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?

@RedToothBrush There were instances where I was on camera being spoken to and they were both standing behind the camera, gesturing that they were both masturbating and it wasn’t just Gregg it was John too and everyone in the production team was laughing and joking with them.

Oh quelle surprise. Last week I questioned John Torodes silence a few times and kept being reprimanded and told what a lovely man he was, who was probably very upset by all this and either knew nothing or had been trying to get Wallace sacked for years behind the scenes.

Nah, you don't work with someone for two decades without knowing this stuff is happening and if you are disgusted horrified when the allegations start coming out then you don't stay silent and keep following them on fucking Instagram.

Absolutely.

When GregG did his PR gaff on Sunday, there were PR experts saying that the two best practice responses in PR are to issue an apology or to go to ground and keep completely silent.

John has been absolutely silent. He's in full PR mode. Indeed it seems all the other faces have kept their heads down firmly.

They've not tried to distance themselves, which would be the other PR tactic for those in the same orbit who might get caught in the fall out.

I always look not just for what people say but also what they don't say as it often tells you just as much.

The fact we now know that GregG's nickname on set was 'Dirk' after Dirk Diggler...

It's not just GregG who should be losing his job. There's a few of them in positions of influence who should be booted. Whilst Gregg is the problem, he's also the fall guy for others who also should have known better.

@RedToothBrush
"‘He was never predatory in any way, a typical old school guy making really bad dad jokes and to be honest, John Torode was exactly the same,’ she added.
‘There were instances where I was on camera being spoken to and they were both standing behind the camera, gesturing that they were both masturbating and it wasn’t just Gregg it was John too and everyone in the production team was laughing and joking with them."

Thanks for posting this - what a mess. How can anyone seriously say he was a typical old school guy, not predatory in any way, then say they stood behind the camera pretending to masturbate while laughing? It's utterly vile.

And also the same old "he wasnt predatory" type of comment, which actually should be "I personally feel he wasn't predatory, however that is only my personal experience of him, and can't comment on anything he might have done when I wasn't around"

The mere existence of the nickname 'Dirk' is particularly damning for Banijai.

It demonstrates how well Wallace's behaviour was known on set.

Well yes. He didn't seem predatory whilst also saying that they observed his on set nickname was Dirk is pretty fucking clueless tbh.

Hello, do you know what sexual harassment is? Have you been working in TV too long to understand why in another workplace that nickname might lead to questions being asked?

Anyone home?!

More these men are "forgiven", rather than "cancelled", more this behaviour will be encouraged.
Really?
😡

Absolutely. In the early 90s a manager thought was OK to push me backwards over a desk and pretend to kiss me (in front of a big office full of people). I still remember how humiliated and angry I was but I laughed it off, as you had to in those days.

This was shared in a tv group I’m part of and is worth a read for those wondering why the women didn’t speak up or make more of a fuss at the time. amp.theguardian.com/media/2012/oct/14/savile-tv-culture-of-female-harassment

WOW. Didn't think I'd see a post on MN defending Gregg Wallace because all our sons might also be serial sexual harrassers too but here we are.

Yes. Among other things, I was offered a job (on a men's mag!) in return for sex, and worked with another editor who was well-known for sexually harrassing younger men and women on his editorial team but made so much money for the company that it was overlooked and his victims sacked/paid off as necessary. That was late 90s/early 2000s. I am GLAD my daughter won't have to put up with the same workplace shit that we did.

The latest bbc article is really graphic. It all sounds pretty systematic and vile. Yuck.

I think at this point the whole MasterChef brand needs to go, it'd become stale and parody anyway with drama and edited "jeopardy" of will Derek's souffle rise in time with 30 seconds to go and yet somehow it always does and it is now tainted.

I know people enjoyed watching it but cooking shows are not hard to develop or make, so there's nothing to stop a new show being made with contestants and decent judges (and if Grace Dent is involved I'd watch). Personally I enjoyed the one Mary Berry and Claudia Winkleman did, it was interesting but not pretentious. But TPTB cancelled it to instead make more series and variations of MasterPerv 🙄.

