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Open letter to Russell Brand from RBS worker

81 replies

Schoolaroundthecorner · 17/12/2014 14:20

So apparently Russell Brand stormed into RBS London headquarters and decided to hassle employees about their pay and bonuses. Now I know Russell is on a crusade at the moment against capitalism and bankers might have seemed an obvious target but he's really getting annoying now (I know plenty of people found him irritating already....). I'm not a banker, not working in a job with big bonuses but I have sympathy with these workers, many of whom are probably not the fat cats he paints them as. In particular I thought this open letter made it clear how self-aggrandising the whole stunt was and effectively punctured Russell's new 'man of the people' persona.

thedailyedge.thejournal.ie/russell-brand-open-letter-1839456-Dec2014/

OP posts:
Nerf · 17/12/2014 21:47

Actually I love the letter - wrong building, security. And I hate the 'bike' comment.

mrsfarquhar · 17/12/2014 21:51

I meant RB is the self indulgent sixth former, love the letter but now need to go off and research 'bike' as i have never heard the term used for men or women before (naive).

Hassled · 17/12/2014 22:00

I adore that letter. If I were to meet Jo from Northern Ireland, I'd snog him. Russell Brand is such a twat.

niceguy2 · 17/12/2014 22:13

RB is the very definition of a champagne socialist.

MorrisZapp · 17/12/2014 22:15

I love the letter, it's spot on and hilarious. But I haven't shared it on FB because it's too long and he said bike.

Ah well.

telsa · 18/12/2014 01:15

The banker is a complete and utter twat...true to form.

Vevvie · 18/12/2014 08:15

At least the bank man has food! Moaning Minnie.

TheTravellingLemon · 18/12/2014 08:33

I liked the letter, it made me laugh and I really dislike the way that RB has been behaving lately. I used to be a fan back in the 6 music days.

I term bike is not really on I suppose but I get what he was trying to say. I don't think he meant 'slags', I think he meant that RB surrounds himself with a series of faceless people who are just there because they want to have sex with him so they can say they've slept with RB. Still not a nice word I guess.

chantico · 18/12/2014 08:38

I find his range pretty limited anyhow, and choosing misogynist language when delivering it does not make up for its tiredness.

JazzAnnNonMouse · 18/12/2014 08:57

Here's Russell Brands reply - worth a read.
m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10152580039838177&id=21641548176

JazzAnnNonMouse · 18/12/2014 08:58

m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10152580039838177&id=21641548176

Russell brands reply

fivepounds · 18/12/2014 08:58

A bike is a slag. Fact.

Schoolaroundthecorner · 18/12/2014 10:26

Russell doesn't actually answer any of the points made in the other letter though, can't say that's surprising.

OP posts:
Isitmebut · 18/12/2014 10:48

Clearly if Russell,or any of the production team, understood what Investment Banking as an industry had done over 30-years to globally lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty - or that a very small percentage of those working in banks are the 'bankers', with large bonuses based on performance he was targeting - this man would not have needed to respond.

Several years after the crash, the facts are all out there, including how the £billions in annual revenues from Investment Banking even after the crash, mostly offsetting the ££billions being written off each year in retail lending through the 'boom' years - plummeted like a stone, after bonuses were slashed, and other investment banks took most of RBS's best staff.

A rough example would be RBS investment banking division MADE £2.4 bil in one year, the retail/mortgage banking division LOST £2.8 bil in the same year = a consolidated/reported £400 million annual loss = public outrage, 'how can you pay investment bankers bonuses' when RBS lost money.

Both governments appeared to take the populist view that better to cut bonuses for the best revenue earners (so they left), rather than have RBS perform like it's global investment banking peers, and have the stock price rise above what we paid for it, and give the tax payer a profit much earlier.

The UK was the only country in the 2007/8 financial crash that felt the NEED to privatize banks, whereas in the U.S. where the banking crisis began, all the $trillions lent to U.S. banks by the U.S. authorities were paid back in full a few years back.

Quite when an RBS having (unlike in the U.S. banks) suffered several years of state populist intervention is therefore able to pay back every penny to the UK taxpayer, god only knows.

Still, facts like that shouldn't get in the way of a taxpayer funded Russell Brand film production, having a rant about something he doesn't want to understand.

GoodKingQuintless · 18/12/2014 11:06

Russels reply just confirms that he is just a nasty bully. Playground bully. Maybe the drugs really got to his head.

He does spout a lot of crap these days.

Why could he not stick to just being an actor? He is lovely, and totally lush, until he opens his mouth and speaks an opinion. I wish he would just shut his mouth and look pretty. Wink

GoodKingQuintless · 18/12/2014 11:07

Does he not realize how "establishment" he has become?

telsa · 18/12/2014 11:10

The reply by RB is great. Isitmebut - what crap are YOU spouting?

Isitmebut · 18/12/2014 11:20

The TRUTH telsa, something that may not be ideological to your liking, but there we are.

ArcheryAnnie · 18/12/2014 11:20

Wow, Russell Brand can fuck right off with his repeatedly using "the disabled" as a shield to defend his idiocy.

Isitmebut · 18/12/2014 11:23

The cost to the Uk taxpayer of bank bailouts to Lloyds and RBS is based on the price the last government paid for their shares.

Just look at other investment banks across the world that saw their stock prices double/treble from 2007 prices, while we still can't get our money back in RBS where investment banking bonuses were paid - why is that?

Chocolateteacake · 18/12/2014 11:27

Its fairly well known that that particular building is mostly admin/back office. I would have decked him if he had stood between me and my lunch.

telsa · 18/12/2014 22:41

It is a complete joke to suggest that the taxpayer will receive the profits back. They never will, and anyway this betrays a complete lack of economic understanding on Isitmebut's part. What is profit? Does it grow on trees? No, it is extracted surplus value, that is to say also stolen from us the workers. Get real.

hackmum · 19/12/2014 09:46

I don't like Brand and I don't much like this banker guy either. Aside from the revolting bike comment, I thought his comment about the BBC and the regressive tax was pathetic. The guy sounds immensely and unjustifiably pleased with himself.

hackmum · 19/12/2014 09:48

Though actually, I do rather like Brand's reply.

Storytown · 19/12/2014 10:04

I think it's about time some journalist did a bit of digging about RB's own finances. I'd particularly like to know how much tax he pays in relation to his earnings.

Or maybe someone should just ask him? Reckon we'd get a straight answer?!