Ian Austin: he’s attacking Keir Starmer – and let’s hope this spat goes the distance.
This is hilarious.
After Keir Starmer had his party’s National Executive Committee ban former leader Jeremy Corbyn from ever standing as a Labour candidate in a future general election, rabid anti-Corbyn activist Ian Austin attacked him.
That’s right – now two right-wingers who both oppose Jeremy Corbyn are at odds. The Corbyn-haters have fallen to fighting each other.
Austin published his opening shot in rabidly anti-Corbyn rag the Jewish Chronicle. He stated:
He could have taken the opportunity to address concerns about his support for Jeremy Corbyn during the period when antisemitism poisoned the party.
After all, in 2019, he said, ‘I do think Jeremy Corbyn would make a great Prime Minister’.
When Louise Ellman said that Corbyn was ‘a danger to the Jewish community’, Starmer insisted: ‘I don’t accept that. I don’t accept that’.
And in 2020 during the leadership election, he even attacked those who campaigned against him, saying: ‘The attacks on Jeremy Corbyn were terrible, they vilified him.’
His supporters insist it is not necessary for him to apologise personally, but his challenge is not to persuade the already committed. He needs to reach out to those who still harbour doubts and concerns about his support for Corbyn.
He does need to account for his support for Corbyn’s leadership and his absence from the fight to tackle the racism that poisoned the party under his leadership.
Of course, it’s a load of nonsense.
Starmer had no option but to support Mr Corbyn in 2019 because Mr Corbyn was not responsible for the accusations of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party at the time and had done everything he could to tackle any genuine anti-Semitism that was there.
Many of the accusations were false, or were falsely upheld, remember. Right-wing factionalists in the party at the time seized on these and built them up, while at the same time slowing down the process by which they were handled, in order to make Mr Corbyn look bad.
He put a stop to that in 2018 when he installed his choice of general secretary and she in turn installed new measures to speed up the handling of complaints.
Starmer supported Mr Corbyn in 2020 – although that was more likely to be a brazen attempt to dupe the hundreds of thousands of Corbynites who were still in the party at the time to vote him into the party leadership.
But then he changed his tune, because he now had the power of the party leader and could do what he liked.
So he started throwing left-wingers out – including left-wing Jews. He justified this by claiming they had broken new rules he had made or were anti-Semites (yes, even the Jews).
And while this makes him two- or even three-faced: he supported Mr Corbyn then – he doesn’t now; he said anti-Semitism accusations against Mr Corbyn were unfair then – he doesn’t now; and he claimed to support left-wing values then – he doesn’t now… that doesn’t mean he should apologise for supporting Mr Corbyn.
It means he should apologise for turning against Mr Corbyn.
Neither of these fatheads will accept that they need to stand down, so hopefully we’ll see them butting heads for long enough to ruin them both in the eyes of the public.
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Ian Wright (right) with Gary Lineker: they were right – the councillor in this story was wrong.
I’m with Wrighty on this one.
It’s the story of Cllr Alexis McEvoy, who called Match of the Day pundit Ian Wright a “typical black hypocrite” after he spoke in support of the show’s presenter, Gary Lineker, and his public stance on the people we all seem to be calling “migrants” these days.
After an outcry, she deleted the tweet and posted an apology, noting that it had caused offence: “I did not mean it to do so and I am deeply sorry. I find racism in any form abhorrent.”
Mr Wright then accused her of making a “fake apology”. In response, she deleted her tweet and deactivated her account.
She also said the tweet had been taken out of context, suggested the row was an attempt to discredit her ahead of local elections, and protested that she also does good things for people, whatever colour they are.
My problem with this is that the councillor did not consider the meaning of her original words before she tweeted them – or she did, and thought they were acceptable. That suggests innate racism to me.
Yes, she may do good deeds. So might, say, a domestic abuser who contributes to food banks and/or other charities. Going further up the scale, Jimmy Savile raised money for charity. At risk of being accused of Godwinning, Hitler loved his dogs.
I’m not for one moment suggesting Cllr McEvoy’s words make her as bad as the other monsters I just mentioned. My point is simply that good deeds cannot be used to mitigate an intentional wrong.
The councillor quit her membership of the Conservative Party and of outside organisations, and reported herself to the authority’s monitoring officer. But would she have done that if nobody had complained – or if complaints had not become public knowledge?
