To wonder why no one seems bothered by links to labour MPs + paedophile rights organisation?

[starlady]

The Mail has published new claims about Harriet Harman, Jack Dromey and Patricia Hewitt supporting The paedophile information exchange. Thought it was a rehash of an old story, but I've looked at the evidence published, and it looks as if harriet etc do have some explaining to do. I won't link to the Mail, but the Guardian gives a more nuanced point of view here

www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/feb/20/dailymail-harrietharman
What I'm finding puzzling is twitter is not bothered! And I haven't seen anything on mumsnet. Isn't anyone bothered? No wonder jimmy Saville et al got away with their actions. I am a labour voter myself, so I'm not trying to be partisan and stir up trouble, but the silence on this disturbs me.

'How far do we go when reviewing the events of the past by present day standards?'

Standards of the majority of society have always been the same. It is only a tiny percentage of the population who went against these standards, and the public today have a right to ask questions about why some people were allowed to go against these standards.

This is what John Peel said once and my impression of it is that he thought it was funny.

"Peel, awarded the OBE in 1998, is perhaps best remembered for his Saturday morning programme Home Truths on Radio 4 in which he talked about family life to Middle England.

But as a young man, he worked in Texas as a local radio station DJ and self-appointed ‘Beatles expert’.

When he was older, he recalled some of the ‘perks’ of the job in several newspaper interviews in the Seventies and Eighties.

Girls, some as young as 13, he said, used to queue up outside his studio to offer him sexual favours. ‘Well, of course, I didn’t ask for ID,’ he said.

‘All they wanted me to do was to abuse them sexually which, of course I was only too happy to do.

‘It was the glamour of the job?.?.?.?but frustratingly, American girls of that period — as they do now, actually — had this strange notion of virginity as a tangible thing which you surrendered to your husband on your wedding night.

‘So they would do anything but s you. They’d give you a b before they’d s you.’

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2213621/Claire-McAlpine-A-15-year-old-killed-leaving-diary-naming-DJs-abusers-Disturbing-questions-John-Peel-So-starts-WERE-involved.html

And the problem is that people like John Peel were accorded almost saintly status by many of the great and the good and he was given an OBE.

How on earth could PIE be affiliated to the NCCL?

Did any politicians ask any questions about how PIE could be affiliated to the NCCL?

Why has there been such silence about this? Why aren't senior politicians asking questions about it? Why is it left to a newspaper to place it on the front page every day for 3 or 4 days running and even then why was there such silence?

Claig, I find that disturbing, yes. He must have been well up in his 20s at the time he's describing there. What gives me pause, though, is that I don't think his attitude was all that unusual at the time.

claig, Yes fashion definitely plays a part. Dave Lee Travis is under fire for the comparably 'lesser' offence- that's NOT to say it is ever acceptable, just not as bad- for groping for what I believe to be adult women.

Yet the 'cool' who have had sexual activity with 13-year-old girls get away with it.

Why no lambasting of John Peel or, for that matter, Bill Wyman. A man who had sex with a girl of 13? Because they are 'cool' people amongst those that set the agenda today while Travis is not.

At the end of the day, politicians (at least those from the big 3 parties) are in it together, and don't want to do anything that will bring politics in general into disrepute. Most of the conflict is just for show, at the end of the day they drink in the same bars, eat at the same restaurants, and send their kids to the same schools.

'What gives me pause, though, is that I don't think his attitude was all that unusual at the time.'

But that is even more disturbing, because ordinary parents would have been disgusted by Peel even then and the parents of the young girls in Texas woud have been disgusted by Peel, and yet he could brazenly almost brag about it and he still had an OBE.

How could a climate have been allowed to develop by the great and the good where a paedophile supporting organisation like PIE could have been affiliated to the NCCL for a number of years ?

And why did no one ask any questions about how this could be and why has there been such silence and lack of inquiry about it and why is it only the Daily Mail that is capable of bringing it to the attention of the public so that eventually the silence can no longer be maintained?

Having finally caught up on newsnight and thinking HH and Ed Miliband are missing the mood on this story (because of the anti Mail vibe after the Ralph Miliband story possibly) - I was also amazed to hear that 1000 PIE members were affiliated to NCCL - did I hear that correctly? NCCL had 6000 members and 1000 of which were PIE supporters.

So a sizeable amount of fees paid to NCCl came from this group. HH put that figure at possibly just £10 a year - I can't imagine £10,000 a year was a small sum for a fringe political lobby group like NCCL in the 1970s. My parents bought their house for not much more than that in 1977.

So it might absolutely be the case that toleration of PIE was more about free speech than about defending what PIE stood for - but I wonder if it's also about the money? I'll scratch your back politics.