If I see him on the BBC ever again or he remains employed by them, I’m cancelling my licence.

I agree @AnAlpacaForChristmasPleaseSanta

I am working class and I know how to write a polite email and I am to the point and rarely ask how someone is

why so bitter at middle call people
who are middle class people anyway
how do you class someone who works in IT Kathryn Middleton is the granddaughter of a miner

I’m so tired of our witch hunt, trivialised society. The media - and social media - is so often angry, sensationalist and unpleasant. You see it on the posts of MN too, often total outrage about the tiniest things. The serious and big issues meanwhile are often ignored.

I haven't read 28 pages but my view on cancellation in cased such as this and Russell Brand isn't that they shouldn't work again in any job ever, but that that particular role, status, fame is a big privilege and they shouldn't be supported to maintain it now that their behaviour and views towards women or other parties have been demonstrated to this extent. I don't mean one slip of the tongue and apologising. Everyone makes mistakes. But not repeated examples of contempt against women.

Give someone else a chance to shine.

If they want to redeem themselves, let them find a way. I tussle with this as there's a danger it forces misogynists or racists etc into a victim mentality underground publishing nonsense as is so easy these days rather than truly reflecting and redeeming themselves but really thi k the main point is that such a position should be earnt and repeated behaviours shown undermine that that merit IMO

Mothers like you are the cause of the Greg Wallace’s of this world - it’s your job to send them out into the world NOT doing and saying crass things. It’s not hard to teach your sons respect

I'm upset that they couldn't behave in a professional manner and made women feel uncomfortable and intimidated and it was all brushed under the rugs. As usual.

As others have said. Because it hits home, directly, personally, currently. This isn’t an abstract thing happening to other people that we are trying to get our heads around. It happens again and again and again and we are still not being heard. The fact that he is a D list celeb actually makes it even more pertinent, we KNOW him, we can point to someone right now in our own lives and say ‘that’s him too’.

@PixiesToGo but this is a serious issue. Many people are commenting as if GW is stuck in the 90s, this is just the BBC etc etc. This problem is still very current, still happening. If anyone works in schools, they know this is the lived experience of many of the girls. This problem has not gone away, there is a new generation of young men coming through who have the same morals of the likes of GW. Maybe, this should be the headline

I agree with point 2 in the OP. GW should have been given the sack years ago by the BBC/the production company. He wasn't, so he kept on behaving disgustingly and inappropriately.
And now it's been given more headlines than it deserves.
All those that saw his behaviour and did nothing (the staff, not the women) are now tut-tutting, but this could have been stopped.

So sexual harassment of women ISN'T a big issue that women face everyday?

We should ignore it because there are other BIGGER issues that are more important?

What pisses me off, about this, is people saying this generally aren't remotely politically engaged and just sit on their hands about everything.

Ok perhaps if other issues are important, you should get out and talk about them. Rather than trying to silence people who do get off their arses about something or dare to have a political opinion.

Stop whining and start doing something about the 'more important thing' then. If you have enough time to whinge here, you have time to start a thread 'about the much more important thing'. Thats not even write a letter or take part in activism.

But nope. The people that plop saying 'more important things' never do that. Because it's really "I'm fed up of hearing about this issue, which may be too close to home for any manner of reasons, so I'll just tell everyone to shut up".

The best you get is a list of 'more important things' followed by a tumbleweed.

@crumblingschools agree about the current issues in schools. I was DSL in a high school for many years up until July. Many cases of male students behaving very inappropriately, even though school had a mobile phone ban on site, the amount of “up skirting “ then sharing photos with peers was shocking. The trauma suffered by the victims was heartbreaking.

JT’s silence is deafening. Lots in the press about how they were never friends, so appears he’s trying to distance himself. Not going to come out of this well is he? Either he didn’t join in with the “banter “ but didn’t call it out either, or he joined in. Bit like Holly and Phil, he would have known and ignored. Either way his career is damaged.

Sounds like the PR bods want to wash their hands of him