The fact is that she didn’t. Her acts of rectification were prompted by public outrage.
That’s why Ian Wright said her apology was fake, and that’s why I agree with him.
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Empty chairs: is this how Match of the Day will look tomorrow?
The BBC has dug a hole for itself after dropping Gary Lineker from its flagship football show, Match of the Day, over his tweet linking government rhetoric on Channel migrants with that of Germany in the 1930s.
Mr Lineker will not be presenting Match of the Day this week – but the reason is not clear. The BBC is saying he’s “stepping back” until an agreement is reached on how he should use the social media – but Sky News reckons he has been forced off the programme for refusing to apologise.
Now, fellow presenters are lining up to refuse to take part. So far, Alan Shearer and Ian Wright have said they will not appear, in “solidarity” with Mr Lineker.
Jermaine Jenas has said if he were asked, he would say no.
Is Saturday’s edition of the show going to be a shot of empty chairs around a desk, with some football clips interspersed intermittently?
Elsewhere in the BBC, Good Morning Britain host Richard Madeley made himself both a hero and a villain in the eyes of the public when he talked about the row surrounding Mr Lineker’s Twitter comments on the BBC’s Question Time.
First, he stood by Mr Lineker’s right to say anything he wants on his personal Twitter account – to applause from the audience.
Then he said what had actually been declared on Twitter was “preposterous” – and received a less enthusiastic reaction.
See for yourself:
What do you think? Should Gary Lineker have his right to free speech curtailed, simply because he presents a programme that is not remotely related to the subject he was discussing?
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Care: this is the most illustrative image I could find that doesn’t show the people involved in the story – but how many severely disabled people are getting the care they need?
This is a serious breach of care. It seems care home staff and a UK city council spent a severely disabled man’s money on things that weren’t for him – and lied to his family about it.
Ian Reeves was a resident at Marston Court Care Home, Leicester, from 2007 until he died in February 2021. His next of kin, sister Sharon McConnell, developed serious concerns about the care he was receiving and how his money was being spent after their mother died in 2018.
She found that his bedroom was bare and he was sitting in a broken wheelchair, so she asked for control of his finances – but was refused.
So she applied to the courts to become a deputy – with the council retaining the role of appointee – and this was granted. Then she requested information on what had been done with his money.
She found that thousands of pounds had gone into and out of his bank account over the years – being spent on women’s and children’s clothes, cosmetics and toys he could not use.
She also found her wheelchair-bound brother’s money had been spent on Zumba classes and chiropody, which she also found strange. The council told her the Zumba classes were specially adapted and he enjoyed taking part.
There was much more (see the source article – link below – for details). Ms McConnell wanted more information but was frustrated by the response, so she urged the council, the police, the Care Quality Commission and the ombudsman to carry out their own investigations.
The police and the CQC very quickly backed out. The council concluded the home had mismanaged her brother’s finances and that more than £1,500 of his money was ‘unaccounted for’.
It ordered the home to apologise, pay the missing money back and carry out a review of its policies for managing residents’ finances. But the home did not accept the council’s findings and claimed the spending on Zumba classes, clothing and toys all met Ian’s needs.
Both Marsden Court and the council have been found guilty of failing her brother and maladministration by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.
The ombudsman concluded both the council and home mismanaged Ian’s finances. Its report, which refers to Ian only as ‘Mr C’, highlights a catalogue of mistakes by both organisations.
Ms McConnell has been offered apologies and £500 in compensation – to make up for the loss of thousands of pounds.
But bosses at the home, while acknowledging they had to learn lessons on good practice from the case, have said they don’t recognise other concerns that had been raised.
They said the home had received a clean bill of health from the Care Quality Commission (which had backed away from investigating, remember) and the council (which had admitted failings) and other professionals regularly visited the home and viewed Ian’s room.
That’s where this story ends. But it raises questions about the care of other severely disabled people at homes around the UK – the most obvious being the following:
How many other people have received – or are receiving – the same or similar treatment to that received by Ian Reeves?
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Yes: this is the only image This Site has of Ian Byrne.
The remarkable aspect of this story is not that Ian Byrne is being victimised by members of his own party, or that he is seeking advice from the police about how to deal with it – This Site and others have already covered those things.
No – the extraordinary part is that the BBC appears to have removed its blinkers and is now prepared to cover it.
