"Massive GRIFTER!" Piers Morgan Grills Russell Brand On Allegations, Prison, 'Truth' & Religion

24:53Piers Morgan:What's been interesting is the way that's played out because you were right in what you said. It was perfectly legal for you to have sex with a 16-year-old girl in the UK. That's the law. In America, here in New York, for example, the age of consent is 17. So here it would have been a crime had you done that here. But I looked at every state in America because I thought it was an interesting, I saw some people commenting on this on social media. In about 30 states in America, the age of consent is 16, the same as the UK. I'm not even sure most Americans are aware of that. About another dozen states, it's 17.

25:30Piers Morgan:Another dozen or so, it's 18. So there's no uniformity around America. But actually, in the majority of states in America, it's the same as the United Kingdom. and therefore would not be a crime. Now, again, people can take a moral view about it. I think you took a moral view about what you were doing then. Interestingly, the GQ interview happened when you were about that age. So it was going on then. And you used the word exploitative. Some people I've seen latch onto this and say, well, yeah, so he knows what he's doing is wrong. He knows that that was wrong. What is that line for you between exploiting as a 30-year-old man a 16-year-old girl to the point where it becomes criminal potentially?

26:17Piers Morgan:What is that line for you? I suppose it's consent, Piers. Right. that the age of consent means in varying ways in different places, people have an understanding which probably isn't wholly accurate and reliable, that at a certain age, a person is able to make a consensual decision to smoke a cigarette or vote or have sex or gamble, and these things vary according to jurisdiction and type of law, and in the place where I was both emotionally and spiritually, And geographically, that was a legal thing to be doing, but not a morally sound thing to be doing. I've been struck by a lot of people on the conservative right in America are furious about what they perceive to be a revelation.

27:08Piers Morgan:It wasn't a revelation to me because it's been talked about before and reported widely. Are you taken aback because you've moved here, you live in Florida, you've sort of embraced the MAGA movement to a degree. not completely, but to a degree. You've written a book, How to Become a Christian in Seven Days. And you obviously are a different person now. There's no question of that. But are you taken aback by the reaction to what you said to Megyn Kelly, the fury from a lot of people on the conservative Christian right here? Often, I'm surprised all the time by stuff, but if people think it's wrong for...

27:50I mean, I'm a Christian and I'm serious about it. I think that the only safe place to have sex is within marriage. So I agree with them. I agree with them. It's very difficult to ask at the beginning of our conversation, what are the challenges? Well, the challenges are a criminal judicial proceeding that's about law and consent, a PR situation that's about people's feelings and sentiments that often cross over, what the compromises and flaws are in a media, judicial and legal system that are plainly somewhat symbiotic and porous. There's a lot of different things happening. But I think probably the simplest thing for me to focus on is, should I have been doing that?

28:36And the answer is, in retrospect, no. And what's a bit difficult is how we all, and I presume you're the same, feel like, well, whatever we did in the past, it's made us the person that we are today. And it's difficult to make that claim when you have to acknowledge that your actions have caused distress.

28:54Piers Morgan:The girl concerned in that story, we can discuss that because it was from the doctor. What if you could have the most reliable Wi-Fi at the same price for five years? That's the Xfinity five-year price guarantee. No annual contracts, no hidden fees, and our best equipment included. Plus, get online in minutes with same-day Wi-Fi. Just five years of fibre-powered Wi-Fi that boosts speeds to the devices that need them most. Lock in your price and unlock the possibilities. Xfinity. Imagine that. Select plans only. Restrictions apply. Powered by fibre. Connected to the premises by coaxial cable. Actual speeds vary.

29:29Piers Morgan:It's not part of your legal case, but she dated you for three months when she was 16. She described you referring to her as the child, sending cars to collector from school, coaching on what to tell her parents, made allegations about the sexual interactions you had, suggesting that you forced yourself in certain ways and so on. But she's not part of the legal case, and let's be clear about that. So there's no suggestion of criminality that's been leveled at you legally. But when you hear that account, what do you feel about the fact you were nearly twice her age she was only 16 and you're picking her up from school all that kind of thing what do you feel about i think some of those details are pretty important and relevant and how i feel about it is as i've said it's not nice to know that my actions have contributed to a person's suffering and there should be some there must be justice for that um the context in which those consensual encounters were happening was a sort of merry deluge of constant consensual activity that was very, very difficult to sometimes believe was happening, but, you know, one adjusts to those kind of conditions.

