Russell Brand: rape and sexual abuse allegations, grifting and general dodginess - discussion

[AnnO'Neemus]

Is it usual for the press in the UK to make serious legal allegation about rape and sexual assault from anonymous sauces?

I understand that people who have made reports to the police regarding sexual assault and rape are able to have anonymity in the press (but they have made a police report), I'm really just interested if the press are free to make such allegations from anonymous sauces and claim public interest in the UK. I don't think the press here in Brazil can do that, also in the USA the stories about Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby, Kevin Spacey (found not guilty) and others had named accusers making the allegation in the stories exposing then.

Yes. Unless the victim themselves waives their anonymity.

From IPSO (Independent Press Standards Organisation)'s 'Guidance on reporting sexual offences'

"All victims of sexual offences, including children, are automatically guaranteed anonymity for life from the moment they make an allegation that they are the victim of a sexual offence. A victim is guaranteed anonymity even when someone else accuses the defendant of the offence. In Scotland, the law is different but the practice of respecting anonymity is the same.A large number of offences are considered sexual offences in law. These include rape, sexual assault, exposure and taking an indecent photograph of a child. Anonymity is also extended to victims/alleged victims of female genital mutilation and, in some circumstances, of ‘human trafficking’ and modern slavery."

https://www.ipso.co.uk/media/2308/sexual-offences-guidance.pdf

Media outlets also need to be careful to avoid the possibility of 'jigsaw identification' of victims. For example, from the same guidance:

"Jigsaw identification

Jigsaw identification occurs when different pieces of information appear in different publications, which allows readers who have seen the reports to work out who the victim is."

So for example, if one newspaper reported a victim as being X-years-old and another media outlet reported that they were grabbed and assaulted while on their way home from School Y or Workplace Z (for example, working at a local hospital), local people who knew someone who was X-years-old and went to School Y or worked at Workplace Z, might be able to narrow down the possibilities and might be able to identify the victim. Hence there are often very vague descriptions.

 

[Raheem]

Think it's more should watch out for what's being buried whilst the circus is in town

"Well, boys, if we propose legislation today, this policy with no meaning or public support will eventually come into force at exactly the same time as Russell Brand becomes a temporary news distraction. So, I ask you, what are we waiting for??"

 

[gosub]

"Well, boys, if we propose legislation today, this policy with no meaning or public support will eventually come into force at exactly the same time as Russell Brand becomes a temporary news distraction. So, I ask you, what are we waiting for??"

Fuck me. Are you saying Jo Moore was more involved with 9/11 than we knew. Now that's a conspiracy theory

 

[bluescreen]

Fuck me. Are you saying Jo Moore was more involved with 9/11 than we knew. Now that's a conspiracy theory

Good to see you taking this subject as seriously as you profess to.

 

[gosub]

Good to see you taking this subject as seriously as you profess to.

Absolutely been on the Jo Moore look out all week.


Conspiracy wise ..on the why now? Suppose you've got Murdoch stepping down. Sounds random but I'd old media / new media double differentiated battle lines.

Facilitated narcissist was monster whilst facilitied doesn't have to faciliting the system being a monster to sort it out.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Murdoch "We finally got Brand, mission achieved, I can step down happy at last."

.etc

 

[Wilf]

I'm afraid you've cranked the Bernard Manning-o-meter so far into the red that you'll have to be banned off this thread for a week for fear of a 70s Racist Comedian meltdown. TTFN.

Well, I'm saddened that a longstanding poster won't be allowed to use a serious thread to rehabilitate Bernard Manning. I mean, does this mean I won't be allowed to post up 'Roy Chubby Brown: worth a new look?'

 

[krtek a houby]

Good to see you taking this subject as seriously as you profess to.

Sadly it seems a small, but vocal, number of posters don't take the subject matter all that seriously. Of course threads occasionally "meander", but why threads like this?

Is it a coping mechanism?

 

[bluescreen]

Commiserations, Wilf I think I know how you feel.

 

[Raheem]

Did this thing where he apparently confessed to indecent exposure on air earn much comment at the time?

Anyone know?

 

[gosub]

Murdoch "We finally got Brand, mission achieved, I can step down happy at last."

.etc

That quote doesn't fit with I mean by double differentiated. 'Brand will do' from that angle

 

[Wilf]

I don't know this Brand person, I'm guessing his fame is in the English speaking parts of the world.

Having had him all over any UK news I've looked at in the last few days, you think he'd have been convicted of mass murders not just some allegations from 20 years ago ( albeit very serious allegations). I was interested to see that government ministers have been writing to the places he makes money before he has been convicted. I'll be interested to see if any MP who is accused of a crime is suspended without pay and ministers write to everywhere they earn money asking if they will still be paid.

