Rupert Lowe’s rape gang enquiry, report published

Thankyou for having common sense.

Charlene Downes is a very sad story. Julie Bindel did some good stuff on this case. The family was problematic and I don’t think we'll ever know the truth.

Things aren’t that good for women and girls?

https://www.gchumanrights.org/preparedness/women-striving-for-gender-equality-in-pakistan-greater-awareness-and-state-support-needed/

The report details horrific stuff

Not what he said and neither of us are mind readers to be able to reliably impute that nuance onto it.

As the history of these isles predate Christianity by some millennia, if he's going to respect that, he should not be trying to force that (other) middle Eastern culture on our citizens. And even if you do think we should import that, you have to decide which flavour because the original arrival wasn't the church of England.

He's a fraud basically.

I don’t think anyone means it should be exclusively white and Christian. More that it should be expected that that is the bedrock of the country due to our history and values, in the way that other countries have bedrock values.

It's a problem because millions of UK citizens (for several generations) are neither white nor christian, and I don't particularly fancy having any of my family or friends deported to meet that idiotic racist stance.

I didn’t even know about this case until it appeared on my feed 5 minutes ago. I always think of poor Charlene Downes and wonder what happened to her. There was also another girl, called Laura, who was murdered by her Pakistani heritage boyfriend in an ‘honour killing’ for ‘bringing shame’ on him with… her presence, I suppose.

Some communities and ethnic groups live across both countries.

We’re talking about Pakistani grooming gangs.

The age of consent for marriage in Pakistan is 16-18 depending on area, and sex outside of marriage is outlawed, so the age of consent for sex is the same age.

The Taliban aren’t in Pakistan.

Islamic marriages aren’t recognised in UK law, which doesn’t undermine the experience of that person whatsoever, except to say that legally - she wasn’t married.

I don’t, and wouldn’t condone the behaviour of any of those men.

But I do think we need to be careful to not apply blanket statements, that aren’t actually true, to situations where they don’t fit.

I think it minimises an argument that should not be minimised.

I can see the point you're making, Sionnach - it's such a pity the victims are being exploited yet again. (Those smiling faces!!! - are on a par with the social worker asking Chloe to "play the part" of a sexually traumatised girl on Emmerdale.)

I suppose the trouble is that more neutral reporting tends to be "politically correct" and therefore seems to pussyfoot around the issues. I liked what you said earlier about treating this as something akin to a Mafia operation, requiring similar strategies to tackle it. But you can't do that if no one will name the target, which there is enormous reluctance to identify clearly (e.g. on here, "it's just MEN!").

Right and in Christianity in modern Britain that medieval practice is completely irrelevant because we have an age of consent here now.

In Afghanistan there is NO age of consent and child marriage still happens every day!!

For them it is NOT historical.

One of the rape gang victims was married to a grown man in a Sharia ceremony at 15 here in the UK, ignoring our laws and using their Shraria law as justification!!

Historically, many religions (including Christianity) actually supported or encouraged child marriage, that isn’t unique to Islam.

Medieval Christian cannon law set the min age at 12 years old for girls. Which I appreciate isn’t 9, but it’s still not adulthood.

Whether women holidaying in Muslim countries can show their ankles has absolutely nothing to do with UK Muslim grooming gangs.

We don’t need to “reach” to make this any worse than it already is. It’s already disgraceful without making parallels that aren’t there.

Yes, agree, it's crazy. I think we need to reassert Western Christian values. I think immigrants would respond well to that because they come from cultures where strength is valued and weakness is despised.

Do you think that the young women and girls in Afghanistan and Pakistan get treated the same as women in France?

No, it’s not “funny,” but it’s also not relevant.

I always find it funny how Muslim countries tend to not bow to this idea that as a countey you have to be open and tolerant to other cultures. Any woman in most muslim countries dressing 'provocativly' would no doubt be arrested. As would a drunk man. Even a gay couple being openly flirtatious.

They do not pander to other cultures on their own soil.

But when they move somewhere everyone has to be respectful of their culture and provide halal options and places to pray and they don't get their women to wear western clothes (like women are advised to cover themselves over there)

Funny isn't it?

What I've found disturbing is everyone's reactions. I think people are overdoing it and losing credibility.

I saw one tweet that said Bonnie Blue became an Only Fans prostitute because... she grew up near....Pakistanis..?

Just lots of hysterical stuff and emotional exaggeration that discredits legitimate concerns made about mass migration. If your only source of news was Twitter you would think Pakistanis are all going around raping everyone in Britain. Its like a very unhelpful wave of Islamaphobia brought about by the Tommy Robinson crowd. Most recent waves of immigrants to the UK come from India, China, Nigeria, Pakistan and Zimbabwe. Yet Tommy Robinson and Restore/Reform love to go on making everything immigrant based about Muslims. Only one of those countries listed is a Muslim one and there's a lot of evidence to suggest on average Muslims commit crime at about the same rate as native whites. Sometimes less so.

If the grooming gang men had been following Islam surely they wouldn't have been consuming drink and drugs and what they call free mixing.

We have got to be really careful here. Is it Islam to blame or is it a cultural problem that seems to run throughout South Asian cultures regardless of religion. Maybe a bit of both? Misogyny is rife in India eg.

The British used to be a reasonable, truth seeking people interested in foreign cultures were becoming parochial paranoid hobbits.

Dubai, a Muslim country, is probably a far safer place to live currently than the UK. Something has gone wrong here

"Lowe wants a white Christian UK, and that, not the wefare of working class girls, is his motivating grievence."

And? Why is that a problem?

Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum is the ruler of Dubai.

Would it be controversial for him to say he wants Dubai to be a Muslim country full of Asians?

What if the leader of an African country said ' we want our country to be black and Christian'

What if the Leader of Japan said they don't want to lose their Japanese culture and want the country to remain mostly Japanese?

You'd think 'yeah, that makes sense. The Japanese people are what makes Japan, Japan. It would be weird to visit Japan and everyone be white and talking with a Liverpudlian accent'

Its not wrong or weird to want Britain to be recognisable as Britain from it's inhabitants!

Lowe seems happy enough with his DIL, he posts about various happy family events occasionally.

He's from a business background where presumably he's met many good immigrants/non-white people and critically, they probably were global elite types who know how to be civilised and integrate into a British workplace. His DIL's family seem to also be global elite types - her father works for a Washington think tank etc. This milieu is not the same as a Rotherham kebab shop...

The online groyper types who follow him have a, er, shall we say wider set of views? "Remigration is the moderate option - get in the boats or get in the ground" is something I've seen quite frequently.

He appears very happy that his son is married to a (presumably) Muslim woman.

But that accounts for nothing, what matter is what you imagine he believes and acts in private?

Exactly this.

They are getting a lot of stick about it on their Facebook pages.

We know that. But as far as I remember nobody has threatened /silenced Giselle Pelicot or shut her down by accusing her of racism.

He had to go online and post on an anonymous forum.
They only had to go through their contacts, talk to their friends or relatives.

Not the same scale. Don't minimise.