General News Discussion

[feral chile]

I think what's good about it could be the discovery of how widespread that type of behaviour was. And as much as things have improved, there's still a fair way to go (in relation to how too many women still get treated in the work place).

[Rufus Gwertigan]

i had a bad experience a few years back, one of the men in my office started taking an interest, waylaid me after the office party, which I foolishly kept quiet about. For 6 months he was a total nightmare, throwing strops if he saw me talking to any male colleagues. At exactly this time, one of the women, who was a friend at the time, and who sat on his table, started hassling me about my social life, and there were loads of unsavoury rumours going around about what I was supposed to be getting up to when I was out, and pretty much a bossy, bordering on bullying, campaign to get me to curtail my social life. (All I did was attend the local live music venue/disco once a week, no hanky panky involved, hubby dropped me off and picked me up afterwards). And loads of stirring between myself and any male colleagues I was on friendly terms with to the point that a lot of people seemed to have developed the idea that I had some kind of issue with them. And it all dated back to that night, with no bother at all before that.

Eventually it all kicked off, and i ended up disclosing what had happened, and why I was having issues with him.

And the girl who was hassling me said. 'has it occurred to you he's jealous?'

Well duh I think I could work that one out. So that apparently excused him of being a complete control freak, stirring up all kinds of trouble for me with other people he dragged into it, and destroying a couple of friendships along the way.

And guess who ended up looking like the bad guy?

[eFestivals]

What... the 'look at me I'm a paedo' bandwagon?

his workmates (The Who?) didn't understand him half the time. I think it's amazing they stood by him with his ideas... Tommy, the Who's Next 'experiment', Quadrophenia, etc

they understood him enough that when he said he was a junkie they knew it was all bollocks to get his name in the papers.

Why do you think this is anything different?

[thesecretingredientiscrime]

I would believe that Saville and his lawyers used his charity giving to his advantage to a major extent and this had an impact on stopping certain things from going public.

[eFestivals]

so, you really think he's concocted the credit-card/paedophile story for publicity?

nope. He didn't have any choice about that story, seeing it came from the old bill investigation into his use of a credit card on a paedo website.

[eFestivals]

so which bandwagon is he jumping on by saying he doesn't want to talk about Jimmy Saville?

if he didn't want to jump on the Savile bandwagon, why is he bothering to say anything at all? Particularly when what he has bothered saying is that he's saying nothing?

[The Nal]

if he didn't want to jump on the Savile bandwagon, why is he bothering to say anything at all? Particularly when what he has bothered saying is that he's saying nothing?

[5co77ie]

if he didn't want to jump on the Savile bandwagon, why is he bothering to say anything at all? Particularly when what he has bothered saying is that he's saying nothing?

[eFestivals]

Regarding him being a user, he was. After Moon died Pete did a load. He was a mess in the late 70s/early 80s. Roger has stated loads of times that he nearly "lost" Pete twice in 1979. Not sure if it was an OD or whatever but he was certainly fucked up.

really? I've heard Daltry say in his own words that Pete was only ever a junkie in his head.

[eFestivals]

(ps, the book he was researching got ditched. He decided it wasn't worth doing in the light of what happened. )

or perhaps there was no book in the first place.

[eFestivals]

yep, perhaps he made the whole thing up

not sure why though..

unless you're assuming all the evidence that was given is wrong

I can't remember all the details now, but I do remember that a legal case wasn't pursued, but not necessarily because his claims of writing a book about it were true.

If I remember rightly, a legal case wasn't pursued on the basis that he'd paid to sign up to access that paedo site, but that there was no record of him having actually accessed the site after having paid - and so there was no evidence of him having actually done anything contrary to the law.

As far as I remember, him claiming to be researching a book had no bearing on the decision to not pursue him to court.

Edited October 11, 2012 by eFestivals

[eFestivals]

that's right. So why would he make up something about researching a book.

because it's able to suggest to the public that he's not a paedo but researching a book?

As far as i'm aware, nothing about the existence of that supposed book he was supposedly researching has ever been verified - at least not until AFTER the point where he knew the old bill were on his case (but before it became public).

From what I've read of the case (and I don't claim that what I've read is accurate, but I have nothing else to go on - same as you) there's nothing which came out to back up his version of events. And so the possibility remains that it was a cover-story.

[eFestivals]

so you think he's a paedophile

Nope, I don't. I'm just not thinking he's definitely not a paedo.

there was nothing to counter his version either.

there was, an awful lot. How bad is your memory?

Pete tried putting forwards that the proof that he was doing research was the fact he'd been in touch with some anti-abuse organisation.

