to wonder why everyone is a sex offender....

[gabbymum]

Every day in the papers there seems to be a new one. Most of them seem to relate to events that happened years ago. What is going on?

not 'everyone' of the recent cases.

Stuart Hall. Jimmy Savile.

none of the other recent celebrity cases have been proven guilty, or admitted guilt. Until then, they are innocent.

Can I just ask, when you are all referring to children what age bracket do you mean? I read one of the story Hall stories and she was 15 and he touched her knee, is this one of the children you mean?

"Just because you're a minority voice, it doesn't mean you're a crusader for advanced thinking; you could just be wrong."

This.

Actually b4bunnies, it's not about disagreeing with the majority on MN, it's about you spouting highly offensive and inflammatory comments. As many have said, a child cannot give sexual consent. For you to state she was "asking for it" is wrong. It's a disgusting thing to think, let alone say. Regardless of public opinion, the crap you were spouting was vile, that's why so many have called you on it.

Haven't read the thread. I think the answer is simply crowd behaviour; initially a few people made a complaint about one person and got a "good" result, this inspired others to speak up, and so and more and more people feel encouraged to speak all of a sudden about any unaddressed issue that may have happened in the past 40 years.

I don't know if some posters (and others in the wider world) think that the concepts of consent, rape and sexual assault were invented in 2003 with the sexual offences act of that year.

They weren't.

mrsmango - don't be silly. just because something doesn't suit you its 'offensive'. group outlook. that's all.

were you there? i was? did you hear the week-by-week accounts? i did. did you think nothing of it because no-one else did either? no? then you don't know.

It's offensive because it's offensive, not down to my personal taste. Nothing silly about that. Do you really believe that excusing sexual abuse, and blaming the victim is anything but?

b4bunnies has it occurred to you that if everyone thinks you're talking offensive shite it might actually not be hive mind and therefore you just might be?

Hmmm if you think a child can 'ask for it' and take any blame in the actions of a adult putting that child forwards for sexual contact or an adult engaging in any sexual contact.

Then you are a poor excuse for a decent human being who needs educating because that is child abuse.

b4bunnies how old was your friend?

Not that it matters but I am just wondering.

It's like that kid Roman Polanski raped...I've heard such awful shit . I don't care if she went there stark naked and begged him (which she most definitely did NOT) it would still be rape because she's a child.

The other thing that makes me incredible angry is the stupid 'logic' people use to excuse this. A woman is a 'slut' (not my term, you understand) at 18, say. 'Well, she was just like that at 13, giving hand jobs at the park...' Abused children are groomed, trained, taught how to think about sexual contact by abusers. They can't always just shake that off and think in a healthy way about sex and relationships the moment the abuse ends.

Possibly bunnies friend's mother had been/was being abused. Possibly she was unable to think normally about her and her child's sexuality (or lack thereof). Possibly she has been trained to think that all women and girls have to offer is sex. I don't know. I know that an adult man should know that a child can't consent.

I remember, oh I suppose I was maybe 15? So back in 1980 or thereabouts. There used to be a girl on the school bus, she was 12 pushing 13, for better developed than me or my peers, lookedolder, acted older and she used to get out and about to night clubs. She made no secret of the the fact she was willingly sexually active. Of course we inwardly judged her.

It's only with the benefit of age that you can see what was really happening. I could armchair analyse her now and probably be quite correct in my assumptions of what was happening at home.

People have always been suckered into celebrity. It's like a little snap shot of a glittering world. Some are seduced by it, the hope they will get a little bit of that glitter in their lives, some are somehow frightened by the power celebrities seem to have and are powerless to stop events happening. Yes, some mothers groom their children in that celebrity world (I'm specifically thinking of Mandy Smith here) and vicariously live their lives through their children.

As far as I'm aware, child abuse/paedophilia has always been illegal. But I do think there is a big distinction to be made between abuse and "the way things were". A slap on the arse in 1970, one of those things, get over it, a slap on the arse today - many avenues open to you should you wish to pursue it and you don't have to put up with that behaviour/assault.

It can only be a good thing that we are more open and talk about it and raise the bar on standards of behaviour. That the veil of power that abusers have, has now been lifted and they can't hide behind that celebrity status any longer.

