I knew he was a wrong 'un!

I’ve written before about some arsehole who was the subject of some excellent investigative journalism into sexual misconduct. Anyway, some justice has been served. Found guilty of one count of rape and three counts of sexual assault. He is still being questioned about further allegations. I allowed myself a small ‘yay!’ at the verdict.  But it was only a small ‘yay’, because I knew I could predict the responses and jokes about to land on social media. Jokes about booky-wooks and celly-wells, about  born-again Christianity, ‘edgy’ comments, ‘clever’ word play. I knew there would be grifters on the right claiming it was his left-wing past that did it. And those on the left taunting the right about granting him sanctuary. Playing football with his allegiances. What larks!

All of these ‘cutting-edge’, ‘hilarious’ takes forget one thing – the victims of his crimes.

One of my least favourite responses is – I knew he was a wrong ‘un from the start.

Did you, aye?

You might well be gifted with some excellent judgement of character, or an innate spide-y sense for grooming, bullying and tawdry bullshit. Good for you. You might never have seen the appeal. You might never have found him funny. You may well have been immune to his charm, his wealth, his fame, his power.  Good. For. You.

But while you are congratulating yourself – what about his victims?

Stop bigging yourself up. Now is not the time. Especially if your narrative is that you’d never have been that naïve/gullible/stupid to be caught up in his shit.

Because whether you mean to or not, you are contributing to the narrative of victim-blaming. You are using the same tactics as his defence team who drew on every rape myth possible. “They knew his reputation.” “He can’t get a fair trial, because he is well-known.” “Why now?” “Why didn’t they scream out?” “He called to check up on them – would a rapist do that?” (Yes, yes, they absolutely would!). All of this helps to shift blame just ever so slightly from the predatory rapist to the people he abused.

Saying you could tell he was a wrong ‘un is part of that insidious blame-shift

You are not better than his victims. You are merely luckier. Especially if you get the chance to judge from a comfortable armchair through the screen of your smart phone, but you never even met the turd.

Let’s get this straight it was never the job of the general public, most of whom never met the greasy sewage pipe, to know he was a wrong ‘un. He was incredibly litigious, so rumours were dealt with at source. At least one woman is still under a court injunction not to mention his name. It was never for his victims to have some innate intuition that he couldn’t be trusted and to get the heck away. It is his behaviour we should be judging. He should have been better. He should have been human.

Apparently, long before the general public were made aware of his proclivities for young girls and not seeking consent, TV companies and media channels were made aware of the stink that surrounded him. Gatekeepers to the media knew and promoted him anyway.

So, perhaps we all need to shut up and take on some quiet reflection. Hopefully, this is the last time I have to write about this.

While we think about how to improve our own workplaces (especially if  working in comedy), the only people I want to hear from right now, are those women who went on the record before the trial and the journalist who did the investigatory work. Their voices still hold value.

(But also, if they want to keep quiet, we need to respect that too).

My final request. Please stop plastering his picture everywhere. We know what he looks like and so do his victims.