Brand had well documented serious addiction issues with heroin and alcohol then went from those to an out of control sex addiction. Again well documented in his books. Shagger of the Year three years running, women literally queueing up at his gigs.
None of this excuses any criminal behaviour, and he should pay the price like anyone else if guilty of anything non consensual.
But he went through the 12 step recovery process and got himself clean. Does a lot of work for addiction charities. His behaviour changed too. Possible that his wife and daughters don’t recognise the man being portrayed in the press now.
But whether the British press and their readers have the ability to acknowledge sex addiction is a thing is another matter. Ain’t gonna happen. Or that people are capable of changing themselves at all.
They just wanna rake up stuff from 20 years ago and cause maximum amount of carnage all round. What does that achieve? More newspaper sales for them. Ruined lives for others.
Wonder whether they want to scrutinise behaviour of rock stars and music industry over past 60 years the same way. They seem to get a free pass. Debauchery and depravity a scale far bigger than this. Underage sex, physical abuse, emotional abuse, non consensual sex and worse. And that’s just stuff we’ve read about in authorised biographies!
My wife left accusing me of sex addiction, did not include 16 year olds, and addiction does not excuse this, if anything drug and drink addiction, along with sex addiction suggests a man out of control
.
As for the other " Rock stars" just because they write things does not mean they are true, none of them relied on TV or Radio, the way it is done today, to gain their fame, and there was not the " Tech" evidence that the internet and mobile phone use gives.
There might well have been wrongdoing, they may well have confessed their sins, without evidence or people coming forward, nothing will happen, Brand is from a different era, trying to live the rock star life, and brain dead to the scrutiny phones and the internet, as well as camera policing and a change in society.
We live in very different times.
Back in the 80,s, I worked for a TV company, and spent a fair bit of time with a very famous person now, close enough to be invited into his home, today he would not have got where he is, the scrutiny of a relationship he had, for so many reasons, would have destroyed him. It was not common knowledge for a good while, I knew.
I also knew it was genuine, I shared time and meals with them, four decades later they are still together, not so sure, under the scrutiny today, they would have not had a chance.
I do not agree with the press scrutiny famous people get today, though some use the press for gain, but in cases like this, where failure of the authorities to listen to the little people, not just the Police, in general, the reason the likes of Brand are given a soap box to shout from, it is the way society has gone.
The soap box Brand has used, could also be his undoing. Live by the sword
