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Home  Attitudes & Opinions Carol Sarler in Observer |
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Sunday, 07 August 2005 |
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King may be a prat but he's served his time
Carole Sarler
Sunday August 7, 2005
The Observer
Contrition must have whacked the BBC with a heavy hand: it was very sorry, it grovelled, that it had allowed Jonathan King to appear on Five Live last week; it was 'not our intention to give him a platform to assert his innocence', simply to see whether 'his state of mind is typical of perpetrators of paedophile crimes'. The apology, we were told, was necessitated by 25 complaints - which would appear to be no more than a public service response, until compared with the 60,000 complaints about Jerry Springer: The Opera that provoked not a word of remorse.
On Tuesday, in much the same tone as the BBC's, every national newspaper solemnly reported the apology. Why? Hardly a week, one might have thought, with a dearth of news.
And so continues the demonisation of the old pop slapper King. Tabloids routinely stalk him. Since his release from jail in March he has been splashed across front pages for daring to stroll in a sunny park where, golly, children were present - presumably much the same accusation as would follow his purchase of a pint of milk in a family supermarket, all grist to the almost entirely accepted, if inaccurate notion that the man is a paedophile. For icing on the cake, there is the constant reminder that he served 'only' half of his seven-year sentence, dished up by commentators apparently unaware that so does every other prisoner of good behaviour.
This is not how convicted criminals are usually treated. Jeffrey Archer did his time, came out and was largely ignored; Jonathan Aitken came out and cashed in by writing about it; John McVicar, a thoroughly nasty piece of bodily harmer, came out, earned his keep as a crime 'expert' and had his story turned into an iconic eponymous film. For King, by contrast, his spell at Her Majesty's pleasure seems only to have heightened the desire for his vilification as a child molester.
Nearly four years ago, on these pages, I expressed disquiet at the severity of his sentence. I found him guilty in my own court, of artless arrogance, of being an utter prat and of 'an unappealingly ravenous appetite for men younger than himself'. All the same, I queried: seven years.
But at least then, unlike now, there was some latent appetite for the facts of his case: he was convicted of consensual sexual contact with teenagers three decades previously, based on uncorroborated accusations and with the accusers - this is crucial - knowing before testifying what would be the monetary value to them of a successful conviction, from both the state's criminal compensation tariff and Max Clifford and his merry men.
Children? No. King's amours, who came across as low-rent jailbait from, for instance, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy and Portugal, who went back time and again for his gifts and money, were, in fact, above the age of consent. On balance, they got more than they deserved and so did King; frankly, if every gay man with a glad eye for younger flesh were to be locked up, our prisons would explode.
That said, it is time, now, for King himself to put up and shut up. He does not sound like a man who takes advice, but if he were he would return to work as an able producer of music and stop his incessant campaigning to be recognised as 'innocent'. Partly this is because he probably isn't - certainly not in the sense that the word would pass muster on the Moral Maze - and partly because, crudely, his is a lost cause. However unfair, unremitting denial can become so irritating that it just results in throwing away good years after bad.
The fall-out from his trials niggles on. It would be correct, for a start, to acknowledge the element of sexual inequality: Bill Wyman, for obvious instance, was never punished for his long-ago relationship with a 13-year-old girl. Perhaps more disturbing is the reminder of how far the national mindset remains in thrall to paedophilia. What one could have hoped, a few 'name and shame' years ago, to be a grotesque but passing phase has flourished instead; the paedophile is our favourite bogeyman and the fact that King is not a paedophile means nothing beside the popular desire for him to be one.
And driving that desire are all those people whose hearts quicken and whose pulses race with the gasp, tut, complaint, smirk, joke or other expression of their titillation; people for whom any story involving sex becomes, de facto, sexy. Such people are, in a literal sense, perverts. Whether Jonathan King is also one is quite another matter.
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