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I was at this gig on the front row. Thought i’d offer what i saw in case it’s of any interest. Not sure what you’ll make of it, but I thought I’d post it anyway. Internet being what it is, i’ll try and back the ‘I was there’ claim up with some details: JV came on stage wearing a Bukowski t-shirt (with a safari jacket on top) and drinking a can of Guinness. He started shouting at a group of us down the front and told us to ‘fucking come together, i’m fucking coming at you, if you don’t fucking come together i’ll fucking have you’.

JV then staged dived onto a big guy a few seats across from us. He did improvised anecdotes about lapdancing clubs and shitting on babies heads to teach negligent parents a lesson, which got a really good reception. Reading that back, all I can say is I guess you had to be there. I was a bit scared but found it pretty fucking exhilirating and kinda hilarious. I’ve never seen him before but some friends had texted to warn me he does this kinda stuff when we found out he was coming on. It was all clearly improvised and quite exciting to watch.

Then he started going on about not being able to ‘get girls’ because he’s a washed-up loser. The quote that the Guardian lady edited was ‘you’re like me (pointing at ‘fat’ guy in front row who he’d jumped on earlier). We’re the same. Except i’m famous. And that makes people do crazy things. I bet i could get any woman in the audience. I’ve got no material, I’m only here to get laid so why don’t we test the theory?’. I think most of us took that as a kind of dig at celebrity.

Then he started talking to a girl on the second or third row who told him she was shy and he immediately moved on. Another girl who was with the guy who’d been jumped on went up and cuddled him. He took the piss out of her but i can’t remember exactly what he said. I was getting really nervous cos i hate being involved in this sort of stuff. Then he started ‘chatting up’ the ginger librarian girl. He took the piss out of her hair a bit while lay face down on the stage attempting to ’seduce her’. This went on a while but to be fair she seemed to be responding well to it (she offered to go and get a hair cut). I’d agree that she seemed quite shy though.

Then it went into the ’sleeping beauty’ bit. He had 6 people carry the girl on stage so they could cement their ‘love’ for each other. The girl got up and they carried her onto the stage. He got a guy to sing Shakespeare’s sisters ’stay’ (think that what it’s called). He did shout ‘don’t move or i’ll kick you in the ribs’ but to us it seemed like this was intended to kinda subvert the mawkishness of the song and the ‘love’ scene. He glided his hands over her body a bit. From where we sat it didn’t look like there was contact but it was hard to tell for sure. Then he went down to kiss her. He kissed her on the lips at first. From where we were sat it looked like she definitely kissed him back but with tongues. He asked for a curtain to be brought down to close the performance. Simon Munnery came on and held his coat over them but we could see he was chatting to her at this point. Before it finished, he chatted to a few of the people and the girl in a fairly amiable way. She came off stage looking kinda confused but we heard her tell a few people that she was fine.

(Apologies for the bad grammar – i’m writing this quickly at work on the sly)

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Where is the official version of events then?

Kate has merely copied the account from the NotBBC website.

The article is now the subject of a ‘legal complaint’ by Vegas, and it and the accompanying blog have been removed from the Guardian website.

When you say ““rape” obviously signifies something much worse in our heads than “assault by penetration””, I don’t really follow, or maybe my head doesn’t work like yours. I think they are the same thing, emotively for me they are anyway.

I didn’t put that at all well, but I can’t think of a better way to put it. I think they are equivalent as you say.

Certainly sounds ‘transgressive’ and ‘challenging’ enough for Stewart Lee. JV’s obviously still in character from ‘Sex Lives of the Potato Men’ – one of the most depressing films ever made.

It’s always easy to stand in condemnation of people you can’t stand anyway (c/ref Gary Glitter etc), much more uncomfortable when its a guy who’s work you really like. I think “Ideal” is one of the best comedies in years. Cue one of the great “how can you enjoy the work of someone whose actions/views you find apalling?” internal dilemmas. I usually manage. I shall continue watching and enjoying I’m sure……

But in the real world, this is really one for the police. And, much as I’d like to think othwerwise, I think it very unlikely indeed this poor woman was “in on it”.

