ChristianKl comments on Welcome to Less Wrong! (7th thread, December 2014) - Less Wrong

16 Post author: Gondolinian 15 December 2014 02:57AM

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Comment author: Journeyman 21 July 2015 09:38:34PM *  9 points [-]

(trigger warning for a bunch of things, including rape and torture)

The Rotherham scandal is very well-documented on Wikipedia. There have been multiple independent reports, and I recommend reading this summary of one of the reports by the Guardian. This event is a good case study because it is easily verifiable; it's not just right-wing sources and tabloids here.

What we know:

  • Around 1,400 girls were sexually abused in Rotherham, many of them lower-class white girls, but also Pakistani girls
  • Most of the perpetrators were Muslim Pakistani men, though it seems like other Middle-Eastern and Roma men were also involved
  • The political and multiculturalist environment slowed down the reporting of this tragedy until eventually it got out

To substantiate that last claim, you can check out one of the independent reports from Rotherham's council website:

By far the majority of perpetrators were described as 'Asian' by victims, yet throughout the entire period, councillors did not engage directly with the Pakistani-heritage community to discuss how best they could jointly address the issue. Some councillors seemed to think it was a one-off problem, which they hoped would go away. Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so. ...

The issue of race, regardless of ethnic group, should be tackled as an absolute priority if it is known to be a significant factor in the criminal activity of organised abuse in any local community. There was little evidence of such action being taken in Rotherham in the earlier years. Councillors can play an effective role in this, especially those representing the communities in question, but only if they act as facilitators of communication rather than barriers to it. One senior officer suggested that some influential Pakistani-heritage councillors in Rotherham had acted as barriers...

In her 2006 report, she stated that 'it is believed by a number of workers that one of the difficulties that prevent this issue [CSE] being dealt with effectively is the ethnicity of the main perpetrators'.

She also reported in 2006 that young people in Rotherham believed at that time that the Police dared not act against Asian youths for fear of allegations of racism. This perception was echoed at the present time by some young people we met during the Inquiry, but was not supported by specific examples.

Several people interviewed expressed the general view that ethnic considerations had influenced the policy response of the Council and the Police, rather than in individual cases. One example was given by the Risky Business project Manager (1997- 2012) who reported that she was told not to refer to the ethnic origins of perpetrators when carrying out training. Other staff in children’s social care said that when writing reports on CSE cases, they were advised by their managers to be cautious about referring to the ethnicity of the perpetrators...

Issues of ethnicity related to child sexual exploitation have been discussed in other reports, including the Home Affairs Select Committee report, and the report of the Children’s Commissioner. Within the Council, we found no evidence of children’s social care staff being influenced by concerns about the ethnic origins of suspected perpetrators when dealing with individual child protection cases, including CSE. In the broader organisational context, however, there was a widespread perception that messages conveyed by some senior people in the Council and also the Police, were to 'downplay' the ethnic dimensions_ of CSE. Unsurprisingly, frontline staff appeared to be confused as to what they were supposed to say and do and what would be interpreted as 'racist'. From a political perspective, the approach of avoiding public discussion of the issues was ill judged.

And there you have it: concerns about racism hampered the investigation. Authorities encouraged a coverup of the ethnic dimensions of the problem. Of course, there were obviously other institutional failures here in addition to political correctness. This report is consistent with the mainstream media coverage. And this is the delicate, officially accepted report: I imagine that the true story is worse.

When a story is true, but it doesn't "make sense," that could be a sign that you are dealing with a corrupted map. I initially had the same reaction as you, that this can't be true. I think that's a very common reaction to have, the first time you encounter something that challenges the reigning political narratives. Yet upon further research, this event is not unusual or unprecedented. Following links on Wikipedia, we have the Rochdale sex gang, the Derby sex gang, the Oxford sex gang, the Bristol sex gang, and the Telford sex gang. These are all easily verifiable cases, and the perpetrators are usually people from Muslim immigrant backgrounds.

Sexual violence by Muslim immigrants is a serious social problem in the UK, and the multicultural political environment makes it hard to crack down on. Bad political ideas have real consequences which result in real people getting hurt at a large scale. These events represent a failure of the UK elites to protect rule of law. Since civilization is based on rule of law, this is a very serious problem.

Comment author: ChristianKl 21 July 2015 10:43:50PM 1 point [-]

some influential Pakistani-heritage councillors in Rotherham had acted as barriers

That a sentence that poses more question than it answers. What kind of influence do those councillors have? How many councillors of Pakistani heritage does Rotherham have? How many councillors of other heritage does it have?

If a powerful politician tries to prevent friends from being persecuted that's not what the standard concern about policemen being too PC is about. It's straight misuse of power.

Sexual violence by immigrants is a serious social problem in the UK, and the multicultural political environment makes it hard to crack down on.

Sexual violence by British MPs seems also to be a problem: http://www.rt.com/uk/170672-uk-politicians-pedophile-ring/

To what extend is this simply a problem of British politicians having too much power to cover up crimes and impede police work?

Following links on Wikipedia, we have the Rochdale sex gang, the Derby sex gang, the Oxford sex gang, the Bristol sex gang, and the Telford sex gang. These are all easily verifiable cases, and the perpetrators are usually people from immigrant backgrounds.

