Pete said:

The day before, a jury cleared Michael Jackson and another absurd celebrity trial collapsed. We 'celebrities' live in Reality Shows these days. I was pleased Michael was cleared. My only experience of his dealings with children is that he has unselfishly helped every cause, and individual child, I have sent his way. In one case he hired a circus for the Down's Syndrome children of a special school of the daughter of a friend of mine, and showed up to happily, and - yes - in childlike enthusiasm - watch the show with them. This little girl believed she was Michael's future wife, and he so kindly allowed her to sit next to him, as his future bride. His feathers may be badly burned, and he may be damaged in other ways too, but he is something of an angel.

http://www.petetownshend....zone=diary
[Edited 6/23/05 17:56pm]

lilgish said:

tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...rmusic.htm

C'mon lilgish, there's a court sticky for a reason.

MsLegs said:

Pete wasn't looking at child porn, he was "doing research"

VoicesCarry said:

Double Co-

VoicesCarry said:

isn't this more about Pete.

i don't care how many cheap shots people take - i believe pete. he really HAS done a lot of work - both in his music and otherwise - about the abuse of children. it kinda ticks me off when people make cheap jokes about him, though i will say the guy really didn't need to be checking out those sites without notifying some kind of authority or something first.

Anxiety said:

I remember hearing he did try and clear it with local cops but he got arrested anyway. I believe him though cause it's no secret he was molested or something, I think he said he was writing a book or something.

you know it's so predictable that some orgers only post on these kinds of threads to debase or make fun. everyone's a comedian. whatever.

JohnP said:

At the end of the day, people can say the same about Micheal. But the bottom line is this both Pete and Micheal have been vindicated by the law and thats all that matters at the end of the day all jokes aside.

MsLegs said:

I agree.

.
[Edited 6/24/05 2:26am]

Anxiety said:

Agreed. I think if Townsend is guilty of anything, it is naivety or just plain stupidity in thinking it was OK to go on a site like that and not get caught using his own credit card.

rocknrolldave said:

And while you you're at it add Micheal on the stupidity list also.

rocknrolldave said:

At the time he did it (1999), it wasn't against the law in the UK. It became illegal towards the end of 2000, a full year after his offence. Secondly he notified both Scotland Yard and a charity combatting child porn on the internet about what he'd done as soon as he'd been on the site, even providing them with the website address. Scotland Yard mislaid the e mail, but the charity not only found it abnd reproduced it, but went so far as to say that Pete should not have been prosecuted at all.

The reason he started this whole thing is because his twelve year old son was surfing the net and did a Google search for the word "teen" and found himself directed to kiddie porn sites. This prompted Pete to start a campaign to eradicate child porn on the internet. He wrote plenty of articles on the matter on his website, between 2000 and 2002. It was quite obvious to anyone reading them that he had indeed done his research into the topic. Some of the things he described in the pieces were horrific.

Most disturbing of all was the fact that the two major credit card companies were openly colluding with child pornographers, in allowing them to function. Pete said (and this, I believe in 2001), that one of the most effective ways of limiting child porn on the interbnet would be for the likes of Visa and Mastercard to stop doing business with the people running the sites. After his arrest and conviction, both companies announced that they would cease trading with paedophile websites.

This is all true and a matter of public record. Pete ownshend deserved to be cautioned for what he did, but not placed on the sex offenders reguster. He is not a paedophile, but an exceptionally brave and conscientious man who tried to right a great wrong. And anyone laughing at that is an idiot.

MsLegs said:

VoicesCarry said:

Wasn't Pete Townshend a child rape victim himself?

TonyVanDam said:

Yes. He was abused by an uncle.

my sweet Mike! Thanks lilgish. (BTW you haven´t answered my last orgnote yet.)

Shapeshifter said:

Great post! I didn't know most of this, and it certainly puts things in a very different light to that in which it was all reported in the media - which is disappointing twice over, first off for how it affects Townsend and secondly for what it says about our media...

Townsend seems to be a decent guy with the right intentions. I am looking forward to his autobiography, I think it will be fascinating

Shapeshifter said:

This is great news. None of this ever comes out in the casual press. If true, poor Pete was unfairly maligned. When we first heard it here in the U.S. it seems so out of place. So uncharacteristic of him.

Glad to see that there is a context to his actions.

Alasseon said:

I was glad to read that too. Pity that people are gullible and only prepared to believe the worst possible scenario that's spoonfed to them. This is why the press should delve a little deeper and not be so superficial. Tossers.