Now you see them....now you don't!

The BBC were quite happy to cast Leslie Grantham in Eastenders for many years - a convicted murderer.

I wasn't aware of that...

The problem with the swift moves to suspend/cancel is that it risks giving the impression that a decision regarding guilt has already been reached. At this stage with all of the high profile cases, no charges have yet been laid - let alone assessed by due process.

Justice has to work for both the accuser and the accused. Ands without opening the whole can of worms that ended with two threads being locked, I fear that we are not seeing justice in action for anyone right now.

I agree that rehabilitation is vital to our justice system and I wouldn't deny anyone their rights. However we operate with the presumption of innocence - and we are coming close to that being undermined.

I find it quite nauseating to see this “celebrity” cavorting on TV. Maybe he’s atoned for his crime , but every time I see him acting the fool and attempting to be funny, my thoughts go to his victims (a well known singer and his family) and I wonder how they feel ?
I just don’t think such people should be in the public eye . They’d have difficulty getting work in many lines of employment that don’t put them in the public eye.

A report has been made to the police about him. The police may or may not find evidence to charge him with the crime, but given the title of the drama he's in I don't think the BBC could have done anything else. If he's ultimately cleared then they can show it at a later date. If not, well, maybe they can re-shoot his scenes with someone else.

Trial by media is becoming the norm, based of current morals (which change over time). They get a scent of a story and take the opportunity for hundreds of stories.

He appears unlikely to avoid investigation and the BBC would appear to think so too. As for Allen, he isn’t and evidence has been judged and no charges made. Haven’t seen Polanski films for decades, in fact I saw Tess in the Fopp sale today and passed, I can see other adaptations of it if I want to.

Before the thread is locked. There is no way Polanski should be given sympathy from any celebs, if what I read he did is correct.

This trial by media, and even worse (in ed westwicks case) social media has to stop.

Ed Westwick hasnt even been charged with anything and it was first a facebook accusation. We used to have innocent until priven guilty, pulling the whole programme (which from my memory doesnt even have his character as the lead) is an over reaction (is white gold, where he is more a lead, still available?) and gives the impression of guilt. Especially, as has been mentioned, there are other people with higher profiles (ed westwick really is pretty unknown to wider public unless you watched gossip girl) that are still working. You can't have it both ways.

It also leads to the bigger question as we move forward, what happens to a persons body of work? Will the BBC never show a weinstein or spacey movie again? What about the other people involved in those projects, should their work never be shown because of one member of the cast or crew? Are people not allowed to watch a piece of entertainment again because one person has committed a crime? If so, a lot of tv shows, films and yes theatre shows will vanish. It could result in a very reduced down arts scene.

Im not saying guilty people should go unpunished or continue to work, but film, tv and theatre are such collaborative art forms that to ban everything seems a potentially dangerous and possibly unfair precedent. Especially as much of this seems to be based on the twitter brigade, which is only a very small part of public opinion. It would be interesting to see if the BBC did show it, how many would tune in. A drama is different to say a stand up comedian whose show would be sold purely on their name and personality.


There have also been muliple cases of women falsly accusing men of rape and even after the truth has come out that mans life has already been ruined. It also diminishes the real rape cases. Sadly, with recent revelations there will be some aspiring actresses/celebrities out there who make false claims to raise their profile (sad, but true). There needs to be a safe and secure process put in place where woman can make these claims and let them be investigated. Anonymity for both parties until charges are brought

False accusations are really rare. Not every accusation can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, that doesn't mean they were false accusations, just that they couldn't met the evidentiary standard for sending someone to prison. Legal systems are predicated on the basis of it being better that a guilty person go free than an innocent person go to prison. Even if the guilty person going free continues to offend. There's a reason why convictions tend to occur when there are multiple victims.