An MP who wants to remain as a Labour candidate at the next election has said he will be “seeking guidance” from police over alleged intimidation.
West Derby MP Ian Byrne tweeted that he faced “shameful” intimidation at an event on Saturday and had blocked those “involved in this appalling behaviour”.
Mr Byrne is being challenged in the race in West Derby by Liverpool councillor Anthony Lavelle and Lancashire councillor Kimberley Whitehead, after losing a series of ballots in his local party.
In a week’s time, members of the constituency Labour Party will choose one of the three to be their candidate.
The process, which started in the summer has been described as “toxic” by Labour members.
Toxic. The fact that this is the word to which party members resort when describing the process imposed on them by their own leadership speaks volumes.
The article then focuses on an alleged incident between supporters of Byrne and those of Lavelle, when events were coincidentally (?) scheduled to take place at neighbouring venues. One has to question how that happened.
Considering the ill-feeling over this matter and the way the Labour leadership seems to be prioritising the other candidates over Byrne, it seems incongruous that this should have happened.
Who was responsible for it?
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Christian Wakeford: this Tory defector to the Labour Party gets to skip the process of selection to stand as a Labour representative in the next general election, while people who have been Labour members all their lives are being pushed out by a hostile right-wing leadership.
The Labour Parliamentary selection process has plumbed a new depth of bias.
This Site has already reported the way the right-wing (dare I say far – for the Labour Party – right-wing?) Labour leadership is trying to squeeze left-wing candidates including MP of the Year Ian Byrne out of being selected to stand at the next UK general election.
Now we learn that Christian Wakeford, the former Conservative MP who crossed the floor to the Labour benches, has been allowed to skip the selection process entirely.
That’s right – a former Tory is being allowed to avoid the judgement of Labour members and voters in his constituency so he can stand for election again, whether the local party wants him or not.
Here’s Damo – and be warned, his language is spicy:
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Ian Byrne: now it seems Labour members who unaccountably want to deprive their constituency of the MP of the Year are trying to intimidate him and his team.
Take a look at this tweet, and the reply it provoked, from a councillor in the constituency of MP of the Year Ian Byrne.
Despite winning the award for his excellent work, Byrne is facing an uphill struggle to be re-selected as the Labour candidate for Liverpool West Derby – because it seems the party’s leaders are deliberately trying to prevent it.
This Site reported on November 5 that
Labour has rescinded Mr Byrne’s access to Organise, the communication facility between the party hierarchy and its members.
His rival in the campaign – a shiny Wes Streeting-a-like from London – does have access to the tool and therefore has a huge advantage over Mr Byrne, who is reduced to trying to resource his reselection campaign on the social media.
Now this:
Unlikely Ian would have blocked anyone unless they had been abusive to him or staff.
With Ian’s massive majority, excellent track record, huge popularity (MP of year) & tireless work in your community, I’m curious to know why you think someone else is more worthy of your vote?
— Nicola James 💙 #EnoughIsEnough #ProtectOurNHS (@NAJ562) November 13, 2022
Nicola James makes a good point. Why would anybody think the MP of the Year is not worth re-selecting? That’s the first indication that something is amiss with Cllr Doyle’s complaint. As for the comment about abusive behaviour… well, here’s what Byrne himself has to say about it:
So he says he suffered intimidation from people including local politicians and will be taking up the matter, not just with the local authority but with the police as well.
This casts an entirely different light on Cllr Doyle’s words, it seems.
It also appears that right-wingers among the Labour members in the West Derby constituency are spreading what Byrne himself has described as myths about him, in a bid to persuade gullible colleagues that he’s not worth their vote. An astonishing claim about the MP of the Year!
Here’s his response, killing these claims with the facts:
In a campaign in which I am saddened to say, fair play and integrity have not always been apparent, I find myself needing to put out this information to clarify a few things for West Derby members. I would much prefer to be concentrating on hold the Tories to account: pic.twitter.com/hDtdTHJErC
For those of you who can’t read images, here’s what the text says:
Mythbusters
Sometimes during a campaign, facts get lost. Several West Derby members have made me aware of what they consider to be, at best, ‘odd’ conversations with representatives of other candidates over recent weeks.
In order to ensure there are no misunderstandings and that all West Derby members have access to the facts, I have put together this simple mythbuster to clarify a few points:
I voted Remain in the EU ref, not Brexit (as members inform me, they have been told by other campaigns). I also 100% respected the outcome of the vote.
