Following on from my last blog when I was discussing the merits of lying, I ended up touching upon the farce known as the IICSA.
However at the same time another child sex abuse scandal was brewing when footballer Andy Woodward waived his right to anonymity to reveal that he, and to his knowledge, some other professional footballers had been sexually abused by football coach Barry Bennell. Bennell is a convicted paedophile, originally sentenced to nine years in 1998 after admitting sexual offences against six boys. Since then he's been jailed a further twice. In his own words he's described himself as a monster.
The scandal is slowly unravelling as more and more brave men are going public with their stories. Of course, with the unravelling comes more accusations, more coaches are being accused. A helpline set up to deal with the situation said that they had received 860 calls in the first week. In the first three days alone they had 60 calls.
We live in remarkable times, in times that I for one, never thought I'd see. I feel like the world is going backwards. As the far right march forward, and with the left literally just popping up their hands every so often as if to say excuse me, it feels like civilisation as we know it could go absolutely anywhere right now.
However there has also been, and sadly there will probably always be a constant - and that is child sex abuse. It's gone on forever....and will not doubt continue to go on, as it's just part of the depraved bit of human nature. We can only hope that with each passing year, more and more survivors, and indeed the perpetrators, get the help that they need.
What really hacks me off though about all of this is twofold:
1) When it was all the revelations of women being abused, the media (both 'social' and real) all really questioned the validity of the women stepping forward. Why now? Were they money grabbing? Fame hungry? The questions were relentless. One false witness out of hundred truthful ones and the 'I told you sos' were flying through the air. Easier to focus on it not happening that it really going on obviously? I mean if I said that there was a 99% chance of you being OK after an operation, you'd probably go for it wouldn't you? You wouldn't ponder the 1% for too long. Yet when the percentage of allegations proved to be truthful, everyone jumped on the tiny percentage of deluded liars, trying to jump on a band wagon. It's not even child sex abuse that this happens with. What about the rapist in the states that got an easier sentence because he was good at sports? Donald Trump has allegations coming out of his slimy ears - but it's easier to dismiss all the women as liars and opportunistic isn't it? Why is that? As each professional footballer has stepped forward he's been instantly believed? Maybe one of them is trying it on? Jumping on the band wagon? Of course that can't be right. . . yet the only difference is gender.
2) When oh when are people going to stop being surprised that it takes survivors years (if ever) to talk about it. Every time this topic comes up I read some comment or another about 'why didn't they say sooner'? I mean what the hell is wrong with people? On one hand I'm delighted that their life has been so rosy, and they are surrounded by people skipping and dancing through the daisy patch of life without a care in the world. Maybe I'm jealous, because in my world, as a teacher I've heard the same old story for decades. I've heard my friends' stories. I've seen how painful it is for somebody to say those words. I've seen the emotional turmoil, low self esteem that child sex abuse leaves them with. I've sat as a student's had a flashback and seen the pain etched on their face.
Why didn't they say sooner. . . because they couldn't. Because people like you, the people that don't want to leave the Daisy field, have missed the fact that the flowers are blooming because they've been covered with manure. Any whiff of that nonsense and you're out of there. You just want to believe that life can't be that bad.
Experts believe that we're only hitting the tip of the iceberg with child sex abuse. They also believe that we don't have the resources available to us right now to deal with the fall out.
Maybe they should simply move to another Daisy patch, and forget about what actually makes life real.
We should be celebrating ALL the brave survivors who chose to speak out. We should attempt to understand WHY people take so long....and then just celebrate the fact that they did it at all.
Showing posts with label IICSA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label IICSA. Show all posts
Thursday, 1 December 2016
Saturday, 26 November 2016
Liar, Liar, pants on fire
Do you remember the film Liar, Liar? It starred Jim Carrey as a man whose son's birthday wish was that his dad would stop lying.
It's an interesting concept isn't it lying? I mean we all do it. To other people ("no I didn't notice that the bin was full otherwise I would have emptied it!"), to ourselves ("I'm not drunk, I've barely had anything to drink"), to the stranger on the street ("no I'm sorry I don't have any change") In fact lying is a part of life. When does a lie become more sinister though? When do we cross the line?
Recently I've been in receipt of a couple of lies, and to be clear I'm not talking about the regular student lies ("my alarm didn't go off", "TFL is a nightmare", "of course I've learnt my lines"), but much more considered lies. Now as I wrote in an earlier blog I believe that the concept of truth is complicated. We can all have our own interpretation of an event. We can all believe that we're saying our truth - so then what constitutes a lie?
I think that a wilful misrepresentation of someone would constitute a lie. Blaming others for your own shortcomings; but then here's the rub - how do you defend yourself against a lie? It invariably comes down to your word against somebody else's? Who's to say which person is telling the truth? How do you protect your reputation without sounding pathetic?
When I first opened the college I got into lots of internet forum discussions about my plans for this new concept in drama training, and even though I was sure that I knew what I was talking about - I got randomly called a liar. Just a few months ago, a similar thing happened, and it didn't matter how many facts I presented to substantiate my 'case' (in this instance I was saying how Drama UK would be folding any day, and I was attempting to reassure someone that I had never attempted to apply for membership. However this other person was adamant that I must have applied....not only that but also that I therefore must have taken an anti-Drama UK stance because we had been unsuccessful in our (non existent) application) the person that I was discussing it with was 100% sure that they were right??
