums climb the charts following Leaving Neverland broadcast



Is it like when the shops sell out of bread and milk before a storm hits?


----------



## planetgeli (Mar 11, 2019)

Favelado said:


> If you've invested so much in something, you can't risk it being true as you've based your life around it. Denial means you don't lose that percentage of your inner-self devoted to the obsession, nor the percentage of your life devoted to your hobby.



This is true. It also applies to a childhood (as opposed to whole life/adult life). Similar to someone above, I knew a woman who was otherwise fairly ‘normal’ who couldn’t believe Rolf Harris was guilty and was quite vicious in her thoughts towards his accusers. She had a childhood invested in Rolf and she wasn’t giving it up.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 11, 2019)

Micro said:


> Is it like when the shops sell out of bread and milk before a storm hits?



I’m going to hazard a no.


----------



## ginger_syn (Mar 12, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> What the fuck is wrong with people buying his stuff after all this.  Jesus.


You should look at twitter, they all seem to have gone a bit more bonkers


----------



## Saul Goodman (Mar 12, 2019)

Spymaster said:


> David Bowie is the one that's always surprised me. He gets a massive pass on here because of some links to Brixton, despite being well known to shag 14 and 15 year old groupies back in the day.


That one sickens me! 
I've been told, in no uncertain terms, to STFU when I dare to mention that Bowie was a nonce, but I shouldn't expect any better.


----------



## Saul Goodman (Mar 12, 2019)

andysays said:


> I'm not a fan of Michael Jackson's music, but I think it is, or should be, possible in many/most cases to separate the talent and the artistic creation from their behaviour or actions.


I hate this bullshit. "Oh, I like his music so let's just pretend he wasn't a nonce."

If a copper beat the shite out of you but he was good at building model railways, would you say "Ah, he's not so bad. You should see what he can do with a Hornby train set!"?


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 12, 2019)

farmerbarleymow said:


> Perhaps the estate is pushing out new editions and remastered stuff to cash in?  But if they're not its a good question - who is buying this stuff?


A lot of people out there think it's faked. They're even producing lots of evidence 

It's inline with the people producing antivax evidence though


----------



## Glitter (Mar 12, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> These people would surely have all his music already?



They might be like me. I’ve bought Appetite For Destruction tons of times due to it getting scratched/lost/borrowed and not returned/tape chewed up/left at someone’s house etc. 

I’ve probably single handedly funded a wing of Axl Rose’s house.


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 12, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> These people would surely have all his music already?


The charts don't work like that any more, grandad. 

100 stream count as one sale.


----------



## Johnny Vodka (Mar 12, 2019)

joustmaster said:


> The charts don't work like that any more, grandad.
> 
> 100 stream count as one sale.



Ouch.  So do radio 1 no longer play the no 1 just before 7pm on a Sunday?


----------



## Sprocket. (Mar 12, 2019)

Saul Goodman said:


> I hate this bullshit. "Oh, I like his music so let's just pretend he wasn't a nonce."
> 
> If a copper beat the shite out of you but he was good at building model railways, would you say "Ah, he's not so bad. You should see what he can do with a Hornby train set!"?



Depends on his track record!


----------



## joustmaster (Mar 12, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> Ouch.  So do radio 1 no longer play the no 1 just before 7pm on a Sunday?


I think I last listened when thatcher died and they didn't play that song.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 12, 2019)

Johnny Vodka said:


> Ouch.  So do radio 1 no longer play the no 1 just before 7pm on a Sunday?



Surely you mean Thursday.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 12, 2019)

8ball said:


> Surely you mean Thursday.



It's always been Sunday.


----------



## 8ball (Mar 12, 2019)

scifisam said:


> It's always been Sunday.



Silly me.  I meant Tuesday (moving to Sunday in 1987).

Then they had couple of days til Top Of The Pops on Thursday to get their shit together...


----------



## danny la rouge (Mar 12, 2019)

scifisam said:


> It's always been Sunday.


It’s always Sunday in Eastasia.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 12, 2019)

8ball said:


> Silly me.  I meant Tuesday (moving to Sunday in 1987).
> 
> Then they had couple of days til Top Of The Pops on Thursday to get their shit together...



Nope, the chart show was always on a Sunday, from 1962 when it first became a regular, official chart until 2015 (it's now on a Friday). It was because new singles were released on a Monday in the UK, so Sunday made the most sense. Now there's a global new release day on Fridays so it changed.

(I had to research this lately for something Global Release Day: Official Chart to kick off your weekend from next month).

(This is possibly not the right thread for this but I don't know what is)


----------



## Apathy (Mar 12, 2019)




----------



## Reno (Mar 13, 2019)

Can’t believe TfL would allow these adverts:

Michael Jackson bus ads 'perpetuate fear'


----------



## danny la rouge (Mar 13, 2019)

Reno said:


> Can’t believe TfL would allow these adverts:
> 
> Michael Jackson bus ads 'perpetuate fear'


It’s a rubbish ad anyway. I read the advert as saying “Michael Jackson was a liar. The word ‘innocent’ in his mouth was a lie. He was deffo a paedo”.

It was only once I had read the explanation that it is protesting his innocence that I was able to interpret it that way.


----------



## maomao (Mar 13, 2019)

danny la rouge said:


> It’s a rubbish ad anyway. I read the advert as saying “Michael Jackson was a liar. The word ‘innocent’ in his mouth was a lie. He was deffo a paedo”.
> 
> It was only once I had read the explanation that it is protesting his innocence that I was able to interpret it that way.



They've colour coded it so that the innocent in his mouth is the same colour as 'facts don't lie'. The only reason they would do this is if they'd already noticed it was ambiguous. Really shit piece of advertising/propaganda even before taking into account what it's trying to say.


----------



## andysays (Mar 13, 2019)

Michael Jackson 'innocent' adverts to be removed


----------



## scifisam (Mar 13, 2019)

danny la rouge said:


> It’s a rubbish ad anyway. I read the advert as saying “Michael Jackson was a liar. The word ‘innocent’ in his mouth was a lie. He was deffo a paedo”.
> 
> It was only once I had read the explanation that it is protesting his innocence that I was able to interpret it that way.



It's like they can't help saying what they deep down know to be true even when they're doing their best to claim it isn't.


----------



## danny la rouge (Mar 13, 2019)

scifisam said:


> It's like they can't help saying what they deep down know to be true even when they're doing their best to claim it isn't.


It's very Freudian.


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 14, 2019)

Starts at 4.0...
Entering Neverland.....the rebuttal to Leaving Neverland. .
Not sure if this is all or if there will be more.
Some of it is compelling and evidentiary as opposed to conjecture... but I'm not sure it's enough to absolutely deny credence to the two men who are saying MJ sexually abused them. Wade Robson doesnt come out of this looking good...but that is their point.


----------



## wiskey (Mar 14, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Starts at 4.0...
> Entering Neverland.....the rebuttal to Leaving Neverland. .
> Not sure if this is all or if there will be more.
> Some of it is compelling and evidentiary as opposed to connective... but I'm not sure it's enough to absolutely deny credence to the two men who are saying MJ sexually abused them. Wade Robson doesnt come out of this looking good...but that is their point.



Who is that made by?


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 14, 2019)

wiskey said:


> Who is that made by?



Good question.
I would imagine that will be Jackson's supporters?


----------



## wiskey (Mar 14, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Good question.
> I would imagine that will be Jackson's supporters?


Admittedly I didn't watch it all but it seemed a bit disjointed, if they had points they didn't expand on them enough


----------



## Baronage-Phase (Mar 14, 2019)

wiskey said:


> Admittedly I didn't watch it all but it seemed a bit disjointed, if they had points they didn't expand on them enough



Yep. I wondered if it was just an intro. But it's too long for that.
The interview with FBI guy was interesting. And the whole Chandler tape if it's real was weird.
The idiots at the end on the radio show were rubbish though.


----------



## Thora (Mar 14, 2019)

The only people who know what happened when an adult man was alone in bed with a series of little boys are the man and the boys - seeing as the man is dead and 4 of the little boys are saying he's a paedophile, the opinions of anyone else seem irrelevant.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 14, 2019)

I suspect that Wade felt betrayed when the family didn't employ him for that dance show thing and thought Fuck it, why should I keep their secrets anymore.


----------



## Chilli.s (Mar 14, 2019)

Hasn't jacko earned  1.5 billion $ since he died?  Loads of people would do anything for a slice of that.  I don't think it's going to ever be proven completely without some doubt.


----------



## Reno (Mar 14, 2019)

Chilli.s said:


> Hasn't jacko earned  1.5 billion $ since he died?  Loads of people would do anything for a slice of that.  I don't think it's going to ever be proven completely without some doubt.


Not much of an insight. That arguement to discredit Jackson’s accusers has been around since the first civil case involving Jordan Chandler.

Now that the documentary is out and available it’s really better to comment after having seen it. This thread is about that after all. If these two men and their families were lying then they all must be the best actors in the world having been coached by a team of first class child psychologists.


----------



## D'wards (Mar 14, 2019)

Also, aside from the sexual abuse obvs, Jackson treated these children with a kindness and adoration and showered them with love and attention.

