The outpouring of evidence about Jimmy Savile shows that scores of people working in the BBC, Hospitals, childrens’ homes and even the police knew – not had heard gossip, really knew – about Savile’s paedophilia, but did not blow the whistle.
To me this correlates with the fact that scores of people in the FCO, MI6, MI5, Cabinet Office and other government agencies knew about extraordinary rendition, but did not blow – indeed still have have not blown – the whistle.
Savile had come to be seen as a big and peculiarly “Establishment” figure. The extreme rarity of whistleblowing in society is a strange phenomenon it is worth taking a few minutes to consider. Why did none of those now coming forward with their stories – not the victims, but the eye-witnesses – come forward at the time? Fear is probably the main answer, in particular fear of losing your job if you rock the boat. One problem in modern society is that people’s job is too central to their identity – most people when asked who they are, will reply what work they do. It is not just the need to earn money; your social status and personal relationships are often dependent on your position at work. To lose your job, or to become a social pariah within the organisation where you work, is too much for most people to contemplate.
That is why BBC producers who knew about Savile, saw him at it, did not blow the whistle on one of the Corporation’s biggest stars. It is why so few whistleblowers spontaneously come forward who have seen corruption in local government planning departments or defence procurement, to give an example. For most white collar crime there are people who are not directly involved bu see it and keep quiet. There is also the deterrent of self-incrimination – after a time silence becomes complicity.
In my own case of blowing the whistle on the international torture network, I know for certain that many other Ambassadors and diplomats knew just what was happening, most of them didn’t like it, but nobody but me blew the whistle. One Ambassador sent me a cheery “Rather you than me!” Some were actively complicit by being involved in rendition arrangements, others passively by not trying to stop it. This is why the Gibsom Inquiry into Complicity in Torture was shelved – it could not have proceeded without revealing that scores, possibly hundreds, are guilty, many of them still high-ranking civil servants. It was to protect them and the institutions in which they work, rather than to protect the high profile war criminals like Blair, Straw and Campbell, that the Establishment closes ranks. I always knew I would never be allowed to testify before an Inquiry into Complicity in Torture.
Whistleblowers are not just thrown out of their jobs. They almost never find new employment, as the one quality every employer values above any other quality is loyalty to the employer, right or wrong. Nobody wants a “disloyal” employee, whatever their motives. And if your whistleblowing involves the world of war and spying, they will try to set you up on false charges, like me, like Julian Assange, and not just sack you but destroy you.
Whistleblowers are rare because it is a near suicidal vocation, and everyone else is too scared to help. The Savile case teaches us far more important lessons than the prurient detail of a lurid life. Think about it.
Interesting article on torture:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2012/oct/19/torture-uk-britain-blood-government
It is really important to keep in mind the differences between whistle-blowing, and just complaining about something, even most detailed and well-intentioned complaining.
Whistleblowing is what MI6’s agent Gareth Willaims and his GCHQ associate Gudrun Loftus did by leaking secret material, especially the Afghan Log, to Julian Assange’s Wikileaks, resulting in its publication, and their apparent murder.
Leaking important, secret information – what can cause all kinds of problems for covert government – is a deadly business these days, explaining why what little of vital importance is drying up steadily.
To go on about what covert governmnet is doing, what I have an avocation in doing, only becomes deadly when the authorities think you have leaked information about something most hush-hush, or one is someone’s spy.
The difference was brought home to me when John Young’s cryptome.org started posting my articles about individual spies, and the Pentagon’s manipulation of weather and land changes, thinking that I was being fed about these matters hy foreign governments, or some spies, working for them.
When I met him for a professional discussion in June 2009 in New York City’s Riverside Park, he asked if I thought that the Agency was still trying to kill me – as it had during 1995-96 when I was an American exile, living in Portugal- I poohed, poohed the idea, only for him to volunteer that it was again out to get me.
And it turned out to be true when the Swedish Security Service aka Säpo chased out a CIA hit squad which was attempting to poison me the previous February – what I only learned of last year.
After that, especially learning that there was no evidence of my having leaked information or spying of anyone, thanks to their breaking into my house of determine what information I had on my computers or in my files while I was away in California for seven weeks, they tried unsuccessfully to entrap as ‘Jihad Jane’s aka Colleen LaRose’s Islamic lover/assassin of Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks – the loony who drew all those insulting cartoons of The Prophet.
The same distinctions were shown while Assange was getting away with posting leaked information while Williams and Loftus were simply disposed of.
