Rolf Harris Conviction Reactions

Here is the reaction of comedian Russell Brand to the conviction of 84-year-old entertainer Rolf Harris on 12 counts of sexual indecency on June 30, 2014. The “Tie Me Kangaroo Down” singer was sentenced to 5 years and 9 months in prison.

According to Brand, there’s no real joy in the conviction because of Harris’ advanced age as he rambles on about the effects upon the many who grew up watching the entertainer on TV. “It just makes you feel that reality is very muddled and confusing, like you have to revise your own childhood,” he says, “That’s an integral part of your own life you have to look back and go, ‘Oh right, so what was going on then then, when I was watching cartoon club and enjoying that stuff?’

You have to wonder if he would feel that way if he was the brother of one of the victims and was a witness to his sister’s suffering. CNN reports that the brother of Rolf Harris’s youngest victim spoke out in a statement read on his behalf outside court. “My sister has had only eight years of her life without this incident going round in her head, and that was her first eight,” he said. “After these cameras have been dismantled and the media circus has rolled on to another town, it will still be with her as it will with the other girls.”

That puts more of a human face on the situation than Brand calling it “a story,” while others are saying it’s been a “witchhunt.” Some reports say that the burden of proof for the accusers is ridiculously low, while others say what transpired in the courtroom could not be fully reported in the press because the details were so sordid. The incidents that were the bases for the charges against Harris took place decades ago, and it appears that Harris was convicted on testimony as opposed to any kind of tangible proof, but certainly the sheer number of victims that came forward carried a lot of weight.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that after the conviction, more than 40 women have come forward to complain of improper advances and being assaulted by the entertainer.

Then there is the “artwork debate”. Here’s an article by Stephen Yolland So is Rolf Harris worse than Roman Polanski? No? Yes? Why? And what to do about the art? that we came across trying to find out if what happened in the Rolf Harris case has changed any minds about Roman Polanski’s case. It’s an interesting look at a number of famous individuals whose reputations have been tarnished by scandal and brushes with the law, ranging from Polanski to Lord Byron and even farther back. Yollande’s suggestion, which seems ingenuous at best, is to leave the artwork of Rolf Harris where it is but just take a brush to his signature.

A comment on the article says that we can’t try people from different centuries by today’s standards and that only Polanski’s case is analogous to that of Harris — interesting because the lapse of time between Polanski’s flight in 1978 and the 2010 extradition demand made to Switzerland was one of the big reasons many felt Polanski should get a pass. We don’t think the cases are really comparable at all because Polanski entered a guilty plea and then took off before his sentencing. That’s a big big difference!