Nope, just someone who believes in nothing but has the ability to be charismatic and wants to make lots of money by being loud about it on his show. Always telltale signs with these sorts of people and Brand hit all of them a long time ago.

 

He'd pull for the establishment if they paid him enough (under an obfuscating guise). Good riddance to him if he's done something to get in serious trouble.

 

What telltale signs are we looking for?

So he reacted to the mainstream and establishment torpeoding the left by grtting bankrolled by thr alt right. Maybe as revenge against the establishment?

if you wanna break it down to its core the whole “scene” is made up of upper-class people who larp as revolutionaries and are angry they didn’t lead the Marxist revolution in 2016. they were the ones most vulnerable to being scooped up by the right, bc they were motivated purely by their standing in political circles and probably didnt even believe what they were preaching anyway. it’s purely just being anti-establishment for the aesthetic with zero underlying principles, which Russell brand always kind of struck me as anyway lmao, like a 13 year old being anarchist for the first time

What telltale signs are we looking for?

 

Conspiracism, 'something the "elites" aren't telling you', appeals to ignore critical thinking, lots of ways that involve bias but the rejection of empiricism is the main one. Talk about distrusting of scientific advancements based on nothing but ignorant intuition. Or similarly, distrusting mainstream politicians based on them being mainstream politicians and nothing else (the curse of believing that Western diabolism is the ultimate priority applies to many so-called leftists in this situation). Brand may have done good work in the past but what I've seen from him recently is more akin to cult leader than reasoned commentator.

 

Sort of valuable to political knowledge to move away from 'if likedCorbyn then good'

Looks like it is just Russell in this investigation. It all looks horrific so far.

 

@1703061347972313303

Nope, just someone who believes in nothing but has the ability to be charismatic and wants to make lots of money by being loud about it on his show. Always telltale signs with these sorts of people and Brand hit all of them a long time ago.

 

He'd pull for the establishment if they paid him enough (under an obfuscating guise). Good riddance to him if he's done something to get in serious trouble.

 

Sounds like your talking about Oswald Mosley there!

Didn't he become big in the first place by piggybacking off Jack Sparrow characterisation and playing that character in real life?

 

What worries me when these cases come out isn't as much that these people exist, but that those around them enable,excuse and turn a blind eye. I've heard reports of assistants and colleagues 'scouting' potential targets for him. Vile.

Will Katy Perry feature in the doc?

So some pretty serious allegations, but also some poor journalism from the Dispatches team imo. I had to turn the documenatry off, did really feel like "GUILTY" before he's even been charged. Thought it missed off some really key bits, e.g. the culture in the mid to late 00s (see Pete Doherty, Amy Winehouse, Lindsayn Lohan) really enabled Brand, created his character/persona and the media at the time loved him. Clearly he is a good looking, charistmatic guy. Although seperately, I do find it ironic he is having a go at the mainstream media, when it helped him in the first place. The show completely missed the fact it was him dating Kate Moss at the time that led to his ascendency too.

 

Like some have suspected, his move to conspiracy theorist may have been some foresight from him about the way the wind would blow in the future. No surprise the likes of whom is supporting him saying it's all a witch hunt. Those text messages are pretty dammning imo

I don't know, the risk to Channel 4 would've been huge broadcasting that if they weren't sure it was true. It implicates *them* as well as the BBC for not responding to the complaints raised. Brand will protest it's a mainstream media attack all he likes, but they've essentially exposed themselves as much as him.

 

The documentary was a pretty horrific watch, but none of it surprising. Always been an absolute creep, I can't believe with his Radio show was allowed to air some of that filth, that conversation with Jimmy Saville was shocking, that was the late 2000s...

 

I don't believe these were the only five cases so hopefully more come forward now that's enough for an arrest at least. The verified text messages and witnesses to one of them have a pretty strong case against him. YouTube really need to take down his channel too or things could get really nasty.

I read the Times article when it came out yesterday, and have been watching the documentary today. It's a very powerful piece of journalism, and given the high bar for getting an article like that published in the UK press due to libel laws, we should take the very disturbing allegations very seriously indeed.

 

Watching the clips of him from the late 00s, when he was at his peak as a comedian in the UK and when many of the allegations took place just shows just how much things have changed since then. In retrospect, the 00s seem to have been a time when every single one of the moral taboos of the preceding generations were being comprehensively demolished, including the taboos around sexuality (also on other matters - the fact that so many mainstream comedies at the time were able to get away with blackface without major uproar is particularly notable). From the mid-late 10s, we've seen the pendulum start to swing where we've seen a new set of moral taboos be set in place as to what is seen as acceptable within mainstream entertainment - some of them new, others more familiar. Russell Brand's rise coincided with the breaking of these taboos, which is why he was able to exploit it at the time, and why any critics of his behaviour at the time could be written off as reactionaries, prudes, or fuddy-duddies.

 

There will be a lot of questions to be asked going forward as to why it has taken as long as it has been for him to have these allegations finally receive the light of day. If his behaviour was known about by the BBC, Channel 4, MTV, the Hollywood studios that employed him, or any of his political connections knew about these allegations at the time, and stood aside and did nothing, then they should be just a culpable as he is and should face judgement.