Guilty or not, I have no view on that, but there appears to be a very strange reaction to these allegations. Has he pissed off the king or something

Ideally, fuck off.

 

[gosub]

Did this thing where he apparently confessed to indecent exposure on air earn much comment at the time?

Anyone know?

Think 'at the time' is a bad yardstick (be nice if it wasnt) Talent -vested intrest etc.. The Sachs affair affair when he got hit by that bus better time stamp for dipping yardsticks

 

[Mation]

Did this thing where he apparently confessed to indecent exposure on air earn much comment at the time?

Anyone know?

You can read about it and listen to the audio of the pre-recorded show, that was then broadcast, here:

Russell Brand: Woman says star exposed himself to her then laughed about it on Radio 2 show

The incident, which happened in Los Angeles in 2008, is the first time Brand has been heard publicly admitting sexual misconduct.

www.bbc.co.uk

But no, there wasn't much comment.

 

[BigMoaner]

.

 

[Spymaster]

I really which they'd stop using the term 'pest'. They're potential rapists and sexual assaulters, not some annoying insect at your picnic...

You can get into a lot of trouble for calling someone a rapist if they haven't been convicted of it. I guess "sex pest" is sufficiently nebulous to avoid legal problems, and few would disagree that Brand is one, at the very least.

 

[emanymton]

You can get into a lot of trouble for calling someone a rapist if they haven't been convicted of it. I guess "sex pest" is sufficiently nebulous to avoid legal problems, and few would disagree that Brand is one, at the very least.

Must be a better option than sex pest or just using alleged all the time though.

 

[Mumbles274]

Sex case? A noun to described someone accused of a sex case


"that sex case Russel brand has a sex case looming"

 

[Spymaster]

Sex case? A noun to described someone accused of a sex case


"that sex case Russel brand has a sex case looming"

"Hang him, hang him, hang him!"

 

[klang]

Pest in German means plague.

 

[Mumbles274]

"Hang him, hang him, hang him!"

Oh shit, can't think of the name of the film.. Mc-something?

 

[Spymaster]

Oh shit, can't think of the name of the film.. Mc-something?

McVicar.

 

[danny la rouge]

Pest in German means plague.

Scots too.

O Bessie Bell an' Mary Gray!
They were twa bonnie lasses,
They biggit a bower on yon burn-brae,
An' theekit it owre wi' rashes.

They theekit it owre wi' rashes green.
They happit it roun' wi' heather;
But the pest cam' frae the Burrow-toun
An' slew them baith thegither.

 

[Cid]

The unusual events described in this chronicle occurred in 194- at Oran.

(also, famously, the French for plague)

 

[Flavour]

This thread is incredibly depressing and severely reduces my desire to post on Urban in general. Too many old fuckers still living in their patronizing, sexist bubbles, which they'll never even realize they're trapped inside. And how much damage it does, to them and to everyone that has to hear it.

 

[bimble]

This thread is incredibly depressing and severely reduces my desire to post on Urban in general. Too many old fuckers still living in their patronizing, sexist bubbles, which they'll never even realize they're trapped inside. And how much damage it does, to them and to everyone that has to hear it.

i feel the same.

 

[BigMoaner]

Someone mentioned the monitisaton of social media content, how problematic it can be. One of the first insights i got into the money to be made off of political digital content was stumbling across the Qanon Annonymous patreon page. A fairly minor niche politcal/journalistic podcast. I think the monitisation everywhere of media helps explain somewhat the extremity of views you find in every nook crany of the internet. Money is so powerful, and if views themselves are being monitised in myriad ways, over and over and over, channel over channel, then it's no surprise in my view that the world takes on a post-truth world feel. A world in which likely rapists like Brand is seen as some debating field for "darker forces", when he really he is another sex offender. The (excellent) Qanon Annonymous patreon page:


That ain't some side hustle, that's big money, especially for a small team with little overheads.

As I would probably do the same, they have an incredibly vested interest in producing Qanon related content, so the actual flesh adn bones reality of Qanon in the "real world" is also being mediated to the masses through monitisation. So most of these normally incredibly toxic full-fascist or quasi-fascist culture war "talking points" are the same. What's real is an increasingly interesting question. As is the "chicken and egg" dilema when dealing with fascism in all its forms.

 

[Cid]

Monetised social media is pretty much the worst possible amount of budget to throw at things. Enough to fill every available corner of the internet with entertainment, infotainment, commentainment and plausible-sounding grifts, not enough to fund serious investigative work. And with an algorithm that has no ethical direction to promote the latter over the former in any case. Disastrous.

