We have seen in the past century and further back into the mists of time how that happens when a dictator and their ringleaders come to power. We see it today with what is going on in the United States under President Donald Trump and in Russia with Vladimir Putin, its war-mongering president.
One of the greatest sadnesses and design faults about humans is that it is far easier for an individual to carry out acts of evil which have momentous repercussions than for a person to achieve the same through doing good. In the end, this imbalance will be one of the downfalls of humanity.
"Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing," philosopher John Stuart Mill said in 1867. And that is precisely what has happened with the whole horrible saga encompassing dead paedophile Jeffrey Epstein and the repugnant crew of politicians, rich people and royals he chose to surround himself with and make money out of.
The imbalances continue today. Where is the accountability for what happened to so many innocent and either under-age or barely-of-age women? They are still, disgracefully, struggling to be heard or believed, even in the face of overwhelming evidence against Epstein and his associates-in-crime in the form of emails and other papers in the latest dump of documents.
A good example of how those who engaged in criminal activity are still trying to gaslight their way out of trouble is the much-discussed photograph of the former prince, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. In this, he has his arm around the waist of the late Virginia Giuffre, who accused him of sexual assault after she was allegedly sex-trafficked to him by Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell.
In the car-crash of an interview with the BBC in 2019, Mountbatten-Windsor said he could not remember meeting Ms Giuffre and did not recall the photo being taken. He then raised a straw man argument, saying "nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored" and suggesting it was a "photograph of a photograph of a photograph".
It seem it is so much harder for women, the victims involved, to be believed than it is the men. The onus of proof is different for the women because, even though there are thought to be many hundreds of survivors of this sordid scheme, the men in these abhorrent incidents still, wrongly, have power and authority on their side.
The fallout from the latest tranche of documents released is, curiously, quite different on either side of the Atlantic, at this stage anyway. While there has been generally muted reaction by Mr Trump and his inner circle and the public to the revelations, the same could not be said for their effects on Westminster, the royalty and the people of the United Kingdom.
Private Eye editor Ian Hislop suggests this might be because the UK still has at least some moral compass left.
British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer is in deep trouble for appointing former Labour party minister and lobbyist Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US when he now admits he knew about Mr Mandelson’s links with Epstein.
Mr Starmer has apologised to Epstein’s victims after an absolute roasting in the House of Commons in recent days. Angry Labour MPs and leadership hopefuls are now working out when might be a good time to roll him.
In the meantime, pressure continues to pile on to the utterly disgraced Mr Mountbatten-Windsor to testify about all he knows.
The poisonous tentacles of Epstein’s ghastly pyramid scheme of sex-trafficking, paedophilia, blackmail and corruption will continue thrashing across the world. We have to hope that, in the end, justice is done for all those victims whose lives have been wrecked by a twisted man hell-bent on gaining and retaining power and influence.
