I’d agree with you more if I hadn’t seen these images of Georgina

http://www.popbitch.com/tshirts/ [note: NSFW]

I guess making a porno kind of makes Russell telling her grandad he’s fucked her a little less of an attack on her privacy and probably tears up these rules of ‘basic conduct.’

[T]he attitude that I find prevalent amongst males, is having the opinion that women who are comfortable being sexually experimental somehow are not “deserving” of privacy.

This isn’t just a sexist thing to say; it’s simply untrue. Yesterday evening I was at a Halloween party and said to another guest: “Knowing everything about Brand, why would anyone sleep with him?”
Immediately, a twentysomething woman piped up with “I’d sleep with him. It’s a story to tell afterwards, isn’t it?”
It certainly is true that people in general have less respect for the sexual privacy of people who publicly exploit their sexuality for personal gain. Shocking that, isn’t it?

Is having a threesome categorically defined as being sleazy or unnatural, and does having engaged in one (as in the original bloggers example) rescind one’s expectation not to have it discussed as public radio entertainment?

No it doesn’t. Next question?

It is these prejudicial and sexually bigoted dualisms that I find repugnant and unevolved and I’m sorry to find that there are still lots of men apparently, including “Pooter Geek” who feel that way too.

You are the one who has expressed “prejudicial and sexually bigoted dualisms”. I’m the one pointing out that modern men and women are a lot more similar than stereotypes paint them. I wonder which of us the words “repugnant” and “unevolved” would be better applied to. What’s even more ironic is that, having falsely attributed sexist views to me, you then blame my being a man for my holding such views. It’s like a parody of feminism.

I find it funny that “Pooter Geek” assumes that one of the things Brand would value most in a prostitute is the fact that she will “disappear afterwards” and be “discrete”.

I wasn’t talking about Brand. I was talking about rich and powerful men who use prostitutes. And I was, in fact, paraphrasing a woman: Heidi Fleiss the “infamous” “Hollywood madame”, when asked by one of her employees why male film stars would pay to have sex with her when they could “have almost any woman they wanted”. Heidi should know; it was how she made her money. (And when her business was threatened, she hit back by threatening to go public about the sexual habits of Hollywood’s rich and powerful.) What Fleiss actually said was even more direct: “Darling, they don’t pay you to have sex with them; they pay you to go away afterwards.”

Is having a threesome categorically defined as being sleazy or unnatural, and does having engaged in one (as in the original bloggers example) rescind one’s expectation not to have it discussed as public radio entertainment?

It is these prejudicial and sexually bigoted dualisms that I find repugnant and unevolved and I’m sorry to find that there are still lots of men apparently, including “Pooter Geek” who feel that way too.

I quote from the above “There are two important reasons (amongst others) why rich, famous, powerful, men pay expensive prostitutes despite, like Brand, being able to “get their chicks for free”: prostitutes disappear afterwards and prostitutes are discreet afterwards. ”

I find it funny that “Pooter Geek” assumes that one of the things Brand would value most in a prostitute is the fact that she will “disappear afterwards” and be “discrete”.

So it’s a good thing Brand wasn’t being paid for his private performance, as he hasn’t bothered to honour either BASIC rule of conduct.

Come on, “Pooter Geek”, this isn’t, sorry to trot out the old cliché, rocket science.

I’m similarly unimpressed by the people who’ve attacked Georgina Baillie. Her career and choices aren’t relevant to the situation, and such comments do smack of misogyny. I’d rather they weren’t muddying the waters on the ‘my’ side of the argument.

But, I find Russell Brand more complex than you’ve suggested. I’ve been listening to his radio show for a long time, and I think you’re mischaracterising him somewhat. Obviously his infamous libido is a, er, prominent part of his comic personality, and he certainly treads a fine line occasionally, but I’ve never picked up on the kind of repellent views you suggest. Even reading My Booky Wook, in which he’s pretty bloody horrible to a lot of women, I got the impression of a sense of decency – but one that admittedly broke spectacularly when he was on serious drugs. But his post-drugs radio show is similarly decent – he’ll say things during quickfire rants, then he’ll make a comment to nullify it. I find him the same as comedians like Jack Dee or Jonathan Ross – they say things which raise eyebrows, but then they grin and say something off-hand and you realise they don’t mean it nastily – you feel like you see the real them beneath, and they seem genuine and likeable. Maybe I’m wrong: maybe this is a clever way to say horrible things and get away with it. But I have a hard time believing that. Check out his resignation video – to me it’s genuine (and classier than practically all the coverage this week) and representative of the guy I thought I was listening to.