To falsely accuse someone of the worst kind of action, someone who has shown you nothing but love and kindness is a truly evil and abhorrent thing.
I cannot believe that Jackson would have encountered four separate evil families. It's just not feasible.


----------



## ShiftyBagLady (Mar 14, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Starts at 4.0...
> Entering Neverland.....the rebuttal to Leaving Neverland. .
> Not sure if this is all or if there will be more.
> Some of it is compelling and evidentiary as opposed to conjecture... but I'm not sure it's enough to absolutely deny credence to the two men who are saying MJ sexually abused them. Wade Robson doesnt come out of this looking good...but that is their point.



God, that's 'rebuttal' is offensively bad. Offensive because they are actually quite insulting to the victims/accusers (calling them idiots and boyfriends- which is a hurtful and irresponsible thing to call two abuse victims, especially male victims, as homophobia and being called gay because of abuse you suffered is a major deterrent for boys speaking out). 
The production company have also made flat earth 'docs' so I wouldn't credit them with any intelligence or investigative credibility.


----------



## ShiftyBagLady (Mar 14, 2019)

What people also need to bear in mind is that all of the Jacksons were brought up to put on a show and they were steeped in abuse.
There's this incredible level of double think going on that he was a spectacular showman but couldn't possibly have been manipulative enough to create a cover for his abuse 
Boundless kindness, gifts and special attentions are tactics of grooming.
Abusing some kids and not others is a also not unusual to create some plausible deniability. Also serves to make the children you're manipulating into feeling special or like they deserve it, depending on the abuser.
I don't understand why people are so doggedly wedded to the idea of his innocence and won't consider the alternative fully.

I still wouldn't let him babysit my kids.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 14, 2019)

ShiftyBagLady said:


> What people also need to bear in mind is that all of the Jacksons were brought up to put on a show and they were steeped in abuse.
> There's this incredible level of double think going on that he was a spectacular showman but couldn't possibly have been manipulative enough to create a cover for his abuse
> Boundless kindness, gifts and special attentions are tactics of grooming.
> Abusing some kids and not others is a also not unusual to create some plausible deniability. Also serves to make the children you're manipulating into feeling special or like they deserve it, depending on the abuser.
> ...



I wouldn't have let him within an asses roar of a child....and I was a fan....years ago.
The whole Neverland nonsense always creeped me out. The idea that parents seemed to think it was all ok baffles me. I never understood the parents who let their children sleep in his bedroom...let alone his bed. 
There is a clip of one kid, the boy who recovered from cancer, and Jackson is skitting at what the lad says about Jackson...how Jackson insisted on the boy sleeping in his bed. That clip in hindsight is very weird.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 14, 2019)

View attachment 164449


scifisam said:


> It's like they can't help saying what they deep down know to be true even when they're doing their best to claim it isn't.





danny la rouge said:


> It's very Freudian.



There's a lot of truth accidentally spoken "in jest" by conspiraloons, they can't help it - and ''MJ is innocent!'' is definitely conspiraloonery, it relies on painting _everyone except MJ_ as dishonest, machiavellian schemers out to destroy their idol's name .. just to avoid the simple truth that here was a man who sexually groomed and abused boys. _Though everybody knew this at the time!_

All anyone ever said about it was _Aww well he never had a childhood, so......_
So. Fucking. What. Fuck him, basically. I still like some of his songs (nobody's spoiling _Smooth Criminal _for me) but seriously.

Anyway, off-topic, some crazy ''truth spoken in jest'' slightly edited / annotated by me for the edification of ickeolytes, back in the day when I used to do this kind of thing for fun 

    

So anyway, MJ's face saying ''innocent'' - then the text saying ''facts don't lie, people do'' is, i agree, that kind of thing. Freudian.


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## Yossarian (Mar 23, 2019)

I've never paid much attention to Barbra Streisand, has she always been this vile?


> "His sexual needs were his sexual needs, coming from whatever childhood he has or whatever DNA he has," she said. "You can say 'molested,' but those children, as you heard say [the grown-up Robson and Safechuck], they were thrilled to be there. They both married and they both have children, so it didn't kill them."
> 
> Streisand goes on to say that she has "a combination of feelings" on the situation and that she blames the parents of Jackson's alleged victims, saying, "I feel bad for the children. I feel bad for him. I blame, I guess, the parents, who would allow their children to sleep with him."



Barbra Streisand Faces Criticism Over Michael Jackson Comments


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## Micro (Mar 23, 2019)

Yossarian said:


> I've never paid much attention to Barbra Streisand, has she always been this vile?
> 
> 
> Barbra Streisand Faces Criticism Over Michael Jackson Comments



Ah, Jesus. What a fuckslice.


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## existentialist (Mar 23, 2019)

Yossarian said:


> I've never paid much attention to Barbra Streisand, has she always been this vile?
> 
> 
> Barbra Streisand Faces Criticism Over Michael Jackson Comments


This is basically "blame anyone but the sainted Michael". This'll cost her dear. At least, I hope it does.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

Yossarian said:


> I've never paid much attention to Barbra Streisand, has she always been this vile?
> 
> 
> Barbra Streisand Faces Criticism Over Michael Jackson Comments



ugh, one abusive narcissist defending another, naturally. There'll be more of these and by their words will we know them.


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## existentialist (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> ugh, one abusive narcissist defending another, naturally. There'll be more of these and by their words will we know them.


They've actually made the fact of Jackson's guilt or otherwise irrelevant - the awful thing is their flat refusal to even acknowledge the possibility, and blame the (alleged) victims - anything rather than open their minds to the possibility that he did abuse these kids, and that *gasp* what they, or their parents, did or didn't do, makes no difference to the culpability.

Blech. It is *exactly* this kind of mindset which is one of the biggest obstacles to getting people to timely disclose when they have been abused - who wants to go public if people are going to say "ahahaha, but 9 year old you didn't run away FAST ENOUGH . You must have been complicit!"?


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 23, 2019)

Yossarian said:


> I've never paid much attention to Barbra Streisand, has she always been this vile?
> 
> 
> Barbra Streisand Faces Criticism Over Michael Jackson Comments





Micro said:


> Ah, Jesus. What a fuckslice.



You hit the nail on the head.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> ugh, one abusive narcissist defending another, naturally. There'll be more of these and by their words will we know them.


Was she ever abusive ? She has a reputation of being a control freak and no doubt she is narcissistic in a way most superstars are, but I have never heard of Streisand being abusive beyond Diva-level behavior and certainly not sexually so. As a rising star in the she was a trailblazer for holding on to her Jewish identity instead of playing it down like every Jewish movie star who came before. She used her power as a movie star and singer to carve out a respectable career behind the camera and got a lot of misogynist shit for it, the type of which a Clint Eastwood never got for doing the same. Politically she's certainly never been controversial, supporting various liberal, environmental and civil rights causes.

What she said here is troubling but I'm also not ready to join in with the mob to crucify her on behalf of three sentences. I'm certainly not ready to equate one ill advised statement with Jackson's crimes. Maybe it's outrage fatigue, but every time a celeb opens their mouth to say something that's considered unacceptable, I'm just as troubled by the Internet's habit to go ballistic in response.

It's a few sentences in the Evening Standard. It reads like there is stuff missing. She acknowledges that the boys were molested even if she does so too hesitantly, she blames the parents, she claims that the boys were thrilled to be there and in some way benefited from their association with Jackson. All of that is acknowledged by the two Jackson accusers and their families in the documentary.

Where it gets problematic is in her statement that "they didn't die" though personally, I have problems with the term "abuse survivor" myself. It implies that either their abuser intended to kill them or that they were bound to go on to kill themselves, neither is necessarily the case. What happened to them is not the same as being murdered, which is no accuse for the abuse. But they have the chance to rebuild their life and in the documentary they look like they are on the mend. The statement about Jackson's "needs" is very unfortunate but one that can be taken as neutral in a situation where one can't be seen to be neutral.

Her mistake was not to publicly condemn the abuse, taken sentence by sentence, what she says is up for interpretation.

Streisand knew Jackson personally and may have felt sorry for him, being fucked up beyond belief and maybe those feelings aren't that easy to switch off. Maybe she's working though stuff in regard to Jackson to get there, maybe stuff has been taken out of context, maybe she just had an off-day. She fucked up publicly but I don't think that makes her a monster on the same level as Jackson.


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## Micro (Mar 23, 2019)

Don’t think anyone’s going ballistic over it. She’s being called out on it, that’s all.


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## Micro (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Where it gets problematic is in her statement that "they didn't die" though personally, I have problems with the term "abuse survivor" myself. It implies that either their abuser intended to kill them or that they were bound to go on to kill themselves, neither is necessarily the case. What happened to them is not the same as being murdered, which is no accuse for the abuse. But they have the chance to rebuild their life and in the documentary they look like they are on the mend. The statement about Jackson's "needs" is very unfortunate but one that can be taken as neutral in a situation where one can't be seen to be neutral.



Sorry, but that sounds all kinds of wrong.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

Micro said:


> Sorry, but that sounds all kinds of wrong.