I am not mentioning this to elicit any support from others about my treatment as it comes with the territory but to indicate what is and what isn’t dangerous disclosures aka whistle-blowing.
The reason people don’t blow the whistle is fear. Often the fear is justified. It’s the internalisation that’s irrational. Blacking things out mentally is a widespread social problem. In their ‘job’ roles, a lot of people act like bloody zombies.
But in some cases, there’s not much irrationality at all.
Take for example the case of Nicolas von Hoogstraten, the notorious thug landlord. Quite a few people who are reading this will have heard about him. He’s got huge residential property interests in Brighton as well as business interests in Zimbabwe. Pretty much everyone in the Brighton area knows that he acts above the law. I’m not aware of any journalist who’s written about him who thinks he’s ‘all mouth’ when he threatens to have people killed.
A lot of tenants in the Brighton area, including many many students, have come up against enforcers from this notorious landlord’s organisation, e.g. being threatened with beatings if they start complaining that the landlord won’t fix what he’s contractually obliged to fix, or being forced out of their accommodation before the end of their tenancy etc., sometimes with their stuff chucked out on the street.
The point I want to focus on is that housing advisers, whether they are at the Council or at Sussex University’s accommodation office, routinely advise tenants who are experiencing threats of violence that “he’s well-known, and we sympathise, but there’s nothing we can do. We always advise people in your situation to find somewhere else to live and to try to put it all behind them” People get the same advice from county court staff too.
And as with Jimmy Savile’s crimes against people less powerful than himself, this has been going on not just for years but for decades.
OK, who’s going to be first to blow the whistle?
[Mod/Clark: Comment has been moved… Guess where?]
sorry, posted on wrong thread. Oh well.
Hot off the press. Breaking news ex Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Tel Aviv. Note ‘Israel says….’ No words from the passengers or crew on the Estelle are reported.
Israel intercepts Gaza-bound boat
The Israeli navy intercepts a Finnish-flagged boat of pro-Palestinian activists trying to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-20015247
Talking of blowing the whistle at the BBC…
Estelle intercepted: Israel navy stops Gaza-bound boat :
20 October 2012 Last updated at 09:56 GMT
Estelle intercepted: Israel navy stops Gaza-bound boat
The Israeli navy has intercepted a boat of pro-Palestinian activists trying to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip.
The Finnish-flagged Estelle left Naples on 7 October with some 20 people of eight different nationalities aboard.
Israel imposed the blockade after the Islamist group Hamas seized control of the coastal sliver in 2007.
An IDF spokesperson confirmed the navy had boarded the ship and that no-one had been injured, but provided no further details.
So Hamas “seized control”, did they? I thought they were elected.
And what’s with the reference to ‘interception’ and ‘stopping’, with the word ‘boarding’ only used in the final sentence? But full marks to the BBC editor who wanted to cover his arse by only using the word in a quote from the Israeli armed forces. He’ll keep his job. So will the headline writer who made sure it didn’t go in the headline.
They forget to say that the Israeli armed forces boarded this ship in international waters. Well done.
Thanks so much to the BBC for quoting what the Israeli armed forces have “confirmed” about what they’ve done.
But what are the 20 victims or their organisation saying?
What is the Finnish government saying?
And the Swedish company that owns the ship?
And the authorities of the countries of which the victims are nationals?
Never mind. Who cares? Best wait for the government that has committed the crime to “provide information”, eh?
Imagine if the Iranian navy boarded a civilian ship in international waters!
Who at the BBC is going to blow the whistle on the fact that the organisation’s leadership is too scared ever to offend the Zionists?
Although former BBC guy Alan Hart has at least done some good stuff.
@nuid
You clearly don’t know how to read my statement. *Compared* to the UK, there is a generally more open disregard for all sorts of rules in Ireland.
The Catholic Church exerts a strong influence, but again, there have always been plenty of places in Dublin where a church, a bookie, and a brothel are within a minute’s walk of one another.
Basically, you are taking issue with something you don’t understand. I’ve no idea why. I’m Irish, but grew up in the UK. I know both cultures well.
Why not try and find something else to do than start a forensic investigation into a single comment of mine, particularly when far wilder claims on the same thread seem to have escaped your penetrating mind.
@Mary – snap! (Although my post is awaiting moderation)
[Mod/Clark: Released from queue, scroll up^ scroll up^]
A fair Press TV report which does not include the anti-Hamas lie in the BBC report. They NEVER mention that Hamas won an election. How dare those naughty evil ‘Islamists’ do such a thing as hold an election.
