Exposing Russell Brand

Like many of the celebrity sex predators who were outed before him, Russell Brand paraded his disgusting behaviour in plain sight. And a lot of us, me included, did not see what was obvious. From his jokey shagging references on EFourum and Big Brother's Big Mouth, to grossly inappropriate harassment via his BBC radio shows, and stand up routines furnished with references to violent sex, in the context of the post-ironic 00s many were quick to - wanted yo - assume this was an anarchic act in the British tradition of near-the-knuckle cheeky chappies. A persona as affected as Michael Pennington's permadrunk alter ego, Jonny Vegas. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

Saturday night's Dispatches and the accompanying Times article were difficult to stomach. In painstaking detail, the joint investigation established repeated patterns of behaviour in which women were groomed and gaslit, subject to sexual assaults and, in one case, rape. Among them included a 16 year old whom, it was alleged, was seriously sexually assaulted. Accompanying the grim details was not just the weight of testimony, but corroborating witnesses, character references, admissions by Brand himself in his multiple autobiographies, and text messages that came from his phone number. If anyone has any doubt after wading through overwhelming and credible claims which, remember, would have been vetted by the notoriously twitchy libel lawyers in C4 and Times employ, then they were either reading or watching something different, or had concluded out of hand that Brand was innocent of the allegations.

Take Britain's self-described working class hero, Paul Embery, for example. He immediately said that Brand was entitled to the presumption of innocence. A typically stupid response from a very stupid man. Firstly, there are no charges and we do not live inside a court case. Second, what does it say about someone who, confronted with overwhelming evidence that a celebrity is a danger to women and has been given a free pass from a succession of broadcast controllers, prattles on about "innocence"? And then we have a clutch of right wing misogynists closing ranks around their man. If you have Elon Musk, Jordan Peterson, and Andrew Tate - backed by the usual horrors from British right wing media (who were not so reticent about the Huw Williams allegations) rushing to provide a defence, then surely that should give anyone thinking about defending Brand pause. But there's never stopping Chris Williamson, who not only retweeted Brand's own conspiracy-mongering defence of his conduct ("all my relationships were consensual", as if that's the issue here), but also the just asking questions response of Jackie Walker. A reminder, as if it was needed, that this pair and their supporters would be the kiss of death to any left project.

A common theme of Brand's conspiracy-inflected support is that their man is a "threat" and therefore needed taking down. But how is Brand a threat, exactly? To whom? Because he incoherently rants about media bias? Or that his snake oil bullshit of wellness retreats, talking therapies and motivational mantras, and ice baths threaten the scaly grip of big pharma? Brand poses the status quo less of a threat than a GCSE media studies class. Indeed, the so-called cosmic right with its anti-vax rubbish and faux anti-authoritarianism fits right wing governance strategies hand-in-glove. Brand threatens the powers-that-be not a jot. He reinforces them.

The more convincing explanation to the "why now" comes from turning the conspiracy theory on its head. The allegations against Brand have had an airing precisely because he's not a threat. Or, to be more accurate, because he's an irrelevance. Since disappearing up his own spiritualist backside, his mainstream entertainment career has more or less withered. He still does stand up, but most of his money comes from his very anti-establishment business interests. In other words, no one in the media has any capital tied up in his celebrity. This is different to, for example, Noel Fielding whose inappropriate relationships have circulated extensively around social media. Yet with a new series of the Great British Bake Off in the can, C4 won't be inviting the spotlight to play on his affairs. Until at least the season wraps up. Similarly, the case of Dan Wootton is instructive. A proper sexual predator and no mistaking, his behaviour has been covered in the Byline Times and has since received coverage in the more liberal sections of the media. Yet his berth at GB News looks secure, even if his position at The Mail is less so. And shall we mention Nick Cohen as well? All three are protected to a degree because of the investments sunk by different media institutions into their person. If Brand was still a significant figure with a hit TV show or series of films currently under his belt, then chances are these allegations would not have had an airing.

Brand's long history of sexual abuse and mistreatment of women has justly caught up with him, and the women who have had the courage to speak out about their awful experiences should be listened to and believed. Likewise, the work sunk into this exposure of Brand's shitty behaviour reflects well on The Times and the Dispatches team. But the forces that enabled their work are the same ones that enforce a pall of silence where other TV and radio personalities are concerned. Brand is not the only sexual predator to have prowled around the celebrity circuit, and even now there are commercial interests working to ensure other allegations about other men remain nothing more than whispers and rumour.