Talk:James Anderton

crass
Taken from the article on punk band Crass: During the mid 1980s, under the direction of James Anderton copies of Crass' Penis Envy were seized, along with other records by Crass and The Dead Kennedys, by Greater Manchester Police from Eastern Bloc record shop. Frank Schofield was charged with displaying "Obscene Articles For Publication For Gain". The band, Flux of Pink Indians its two record labels and its publishing company were also charged under the Obscene Publications Act, but all charges were dropped by Greater Manchester Police.

Shouldn't something on this be in there?

liberal-left?
"he was often in conflict with the liberal-left in the city's political leadership during the 1980s"

In the 1980s, Liverpool was largely being run by Derek Hatton and the Militant Tendency. Militant were hardly "liberal-left": they were Trotskyists. It's not clear to me whether the author meant liberal to be interpreted in classical British political terms (free trade and what-not) or in current American terms, but either way, I'm not sure it's accurate. Hence removed original to talk page and reworded.

--Telsa 14:13, 25 October 2005 (UTC)
 * While I agree with you about Hatton's politics, I should point out that we're talking about Greater Manchester here, not Merseyside! -- Necrothesp 00:07, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

Urrr. Good point. :) What was I thinking? Telsa 18:03, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Homophobia cat
I've removed Category:Homophobia again for three reasons: Please comment here before reverting. Thanks! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 03:58, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) He isn't homophobia
 * 2) Homophobia isn't central to who he is or what he did. See Category talk:Homophobia for consensus on how/wen the cat should be used.
 * 3) It isn't sourced at all.  If he really is a homophobe, that's controversial and should be well sourced.


 * 1) He is not "homophobia", but homophobic, and the category "homophobia" relates to articles that concern express examples of the topic (be that historical events, biographical articles, political issues, etc). Stop being pedantic.
 * 2) His homophobic views and comments are relevant as they were expressed in public and created IMMENSE controversy at the time. His remarks about homosexuality and AIDS in particular were arguably the most infamous words he spoke as it almost ended his career and was a prominent issue in local political history.
 * 3) It was sourced, and I have now added further sources.79.65.89.199 16:03, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
 * You're absolutely right about the use of the category - sorry if my pedantic comment offended.
 * His comments may have created controversy, but they're hardly central to who he was or what he did. Fred Phelps basis his whole life and church on homophobia - this man happened to make one comment.  I'm not excusing him or saying he wasn't homophobic - I'm just saying he doesn't belong in a category that contains people, places, and events that epitomize homophobia.
 * Your sources all say the same thing, and in about the same way. In articles that are written on various topics, they all mention - once - that he said what he said.  One of those sources would be sufficient, and none of them support adding him to the category.
 * Does anyone else have any thoughts? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 18:51, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
 * He does seem to be known for his homophobia, if the category includes people known for such then... Another idea is to amend the description of the category to be clear who could be added and even possibly a subsection of public figures known for their homophobic activities. Benjiboi 15:02, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
 * The homophobia category should effectively be a grouping of articles that relate to the topic of homophobia, and this should include articles about people who have demonstrated homophobic tendencies to the extent that it has become widely known about them (i.e. press coverage, etc). I agree with Benjiboi that the category description should make this clear (if that's what you were saying, Benji). In Anderton's case, he made these remarks publicly whilst he was the Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police and the remarks were massively controversial, and I mean massively. It doesn't have to be the most central part of who he is (neither is the year of his birth or classifying him as coming from Wigan, which are also both categories used here). It just has to be something that he became widely known for. To me, Anderton will always mainly be known as the bible-bashing copper who made the dreadful remarks about homosexuality and AIDS, and I fully agree with one of the editors above that these comments were probably the most infamous comments he ever made. Along with his force's constant raids on gay establishments whilst he was in charge (which I believe is mentioned in one of the sources), I believe it carries enough weight to list him in the category. Something I would like to make clear though is that the homophobia category itself should not be used as a weapon to label people or be taken as an insult. It should just refer to articles that strongly relate to the topic so that people who browse the category can find a variety of articles and process that information as they see fit. MassassiUK 02:49, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
 * He personifies homophobia to those of us who lived through the eighties and would be a good case study for anyone interested in homophobia as a cultural phenomenon. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.113.113.159 (talk) 21:07, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Categories could be set up I suppose for 'anti-gay activist' or 'people convicted of homophobia' but he wouldn't even fit into those never mind the pejorative labeling aspect of category;homophobia where sticking it onto a living person is expressly forbidden by WP:BLP as noted in the header for that category. Dmcq (talk) 11:23, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

New stuff under 30 year rule
There is a very interesting set of documents released under the 30 year rule on 1 Jan 2012, which can be found at

http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/s/1469549_men-exclusive-read-all-the-secret-documents-relating-to-the-sir-james-anderton-affair

which should be incorporated into the article (by some experienced Wikipedian). Also whilst commenting, the only heading in this article is 'career'. Surely it should be split into other sections, ie Early/personal life, AIDS controversy, Stalker affair etc, reactions to Scarman report etc.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.155.193.120 (talk) 17:35, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Youngest Chief Constable Claim
I've removed the claim that Anderton was the youngest ever Chief Constable. I have considered whether he may have been the second or third youngest, etc, but it appears his age is of no significance. Joseph Davidson Sowerby was 29 years old when he took office in 1892 at Plymouth Borough Police, and officers such as Robert Cyril Morton Jenkins were in their late thirties when they became chief officers. Sowerby, so far, appears to hold the record. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheRothOfKhan (talk • contribs) 15:02, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120316162444/http://www.manchesterlieutenancy.org/index.php?page=james-anderton to http://www.manchesterlieutenancy.org/index.php?page=james-anderton

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David Britton and Lord Horror
The link cited does indeed state that Britton was imprisoned for four months, but I'm having trouble confirming that from other sources. Sources such as https://thequietus.com/articles/10988-michael-butterworth-savoy-publisher-interview refer to Lord Horror as having been inspired by a previous jail term of four weeks in Strangeways in 1982. That doesn't logically exclude the possibility that he was jailed again over Lord Horror, but in that case it's surely odd that neither the Quietus article nor http://www.mancunianmatters.co.uk/content/160870252-last-author-banned-obscene-comes-out-hiding-manchester-exhibition-boundary-pushing mention it. 130.225.26.35 (talk) 10:56, 14 May 2020 (UTC)