Even if I may not have articulated it as well as I’d like to, I’ll stick by it. I’d like to add that the word “survivor” is supposed to give a positive spin to something which the victim of abuse may find hard to live up to. It comes with a narrative and a clear path when the fall-out is more complicated that that path allows for. 

Stop Calling Sexual Assault Victims "Survivors" — It's Time to Reclaim the Word Victim


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Was she ever abusive ? She has a reputation of being a control freak and no doubt she is narcissistic in a way most superstars are, but I have never heard of Streisand being abusive beyond Diva-level behavior and certainly not sexually so.



I never said she was _sexually _abusive, but she has spent her entire career treating her employees and fans like absolute shit - she's notorious for it. ''Abusive'' is a broad term and it sure as fuck covers the kind of persistent rudeness and offensiveness associated with the word _diva _(ffs the word diva / divus originally means a person who has been deified, so it's easy to see why such people imagine themselves above the rest of us)


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## Micro (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Even if I may not have articulated it as well as I’d like to, I’ll stick by it. I’d like to add that the word “survivor” is supposed to give a positive spin to something which the victim of abuse may find hard to live up to. It comes with a narrative and a clear path when the fall-out is more complicated that that path allows for.
> 
> Stop Calling Sexual Assault Victims "Survivors" — It's Time to Reclaim the Word Victim



Everyone is different, and get through bad shit differently. Some might shun the ‘survivor’ label, while others might find ‘victim’ makes it sound like they’re still scared in a corner. 

It’s definitely not up to the rest of us to define how an individual victim of abuse should see themselves and describe themselves in the context of that abuse.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> I never said she was _sexually _abusive, but she has spent her entire career treating her employees and fans like absolute shit - she's notorious for it. ''Abusive'' is a broad term and it sure as fuck covers the kind of persistent rudeness and offensiveness associated with the word _diva _(ffs the word diva / divus originally means a person who has been deified, so it's easy to see why such people imagine themselves above the rest of us)


She has a reputation of being controlling and difficult to work with but I also know how that gets framed differently for women than it does for men.

When you are that famous, gossip quickly meshes with fact so I would take that with a pinch of salt.In moments of utter boredom, I have looked into who the most notoriously awful people to work with Hollywood and Streisand doesn’t come up and I haven’t read anything that is abusive. It’s more like getting her way in professional situations.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

I see. Abusive behaviour is OK if it's just about _getting your way in professional situations._

I think I've worked in that workplace, it was shit.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> I see. Abusive behaviour is OK if it's just about getting your way in professional situations.



Streisand has gone up against directors and producers when she disagreed with their creative choices, who’ve then described her as demanding and bossy. Eventually she got so fed up, she became a director herself at a time when female directors were unknown in big budget Hollywood films. After early success and a ton of Oscars and nomination for her efforts, she never got the opportunities of male movie stars who went into directing, despite her level of success and stardom.

That is not abuse behaviour, it’s a double standard in how powerful men and women get assessed differently. I’m sure she can be difficult to work with, at that level you need to be tough as nails and signal power by making demands, but that is not being abusive. It can easily be framed as a woman asserting herself in a male environment.

I have read no stories about Streisand treating people who work for her, like assistants, etc in an abusive way. No tales of throwing phones and ashtrays. No string of lawsuits by former staff for cruel or abusive behaviour. So what are you basing you abuse allegations on ? Has she chucked an ashtray at you ?


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

Micro said:


> Everyone is different, and get through bad shit differently. Some might shun the ‘survivor’ label, while others might find ‘victim’ makes it sound like they’re still scared in a corner.
> 
> It’s definitely not up to the rest of us to define how an individual victim of abuse should see themselves and describe themselves in the context of that abuse.


You are making presumptions about “the rest of us” here. To your response that this “sound all kind of wrong” I pointed out that the “survivor” narrative is a problematic one. It has become the default term for abuse victims in the media and online in a rather uncritical way.

I did not prescribe how victims of abuse should identify themselves.


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## SheilaNaGig (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> You are making presumptions about “the rest of us” here. To your response that this “sound all kind of wrong” I pointed out that the “survivor” narrative is a problematic one. It has become the default term for abuse victims in the media and online in a rather uncritical way.
> 
> I did not prescribe how victims of abuse should identify themselves.




How is “survivor” problematic?

I adopted “survivor” when I decided and realised that didn’t want to self identity as a victim.


ETA These ways I tend to frame it altogether differently. Partly because I feel and remember and talk about it differently. Part of that change is the shift I made from “I am someone to whom bad things have been done” to “I am someone who has done work to overcome the things that were done to me”.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Streisand has gone up against directors and producers when she disagreed with their creative choices, who’ve then described her as demanding and bossy.



That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the various demands for staff not to speak to her or even look at her. It's possible to wave this away as _oh well it's not the worst thing ever_ - which is what people have been doing about MJ for decades btw - but the fact is she's horrible to her staff and the staff of places she stays, because she can be. But because some people (eg your good self) look up to her as a champion of female empowerment, it's OK to tell staff not to look at her.

You're clearly a fan, so there's no point in going on about this. But I'm quite sick of people getting a free pass to treat those they consider beneath them like shit (to even see people as _beneath them_ and worthy of such treatment!) just because they've earned respect in some _other _way.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the various demands for staff not to speak to her or even look at her. It's possible to wave this away as _oh well it's not the worst thing ever_ - which is what people have been doing about MJ for decades btw - but the fact is she's horrible to her staff and the staff of places she stays, because she can be. But because some people (eg your good self) look up to her as a champion of female empowerment, it's OK to tell staff not to look at her.
> 
> You're clearly a fan, so there's no point in going on about this. But I'm quite sick of people getting a free pass to treat those they consider beneath them like shit (to even see people as _beneath them_ and worthy of such treatment!) just because they've earned respect in some _other _way.


I’m not a fan of Streisand,you just make a lot of allegations based on gossip and you present no evidence to back up your claims. I object to that this is what counts as fact on social media now, it’s all about the feels and not about evidence. Yup, Streisand has a rep for being demanding, humorless and not that cuddly but you framing this as abuse and equating her with Jackson, is ridiculous. 


I don’t read gossip rags but I know my way around film history and theory and how Streisand is regarded in that culture. Try to shit talk Streisand on feminist film twitter and see what responses to get there.

Sorry can’t be arsed to argue on that level.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

I mean, she definitely did just say some pretty evil stuff about the Jackson case, so not too upset about casting aspersions on her character.

I'd love to see what kind of house she lives in...


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## D'wards (Mar 23, 2019)

Favelado said:


> I'd love to see what kind of house she lives in...


Shopping mall an all


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> I’m not a fan of Streisand,you just make a lot of allegations based on gossip and you present no evidence to back up your claims. I object to that this is what counts as fact on social media now, it’s all about the feels and not about evidence. Yup, Streisand has a rep for being demanding, humorless and not that cuddly but you framing this as abuse is ridiculous.
> 
> 
> I don’t read gossip rags but I know my way around film history and theory and how Streisand is regarded in that culture. Try to shit talk Streisand on feminist film twitter and see what responses to get there.
> ...



Fine, but for me this is not a question of identity but of class (as in ruling -vs- working).

EtA, I'm not backing up with evidence the well-known fact that Barbara Streisand is awful to people who work for her. She's not the only one either, plenty of bosses are abusive to ''their'' staff in countless ways, it's about creating and maintaining social power relations. I don't care about her tbh, don't like her voice or the songs she sings, but she's out there defending a child abuser and smearing the victims / survivors of that abuse. It appears to be quite in-character.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

SheilaNaGig said:


> How is “survivor” problematic?
> 
> I adopted “survivor” when I decided and realised that didn’t want to self identity as a victim.
> 
> ...


I thought I explained that in the post before.

As I said, I have no problem with how people self identify but due to the reasons I gave, I’m no fan how this has become the default term for abuse victims in the media.


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## Micro (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> I’m no fan how this has become the default term for abuse victims in the media.



Has it though?


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> Fine, but for me this is not a question of identity but of class (as in ruling -vs- working).
> 
> EtA, I'm not backing up with evidence the well-known fact that Barbara Streisand is awful to people who work for her. She's not the only one either, plenty of bosses are abusive to ''their'' staff in countless ways, it's about creating and maintaining social power relations. I don't care about her tbh, don't like her voice or the songs she sings, but she's out there defending a child abuser and smearing the victims / survivors of that abuse. It appears to be quite in-character.



I’m still not on board with you passing off rumors and gossip as “well-known facts” no matter how often you repeat it.

Mildly bored and with time on my hands while waiting for someone who is late, I’ve now had a look about Streisand’s apparently abusive behavior online. When celebs treat staff poorly there are trails of gossip, lists of “most awful” where the usual suspects turn up over and over, Reddit threads and there are lawsuits. There is zilch in regard to Streisand. The worst I could unearth is an Evening Standard article on a trash talking biography obsessed with her sex life (she was a slut, apparently!), which no doubt was earning its writer a good living. She demands peach toilet paper wherever she stays, if you trust that as a reliable journalistic source. The most recent stuff on her professional behavior are interviews with Seth Rogen, talking about how after being intimidated by her reputation, how surpringly fun and easygoing she was to work with on their film together and that she bought everybody bagels.

