Cliff Richard

[PlainmoorRoar]

Those sources Goalscorer wow!

Fox news, reddit and very biased 'voice for men sites,' going to be some real accurate reporting going on there!

[Gullscorer]

Those sources Goalscorer wow!
Fox news, reddit and very biased 'voice for men sites,' going to be some real accurate reporting going on there!

So you've not looked at them yet, then?

How do you decide what is and is not bias? And where in the world d'you think you won't find bias? The BBC..?? Jezebel.com..?? Anywhere..??

[happytorq]

What you are really saying is that you are quite happy for any number of false accusers to put innocent men through hell in order to encourage more alleged victims to make accusations. This kind of twisted logic ignores the fact that the more false accusers there are, the more likely it is that real victims will be regarded with suspicion.

Apparently you didn't even read what I wrote. I explicitly stated that it's important to keep the accused's names private until a conviction has been reached, exactly for this reason. I also think that false accusations would reduce if it was known that the accused wouldn't have his/her (although it's usually his) name everywhere.

With that said, it's more important to me that sexual abusers are punished for their crimes, and that won't happen if victims are scared to come forward. Sexual assault is by its very nature an extremely difficult offence to prove, because it usually comes down to a classic case of he said/she said. That's why reporting such crimes needs to be done as early as possible, to gather any physical evidence that would help in a prosecution. I'm sure our resident legal expert will tell you that physical evidence means a lot more in the legal process than witness accounts. There are cases in which a false accusation is made, and of course it's in everybody's interest to prevent that from happening but it is my hope that justice system is robust enough to root those out.

Not everything is some sort of feminist conspiracy to emasculate men. Your postings suggest that you somehow feel that men are being marginalised by some shadowy feminist organisation who spend their whole time thinking of ways to further push their nefarious agenda. It makes you sound like you're in a basement somewhere with a tin foil hat on your head. You only have to look on twitter occasionally to understand that there are some men who view any push for equal rights as a challenge to their own masculinity, which is frankly pathetic.

[Gullscorer]

(1) Apparently you didn't even read what I wrote. I explicitly stated that it's important to keep the accused's names private until a conviction has been reached, exactly for this reason. I also think that false accusations would reduce if it was known that the accused wouldn't have his/her (although it's usually his) name everywhere.

(2) With that said, it's more important to me that sexual abusers are punished for their crimes, and that won't happen if victims are scared to come forward. Sexual assault is by its very nature an extremely difficult offence to prove, because it usually comes down to a classic case of he said/she said. That's why reporting such crimes needs to be done as early as possible, to gather any physical evidence that would help in a prosecution. I'm sure our resident legal expert will tell you that physical evidence means a lot more in the legal process than witness accounts. There are cases in which a false accusation is made, and of course it's in everybody's interest to prevent that from happening but it is my hope that justice system is robust enough to root those out.

(3) Not everything is some sort of feminist conspiracy to emasculate men. Your postings suggest that you somehow feel that men are being marginalised by some shadowy feminist organisation who spend their whole time thinking of ways to further push their nefarious agenda. It makes you sound like you're in a basement somewhere with a tin foil hat on your head. You only have to look on twitter occasionally to understand that there are some men who view any push for equal rights as a challenge to their own masculinity, which is frankly pathetic.

(1) I read what you wrote, but you don’t appear to have read any of my posts on this forum, nor any of the links I provided on this thread and on others over recent months. Retaining anonimity for the accused is not the real issue here as it would have little effect on the numbers of false accusers for as long as these liars know they will almost certainly get away with their lies, usually with nothing more than a slap on the wrist.

(2) With these words you now openly admit that you believe the fact that innocent men are falsely accused and convicted is less important than encouraging accusers (false or otherwise) to come forward. It is revealing that you refer to them, as many do, not as accusers but as ‘victims’ from the outset, thereby prejudicing the chances of the accused receiving fair trials. At least you agree as to the importance of physical evidence, of objective and independent corroboration. But then you go on to infer that because such evidence is rare, mere accusations should be sufficient and all accusers are to be believed. It is a long-held principle of justice that it is better for a dozen guilty people go free than for one innocent to be convicted. How you can believe that catching false accusers will discourage real victims stretches credulity. All accusers, false or otherwise, have a right to be taken seriously, but so too have the innocent, until proven guilty. When you rely solely or mainly on accusations, then you can say goodbye to justice. The Innocence Project in the USA shows what happens to justice in the absence of evidence.

(3) I don’t think I have ever described feminism as a conspiracy (though there may well have been a few informal conspiracies over the years) but it is certainly an ideology, evolved from the perceived injustices and grievances of the ‘women’s libbers’ over forty-five years ago, and founded on totally false premises which have been disproven and debunked many times (though feminists and their supporters always completely ignore any evidence which destroys their world view, and inflate and distort evidence and statistics in order to support their cause), an ideology which has become embedded in our culture, with power and infulence in academia, politics, law, and the media, and one which more and more women are rejecting. And like all ideologies, whether religious or political, it regards itself as the sole arbiter of all issues and seeks to silence, censor and destroy those disagree with the thinkings of its group mind. Your ‘tin-foil hat’ reference is a typical example of those who resort to ad hominem attempts to ridicule, shame, and silence, when they have no answer to the arguments put forward, are unwilling to address the real issues, and cannot face the truth that they have lost the debate.

[Gullscorer]

If the jury has reached a guilty verdict, the defendant must be guilty, right? Not necessarily.

Read the books listed below and be disturbed, be very disturbed, about the state of justice in Britain - or indeed, anywhere else in the world.

Our system of justice is fallible and it is not just corrupt police officers or prejudiced judges at fault: juries too can be prejudiced and give perverse verdicts accordingly.

"They must be guilty, that's why they're here, isn't it?"

A study in Canada (remember that the Canadian and US systems of justice are based on ours) of nearly a thousand people called for jury service found that over 40% would not give the benefit of the doubt to any person charged with sexual offences against children - or as supposedly 40% of respondents to a similar survey in Britain back in 2007 said about people brought to court for trial for any form of crime.

Not suprisingly, an American study of a smaller sample involving men who have ultimately been proven to be innocent concluded that in the case of actually innocent men charged with crimes, juries on average convict 25% of them.

If you think the British justice system is the best in the world, read these books. If you are satisfied that the British justice system gets it right most of the time, read these books. If you think you have done nothing wrong so you are not at risk of a miscarriage of justice, read these books:

No Smoke by Sandra Lean
Judge For Yourself: How Many Are Innocent? by L A Naylor
The Death of Justice: Guilty Until Proven Innocent by Michael O’Brien
Forever Lost, Forever Gone by Paddy Joe Hill
Error of Judgement by Chris Mullin

[Gullscorer]

By the way, the Official 2015 Cliff Richard Calendar is on sale now..