What did I just read in The Guardian?? (tw: child abuse)

[AnnunciataM]

Is it just me or is this article a bit too sympathetic towards a man who was found guilty of viewing images of child sexual abuse? The man in question doesn't seem to have much remorse - he is angry that the police made him tell his wife why he was arrested (calling it a 'nice twist of the knife'), moans that people might think he's dangerous (wonder why?) and his wife actually decided to take him back and make a go of things. They don't seem to have given much thought to the real victims here.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/article/2024/jul/27/husband-viewing-child-abuse-images

Maybe there is more of this happening in different sectors of society than we know.

This case alwyas stuck in my mind because of the 'excuse' reported in the Daily Mail that he started to watch porn "In the evenings if my wife was out of the country and I was alone it was something interesting to do."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10402929/Retired-BBC-director-76-832-child-abuse-images-gasps-shock-avoids-jail.html

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/uknews/17321687/retired-bbc-director-sentenced-child-abuse-images/

I read that article and couldn't quite believe it. It was completely sanitised and full of excuses.

The bit that gobsmacked me most (of all of it) was the bit about how her husband still had a really good relationship with her mother.

It's written like we're meant to pity them. I feel sick.

Yes - it was the tone that was off as much as the content. No ownership of wrongdoing, blaming it on porn addiction as if that made it OK and not real child abuse.

It’s a colossal problem and if every single person doing this was arrested, charged and imprisoned it would pretty much collapse the prison system.

It's more likely that he has been using porn since adolescence, but keeping it secret. His wife being away just provided the opportunity to use more of it. They lie and lie and lie.

Seems entirely in keeping with the guardian of you ask me 🤮

This is an incredibly important point. I firmly believe that gender self-id will ultimately lead to attempts to normalise sexual relationships between grown men and children. As activist push the boundaries of what is normal, detach children from parental supervision and control, weaken safeguarding and undermine the family unit, the underlying agenda is clear. It will be presented as one of many diverse sexualities and in the age of someone’s identity trumping everything, it’ll slide out of the shadows.

IKR. It's gross.

The wife decided to stay with the prick, so maybe it was either accept the pedo or lose contact with daughter and grandchild. If so, what a terrible choice to have to make.

Yes - and yet the tone was quintessentially Guardian.

I agree! Vile man. Stunned that she stayed with him. No clue why they gave it the column inches.

I find both of their responses disturbing. She has made the choice to stay with him and seems relieved he managed to change his name before the new legislation comes in.
He has tried to deflect and not take full responsibility for his actions.
The whole article is nauseating. They had to sell their dream home and he has to do manual work. No sympathy here.

He’s a monster and she’s no better. Not only are the innocent children made to suffer pain, fear and humiliation but they will carry the effects of this horror for the rest of their lives.
If that were my husband I’d have probably tried to knife him and certainly would not want to be in his company ever again. He would never see my child either.
I don’t care what people think of me for my opinion, I’m pretty sure I’m a better person than either of those involved.

We are already seeing this happening I think. Light raps on the knuckles in court, rebranding as MAPs, boundary pushing like the Olympic open ceremony…. Makes me feel utterly sick.

They should all be castrated (not chemically).

There's an online support forum for partners/parents of these men. It's quite sad to read. Many of them accept his excuses, but a lot don't and their lives are still pretty much destroyed.

I don't think it's fair to say she's no better. She wasn't masturbating to images of children being raped.
It's also very easy to say you would knife somebody, but in real life you go to jail for things like that. I'd have wanted to knife him in her place, but doing that would mean I would go to prison and, if he survived, the pedo would be raising the child. No way would I risk that.

I think that's what the article was aiming for that this man could be forgiven

I don't think they have painted him in a sympathetic way, just put his own words in the paper and let him show himself as self pittying and cowardly. He refered to his Catholic upbringing twice, as if he is saying that this somehow means he isn't to blame. He sought out such awful extreme abuse when he could have sought help before it got to that.

His son is going to suffer because of his wife's decision to stay with him.

I thought social services intervened in these cases and try to prevent the child living with the adult?

In whose gift is forgiveness? The children who were abused?

Well it's first person, and to be honest I think it's important to hear the self-serving bullshit straight from the horse's mouth, although of course it's disgusting and shocking too.

If it had been approached in a different way, by a different paper, they would likely have drawn them out to talk about the victims. I think it's better that the world hears that they do not give a fuck and their pity is all for themselves.

Vile.

The fact that the wife worked in safeguarding turned my stomach to start with.
And as for his morals, he had the brass neck to go back to work after his arrest because he didn’t need to tell them about it.
I grew up well before the internet porn era. I know lots of people look at it, I’m also aware it causes issues as viewers become less sensitive and move to more aggressive materials. However, it’s still a huge, huge leap to move to what this man did. He knew there were huge risks, and kept on doing it.
I have not on iota of sympathy. I’m not sure why being brought up Catholic seems to get an honourable mention either. He had no care for his wife, son or both families.
How would he feel if his own son was abused to be used for someone else’s entertainment? Because these children are all somebody’s kids, damaged forever in ways we can never imagine. And he gets a community order where someone who has not paid a tax bill can get a sentence.
How this woman has any kind of physical relationship with him I have no idea. Sickening.

Not always, if the non-offending parent is seen to be sufficiently protective.

An interesting read which threw up a few things for me:

It's always men. Not 'almost always' as she claims the police said. Women do not seek out images of men abusing children for pleasure. Women do not masturbate over child abuse.

I agree the article minimises the victims. But I think the intention was to look at a real life scenario in depth and so they had to jump beyond the initial revulsion right thinking people feel at child abusers which usually means we never hear the background story.

It's interesting to hear he was using porn and it escalated. Well, more terrifying than interesting I suppose as it suggests many other men could graduate to child abuse. I always thought it was faulty wiring but maybe the propensity really is there, deep within all men, to be sexually attracted to children. And maybe internet porn has the potential to unearth that. They certainly are all attracted to very young women, but usually draw the line at about 18 for reasons of social acceptability at least.

It seems that - as bloody usual - the women had to do the hard thinking and coddle the man - she had to ring his parents, she had to do all the mental preparation and planning while he just wallowed. She had to talk him out of suicide- in an intelligent and considerate way, by appealing to his love of data and facts. This is what I loathe about men. Their unending expectation that women will serve them, yet their simultaneous demands to be treated with respect they don't deserve and be treated as leaders when they are all just immature play actors in every walk of life. Obviously, as is the case with so many men, he took his wife and family for granted and did not deserve them one bit.

And yet, I do still feel a modicum of sympathy for the child abuser. Not because I condone his behaviour. But because I do believe it is faulty wiring, or bad brain chemistry, or a flaw in the male DNA, or something else something biological. And that means there is little these people can do to stop it. Perhaps someday we'll have the medical knowhow to operate and rewire their brains to fix them. Until we achieve that, we are in the dark ages treating people as evil when they're really just mentally ill.

As always, totally agree with you XChrome!