30:51And I would say peers, on a personal level, yes, of course, that's wrong. It's morally and spiritually wrong. It's legal. It's not a legal issue. But, you know, I don't want to try to minimize my actions anyway. I'm fully, fully culpable and absolutely happy, not happy, but willing, of course, to deal with the consequences of my actions. Not so willing to deal with consequences of actions that were not undertaken. I think that's a really important distinction to remind you and your audience of. And also I suppose it seems like a deliberate removal of context not to continually cement the famous men that are single have always and typically behaved in this manner.

31:43One prays consensually, but one also suspects that there's a responsibility incumbent on people that have that power, whether that power is magnetism or whether that power is fame or whether that power is money or whatever that power is. It's not very easy to live a moral life in a culture that really openly rewarded. Were you still at The Sun when I was being shagger of the year? This one, I was literally being given awards for it.

32:07Piers Morgan:So, of course, it's really terrible. I'd actually left for some, but the Sun had an award called Shagger of the Year, and you won it a couple of times. Three times. And it was, yeah. Some of the glories faded. Right, but it was... Amidst the rape allegations, the Shagger of the Year titles do not seem quite as valuable, I'll have to confess. Right. Some of the shines come off. Well, the point I would make is, at the time, everyone embraced it as good fun. You were seen as this big shagger, and it was all very funny and entertaining, and nobody at the time was coming forward to say this was rape, sexual assault or anything else.

32:43Piers Morgan:And that was the context of that time. Now, obviously, there's a very different thing about it. Well, I'll ask you something as a journalist. Also, during Me Too, no one came forward. In fact, people came forward subsequent to a very deliberate documentary and I feel that, therefore, it's difficult to remove the documentary from the chronology, because it's sort of an important artifact in there. And I'll just, we'll point that out and how difficult that makes, even our conversation, the idea of a fair trial, an ongoing conversation, because I would say literally precisely the same behavior that was lauded, consensual excessive sex, was reframed when it became convenient, appropriate, and useful as non-consensual.

33:27and now we have a method and means for dealing with a potentially difficult situation. Now, I wouldn't be so grandiose as to suggest that I am the situation. The situation is something that you do know a lot about. Media has changed from centralised media with a degree of centralised control with rare anomalies. But let's take the COVID example as primary. If you were working in mainstream media during COVID, you would have a pretty prescriptive approach. Indeed, you had that approach. subsequent to COVID and amidst the pandemic period, inquiries and questions were made in real time. In fact, I participated significantly in that.

34:05And it's a matter of public record, the logically AI who worked for Moderna, Pfizer and the British government dealt with my content, de-amplifying, commenting on, and indeed the 77th Brigade, a psyops organization that primarily works in foreign territories with the British military during the COVID period, worked in the UK to, and this is a direct quote from I think the Times, take down social media influencers. Now, there's an obvious clear distinction between my reckless, lascivious conduct, about which I was open and honest, indeed your own words demonstrate that, contemporaneously, and the obvious retrospective damage that's now done.

34:41It's difficult not to imagine that a documentary made in the midst of my own conflict, ongoing conflict with mainstream media, which to be plain and frank, I regard as akin to evil. What I mean by that is I think it primarily exists not to give people true information, but to maximise people's vulnerability and the ability of powerful interest to exploit and control people.

35:05Piers Morgan:Can I just, on that point? Yes, you can. But remember, be careful because of the legal situation. No, no, I will be. I just want to land fully. I will be. that when a country and a country's media treat its own population as a kind of invaded and occupied territory, we should pay attention to that. That there was a military operation took place in this country, the United States, and in our beloved country, the United Kingdom. And there's a reason now, Piers, that people from farmers to the white working class, to almost every aspect of British public life, is alive and febrile with hostility, anger, and confusion.

35:39The systems are breaking down. The systems are breaking down because of the technology. When Breitbart said brilliantly that politics is downstream of culture, perhaps we could have included that technology is very near the top of that stream, not the absolute source. But technology is changing everything.

35:54Piers Morgan:No, I agree with that. But let me ask you, why would the state, the establishment, why would they come after you particularly? I mean, you were doing a YouTube channel. You were doing your thing. You were having opinions. But a gazillion people were doing that. this sense that you were somehow singled out, targeted deliberately, that all these allegations are only because you, Russell Brown, were saying stuff about a COVID pandemic or whatever. A lot of people think that's honestly bullshit. I was like, come on, Russell, it's not that. And when they hear you be, I wouldn't say you're dismissing it, but when you say, no, no, but when you say, when people say also.

