CORNFLAKE

Before we start I should make it quite clear that I have absolutely nothing against the idea of “freedom of speech”, thinking (like many before me have) that “I might disagree with everything you say, but would defend to the death your right to say it” and all that sort of thing. Nevertheless, the way that TwitWorld and other “social networking” websites allow what is essentially unsubstantiated gossip and wild speculation to be disseminated is becoming a real cause for concern for me, especially in an era when the words can very quickly become global, and that what is mere idle speculation can become regarded as absolute fact by certain parties who leap to certain conclusions and sometimes then go off in search of a mob to join with a desire which essentially boils down to “Kill the beast!”

I never really believed that it might be something as simple as “better communication” which might be the thing that brought about the end of civilisation as we know it…

Don’t get me wrong. If someone has done something wrong, then they deserve our derision and should be prosecuted as far as the law will allow, but we ought not to let the law of the jungle take over in these circumstances, but let the actual law do its work. Once we let the “I reckon” brigade take over how things are allowed to unfold, madness and anarchy will ensue.

Those defending such places always maintain that the system “checks and balances” itself, but when it comes to certain subjects, people’s blood can run very hot, and the basic rules of sanity and self-control can sometimes no longer apply. The difficulty is never the fact that people can tell other people the actual truth behind the hysteria, but the fact that someone might have already leapt to their own conclusions and gone off and done something rash before those controls have had a chance put things back into proportion.

And so, Operation Yewtree has spread its branches and claimed another well-known celebrity scalp. Now, I’m not overly familiar with the “Hairy Cornflake” in question, but, like many people my age, I was aware of his existence and so, as yet another one of those characters who was “always around” in our media-culture obsessed world gets sucked into that growing cesspool, I was, once more, rather alarmed to finally find out about it.

Those “Radio 1 Christmas Parties” really must have been precisely the sorts of things that our parents warned us about after all…

I was bothered by the way the arrest was revealed, however. Whilst in it unhidden frenzy of gleeful schadenfreude, and its eye on its own agenda, Sky News let the name slip with the kind of wild recklessness almost guaranteed to whip up the mob into a frenzy, the “dear old” BBC was, perhaps not unexpectedly given its recent record with such matters, rather cautiously referring to “a man in his sixties” having been arrested.

However, whilst most of the “official” news outlets seemed reticent to use an actual name, within moments it was all over Twitter and, even though the type of alleged abuse might not be the same thing at all, (because at that stage it had never even been suggested), enough of the “I reckon” brigade were putting two and two together and making twenty-seven, and making dubious links between the story and the actions of his colleague which have recently been so widely reported.

We ought to understand this quite clearly, at this time there is no suggestion that what one of them is supposed to have done was the same thing as what the other may have done across several decades. A revelation of an alleged situation, which may or may not have been of a completely different nature, arose during certain enquiries and an arrest was made, and yet we see the PR people in the company he was broadcasting for already jumping through hoops in order to distance themselves from this “freelancer” whose alleged crimes pre-date their employment of him (in case you hadn’t realised it...)

This didn’t stop one website from publishing a photograph of all the Radio One DJ’s standing around a wheelbarrow full of crap (actually, the So-vile was sitting in it) on the steps of Broadcasting House back in the day, but merely labelling it with the Cornflake’s name and the damning implication of the two words “…with Savile”.

But in this current mob mentality, that could be enough of a trigger for some serious new crimes to unfold, and, as we all know, once the mob take it upon themselves to take matters into their own hands, pretty much anything can happen, and we really, really ought to try and remember that old adage that “two wrongs do not make a right”, another of those “words of wisdom” our square old parents tried to impart to us when all we wanted to do was go out and have a bit of fun…

Obviously, if these allegations do turn out to be true, then the full weight of law should be brought to bear upon the perpetrators, and all of our sympathy ought to be with the victims, but there really are ways and means, and, no matter how you dress it up, indulging in the actions of the mob, taking part in vandalism or other forms of brutality, is still just as wrong, no matter how “affronted” you may feel, when it comes to high crimes and misdemeanours, even in the name of “squeaky-clean, whiter-than-white, holier-than-thou, guilty-until-proven innocent” retribution, the ends can and should NEVER justify those means.