The Rotherham 1,400 children plus – WHO is responsible?

[Isitmebut]

The Rotherham situation, where the authorities appear to have done NOTHING to protect children in care, goes back 16-years, as it appears there was a largely ethnic element involved and ‘the powers that CONTINUE to be’ in a job, were afraid in that political climate, to be seen as ‘racists’, but why?

I can remember posting when anyone even daring to mention the affects of immigration on housing, jobs and local services were called ‘racist’, sometimes whole posts/threads were deleted on media boards (even the Daily Mail) - while the government of the day, not held to account by the media on their side, were free to continue a ‘multicultural’ agenda they adopted in their first few years they never sought at the ballot box.
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2354713/BBC-chief-admits-We-deep-liberal-bias-migrants--changed.html

But as this article points out, the fear of being accused a racist, affected even household conversations.
“Are we all racist now?”
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/10860492/Are-we-all-racist-now.html

And the problem with secret sofa government policies, where local authorities and media compliance is key to continued electoral success, is that you can’t be SEEN to raise ethnic issues OR plan ahead for the numbers in homes, healthcare or schools – especially in a 2010 General Election manifesto, in electoral damage limitation mode.
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/6418456/Labour-wanted-mass-immigration-to-make-UK-more-multicultural-says-former-adviser.html

The 2000’s seem to be a time when our public sector/local government numbers increased enormously, but seemed to both have THEIR OWN POLITICAL agendas, and failed so many vulnerable people, especially children in and out of care.

For no one in Rotherham to take responsibility for what happened to the 1,400 children (we know about), is a national disgrace – that is not good enough.

I'm just thinking of the Child sex abuse scandals within the Catholic Church. My family are devout Catholics. It was painful for the true believers in my family to hear the scorn poured on their faith, to see the lack of respect given to the leaders of their faith, to read scathing jokes in the newspapers etc. I am not very religious myself, but even I felt a pang when all were tarred with the same brush thinking of older generations in my family who had entered the clergy, took vows of poverty which they followed, lived lives of service, and even travelled to foreign countries where children were at risk of genocide by dictators to put themselves as a physical block between them. To have them written off with a smirk as probable pedophiles was painful.

However, bleating by older relatives that the incidence of pedophillia among the catholic clergy was no greater than society at large, sounded off. It may have been true, but the spotlight was on Catholics and Catholic institutions. Time to buck up, take it on the chin and get your own house in order. The sort of corporate responsibility that everyone shouldered in a social sense forced a change in attitude that I think is for the better.

Holiday, from what I have read, the Catholic Church had more or less unopposed power and influence in Ireland and that helped set the scene for some priests to be abusive. For years, virtually no one dared question a priest. Now of course, the church has lost that unquestioned power and anyone can say whatever they want about it. I can well understand it must be painful for those who were sincere believers and members of the clergy.
Maybe the Pakistamni community is where Ireland was in the 70's- not really ready to hear the bad stuff?

What a brilliant post, HolidayPacking

I totally get this would have been very painful for your family and completely agree how wrong it would have been to "tar everyone with the same brush." How wise of you, though, to recognise the need to "take corporate responsibility" and "get the house in order" in view of the damage done

While I understand that senior folk can sometime be a little resistant, I do hope that at least some of the more devout family members were prepared to utterly condemn what happened?

Yes, Puzzled, everybody, even the older generation understood that the allegation were true and ghastly. There was no denial. They just would have liked it if everyone has been more deferential and pussy-footed around. Sometimes, what you would like, and what is good for you aren't the same thing!

the 'authorities' shouldn't just lose their jobs they should be jailed.

wtf is saying a feeble 'sorry' going to do, clear their conciences?

YY Anyone, why aren't some of these people being arrested for perverting the course of justice?

Im just sick to death of constant failings to protect the vulnerable (I speak from personal experience).

WTF are they paid for? why are they in these jobs if they cant be arsed to do the work?

all victims have a life sentence of trauma.

those who failed should have lifetime sentences for inflicting that trauma.

theyre just as bad as the men who groomed and used the poor children.