We're currently in the middle of the mother of all 'he said, she said' lies at the moment with the ongoing saga of the IICSA. The infamous inquiry which was supposed to be the government finally truly investigating all the allegations of institutional child sex abuse in the UK. Well at this moment in time it's reading like a workshop for a new Ray Cooney farce. I mean they can't even find someone to chair the damn thing effectively. Evidence is being dismissed or in many cases lost, before things can be investigated. Then worse of all, slowly one by one, the support groups are leaving the inquiry - and they're leaving because they just know - that once again their word is not going to be heard. They are going to be called out as liars.
I've seen a National organisation be embroiled in a scandal, and I've seen how effectively they managed to sweep it under the carpet. Accusations weren't even investigated. Evidence was lost. The media wouldn't touch it, and injunctions were being issued left, right and centre. The establishment (whoever 'they' might be) looked after their own. What they definitely didn't do, was to look after the interest of the 'child(ren)'.
This isn't lying though is it? This is denial? Or is it something much more sinister that's rippling under the fabric of our society? Is this a reality - but one that nobody wants to face?
What society needs is a big old BS detector. Someone needs to go onto Dragon's Den with a contraption that's more compact than a regular metal detector, but is as accurate as one of the really expensive ones. The polygraph can be beaten (. . . I mean someone should really tell those people on the Jeremy Kyle show about some tricks/drugs that could help them to beat that little 'ole machine) - so a BS detector is the answer.
With that in mind, we could all stick with the rubbish everyday lies. The ones that we shouldn't say - but we do ("sorry I was late, the bus didn't turn up" aka "I just wanted to finish watching a really good programme" or "just checking that you got my email, it's just that my server's been playing up" aka "I emailed you days ago, why the hell aren't you answering me?"), but when it came to the important things like protecting a person's reputation . . . or the other side of that coin exposing the case of the paedophile rings that are being given a tacet permission to continue in our society. . . . the ability to truly trash a person's reputation. . . we simply turn on the BS detector, project the findings on a huge display, and all move on with our lives, with lessons learnt, and the appropriate punishment given.
Simples
It's an interesting concept isn't it lying? I mean we all do it. To other people ("no I didn't notice that the bin was full otherwise I would have emptied it!"), to ourselves ("I'm not drunk, I've barely had anything to drink"), to the stranger on the street ("no I'm sorry I don't have any change") In fact lying is a part of life. When does a lie become more sinister though? When do we cross the line?
Recently I've been in receipt of a couple of lies, and to be clear I'm not talking about the regular student lies ("my alarm didn't go off", "TFL is a nightmare", "of course I've learnt my lines"), but much more considered lies. Now as I wrote in an earlier blog I believe that the concept of truth is complicated. We can all have our own interpretation of an event. We can all believe that we're saying our truth - so then what constitutes a lie?
I think that a wilful misrepresentation of someone would constitute a lie. Blaming others for your own shortcomings; but then here's the rub - how do you defend yourself against a lie? It invariably comes down to your word against somebody else's? Who's to say which person is telling the truth? How do you protect your reputation without sounding pathetic?
When I first opened the college I got into lots of internet forum discussions about my plans for this new concept in drama training, and even though I was sure that I knew what I was talking about - I got randomly called a liar. Just a few months ago, a similar thing happened, and it didn't matter how many facts I presented to substantiate my 'case' (in this instance I was saying how Drama UK would be folding any day, and I was attempting to reassure someone that I had never attempted to apply for membership. However this other person was adamant that I must have applied....not only that but also that I therefore must have taken an anti-Drama UK stance because we had been unsuccessful in our (non existent) application) the person that I was discussing it with was 100% sure that they were right??
We're currently in the middle of the mother of all 'he said, she said' lies at the moment with the ongoing saga of the IICSA. The infamous inquiry which was supposed to be the government finally truly investigating all the allegations of institutional child sex abuse in the UK. Well at this moment in time it's reading like a workshop for a new Ray Cooney farce. I mean they can't even find someone to chair the damn thing effectively. Evidence is being dismissed or in many cases lost, before things can be investigated. Then worse of all, slowly one by one, the support groups are leaving the inquiry - and they're leaving because they just know - that once again their word is not going to be heard. They are going to be called out as liars.
I've seen a National organisation be embroiled in a scandal, and I've seen how effectively they managed to sweep it under the carpet. Accusations weren't even investigated. Evidence was lost. The media wouldn't touch it, and injunctions were being issued left, right and centre. The establishment (whoever 'they' might be) looked after their own. What they definitely didn't do, was to look after the interest of the 'child(ren)'.
This isn't lying though is it? This is denial? Or is it something much more sinister that's rippling under the fabric of our society? Is this a reality - but one that nobody wants to face?
What society needs is a big old BS detector. Someone needs to go onto Dragon's Den with a contraption that's more compact than a regular metal detector, but is as accurate as one of the really expensive ones. The polygraph can be beaten (. . . I mean someone should really tell those people on the Jeremy Kyle show about some tricks/drugs that could help them to beat that little 'ole machine) - so a BS detector is the answer.
With that in mind, we could all stick with the rubbish everyday lies. The ones that we shouldn't say - but we do ("sorry I was late, the bus didn't turn up" aka "I just wanted to finish watching a really good programme" or "just checking that you got my email, it's just that my server's been playing up" aka "I emailed you days ago, why the hell aren't you answering me?"), but when it came to the important things like protecting a person's reputation . . . or the other side of that coin exposing the case of the paedophile rings that are being given a tacet permission to continue in our society. . . . the ability to truly trash a person's reputation. . . we simply turn on the BS detector, project the findings on a huge display, and all move on with our lives, with lessons learnt, and the appropriate punishment given.
Simples
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