I just watched the Walliams programme and...

[Headtorch]

I don't think it was that bad?

Maybe with all the hype I expected it to be on the RB scale, but it isn't.

Undoubtedly a sleaze and probably several cases that could be brought for workplace harassment, but as terrible as I expected. Enough that those companies should refuse to employ him though, which they have, now it's come out.

Which I guess shows how low the bar is.

@kerstina so you're ok with him sexually assaulting a 15 year old?

At least 2 of the women interviewed mentioned how intimidated they were by his size at 6 ft 2 and how he physically towered over them.

Agree with @SheilaFentiman that you have to think of this in context with who he was then with Channel swims and winning awards.

The girls involved mainly seemed to have the sense to avoid him. They are the ones with the power, they are young beautiful girls and we should educate our daughters to realise that.

Sorry, but bollocks. This is magical thinking and victim blaming. One girl gets away from him early enough, he moves onto the next and the next and the next until he gets somewhere. That doesn’t give the “young beautiful girls” power, what power???

Still waiting for that Hollywood star on France who basically admits to drugging and raping a 13 year old to face any kind of justice.

Walliams seems like a nasty, lecherous creep who more or less operated within the law as it stands. Meanwhile Polanski is being applauded for making a new film with Ewan McGregor to critical acclaim after drugging and raping a 13 year old! Seems justice is somewhat selective.

I'm not sure where everyone is getting that this isn't too bad. The last time I was attracted to a 15 year old, I was 15. He's been sexually abusing young teenage girls. I don't even know how to explain it any differently to that, actually. If that statement in itself leaves you thinking it's not that bad then I guess we know why sexual predators feel so empowered to do the things they do.

Walliam’s blatant abuse of the legal system is one of the biggest cases of Streisand effect I’ve ever seen. By trying to desperately hide the media investigation people have been left to speculate for quite a while about what the allegations are, and his threats to kill himself, along with the current atmosphere around the Brand conviction, have led people to assume that he’s committed multiple crimes.

But what he’s done is, of course, totally reprehensible and a disgusting abuse of power, and Im pretty sure more will come out, possibly including criminal charges. What he’s done to those women might have been accepted and even laughed off in the past, but we absolutely need zero tolerance of this kind of behaviour if we are to have a society where women and girls are treated with respect. He’s left a trail of pain and trauma in the wake of his search for sexual gratification with girls and young women.

You don't think it is 'that bad' that a famous, wealthy man uses his fame to groom teenage girls from the age of 15? that he made passes at women in the workplace while his employers (TV executives and publishers) turned a blind eye for the sake of money? or that many of his friends also chose to ignore the fact he was bringing teenagers to parties? or that he then sought to silence the media by using his money to 'buy' an injunction?

Men don't have to commit rape to be exposed as sleazy, exploitative pigs and you need to have a good look at your morals.

This is the theme that has emerged since metoo - fear of speaking up. That needs to change.
I'm heartened to see established women, working in showbusiness and the media, having the courage to expose this shit.

“They are the ones with the power, they are young beautiful girls “

No. men are mostly bigger and stronger. He had the power of his fame and he coerced and manipulated them if the allegations are true. Men are still more likely to be in positions of power. You are basically saying women are responsible for men abusing them because they are so attractive and the poor men can’t help themselves. Wrong. This is victim blaming and doesn’t hold abusers to account.

“Publicly crucifying men who have bipolar , ADHD , anxiety and depression or whatever doesn’t sit well with me.”

This is not what is happening. If the allegations are true (I believe them) - He has behaved in a predatory and abusive way. He has committed child sexusl abuse. He had groomed and coerced young women and a girl into sexual activity using his power. Please don’t use those diagnoses as an explanation for that as you are doing a massive disservice to anyone with those diagnoses. ADHD, bi-polar, anxiety and depression do not cause sexually predatory behaviour, grooming, manipulation, entitlement, coercive control or CSA. Those are not symptoms, they are choices. Had he not been aware they were wrong he’d not have tried to keep it hidden.

“David Williams does seem vulnerable to me for all his money and so called power.”

He may well have vulnerabilities. However, pleading vulnerability is also part of the abusers play book. It’s a common pattern to try and avoid accountability. He is a narcissist I think. And he essentially used these women and girl as objects for his own gratification. He engaged in CSA (if the allegations are true) and there is no excuse for that. Ever.

So if you want, you can continue to be an apologist for abusive male (and it’s not all men, but it’s nearly always men) behaviour and try and maintain the status quo, or you can be part of the solution and call a spade a spade. It’s abuse. And it needs to stop.

He sexually assaulted a minor if the allegations are true. Thats illegal.

form our own opinion rather than jumping on the next witch hunt bandwagon.