Jumping backwards again to "the way things were", I quite often read auto/biographies and of that 50/60/very early 70's era there is quite often the line "I left home at 15 and moved to London" - presumably because the school leaving age was still 14/15. A lot of those dance troups on TOTP were only 15 and living away from home.

You certainly wouldnt let your daughter do it today, not unchaperoned anyway. But back in the swinging 60's it almost seemed normal to leave home at 15 and seek your fortune in London or Paris.

I defo think these type of things are reported more and taken seriously now. When my dad was younger he said people never heard of things like this. Maybe it was kept hush? Maybe family values have changed and with less close knit communities and families maybe it is easier for people to get away with horrific sexual offences?

We are more open sexually, we discuss things that 99% of the time I think should only be discussed in a bedroom between concenting adults!!

But I also think back then before you had the shift in demographics and the population movement that we have today, we all knew who the "weird bloke" down the road was. You may not have known why he was "weird" but you knew to keep away, if you were told to keep away, you didn't challenge your parents and demand explantions.

To put that in perspective, we had a "weird bloke" next door but one. Doing child like things such as delivering all the Christmas cards, drummed into me to never go into number 55, anyone elses house, fine, but not number 55. I accepted that rule. It wasn't until I was about 23, and next door came charging in in tears because no 55 was standing in her garden with his pants round his ankles masterbating, that I understood why No 55 was out of bounds. Then I found out he had a rather long history of flashing at primary aged girls and masterbating in childrens play areas. My friend moved away very suddenly when I was 6, after the whole garden incident, I then understood why she hadn't said goodbye.

Now if I was having that same conversation with my own children, I would be challenged as to why No 55 is out of bounds, get into some explanation about flashers and so forth. A simple "don't go there" just would not suffice.

So the whole open-ness of sexual activity is right out there on the table. I'm not so sure primary aged children need to know about seedy sex, but I'm sure someone will come along and correct me on that score .

But in opening up sexual talk you have also opened up recourse to help lines, groups, therapy that people wouldn't have known about, had they existed 30/40/50 years ago. Sex was still quite taboo as a topic of conversation when I was growing up - I'd not ever have had a sexual conversation with my mother but I seem to frequently have them with my children.

just read this interesting article www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/03/stuart-hall-savile-victims-voices?INTCMP=SRCH

how old? she'd be fourteen plus.
her mum's background? definitely she'd had some unfortunate experiences.
child abuse apologist? definitely not. not at all. certainly those named individuals with a history of child sex abuse deserve prosecution, no matter how long ago the cases occurred.

but no matter how angry mn is about this or that, it genuinely was different for girls in the 1970s. girls who thought they were 'winning' in the system, the ones who got the attention, took advantage of that. you can make whatever comments you like, that's how it was and shouting about it now won't change it.

"girls who thought they were 'winning' in the system, the ones who got the attention, took advantage of that."

But they weren't winning, were they? The men who were abusing them were. Let's stop focusing on the behaviour of groomed girls and accepting their view of the world then, and focus on the behaviour of the grown, adult men who thought it was OK to fuck children and very young, inexperienced adults.

I wouldn't dream of going to bed with a man under 25 years old, because I'm in my mid 40's. It's legal, there's nothing formally wrong with it and I've had offers, incredibly. But I wouldn't do it, because I'm not a bloody pervert who gets off on having control over a vulnerable younger person and who thinks I have the right to go in and influence their sexuality and attitudes to relationships and sex when they are still finding themselves and should be able to do that without the influence of someone much older and more experienced than them. What is wrong with the men in this scenario?

And this:

"none of the other recent celebrity cases have been proven guilty, or admitted guilt. Until then, they are innocent."

Not necessarily. They're innocent before the law. That doesn't mean they are innocent per se. We don't know if they are innocent or guilty, but the statistical probability is that they are guilty, because the rate of false allegation of sexual crimes is so low - less than 3 or 4%. They have a 90%+ probability of being guilty. Which doesn't mean that they're not innocent (someone has to be in that 6%-ish), but it's statistically unlikely.

Not only am I disgusted by your views on what happened to your 'friend' b4, I am that you cooly continue to defend your standpoint as an apologist to rape. For shame

Wow.you have basically just said that children in the 70's were fair game for sexual predators.

No matter what a child does or says or how they dress no matter what,if a adult has sexual contact with them that adult is in the wrong