It later came out - from that anti-abuse organisation - that he'd only contacted them after he knew the old bill were on his case.

What evidence could there be that he was doing some research if he decided to not finish it?

a stack of research that pre-dated the old bill's investigation?

As far as I'm aware the old bill found nothing of any research, which is why they didn't go with the research story and so gave him a caution.

Edited October 11, 2012 by eFestivals

[The Nal]

Couple of facts here then....

I had a similar conversation with a mate recently who insisted Pete was caught with "thousands of images" on his PC.

- Townshend has been involved in anti child abuse/paedo cause sinces the late 70s. This is not disputable.

- He was sexually abused as a child so his involvement came from that.

- The filth didn't find one image or search for child porn on any of the 6-7 odd PCs and Macs they took from his house.

- He admitted paying to get onto a site he thought was set up as a sting operation by the cops to "see what was on there"

- If he was a fiddler, he hardly would've used his "Pete Townshend" credit card to access the site.

- He was rightly put on the ex offenders register as is the law o the land.

- This book has been written on and off for nearly 20 years.

Edited October 11, 2012 by The Nal

[eFestivals]

He was sexually abused as a child so his involvement came from that.

I know that's what he says, and I've no reason to disbelieve that he was abused. I believe he probably was.

But it's also the case, I believe, that the majority of child abusers were abused themselves as a child. So while that fact means nothing against Pete, it also gets to mean that that fact doesn't suggest innocence either.

If he was a fiddler, he hardly would've used his "Pete Townshend" credit card to access the site.

Why not? Just about everyone else that accessed the same site or sites used their own credit cards, and the use of their credit cards was what directly led to very many convictions.

I'm not trying to say he's a paedo. I'm saying those particular facts don't mean he's not a paedo.

[eFestivals]

you need to back that up. I don't remember any.

you can go google it just as well as me. And seeing as you're the one who wants to know of it, google is that way.

I'm not saying what I've said for the fun of it, I'm saying it because it's what I read of the case.

As I've said, I'm not of the view that Pete is definitely a paedo, I'm merely saying that the details of what came out did not clear him of that possibility.

[The Nal]

As I've said, I'm not of the view that Pete is definitely a paedo, I'm merely saying that the details of what came out did not clear him of that possibility.

[Rufus Gwertigan]

Nope, I don't. I'm just not thinking he's definitely not a paedo.

there was, an awful lot. How bad is your memory?

Pete tried putting forwards that the proof that he was doing research was the fact he'd been in touch with some anti-abuse organisation.

It later came out - from that anti-abuse organisation - that he'd only contacted them after he knew the old bill were on his case.

a stack of research that pre-dated the old bill's investigation?

As far as I'm aware the old bill found nothing of any research, which is why they didn't go with the research story and so gave him a caution.

[eFestivals]

what you've said so far hasn't been particularly reliable

"Pete wasn't a heroin user"... welll he was

No, I've said that Daltry has said he wasn't a junkie, because Daltry has. And that's a different thing to what you've just said.

"why did he talk about Saville if he didn't want to talk about it"... because he was asked

All I said about that was a suggestion that he was wanting some self-publicity. Since then you've said he was asked about it. Nothing of that (or the previous thing) proves me unreliable.

I can't find it... I've already looked.

fair enough, then I guess I wouldn't find it either so I won't bother trying.

But failing to find it doesn't mean that what I've said wasn't reported, because it very definitely was. If you'd have read everything around the allegations you'd have come across it.

There was Pete's version of everything which went on around his use of his credit card for that site, but not all of what he said was the true facts, as the statement by that anti-abuse org got to prove (they were quite upset with Pete for using their name as a part of his defence when their involvement did not 'clear' him as he was suggesting).

That doesn't mean that he's a paedo - it's quite possible that he got confused over dates and the like. But neither does the involvement of that anti-abuse org put him in the clear as he tried suggesting it would.

[eFestivals]

All thats ever come out is that he paid for a paedo site and then cancelled it straight away. Theres never been anything else.

There's never been anything else to firmly suggest any involvement with paedophilia, true.

But the fact that a part of the defence that he offered does not put him in the clear as he said it would do - but in fact suggests that it might have been done as a cover story - makes the waters muddier than they might have otherwise been.

[The Nal]

Penthouse: Did you seek professional help?