When you say ““rape” obviously signifies something much worse in our heads than “assault by penetration””, I don’t really follow, or maybe my head doesn’t work like yours. I think they are the same thing, emotively for me they are anyway.

I find Milgram’s experiments – and similar fascinating. Did you read this article on Zimbardo?

Kaet, I understand what you mean by your first paragraph. The legislation has very clear definitions, and as has been pointed out, the sentences for “rape” and “assault by penetration” are the same.

That said, “rape” obviously signifies something much worse in our heads than “assault by penetration”, though of course both actions are violations. It seems to me the reason you see “rape” instead of “assault by penetration” in the media is because it reads ‘better’ and obviously has that emotive difference of meaning to which you refer – that signifier of something much worse than mere assault.

And of course it will be a rare person who will write in to complain that “in fact it was assault by penetration, not rape”.

What is also interesting is a lot of people looking to see if the whole thing was staged. Despite the fact that none of the eye-witnesses suggested at any point that it might have been. If it was staged it raises questions about the reaction of the public, the other comics (if they didn’t know) and in particular the six members of the audience who assisted in the debacle – were they plants too.

But the incident happened last Friday, of course it has taken a while for reports to filter into the mainstream but that’s a week – and we’ve heard nothing from either Vegas or the woman involved to suggest it was staged. I think maybe people don’t want to believe this sort of thing could happen or that they might be swept along with the crowd and not stand up to this sort of thing, so they are searching for a get-out like “it was staged”. From everything I’ve read I really do not think it was staged.

I also think those in the crowd should not judge themselves too harshly. Many scientific reports suggest it is extremely difficult not to go along with a big crowd in situations like this. Added to the fact that the comic is on a stage, with a microphone, in a big auditorium, which cost good money to go to and has uniformed staff showing you round, etc. Lets hope that people (those who were there and those reading about it later) learn from this that just because a big crowd goes along with something – you don’t have to. And lets hope the lessons can spread over into crime prevention policies too.

Although the story that kicked off the interest in the bystander effect – the Kitty Genovese murder/rape – has been shown not to have been quite what was reported at the time, the effect itself is very well documented and supported by evidence, not least by Millgram’s classic experiments.

So if your question is whether it could be a factor in explaining why no one tried to stop the show, then the answer would be that its certainly a candidate and, in fact, the environment in which the incident took place – a comedy performance – may well have contributed to the audiences inaction – if enough people were laughing at the routine then that may have influenced many of those who subsequently found it disturbing to feel, at the time, that what they were watch was either staged or that the woman was fine and had fully consented to the act.

At least one commenter on CiF who said they were at the show has indicated that they shouted out to the woman that she should throw JV off her, only then to say that she didn’t think she shouted loudly enough.

That’s unlikely to be the issue here. It’s not that this individual didn’t shout loudly enough but that she shouted out the wrong thing – instead of shouting out to the woman to tell her what to do, which could easily be misinterpreted as a bit of heckling, had they shouted the obvious – ‘Look he’s really touching her up!” or ‘This is real!’ – or something to that effect, focussing on what people were seeing, then it may have prompted others to respond…

Its a bit like the Emperor’s New Clothes – the way to get through is often a matter of saying the obvious.

I don’t think this was anyone’s point – rather, that if a performance artist did a similar thing *that was staged*, people would be more inclined to believe that it was staged than if it’s done by a drunken working-class maniac.

- or mouth, lest any would-be mouth-rapists out there take solace from Unity’s post

More relevantly, in the spirit of Unity’s comments, forced penetration with an object (including a body part that isn’t a penis) carries the same maximum sentence and sentencing guidelines as rape and therefore clearly is seen as equally bad.

