The gap between who Russell Brand told us he was, and the Russell Brand who was alleged to be a rapist last weekend isn't, as claimed by an investigation, all that great.
Brand, 48, wrote about sleeping with thousands of women. He detailed spitting on them, screwing around on them, treating them horribly. He joked about his insatiable sexual appetite. He’s spent hours making people laugh by revealing some of the most sordid moments of his life: losing his virginity at 17 in Hong Kong after his dad brought three sex workers back to their hotel room. Being so promiscuous that his agent forced him into rehab for sex addiction.
But, this was the mid-noughties. Under a cloak of irony, nihilism and camp, at the height of his fame, Brand was able to subvert notions that he could be a danger to women. His jeans were too tight, his hair was too big and his literary references too erudite for him to be considered an aggressive sexual predator. Brand was silly. He was saucy. He would sometimes go too far for the sake of a cheap gag, but he was sensitive? He loved language? He was vulnerable from a lifetime of drug addiction and trauma?
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If you want to measure the general pace of cultural and social change post #MeToo, of what’s deemed appropriate or acceptable in the workplace, of simply what’s funny or not, you could use Russell Brand’s career as a yardstick.
Looking back at the ways in which we, as a culture, excused and glorified Brand has truly made me wince in the last week. And I’m not alone. In the past week both the BBC and Channel 4 have launched retrospective investigations for the periods they hired Brand, as well as removing some of his previous content. While YouTube has suspended adverts on videos by the comedian.
The remarkable investigation by The Sunday Times and Channel 4’s Dispatches team reports that Brand, and who Brand is alleged to be, was always hiding in plain sight. His alleged behaviour was referred to as being 'an open secret in the entertainment industry. Employers are said to have known he was, at the very least, 'problematic' with women and not to be trusted alone with female staff.
Long before the most recent allegations comedians on the circuit are said to have warned each other – and told their audiences – that he was a menace. His reputation was such because of behaviour he had admitted to across his various platforms. And yet, he was still enabled. Still treated as a star whose demands should be catered to. Still given a sense of power and entitlement over women. Still able to spin his way out of trouble by presenting himself as someone who publicly reckoned with his many issues.
Reading the accounts of the four women who went on record with allegations against Brand – although journalists say they interviewed and spoke to many many more – is utterly grim. Their accounts of of what Brand allegedly did to them, and their fear of coming forward until now feels like a sucker punch to the gut. Because while there is a gap between being a debauched figure of tabloid fun and being a man who has been accused of rape, sexual assault, grooming, and abuse, in Brand’s case, he paraded the warning signs to us for years.
He parcelled his experiences as funny anecdotes, then later claimed he had learned and grown from any mistakes he’d ever made. Without any actual accountability, he was able to reconfigure himself as a guru on the path to healing himself (and you – for a price – subscribe now!) by monetising therapy-speak, positioning himself as an independently thinking free spirit, and scraping the wellness barrel for its last drops of profit.
Which brings us to the wacky versions of reality we’re now all forced to live in, where whether you believe these women doesn’t come down to proof, or the work journalists have done to get this story legally published, but where your political alliances lie. Whether you think this is a stitch up against someone who was becoming 'too powerful' as an alternative voice, who is a threat to supposed snowflake cancel culture, who won’t conform. Or, whether you trust and believe the alleged victims and appreciate the bravery it takes to speak out in an environment so hostile to truth. Ultimately, it will be up to the police to lawfully investigate whether there is a criminal case against Brand, and for the courts to rule on his guilt, or innocence, either way.
Since the investigation into him began four years ago, Brand has drifted and grifted into the space online he occupies now: setting himself up as an anti-establishment hero, opposed to the mainstream media despite making his name, career and fortune within it, as someone who passionately feeds rage, paranoia and conspiracy thinking for clicks on his social media channels.
Unsurprisingly, he has doubled down on his innocence. First by posting a Youtube denial before the story even broke, then by going ahead with a sold out gig the same night Channel 4 aired Dispatches. In Brand’s mirror world, support comes from an unholy alliance of figures – self-confessed misogynist Andrew Tate, currently awaiting trial on charges of rape and human trafficking in Romania (which he denies), billionaire Elon Musk, who signalled his support for Brand before he even read the allegations and a motley crew of GB News presenters, right-wing columnists and, of course, the millions of followers Brand has cultivated.
Questioning the very existence of facts and pouring doubt on the validity of what women experience, feel and say, so that you are the true victim and not the perpetrator of a violence against women, has become an effective way for men to splinter the public discourse. We saw it with Harvey Weinstein. We saw it with Danny Masterson. And with, of course, Donald Trump who has used his “fake news!” weapon so bluntly, so shamelessly, that he openly admits he can manipulate his base to believe in whatever he does. It remains to be seen whether what Brand is doing is any different.
Why did the women choose to remain anonymous? Why did it take this much time for journalists to gain their trust, to tell their stories, to try and hold an industry – and not just Brand – to account? Given the response, the sneering, the disbelief coming from other women as well as men, why wouldn’t it?