Obviously people’s interpretations differ, and ‘I think he’s ok’ is far from a compelling argument, but I mention it because I’m the first person to turn off comedians who do treat women badly, and I certainly have no interest in defending such people.

On the show in question I didn’t pick up on any ‘I banged her / she’s a slag’ vibe. He mentioned he’d slept with her, but only because of the Andrew Sachs link – I think this, rather than the ‘liberated female’ idea, was the primary motivation. Obviously, the fact that he mentioned it at all is something worth discussing. I can see that many people regard such things as private – your use of ‘un-gentlemanly’ is interesting – but I personally don’t see why saying you’ve slept with someone is inherently not-ok. I don’t see any compelling inherent ‘right’ to privacy, although I of course think people should always be polite. But surely the politeness/impoliteness is in the way it’s brought up? As well as whether the other party would want such details broadcast, of course, which is probably one of the places this show stepped over the line. Admittedly it’s one of those things where my automatic reaction is ‘ooh, not sure about that’, but I have trouble backing that up with anything substantial.

But even if we agree that it was impolite and wrong to mention it, I can’t see that it indicates any inherent misogyny. Thoughtless humour, some would say, but nothing more.

What I’d like to know actually is what IS this peculiar, primarily male, trait of needing to be publicly indiscrete about what should be the most intimate of secrets between two people, whatever the level of any subsequent relationship?

Because media kiss-n-tell stories are “primarily male”, aren’t they? Think of all the famous straight men who have been brought down by ex-lovers. Now try to think of even one famous straight woman who’s suffered the same fate. (This is also partly down to that other double-standard: if one of two consenting heterosexual adults subsequently regrets a sexual encounter, then the man is usually painted as having been the predator and the woman the victim.)

There are two important reasons (amongst others) why rich, famous, powerful, men pay expensive prostitutes despite, like Brand, being able to “get their chicks for free”: prostitutes disappear afterwards and prostitutes are discreet afterwards. Even that isn’t guaranteed if someone is prepared to offer enough money—there’s a reason why prostitutes are so called.

We live in a reality show, confessional culture. I too have had the experience of people I’ve never spoken to knowing things about me that even my mother doesn’t know. I’m not daft or bitter enough to put it down to some “primarily female” tendency. It’s simply that there’s no such thing as a secret any more. And that’s another reason to be careful who you share a bed with.

What I’d like to know actually is what IS this peculiar, primarily male, trait of needing to be publicly indiscrete about what should be the most intimate of secrets between two people, whatever the level of any subsequent relationship?

I once had an ex-lover who used to delight in telling graphic public tales outlining his and my sexual antics and is probably dining out on it to this day. It was absolutely horrifying, even on a small and local scale. I’m quite sure if this guy could have taken to the airwaves with his indiscretions he would have done so with gusto.

Like all womanizers, Brand drags out that old cliche “I just love women” to justify his promiscuity, and then does the ultimately un-gentlemanly thing by dis-respectfully exploiting what appears to have been a stress-free casual affair, in order to create “anarchic” humour on a show for which he gets paid large amounts of money. Recalling Olivier famously telling Hoffman to “try acting” instead of killing himself with the rigours of method training, perhaps someone should tell Brand to do just the opposite: “try writing” instead of regurgitating moments of his private life, without consent of others, as a lazy alternative to the hard work of using his undoubtedly sharp intellect to dissect society with intelligence and wit, as well as flair.