I’m actually more irritated by the virtue signalling social media orgy of condemnation that ensues, than by the latest celebrity statement to cause offence. The attitude that a person now is entirely defined by a poorly worded statement. It’s become an almost daily ritual of people whipping themselves into a righteous frenzy. It’s the relentless narcissism social media feeds rather than saying anything of value, a selfie of ones righteous soul. “I condemn child abuse in the sternest way possible and here is my outrage” How controversial ! “I oppose someone not coming out in clear enough condemnation of an abuser” Lovely, have a medal for being a superior human being!

So congrats, you never liked her anyway. Apparently your superior tastes have morally inoculated you.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

But christ. Noone except you is getting upset and, again, she said something dodgy that others have merely criticised. All the other stuff you've brought into the thread is true or not true, but it is irrelevant.

She thinks that Jackson's alleged abuse was fairly trifling. People said "what a nobhead".

Fair enough.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

Favelado said:


> But christ. Noone except you is getting upset and, again, she said something dodgy that others have merely criticised. All the other stuff you've brought into the thread is true or not true, but it is irrelevant.
> 
> She thinks that Jackson's alleged abuse was fairly trifling. People said "what a nobhead".
> 
> Fair enough.


I objected to mojo pixy claiming Streisand was a fellow abuser, equating unsubstantiated claims of her mistreating staff, with Jackson’s abuse. It pisses me off when people cite non-existent “facts” ( the social media tactic which got us Trump and Brexit and whatever next) and it’s also trivialising actual abuse.

That got me thinking of the social media outrage culture and how a long running misogynist narrative about Streisand, is now being spun as her always having been a bad apple.

Feel free to engage with any of that or simply ignore. It’s a discussion board after all.

I agree that she was a being nobhead, but what I’ve seen here and on social media are more extreme accusations.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

There do seem to be a fair number of reports from hotel staff and decorators that she insists on not being looked in the eye. There's one that says she insisted on hotel staff walking backwards away from her, presumably heads bowed. That's pretty disgusting if true.

The same names crop up again and again. J-Lo - Streisand et al.


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## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Was she ever abusive ? She has a reputation of being a control freak and no doubt she is narcissistic in a way most superstars are, but I have never heard of Streisand being abusive beyond Diva-level behavior and certainly not sexually so. As a rising star in the she was a trailblazer for holding on to her Jewish identity instead of playing it down like every Jewish movie star who came before. She used her power as a movie star and singer to carve out a respectable career behind the camera and got a lot of misogynist shit for it, the type of which a Clint Eastwood never got for doing the same. Politically she's certainly never been controversial, supporting various liberal, environmental and civil rights causes.
> 
> What she said here is troubling but I'm also not ready to join in with the mob to crucify her on behalf of three sentences. I'm certainly not ready to equate one ill advised statement with Jackson's crimes. Maybe it's outrage fatigue, but every time a celeb opens their mouth to say something that's considered unacceptable, I'm just as troubled by the Internet's habit to go ballistic in response.
> 
> ...



It's not up for interpretation. She said they were thrilled to be there and it wasn't Jackson's fault. I don't care if she's a diva or an angel, it's an incredibly shitty point of view.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

Favelado said:


> There do seem to be a fair number of reports from hotel staff and decorators that she insists on not being looked in the eye. There's one that says she insisted on hotel staff walking backwards away from her, presumably heads bowed. That's pretty disgusting if true.
> 
> The same names crop up again and again. J-Lo - Streisand et al.


Yup, that’s the Evening Standard article I referred to above, citing a slut shaming, sensationalist biography written to make a buck. I don’t see Streisand’s name cropping up again and again in regard to “abusing” staff. 

She has a reputation for being “difficult” as in standing her ground with her equals when it comes to creative choices. That gets lazily conflated with the poor anger management antics of a Mariah Carey or J-Lo. Sure, she can afford expensive hotels and can expect a certain degree of service, like peach loonpaper if she wishes. The no-eye contact trope has been ascribed to lots of stars and frequently has been bullshit. It almost feels obligatory to throw that in with a gossipy tell-all biography.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Yup, that’s the Evening Standard article I referred to above, citing a slut shaming, sensationalist biography written to make a buck. I don’t see Streisand’s name cropping up again and again in regard to “abusing” staff.



No it isn't.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

There's stuff on the internet dating back to 2000 on the subject. Reports cropping up every couple of years from various staff at various locations about her not wanting to be looked in the eye. If the book is the one that came out in 2017, it's only confirming the stuff that people have spent a pair of decades saying about her.

You claim not to be a fan - are you sure? What's rattling you so much about this?


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Seth Rogen



Not what I'm talking about at all, you keep talking about how someone acts with people they consider their equals. I'm talking about how someone acts with people they consider ''theirs''.



Reno said:


> So congrats, you never liked her anyway. Apparently your superior tastes have morally inoculated you.



This is silly ad-hominem stuff. I was making the point I have no skin in the Barbara Streisand game, and by the way my tastes in music are as far as I know generally considered mostly bad by people I know.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

Favelado said:


> There's stuff on the internet dating back to 2000 on the subject. Reports cropping up every couple of years from various staff at various locations about her not wanting to be looked in the eye. If the book is the one that came out in 2017, it's only confirming the stuff that people have spent a pair of decades saying about her.
> 
> You claim not to be a fan - are you sure? What's rattling you so much about this?


Current discourse on social media is what’s rattling me about this. How everything has to be either black or white and how people position themselves in regard to famous people’s major or minor moral failings. The instant rush to judgement and the flaunting of a superior moral position for all to see.

And no, I’m not that much of a Streisand fan but I have respect for her talent and she was a trailblazer for women and especially Jewish women in film. Until fairly recently the reputations of women in the industry who tried to break out of the cookie cutter role assigned to them, have often been under attack and their achievements have been diminished. Streisand certainly is one such case. I find that more troubling than tittle tattle about Streisand’s apparent demands when she books herself into an expensive hotel.

The no-eye-contact thing is a common celebrity demand and has to do with famous people getting stared at all the time as soon as they are in public. They never have anonymity. Ever been on the tube and catch someone staring at you ? It’s weirdly intimate and unpleasant. Now multiply that by however many people are around at all times. For me that’s the main reason why I would never want to be famous. I suppose when you pay a shitload of money for a luxury hotel with all the trimmings, you can buy anonymity and ask for staff not to stare or make eye contact. That may seem eccentric and I hope that’s not the way I would deal with it but wanting a respite from this constant attention is not abuse. If this is something stars demands from her personal staff, then then no doubt that will be in the contract and they can take of leave the job.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

Okay, but it's a multi-millionaire treating the working class like servants. If she made hotel workers walk backwards away from her with their heads bowed. Do we want trails blazed by people who do good things but treat ordinary people like scum, and defend abuse? Surely there are people better than her who did the same thing and aren't nasty inside.

You've spent a lot of time defending her on grounds of identity. It seem pretty irrelevant here.

The point about eye contact for normal people by the way. It's weird in London, where people have a very abnormal attitude to human interaction, but I've lived in other cities where people can handle it just fine. I'm sorry that you too would ask for staff not to make eye contact with you if you were famous. Seems a bit sad.

I'd say hi to them if I was in a good mood, and politely ask for a little privacy if I wasn't.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 23, 2019)

This is a very silly argument over Streisand. Not sure why anybody should care what she thinks about anything, and I personally don't give two fucks either way about her, but to repeat the bit Yossarian picked out, she said:



> "His sexual needs were his sexual needs, coming from whatever childhood he has or whatever DNA he has," she said. "You can say 'molested,' but those children, as you heard say [the grown-up Robson and Safechuck], they were thrilled to be there. They both married and they both have children, so it didn't kill them."



That's vile by any standards from anyone. Jaw-droppingly idiotic and ignorant. Rarely have I read such a concentration of wrongness in such a short set of words.


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## D'wards (Mar 23, 2019)

The woman has a personal shopping mall in her basement. 

She said goodbye to normality a long time ago


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## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

I don't know what on earth whether Barbra Streisand treats her staff like Roman slaves had to do with whether it's ok to say what she said.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

Favelado said:


> Okay, but it's a multi-millionaire treating the working class like servants. If she made hotel workers walk backwards away from her with their heads bowed. Do we want trails blazed by people who do good things but treat ordinary people like scum, and defend abuse? Surely there are people better than her who did the same thing and aren't nasty inside.
> 
> You've spent a lot of time defending her on grounds of identity. It seem pretty irrelevant here.
> 
> ...



When you work at a hotel, your job literally is being a servant.

I don’t care how you deal with brief casual eye contact, thats not the same as being stared at by everybody all the time as soon as you are out in public. I would find that deeply unsettling.

I always think it’s good to make an attempt to understand why someone did or said something wrong rather than instantly grabbing a pitch fork and joining the mob. What is ever to be gained from that ?


----------



## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> When you work at a hotel, your job is being a servant.
> 
> I don’t care how you deal with brief casual eye contact, thats not the same as being stared at by everybody all the time as soon as you are out in public. I would find that deeply unsettling.
> 
> I always think it’s good to make an attempt to understand why someone did or said something wrong rather than instantly grabbing a pitch fork and joining the mob.