However, non-penetrative sexual assault, which Vegas would be guilty of if this is non-consensual and the girl not a plant [it's pretty clear that 'fingered the girl through her clothes' means 'touched the genital area' not 'penetrated the vagina'], carries a lower maximum sentence and lower sentencing guidelines.

“And I would add that even if it WAS staged it would be incredibly triggery for anyone in the audience who has been through similar experiences.”

What, so performers should avoid touching on anything unpleasant in case they trigger unpleasant memories among some audience members?

Now of course we need a debate on what exactly “fingering” means. I’ve always understood the term to mean penetration of the vagina (or arguably anus) with the fingers. And we could debate all day whether that constitutes “rape” or “serious sexual assault”. Either way it’s a significant crime.

I’m not sure it needs to be debated per se – the definitions in law are clear and set out in a commendably matter of fact fashion.

Where things get a little more complicated is in the use of ‘rape’ as a rhetorical ‘device’.

Rightly or wrongly, sexual offences are widely perceived to be ‘hierarchical’ in terms of severity – touching is perceived to be a lesser matter than ‘fingering’ because its lacks a penetrative element and ‘fingering’ perceived to be a lesser matter than rape because the different appendages used in each offence.

Okay, so we’re dealing with some pretty fines matters of ‘degree’ but such fine distinctions are often the stuff of which straw men attacks are constructed.

If you’ll forgive the gross generalisation here, feminists will often characterise sexual offences in terms of or by reference to rape even if they don’t quite fit the legal definition of the term because what they are referring to, primarily, is the ‘moral character’ of the offence. Rape is used in a figurative generic sense that encompasses not only the specifics of the act itself, but the context in which it took place and power relationships in operation at the time of the offence.

That’s not an unreasonable perspective by any means in the context of a debate but the kind of hierarchical perception of these offences that is pretty common currency in the public discourse does, unfortunately, open the door to the charge that references to rape are being deployed to try and make a situation ’seem more serious than it actually is’ in order to gainsay the argument.

So what starts out as perfectly reasonable and defensible statement of a moral position can very quickly come under attack as an attempt to ‘cry wolf’ even though the basis of such allegations is invariably an obvious straw man.

I’m not criticising you or your take on this story – you are obviously commenting in good faith and there is nothing at all unreasonable in your position if it transpires this wasn’t a staged incident. What I have tried to point out, maybe not very well, is that feminists are generally up against a ‘constituency’ that will oppose pretty much any position they put up, simply because they’re feminists and that hair-splitting over fine definitions is, within that constituency, an all too common tactic used to try to automatically gainsay what are otherwise legitimate arguments.

By unpicking the definition of rape in your original comments, what I hope to achieve – and it seem to have work – was close off the scope for the kind of cheap shot attacks that were thrown into the discussion at CiF, many of which have now been moderated.

What I am also saying, and playing Devil’s Advocate with, is both that how this story is being presented in the media and what that says both about how the media perceives the story and how its readers respond to the publication of those perceptions.

This is where the classism element come in to play.

If this wasn’t staged, then guilty is guilty – there is no distinction to be drawn between a comedian and a performance artist if what has been committed is a criminal offence.

If, however, this is a staged incident and this is confirmed by JV and by the woman who take part in the ‘performance’ – and I do think that confirmation has to come from that source for ‘plant’ angle to stand up – then what I am suggesting is that the perceived social class of the ‘artist’ will play a big part in how the audience perceives the performance.

The mere fact that JV act is based on a drunken working class comic shtick rather than on his being an ‘artist’ means that:

a) it more likely that the audience will have perceived or come to perceive that what they saw was an actual sexual assault, and

b) that even those who left the theatre convinced that the routine was stages would be considerable more likely to interpret it as a crude attempt to shock than they would to question whether there was some other meaning/intent behind the performance.

Conversely, if this has story related to a show billed as performance art, the audience would be more likely to think that what they saw was staged and that the artist was trying to make some sort of serious point, even if they couldn’t quite put their finger on what that point is.

