Phillip Schofield's Career DEAD? 🤷‍♀️ The Castaway Years

Sheena said:
Didn’t he get his “boyfriend” a job rather than coercing a junior worker?

It’s nepotism rather than abuse of power then, no?
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No, by all accounts including his, the relationship began when he was working on the show.
 
Pingu said:
No, by all accounts including his, the relationship began when he was working on the show.
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But then the argument he groomed him from before doesn’t work, does it?

THESE SEX SCANDALS ARE SO CONFUSING.
 
A women I work with has just split with her boyfriend of 6 years and come out as a lesbian. So much of what she is getting from people is "I mean, if you'd left him for another man that would have been one thing but you strung that poor guy along, didn't you? You were lying to him the whole time really" and I find that infuriating (especially because he assaulted her 6 weeks ago so fuck him). People really frame their feelings so differently when the relationship is anything other than cishet. So that is influencing my reading of this.
 
Sheena said:
But then the argument he groomed him from before doesn’t work, does it?

THESE SEX SCANDALS ARE SO CONFUSING.
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Why not? I’m not saying there definitely WAS because that’s all a bit fuzzy but just because the sexual relationship didn’t start until he was on the show doesn’t rule out grooming before that.

It’s clear from the (unreciprocated at that point) tweets that the boy idolised him, we know that Schofe got him a job in television and then slept with him, so it’s not a GREAT sequence of events to begin with whatever happened or didn’t happen in between.
 
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Too many people are quick to accuse him of grooming though, which if it's true that the guy was a consenting adult at the time any sexual relationship started, is categorically incorrect. Bill Wyman never got this much shtick, did he?
 
So this runner guy used a fundraising page to help him fund his move to London?

Quite the little go getter one might say.
 
Eddie said:
Too many people are quick to accuse him of grooming though, which if it's true that the guy was a consenting adult at the time any sexual relationship started, is categorically incorrect.
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Adults can be groomed too
 
I went out with an older guy when I was a teenager. I knew exactly what I was doing and feel nothing negative about the experience. Yes, many of the attacks seem entirely grounded in homophobia, from the off. There is definitely an element of a gammony ploy to dethrone a previously popular newly outted gay man, based on the premise that it he was being deceptive by being gay with a wife. But as gay men, especially those of a certain age, hopefully understand that's not that clear cut.

That all being said, based on the little we know of the backstory he comes across as a sleazy cunt at the absolute bare minimum.

The paedophile brother element is just weird and it's hard to place into the narrative, without leaning into the dated trope that gay men are all secretly paedophiles. I don't think it's unfair to question their childhood, but also we just don't know enough to make a full judgement call.

As for Holly, I think she comes across appallingly. She clearly knows the lot and happily ignored it until her career became threatened. Whatever it is, that she knows, those actions are despicable.
 
What I find a bit uneasy is not the 16/18 thing (weird muddy area.. also see how unless you're a teacher/doctor you can literally have sex with a 16 year old, but nudes would get you locked up) but knowing him since he was 13 or 10 or whatever. Certainly not on the side of Twitter witch hunters who tend to take things to extremes and sure let's just assume this was a natural friendship that found itself blossoming into more when he was an adult. I guess I've just seen so many comments from the extremes along the lines of "befriending someone as a child then later having a sexual relationship with them when they're an adult is grooming" to end up questioning whether reality lies somewhere in the middle, then feel uneasy.

I'd love for it to be the best case. I idolised him as a kid and want to continue looking back on Going Live without any Savile stuff tainting it (not that I ever idolised Savile to be honest, he always just came across as a weird old man)

It's positive that the younger guy has been trying to protect him, which unless there's something really bad going on, suggests that he doesn't feel any harm has been done. Time will tell but hopefully he'll elaborate on that.

Twitter ghouls will still call him the P word but they do that to everyone. There are some who would call me one for being with a 24 year old. (Pre frontal cortex blah blah)
 
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It just comes across as HIGHLY inappropriate and he has rightfully been penalised for it. There's perhaps a discussion to be had about tv personalities becoming too powerful for their own good.
 
Cloud said:
What I find a bit uneasy is not the 16/18 thing (weird muddy area.. also see how unless you're a teacher/doctor you can literally have sex with a 16 year old, but nudes would get you locked up) but knowing him since he was 13 or 10 or whatever. Certainly not on the side of Twitter witch hunters who tend to take things to extremes and sure let's just assume this was a natural friendship that found itself blossoming into more when he was an adult. I guess I've just seen so many comments from the extremes along the lines of "befriending someone as a child then later having a sexual relationship with them when they're an adult is grooming" to end up questioning whether reality lies somewhere in the middle, then feel uneasy.

I'd love for it to be the best case. I idolised him as a kid and want to continue looking back on Going Live without any Savile stuff tainting it (not that I ever idolised Savile to be honest, he always just came across as a weird old man)

It's positive that the younger guy has been trying to protect him, which unless there's something really bad going on, suggests that he doesn't feel any harm has been done. Time will tell but hopefully he'll elaborate on that.