It is inaccurate to compare the child abuse scandal within the Catholic church to what happened with the asian grooming gangs. First of all the catholic clergy who engaged in the child abuse were representatives of the catholic church. They were the leaders of their religious congregations. Therefore to make a link between the catholic religion and what they did would have had some basis because they were part of the catholic religious institutions.

The men involved in the asian grooming gangs on the other hand were just a random group of low status Pakistani males (taxi drivers; unemployed, poorly qualified young men; take away/kebab shop workers etc). They did not represent any faith based or any community institutions, they were just nominally muslims if that. Now I am mostly not judgmental but I think even the most liberal of muslims would agree with me that these men were probably the worst examples of muslims you could possibly ever find on the face of the earth. These men committed some of the worst sins in the Islamic faith. Rape (a crime that would receive the death penalty), pre-marital sex (both men and women are expected to remain virgins until marriage incidentally), adultery (another crime punishable by death whether male or female if convicted), drug-taking and forcing others to take drugs, drinking alcohol and forcing others to drink alcohol, physical abuse, sexual abuse, lying, cheating, etc. If they had been convicted of the same crimes that they had committed in the UK in say somewhere like Saudi Arabia they would probably all have received the death penalty. That is how serious their crimes are according to Islam. For most muslims the idea that their actions are in any way linked to Islam is just absolutely ludicrous, in fact their actions are in contradiction to even the most basic teachings of Islam. It really takes some convoluted thinking to see any connection between what they were doing and Islam.

However, when you have a religion that explicitly states "God made man superior to woman" and then goes on to outline all the ways in which women are legally less entitled than men

And here we have a perfect example of the convoluted thinking required to do this. First of all the Quran does not say God made man superior to woman. It in fact says quite the opposite.

'O Mankind! We have created you from a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know one another. Verily, the most honorable of you in the Sight of Allah is the believer who has Taqwa (piety and righteousness). Verily, Allah is All-Knowing, All-Aware.' [49:13]

Not the male, the Arab or the white but the person who is the most pious.

'Whoever does righteous acts, whether male or female, while he is a believer, verily, to him We will give a good life, and We shall pay them certainly a reward in proportion to the best of what they used to do.' [16:97]

I could quote more but I dont want to derail the thread. There is no verse in the Quran that explicitly states God made man superior to woman, even in the most badly translated texts. Similarly Islamic laws tend to apply equally to both men and women with a few notable exceptions for example inheritance laws, however there are historically very good reasons for these differences. If you want to discuss this further pm me as I really dont want to derail the thread and make it in to a discussion about anything other than the very serious topic of child abuse.

Im not really qualified to speak on Pakistani culture but I would say the actions of these grooming gangs are just as horrific and alien to the Pakistanis that I know as they are to any other person. I have not heard anyone try to defend or justify what these men did and their actions make as little sense to them in the context of their own culture as this crime would to anyone else. I grew up around quite a well-educated, professional class of Pakistanis and the concept of asian grooming gangs was totally unheard of. So Im sorry I cant make the link between Pakistani culture and the hideous crimes of these abusers that you seem to.

I can understand why, though I dont agree with people railing at the Pakistani community and leaders. I think it is much easier for people to externalise this problem and make the focus of their anger a small immigrant community rather than accept the fact that there has been a much wider culture of complacency for many years in this country towards the abuse of vulnerable young people. It is much easier to focus on other peoples cultures and ask why then focus on how and why the authorities in this country charged with protecting young people looked the other way whilst politicians, celebrities and other establishment figures abused children. It makes sense in that context why people demand apologies from communities (who have nothing to do with the crimes of the child abuse predators from their community) as it is incredibly unlikely they will get apologies from the most powerful and influential people in the country who willfully ignored and in some cases facilitated the abuse of children.

great post peacefuloptimist.

I think the one factor that is being overlooked is money. These gangs of whatever cultural group or none specific are making money out of these young children. It takes money to ply them with drugs and drink, run them round in taxis, pay the heavies who make and carry out threats.

Money. That's the link between all these cases & money buys protection. A few at the bottom of the money pile are prosecuted but those prosecutions are mere window dressing. Every pimp who is gaoled will be replaced.