‘Israel imposed the blockade after the Islamist group Hamas seized control of the coastal sliver in 2007.’
http://presstv.com/detail/2012/10/20/267760/gazabound-aid-ship-attacked-by-israel/
The more I think about this the more I incline to the view that it has very little to do with fear of losing your job and much more to do with the content of your character. Think of those people who administer electric shocks to people in psychology experiments because they are told to by people in authority. Not all do, some refuse. What’s the difference? The whistleblowers are the ones who gave shelter to their Jewish neighbours on Kristalnacht. Those who did not speak out are the ones who shut the curtains and turned the wireless up loud. We British have a great sense of moral superiority over the Germans with respect to the rise of Nazism, but the flood of revelations about Jimmy Savile, twenty years too late, make it clear that we would have been no different.
For anyone who’s interested in what the organisers of the Estelle aid ship are saying about its being attacked today in international waters by the Israeli armed forces, here is the organisers’ website:
http://shiptogaza.se
The disgusting BBC couldn’t manage to ask the organisers for their side, being too busy repeating what the Israeli attackers said.
Here is what the organisers are saying:
Estelle is being attacked
According to Dror Feiler, spokesperson for Ship to Gaza Sweden, Estelle was attacked at 10.15 AM CET. Five or six military vessels surrounded Estelle. Soldiers wearing masks are now trying to board the ship. The attack took place on international waters: N31 26 E33 45
Incidentally, that position is nearer Egypt than Gaza.
If the Estelle was attacked in Egyptian territorial waters, then Israel is guilty of an act of war.
Not that Egypt would respond, but what if people start attacking Israel’s international interests?
In legal terms, the Israeli attack on the Estelle is an act of war against Finland. Indeed Israeli even threatened Finland beforehand.
Although the most immediate consideration must be the whereabouts and wellbeing of the 20 civilians who have been taken prisoner, I wonder how long it will take the Israeli servicemen to start using the prisoners’ bank cards, as they did after the flotilla massacre?
You are correct David R. Miles out and nowhere near Israeli waters.
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=N31+26+E33+45&ll=31.428663,33.75&spn=2.376276,3.433228&oe=UTF-8&t=m&z=8
Sky News have just had Avital Liebovitz on from the Israel navy spouting the usual lies and propaganda. She is always wheeled out on these occasions just as Micky Rosenfeld from the state police is produced to comment on a land based incident if Regev is not available.
I always laugh when I see this spoof You Tube produced after Mark Regev had done his best after the Mavi Marmara slaughter with his lying mock up of what happened on the top deck.
{http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ME_NpnH7jDc&bpctr=1350734257}
He features as does Avital.
@Nevermind. The position is not in Egyptian waters. It’s in international waters, to which the nearest dry land is in Egypt. (But Gaza is almost as close.)
If the armed forces of one country attack a ship registered in another country, that is always an act of war. It doesn’t matter where the attack takes place.
Has the organisers’ website at http://shiptogaza.se been attacked too? I’m not getting it to load.
Psychopathic societies generally produce more own-trumpet blowers than whistleblowers. The Third Reich remains the best modern day example of what happens if nobody blows the whistle. Or if just a few people blow the whistle and the rest just march to the drum.
Bring on the violins!
“Sir George Young”
http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2012/10/19/toff-swap-andrew-mitchell-replaced-by-baronet/
“You clearly don’t know how to read my statement.” — kingfelix
“Clearly” nothing. There is only one short answer to your condescension but I won’t post it here. You tried the same thing on another thread – all polite when you thought I was in the UK, but suddenly abrupt when you discovered where and who I was.
“*Compared* to the UK, there is a generally more open disregard for all sorts of rules in Ireland.”
As I said, wild exaggeration.
“Basically, you are taking issue with something you don’t understand.”
More tedious condescension.
“I’m Irish, but grew up in the UK. I know both cultures well.”
If you grew up in the UK, you don’t know Ireland like I do. I was not only born here, I grew up here, reared my children here, and lived my entire life here. Don’t attempt to lecture me.
And didn’t you write,
“I don’t believe timidity, in itself, arises from some essential component of the English character, but it may well have been drummed into most of us over the decades/centuries.” You seem to have some identity confusion that I don’t suffer from.
“Why not try and find something else to do than start a forensic investigation into a single comment of mine”
You made a sweeping and ridiculous assertion about Ireland, that’s why.
“particularly when far wilder claims on the same thread seem to have escaped your penetrating mind”
Sarcasm AND condescension. Well done. I’ll comment on what I want to comment on, not at your dictation, ‘kingfelix’.