What justification have you come up with for her saying that it was no big deal for Jackson to abuse those boys then? 

She said it because he was her friend and she can't handle the idea that he might not have been a good person. That's the reason people say that sort of thing. No need to say she said it because... she tells staff not to make eye contact?


----------



## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

scifisam said:


> What justification have you come up with for her saying that it was no big deal for Jackson to abuse those boys then?
> 
> She said it because he was her friend and she can't handle the idea that he might not have been a good person. That's the reason people say that sort of thing. No need to say she said it because... she tells staff not to make eye contact?


I wrote about that in my first post on this, can’t be bothered to repeat myself because you can’t be bothered to read a couple of pages back.

I don’t think anybody here, including me, agrees with or approves of what she said.


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## Favelado (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> When you work at a hotel, your job literally is being a servant.
> 
> QUOTE]
> When you work at a hotel, you are still a human, worthy of being treated with respect and dignity.


----------



## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> I wrote about that in my first post on this, can’t be bothered to repeat myself because you can’t be bothered to read a couple of pages back.
> 
> I don’t think anybody here, including me, agrees with or approves of what she said.



No, I read it, thanks (rude bastard), and you didn't have any rationale at all.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

scifisam said:


> No, I read it, thanks (rude bastard), and you didn't have any rationale at all.


Yes I did and fuck you too.


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## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> Yes I did and fuck you too.



WTF is wrong with you? Have a look at yourself, spending ages defending Streisand for saying something so vile then telling me to fuck off. 

Christ, I wander back onto urban briefly and get reminded pretty quickly why I don't post much any more.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> When you work at a hotel, your job literally is being a servant.



No, the job is _providing a service_. _Being a servant _isn't the same at all.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

scifisam said:


> WTF is wrong with you? Have a look at yourself, spending ages defending Streisand for saying something so vile then telling me to fuck off.
> 
> Christ, I wander back onto urban briefly and get reminded pretty quickly why I don't post much any more.


I never defended Streisand for what she said. You have just proven everything I’ve think is wrong with this type of discourse on social media. As soon as anything touches child abuse, you are not allowed to argue with nuance. All you are allowed do is to shriek at the top of your voice that child abuse is a bad thing. Everybody who tries to understand why someone says something as stupid as what Streisand said is “vile”.

Thanks, I’ve had enough of this myself.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 23, 2019)

She said something vile, and by all accounts she's a quite vile person IRL so whodathunkit basically. There may well be nuance in there to be found but it's probably not worth the effort.


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## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> I never defended Streisand for what she said. You have just proven everything I’ve think is wrong with this type of discourse on social media. As soon as anything touches child abuse, you are not allowed to argue with nuance. All you are allowed do is to shriek at the top of your voice that child abuse is a bad thing. Everybody who tries to understand why someone says something as stupid as what Streisand said is “vile”.
> 
> Thanks, I’ve had enough of this myself.



If you're not defending Streisand then WTF are you doing? There's no nuance to what she said, there's no excuse for saying it. You don't need to "shriek at the top of your voice" that child abuse is bad to acknowledge that.

You said, and I quote, "what she said is up for interpretation." That is defending her. You claimed things might have been left out (even though they haven't). You claimed that talking about Jackson's needs could be seen as neutral. No, it can't. 

Honestly, you can totally fuck off. Defending that as _neutral_. I've never had a problem with you but that is a sick thing to say and if you don't realise it then you have a serious problem.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> I never defended Streisand for what she said. You have just proven everything I’ve think is wrong with this type of discourse on social media. As soon as anything touches child abuse, you are not allowed to argue with nuance. All you are allowed do is to shriek at the top of your voice that child abuse is a bad thing. Everybody who tries to understand why someone says something as stupid as what Streisand said is “vile”.
> 
> Thanks, I’ve had enough of this myself.


I think sam has produced the best bit of attempting to understand why she said what she did:



> She said it because he was her friend and she can't handle the idea that he might not have been a good person. That's the reason people say that sort of thing.


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## danny la rouge (Mar 23, 2019)




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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> I think sam has produced the best bit of attempting to understand why she said what she did:


How is that more insightful the first thing I said on the matter several pages back, which sam has just claimed had no rationale to it at all:

“Streisand knew Jackson personally and may have felt sorry for him, being fucked up beyond belief and maybe those feelings aren't that easy to switch off. Maybe she's working though stuff in regard to Jackson to get there, maybe stuff has been taken out of context, maybe she just had an off-day. She fucked up publicly but I don't think that makes her a monster on the same level as Jackson.”

Unlike him I didn’t claim that they were friends, because that they were not.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

scifisam said:


> If you're not defending Streisand then WTF are you doing? There's no nuance to what she said, there's no excuse for saying it. You don't need to "shriek at the top of your voice" that child abuse is bad to acknowledge that.
> 
> You said, and I quote, "what she said is up for interpretation." That is defending her. You claimed things might have been left out (even though they haven't). You claimed that talking about Jackson's needs could be seen as neutral. No, it can't.
> 
> Honestly, you can totally fuck off. Defending that as _neutral_. I've never had a problem with you but that is a sick thing to say and if you don't realise it then you have a serious problem.


Get a grip FFS.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

mojo pixy said:


> She said something vile, and by all accounts she's a quite vile person IRL so whodathunkit basically. There may well be nuance in there to be found but it's probably not worth the effort.


That’s where we differ. I think it’s always worth the effort.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> How is that more insightful the first thing I said on the matter several pages back, which sam has just claimed had no rationale to it at all:
> 
> “Streisand knew Jackson personally and may have felt sorry for him, being fucked up beyond belief and maybe those feelings aren't that easy to switch off. Maybe she's working though stuff in regard to Jackson to get there, maybe stuff has been taken out of context, maybe she just had an off-day. She fucked up publicly but I don't think that makes her a monster on the same level as Jackson.”
> 
> Unlike him I didn’t claim that they were friends, because that they were not.


Cos you wrote 'maybe she just had an off-day'. All too easy to find yourself excusing paedophiles when you're feeling grumpy?  Maybe not the best approach to seek to downplay what were pretty unambiguous words. 

Sam's a her, btw.


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## Reno (Mar 23, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> Cos you wrote 'maybe she just had an off-day'. All too easy to find yourself excusing paedophiles when you're feeling grumpy?  Maybe not the best approach to seek to downplay what were pretty unambiguous words.
> 
> Sam's a her, btw.


How does that void the other two possibilities, especially if you combine 1 or 2 with 3 ? People are caught off guard by questions in interviews all the time and talk shit.


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## scifisam (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> How does that void the other two possibilities, especially if you combine 1 or 2 with 3 ? People are caught off guard by questions in interviews all the time and talk shit.



Because the thing is, to say something like she said, you have to think it first. She had the thought that it was not a big deal for him to have abused those boys. 

There can be ridiculous over-reactions to what celebs say on the internet, but this particular statement really is vile - it's not mis-speaking, it's not a bad day, it's not thinking out loud, it's indefensible. It's a bit weird to defend her because _other_ celebs have been unfairly piled on.


----------



## existentialist (Mar 23, 2019)

Reno said:


> It's a few sentences in the Evening Standard. It reads like there is stuff missing. She acknowledges that the boys were molested even if she does so too hesitantly, she blames the parents, she claims that the boys were thrilled to be there and in some way benefited from their association with Jackson. All of that is acknowledged by the two Jackson accusers and their families in the documentary.


So...she - apparently - "grudgingly" acknowledges sexual abuse of the children. And somehow, the fact that the boys were "thrilled to be there and in some way benefited from their association with Jackson" in some way MITIGATES this?

Look. I'm generally reluctant to play my own abuse survivor card too freely, but this is pretty sickening bullshit. My abuser (one of them) had a fabulous model railway set, and my 7 year old self was fascinated enough by that. The fact that the consequence of being interested in that model railway meant that I got abused wasn't part of some clever and nuanced calculation I made. That's the fucking POINT about sexual abuse - it's perpetrated against people who aren't in a position, psychologically or developmentally, to make the kind of equivalences that enable them to stay safe. You don't hold kids liable for what adults do to fuck them up - and, trust me, it fucks them up - just because they apparently enjoyed some of the, ah (urgh) "fringe benefits". Take it from me, there was NOTHING about the abuse that I appreciated or enjoyed, model railways or not. Feel free to tell *me* to my face that there must have been... 

And, on the question of "benefiting from association"...I got to sing at a number of really quite prestigious concerts at the Purcell Rooms on the South Bank. I sang at St George's Chapel in Windsor Castle, and at a number of other events at which significant notables were present. Believe me when I tell you that all that "benefit" was nothing compared to the price I've paid for being a victim of abuse for all those years in my childhood.



Reno said:


> Where it gets problematic is in her statement that "they didn't die" though personally, I have problems with the term "abuse survivor" myself. It implies that either their abuser intended to kill them or that they were bound to go on to kill themselves, neither is necessarily the case. What happened to them is not the same as being murdered, which is no accuse for the abuse. But they have the chance to rebuild their life and in the documentary they look like they are on the mend. The statement about Jackson's "needs" is very unfortunate but one that can be taken as neutral in a situation where one can't be seen to be neutral.


