...to start a thread about a Mumsnet thread? Russell Brand......

[Hakluyt]

...........why?

Yes, if you want to have a web chat with a pretty comedian, then go for it. It makes us all look a bit trivial, but hey ho.

But treating him like a serious social and political commentator? Really??????

It will be interesting to see how his 10 minute spoken answers come across in a webchat, whether he will be able to just answer the questions simply and understandably without the accompanying arm-waving and knee-patting that we see in interviews.

I also wonder how much of a done deal it was for him to go from Newsnight to Mumsnet flogging his wares.

What concerns me is RB is promoting a book and vulnerable people will cling to the hope he will help them have a better life. The only ones who will benefit will be Brand and his publisher.

"So he's actually talking sense but managing by his use of words to appear to be talking absolute bollocks?"

I suppose it's a change from the more usual other way round............

if only someone could combine talking sense and being intelligible! They could take over the world!

He is very much "for the people said someone up there ^.

No. No he isn't. He's a rich gobshite with some very useful social connections and a book to sell. Plus it's so very easy to whip up the disenfranchised isn't it - Heaven forfend that he might be using them to further his own grubby ends. Russell Brand? Yuk.

The man is a tit. I don't think he should be denied a platform for being a tit, but I hope he gets a lot of PARKLIFE on the thread because he really does talk drivel.

I bloody love Russell Brand, when is the web chat?

Can't stand him, repugnant little oaf.

I can't bear him. He's a misogynistic arse. Can't believe he is being taken seriously and given web chat on here! He has nothing interesting or new or even coherent to say wrt politics.

No. No he isn't. He's a rich gobshite with some very useful social connections and a book to sell. Plus it's so very easy to whip up the disenfranchised isn't it - Heaven forfend that he might be using them to further his own grubby ends. Russell Brand? Yuk

Hear, hear. I might have more time for him if he was donating the proceeds of his book to help the needy. No chance of that!!

Whether or not he's talking nonsense, it is ALWAYS interesting to have someone add something new to the politics melting pot; and the very fact we are talking about this shows that it is making people discuss politics - they might not be here on Mumsnet, but that includes the young and disenchanted who might otherwise not be interested.

What's alarming is how many people discount what he is saying because of who he is and what he has done. He's not trying to be an MP, you don't have to like him or what he is saying!

And anyway, why shouldn't he promote his book or make money? He's not actually advocating a communist society; better he should quietly amass his dosh and keep his opinions to himself like so many other businessmen none of us can name? He has passion and a platform: I don't see what is so wrong with him using it.

And he's not uninformed. He speaks eloquently and from a position of knowledge about drug addiction and alternatives to current policies, which is rare and useful even if you don't agree with his ideas.

I don't find him remotely interesting. I can never understand a word he says anyway. I feel like treating him like a child and saying 'if you want me to listen, calm down and talk normally, rationally, and in plain English'. I don't listen to anyone who lectures me without pause to listen.

Discounting people because of what they say or what they have done is a reasonable course of action surely?! That's generally how you judge the validity or worthiness of what they have to say isn't it?!

That was to edit.

I think people need to forget about RB's background and start watching The Trews on a daily basis before they form a strong opinion on him. He makes so many valid points that nobody else on TV is making. When I hear political leaders now I just hear 'bla bla bla'.

The messages RB is putting out are very good and true and would benefit everyone. Plus he is very funny. I agree with nearly everything he says.

Leatherbag, you're right: I didn't say you shouldn't judge him on what he SAYS (of course you should!), but I see what you mean about what he has done. I was referring to the Andrew Sachs business, which people were referencing earlier as a reason not to listen to what he is saying NOW. But I don't think that is relevant, myself - partly because I think he was maligned on that score, and I dislike when people make snap judgements on a situation upon reading quotes and commentary in a newspaper without reading or listening to the material itself in context, which is what a lot of people did then - and partly because that episode was in connection with his work as a comedian, i.e. a performer, and I see his political stance as more of a personal passion project, as an individual - in line with his documentary-making and activism regarding animal rights and addiction. I appreciate that people may not agree with me, however.

"alternatives to current policies"

Could anyone just quickly sum up what the alternatives he's putting forward are?

I like him, and his politics. I think he's managing to engage a whole lot of people who are not currently political at all, and I think he's pointing out some very important and serious inequalities and unfairnesses that have gone unchallenged for far too long. In a democracy, you don't have to be a politician to have a political opinion - you could argue that it's some kind of civic duty to take a stand. Plus, everything he says suggests he's well aware of his own privileged and wealthy status and of the fact that he'd be worse off should his ideas be put into practice.

I find a lot of the comments made by him both on threads like this and in the media snobby at best and downright offensive in the way that they talk about class at worst.

I have PhD in political philosophy and am currently writing a book on the subject, so I am neither ignorant on these matters nor easily swayed by celebrity. (I am not claiming that this makes me right, just that not everyone who sees what he is doing is some kind of impressionable idiot, which is what some people are suggesting).

(But I do agree that his attitude towards women could be better! :) )

Hakluyt, ah, I meant his ideas about the treatment of addition. I'm not sure his exploration of different social systems are proposed alternatives, as such, or at least economists have said they are unworkable. I think the book is designed to show alternatives and promote discussion - he doesn't paint himself as a politician. But that would be a good question for the web chat...

Economists, pfffffft.

The First Law of Economists: For every economist, there exists an equal and opposite economist. The Second Law of Economists: They're both wrong.

Ha! Economists say things I don't understand, therefore I think we can safely say they are unreasonable.

Could anyone just quickly sum up what the alternatives he's putting forward are?

He's not running for president! As far as I can tell, he mostly advocates treating people more humanely. Can't see much wrong with that myself.

I just see his current re-invention as a political 'force' (!) as the re-branding of Brand. He can't play the ingenue anymore, he couldn't cut it in America, he is so utterly one dimensional that anything he appears in automatically becomes the Russell Brand show. It is always about HIM. It's sweet that he's chosen to champion the underdog, but the causes he champions are simply being used as a vessel for him to stay relevant - after a fashion.

One can't help but wonder if his time with Jemima Khan has either radicalised him to hate certain powerful families or he has simply become a stooge.

Regardless, he is ridiculous - man whose lights are all on but with nobody at home. It is politics for the X Factor generation, sound bites, blather and superficiality.

Notwithstanding the fact that he encourages people NOT to vote. For that alone I think he is a colossal dick. People, especially women, have died for the right to vote. It is the only way to effect change, whether our democracy is spotless or not is beside the point. If he continues to encourage a damaging, poorly educated form of apathy we will keep getting disenfranchised youth who allow cocks like the ConDems into power simply because they won't vote for a party more in tune with them.