<was writing this when BigMoaner posted, QAA is a great example>

I don't think this is really true, or at least it's an environment that is changing rapidly... Traditional media does have some substantial advantages in certain (usually very important areas), but it also neglects vast swathes of our social/cultural environment. Brand is a good example of their strengths; Channel 4 and the Times will obviously have extensive access to e.g people who make programmes for Channel 4. They have the resources for legal protection etc too. But venture outside broadcast media, outside Westminster, outside conflict journalism (although see e.g Popular Front) and often the only work being done is by people who exist outside the mainst- fuck. Outside the traditional media ecosystem. Journalism on law, on protest, on environment, on science, on other media (see e.g people make games on Roblox). The lawyers who got Alex Jones to pay up? They used the podcast Knowledge Fight extensively, and indeed got the hosts as expert witnesses.

Not to get sidetracked into too much detail. My point is that there is valid journalism, and valid commentary happening. It's a bad idea to write this stuff off, because it is often hands down the best source of information on issues that traditional media doesn't value or indeed actively avoids or is genuinely shit at (like thinking of trans people as people). In the context of this thread, it is fucking wild that people think the best entities to regulate that are er... the frankly near-mystical YouTube backend and Elon Musk. i.e leave everything at the hands of corporate entities. Every leftish youtube channel has a story of how x or y video (even the entire channel, that happened to popular front iirc) got demonitised either by some arbitrary decision or by takedown request spams from motivated groups.

Of course how you do that, I don't know. It's not easy... But I think there is far too little pressure on companies whose broadcasters are free to promote actively damaging information (that would be Brand etc) and/or far right propaganda (Daily Wire, Prager U etc). Brand should not have had a monetised channel even before this. The lines at the moment are arbitrary and driven as much by personalities involved and exposure to the general public as anything else. The worry of course is that our current environment of both-sideserism would see left-oriented or anti-corporate work restricted.

 

[BigMoaner]

<was writing this when BigMoaner posted, QAA is a great example>

I don't think this is really true, or at least it's an environment that is changing rapidly... Traditional media does have some substantial advantages in certain (usually very important areas), but it also neglects vast swathes of our social/cultural environment. Brand is a good example of their strengths; Channel 4 and the Times will obviously have extensive access to e.g people who make programmes for Channel 4. They have the resources for legal protection etc too. But venture outside broadcast media, outside Westminster, outside conflict journalism (although see e.g Popular Front) and often the only work being done is by people who exist outside the mainst- fuck. Outside the traditional media ecosystem. Journalism on law, on protest, on environment, on science, on other media (see e.g people make games on Roblox). The lawyers who got Alex Jones to pay up? They used the podcast Knowledge Fight extensively, and indeed got the hosts as expert witnesses.

Not to get sidetracked into too much detail. My point is that there is valid journalism, and valid commentary happening. It's a bad idea to write this stuff off, because it is often hands down the best source of information on issues that traditional media doesn't value or indeed actively avoids or is genuinely shit at (like thinking of trans people as people). In the context of this thread, it is fucking wild that people think the best entities to regulate that are er... the frankly near-mystical YouTube backend and Elon Musk. i.e leave everything at the hands of corporate entities. Every leftish youtube channel has a story of how x or y video (even the entire channel, that happened to popular front iirc) got demonitised either by some arbitrary decision or by takedown request spams from motivated groups.

Of course how you do that, I don't know. It's not easy... But I think there is far too little pressure on companies whose broadcasters are free to promote actively damaging information (that would be Brand etc) and/or far right propaganda (Daily Wire, Prager U etc). Brand should not have had a monetised channel even before this. The lines at the moment are arbitrary and driven as much by personalities involved and exposure to the general public as anything else. The worry of course is that our current environment of both-sideserism would see left-oriented or anti-corporate work restricted.

can you see though Cid that the very fact that QAA are racking it in, that the actual reality of Qanon becomes mediated through the vested interest of the podcasters themselves? See the problem? It's not necessarily the message (top quality, funny, informative in this instance), it's the affect on reality itself that is the issue? the medium becomes the problem. QAA is just one tiny example. No way round it, i guess. The one thing to monitor I guess is attitude change, condition change, quality of life change, workers right change, whilst all this stuff is pummelled into brains. That's the significant markers i suppose.

 

[Cid]

can you see though Cid that the very fact that QAA are racking it in, that the actual reality of Qanon becomes mediated through the vested interest of the podcasters themselves? See the problem? It's not necessarily the message (top quality, funny, informative in this instance), it's the affect on reality itself that is the issue? the medium becomes the problem. QAA is just one tiny example. No way round it, i guess. The one thing to monitor I guess is attitude change, condition change, quality of life change, workers right change, whilst all this stuff is pummelled into brains. That's the significant markers i suppose.

Is traditional media immune to that? I would say very definitely not. If you have journalists covering specialist areas, then they always have a vested interest in making that area 'newsworthy'.

It is probably something that should be discussed more, I get the feeling it has been from time to time, but yes it's a valid point.