Townshend. I went to this doctor and he prescribed some sleeping tablets, some high-power vitamins, and an anti-depressant, or tranquilizer of sorts, called Ativan. [Ativan is chemically a close relative to Valium and Librium.] Now these Ativans were really the business. They made me feel incredibly good. I felt as if I could cope with everything. So about a month before Christmas, I decided to go back into the studio again. And there was this French woman hanging around all the time, and she asked me, "Have you got any junk?" And I said, "No." And she said, "Well, how the hell are you managing?" So I said, "Managing what?" I suddenly cast my mind back and I remembered a series of events that had happened to me throughout the year. The most notable incident was being carried out of a nightclub and taken to a hospital with a drug overdose. I had not been able to remember the circumstances except that, when I got to the hospital, a nurse found needle holes in my arm.

After this happened, I rang up a friend of mine who was a dealer in cocaine. Incidentally, he is now dead at twenty-six years of age. He died of an OD last week, just before I came away. Anyway, I rang him up and asked him, "Have we been doing any, you know, smack?" And he said, "Yeah. Sometimes I put a bit in with the coke, but not enough to cause any problems." But you see we'd been doing a lot of freebasing .So when the Ativan stopped working, and I turned to heroin, it did not take long for me to become well and truly hooked. I just sort of topped off a habit, I guess.

Penthouse: But why the track marks?

Townshend: I only later discovered the significance of that. In the nightclub that evening, a so-called friend of mine in the music business said to me, "You look really smashed." I said, "Yeah, I am." He said, "I've got something for you." And he took me in a toilet and gave me an injection of heroin. Apparently, I had used heroin in front of a few gossips one night, and word had gotten around that I was a heroin addict. So this guy thought I was suffering from withdrawal and that he was doing me a favor, when in fact I'd simply had too much. to drink. Anyway, the shot of heroin temporarily killed me -- my heart stopped. When they carried me into the hospital, I was dark blue. The nurse actually had to rip off my shirt outside the hospital and beat me back to life.

There's never been anything else to firmly suggest any involvement with paedophilia, true.

But the fact that a part of the defence that he offered does not put him in the clear as he said it would do - but in fact suggests that it might have been done as a cover story - makes the waters muddier than they might have otherwise been.

Edited October 11, 2012 by The Nal

[eFestivals]

What research could he have been doing? There are many people out there that do investigate child porn rings and the only reason they look at the images is in an effort to identify victims and offenders and possible locations. The authorities have a vast array of resources at hand to do that. Acting alone what do you expect to gain from it? I dont buy into the idea that you need to see it to get an understanding of what is happening. All you need to do is read testimonies from others. To me even looking out of curiosity is as bad as looking for arousal, as the paedo still makes his money and that legitimises the site for him.

yep. All that you say there was said at the time, and all suggests that his claims of doing research might not be the truth of things.

Having said that, I've at some point long in the past considered googling for such sites out of nothing other than curiosity (mostly because of how much the media have gone on about it, in much the same way that most people have looked at porn online because of how much the media have gone on about it) but thought better of it (thank gawd, it would have been a stupid thing to do, both because of possible comeback, and because I suspect that what I would have seen I would have found very disturbing) - so I certainly don't reject curiosity as a reason for why some people might look at such sites.

As I keep saying, I don't think Pete is a paedo. But I do think that from what is in the public domain there's reasons to doubt his claims that he's not.

Would I be happy to leave him alone with a young child of mine? Very definitely not. I wouldn't take the chance.

[eFestivals]

After this happened, I rang up a friend of mine who was a dealer in cocaine. Incidentally, he is now dead at twenty-six years of age. He died of an OD last week, just before I came away. Anyway, I rang him up and asked him, "Have we been doing any, you know, smack?" And he said, "Yeah. Sometimes I put a bit in with the coke, but not enough to cause any problems."

It's stuff like this which puts into my mind that he really is completely full of shit.

His dealer conveniently "died last week"? It could have happened, I suppose.

The suggestion is that he OD'd on coke. Hugely unlikely.

His coke dealer was mixing in smack and he never noticed? Yeah, right.

A coke dealer was mixing in smack? Yeah, right.

It could have happened how Pete said. But he must have been hanging with a unique drug dealer.

[eFestivals]

Ps - and those stories are completely different stories to other stories he's told.

For example, the story Pete told which had Daltry saying Pete was full of shit about drugs and being a junkie has Pete saying something along the lines of "I took smack once and that was it, I was an addict".

Townsend might tell good stores. But don't go making the mistake of believing they're all true.

[eFestivals]

Many addicts say that. It doesn't mean they only took it once then never again, rather that it only needs one - the first - time to become addicted

nope, from having read that interview Pete meant it literally. That was the whole point of what he was saying (it's from sometime after I started running efests I think, but before the paedo images stuff).

But either way, it's still a completely different story to the versions that Nal just posted.

Which of course all backs up what Daltry has said about Pete being full of shit most of the time.