In Defence Of Russell Brand And Jonathan Ross

They might as well be racists...

If you've been living in Britain for the past week you will be aware of the controversy surrounding Russel Brand and Jonathan Ross, and their "obscene" phone calls to Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs. The papers have been full of indignation over this incident, and although this is not a racial issue, I wanted to discuss it because, as on so many race-related occasions, the media and the reaction of the general public have been driving me spare. As such, I thought I would take the opposite view - and defend Brand and Ross from the vitriol being poured their way.

First of all, let's make it clear that this SHOULD NOT be about whether Brand and Ross are actually funny, or talented, or not. This SHOULD NOT be about whether they deserve to be paid millions of pounds a year for their antics. Disliking a person's sense of humour or wages is NOT sufficient grounds to call for someone to be sacked from their job. Try telling your boss that your supervisor should be sacked because he tells bad jokes and gets paid too much, and see how far you get. And then try telling that boss the same things when you don't even WORK for the company.

So what conceivably COULD all the fuss be about?

The first question is whether the messages the duo left on Sachs' answerphone constitute "abuse". A lot of misinformation has been going around regarding the true context of the incident. First, it should be pointed out that this was NOT a "prank call". Nor was it random bullying. Sachs was scheduled to do a telephone interview on the show. But when they phoned him, he did not answer, and they were diverted to his answerphone instead. Brand started by simply leaving a message asking why Sachs was not answering his phone, at which point Ross suddenly shouted, "He fucked your grandaughter!" - which they had been discussing earlier. Brand and Ross made a couple of attempts to call back and rectify the situation, trying to shrug it off with more humourous asides, and it gradually spun out of control. Did they go over the top? Very much so. But was it "abuse" in any sense of the term? No, they did not abuse anyone. Annoyed, maybe, but not abused.

The next question centres around the claim that Brand had sex with Andrew Sachs' grand-daughter. From what I can tell, this is true. The previous week, Brand had David Baddiel on the show, and they talked about a party both of them had been at, which Georgina was also present at. And Georgina herself has pretty much issued a statement to the affect that the claims were true. While stating that she felt "betrayed" by Brand's comments, she also said that "what happened between me and Russell should stay private" - not exactly a ringing denial. So it seems, at the moment, that Brand and Ross can't be charged with libel or defamation, either. True statements can't be censored from the radio.

It must be remembered also that Georgina is a member of a group called the Satanic Sluts. I dare say that Andrew Sachs is, or should be, more concerned or offended by that than whether she slept with Russell Brand.

So the next question is: could they be done for sending harrassing phone calls? Again, I say no. The calls were a joke that spun out of control; they were not calculated that way, and nor were they at all malicious. Britain is a free country - and that includes precisely the freedom to annoy people, or even offend them. If it doesn't, it's not a free country. It would be one thing if Sachs himself had insisted on pressing charges for receiving harrassing phone calls. But he has not done so. So how "annoyed" or "harrassed" can we really say he was?

The bottom line here is that there is simply no reasonable objection anyone can raise to this incident except personal prejudice. People think Ross and Brand should be sacked because the joke "offended" them. Well, I'm sorry, but that's not how things work. People aren't put out of work because YOU don't like their jokes. It is also worrying that so much misinformation about this is floating around. The vast majority of the people who have complained about this incident have not even listened to the recording of the show in full. It is telling that following the broadcast there were only TWO complaints from listeners about the show. It was only AFTER the event gained nationwide publicity that thousands more people suddenly added their voices to the chorus - again, many of them without having even listened to the recording.

People are ganging up on Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross because they have a personal axe to grind. They don't like the men themselves. I don't believe that should EVER be justification for calling for someone to lose their job. As for me, I call for all charges to be dropped against both of them. Suspending their TV shows, as the BBC have just done, is absurd, and so is sacking them. Brand and Ross can make personal apologies to Andrew Sachs IF THEY WISH. If they do not wish to, however, that should be the end of the matter.

Let's tuck this farce away and get on with our lives. They're too short to waste on such petty hysteria.