My office was not closed for my first year in the role as MP. I set up a highly visible and accessible, brand new MP’s office in Tuebrook, one of the poorest wards in our constituency. Within the first few months of the role, I, like everyone, was subject to Covid-19 rules which I followed. My office was open 8am – 6pm durinq the pandemic but subject to the same lockdown and social distancing rules as everyone else.
Myself and my team worked non-stop during the pandemic and supported West Derby constituents in so many different ways. I sadly had to close the office to the public again earlier this year as a security precaution, due to frightening death threats made against myself, team and family by a far-right extremist posing outside the office. This does not mean myself and my team are not working, we are, all day, every day, for the people of West Derby.
As the MP for West Derby I am responsible for many things, all of which I take very seriously. Councillors have primary jurisdiction over local council issues such as traffic, potholes, dog muck and street lighting. Within West Derby, each ward has three local councillors who I support and encourage to carry out their roles fully.*
I am not obsessed with foodbanks. I am however committed to ending the need for foodbanks, and I make no apology for that. Please look at my work on the Right To Food campaign to see how I am challenging the need for the very existence of foodbanks: www.ianbyrne.org/righttofood
Thank you for your time.
Ian Byrne, MP Liverpool West Derby *Please see separate statement issued 13. 11.2022 regarding intimidation
Looking at Byrne’s preface to his statement, it seems clear that he’s saying “fair play and integrity” are no longer part of the Labour leadership’s skillset.
Perhaps, instead of trying to remove MPs who have those qualities – like Byrne himself – party members across the UK should concentrate on ridding their organisation of the parasites that have infested its head office instead.
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Ian Byrne: his own party may have dis-Organise-d him but will he be able to use the social(ist) media to turn the tables on the hierarchy?
Could the UK’s voters ever have been given a clearer sign that they should not support a political party?
Labour is trying to remove MP of the Year Ian Byrne from his Liverpool West Derby Parliamentary seat – but as he is the recipient of that award, and hasn’t done anything wrong, the party is trying an inventive way of doing it. Constructive dismissal, one might suggest.
So, in the campaign to be reselected as the party’s candidate for that seat, Labour has rescinded Mr Byrne’s access to Organise, the communication facility between the party hierarchy and its members.
His rival in the campaign – a shiny Wes Streeting-a-like from London – does have access to the tool and therefore has a huge advantage over Mr Byrne, who is reduced to trying to resource his reselection campaign on the social media.
Here’s Damo with the details:
Labour is so blatantly rigging selection rules now, that they've removed MP Ian Byrne's access to his local membership, leaving him running a campaign via social media as the only way to get the word out. Well, I've some words too…#DamoRants#WestDerbyhttps://t.co/BZl6SY0u8w
— Damien Willey, Detester of Tories. (@KernowDamo) November 4, 2022
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Laughing at us: Boris Johnson grinned inanely and bobbed about on his bench while MPs attacked his contempt for the rules and denials of guilt.
What an apocalyptic performance.
Prime Minister’s Questions could hardly have gone worse for Boris Johnson. It is hard to tell which moment was more damaging for him.
Was it this, in which senior Tory MP – and himself a former leadership contender – David Davis quoted (among others) Oliver Cromwell?
I was one of many to comment on it…
The @DavidDavisMP intervention changes everything. People have been saying the Tories don't have anyone with whom to replace @BorisJohnson so won't replace him, but this suggests that the grandees don't care and just want him out. #PMQs#PoliticsLive
Alternatively, was the tipping-point this moment, in which Johnson himself laughed at criticisms of his rule-breaking?
I had something to say about this as well:
It's a sharp contrast to last week's show of contrition, with @BorisJohnson smirking, pulling faces and bobbing about on his bench like a naughty schoolboy. Does he not know how bad it looks when he has been caught rule-breaking – like a naughty schoolboy? #PMQs#PoliticsLive
And now we’re all waiting to see if Graham Brady, chairman of the Tory backbench 1922 Committee, will come out and say he’s received enough ‘no confidence’ letters to trigger a leadership challenge against Johnson.
After today’s performance it seems that, for many of us – Tories and Opposition alike – that moment can’t come soon enough.
