John Chuckman
COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN THE INDEPENDENT
“Jimmy Savile: Louis Theroux says he ‘thought there was a sexual dimension to his personality’ but he didn’t know what.
“Theroux says he still thinks his 2000 film ‘holds up’ despite failing to reveal decades of alleged sexual abuse against the entertainer”
“Following Savile's death in 2011, 450 alleged victims of sexual abuse contacted the Metropolitan Police in just 10 weeks, with officials describing the scale of allegations against him as 'unprecedented.'
“The documentary ‘When Louis Met… Jimmy’ was released some 11 years earlier, before the mass allegations were made.”
Louis Theroux only confirms something long understood.
Many human monsters have complex personalities, and it is entirely possible to know one of them, at least to a degree, while seeing only the aspects he wants to display to you.
Many people thought Hitler charming in person, including high fliers like the Duke and Duchess of Windsor as well as many ordinary people. Hitler’s secretaries were delighted having tea and cream cakes with him regularly as a pleasant break from hard work.
Many people were literally awed by Stalin. He was a powerful presence in any room and a very intelligent and hardworking man. Literally millions of Russians wept sincerely at the announcement of his death.
Just look at the way our corporate press and politicians treat someone like the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. He’s a reformer. He’s charming. He’s a breath of fresh air in the Middle East. Lots of flattery and publicity surround him.
He was even sent on a charm-offensive trip through the United States to meet many, many important Americans.
In fact, already when they met him, he was known to some as a ruthless usurper, someone who would kidnap and imprison a number of rival princes, taking huge sums of money from them in exchange for their freedom.
Many prominent Americans shook hands and smiled and dined with this truly bloody creature who kills women and children in Yemen and in his suppression of the Shia minority at home. Who has beheaded teenagers and set a record pace for executions in his country, including some by crucifixion.
And who unquestionably had a man, a journalist he didn’t like, sawed-up alive and burnt in a back-yard barbecue oven. Even the CIA agrees the evidence is convincing.
And then there’s Netanyahu, a truly fervent admirer of the Prince, and a man who himself literally has slaughtered thousands of Palestinians and Lebanese and bombed Syria many, many times.
A man who lies constantly according to direct testimony from Presidents Obama and Sarkozy in a live-mic incident. A man who welcomes periodic thefts of other people’s homes and farms.
His troops kneel regularly behind a fence to shoot the unarmed people of Gaza who demonstrate for some rights. His “most moral army on earth” has killed more than 200 in that fashion and wounded thousands, a good many sustaining permanently-disabling injuries.
Yet Washington is full of people who flatter him and say his "restraint" is remarkable. As is Hollywood. And there are many photos with the charm turned on and lots of smiles and handshakes.
