Hoping that Greg Wallace is forgiven, rather than cancelled

[Toodaloo1567]

Just a few concerns about this whole GW thing. Caveat: I do not condone behaviour that is illegal.

1. It does kind of look like a whole bunch of privileged TV luvvies are clamouring to denounce someone with really quite humble roots. I grew up in London and am constantly paranoid about how I come across to my mainly middle class colleagues. The thing is, middle class and privileged people operate by a set of unwritten rules. It’s like a full time job in itself trying to emulate their way of interacting, lest you be called out for not being ‘nice’ enough or doing something odd to them, like forgetting to start an email with ‘Hope you are well?’. Only, they won’t let you know to your face that you’ve accidentally been too sharp or direct, or maybe that your joke wasn’t woke enough - no, that stuff just goes straight to HR.
2. The equality act 2010 makes it the employer’s responsibility to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace. Why wasn’t all this lewd stuff dealt with? GW said that no one had made a formal complaint. Again, it makes me wonder whether the middle class luvvies just didn’t want to call things out at the time because it’s ‘beneath’ them to even consider doing something about it.
3. Even though he’s apologised, the public doesn’t think that’s good enough. It’s like only perfect people get to keep their careers. Woe betide you if you said something crass on twitter 10 years ago, or got caught speeding or something.

Of course, lots of you would want to shout me down over this, but you know what? We’re all mums here and many of us have sons. Boys and young men do and say crass things. GW hasn’t raped or systematically abused anyone. It doesn’t make what’s happened right, but I also don’t think it’s right that swarms of pitch-fork waving strangers get to play judge, jury and executioner. I’m a big fan of forgiveness. Am I the only one?

Oh bore off. Poor Greggy with his humble roots. Blah blah blah.

Working class or upper class should be irrelevant. No one should do or say the things he has said regardless of some unwritten rules, what a ridiculous post.

Also he hasn’t actually apologised, his first video victim blamed and proved his sexist and misogynistic attitude. His second video was all about poor me, I’ve had such a hard time, I’ve been so alone… yada yada yada. What a crock. He deserves everything coming to him, it’s the only way these disgusting men might actually learn something.

To be honest at the very beginning of this I was wondering whether it was related to some sexual innuendo relating to the food he was eating and not ‘reading the room’. I’ll also admit that I’ve enjoyed watching Gregg on Masterchef in the past. But really OP it’s more than someone making some banter and crossing the line. This is about a man who has abused his position of power; who, by the sounds of it, objectifies women and their bodies and feels that (because if said power) he can talk about their bodies; someone who gets a thrill out of making women (and other men) of all ages feel uncomfortable.
What scares me is how silenced people are - all the cast and crew members over the years who didn’t feel they could speak up and be heard. You talk about being a mum of a boy (me too) what about being a mum of a girl? A girl who was touched or objectified or made to feel uncomfortable by a 60 year old man on her first job? And not feeling able to say anything for fear she would lose her job?
I think it’s our responsibility as mums of boys to raise them to respect the body boundaries of girls; to relate to girls as whole people with interesting minds rather than bodies to be groped or commented on.

'No formal complaint'

I've been compiling a list of incidents and complaints involving Our GregG which constitute 'receipts'.

2008 Dr Kate Tomas complaint about sexual harassment and bullying.
2011 Kirsty Walk incident (not clear if she made a complaint at the time)
2012 Emma Kennedy complaint about groping
2013 Katy Brand on MasterChef - awkward moment broadcast (she didn't put in a complaint)
2014 Gregg Wallace on Strictly Come Dancing - awkward inappropriate moment broadcast. Aliona Vilani seems to have made it clear just how much she dislikes him.
2014/5 Georgia Harding complaint about behaviour on Eat Well for Less
2015 "Lisa" who worked on Eat Well For Less raised with a senior colleague that he touched her inappropriately whilst filming in a supermarket.
2015 "Anna" was called to his dressing room whilst working on MasterChef. He was not properly attired and "His pubic hair was on show, where you can see the top part of his penis, and he was wearing no boxers underneath." It was raised with colleagues who escalated it. The production company gave her an option to follow it up but she declined as she was afraid to pursue.
2017 Aasmah Mir complaint
2018 Wallace officially warned about his conduct on Impossible Celebrities by the BBC
2022 Dawn Elrick complaint on behalf of a number of production staff who were told they had to waive their anonymity and report individually. This is the most concerning as it was a group complaint that was about establishing a pattern of issues and it was supported by a union that serves TV crew.
2023 Nestlé bans Inside The Factory from their premises due to Wallace's behaviour
2023 Wallace does controversial C4 hoax programme about 'genetically engineered human meat'
2024 "Women of a certain age" video for which he subsequently apologised for

This is not a list of all the allegations. This is the list of COMPLAINTS that were registered at the time with authority or more senior staff. OR they are incidents which can be verified.

Not on the list is the rape joke which was filmed.
Not on the list is the allegations of cock in sock.
Not on the list is the lesbian harassment on a C5 show.
Not on the list is another allegations of inappropriate touching or groping.

These threads have also produced some allegations from MNetters, which obviously can't be verified, but in the same vein.

But all we get is 'by why didn't Kirsty Allsopp complain if it was so bad'...

...if you can't see the problem is institutionalised within media production so that senior staff do fuck all when they see a pattern, I'll nickname you Elton.