The thing about witch hunts? Witches aren’t real.

The thing about investigations into sexual predators? Predators are, regrettably, all too
real.

Gosh, this sounds very much like the first rule of misogyny, namely “women are responsible for what men do” 🙄

Not just the work place. Everywhere. Men should treat women as fellow humans first and foremost every time and self regulate so that physical attraction is communicated respectfully and sexual interactions are only engaged in where there is clear, enthusiastic consent. Men need to stop de-humanising and objectifying women full stop.

I am so tired of all the misogyny on a women's site.

All you have to ask yourself is... is it normal to be interested in girls who are half your age? Or even younger? There's nothing 'not that bad' for a man to be in his 40's chatting up 15, 17 year olds. These are girls more than young enough to be his daughter.

It's really quite vile.

Wow, the bar is in hell isn’t it

Lara Stone is 13 years younger than DW but was 26 when they started dating @kerstina

These NDAs need looking at @SheilaFentiman

Lisa Nandy commented this morning and 5live are asking if there is a 'media problem '. Fucks sake ..no we have a men problem. We have a power problem. We have a patriarchy problem.

I worked in an industry where women were abused because we were a tiny minority. Like Shapi Korsandi who spoke about this culture the other day, young women in the nineties just got on with it. We thought we were empowered by drinking pints and fitting in with the lads, and if things went on we just shuddered and put it down to a bad experience in many cases.

@OffWith my mother encouraged me into a relationship with my teacher which began as soon as I finished my a level exams. She told me she thought he fancied me when she'd been to parent's evening. It was consensual and I thought I was in love with him but I was 17 and he was nearer 30. He'd be in big trouble these days for good reason. Even then he hid our relationship because he knew it was wrong.

The thing I can say that has helped me whenever I have experienced something abusive or inappropriate with a man is when someone has stood up and said it was wrong. Often I didn't even understand I was being mistreated. I know now how much those experiences shaped me. Lucy Beaumont is a good person. So is Shappi Korsandi but we need more. We need a culture where people are afraid for their careers not because they have spoken out but because they haven't.

Surely it’s criminal to have sexual contact with a 15 year old? He sucked her breast and tried to make her touch his erect penis. That’s sexual contact with someone under the age of consent. It’s illegal.

As one of the victims said last night on Newsnight, none of the people he was ‘helping get into the industry’ got any form of job or training or anything of the sort. So then you look at motivation for his pursuit of them, and the allegations of sexual assault and abuse, what other reason is he pursuing teenage girls? Not that bad? Wow. He’s an actual predator. Look at the facts of it. He’d meet, or in some cases see somewhere, a CHILD. He’d then spend time and resources actively tracking them down and send them cards, letters, flowers, and invites. He’d spend ages and ages, sometimes months or years just going back and forth. He had a huge rotating stock of them on the go, and was at different stages of grooming with them all. Then at one point or another, he’d pounce.

The woman on newsnight last night described herself as a vulnerable young woman at the time. She’s the one who looks shocked and gaunt, and sad, in the photo that includes Jonathan Ross and others round a table. DW had been writing to her and communicating with her with no sex involved for ages, he took her for dinners and parties like the one in the photo. When she was 18 she became homeless. He invited her to live with him in a spare room. When she got there, there was no bed in the spare room. He said never mind just sleep in my bed, she refused and slept on the sofa. Every night he’d sit on the sofa with her begging her to sleep in his bed, stroking her legs and touching her, pressuring her to get in his bed with him. He knew she was 18, penniless, was struggling with her mental health, and was homeless. That is grooming. He had been ‘safe’ up to that point, to get to that girl at a vulnerable stage. I don’t see how any version of not that bad is applicable here. He’s a monster.

Arguing there’s worse out there is a bit dodgy.

The fact remains that cultivating teenagers and twenty-somethings who you later don’t sleep with and don’t attack is ick not illegal.

It is when they are 15.

If your 15 year old daughter was alone in a car with a 6 foot 2 man in his 30s and he sexually assaulted her (as the 15 year old claims in the investigation) do you think she would feel scared or feel sorry for him?

What you’re saying is very dangerously close to ‘poor men, they can’t help it’.

Remember a number of the girls he proactively sought out and pursued ‘romantically’ were 15, 16 and 17.

Men who do that are scary.

I think there is much more to come out.
His desperation to silence the press and spend a huge amount on legal ways to do it is very telling.
I'm sure this is just the beginning.

God I watched it and it was awful. Predatory and repeated patterns of abuse of power. Grooming girls and selecting girls who would be vulnerable. Really disgusting. There will be much more coming out about this.

I think it doesn’t sound that bad and doesn’t deserve this level of hysteria. There are plenty of actual criminals perpetuating actual crimes, we should focus on that.