Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from July, 2014

Jake the peg diddle diddle

The Rolf Harris conviction for sexual abuse leads me to ask a question. Does 'evil' or wrong-doing wipe out any 'goodness' we have once seen in an individual? I ask this not to 'forgive' Harris but to address a significant ethical question. Do we like or enjoy Rolf Harris's songs any the less because of his conviction? Are they indeed different when we listen to them. I have had Jake the Peg buzzing round in my head for days now. It won't go away, and as I conjure up the image of Harris performing it I still smile - perhaps now a kind of guilty smile. We are told there are two sides to Rolf Harris - one being the dark side. But does the dark side really diminish the joy of the light side? Cilla Black I think summed it all up when asked to comment on the news of Harris's conviction. "I'm disappointed." Yes and I am disappointed too. We have been let down by another 'hero'. We build people up and put them on a pedestal and exp