36:34I was thinking that's quite reductive, if I may say, the way that you've sort of framed it, because it is not just me. I mean, the idea that there is not a set of powers that manipulate the public conversation in the wake of Charlie Kirk's murder, the annihilation or near annihilation, which he obviously survived, of Joe Rogan, the vilification of admittedly controversial figures like Tommy Robinson or Andrew Tate, and I'm not trying to set myself up in a rogues gallery here, but, you know, Piers, you've operated in media for long enough and with enough depth and understanding to recognise that there are flavours and ways of handling obstreperous public figures.

37:19And I don't think of myself as particularly important. I know that I'm... That's really my point.

37:26Piers Morgan:My point is I just don't think that you were... I mean, I don't mean this to be remotely derogatory. No, but I'm not... Because you had a very popular channel and lots of people were watching it. It's not that. It's just I don't think that your influence in any of those debates would have warranted the establishment going, right, we've got to silence Russell Brand. Yes, I think you're right. And I think it's that kind of reductivism that stops people having a clear view of how these systems work. And sometimes it's good to take recourse to some of the great American comedians, as Carlin says, where interests converge, no conspiracy is necessary.

38:00You know that deep state organizations are nebulous as well as nefarious, that they operate in ways that are difficult to understand, that there is a kind of overall intention. You know that there was a point where mainstream media recognized we're going to have to pivot radically. We're not selling newspapers anymore. People are getting their news from different sources. People are having different conversations. People are starting to not trust en masse. Think about this as a good metric, if you'll indulge me. Say like 20, 30 years ago when people would talk about someone like Alex Jones. And let's not talk about me.

38:35Let's just go with, you know, I've got a criminal trial. And quite right. And by God's grace, the right outcome will prevail. And whatever that is, then that's God's will. But on the matter of is there such a thing as controlling the media and is there collateral damage in when you're controlling a narrative? Did people want a particular style of reporting and particular information to be prevalent during the pandemic period? Yes. Were voices shut down? Was information controlled? Do people get de-amplified? Do people get kicked off X the whole time?

39:09Piers Morgan:But I would argue a public health crisis of that magnitude globally. You did argue it, Piers. And one of the most reasons that you remain contentious is because you advocated. You've shamed people into getting vaccines. And we now know those vaccines have killed more people than they say. I'm not hectoring you. No, no, because, no, I'll tell you why. Because I'm like most people. You've repeatedly apologised. Yes, and I've said, you know what, I believed. Hang on, you've raised it, so let me address it because I've heard what you said about this, and I don't blame you. I mistakenly, with hindsight, accepted the real-time scientific advice, which often changed, often changed.

39:48Piers Morgan:And in particular, when they said, if you have the vaccine against COVID, you cannot transmit the virus. Which was a lie. I thought that was an incredibly powerful thing. And an untrue thing. Which meant that, you know, some old person walking around might be infected by some reckless young guy who doesn't want to have the simple jab, and he may kill that person. It turned out that was not true. So what do you know? And I became... Wait, let me finish. I became incredibly censorious of people who wouldn't have the jab for a period of a few months. And then, when they changed the advice, I felt I had actually, in the initial moment, abrogated my journalistic duty.

40:28Piers Morgan:What I should have done was be more sceptical, be more challenging, and certainly be less censorious and judgmental, accepting that in a fast-moving health emergency, the advice is likely to change. Of course. So I accept all that. No, you don't, actually. But where we're different is this. I still believe that the vaccine saved millions of lives. Yes, yes. A lot of people don't. No, I don't. You don't. I know, but I do. Good. OK, that's good. That will be something you'll potentially be adjusting in the future, Piers. And when you do, you may have another mea culpa to offer to your audience, because it seems significant to me that that crisis benefited some very powerful interests, granted further governmental powers, instantiated the ability to govern at a global level, revealed just how willing people would be to take a medicine, a concoction, let's call it a little more accurately, that seems like it might be extremely deleterious, causing infertility, miscarriage, myocarditis, and that that was something that was undertaken with a degree of complicity, at least.

41:26Piers Morgan:Do you believe in vaccines generally? I have the kind of questions that anyone that's paying attention to media... There was a measles, a little outbreak of measles recently. Even RFK was giving evidence yesterday and said he absolutely believes in the measles vaccine. In fact, he said, I'm not anti-vax at all. In fact, he said, I support most vaccines. He had legitimate questions about the COVID vaccine because of the speed at which that was designed. In your case, are you anti-all vaccine? No, I don't... Which vaccines do you accept are good? Piers, calm down and slow down. It's a serious question.