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Accused and accuser: Prince Andrew (left) is said to have sexually abused the woman now known as Virginia Giuffre (right) while she was still a child – and is doing everything he can to avoid facing trial for it. This in itself casts suspicion on his claims of innocence. And it may be bringing the UK Monarchy into disrepute for protecting him.
Let’s start this article with the important question: is anybody tracking down the perverts who had sex with underage girls provided by Ghislaine Maxwell?
It’s all very well saying that the procurer has been convicted so the route via which these vile creatures gratify their disgusting desires has been cut off – but it only means they will find other ways.
Police – in America – are going through the now-infamous black book kept by Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein, but they are treating the associates listed within merely as possible witnesses, rather than as possible suspects (until and unless evidence is found to justify criminal proceedings).
That may come as a relief to people like Keir Starmer’s recently-appointed henchman Peter Mandelson, who has 10 entries in the book (suggesting that he wanted the paedophile pair to be able to get hold of him wherever he may have been), and newly-to-be-knighted Tony Blair, who has an entry in the book himself.
It may not be so much of a comfort to Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, who appears in the book 16 times and is accused of child sex offences.
And the repercussions may undermine the foundations of the UK Monarchy – an institution that has survived for almost a thousand years. That’s plenty of time to fall into filth and corruption – and to hide it by abusing the privileges that come with the highest position in the land.
It’s being reported that Andrew has just begun to show concern that his alleged crimes may bring down the Monarchy. It seems he had not previously spared a thought for the fact that being involved with people in a paedophile ring (whether he was a part of it or not) might bring that ancient institution into disrepute.
In This Writer’s opinion, the acts that have really put the future of the Monarchy in question are his attempts at evasion – his refusal to travel to America to face charges is not the behaviour we would expect of an innocent man; I understand he has claimed that his accuser should not be permitted to continue with her case because she now lives in Australia, not the USA (but that should have nothing to do with it; this is an international sex crime case and it seems logical to base the prosecution in the country where the offence was allegedly committed); and it seems he has also put forward a claim to have been in a UK branch of Pizza Express with one of his daughters at the time of the alleged offence – although nobody has come forward to corroborate the claim (and members of the public would certainly remember, even from 21 years ago, if a Royal walked into their local fast food joint).
His continued attempts to avoid justice are hugely harmful to the UK Monarchy because it makes the Queen complicit in the alleged crimes; Andrew is seen as having committed them (whether he really did or not is immaterial to this part of it) and then gone running behind his mother’s skirt tails for protection from the consequences.
Bear in mind that both Epstein and Maxwell, along with another sex offender – the US film producer Harvey Weinstein, were photographed at the 18th birthday celebrations of Andrew’s daughter, Princess Beatrice. It seems that Royalty and sex crime are well-entwined.
In his evasion attempts, Andrew is hugely aided by the UK’s mass media organisations – particularly the BBC. Maxwell was the daughter of a newspaper magnate (who was himself disgraced after he fell off his yacht and died, when it was found that he had been stealing from the Mirror Group’s pension fund). This means she is well-known to many of the journalists who have been writing about her – and their work has reflected their own sympathy for this child abuser.
The hypocrisy enough to send you reeling: the same people who took glee in claiming that former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn should take responsibility for his brother Piers advocating criminal damage of Covid-19 vaccine-supporting MPs’ offices have conspicuously failed to suggest that Boris Johnson should take similar responsibility for his sister Rachel’s article, It’s hard not to pity Ghislaine Maxwell.
This Writer has absolutely no pity for anybody who uses children to gratify their (or other people’s) perverse sexual desires.
The BBC’s editorial position has also been characterised as calling for us to bless this poor lost soul – with manipulative choices of verbiage. So when referring to the girls or children who were abused in Maxwell’s paedo ring, the BBC describes them as “underage women”.
That’s sickening.
And there is worse. Coverage refers to Maxwell by her first name, as though she’s our friend; her victims are described as “accusers”; after previous reports of similar crimes referred to “grooming gangs”, there is no such attempt to whip up outrage here (quite the opposite); and there are no calls to interrogate participants in the abuse (going back to the black book).
The BBC went too far when it booked people who are known to be sympathetic to Maxwell, to comment on the case in its news programmes.
The backlash, after Epstein’s former lawyer Alan Dershowitz – himself now accused of child sex crimes – appeared on BBC bulletins, giving a sympathetic view of Maxwell and insisting on both his own and Andrew’s innocence, was huge.