The idea that there are people from Immigrant backgrounds isn't what's surprising about the story of Rotherham or even that politicians act in a way to prevent reporting of tragedy. Politicians trying to keep tragedies away from the public is a common occurrence.

The thing that's surprising is the allegation of police inaction due to them being Muslim. Which happens something that you didn't list in your "what we know" list.
It would have to be true for the claim that PC policeman don't do their job properly to be true.

Comment author: Journeyman 21 July 2015 11:21:03PM 1 point [-]

If indeed the coverup of the ethnic dimension was directed by British politicians, we might ask, why were they trying to hide this? In a child sex abuse scandal involving actual politicians, it's clear why they would cover it up. But why were these particular crimes so politically inconvenient? It's clear why Pakistani council members wanted to hide it, but why did the other council members let them?

We are not privy to the exact nature of the institutional dysfunction at Rotherham. But it's clear that the problem was occurring at multiple levels. One of my quotes does mentions that staff were nervous about being labelled racist, and that managers told them to told them to avoid mentioning the ethnic dynamics.

Here's another quote, which shows that reports were downplayed before politicians were even involved:

Within social care, the scale and seriousness of the problem was underplayed by senior managers. At an operational level, the Police gave no priority to CSE, regarding many child victims with contempt and failing to act on their abuse as a crime. Further stark evidence came in 2002, 2003 and 2006 with three reports known to the Police and the Council, which could not have been clearer in their description of the situation in Rotherham. The first of these reports was effectively suppressed because some senior officers disbelieved the data it contained. This had led to suggestions of cover- up. The other two reports set out the links between child sexual exploitation and drugs, guns and criminality in the Borough. These reports were ignored and no action was taken to deal with the issues that were identified in them.

So there are multiple kinds of institutional dysfunction here. It's not just politicians, it's not just police being PC. But from the quotes in my previous post, it's obvious that political correctness was a factor. Police, social workers, and politicians, all the way up the chain know that being seen as racist could be damaging to their career.

In the UK, there is a lot of social and political pressure to support multiculturalism and avoid any perception of racism. Immigration is important for economic agendas, but also for left political agendas of importing more voters for themselves. It is not a stretch to believe that this political environment would make it difficult to address crimes involving immigrant populations.

Comment author: hairyfigment 22 July 2015 07:03:40AM 1 point [-]

You correctly note that there were factors beyond "PC", but fail to address the horrific corruption. At least two councilors and a police officer face charges of sex with abuse victims.

The police officer has been also accused of passing information on to abusers in the town. A colleague of the officer has reportedly been accused of failing to take appropriate action after receiving information about the officer's conduct. Both have been reported to the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

Another police officer, seen here being white, supposedly had an extensive child pornography collection. No word on whether this was related or whether the department just attracted pedophiles for some bizarre reason.

While I didn't predict this beforehand (nor, I think, did you) it seems both more credible, and more likely to protect the rape-gang, than does the idea of people seeing strong evidence of the crimes and somehow deciding that arresting immigrants was more likely to hurt their careers than ignoring a story which was bound to come out eventually. The "political correctness" you speak of apparently refers to people not wanting to believe their fellow police officers and council members were implausibly evil criminals.

Comment author: Journeyman 22 July 2015 07:45:21AM *  2 points [-]

Thanks for providing the additional details, which I hadn't encountered. I don't think this corruption is mutually exclusive with the theory of political correctness. The Rotherham Scandal went back to 1997, involving 1,400+ victims. There are now 300 suspects (including some council members that you pointed out), and 30 council members knew. We not know the ethnicity of the council members who are suspects.

With such a long history and large number of victims, it doesn't seem very plausible that a top-down coverup to protect council member perpetrators is sufficient to explain this story. These people would need to be supervillains if they were the ringleaders since 1997, and the failure of investigation was just about them.

It is already established by my quotes from the report that political correctness about race was a factor in the coverup and failure of the investigation. Certainly the corruption and participation of council members and police is a disturbing addition to this story. With such a vast tragedy, it's quite likely that the coverup was due to multiple motivations and lots of things went wrong.

Comment author: ChristianKl 22 July 2015 11:15:06AM 1 point [-]

With such a long history and large number of victims, it doesn't seem very plausible that a top-down coverup to protect council member perpetrators is sufficient to explain this story.

It seems like we have a perfect control case with the pedophiles in Westminster which didn't involve multiculturalism. They also engaged in it for a long time and managed to suppress it.

Comment author: ChristianKl 22 July 2015 11:18:31AM 0 points [-]

While I didn't predict this beforehand (nor, I think, did you) it seems both more credible

I might add that I did speak about chauvinistic police officers as a problem and also that corruption is likely a cause over at Omnilibrium.

Comment author: ChristianKl 22 July 2015 10:18:16AM 0 points [-]

and that managers told them to told them to avoid mentioning the ethnic dynamics.

There a huge difference between persecuting someone and then not writing his race or ethnicity into an official report and avoiding to prosecute them.

It's clear why Pakistani council members wanted to hide it, but why did the other council members let them?

From what you quoted from the report the those Pakistani council members were influential people. Just like the politicians who covered up the child abuse in Westminster also were influential people.

In general politicians also never want that scandals and tragedy under their watch get public.

At an operational level, the Police gave no priority to CSE, regarding many child victims with contempt and failing to act on their abuse as a crime.

Regarding child victims with contempt does suggest a dysfunctional police but it's not about multiculturalism.