41:58I understand it's a serious question. Of course it is, but I want you to calm down and slow down. Very calm. Because, well, then, in which case, unyoke yourself from the conditioning of the world you've found yourself in. See when Chomsky, and there's a guy whose reputation has changed, said to Andrew Marr in response to Andrew Marr's, well, I've not been conditioned by the BBC. They've not told me what questions I can ask and what my perspective should be. Chomsky said to Andrew Marr, no, I'm telling you, if you didn't have the right opinions and the right perspectives, you wouldn't be sitting in that chair.

42:34Now, you and I have moved between many chairs. We've seen what goes on at the Daily Mirror. We know what happens. We know how people get information. And I know your position on the most public things. And I want to talk to you just as a person that survived in this world.

42:50Piers Morgan:But on vaccines. I'm not an expert on vaccines. I don't know anything about vaccines. Are there any vaccines that you think are good? It's not something I'm interested in. I don't think... But you're very interested in it. You talked about it a lot. No, I'm interested in truth. And where truth and vaccines intersect, I'm interested in that piece. So let me... Hold on. with all of this going on, with all of the upcoming trial, with the complexity of contemporary media, with a country in tumult, with crisis and protest and war, you care what the guy from Sarah Marshall and GQ thinks about vaccines.

43:23Well, maybe then my opinion is worth paying attention to. Well, that's my point. And particularly if you have a... That's my point. Either you think it is important or you don't. What I think is important is being able to tell the truth and being able to control information. Now, when you worked at The Sun and The Mirror, you'd have had certain obligations and restrictions. There's certain stories that get published and don't get published, certain celebrities that get taken down and others that don't. And now you work in this world. And what my prayer is for you, Piers, is that you recognise, and I don't mean this in an insincere way, because I think that mutually we have an opportunity to participate in something a little grander than standing on the sidelines where our face is in the trough of media money, participating in the exacerbating ignorance of people in the UK and the United States of America.

44:09The reason I think you've had all these controversies is because you are bullish and you are willing to have a conversation. You're willing to have a go, and that's a real great ability.

44:16Piers Morgan:I'm also willing to admit when I'm right. That's a lovely quality also. I think everyone should have that. But it's good because, yes, in response to new information, we should be able to reassess our opinion. Indeed, I didn't used to be a Christian. I'm a Christian now. And sometimes I'm astonished that other people aren't Christian. And then I remember, oh, you didn't used to be Christian. You didn't know that God is real. You didn't know that it says in the Bible, be careful, the institutions of power have been captured by dark forces. And what I'd like to say is say 30 years ago, Alex Jones, David Icke looked at crackpots and wackos.

44:47And in many corners of our culture, they're still regarded with that level of derision. And they're on a spectrum and they say that they're the extreme end of that spectrum. And at the other end, BBC, New York Times, 20 years, 30 years down the line. Where do you think the needle is moving? Indeed, where are you moving? You've moved from...

45:07Piers Morgan:I'm not moving to where David Icke and Alex Jones are. You were like, well, did you report on a recent story that suggests that there might be global paedophile rings? Have you heard the rumours that many people believe that that pandemic had cooperation and planning and even intersects with Bill Gates and Epstein and those rumours? Now, conspiracy theories are, by their nature, difficult to corroborate because of the ability of real power to mask itself, the necessity of real power to mask itself. And while we sort of sit around in a Punch and Judy show of advocating for Trump or condemning Trump or laughing at Keir Starmer's voice or his former actions when he was at the CPS and what he didn't do about Julian Assange and what he didn't do about other famous and awful cases in our country and how he sped up the courts during those riots.

45:51While that's all taking place, we've not got our eye on what's truly happening. The power is migrating across our entire culture. People are caught up in many needless conflicts. Indeed, your show does a brilliant job of hosting conflicting views, where it's really great orators like Dave Smith. And the great story is... I think it's really important to bring people together. It's nice, mate, but it's a little bit of a circus. And we've got to find some conciliation because I believe this. I believe that we are... And it's hard for me to talk about this because, yeah, I've got enough on my plate, man.

46:20I've got enough on my plate with my own personal life, like most people do, like most people do in their own way. But I sense we are at a time of real crisis in the UK. I sense that that crisis is not going to be resolved by any reshuffling of the existing participants in our parliamentary dance. And a lot of people feel that way. And that's why there's despondency and despair. And what the pandemic was, what was important about the pandemic, I believe, Piers, was not the how well you can undergird the science behind the vaccines. And obviously that don't look good at all in hindsight. But the way that the media complied and supported that messaging, of course, with, you know, it's a medical crisis.