Any apology for this affiliation now looks like a Daily Mail scalp but this story was covered before by the Telegraph and could have and should have been dealt with then. Her comments post Savile make toleration of PIE seem even more bizarre.

And I'm most definitely no Tory / they have nothing to be smug about today!

I know Patricia Hewitt isn't in office but I wonder how she feels about HH saying this happened before her time at NCCL- because it happened when PH was there.

Very good points sallymanda.

Who decides that these people are cool ?
Who determines our moral standards?
Why did no one speak up about this more forcefully? Why was it allowed to continue?

Why was their silence about it in high quarters and amongst the great and the good?

'I was also amazed to hear that 1000 PIE members were affiliated to NCCL'

No I think that is wrong.

I don't think there has been silence, Claig. As I said upthread, and several other people have said it too, this NCCL/PIE connection has been mentioned in the media many times over the last 30-40 years. I've known about it for a long time and I'm pretty sure I first read about it in Private Eye back in the 80s or 90s.

Teenagers have always been sexually active, haven't they? When they get the chance, that is. Parents back in the 50s and early 60s were keen to restrict their teenagers' sexual activity because of the fear of pregnancy and reducing a girl's marriage prospects, to put it crudely. (Things were less clear cut later on.) However, what's changed in living memory is that it's finally been recognised that no matter how much a 13-year-old pushes for sexual contact, an adult has a responsibility to walk away, because there is a power imbalance which means it can't be a healthy relationship.

Kevin Maguire was on the Sky Press Review programme last night and he mentioned that apparently Private Eye have been reporting on this for a while. He also said "if this was about Conservative cabinet ministers, would the Daily Mail report it? I think they would"

Men, claig, not just men, though, the powerful men of the day.

Think of today's (usually white) middle-aged men, who are their idols? John Peel, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles. All men have idols and, for this generation, these are those idols. And idols can do no wrong, can they?

I'm even going to separate it into labour, conservative or liberal, all these men have the same idols.

Tony Blair and his guitar says it all.

Completely wrong, Sauce, I think. I believe Harman said that 1000 organisations were affiliated to the NCCL and one of them was PIE. The 6000 members is a completely separate point. Those were individuals. The affiliates were organisations.

I'm not even, that should read.

There were 6000 members and 1000 affiliates - some of those were PIE paying a fee to be affiliate

Apologies - my post above isn't accurate.

X post -

sorry everyone - terrible research on my part.

'I don't think there has been silence'

You are right. Everyone knew about it, but no one discussed it.
People hoped it would go away.
The Mail brought it back up and put it on the front page.
Silence.
People hoped the Mail would drop it and it would go away.
The Mail put it on the frontpage again.
Still silence.

Finally, silence could no longer be maintained and now it is discussed at the top of news bulletins on TV channels.

Kudos for admitting that, though!

sallymanda, you are right that these idols are common idols for everyone in the country. They are portrayed as such and some are even given OBEs.

But that is even more disturbing, because ordinary parents would have been disgusted by Peel even then and the parents of the young girls in Texas woud have been disgusted by Peel

Most of the disgust would have been turned on the 13+ year old sexually abused girls.

Haha! There was no debate! I totally misheard!

Brain cross???

Brain cells!!!

I agree, sadly, nauticant. We saw that very recently with the Jeremy Forrest case, didn't we?

And there are now inquiries to see if PIE may have received public funds

Why only now? Someone must have known that it may have been receiving public funds

"Today, almost 35 years later, the contents of The Magpie seem so vile and amoral, and the activities of a lobby group dedicated to advancing the human rights of predatory paedophiles so disgusting, that it’s incredible either was allowed legally to exist at all.

However, it now seems that the Paedophile Information Exchange wasn’t just tolerated by the liberal authorities of the time. There is growing evidence that the era’s Left-wing establishment saw it as a socially acceptable pressure group and actively encouraged its ugly campaigns and sinister public meetings.

Indeed, it emerged this week that the Labour government of the Seventies may even have helped finance the organisation and its morally bankrupt publication The Magpie.

On Sunday, the Home Office announced that it had ordered a ‘thorough, independent investigation’ into shocking allegations that the Paedophile Information Exchange received public funds while James Callaghan was in Downing Street.

It will examine whether tens of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money was funnelled to it via the Voluntary Services Unit [VSU], a department of the Home Office that gave annual grants to charities and non-profit-making lobby groups.

The probe comes after a whistle-blower had claimed the payments were signed off, over several years, by a senior civil servant who worked under Labour’s then Home Secretary, Merlyn Rees."

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2523526/How-Labour-Deputy-Harriet-Harman-shadow-minister-husband-Health-Secretary-Patricia-Hewitt-linked-group-lobbying-right-sex-children.html

Let's hope there is no more silence.