The corporation’s bosses had to issue a statement admitting that Dershowitz’s appearance had not met BBC editorial standards, and that the matter would be investigated to find out “how it happened”.
The statement led to what some have described as “the Twitter burn of the year” – from the Sunday Sport‘s Twitter feed: “That’s putting it mildly. It didn’t even meet OUR editorial standards.”
Of course we all know how it happened. Dershowitz was booked by a BBC booking agent who – knowing that he is himself a suspect – contacted him or his agent/manager and asked to interview him. They then falsely presented him as an independent legal expert. It was deliberate – and deliberately misleading.
And now the BBC has lost any right to claim that its news coverage is impartial in any way, as people across the UK are accurately accusing it of deliberately protecting the rich and privileged at the expense of the poor and vulnerable.
I say accurately because, having admitted its fault over Dershowitz, the BBC compounded the mistake by booking Maxwell’s brother Ian, who was interviewed about his sister the very next day.
Of course he made a big fuss about claiming she was innocent – on a news platform that is watched and believed by 70 per cent of the UK’s population. Think about that.
A former BBC political news editor, Rob Burley, has claimed that failures like the Dershowitz booking are results of budget cuts at the corporation – to which critics responded by pointing out that such errors exclusively benefit the UK’s rich and powerful elite. They quoted a current saying: “It’s not a bug; it’s a feature” of the BBC.
Even former BBC reporters like Adil Ray have railed against the corporation’s biased coverage. In a tweet, he stated: “When I filmed a doc on the sexual exploitation of young girls by some Pakistani men it would not have been acceptable to hear a defence from their brothers. Why is it ok now?”
The answer is obvious: families of abusers who travel on buses, instead of luxury cars or yachts, simply don’t get that platform. And the question isn’t why the former don’t – it’s why the latter do.
And let’s face it – the BBC doesn’t have a good record of identifying, accusing and denouncing child sex offenders. Look at the way Jimmy Savile was protected for decades. He was a close friend of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, of course.
Sadly, this deference to the rich and powerful isn’t limited to the BBC and Rachel Johnson – whose bias towards Maxwell is likely to be due to the fact that the child sex procurer was at Balliol College, Oxford, with her own brother: UK prime minister Boris Johnson.
See how the people in this group link up and protect each other?
Returning to Andrew, it’s one reason we should be grateful that proceedings against him are taking place in the United States; it is unlikely that the UK’s compromised legal system would ever have even accused him. It didn’t accuse Savile during his lifetime, after all.
And let’s remember that Metropolitan police commissioner Cressida Dick is another alumnus of Balliol College, Oxford, who may well have known Maxwell there at some point – either as a student or as a former student.
I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how accusations against this fellow Balliol alumnus may have been taken by a Dick police administration, because we have the evidence of the Christmas 2020 parties that allegedly involved fellow Balliol alumnus Boris Johnson to help us.
That’s right: if Ghislaine Maxwell had been accused in the UK, the police would probably have responded by saying they don’t investigate incidents from more than a year ago.
Below please find material from Twitter that may provide valuable further information:
Ghislaine Maxwell deserves to go to prison, but where the fuck are all the men who actually had sex with these girls???
Now that Ghislaine Maxwell has been found guilty of selling children for sexual abuse, don’t you think we should investigate whom she sold the children to?
I don’t want to hear another word about how tragic her life is, only want to hear about the devastation caused to victims
Julian Assange faces 175 years in a Supermax prison for exposing the crimes of the powerful, but Ghislaine Maxwell only faces "up to" 65 years in prison for running an international child-sex trafficking ring for the global elite?
Three sex offenders, including two paedophiles, attending the 18th birthday party of some Princess at Windsor Castle. We’ve really no idea how big this cess-pit is. https://t.co/oTI1HPNFy4
Interesting how people were screaming at Jeremy Corbyn for the actions of his brother Piers, are now silent on that fact that Boris Johnson’s sister literally wrote an article “It's Hard Not to Pity Ghislaine Maxwell"
For anyone in any doubt about whom the @BBC serve the #Maxwell case exposes its role in defending the establishment. It’s not independent it’s not neutral it’s a tool of the powerful to influence how we think.