 

It's surprising that he managed to escape scrutiny in 2013, just as the Jimmy Saville scandal led to Yewtree and the conviction of many British celebrities (just as Brand was starting his Citizen Smith schtick), and then again in 2017 when Me Too was bringing Hollywood offenders to justice when you consider of brazen his act was (Hidden in Plain Sight indeed). It makes you wonder if there are any household names doing something similar in 2023 that we will look back at in a similar way 10 years from now.

 

As to how he got away with it for so long, one possibility is to do with that devilish root - money. In his prime he was making so much money for so many people, be it Channel 4, his book publishers and papers he worked for, his production companies, or the Hollywood studios he was making films for, and if the allegations came out at the time, then they would have stood to lose millions. Whilst I 100% disbelieve Brand's current output is the reason why they are going after him now, it is true that those who would have make money off of him now don't have anything to lose - he hasn't appeared on Channel 4 since 2019, and was appearing in Hollywood films up to last year - I don't think many other people are making megabucks from a self-produced YouTube channel.

 

And on the subject of conspiracy theories - he's been a conspiracy theorist for a long time - at the height of his proto-Corbyn revolutionary stage, he was retweeting David Icke approvingly and not refuting the conspiracy that 9/11 was an inside job. The idea that his current conspiratory output is an attempt by him to put a guardrail around him so that other conpiracy nuts will back him up seems to far fetched even for him - the simplist explantion it that Russell Brand is, and always has been, an idiot.

Not seen the documentary but I've now read the article in full (https://archive.ph/KX4zn) and it is comprehensive, damning and also very harrowing and upsetting to read in places. I knew he had quite a reputation and at times even though his Jekyll and Hyde personality actually came through often on his chaotic and anarchic Radio 2/6Music shows, which I was a fan of at the time, despite this I didn't realise how dark, abusive and controlling he could be.

 

As for the reaction- well the statement that he put out was disgraceful and shows he has a complete lack of contrition or remorse for what he is alledged to have done, but I suppose that's mostly the lawyers saying that he needed to get 'ahead of the story' and not admit culpability. It's still a dick move, better to say nothing at all. It is entirely predictable that those that preach the same anti-establishment conspiratorial rabbit hole BS that he has now fell down have come out in support of Brand. Ditto him saying this is the establishment hoping to shut him down as he's getting close to 'the truth' without specifying what that truth is of course. What I hate about this (apart from all of the abuse and suffering these women - and in one case, a child, had to go through) is how any support for Brand or those seeking to minimise or make light of the serious accusations on social media actually makes it worse for victims to come forward.

 

I think as others have already said it speaks to how - in ALL parts of life - abusers can become enabled by the structures of the system that surround them (success, money etc.) by making themselves an integral part of that system. I don't condemn ppl for not doing more because in the end abusers will always find a way to manipulate and control those they need to in order to survive. This is just a depressing reality, but we can and should make it easier for victims to be heard and taken seriously.

 

The irony of the Met Police urging victims of sexual assault to come forward tho..

The Times have confirmed that more women have come forward with allegations against him.

I always got total Charles Manson vibes from this guy, not gonna lie.

Yeah - I haven’t seen the programme yet nor read the allegations but when Whoddy posted that there was going to be something like this upcoming my mind immediately went to Russel Brand as being the comedian in question.

It's noticeable that so many of the commentators who go on about "protecting women" to justify their horrific transphobia are the ones who are protecting Russell Brand - saying that it's because he speaks truth against the mainstream media aren't at all bothered about the sexual assault allegations against women in the slightest.

 

And the idea that the media companies (Which includes the right wing Murdoch press in this instance) would go to all that trouble of making up these sexual abuse investigations to bring him down based on his current output is absolutely laughable. Yes he has lots of followers, but he's just one of many many useful idiots and far from being the most influential. Plus he changes his stance like the weather in any case.

 

Wonder if Katy Perry will make a statement too.

Yeah - I haven’t seen the programme yet nor read the allegations but when Whoddy posted that there was going to be something like this upcoming my mind immediately went to Russel Brand as being the comedian in question.

 

Really? I immediately thought of David Walliams tbh but that would ofc be stretching the definition of the word 'comedian' beyond all linguistic precedent.

Really? I immediately thought of David Walliams tbh but that would ofc be stretching the definition of the word 'comedian' beyond all linguistic precedent.

Haha!

 

But yes - and it was weird as I can't say I've thought or even heard of Russell Brand in at least 5-10 years, yet he still immediately came to mind

Really? I immediately thought of David Walliams tbh but that would ofc be stretching the definition of the word 'comedian' beyond all linguistic precedent.

 

Omfg this was 100% my thought process too!! :rofl: He's so bad!

Anyway Brand has been cancelled from his comedy shows - he had 3 left on his current tour.

 

Apparently on his show at Wembley during weekend he got a standing ovation from the crowd. Just vile considering the circumstances :manson: