Where shall we deport white British Christian paedophiles to?

On 26 February 2016, a group who groomed 15 teenage girls, raped, sexually assaulted and prostituted them out under threats of death, were jailed. Arshid Hussain, 40, was jailed for 35 years and his brothers Basharat, 39, and Bannaras, 36, were jailed for 25 and 19 years respectively. Uncle of the brothers, Qurban Ali, 53, who was found guilty of conspiracy to rape and jailed for 10 years.

Associate Karen MacGregor, 59, was jailed for 13 years and Shelley Davies, 40, given an 18 month suspended term for false imprisonment and conspiracy to procure a woman under 21 to become a common prostitute. MacGregor was also convicted of two counts of conspiracy to rape.

It was an appalling case in which the Hussain brothers, who boasted that they “ruled Rotherham”, the English city where they lived and operated their underage prostitute ring for 16 years with girls as young as 11, had a known reputation for violence and pimping, yet police and social services did nothing, allegedly for fear of being branded Islamophobes and racists. It is has been claimed as many as 1400 girls were targeted by the gang in Rotherham and across the county of South Yorkshire.

One day earlier, in the English city of Oxford, Andrew Picard, an 18-year-old student of Eton College, England's top fee-paying school, was convicted of sharing more than indecent images of children on social media. These images included children as young as 2-years-old being raped and even being forced to perform sexual acts with dogs. Picard's sentence? A 10 month prison sentence, suspended for 18 months with a requirement to undergo mental health treatment, after his defence counsel claimed that Picard had “issues” with his sexuality.

The judge, Peter Ross, handing down sentence to Picard stated “This defendant Andrew Picard was a privileged young man. His family are clearly wealthy enough to send him to school in Eton. Quite how you found your way into this unpleasant world Mr Picard, the world of chatrooms and exchanging this material, is not clear to me.”

Without a doubt, the Rotherham case throws up many questions, not least of why and how the Hussain brothers were allowed to get away with their appalling crimes for so very long. Questions have to be asked and people should be brought to book for failure to act (don't hold your breath though).

What is really insidious however is the hypocrisy which has surrounded the Rotherham case, and how the extreme-right, and even the not-so-extreme-right are attempting to use the case to back up their own anti-Islamic bigotry and racism. The Hussain brothers come from a Pakistani background, and their have been calls to deport them to Pakistan. Meanwhile, the anti-Islamic brigade have jumped on the bandwagon, claiming that the root of the Rotherham scandal lies deep within Islamic culture and it's treatment of women as inferior beings.

Okay, granted I do believe there is truth in this. Generally the treatment of women in Islam is utterly appalling. They are indeed seen as inferior to men, treated as little better than slaves in many Islamic cultures, and female genital mutilation (FGM), removal of the clitoris and / or sewing up the vagina, is so widespread in many Islamic societies that there are now some Muslims – including women – in the UK trying to argue for FGM to be carried out surgically, in much the same way that circumcision is carried out on Jewish and Islamic boys (NB Muslims, this is never happening – decent people want all genital mutilation, including circumcision, gone forever). All of this is all the more insidious as men and women are actually considered equal in Islam.  Just as many Christians need to actually read a Bible, a great many Muslims should try actually picking up the Qur'an now and again.

But hold on, notice something else about the Rotherham gang? They were aided and abetted by two white women, British nationals, who are at the least culturally Christian. And then of course we have the appalling case of Andrew Picard, a wealthy, white British national, attending a school which has a strict Christian ethos. Where then would those decrying the Hussain brothers like these three people deported to? And does this mean there is a problem where white “Christian” culture treats women (and children) in the UK? And let me answer that latter question for you with a resounding YES, it most certainly does.

I was listening to a radio broadcast about the Rotherham case, in which the announcer suggested that this treatment of women was inherent in Muslim society, and more or less claimed that all such gangs are Muslim. Whilst the incidence is indeed alarmingly high and needs to be addressed (and not by the government's knee-jerk reaction of removing passports from dual-nationality criminals under anti-terror legislation), to suggest that it is inherent to ALL Islam, and that is wholly Islamic is not only a gross generalisation, it is not only poppycock, it is bigotry.

People-trafficking in Europe is a huge problem, mostly (but not always) carried out by those from eastern European countries, most of whom are white, many of whom are Roman Catholic or Orthodox Christian, and devoutly so. Included in this trafficking there are gangs who rape, sexually abuse, and prostitute women and children. The Roma community from Romania and surrounding countries are particularly vulnerable to the traffickers. I said many years ago that the Roma suffered for centuries in imperial days, they suffered under the Nazis, they suffered under the communists, they suffered in the post-communist era, and that if they suffer in the EU, each and every one of us EU citizens carries the responsibility for that. Well, they are suffering in the EU, and the UK along with many other EU countries, is turning a blind eye to the enormity of the evils, including women and children being abused and prostituted,and we all carry that burden.

But then of course, we need not look to Islamic countries, or even to eastern Europe, for one of the biggest paedophile rings in the UK. One which included men who were not merely culturally Christian but many of whom professed to be actively Christian, men, who were all white, all UK nationals, all from privileged and wealthy backgrounds, and a ring which we now know for a fact was indeed covered up. I am speaking of course about the paedophile ring which we now know operated among elected members and peers of the UK government from at least the late 1960s, which successive Prime Ministers were aware of, and not only did nothing to address but must have actively covered up to protect those involved.

I condemn Edward Heath (possibly implicated himself) for his part in that. I condemn Harold Wilson, and his successor, Jim Callaghan, for their part, as I do Margaret Thatcher. And yes, I will also similarly condemn John Major, Tony Blair, and even the present Prime Minister, David Cameron. I do not forget that it was as recently as 2013 that David Cameron described those claiming abuse by MPs in the 1970s as “fantasists”.

So, where would the anti-Islamic bigots like all those involved in the Westminster paedophile ring who are still alive like them deported to? Which part of their Christian culture would they say makes this an inherent problem?

And when one looks at the Westminster paedophile ring, Judge Peter Ross should not be in the least surprised at Andrew Picard, from an equally wealthy and privileged background, becoming involved in the sharing of obscene images of children. More than that, the inference of his statement is that those of such backgrounds do not get involved in paedophilia. That inference is not just wrong, it is not just ignorant, it is not just arrogant and elitist, it is in fact deeply prejudiced, as to say such is to suggest that paedophiles come only from those less privileged.

Paedophilia does not recognise any boundaries; not those of social class, affluence, upbringing, religion (or lack thereof), race, ethnicity, culture, gender, sexuality, bodily or mental ability, or anything else anyone wishes to think up. It cuts across ALL society, with paedophiles coming from all sorts of backgrounds.

And while I am about it, I am equally appalled at Judge Ross in handing down such a paltry sentence, for such a thoroughly disgusting and serious crime, because he was fooled into believing that Picard was “confused” about his sexuality. I don't know where the defence counsel found the psychiatrists and doctors from who made these claims, but I would sincerely suggest they need to go back to school, or like I have done, merely read some research, first on how sexuality forms, then on the sexual abuse of children.

There is a small number of such deluded people who are trying to claim that paedophilia is a sexual orientation, no different from being heterosexual, homosexual, bi, pansexual or asexual. Yet only a scan through even the easiest-reading cases of psychologists dealing with sexual abuse, be it of children or adults, will tell you that it is a learned sexual behaviour. Our sexuality, whatever that may be, is decided in the womb. Science has not yet found the "gay gene", but points strongly towards it. The sexual abuser however is not born with that abuse imbued in their psyche, rather they learn it as they grow.

This is a very important distinction. For when people try to claim that paedophilia is a sexual orientation, it merely enables those who ignorantly (or even not so ignorantly) try to claim that LBGT+ people are all perverts and child abusers. It is actually a fact that the overwhelming majority of child abusers are cisgender heterosexual men, with cishet women coming second, although the incidence is far lower. LGBT+ people are in fact WAY down at the bottom of the list. Even most male paedophiles who prey upon little boys are otherwise heterosexual. But of course, the ignorant, bigoted public see an LGBT+ person and immediately make generalisations – just as they do with Asian Muslims. In fact, and bear this sobering thought in mind, more women and children (and men in fact) are abused in the UK – sexually, physically, verbally, and psychologically – by white, cisgender, heterosexual, male, UK nationals than any other demographic within UK society; many, many more.

Of course, the anti-Islamic mindset does not want to hear or face up to these facts, but facts they are. A similar case was that of the sexual abuse, rape and robbery of hundreds of women in Cologne and other cities in Germany, which was immediately put down to Islamic asylum seekers from Syria. To date, not one Syrian refugee, not one Muslim, anywhere in Germany, has been arrested for one of these attacks, and after the event, there were in fact many German women who said that sexual abuse of women in Germany, culturally very Christian (so much so they still do not have same-sex marriage), was endemic and in the main carried out by white, male, German nationals. Inconvenient truths they may be to the bigots, but they remain truths nonetheless.

I am not for one moment being an apologist for Islam, or for the Islamic mindset which does indeed oppress women – and children. Muslims can make all the apologies they want for Mohammed (piss be upon him), but any man who “marries” a 6-year-old and consummates that marriage when the girl is 9-year-old is, by anyone's definition, a paedophile. And I likewise condemn those individual Muslims who take child brides, and the Islamic countries which permit that perversion to happen. Just as I fully condemn those Islamic countries where women who are disobedient to their husbands, who are outspoken, who dare to seek an education and / or a career, or as much as merely show the tiniest bit of flesh, or even be seen outside alone, can be subjected to jail, lashes, having a limb cut off, stoning to death, hanging, or beheading. Some people claim that such countries exhibit a medieval mindset in their treatment of women. They do not – even in medieval Europe, women were never subjected to such treatment, but actually enjoyed many rights. In fact, in Scotland and England, noblewomen who were widowed were expected to, and did, raise and lead armies when needed. So, the two are actually incomparable and that treatment of women is indeed unique to the fundamentalist Islamic mindset; and note that I say “fundamentalist” there, for that is another important distinction to make. And do I believe that the Asians in the Rotherham gang should be deported after their sentences? I would happily pack their cases myself.

But neither does that absolve the treatment of women and children in white, western, culturally Christian society. It is sobering to reflect that it is only since as recently as 1976 in the UK that the law has deemed it is indeed possible for a husband to rape his wife. Before then it was deemed that a husband was merely taking his conjugal rights, and alarmingly, there are indeed men, and sadder still, women who to this day hold that mindset, believing that their god gave men and women different roles. So yes, I equally condemn such people. But then I also condemn those, right here in Scotland, from the Free Church of Scotland (the Wee Frees) and the Free Presbyterian Church (the Wee Wee Frees) who have at times called for the stoning of adulterers to be legalised “because it is biblical”. Again, those of that mindset are religious fundamentalists, and equally as dangerous as Islamic fundamentalists. They are in effect a Scottish Presbyterian Taliban.

As far as paedophilia is concerned, I condemn all white, culturally Christian, UK society which kept cases of child abuse covered up for so very long, which continues to cover up, make excuses for, underplays and downright dismisses cases of child sexual abuse to this day, and have not only destroyed thousands, millions, of lives, but are continuing to do so. Look at the case of BBC disc jockey, TV presenter, health promoter and charity worker, Jimmy Saville, who was first given an OBE and later a knighthood for his charity work. With people still coming forward, Saville used his BBC position and celebrity status to abuse countless children and teens, including those physically and mentally disabled. The number of victims ranges from 450 to 1000, possibly making him the most prolific paedophile of all time. There are many today from inside the television industry who claim that Saville's abuse of kids and young people was an open secret, and nobody did anything about it, because of his celebrity status. A BBC enquiry claims that they failed to act on 73 cases involving Jimmy Saville. 73 out of a possible 1000, over 30 years? And the band played “Believe it if you Like”. Ah, but Sir Jimmy was a good Roman Catholic.

Which brings me onto the Roman Catholic Church, and neither do I nor shall I shy away from a church which not only has innumerable members of clergy who have abused children, but which has actively protected paedophiles, and even has the gall, right up to and including the present Pope, to call upon the survivors of clerical sexual abuse to 'forgive' their abusers. No way, Frankie. That is not only enabling abusers, it is not only absolving them of their wrongdoings, it puts the ball in the abuser's court and effectively blames the victim – a tactic very common among paedophiles and other abusers. It is they who need to not merely ask but beg forgiveness from their victims.

Does that mean I am being bigoted and suggesting that paedophilia is endemic in the RC Church? Not for one moment. I am well aware that the majority of RC clergy the world over are good, well-meaning people, working hard for their communities. But if I am going to condemn one faith, the largest Christian church in the world need not believe it is ever going to get a free ride from me. If you give criticism, be prepared to take it as well.

Paedophilia at it's root, believe it or not, is not even sexually-driven. Like all and any abuse, the sexual abuse of children is carried out by inadequate individuals, usually but not always cishet men, who seek power over others and thereby single out those least able to defend themselves. The driving force behind paedophilia is the need to control, which they do by humiliating their victims. The paedophile, like any other abuser, is in fact a bully, and in the nature of the bully, a coward at heart. When we come to understand that, we see that there is no other driving force, from any other influences within the paedophile's life or background. As I said before, paedophilia recognises no boundaries and it is a learned sexual behaviour. Comparing the cases of the Rotherham gang and Andrew Picard (and Jimmy Saville, Cyril Smith, Greville Janner, Rolf Harris, etc, etc) makes that plainly obvious.

Those who shout loudest about the Rotherham case, and other such cases of Asians who may be (but are not always) Muslims abusing children claim to be speaking out for the victims. They are not. Far from it, they use these cases to promote their own bigoted agenda against Muslims in particular, and Asians in general. That they do so, they not only use the survivors of abuse, they not only dishonour them, they are in fact by using these victims for their own means, actually abusing them even further.

Those who truly care about the survivors of Rotheram, or any other child abuse, would never sink to any such level.

Many thanks to NeonZero for making the attached image "Toddler in Fright" available free to use on Wikimedia Commons.