Fuck you. I may not have "died" as a result of my abuse. But I fucking well died a bit inside each time it happened. And, getting on for half a century later, those internal deaths are still a festering lump of dead tissue in my psyche that have fucked up two marriages, my own self-image, and god knows how many relationships along the way. Don't give me your apologist bullshit about how it wasn't all that bad - I have spent significant portions of my life *wishing* I was fucking dead, but lacking the will to do anything about that - the only reason I am alive and as functional as I am is down to my own sheer bloody-mindedness, and a strong urge to survive, and those cunts can claim no part of that, so don't even try to on their behalf. There are bits of me I can prod and get no feeling from. Those bits ARE dead. And it was people, people just like Michael fucking Jackson, who killed those bits. It doesn't matter whether my abusers decided that I might or might not want to kill myself - the point is that they took what they wanted with nary a thought about what effect on me that might happen.



Reno said:


> Streisand knew Jackson personally and may have felt sorry for him, being fucked up beyond belief and maybe those feelings aren't that easy to switch off. Maybe she's working though stuff in regard to Jackson to get there, maybe stuff has been taken out of context, maybe she just had an off-day. She fucked up publicly but I don't think that makes her a monster on the same level as Jackson.


It was people doing what Streisand is doing today that made children like me feel less able to tell someone what was happening to them. I think the idea that this "makes her a monster on the same level as Jackson" is a straw man - nobody's suggesting that, specifically. But her willingness to excuse and justify his abuse of children makes her part of the problem, not part of the solution. And she can stand or fall by that, as far as I am concerned. Fall, preferably.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 23, 2019)

Well said. 

Sorry it needed saying.


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## Reno (Mar 24, 2019)

Edited


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

Sorry you had such a rough abusive childhood Reno. It takes courage to talk about it and you and existentialist are both very courageous people to be able to write about what happened to you. 

 I'm glad Streisand has apologised and that she sees how objectionable her comments were. She didn't really think about the boys he abused...at all. It's as if she didn't care about the fact MJ abused 7 or olds because she knew him as a friend. She was defending her memory of her friend instead of realising that Michael Jackson was a walking lie. He lied about who and what he was all his life. And nobody can defend that lie because it damaged the most vulnerable of all; the kids he spent all his time encouraging to stay with him. The kids he attracted to his home with carnivals and games and fun things to do. All the things kids love. He entrapped children. Sifted through them, chose ones he was sexually attracted to, groomed them, raped and abused them. And they were so manipulated and awestruck as to think this abuse was a way to show love. He was fucked up but he fucking knew what he was doing was wrong. 

Sexual manipulation to abuse and grooming is the most fucked up thing anyone can do to a child. And Streisand is thick as shit and worse, to say what she said.  She has obviously been advised to apologise but really it's too late.


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## ash (Mar 24, 2019)

Can anyone help:
Why do teenagers want him to be innocent ??? It’s not just my 14 year old - speaking to other parents  with kids in different schools and locations the ‘justice for Michael’ is a big thing


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

ash said:


> Can anyone help:
> Why do teenagers want him to be innocent ??? It’s not just my 14 year old - speaking to other parents  with kids in different schools and locations the ‘justice for Michael’ is a big thing



Because nobody likes their hero to have feet of clay. 
In order to accept that he was a manipulative groomer and abuser of kids they have to accept that all the "magic" that was "MJ superstar" was one massive lie.


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

Lupa said:


> Sorry you had such a rough abusive childhood Reno. It takes courage to talk about it and you and existentialist are both very courageous people to be able to write about what happened to you.
> 
> I'm glad Streisand has apologised and that she sees how objectionable her comments were. She didn't really think about the boys he abused...at all. It's as if she didn't care about the fact MJ abused 7 or olds because she knew him as a friend. She was defending her memory of her friend instead of realising that Michael Jackson was a walking lie. He lied about who and what he was all his life. And nobody can defend that lie because it damaged the most vulnerable of all; the kids he spent all his time encouraging to stay with him. The kids he attracted to his home with carnivals and games and fun things to do. All the things kids love. He entrapped children. Sifted through them, chose ones he was sexually attracted to, groomed them, raped and abused them. And they were so manipulated and awestruck as to think this abuse was a way to show love. He was fucked up but he fucking knew what he was doing was wrong.
> 
> Sexual manipulation to abuse and grooming is the most fucked up thing anyone can do to a child. And Streisand is thick as shit and worse, to say what she said.  She has obviously been advised to apologise but really it's too late.



Does this need repeating over and over? What is the point of this?

This is exactly what Reno objects to, and me too actually. This constant moral condemnation, over and over and over and over.

And this narrative that talking about abuse in public is somehow courageous. Perhaps it also takes courage to not talk about it and keep it private.


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## Oula (Mar 24, 2019)

Following on people not wanting their hero tarnished - I'm struggling with what to say to my 7 year old about the whole thing. He is a massive fan. We went to see Thriller at Xmas and he went dressed as MJ and was dancing in the aisles. The cast noticed him and called him up to the front. It makes me feel very uncomfortable to know that's how the abuse of one of the boys started with the real MJ. I also feel guilty that I introduced my son to his music.

A while back he asked if he could watch the Oprah interview with MJ and I said no. When he asked why, I said "because I don't think he had a very happy life and I don't think you should think about that, I think you should just enjoy the music". That was because I thought he'd be talking about his dad beating him in the interview. I don't feel that response covers the situation now.

I've never talked to my son about sexual abuse. I've told him his body is his own and he decides who touches it, that sort of thing. But never told him what some adults do to kids.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> Does this need repeating over and over? What is the point of this?
> 
> This is exactly what Reno objects to, and me too actually. This constant moral condemnation, over and over and over and over.
> 
> And this narrative that talking about abuse in public is somehow courageous. Perhaps it also takes courage to not talk about it and keep it private.



What exactly are you objecting to?
It's not about morals.
It is a crime to groom and abuse kids.

And yes...it takes a lot of courage for a person to talk about the abuse they went through. And it is up to each abused person to decide for themselves whether they want to open up about it or not.

This is a forum. Its designed for the purpose of people sharing thoughts and ideas and being open to discussion. If you've got a problem with reading those thoughts and ideas then maybe ignore the thread?

And btw.. I didn't condemn Streisand. I said I was glad she had apologised. She obviously recognised that her comments were offensive and worse. 
But I'll stand by my assessment that to say what she said was thick as shit .


----------



## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

Lupa said:


> What exactly are you objecting to?
> It's not about morals.
> It is a crime to groom and abuse kids.
> 
> ...



We know it's a crime. Everyone here knows that. Therefore its not about our need to know, because we know that already, it's about your need to let people know how awful you find it. 

Yes it can take courage. And it can also take courage not to talk about it and use different ways of managing. That's my point. One isn't necessarily more courageous that the other. 

tbh I think you're right, I don't think this place is for me anymore, hasn't been for ages, but not for the reasons you suggest.


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## existentialist (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> Yes it can take courage. And it can also take courage not to talk about it and use different ways of managing. That's my point. One isn't necessarily more courageous that the other.


There's an implication to that I don't much care for. I think it's true to say that for most survivors/victims of abuse, being heard (and believed) is a very important part of their recovery. That doesn't have to be in a public forum, but sometimes it happens that it is.

And the other thing that is important - I have my own reasons for knowing this - is that sharing one's own experiences helps reduce the shame and isolation other survivors/victims feel, and can encourage them to start overcoming the negative consequences of their experience.

I can't really see how anyone can have a particular problem with that .

But I am generally in agreement about the idea that talking about one's experience of abuse doesn't _have_ to be courageous. I spent 40 years having the courage not to talk about it...I guess I must have just run out of courage


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

existentialist said:


> There's an implication to that I don't much care for. I think it's true to say that for most survivors/victims of abuse, being heard (and believed) is a very important part of their recovery. That doesn't have to be in a public forum, but sometimes it happens that it is.
> 
> And the other thing that is important - I have my own reasons for knowing this - is that sharing one's own experiences helps reduce the shame and isolation other survivors/victims feel, and can encourage them to start overcoming the negative consequences of their experience.
> 
> ...



I don't have a problem with it, I have a problem with the courageous narrative, like the survivor narrative. It's  a media narrative, like battling cancer. There are different types of courage, and it's ok not to be courageous. 

But go ahead and make the worst interpretation of my meaning because it makes you feel right and good.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> We know it's a crime. Everyone here knows that. Therefore its not about our need to know, because we know that already, it's about your need to let people know how awful you find it.



Its not about me at all. 
But to take you up on all the things you think we know that we know. 
There are people in the world who don't know what you and I know. There are kids who don't know that abuse is a crime. There are adults who think it's not a crime and that they are being persecuted for their sexual attraction to little children. 

There are people in this world who deny the holocaust happened too. 

If people stop speak about abuse and start keeping it in then we return to silence. And that is where we become inhuman. 

There are issues that need to be kept in people's consciousness. There are things that happen in this world that cannot and should never be silenced for the sake of someone getting tired of hearing it.

And it's too easy to say "we know enough so stop bringing it up".


