Jimmy Savile the BBC and you.

[Mick-Talbot]

Well it's not going away any time soon is it?



Legend
One of the good guys
I also thought him a real gentleman
RIP Jimmy - we'll never see his like again.
bless him I liked Jimmy Saville........hope he has the best send off ever, he deserves that at least!.......

Taken from threads on Answerbank around the time of Saviles death


Now the vast majority of us accept that the women now coming forward were badly let down.......... but what about you, do you feel let down?

After all you were the ones paying most of Saviles wages.

In letting the Savile christmas special program go out the BBC encouraged people hero worship a predatory paedophile.

Peter Rippon should be ashamed of himself and resign, if not, sack him.
Do you want to see heads roll at the BBC?

[Prudie]

Seems like it's a lot more than just the BBC who were involved and covered all this up at the time. It's quite frightening - the secret handshake type thing is more powerful than most of us realise.

[magsmay]

It seems a lot more woman are coming forward now the 'C' word (Compensation) has been discussed. I'm not condoning hard-core child abuse (obviously) but in the 70's a tap on the bum at work or a lewd suggestion was not classed by anyone -including woman- as sexual harassment -you just laughed and got on with it -now-a-days it seems a guy can't wink sideways at a girl before he's up on a charge. Strangely it doesn't seem to work the other way around -last time i worked in an office the poor guys in there were regularly 'harrassed' by middle age woman old enough o be their mothers . yes heads should roll at the BBC - but for the right reasons -not cos Jimmy sa-VILE patted sandy shaw on the bum in 1965

[Mick-Talbot]

Nothing personal, magsmay but What The Funicular?

[jno]

nobody's going to be getting any compo for being patted on the bum.

I don't think it was at all clear when the Savile special went out that anyone outside Newsnight had any idea he was a predator. Perhaps they should have, but it seems the way the BBC go about things is each department follows its own plans and doesn't involve others. This isn't a bad recipe for editorial independence, but it can lead to clashes like this one.

I'm still waiting for an explanation of why the Newsnight programme was pulled. It might just be that digging up 40-year-old stories isn't really what Newsnight is for.

[magsmay]

mick - I think that came out a bit wrong ;-( just a bit fed up woman are now coming forward that were over the age of consent at the time and saying they've been abused. Its bad enough what he did to children and the press should concentrate on that and not involve people (like sandie shaw) who are just looking for publicity.

[Mick-Talbot]

It was pulled because they had to choose between a program about

'Jimmy Savile the Superhero fund raising lovable saint'
or
'Jimmy Savile the pervert'


Even an idiot would have at least thought it best not to run either of them under the circumstances.

[jno]

no, there was no need for a choice; they could have run both. There's no "BBC Line" on these things. Somebody decided to drop Newsnight when they didn't have to, which is why I'd like to hear the reason. Rippon might have been leant on from above or he might not.

[Mick-Talbot]

Surely if they had run the Newsnight program no one would have watched the
'let's all eulogise and wax lyrical over Jimmy Savile' program ....hence Newsnight was pulled?

[jno]

one programme would certainly have put the kibosh on the other. But it isn't Newsnight's job to promote other department's Xmas specials. My guess is you're right, it was pulled to save face. But I don't think it's at all clear how this was done and who was ultimately responsible.

Incidentally, a good piece of trawling at the beginning of your Q. Now that everyone's saying "Of course, I knew this all along, everyone did" it's worth remembering that no, everyone didn't know. (I didn't, for a start.)

[lady-janine]

i saw a bit of one of his programmes once. didn't like it and so never watched him again but never did i dream that he was guilty of anything so awful.

have seen more of him on news programmes lately than ever saw of him before and it is easy to see there was something odd about him. imo those that knew but did nothing are just as guilty. not times were different then. child abuse is never acceptable especially as some of them complained and were not believed. their non-believers are also guilty of neglect.