Also in the News - Part 2

[kyleolly]

An investigation between the times and channel 4 who do they think they are if crimes have been committed it should be a police investigation 

[m4DD0gg]

There are other names too that will come to light. Noel Fielding, Jimmy Carr and David Williams.

[Wymsey]

8 minutes ago, kyleolly said:

An investigation between the times and channel 4 who do they think they are if crimes have been committed it should be a police investigation 

Who knows, a formal complaint/report may have been made to the police by one of the alleged victims?

[Chelmofox]

17 minutes ago, kyleolly said:

An investigation between the times and channel 4 who do they think they are if crimes have been committed it should be a police investigation 

Remind us how the Jimmy Saville story broke?

[kyleolly]

6 minutes ago, Chelmofox said:

Remind us how the Jimmy Saville story broke?

Dunno was it a media investigation by any chance so he was never brought to justice 

[Guesty]

It's not up to journalists or news organisations to force traumatised women to go to the police. 

 

As I said in another post 67,169 rapes were reported last year in the UK. Only 1.9% even had charges brought. Do we really think all 64,000 odd people were lying about being raped? Or is there a serious issue with rape convictions. 

 

Why would woman want to report rape anyway - especially of a famous person. If it did go to court they've got to wait years whilst everyone slags them off about the reason they've reported him. They just want fame, they just want his money, they just want attention, why now why not then. There's an excuse to slag them off and spin it no matter when or why they report it. Then if they do get to court, expensive lawyers dig into their life and look for anything that could discredit them and they basically get put on trial and retraumatised. 

 

Sounds like most of these woman were uncovered through four years of research. None of them knew each other or were paid for this or it seems wanted the attention.

[Wymsey]

20 minutes ago, m4DD0gg said:

There are other names too that will come to light. Noel Fielding, Jimmy Carr and David Williams.

Is that what you heard somewhere?

 

If not, naming anyone who hasn't done anything wrong could be damaging from a legal perspective.

[ajthefox]

37 minutes ago, kyleolly said:

An investigation between the times and channel 4 who do they think they are if crimes have been committed it should be a police investigation 

It's called investigative journalism - it's a thing that happens often exposing stories that wouldn't have come to light otherwise.

[kyleolly]

3 minutes ago, ajthefox said:

It's called investigative journalism - it's a thing that happens often exposing stories that wouldn't have come to light otherwise.

A heroin and sex addict forcing himself on women must have took some real hard investigation for that to come to light 

[Chelmofox]

23 minutes ago, kyleolly said:

Dunno was it a media investigation by any chance so he was never brought to justice 

Yes - it was an ITV investigation if I recall. Not saying its the right or wrong to go about it. Proving sexual assault is very difficult. Investigations like these provide another (and anonymous) outlet. 

 

A massive percentage of sexual assault claims don't result in prosecution, and it can take a long time for people to come to terms with it. We found out this week that my wife's best friends daughter tried to commit suicide and is currently on watch in hospital after taking a huge amount of pills and cutting her arms and legs to shreds. She has just confessed that she was coming to terms with what she explained as sexual assault a few years ago when she would have been 13. Currently, Twitter is awash with people saying these women are wrong because they didn't go to the police 10-15 years ago. In the vast majority of cases, that isn't possible.

 

Back to Saville, he made himself so powerful it was impossible to come forward. Brand has spent the last years cosying up to the extreme right wing. As soon as the story came to light, he has claimed this is an establishment plot to silence him, and he has seen high profile support from Elon Musk claiming that 'they' (establishment) don't like competition. Its odd that none of these actually want to engage on a moral or judicial level. Its all about having their right wing views silenced. In lieu of all that, i think its understandable that women may not have come forward in the past - you are not just fighting the individual but the whole crowd they are part of.  I've not read to much into this case and i don't care much for Brand, but i hope that if there is something in this story that it goes through a proper process from here. 

Edited 16 September 2023 by Chelmofox

[kyleolly]

3 minutes ago, Chelmofox said:

Yes - it was an ITV investigation if I recall. Not saying its the right or wrong to go about it. Proving sexual assault is very difficult. Investigations like these provide another (and anonymous) outlet. 

 

A massive percentage of sexual assault claims don't result in prosecution, and it can take a long time for people to come to terms with it. We found out this week that my wife's best friends daughter tried to commit suicide and is currently on watch in hospital after taking a huge amount of pills and cutting her arms and legs to shreds. She has just confessed that she was coming to terms with what she explained as sexual assault a few years ago when she would have been 13. Currently, Twitter is awash with people saying these women are wrong because they didn't go to the police 10-15 years ago. In the vast majority of cases, that isn't possible.

 

Back to Saville, he made himself so powerful it was impossible to come forward. Brand has spent the last years cosying up to the extreme right wing. As soon as the story came to light, he has claimed this is an establishment plot to silence him, and he has seen high profile support from Elon Musk claiming that 'they' (establishment) don't like competition. Its odd that than of these actually want to engage on a moral or judicial level. Its all about having their right wing views silenced. In lieu of all that, i think its understandable that women may not have come forward in the past - you are not just fighting the individual but the whole crowd they are part of.  I've not read to much into this case and i don't care much for Brand, but i hope that if there is something in this story that it goes through a proper process. 

Exactly and this documentary isn’t the proper process

[Chelmofox]

Just now, kyleolly said:

Exactly and this documentary isn’t the proper process

I know that. Its investigative Journalism that allows people to come forward who previously felt they may not have been able to, for all the reasons i described. 