The framing of this case & the language used @BBC is a reminder of how the narrative is being controlled. First names of the guilty; accusers not victims; no "grooming gang" outrage; no drive to interrogate those who participated; sympathetic spokespeople. https://t.co/vpc9vXsjde
If only the TV and radio stations showing compassion to convicted child trafficker #Maxwell would direct that care and understanding to the survivors we would live in a better world.
As well as being one of the accused, this is the guy @BBCNews went to for first reaction to Ghislane Maxwell’s guilty verdict. pic.twitter.com/trpa7RP4KJ
Not satisfied with giving Alan Derschowitz a platform to attack Desmond Tutu as an "anti-Semite" and a "bigot" the BBC two days later give him a platform to defend Ghislaine Maxwell… POST CONVICTION!!!! Horrendous from the beeb
Even longstanding critics of the BBC were shocked by its decision to interview Alan Dershowitz following the Ghislaine Maxwell verdict. What does this tell us about the state of the organisation? (Thread) pic.twitter.com/gvfBWikhsY
Ian Maxwell is on r4Today defending convicted sex trafficker #ghislanemaxwell just now. Can you imagine the #bbc giving the family of a convicted Pakistani grooming gang leader a similar platform to defend a relative?!
Why is @BBC giving airtime to the Maxwell family on their main news bulletin? Ghislaine was found guilty of sex trafficking. The Maxwell family cannot accept the verdict. Families of abusers who travel on buses, not luxury cars or yachts, do not get this platform.
Why is the BBC now running an interview with Ghislaine Maxwell’s brother, pleading her innocence, on its main bulletin on R4? Would they do that for any other child sex offender found guilty in a court of law?
So yesterday the BBC was forced to issue an apology for inviting Alan Dershowitz to “analyse” Ghislaine Maxwell’s conviction as he clearly wasn’t an independent voice.
Yet today they’ve literally handed a primetime platform to *her own brother* to back her up!
BBC & others running interview by brother of convicted #ghislanemaxwell, claiming her innocence. In 2011, when I filmed a doc on the sexual exploitation of young girls by some Pakistani men it would not have been acceptable to hear a defence from their brothers. Why is it ok now?
Does anyone remember the relatives of the Rochdale child abusers being given prime BBC slots after a guilty verdict to protest their innocence and undermine the testimonies of the victims? https://t.co/WiRqDLxbJD
Confess I'm genuinely surprised by the ongoing tone of the BBC's coverage of Maxwell's conviction. Mostly because it's hard to see who benefits. My best reading, it's not conspiratorial, it's a reflection of the deeply embedded deference to power & wealth across the organisation.
Interesting how quiet royal correspondents are. Or could it be, they are waiting for instructions from their publication owners, who in turn are waiting for the Palace to instruct their next move?
Of course the BBC News framing of Ghislaine Maxwell is appalling, they've been doing it for decades to protect the establishment, they lied about Scottish Independence, they lied about Jeremy Corbyn, etc Analyse any BBC News story and it's twisted to protect the powers that be.
Memo to @BBCNews : You can be rich, expensively educated and a criminal. It seems that you find that hard to believe, but trust me, just open your eyes and you will find the evidence all around you. And some are even convicted, however unlikely you think that to be.
It is surely now time for all those politicians and other public figures that have visited one of Epstein’s or Maxwells homes to be investigated for possible involvement in child sexual abuse. Can we now start to put together a list of U.K. residents known to be associated.
I fear that were Maxwell truly looking for a deal by giving evidence against Epstein's rich and powerful friends, she would suddenly discover she too had committed suicide.https://t.co/7zqyMTm326
The conviction of Ghislaine Maxwell is welcomed. I will state I believe after 3 years work on this case, I believe she was the chief and the former taxi driver Epstein the functionary. I now call on the Met Police to reopen their 1994 investigation into her activities in London.
I don't say this lightly, but I have grave doubts about whether the UK law enforcement and justice systems would have brought down two powerful figures like Epstein and Maxwell.
— Dorset Eye (Independent Citizen Community Media) (@dorset_eye) December 31, 2021
It’s amazing and shocking to think that after the disastrous impact of the Jimmy Saville cover up on the BBC, they’re still going with the “let’s be soft on famous paedos” strategy. pic.twitter.com/VltDlePCMP
We need to know who is paying Prince Andrew’s legal fees
I suspect it is the British people
It is hard to think of a more despicable use of our money than to help a very rich man in his attempt to escape justice from credible allegations of child rape
Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.
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