Russell Brand has become a really hot story, and looking at the media landscape, everyone has a different reason as to why they're interested.
The former actor turned political/cultural commentator has grown quite a mighty audience, and it's not something the left approves of in the least. Brand's brand of commentary calls out mainstream media narratives as the lies they are, and he's talking to all the people he shouldn't be. This results in a form of narrative destruction, and for the left, controlling the narrative is everything.
No one hates losing control of the narrative more than the corporate media, and once you become a threat to them, they will go out of their way to ruin your reputation and/or destroy you financially and professionally. Brand must have rubbed too many people the wrong way, and as such, they went searching into his past to see if he rubbed any other people the wrong way...if you're picking up what I'm putting down.
If you want a good rundown of the charges coming against Brand, I recommend this coverage by Brad Slager, who delves into the allegations with further detail.
(READ: The Need for Caution on Russel Brand Accusations and Why the Press Is Not Being Cautious - Pt. 1)
But my focus is the media's intentions.
An article from The Times spoke about the ongoing investigation into Russell Brand, and a few things caught my eye that should shine some light on the fact that this is a witch hunt to silence a man they've come to dislike and feel threatened by.
Starting with this one. Emphasis mine:
Over the past few years, reporters have interviewed hundreds of sources who knew or worked with Brand: ex-girlfriends and their friends and family, comedians and other celebrities, people who worked with him on radio and TV, and senior staff at the BBC, Channel 4 and other media organisations.
So the investigation into Brand began years ago, and the quest to gather any damning information about him was so thorough that they were effectively interviewing anyone who ever stood five feet away from Brand.
It gets even worse when you see the extent they were willing to go through to get this information:
Along with these interviews reporters have seen private emails and text messages, submitted freedom of information requests, viewed medical and therapists’ notes, scrutinised Brand’s books and interviews, and watched and listened to hundreds of hours of his shows on the BBC, Channel 4 and YouTube to corroborate allegations.
At some point, this stopped being an investigation and became a mission that utilized every resource news organizations had to get the dirt they needed on Brand.
But it doesn't stop there. We can see what the mission was from the very beginning with this line:
All said they felt ready to speak only after being approached by reporters. Several said they felt compelled to do so given Brand’s newfound prominence as an online wellness influencer, with millions of followers on YouTube and other sites.
So now we have to ask if this compelling feeling they felt was urged on by these reporters who were clearly trying to find what they could to ruin Brand.
Is Brand guilty?
I don't know.
What we do know about Brand is that he was a movie star who was addicted to sex, drugs, and rock n' roll. It's a bad combination and one prone to serious issues and dangerous situations. The probability that every single sexual interaction he had while in a drug-fueled state was pure as the driven snow he snorted is minimal.
The question isn't necessarily about whether or not Brand was the choir boy of sex addicts, but whether or not he actually raped people. That should be the primary concern of every person on Earth, but let's be clear: That's not the media's concern.
The media's concern is likely three things.
Firstly, the silencing of Brand, which will be one more popular voice challenging their narrative gone.
Second, they get to reinforce the false narrative that Republicans don't care about women and that the right is a cesspool of pro-patriarchial attitudes that, if given the chance, would push women into a second or even third-class citizen status. This is a great narrative to have running when it comes to time to vote in the 2024 election.
Thirdly, the ruination of Brand can translate to a bad reputation developing for the platforms he calls home. In this case, that platform is Rumble. Rumble is a free speech platform that plays host to a myriad of voices, and many of them are well-known figures on the right. Giving Rumble that reputation may turn people off to it and cause them to never visit and possibly those who choose it as a platform to walk away. This could also help in the preservation of narratives as fewer people will be venturing to Rumble to hear news and opinions inconvenient to the corporate media.
I hope Brand is innocent, not just because I want the media to lose but because it's my sincere hope that no one suffered such an egregious and traumatic event as a rape. If he is guilty, then he should suffer for it, but let's not get it twisted. The media isn't on some noble quest to bring a wrongdoer to justice. This is a witch hunt and a politically expedient one at that.