God I Hate the Discourse
The one in which I offer social commentary about social commentary
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It’s October now. Are we still talking about Russell Brand? Did I miss the chance to give my hot take? Well, too bad:
I liked Russell Brand’s interview with Mooji and some of his commentary on addiction and the 2020 presidential debates. I find his fixation on clickbait conspiracy theories to be tiresome. I used to live around the corner from him in London and I once saw him walking home with a chicken dinner from Bird. I’d guess that, regrettably, the allegations against him are probably true. I don’t think he’s some sinful hyper-sexual miscreant or anything like that; I just recognize that powerful people, especially powerful men, are primed for a sense of personal entitlement and unaccountability that seem to go hand in hand with violating other people. Also, rape allegations are usually true.
That is the sum total of everything I think about Russell Brand. In my humble opinion, that’s as much as any of us should ever think about Russell Brand.
But according to the Internet, a lot of people have a lot of thoughts about Russell Brand. A lot of people want to share their thoughts. A lot of people are sharing their thoughts in a lot of places I can’t avoid seeing.
It makes sense that those who’ve suffered more violent experiences of sexual assault than I have, or those were more deeply invested in Russell Brand’s content than I was, would have stronger emotional reactions to the allegations than I do. In either of these cases, it would behoove us to remember that, like every emotional reaction had by every human since the dawn of time, these reactions to the Russell Brand news are far more about these people’s own personal experiences than they are about Russell Brand. This is not to belittle or delegitimize anyone’s emotions, simply to remember the reality of how emotions work.
As for those jumping up and down about how heinous the #MeToo Cancel Mafia or whatever is, I’d like to wish you all a very pleasant session with your therapist. Don’t have a therapist? Well, have you heard about BetterHelp? It’s another thing I haven’t been able to avoid seeing all over the Internet.