If this was a genuine sexual assault, then all such considerations would be rendered irrelevant – a sex offence is a sex offence no matter how anyone would prefer to dress it up.

If it was purely a staged performance, however, then how that performance is, and will be, perceived is very much a function of how JV is perceived as a performer in terms of his apparent social class.

That’s not letting him off – he still has to explain himself and the explanation really does have to be a good one, because even if this was staged, it could still very easily put his career down the toilet even if nothing illegal occurred.

Now of course we need a debate on what exactly “fingering” means. I’ve always understood the term to mean penetration of the vagina (or arguably anus) with the fingers. And we could debate all day whether that constitutes “rape” or “serious sexual assault”. Either way it’s a significant crime.

As to the idea that classism comes in to it – I have to disagree. Clearly on the night, no-one did anything to stop Vegas. Afterwards people thought about it and have started to reconsider whether that was a reasonable response and to express their feelings on the subject. Now I agree that it is quite possible that if a “posh” performance artist did a similar thing there might be even less fuss made. But the solution is not to let Vegas off. The solution is to prosecute Vegas and to also prosecute the “posh” performance artist. We can’t say “posh people get away with violent crime so we should let working class people get away with it too”.

I see what you’re saying about what he could have been trying to do had it been a plant – I think I suggested the same reasoning myself in my post and, fairly arrogantly given that he is a professional standup, perhaps a way he could have made his point more effective. I agree that someone in a room full of people should have stepped in to at least object, but I don’t really want to utterly condemn them for that. Sitting here objectively, I can pass judgement on these people and say that I would have stepped in myself, but I find it hard to believe that many of the hundreds of people who were sitting there impassively during what happened wouldn’t be saying the same thing in my detached position.

Again, all of this assumes that the accounts are accurate.

Class comes into it because the public persona of JV is that of a stereotypical drunken Northern lout and many of the automatic assumptions being made about this incident are predicated on that perception.

In short, if it Johnny Vegas, pisshead and professional Northerner, then its JV the rapist, but if it were Jonathan Vegas (silent ’s’) the Parisian performance artist then its a brave and challenging piece of searing social commentary. That’s the class element in terms of perceptions.

As for what he might have been expecting if this is a staged scenario and what the point may be, that takes us into a long tradition of psychological inquiry heading right back to Millgram’s classic experiments.

Look, a few years ago I worked on a local anti-racism project (in local schools) with, amongst other, an photographer and photo montage artist named Vanley Burke.

Now Vanley is brilliant and we were lucky to get him – he was personal friend of another colleague who headed up the project – especially as he was just off a gig photographing Mandela.

(Vanley is black, btw)

So we did the project and then ran an open event at the end of it for the local community, at which my boss had the wizard wheeze of putting up a couple of flipcharts in entrance lobby for the locals to write their comments about the event on.

Anyway, Vanley arrived, and shortly after I saw him calmly walk over to one of the flipcharts, picj up a pen and write something on one of the flipcharts, after which he walked away a calm as you like.

I wandered over to see what he’d done, and there on the chart in foot high letters is said simply, ‘NF’ – and this was in Tipton, which has been the NF and BNP’s HQ round here for a good few years.

So, about half the people at the event are non-white and we had guests from the local council and NHS, who I worked for at the time, and Vanley has just written ‘NF’ on the feedback chart in the entrace lobby to the venue – what do I do?

I trust Vanley, think about it for five minutes, figure out what he’s up to and let it ride…

…three hours later, one of the guests finally gets around to complaining about what on the chart, so I calmly take it down, apologise and say nothing about how it got there.

Next day, we’re in a debrief about the event and the boss is spitting feathers over the chart, at which point I simply point out that its was Vanley’s doing and that he had a vaild point to make… it took three hours for someone to complain about the NF symbol on the chart, even though it was in plain sight and people had been wandering past it all morning, and that was his point. People should have complained and should have done so right away, but they didn’t, so what does that tell you about their attitudes towards race, ethnicity and the power structures that relate to it in that local community.

