Danczuk's Doppelgänger* Danger in Rochdale!

N.V. editorial comment:  The letter (below)in last Saturday's

Rochdale Observer from Les May warns readers of the danger of

repeating past errors.  Simon Danczuk and Matthew Baker

at their recent book launch have said that the public today

are not so deferential and will not be so easily taken in as

they were when Cyril Smith dominated politics in Rochdale

and beyond.  But as Mr May's letter implies we clearly need

eternal vigilance:

DON'T REPEAT PAST ERRORS

I was pleased to see the original RAP article reprinted in your columns.  Its professional and restrained tones form an interesting contrast to some more recent writings on the same subject.

But the mistakes of the past are about to be repeated as the contribution to the final 'outing' of Cyril Smith made by the Burnley based cultural and political magazine 'Northern Voices' seem to be in danger of being quietly dropped from the record.  RAP co-editor John Walker readily acknowledged its efforts to keep the story alive in the nine-page article 'Cyril Smith's Spanking Memoirs' which was published in the magazine.  This would have been inestimable value to anyone writing about the subject and should be properly credited.

We can do nothing to undo the things that happened to these men in their youth.  But we can ensure that the record of what happened to them and the final unmasking of Cyril Smith is as accurate as we can make it.

To do otherwise is to fall into the trap of once again believing the carefully constructed myth just as happened with 'Big Cyril'**.

Les May,
Cresent Road,
Rochdale.

*  In fiction and folklore, a doppelgänger or doppelganger (/ˈdɒpəlˌɡæŋər/; German: [ˈdɔpəlˌɡɛŋɐ] ( listen), look-alike, literally a "double goer") is a double of a living person and sometimes portrayed as a harbinger of bad luck. In some traditions, a doppelgänger seen by a person's relative or friend portends illness or danger while seeing one's own doppelgänger is said to be an omen of death.
In contemporary vernacular, the word doppelgänger is often used in a more general sense to identify any person that physically or perhaps even behaviorally resembles another person. 

**  'Big Cyril' was the title of Cyril Smith's autobiography.