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

I didn't say anything of those things. I'm talking quite specifically about this thread, and the repetition of condemnation over and over and over. More specifically, I'm objecting to the 'calling out' of Reno because he doesn't agree with joining in with that.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> I don't have a problem with it, I have a problem with the courageous narrative, like the survivor narrative. It's  a media narrative, like battling cancer. There are different types of courage, and it's ok not to be courageous.
> 
> But go ahead and make the worst interpretation of my meaning because it makes you feel right and good.




It's not really a media "narrative" as such though...is it?
Media happens to be the medium that people are using to talk about their experiences. In the past, people could not tell their story of abuse only once. It had to be told over and over. And they had to face someone and watch as that person judged them and either believed them or didn't. Every time they spoke about it they went through this judgement process. And in those circumstances you could see why people stayed quiet and didn't talk about abuse. 

Thankfully things are different now...and people can open up about what happened to them relatively anonymously if they wish. Most people find that helpful even if those listening or reading are complete strangers. 

I think it takes courage just to live out your life having been abused as a child.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> I didn't say anything of those things. I'm talking quite specifically about this thread, and the repetition of condemnation over and over and over. More specifically, I'm objecting to the 'calling out' of Reno because he doesn't agree with joining in with that.




I didn't call out Reno.


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## scifisam (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> I didn't say anything of those things. I'm talking quite specifically about this thread, and the repetition of condemnation over and over and over. More specifically, I'm objecting to the 'calling out' of Reno because he doesn't agree with joining in with that.



Reno did a lot more than object to Streisand being called out, he defended what Streisand said. 

I'm not really sure what you're on about to be honest. There hasn't been a lot of recreational outrage. People were shocked at someone saying something so horrible in public, but if Reno hasn't posted to defend it there would have been hardly any posts about Streisand at all.


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## TopCat (Mar 24, 2019)

Reno said:


> Was she ever abusive ? She has a reputation of being a control freak and no doubt she is narcissistic in a way most superstars are, but I have never heard of Streisand being abusive beyond Diva-level behavior and certainly not sexually so. As a rising star in the she was a trailblazer for holding on to her Jewish identity instead of playing it down like every Jewish movie star who came before. She used her power as a movie star and singer to carve out a respectable career behind the camera and got a lot of misogynist shit for it, the type of which a Clint Eastwood never got for doing the same. Politically she's certainly never been controversial, supporting various liberal, environmental and civil rights causes.
> 
> What she said here is troubling but I'm also not ready to join in with the mob to crucify her on behalf of three sentences. I'm certainly not ready to equate one ill advised statement with Jackson's crimes. Maybe it's outrage fatigue, but every time a celeb opens their mouth to say something that's considered unacceptable, I'm just as troubled by the Internet's habit to go ballistic in response.
> 
> ...


Fucking hell


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

scifisam said:


> Reno did a lot more than object to Streisand being called out, he defended what Streisand said.



I didn't think he did, I read it as he was saying it wasn't equivalent.


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## TopCat (Mar 24, 2019)

Reno said:


> Even if I may not have articulated it as well as I’d like to, I’ll stick by it. I’d like to add that the word “survivor” is supposed to give a positive spin to something which the victim of abuse may find hard to live up to. It comes with a narrative and a clear path when the fall-out is more complicated that that path allows for.
> 
> Stop Calling Sexual Assault Victims "Survivors" — It's Time to Reclaim the Word Victim


I call myself a survivor as it's hard to resist suicide after being raped at age 8. Hard but for me, not impossible thus far.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

I think what we can learn from all of this is that our musical heroes are the same as the rest of the detritus that we call human beings.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

TopCat said:


> I call myself a survivor as it's hard to resist suicide after being raped at age 8. Hard but for me, not impossible thus far.




(((TopCat )))


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

Lupa said:


> It's not really a media "narrative" as such though...is it?
> Media happens to be the medium that people are using to talk about their experiences. In the past, people could not tell their story of abuse only once. It had to be told over and over. And they had to face someone and watch as that person judged them and either believed them or didn't. Every time they spoke about it they went through this judgement process. And in those circumstances you could see why people stayed quiet and didn't talk about abuse.
> 
> Thankfully things are different now...and people can open up about what happened to them relatively anonymously if they wish. Most people find that helpful even if those listening or reading are complete strangers.
> ...



I wasn't saying people shouldn't talk about their abuse, I didn't say that. And yes it is courageous, I may have worded that badly, but again, other ways require courage too, worthy of equal respect and value.


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## scifisam (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> I didn't think he did, I read it as he was saying it wasn't equivalent.



He really did:

It's a few sentences in the Evening Standard. It reads like there is stuff missing. She acknowledges that the boys were molested even if she does so too hesitantly, she blames the parents, she claims that the boys were thrilled to be there and in some way benefited from their association with Jackson. All of that is acknowledged by the two Jackson accusers and their families in the documentary.

Where it gets problematic is in her statement that "they didn't die" though personally, I have problems with the term "abuse survivor" myself. It implies that either their abuser intended to kill them or that they were bound to go on to kill themselves, neither is necessarily the case. What happened to them is not the same as being murdered, which is no accuse for the abuse. But they have the chance to rebuild their life and in the documentary they look like they are on the mend. The statement about Jackson's "needs" is very unfortunate but one that can be taken as neutral in a situation where one can't be seen to be neutral.


He repeats that the boys were thrilled to be there, as if that excuses anything, and says that talking about Jackson''s "needs" is neutral. I think you can talk about paedophiles having desires/wants in a sort of neutral way, because you don't have to act on desires, but needs are something people have no control over and have to act upon. Rapist apologisers use that word - "a man has needs."

I disagreed with Reno because of that, not out of some sort of virtue signalling, which seems to be the veiled accusation. 

Nobody's got a problem with him saying that Streisand and Jackson aren't equivalent.


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## TopCat (Mar 24, 2019)

existentialist said:


> So...she - apparently - "grudgingly" acknowledges sexual abuse of the children. And somehow, the fact that the boys were "thrilled to be there and in some way benefited from their association with Jackson" in some way MITIGATES this?
> 
> Look. I'm generally reluctant to play my own abuse survivor card too freely, but this is pretty sickening bullshit. My abuser (one of them) had a fabulous model railway set, and my 7 year old self was fascinated enough by that. The fact that the consequence of being interested in that model railway meant that I got abused wasn't part of some clever and nuanced calculation I made. That's the fucking POINT about sexual abuse - it's perpetrated against people who aren't in a position, psychologically or developmentally, to make the kind of equivalences that enable them to stay safe. You don't hold kids liable for what adults do to fuck them up - and, trust me, it fucks them up - just because they apparently enjoyed some of the, ah (urgh) "fringe benefits". Take it from me, there was NOTHING about the abuse that I appreciated or enjoyed, model railways or not. Feel free to tell *me* to my face that there must have been...
> 
> ...


Big love mate.


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## existentialist (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> I don't have a problem with it, I have a problem with the courageous narrative, like the survivor narrative. It's  a media narrative, like battling cancer. There are different types of courage, and it's ok not to be courageous.
> 
> But go ahead and make the worst interpretation of my meaning because it makes you feel right and good.


I actually agree with what you're saying about the "courageous" narrative. But you have a way of putting things, and a prickliness about people's responses, which makes it very difficult to have a positive or purposeful discussion with you. Perhaps _that's_ what you're not liking about this place?


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## TopCat (Mar 24, 2019)

I can make efforts and do so to avoid suicide. So an on going battle. If cancer came willpower don't mean much.


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## TopCat (Mar 24, 2019)

Babs says she feels deep remorse.


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

TopCat said:


> I can make efforts and do so to avoid suicide. So an on going battle. If cancer came willpower don't mean much.



Yes, that is a difference. 

I'm not saying that living with the aftermath of abuse doesn't involve courage but there's a lot of other messy stuff too, less positive, that is very hard to articulate.


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

existentialist said:


> I actually agree with what you're saying about the "courageous" narrative. But you have a way of putting things, and a prickliness about people's responses, which makes it very difficult to have a positive or purposeful discussion with you. Perhaps _that's_ what you're not liking about this place?



No, I don't think so.


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## TopCat (Mar 24, 2019)

Red Cat said:


> Yes, that is a difference.
> 
> I'm not saying that living with the aftermath of abuse doesn't involve courage but there's a lot of other messy stuff too, less positive, that is very hard to articulate.


Try to articulate.


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## Red Cat (Mar 24, 2019)

TopCat said:


> Try to articulate.



I meant that the emotional aspects of living with the effects of abuse are very hard to articulate with words, it's messy, as in not clear so as to be given shape by words, and that the emphasis on the courage needed to speak, while understandable, perhaps, not ignores, but gives less emphasis to the other very painful aspects of experience that can't be put into words. I don't intend to suggest it's an either or kind of thing.

I don't know if that is clearer, it's not easy finding the right words, I think we all make mistakes with that.


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## mojo pixy (Mar 24, 2019)

TopCat said:


> Babs says she feels deep remorse.



Of course she does, she has a big Hyde Park show coming up this summer. Her business management team will have told her exactly how remorseful she needs to be, so as to minimise the impact on sales.


