Fiona Bruce

[MayThe4th]

If Fiona Bruce had just clarified what was being referred to when talking about Stanley Johnson being guilty of domestic violence that would have been understandable. But to then go on to say that it had only happened once? Did that really need saying?

we all know domestic violence doesn’t start with a broken nose…

It makes you wonder what the current BBC hierarchy would have made Richard Dimbleby say when he reported on the liberation of Belsen. Would they have needed balance?

Or Charles Wheeler reporting on the death of Pieter Fechter.

I actually spelt her name wrongly before so would like to correct the record. Charlotte Wahl.

The victim is dead.

This. She's not a random person-she's supposed to be an expert. She needs to get this sort of thing right.

She's another one in the Tory pocket. That's what makes it so disgusting. She's defending her mates.

There was no balance to explain the ex wife claimed violence happened a lot.

@Firehouse1 I disagree with you on this issue but please stop quoting and @ at me.

She was using what his friends had said to defend him. She didn’t need to reference their defence of him at all. She said it because she’s on his side.

She should lose her job. But she won’t.

That’s interesting. I hadn’t thought about it like this.

I don't agree with your assertion at all. Tell me, why would she defend him?

She said that this was what Stanley Johnson's friends had said, they are hardly likely to be unbiased are and more than likely be predisposed to minimize and downplay his actions

they haven't, instead they have issued a statement basically saying how upset Bruce is and how horrified she feels if this has caused distress to victims and survivors. Women's Aid have been very clear about the wrongness of the "one off "comment

Charlotte Wahl said that Stanley Johnson 'hit me many times, over many years'.

Friends of Stanley Johnson have said it did happen, it was a one off. They simply admitted to the one time that could not be denied.

Why did Fiona Bruce intervene? There was no need to intervene.

Why did Fiona Bruce only see fit to quote the 'friends', rather than the victim, and leave the viewer with the impression that it was a one-off?

Did she receive instructions to intervene? Was she asked to intervene? Was she asked to say what she did which gave a false impression of the extent of the DV and minimised the issue.

Totally agree. I'm very much struggling with that too.

...Fiona Bruce, who has previously campaigned against domestic abuse with us at Women’s Aid and other domestic abuse charities, and has spoken publicly about her friend’s experience of abuse.

Why on eart are people accusing her of being an apologist for DV when she's spent 25 years doing this kind of work?

Come on now, which is most likely...
a) she's an apologist for DV, or
b) she had to interject suddenly with the background to something that a panellist came out with, and did so slightly clumsily?

She was using what his friends had said to defend him. She didn’t need to reference their defence of him at all. She said it because she’s on his side.

@EggBlanket see my post above. Why one earth do you think that someone who has spent 25 years working with DV charities would be on his side?

Looking at the clip again, Fiona’s response is bizarre. She didn’t have to respond the way she did.

She says it’s to give context. She could have said that SJ hasn’t commented but that his late wife wrote about it in her biography and that it’s on record that she was hospitalised with a broken nose. That would give us all the context we need.

No one with even rudimentary knowledge of DV would believe that it was a one-off, so why say it? It doesn’t make sense unless the motive is to trivialise the point the panelist was making about SJs character. And no one who cares about DV as much as she says she does would do that.

metro.co.uk/video/fiona-bruce-refers-stanley-johnson-domestic-abuse-one-off-2894847/?ito=vjs-link

Once more, what FB said was not ad hoc and clumsy. It was an almost direct quote from a newspaper article quoting a section of the book.

Thsi was preprepped (you could see she was reading it). Someone working with DV for 25 years ought to have read that and said WTF , write me something clearer and better to say if I need to interject. I doubt any of us would have said that, even if unprepared and we aren't accomplished journalists and DV charity ambassadors.

Because she’s a raving Tory and her husband is a well known tory donor.

Do you ever listen to her presenting Question Time on radio 4? She’s not in the least bit impartial.

I felt this week that QT is beginning to be so dumbed down it is turning into Jeremy Vine or the Wright Stuff. A little while ago it felt like student debating society. I think it has lost its way in general sadly and this exchange might be in indication of what is wrong with the programme which I think the makers are responsible for and FB is taking the heat for.

You seem to have cherry-picked from that women’s aid quote there. The rest has expressed very clear disappointment in the way she acted, and the way she knowingly minimised domestic violence.

And frankly I could care less how many years she’s been claiming to support victims of domestic violence. The instant she opened her mouth to minimise domestic violence her credibility vanished.

I included the entire Women's Aid statement upthread but here it is again

Farah Nazeer, chief executive of Women’s Aid, said:
“At Women’s Aid we were shocked last night to see the Question Time presenter Fiona Bruce state, in response to a comment that Stanley Johnson was a ‘wife-beater’, that “friends of his said it did happen, it was a one off”. This comment was unnecessary and irresponsible. We know at Women’s Aid that domestic abuse is rarely, if ever, a ’one-off’, with the vast majority of abuse being a pattern of behaviour that includes different forms of abuse. In this case, the survivor has been quoted saying she was always being hit by Johnson, and that she was not allowed when married to Johnson to have a car, possibly indicating controlling behaviour. Even if abuse is an isolated event, it would have still been domestic abuse, and this should never be minimised.
We are particularly surprised to hear this comment from Fiona Bruce, who has previously campaigned against domestic abuse with us at Women’s Aid and other domestic abuse charities, and has spoken publicly about her friend’s experience of abuse.
Question Time is a flagship BBC programme and carries with it authority over the narrative. The narrative that domestic abuse can be dismissed as a one-off is harmful, and influences how seriously the public take domestic abuse. Our recent report into public perceptions of domestic abuse shows what a long way we have to go to shift public attitudes that enable and tolerate domestic abuse in our society, and last evening’s comment illustrates exactly this.
We ask the BBC to take this seriously and have clear guidelines on how domestic abuse is referenced across their programmes and channels. The BBC has a huge platform, and with it comes a significant responsibility. For us to end domestic abuse, we need to work together to not only address the support needs of survivors, but address the attitudes that enables domestic abuse to not only exist but thrive across society, as perpetrators are not held to account.”

I'm shocked that a son could appear so close to his father when he knows that's how he treated his mother. I'm not saying he has to go no contact but they do seem close. I wonder if his siblings feel the same.

I wondered that too. My DD has refused to have anything to do with her biological father for over 20 years because of what he did to me. She doesn't even know what he did, just that he hurt me and that's enough.

They’re all close to both parents. (Mother is dead now).

Looks like she’s stepping away from her charity role. Well done witch hunters! Another one cancelled…. Sigh