@Toodaloo1567 did he apologise though? Did he say "I was wrong, I said a bunch of disgusting things over the years, I recognise that this was absolutely unacceptable, and I sincerely regret it"

Or did he say "I'm sorry you feel this way"?

Even worse, he said "I'm sorry middle aged middle class women feel this way, and it was only 14 out of however many thousands so I'm good"

Na fuck that. I'm working class and I think the man's a misogynistic knob.
I don't do forgiveness either.

NO BODY agrees with you OP@Toodaloo1567
Have you been drinking/taking drugs? I mean drinking heavily?

People deserve forgiveness when they show contrition. GW has done nothing of the sort. Maybe if he understood and apologised for his behaviour he could be forgiven.

Agree. That’s the thing which is absolutely inappropriate….if he did it. There doesn’t seem to be any substance or elaboration around the incident, and I can’t imagine it happening.

I mean there are so many points in this post that are just 🤯but just to counter the class issue, I think if you scratch the surface you see that a lot of working class communities were matriarchal at their very core.
Certainly Gregg wouldn’t have liked to try his one liners out on any of the Northern women I grew up around, even in the 1980’s. He’d have had short shrift and that’s a fact.

Horrible man, I'm glad he's been exposed and will not grace our screens again, hopefully. He doesn't get a pass for being working class, and he has not shown any remorse, so fuck him.

However, I think it's gone far enough now. I feel for his poor wife and boy.

Sorry that list is not up to date.

I need to add
Gregg Wallace asked a British Sign Language interpreter to sign “big boobs” and “sexy bum” in front of a live audience at the BBC Good Food show, an attender has told the Guardian.

A MasterChef fan who was at the BBC Good Food Show at the NEC Arena in Birmingham in 2012 said Wallace had asked the interpreter if she had to sign everything he said before making the comments. The woman who was in the audience said she had been “appalled and aghast” at “sexist” behaviour by Wallace during the live event in front of about 400 people.

She complained to the BBC about his conduct

And

The fresh claims about allegations of inappropriate comments come after Melanie Sykes revealed she made an informal complaint about Wallace, saying that having to work with him on Celebrity MasterChef in 2021 was the reason she quit TV.

There's two more. Complaints actually made.

But apparently not through the right channels and 'formal' enough.

If I behaved the way Gregg Wallace has at my place of work then I'd expect to be sacked and lose my career.

Why should it be any different for GW?
What is he doing to show he recognises his behaviour is inappropriate and he deserves forgiveness?

I really really don’t WANT to imagine it happening 🤢

How insulting to working class people that you think being working class equates to being a sexist, misogynistic, lewd arsehole. You’ll be saying next that it’s not his fault he didn’t realise it wasn’t still the 1970s.

Times have changed and thank goodness people are no longer allowed to intimidate people and say offensive things. Sometimes cancel culture is a bad thing, but when it comes to men abusing their position of power and thinking they can say and do what ever offensive thing that enters their head, it’s definitely a good thing.

I had some sympathy with him when the story first started emerging, but when he doubled down and offensively victim blamed middle class women “of a certain age” he sealed his own fate and showed the world exactly what he was. He 100% deserves to be cancelled.

In what sense were the comment about his aunt's cunt or jamming your dick up your girlfriend's arse funny? Because if they were jokes I must have had a sense of humour fail.
It's sexual bullying. You defy the other person to call you out on something you know has shocked and disgusted her. If that person acquiesces or even laughs uncomfortably, you've won.
Oh, and the point about innuendo is that it's not crude and explicit.

All I can say is thank goodness I grew up in a time before all this "cancelled" nonsense. I wonder how many generations it's going to take before someone sees this idiocy for what it is.

Is the bar for men so low now we give them credit if they "at least didn't rape anyone"?

Gosh yes, please an immediate return to the Glory days when the Menz can say and do what they like to the silly little women and no one made a fuss

welcome to MN, Gregg.

No. I hope he feels the full force of the disgust we all have for men like this who make young women (in particular) very uncomfortable indeed when they are trying to work.

I was in the army. I knew, sort of, what i was going to be up against but FUCK ME it is TEDIOUS to hear "get your tits out for the lads" every time you walk into a bar. Or if you have to pick something up from low down "oh while you're down there, luv" - often to the sound of a fly unzipping. And all the other absolute shite that women have to put up with.

Those middle-class middle-aged women are probably the only ones who can make a fuss and he even half-listened to.

But sure. We should just let dirty old creeps like this make our daughters, sisters, friends, complete stranger-young women feel uncomfortable at work. Slow fucking handclap, OP.

Bring your sons up better than this. And call your husband out when he pulls stupid creepy sexist stunts like this (your husband and sons must be like this because i can't for the life of me think of another reason you think we should all ignore this)

MASSIVE PLOPPER ALERT - STOP WASTING YOUR TIME RESPONDING

Patronising drivel from the OP.
The working class men I grew up with didn't behave like Wallace.

Sorry haven’t read the whole thread but but I’m horrified he’s going to be on BBC 1 right now folks. This is so tone deaf and an affront to women. Shame on you BBC. And your white male (entitled) bosses. I’m disgusted.

I don't agree with you tbh.

But since you say 'half the things' would you care to expand on the other half and the sheer number of very upset women?

Or don't they count? It's just the half you disagree with that matter?

Right. Got it.