Now tell me: why hasn’t there been the same level of protest in Ireland since the “bust” as there has been even in the UK? (Not to mention Greece and Spain.) Not by students? Not by unions? Not by anyone in fact? Especially since (according to you) there is “open disregard for all sorts of rules” here? And you mentioned the word “rebellion”?
I’m sure you’ll be able to write a dissertation on the subject, especially all the way from Taiwan. (Not that I’ll necessarily read it or reply to it, given your snotty attitude.)
N_ Crashed due to overload or most probably taken down I should guess. They did that to the Mavi Marmara.
High Seas. Freedom of the Seas etc.
http://www.un.org/Depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/part7.htm
“Does the Romney family now own your e-vote?”
http://freepress.org/departments/display/19/2012/4748
High Seas. Freedom of the Seas etc.
http://www.un.org/Depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/part7.htm
Thanks Mary. I need to bookmark that one.
This is a good blog. It is tough to know what the answer is. I worked for one of the UK’s largest wealth managers and saw a director frequently abusing his position by insider dealing, front running client orders and overcharging. I mention it to superiors and they made it clear it was taboo. I managed to get out in the end but for a time I felt distressed by it. How do you blow the whistle then go home and tell your family the house will probably be repossessed and your career is over.
A whois enquiry for shiptogaza.se returns the IP address: 89.221.240.54
Anyone else, please check this for me.
ping 89.221.240.54 is successful…
traceroute is very slow; here is traceroute output from the edge of my PlusNet connection onwards:
5 ae2.pcl-cr01.plus.net 195.166.129.6 55.264ms
6 xe-11-1-0.edge3.London2.Level3.net 212.187.201.209 54.811ms
7 ae-0-11.edge4.London2.Level3.net 4.69.200.126 56.025ms
8 ae-3-3.ebr1.London1.Level3.net 4.69.141.189 394.590ms
9 ae-59-114.csw1.London1.Level3.net 4.69.153.126 55.142ms
10 ae-1-51.edge5.London1.Level3.net 4.69.139.75 54.595ms
11 ldn-b5-link.telia.net 213.248.91.57 105.566ms
12 ldn-bb2-link.telia.net 80.91.249.181 55.527ms
13 hbg-bb2-link.telia.net 213.155.132.250 79.435ms
14 kbn-bb1-link.telia.net 213.155.135.125 90.984ms
15 kbn-b4-link.telia.net 80.91.246.47 91.277ms
16 m-b-peer3-link.telia.net 213.155.133.251 91.994ms
17 m-b-c5-link.se.telia.net 81.228.93.56 98.832ms
18 dro-td1-link.se.telia.net 81.228.73.30 91.227ms
19 hs-c-a11-link.se.telia.net 81.228.78.223 93.046ms
20 78.77.169.63 78.77.169.63 92.999ms
21 194-218-167-158.customer.telia.com 194.218.167.158 92.191ms
22 no reply *
Help with interpretation would be appreciated.
“Sir George Young”
http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2012/10/19/toff-swap-andrew-mitchell-replaced-by-baronet/
Gosh. Isn’t he up himself on his website? It’s like something from another age – St Mary Bourne, Lady Aurelia et al.
I cannot find the photo of Jimmy Savile referred to by Sue in the comments which are nicely acerbic. I don’t even object to the language used. After all, Young’s predecessor was prone to using the odd four letter word. I can see why he uses a bike. Less chance of being found over the limit on two wheels rather than four in 1987. See Wikipedia.
Jody Scheckter’s wife Clare bunged him £5,000 for his funds in 2010. What a waste. He also declares a pair of socks given to him when he opened a wool shop and then a paper knife and a bottle of wine. I think he is taking the piss out of the expenses regulations.
He is a drip and a throwback to England’s class-ridden past.
Today has turned out busy, and I was off to a late start. I’m not going to get to the demo.
http://www.sirgeorgeyoung.org.uk/pages/images/ACF7232.jpg
A British rail poster/leaflet.
http://shiptogaza.se/ is loading properly again now, so probably the problem was just heavy demand for the site.
Good grass roots site for march overage – video and tweets.
http://london.streetreporter.org/oct20
Particularly like the tweets: –
Overheard police reassuring the public “oh don’t worry, these people are law abiding citizens, they just don’t like this Government” #Oct20
#Oct20 Right-wingers are always keen to tell us how Thatcher smashed the Trades Unions. So why are they so bothered about the marches today?
and more!