By choosing, as the target of his hastily concocted prank-a-deux, a woman with a blatantly sexual image, he is reviving that primal chauvanistic prejudice that brands, no pun intended, a liberated female as the archetypal scarlet woman. So whilst consensual non-monogamous sex should be acceptable between two adults who need to trust each other with the reasonable assumption that no undue harm should result from the assignation, instead we’re getting that same ole “yeah i banged her!”/”she’s a slag!” dichotomy that I hoped wasn’t still hanging around in people of Brand’s generation.

Worse, I have now read some really vile comments on the Internet directed at Georgina Baillie from fans of Brand, that practically accuse her of orchestrating the entire affair in order to gain herself notoriety for her Burlesque act. Some go less far but insist that she should be glad of the media attention because, hey, after all we’re talking about a chick who runs around in black corsets and tutus with fangs on in a group with the word “sluts” in it. Personally, although the particular aesthetic of her act is not something that particularly rocks my boat (I think erotic angels would be far more radical), I would agree with Voltaire: “how abominably unjust to persecute a [woman] for such an airy trifle as that!”

Sheesh, has the battle for mutual respect between the genders and sexual orientations progressed so little then than in the first decade of the 21st century, one of our leading young comics who is supposedly bridging the generation gap between the new crop of precocious youth and the old guard, turns out to hold the boringly double-standardised attitude towards women and sexual politics that I thought had long ceased being a la mode?

That’s the real dirty little secret of this whole rather undignified hullabaloo.

When did it come back in fashion to Brand, yes pun intended this time, women as whores simply because they choose to be as sexually free as the men who presumably want them to be that way in order to successfully bed them in the first place?

Are things still like that between the gander and the goose?

The real shame is that Russell has demonstrated through this most nakedly un- self-conscious act that he not only has something of the nasty tattle-tale about him, but deep-down inside holds repellent misogynistic views which he assumes to be so normal that he still doesn’t quite yet get what he’s supposed to be saying for.

Or to whom he ought to be saying sorry.

My disappointment in Brand is not for what he did so much nearly as much as it is for what it revealed about how he really thinks. Surely an even worse disappointment is in the voices, thankfully outnumbered, that have rushed to defend Brand in ways that expose their own woman-bashing justifications for why Georgina is owed no apology (see Les Wilson of Farnborough, Hants Times Online letters October 30, and some of the authors published here).

Now, after being publicly shamed and getting exposure she never asked for in a way no-one would ask for it, if she does try to take the experience to the bank, she’ll undoubtedly get criticized for trying to cash in!

Hey Georgina, I heard the Beeb has an unexpected release of $1.5 million at the moment!

Sadly, despite undoubtedly being far more entertaining, funnier, sexier, and less offensive than Brand’s radio prank, I’m sure that the Satanic Sluts Burlesque Show would probably be in breach of some kind of decency standard or other.

Yours sincerely,

Diana Rosalind Trimble

I think there is an age gap with concerns, and generation related for sure. If you’re under 30 or so with no kids/grandkids, you’ll think it’s a storm in tea-cup, if you’re older and have kids you’ve probably been like me…. incensed.

However, Brand-liking/Brand-laughing is certainly generational generally, and HIS fate is not my concern here.

But if Ross was my mate as a contemeporary, I’d distance myself from him. Ricky Gervais (often edgy and controversial in stand up…. witness ‘Politics’ and his holocaust joke) is still a sensible and mature adult, and historically, a good mater of Wossy. It’ll be interesting to see how that friendship goes, and how Wossy’s marriage goes.

If you’re younger than me, you’ll think I’m worrying for nought, and should ‘get a life’, if you’re not, you probably think a 12 week suspension is not adequate (just remember the only 3 months suspension without pay is a£1.5M wage hit….. makes you realise how much he’s paid).

The end. (until next time! And there WILL be a next time!)

The real problem here is the media (jokes look alot different at 8am on the front page of the daily mail than they do at 9pm on a Staturday night), the scaredy cats in the BBC management, and last but not least, the sad old ladies who have nothing better to do with their lives that get indignant over their morning tea

What I find quite disgraceful is that our prime minister has got time to be commenting on this sort of nonsense, and that it’s been the first item on the news for the last couple of days. People really really need to get some perspective and complain about things that actually matter.