Where no money changes hands it's pay offs in the form of favours and patronage and that's how the network works all the way from the northern streets to the corridors of power.

Police and SWs can lose their jobs if they are accused of racism, making racist remarks - it is a broad brush.

So, imagine you were one of those in Rotherham. I would assume (perhaps wrongly) that the minute you rocked up in an Asian neighbourhood to interview family of suspects they would close ranks. Next thing you know the local cultural rep/ church leader whatever, would be writing to your Chief. Suggesting that your behavior was unacceptable, next you know you are hauled before bosses with final warnings etc.

Upshot would be you would steer well clear in future.

This is the main prob imo and it hasn't changed much.

I blame the cowardly Govs over the last decades, telling us constantly how we in Britain welcome foreigners, that Britain is multicultural etc. It is really a lie. We have accepted others settling here and been happy because they
1 merged into the local pop within a generation.
2 or kept to themselves entirely, didn't take advantage of our law abiding country to make their fortune and educate their DCs but keep their heart and often homes/family overseas which is the case now.

I feel the Gov should penalize Pakistanis, Afghanis or whoever are the perpretators of abuse or jihadi behavriour and stop allowing so much movement between the countries, make visas harder to obtain. Reduce the numbers of immigrants.

Encourage (force) greater integration of those here.

If you actually do something which has detrimental effects to the life of non law abiding immigrants, the ones wanting to come here will put pressure on the trouble makers, the ones here will want to be seen as good citizens. As it is now why should they give a monkeys what we say / think, it is completely irrelevant to their lives, lived in their exclusively immigrant towns and neighbourhoods.

I think you are right peacefuloptimist, there is a big difference between leaders in a faith and just some randoms from the greater culture.

I think there is some analogy though, about people desiring deference and taking umbrage. Muslims and Islam seem to be treated as a special category in our society. The UK is traditionally a Protestant country, but when large groups of Catholics immigrated here and became settled, Catholicism became part of the society we all share and therefore non-Catholics have a right to critique. In the same way I think comedians, wits in the newspapers etc. should be lambasting more conservative elements of the Muslim community in this country for backwards ideas about women.

Personally I think the whole attitude of 'I'm not like that so it's not my problem' is the cop out that allows these men to get away with these crimes again and again. It is up to the whole of society to condemn this behaviour in the strongest way and ensure the victims receive justice. We should all be speaking out against violence and abuse and not turning a blind eye or excusing behaviour.

I think most men are decent people they don't rape or abuse women or children. But most men do turn a blind eye to it, they perpetuate misogyny no matter how 'benevolent' and sustain rape myths such as believing most reported rapes are regretted one night stands or vengeful women. If all the good men stood up to this behaviour we might have a hope in hell of tackling it, so all men and all society are responsible.

Good post

Peaceful optimist I cannot reply as exhaustively as you have done, I do not have a copy of the Coran to hand. I read it many years ago, the North African version" malekite Coran" in French, many argue you can only really understand it correctly in Arabic,not a language I speak. Just looking at the Wikipedia page on women and Islam though there is a quote re beating " disobedient" women. For me, whichever way you cut it the Coran is not egalitarian and what's more it lays the ideological groundwork for men who may want to dominate women.
I agree you can t make a direct comparison with the Irish catholic situation. But there are commonalities. It wasn t just the priests in Ireland who created the situation, other sections of society wold have been aware but decided not to confront ( police,lawyers). Furthermore,there have been quite a few cases in this country and abroad of imams using their position to sexually abuse children. In some cases it went on for years because parents were scared to report it.
I think that for large sections of white liberal society, holding police, SS, politicians to account is much more within their comfort zone than daring to say there is a problem within a particular ethnic minority community.
My feeling is this will not be the last case of organised child sex abuse by Muslim heritage gangs to come to light. Eventually there will have to be some acknowledgement and soul searching among certain communities, but it will happen slowly because at present the vested interest and the easiest thing to do is to keep quiet. Those who speak out from within can expect all sorts of pressures to keep quiet.