It’s conceivable that JV could be making a similar point – people in that audience should have complained to the police, they should have got up and walked out – hell, fuck it, on the strength of the description of what went on, someone should have got up out of the audience and made an effort to stop the fucking show.

But it seems that no one did, they just sat there and no matter how disturbed they were by what they saw, they did nothing but mumble to themselves and then piss and moan to the press afterwards.

That’s the other side to this story – you’ve got a room full of people watching what appears to be a sexual assault on a member of the audience, just a young woman seemingly on a normal night out – and no one lifted a fucking finger to try and stop what was going on in front of them.

Now what does that say about attitudes amongst members of that audience – whatever JV did or didn’t actually do, if there’s one thing that everyone should be getting fucking angry about then its that!!

I really hope it was a staged performance (though, given that JV’s act usually involves mock-slavvering over women, I am not so sure) and I find it hard to believe that men like Stewart Lee and Simon Munnery would let anything like this go on. They are probably *the* most politically correct (I mean that in an entirely positive way) comedians around. On the other hand, the accounts of what happened I have read paint what happened as pretty deplorable. If she wasn’t given an opportunity to say no, I don’t think it really matters how the woman felt to make it completely wrong.

What I don’t understand at all is what the point was, if it was staged. Again, I’m assuming that what has been reported is true. What is JV hoping for? An audience member can surely only assume that it wasn’t staged and, you’d hope, the response should be to contact the police or at least to raise objections to what happened. Was he hoping for this? Was he actually hoping someone would point out that he’d gone too far? In which case, why didn’t he – or the compere – embarrass the audience by pointing out what they’d just allowed to go on? Surely this would have been a much more effective way to make such a point

I can’t believe that Munnery and Lee would allow anything so terrible to go on unchallenged (and my judgement is perhaps clouded by not wanting to believe that they would do such a thing) but, judging by the two accounts given, something so terrible *has* gone on unchallenged. I can only hope that it was staged, in which case I don’t really see the point. It’s a great shame that neither JV nor Stewart Lee were willing to issue any comment to the Guardian, though they must obviously have been concerned about being stitched up. SL, like most comedians, has been on many occasions stitched by journalists – but always for something he said, rather than something he or anyone else had done. I hope they feel able to comment later.

Even if she was a plant, Vegas has really gone down in my estimation.

Indeed.

And I would add that even if it WAS staged it would be incredibly triggery for anyone in the audience who has been through similar experiences.

I’m not the sort of person who would pay money to see Johnny Vegas anyway, but this makes it even more unlikely.

Oh Jeebus, yes – even it was staged then unless he come up a very good explanation for why he did it then he deserves a good long stint working a double-act with Michael Barrymore as warm-up for Chubby Brown as penance for coming up with one of dumbest and creepiest routines in living memory.

The problem I have here is that Vegas could conceivably be boorish enough if he’s been on the sauce to pull a stunt like this with an audience member, in which case the Rozzers can happily reserve him a cell next to Guido as far as I’m concerned.

Then again, when he’s on form he’s also intelligent enough to stage something like this as well, if not as a carefully thought out piece of social commentary then just as a way of shocking an audience.

If we were talking about Sadowitz here, then I’d be heavily down on the side of this being a fake, and there are other comedians (who I won’t name for obvious reasons) who’s involvement in something like this would scream out for them to be arrested on the spot, but Vegas is one where there’s enough uncertainty to make it difficult to call without more information.

Maybe we’ll have to wait to see if Mon-keh disowns hims before we can be sure.

One way or another, I do think there’s enough in this to suggest the Police should be making an effort to identify the young woman and ask the necessary questions, and to move quickly to get to her before she’s found by Max Clifford or the NoTW.