This article lists counter-claims (against the families' claims in the Leaving Neverland documentary). Do they hold up?
Why is U.S. Media Silent on the Implosion of Leaving Neverland, While the U.K. Press is Pouncing?
JOHN ZIEGLER APR 4, 2019 10:40 AM
So this type of article is typical of the arguments put forward by anti-victim guys to discredit victims' testimony, particularly in pedophile circles.
Mr. Pilger's arguments remind me of those of the guys who loosely dragged the poor children in the Outreau affair through the mud. In this French case, the perpetrators' lawyers acted indignantly to clear pedophiles, in contempt of vulnerable children. They discredited them on the basis of arguments based on details (what was the colour of the carpet in the room where you say you were raped)? A child traumatized by a disgusting act of violence on his intimate parts will pay attention to the colour of the carpet, of course! These unworthy lawyers do not care about relevant elements but go looking for silly details. They also discredited the children with stories of date and place. However, tapes of their filmed sexual violence were available. The media did not take an interest in it and preferred to let off steam on ridiculous details. At the time, 99% of the French population fell for it and considered these children liars! Imagine the suffering, the additional trauma that this has caused to these really victime children; these children, adults today, have psychiatric disorders since.
It centers on Safechcuk’s detailed claim in the movie that he was forced to have sex with Jackson, near the start of his abuse, in the second floor of the train station at Jackson’s Neverland Ranch.
... In the film and in his lawsuit deposition, Safechuck says that his abuse by Jackson ended in 1992, when he was about 14 years old.
... However, there is now a huge problem with Safechuck’s allegation. Construction on the train station building, which was not commenced until late 1993
Scientific research on brain have demonstrated that memories change over time. Even without science, anyone knows that, based on its own experiences. This is even more obvious with children who are victims of abuse as a result of a PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder)
If this guy had a minimum knowledge of psychology, he would know that memory is not infallible. When you are an adult, even in normal times (without any context of abuse), you have difficulty remembering the date of certain events in childhood, or even their sequence.
This suggests that Safechuck, based on his own testimony, and the film’s most prominent premise, made up the story about being abused in the train house.
So the author of this bad paper admits that Safechuck had been abused, but not in the train house.
The other accuser, Wade Robson, asserts in the film that he was first abused by Jackson when left alone with him as his family went on a trip to the Grand Canyon. However, his mother, Joy Robson testified under oath twice, indicating that Wade was actually on that trip with his family
This does not discredit the veracity of the abuse statements, because again it is a question of the bad tricks that memory plays on us when we think about the events of our childhood. Mr. Pilger has never been himself a child? Just look at our own flaws. For example: when my daughter was 6 yo, I left her alone for a whole weekend to go to a conference. I told her where and why. When she was 10, I no longer know what we were talking about, and she reminds me of this episode by saying that I abandoned her when I went to visit houses to buy. Four years later, her memory therefore confused the episode "going to a conference" with another episode that took place a year earlier when I left her and went visiting houses in another region.
So in the case of Wade Robson, it is very likely that he did go to the Grand Canyon with his parents, but that the weekend he stayed with Michael Jackson was another time his parents were away. Or the parents had stayed at home but Wade felt it as an absence of the parents from their home. It's a feeling you can easily have as a child when you're left at family or friends' home for several days.
(it should also be noted that a radio interview Joy did in 2011, which casts further doubt on other aspects of Wade’s timeline, was just recently mysteriously removed from YouTube).
What is the reason for this disappearance? Maybe Wade had said some very compromising things about the popstar.
It was revealed that Joy not only remained part of a Michael Jackson fan group on Facebook, well after her son went on the Today Show in 2013 to announce that he was abused, but that she had “liked” several pro-Jackson posts way after that event. Then, within hours of someone tweeting about this discovery, those “likes” suddenly disappeared.
The mother's attitude or mentality must not distract us from what the child has suffered!
The best way is to ask Joy why she deleted her likes, rather than raise doubts about the sincerity of the child victim. Isn't it, Mr. Pilger?
Robson testified in his lawsuit that he realized he was abused while in therapy in May of 2012. However, there is an interview with Robson which was posted to YouTube in July of 2012 where he is still speaking of Jackson with very high praise.
Mr. Pilger definitely lacks basic knowledge of psychology. In the case of incest at a young age (toddler, infant), or with someone appreciated by others and even more so with a national or international star, most of sexually abused children do not realize the harm of having sex, especially when it is done without physical aggression, with sweet words, with an attitude of superficial caring. The child, being vulnerable by nature, is easily manipulable, wants to please the adult, wants adults to be happy with him, wants affection. Sexual predators know this very well and abuse this vulnerability. These children realize this later, after adolescence, or when they are adults.
And then there are also children who are ashamed to admit to themselves that they have been manipulated and abused, and therefore remain silent and suffer in silence untill they become aware of it.
Mr Pilger ignores the cases of adults who were abused in their childhood but who complain at the age of 20-30-40 ?
Thirdly, the impact of the #MeToo movement having radically altered the rules for how we evaluate such stories is much more pronounced here.
This movement had been constructed purposely, in the heat of the postliberal madness, for spreadind false accusations, thus confusion and discredit on real victims.
Finally, we must be very critic when someone wants to present children as liars of sexual abuse, particularly by distracting us with date and place stories. One must not forget the other elements, much more relevant.
One musn't forgeit neither that it isn't easy for a child (even for an adult abused in childhood) to speak about that, to let the world know their name, know their abuse, know their intimate story, to take the risk of being moked, the risk of being being ostracised.