There is a big difference between leaders in a faith and just some randoms from the greater culture

There certainly is, but can I suggest that general public perception is also important? Of course these criminals aren't representative of the Pakistani/muslim population in any way - which may be precisely why many expected to see a greater outcry about it. The hugely decent catholic majority weren't leaders of anything either, but I believe it was often their recognition of the problems and the steps which had to be taken which did so much to move things forward

I thought the comment about apologies being demanded from the Pakistani community a little disingenuous, since as far as I recall nobody's said this; in any case apologies suggests personal blame, which obviously isn't appropriate. What many do seem to be calling for is some recognition of cultural influence on everyone concerned - just as they want all the other issues to be addressed too

Unfortunately, while most accept the complexities of this whole thing, there are still those who'll try to manipulate it into being all about "awful foreigners" who should "just go home" and others who'll insist at every turn that race has absolutely nothing to do with it and that suggestions to the contrry are racist

For me, neither is likely to add much to the debate which will need to happen sooner or later

Puzzled, check the statistics. The majority of perpetrators of sexual violence are white. In cases like this they are all men, though, every last one of them, and they all live in the UK. We have a problem in OUR culture, these men are all from OUR culture, it is OUR society that presents women and all the other non-men (children, female and male) as accessories to the project of masculine power. MEN are the ones who need to recognise and address the sickness that is proving yourself male by penetrating things with your penis.

I don't think the suggestions that being Muslim or Pakistani are racist, I think they are a post facto rationalisation because we refuse to countenance a discussion about masculine identity. We have a culture which regards male power, and the right to assert it as sacrosanct. Any attempt to question, any attempt to rein it in, hold it accountable or otherwise suggest that men as a class need to rethink their relationships with everyone outside their class, or that men as a class should be accountable for things like male sexual violence is met with derision, scorn, threats and outrage.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if this was a problem of so-called Muslim culture? At least we'd have a fighting chance of addressing it. But what it's really about is male identity, male sexual posturing to other males and so no matter how many Imams come out and say, this is not on, it will continue.

I take your point, OutsSelf, but then abuse isn't solely seen among men either; the past appalling treatment of children by nuns in some residential homes is just one obvious example

Statistics are all very well, but I honestly don't feel there's much progress to be made through claims about one group containing more abusers than others; surely all we can do is deal with each case as it arises, whatever the cultural, political, racial, religious or any other sensitiviies involved

Well, insisting we think about the ways that religion or culture play a part in the sexual violence against women and children but then saying well hang on, women are abusive too when someone points out that all of the crimes we are talking about were committed by men is illogical.

Nuns may well have been abusive but show me evidence of gangs of women grooming anyone for their sexual gratification. To equate the actions of those nuns with the mass rape of children is to make a false equation.

We need to talk about masculinity. We need to talk about how men of all cultures equate masculine power with penetration. We need to talk about how men of all cultures treat women and children as accessories in their quest for masculine identity. We can say, they are from this community or that community. But the fact is, they are all men living in our country, men living in our culture.

I just really need to underscore: all the crimes we are talking about are committed by men. All of them. How can we be willing to wonder if ethnic identity has an impact here but not be talking about the gender of these crimes?

Good point outself. Sadly I think we all just take it for granted it is men who sexually harrass or exploit/ groom/ rape. It just seems to go without saying, those crimes are always perpetrated by men.

How can we be willing to wonder if ethnic identity has an impact here but not be talking about the gender of these crimes?

Yes, you're right - in various posts around MN I've written that many issues will need to be considered but not mentioned this one specifically. Cartainly I agree that this needs addressng too ...

I agree with whataboutbob, sadly, it pretty much goes without saying that men perpetrate the vast majority of these crimes.

Can we stop making this into a feminist debate? Let's get back to the issue in this case: Pakistani men grooming white underage girls. Drugging them. Raping them. Why do these gangs make the racial distinction in who they rape? Let's talk about that.

Absolutely Pistolshipped. Please do not label them as Asian. I am Indian born English. However, I am really English. That being said I would not want to be labelled as Asian. It is not Sikhs, Hindus, or Buddhists who do this vile grooming, raping and other abuses. We have integrated into mainstream society. So it tears our hearts apart when we are labelled as Asian. Muslims can hide under the anonymity provided by the label "Asian". We despise this label as we feel that we are grouped together with Muslims.