Civil society does not have to make the same decision. We can decide that we would rather an innocent person doesn't have their career as an actor or director prosper than have a rapist become rich, celebrated, powerful and successful. We can decide that we just don't enjoy watching the work of someone we think might be a rapist. People in the industry can decide that they don't want to work with people who have been accused because they don't want to risk the safety of their staff or because they don't like the atmosphere they create on set. Certainly with a Weinstein or a Spacey it is evident that they created hostile working environments.

Of course that will depend very much on the audience and the industry. Over the years audiences have decided that they can watch films by Woody Allen and Roman Polanski without being distracted by the accusations against them, and many in the industry have worked with them without complaint. But right now that sentiment appears to be shifting.

No-one really wants to watch Jimmy Saville or Rolf Harris on TV now. Kevin Spacey's career is dead. We will see what happens with Ed Westwick.

I have a strange feeling that false accusations may be less rare when it comes to celebrities. There is so much craziness around fame - think about the stalkers that celebrities attract. Nothing surprises me in the crazy world of showbiz. The high profile of the accused also puts at risk a fair trial. I speak as an old school feminist.

This discussion has focused on a person starring in a show/film, but what about those behind the scenes. Should all films which Harvey Weinstein has been involved with never be shown? On the other hand, what about all the other creatives in a show/film? Do they lose out because one is bad? I do not have the answers but whether to show something or not is more complex than at first sight.

There are cases out there of a man being accused of rape and convicted then handed a custodial sentence, thinking more recently about the case of Chad Evans.

However accusations by one person can be made to the police and the police will not do anything, because the police want to wait for other accusations to come forward, they call it going on "Safari" or "Shaking the Tree". The Crown Prosection Servics know that if they just have 1 person in court to say the defendant "did it" and the defendant said "I didn't do it, your honour", the the jury will likely side with the defendant, how could the jury find someone guilty, one persons admission isn't beyond reasonable doubt, there have been many times a defendant has walked, as the case sounded strong and the victim sounded very truthful, but yet the case has collapsed because the jury isn't confident of convicting on one person's admission.

This isn't helped by when people make proven false accusations, like in the case of Chad Evan. More recently a  onus victim got jailed, when her account proved to be false, when she claimed she was raped by 8 men, before this another man was convicted because of her making false allegations and was serving a jail term, it was proven to the jury in this case by the prosecution that she made these allegations to make her lover jealous, she rightfully got jailed for 4 years for perverting the course of justice, in my mind eye, she should have got double that, she has done a terrible disservice to all genuine victims, with her pernicious allegations.

I have been in that exact situation on a jury panel in a similar case, where several people made allegations, but if it was one person, I am not sure if my vote would have been different. The burden to get the right decision is immense, even today I replay the trial in my head to see if I made the correct decision, I always come up with the same conclusion though. Incidentally the man walked free from jail 20 years earlier, where a jury wouldn't convict the defendant of 6 charges of rape, that person happened to be his own daughter. So in a way I have seen all sides and from a jury perspective and see why the police do nothing in the first instance.

I'm not just thinking of entertainment or just about abuse here, and it can be a very different matter when there are many accusations and certainly when people have admitted their guilt. But those are specific instances and it's dangerous to extend that to the general case.

My go-to case when it comes to issues of social media justice is the case of Justine Sacco, which I mentioned on the old forum. She made a knowing joke on Twitter about the obliviousness of privileged westerners and their attitude to the third world, but people took it seriously and went on a campaign to destroy her without ever bothering to check that they had their facts right and understood the situation properly. She lost her job (although it worked out to be better for her in the long run), but all the people who attacked her moved on to the next target of their ire without ever bothering to spare a thought for the person whose life they'd disrupted. They'd been outraged, they'd made someone suffer for their outrage, job done. Better not stop and think "Wait, am I actually the good guy here?" Might not get the right answer.

This is the danger that's often overlooked. You can't undo the damage. A very few people might realise they got it wrong and perhaps some will even apologise, but sorry doesn't give someone their life back and it doesn't repair their reputation. You can always punish someone later if more evidence comes to light, but how do you take back ruining someone's career? Social justice is incredibly risky, and I don't see any signs that people are taking that into account.