Twitter ghouls will still call him the P word but they do that to everyone. There are some who would call me one for being with a 24 year old. (Pre frontal cortex blah blah)
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I liked him as a kid too, for both Going Live and CBBC (the broom cupboard) but if I'm honest, I probably preferred Sarah Greene.

I also vividly remember Kylie teaching his wife, Stephanie Lowe the moves to the Wouldn't Change A Thing dance, when she was a presenter too. I'm sure I have that on VHS somewhere.
 
GinAg (39) said:
As for Holly, I think she comes across appallingly. She clearly knows the lot and happily ignored it until her career became threatened. Whatever it is, that she knows, those actions are despicable.
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I’m not convinced she comes back from this - certainly where This Morning is concerned - easily either for that exact reason. The whole setup now feels tainted when part of the appeal of the current show is in their supposed friendship.

I don’t think swathes of the audience watch the show with a critical eye and stop to question whether it’s a facade, but that’s the existential situation This Morning now finds itself in, and that’s hard to repair when one half of the duo remains.
 
Reading other replies, I'm going to back down on the "uneasiness" thing. It's more thinking aloud on the "if"s and speculations than actually accusing him and using the word "noncey" in the "please don't turn out to be" context might have been a bit much. Partly I remember the start of the Rolf Harris allegations (who I liked) and saying "hey this is a witch hunt he's probably innocent" etc and getting proven wrong and not really wanting to go through that again.

I felt bad enough on another forum when I mentioned my age gap relationship (40+24 when we met) and got a few comments suggesting it was dodgy so don't want to fuel the fire of calling a presumed-innocent person horrible things.
 
It seems according to social media that the vast majority of people think he is a groomer and a sexual predator.

For me the part that I find really uncomfortable is that he knew the boy since he was well underage. That alone should have made him off limits.

I think Holly’s days are numbered too. If I were her I’d probably want a clean break anyway. Alison and Dermot could be in for a stroke of luck soon.
 
KaLa Zarra said:
For me the part that I find really uncomfortable is that he knew the boy since he was well underage. That alone should have made him off limits.
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This is an interesting one. Why?

Liam Payne for example auditioned in front of Cheryl when he was 14 and they then had a child together when he was legal. She was on a judging panel so had the same sort of power imbalance that Phillip may have had in terms of getting this male into television. Yes the age gap in this case is even wider, however in terms of the law, some may be 'weirded out' but actually, who are we to judge?

I can also totally see why people would be looking into other factors such as his brother, and I think there is more info that we do not know. I can only speak from my own personal experiences but I was very underage when I was doing similar things that this runner in question may have been doing, but I would still say that I knew exactly what I was doing and made my own decisions, however looking back in the eyes of the law I was a child. I think there needs to be more concrete facts and info before we can all come to a judgement really. I am totally not excusing any vile or predatory behaviour, but I think every situation has a context if that makes sense, and we don't know the full context or even facts at this stage.
 
Can we all just agree that ITV have hugely spread themselves thin when it comes to their live presenting duties for light entertainment? These golden handshake deals are ridiculous. I don’t remember it ever being this bad growing up, with the SAME people across the network on multiple shows.
 
Ellie said:
Can we all just agree that ITV have hugely spread themselves thin when it comes to their live presenting duties for light entertainment? These golden handshake deals are ridiculous. I don’t remember it ever being this bad growing up, with the SAME people across the network on multiple shows.
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This!
 
To make matters worse, you have people like Bradley Walsh and Holly Willoughby moving over to the BBC and taking over everything there too.
 
Ellie said:
Can we all just agree that ITV have hugely spread themselves thin when it comes to their live presenting duties for light entertainment? These golden handshake deals are ridiculous. I don’t remember it ever being this bad growing up, with the SAME people across the network on multiple shows.
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It's even worse than it appears, I think. Primetime and 'light entertainment' has got increasingly safe and unadventurous over the last couple of decades, with hardly any new formats or ideas - and then using the same presenters over and over again over recycled formats.

Someone posted the other day that Richard Osman tweet saying it may be because we're not getting the talent coming through children's TV any more.
 
Apparently Ruth made a complaint when she found out and she got fired because of it!

People are saying Holly should be sacked because she knew but it’s been an open secret for years, and in a way I don’t blame her for keeping quiet if she could have lost her job over it.
 
lolly said:
It's even worse than it appears, I think. Primetime and 'light entertainment' has got increasingly safe and unadventurous over the last couple of decades, with hardly any new formats or ideas - and then using the same presenters over and over again over recycled formats.

Someone posted the other day that Richard Osman tweet saying it may be because we're not getting the talent coming through children's TV any more.
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This as well as the good old British comedy panel show. I swear it’s the same 10-15 comedians across all networks on rotation.

I suppose in the 80s a load of the presenters were all old 60s pop stars and end of the pier comedians. Now it’s ex-kids TV actors/presenters. We just need a new pool of talent.
 
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Despite the above comments, tonight's Blankety Blank was one of the funniest things I've ever seen! :D :D :D
 
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