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## Reno (Mar 24, 2019)

scifisam said:


> Reno did a lot more than object to Streisand being called out, he defended what Streisand said.
> 
> I'm not really sure what you're on about to be honest. There hasn't been a lot of recreational outrage. People were shocked at someone saying something so horrible in public, but if Reno hasn't posted to defend it there would have been hardly any posts about Streisand at all.


No, I did not defend what she said, stop fucking slandering me !

I responded to a claim that Streisand as an abuser is the same as Jackson because according to gossip she is not a nice employee/hotel guest. I find that an insult to actual abuse victims. I‘ve had shitty jobs, I left them. My abuse is forever staying with me.

I tried to find a rationale as to why she might have said what she did without her being a total monster. I do believe that people can say the wrong thing when put on the spot, especially when they are still processing a situation. That is not the same as “excusing” what she said. I’ve also written at great length about the documentary and how I feel about the abuse allegations (spoiler alert: I think the are totally credible and devastating) Just because I’m not part of the self-congratulatory social media pitchfork waving crowd does no make me, an abuse victim, an abuse apologist.

So cut it the fuck out !!!


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## Reno (Mar 24, 2019)

TopCat said:


> I call myself a survivor as it's hard to resist suicide after being raped at age 8. Hard but for me, not impossible thus far.


As I’ve said, any abuse victim/survivor should be free to identify whatever they feel fits for them. I have reasons why I feel it’s an inappropriate term for me. It has to do with my objection to the positive thinking ethos and how Its becoming the default in our language to put a positive spin on negative events.  It’s the same with “they’ve passed on” because “they died” somehow is too blunt.

So I’m fine with remaining a victim because I reject the positive narrative tied to “survivor”. Not that I ever describe myself as such because I hardly ever talk about what happened to me, but that would be the term I use.

What about those who can’t live up to that narrative ? Are they a failure ? Disabled people reject the notion that they are inspirational, for just getting on with their lives. They don’t need the extra pressure of living up to being an inspiration to others.


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## Reno (Mar 24, 2019)

I’ve decided to self-ban for a while, being here is not good for my mental health right now. I’ve deleted the very personal post on the previous page for reasons of privacy. There are lurkers on Urban who known me in real life but I’m not close to them, so I don’t want to share that with them.

I’d appreciate if you don’t quote previous posts of mine on this thread without me being able to answer back.

Cheers, see you in a while!


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 24, 2019)

Take care of yourself, Reno.


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## Baronage-Phase (Mar 24, 2019)

littlebabyjesus said:


> Take care of yourself, Reno.




+1


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## danny la rouge (Mar 24, 2019)

Take care, Reno . All the best.


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## Sue (Mar 24, 2019)

(((Reno))) Hope you feel able to come back soon -- we need you on the film threads. X


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## D'wards (Mar 24, 2019)

In a while, crocodile


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## scifisam (Mar 24, 2019)

Yes, take care of yourself. You were defending Streisand and it's a bit weird that you're denying it. 

Think I'll piss off too though since I'm clearly not welcome here, hideous virtue signaler that I am.


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## editor (Mar 24, 2019)

Reno said:


> I’ve decided to self-ban for a while, being here is not good for my mental health right now. I’ve deleted the very personal post on the previous page for reasons of privacy. There are lurkers on Urban who known me in real life but I’m not close to them, so I don’t want to share that with them.
> 
> I’d appreciate if you don’t quote previous posts of mine on this thread without me being able to answer back.
> 
> Cheers, see you in a while!


Hope you're back soon!


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## editor (Mar 24, 2019)

On a different note. Michael Jackson is off my DJ playlist until such a time that the awful allegations are credibly dismissed. Shame, because he recorded some bloody amazing tunes.


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## campanula (Mar 24, 2019)

Reno said:


> I'm not on board with always presuming that sex abusers must have been sexually abused. I'm pretty sure it's more complicated than a theory which makes it sounds like vampirism, this inevitable fate of the abused. Some abusers were, many weren't abused and most of those who were abused, don't go on abusing.
> 
> There has been recent research which proposes that paedophilia is a sexual orientation, which paedophiles can do little about.



I jumped from Reno's post and didn't read any further because it is, I think, entirely fair to examine the often glib claim of recurring and cyclical abuse. Because the corollary of the abuser having been abused must follow that those who have been abused (I have) must grow up to become abusers themselves (I fucking know I haven't).
So, apols if I am being crass or insensitive...but the often repeated claim of repetition down generations is almost as punishing as the dreadful adjustments which have to be made to simply negotiate a life.
Likely backing away now.


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## littlebabyjesus (Mar 24, 2019)

scifisam said:


> Yes, take care of yourself. You were defending Streisand and it's a bit weird that you're denying it.
> 
> Think I'll piss off too though since I'm clearly not welcome here, hideous virtue signaler that I am.


 Not true. fwiw I like both of you enormously. I totally agreed with you on this, but I hope neither of you leave because it was a really stupid argument.


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## existentialist (Mar 25, 2019)

campanula said:


> I jumped from Reno's post and didn't read any further because it is, I think, entirely fair to examine the often glib claim of recurring and cyclical abuse. Because the corollary of the abuser having been abused must follow that those who have been abused (I have) must grow up to become abusers themselves (I fucking know I haven't).
> So, apols if I am being crass or insensitive...but the often repeated claim of repetition down generations is almost as punishing as the dreadful adjustments which have to be made to simply negotiate a life.
> Likely backing away now.


No, you raise an important point, campanula. It can be easy for some people to unthinkingly reverse cause and effect and assume that, if most abusers were abused, then most abused people become abusers, and it is a point which cannot be challenged often enough.

One of the biggest problems is that people often want to "other" sexual abusers and the like - to distance them as far from their own experience as possible. Which means that the whole notion of exploring what the causative factors in people becoming such abusers becomes fraught, because many people don't even want to go there, far less get into some nuanced discussion about how someone whom they would prefer to see as a monster can also have been a victim, too. Effectively, to the simplistic mindset, it becomes an all-or-nothing deal - either you're touched by abuse and thus potentially a monster, or "it never happened to me, guv", and you've never been a victim, and of course you're not a perpetrator.

Real life, as we know, is a bit more complicated. Which is not - and I always end up saying this, but perhaps it isn't necessary - to excuse in any way the behaviour of the perpetrators. Explaining, and exploring the causes of, people becoming abusers is not the same thing as excusing them for being so.


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## TopCat (Mar 25, 2019)

We don't explore the mind sets of other rapists so why do so with MJ? Savile just got vilified once people let the scales fall from their eyes. 
Oh and Jordy Chandler's accusations against MJ were enough for me and how long ago was that?


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## existentialist (Mar 25, 2019)

TopCat said:


> We don't explore the mind sets of other rapists so why do so with MJ? Savile just got vilified once people let the scales fall from their eyes.
> Oh and Jordy Chandler's accusations against MJ were enough for me and how long ago was that?


Who is this "we" of whom you speak?  Part of my own rehabilitation was a wish to try and understand the mindset of my abusers, and by extension, that of people who abuse generally. I cannot pretend that I have been hugely successful in this, but I've learned a lot along the way.

And part of my desire to do that was my own internalisation of the abused/abuser duality myth - I wanted to know what made me, as an abuse survivor, different from my abusers, who, for all I know, were also abuse survivors. I didn't get very far with that, but nobody can say I didn't try


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## Micro (Mar 25, 2019)

TopCat said:


> We don't explore the mind sets of other rapists so why do so with MJ? Savile just got vilified once people let the scales fall from their eyes.
> Oh and Jordy Chandler's accusations against MJ were enough for me and how long ago was that?



Documentaries and books about what makes rapists and serial killers tick are hugely popular. There were several on Saville.


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## rekil (Mar 27, 2019)

scifisam said:


> Yes, take care of yourself. You were defending Streisand and it's a bit weird that you're denying it.
> 
> Think I'll piss off too though since I'm clearly not welcome here, hideous virtue signaler that I am.


How nice of mister cinema to deploy the far right term "virtue signalling" which like "globalism" and "cultural marxism" has never been used by anyone other than irredeemable bellends.


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## scifisam (Mar 30, 2019)

copliker said:


> How nice of mister cinema to deploy the far right term "virtue signalling" which like "globalism" and "cultural marxism" has never been used by anyone other than irredeemable bellends.



TBF, he didn't use those terms himself, I don't think. 

Do you know what, it was a bit galling pointing out that someone was defending a paedophile excuser and then seeing them be told come back, we love you! when I got no back up at all and was unfairly called out for supposed virtue signalling when nothing like that was going on. I mean, I like Reno too, but man, I was right (for once) and still nobody backs me up. Just how disliked am I?  But fuck it, today I am bored and it's not all about me anyway. 

Imagine the amount of shit Jackson's current accusers have to live with. Not just them, but their families. And they would have seen very early on how bad it was going to be; that's one of the reasons they testified. No amount of "fame" or money would compensate for the lives they must be living now, harangued online and in real life by MJ fans, forever. They saw it happening to other people and at first they chose not to put themselves through that. Jordy Chandler seems to live under an assumed identity and these accusers already knew what happened to him. What a shitty way to have to exist. 

I do think that speaking out in those circumstances is brave. I don't think that not speaking out is cowardly, though. There's a middle ground.


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