[Guesty]

Harvey Weinstein only got exposed because of a New York Times investigation.

 

Sometimes this is what it takes to expose powerful people.

[Lionator]

1 hour ago, m4DD0gg said:

There are other names too that will come to light. Noel Fielding, Jimmy Carr and David Williams.

One of these on here is not the same as the other two. A nasty bugger yes but not what you’re accusing him of. Especially as Katherine Ryan disclosed this stuff to him.

[Daggers]

For clearance, this isn’t about Brand, this is about an industry that hasn’t learnt from any previous serial rapist and sexual predator and allows them to continue to proliferate within the industry because they value talent over safeguarding. 

[Leicesterpool]

Think that's annoyed me in all this even with accusations people have still attended Russell Brand's show tonight. Innocent until proven guilty but would you feel comfortable throwing support to someone that quite possibly be a rapist. 

[Scotch]

Having watched that, I feel there is plenty of evidence to suggest he's a scumbag. 

 

Not sure there is a whole lot of evidence to suggest he's a r@pist though. Ofcourse there isn't any to suggest he isn't either.

 

Either way, I wouldn't want a female family member or friend to be around him but he, like any other deserves the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty and if that's all the proof they have, I don't imagine that would happen. 

[Sly]

Beyond anything else, he’s always been a bit of a weirdo and a box of frogs. 

[Daggers]

8 minutes ago, Scotch said:

Having watched that, I feel there is plenty of evidence to suggest he's a scumbag. 

 

Not sure there is a whole lot of evidence to suggest he's a r@pist though. Ofcourse there isn't any to suggest he isn't either.

 

Either way, I wouldn't want a female family member or friend to be around him but he, like any other deserves the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty and if that's all the proof they have, I don't imagine that would happen. 

I was completely taken aback by the allegation that he’s a comedian tbh. 

[grth2004]

12 minutes ago, Scotch said:

Having watched that, I feel there is plenty of evidence to suggest he's a scumbag. 

 

Not sure there is a whole lot of evidence to suggest he's a r@pist though. Ofcourse there isn't any to suggest he isn't either.

 

Either way, I wouldn't want a female family member or friend to be around him but he, like any other deserves the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty and if that's all the proof they have, I don't imagine that would happen. 

I think that’s my view too, followed him for a few years and been to one of his Gigs a few years ago and he’s pretty much admitted he was a sex addict and drug addict who had a god complex. 
If he’s raped someone then take it to court and lock him up if guilty. 
The clips of his comedy routine made him look terrible but I found that bad taste if you’re talking about a Rape case  

seriously weird program and I can’t decide which way to go. 

[Scotch]

2 minutes ago, grth2004 said:

I think that’s my view too, followed him for a few years and been to one of his Gigs a few years ago and he’s pretty much admitted he was a sex addict and drug addict who had a god complex. 
If he’s raped someone then take it to court and lock him up if guilty. 
The clips of his comedy routine made him look terrible but I found that bad taste if you’re talking about a Rape case  

seriously weird program and I can’t decide which way to go. 

Yeah, I feel like the references to his routines were framed to come across like "he done this and look, he's even spoke about doing it on stage" (like the mascara thing for example)  but very much appeared to me like they built their allegation around something they saw him say...

[Guesty]

I was expecting more to be honest given how much it was hyped up. But the stuff they published will only be the stuff that they and their lawyers one hundred percent feel they can include without being sued. I assume (which could be totally incorrect) they will probably have other stuff which didn't pass the legal tests or incidents where people didn't want to be included. I guess they're hoping more people come forward now. 

Edited 16 September 2023 by Guesty

[Alf Bentley]

6 hours ago, Wymsey said:

Of course.

 

Brand says these accusations may have been 'coordinated' - either he's got evidence of this somehow or is digging a hole for himself.

 

It's really hard to say unless the Dispatches programme later (may) reveal more evidence of any truth at all to this.

 

I've returned to Brand's statement to double-check my understanding of what he said: https://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/russell-brands-statement-full-ahead-30954760 (video also available).

 

He wasn't saying that the different accusations were coordinated. He was saying that the two different media organisations (Times and Channel 4) were engaged in a coordinated MSM attack on him, on "these kind of spaces", his followers' voices etc.

In other words, absolutely classic conspiracy theory fear-mongering about powerful interests having a mysterious "agenda" against him as a tribune of the people.

 

Brand is an intelligent man who has worked in various forms of media for decades. He therefore knows that newspapers and TV channels sometimes conduct joint investigations. He is clearly dishonestly pretending that he doesn't know this in order to manipulate fearful, gullible people into seeing this as a conspiracy and supporting him in his hour of need.

 

People can make up their own minds on the credibility of the accusations made against him. I watched the programme and found them pretty credible - and backed by secondary research into the credibility of the accusations and more wide-ranging circumstantial evidence. As others have said, that might not be sufficient evidence for charges to be brought against him - it rarely is in such cases and I don't know what can be done about that. But for me the very fact that he is dishonestly peddling conspiracy theories and fears of mysterious powers and agendas is evidence of him acting in bad faith to protect his personal position.

 

Edited 16 September 2023 by Alf Bentley

[bmt]

The guys a **** and this is the most obvious me too I've ever seen

[ozleicester]

5 hours ago, Daggers said:

For clearance, this isn’t about Brand, this is about an industry that hasn’t learnt from any previous serial rapist and sexual predator and allows them to continue to proliferate within the industry because they value talent over safeguarding. 

well... its a bit about brand, the raping, grooming and abuse parts mostly