46:58and we have to protect people. But this is my point. It's like in a medical crisis... One second. Because in a medical... I'm sorry you have to ask a question. One second. In a medical... Of course. And we're all looking forward to it enormously. Of course. We should all have a little go. Let it run long. Like, in a medical... How much of a medical crisis was it indeed? And what was the role in media? If we step back for a moment and watch what happened during that period... Well, many millions of people died. Who was vilified? Who was condemned? What are the excess deaths now? Who's controlling these statistics?

47:23Everywhere you look, Piers, there's such astonishing anomalies.

47:25Piers Morgan:But you accept many millions of people die from COVID, do you? I'm so uncertain about what happened at that time that I believe that I use it mostly now as a kind of lens to look at how disgusting our culture has become, how appalling, how condemnatory. But why are you avoiding my question? Because I have a better one. Because I have a better one. What's a better one? Who believes, even for an instant, that the function of government and media is to protect us and take care of us anymore? Who believes that they would put you in your homes and make you take a medication to preserve human life. I'm not talking about the wonderful staff at NHS hospitals or brilliant doctors or even magnificent scientists.

48:02I'm talking about this set of interconnected interests that are sometimes difficult to describe, visible in silhouette, evident in the Epstein files, obvious when wars happen that you don't anticipate happening but somehow seemed inevitable, and clear more than anything during the COVID period. Had you been Prime Minister... OK, I get it, I get it.

48:21Piers Morgan:Had you been Prime Minister when the COVID pandemic broke out, What would you have done? All right. This is what I would do, is I would immediately... Just to put it in context, you're seeing in Italy, in Lombardy, they're seeing thousands of people a day dying. I remember. Because they lived in big family groups and houses. Yes. And it was ripping through them, as it did through our care homes, for example. I'll pay attention to them hazmat suits in China that suddenly disappeared and those stories of people dying in the street. The origin of it is one issue. But once it's broken out, and it's clearly killing a lot of people very quickly, and it's clearly going to come to our doorstep.

48:56Piers Morgan:I have an answer. You as the Prime Minister, what would you do? Firstly, this. The very office of Prime Minister and executive power to that degree is absurd and corruptible, and it's one of the primary problems that must be addressed. Forms of technocracy, that means government by some experts, that's what that means, could be really, really helpful in a true democracy. What I believe should have happened or could have happened, because that's really what you're asking me about the pandemic period, is that we should have remained open to a variety of views, including the views that were deliberately shut down and censored from the get-go from prominent and valid experts like EG, Peter McCulloch, Robert Malone, Jay Bhattacharya, experts of institutions of great respect and worth.

49:42Listen to what they were suggesting, like in the, what was it called, the Barraclough Agreement, the Barraclough Declaration, right at the beginning.

49:49Piers Morgan:How would you have known which ones to believe? Well, the fact is that I wouldn't place so much certainty in my own perspective and opinion, because firstly, I believe in God. And so I truly do believe in the values of protecting as many people as possible. I do believe in public good. I would have listened to the valid experts. I would have investigated. But there were many valid experts, as you know, saying different things. Do you know another thing to look at? Who's getting paid by whom? Who's worked for Moderna? Who's worked for Pfizer? Who's worked for Logically AI? Who's got these kind of...

50:20Who has connections to certain financial institutions? Would you try to make a vaccine? What? I don't know, mate. Because, again, we're venturing right into sort of territory. Don't ask me.

50:30Piers Morgan:The killer virus is coming. It's killing, obviously, a lot of people very quickly. You have an ability through your own scientists... I can give you a better answer. ...to create something that may be an antidote to it. I can give you a better answer. It might not be perfect. And there might be a lot of side effects, as there have been with every vaccine in history. Would you, as the leader of the country, have done anything to protect the people from the virus, or would you have just let it do its thing? In a sense, I have to reject this hypothesis and this condition because it brings to the forefront so many things I disagree with.

50:58But by answering the question in the way that I want to, I can, I think, tell you a lot. I'm not saying educate you. I'd never be so bold. Very happy to be educated. But that's not my intention, and that's not what I believe is happening. I would like you to educate me. This is what I think. I believe in maximum personal sovereignty and freedom. I believe that if you empower individuals and individual communities to the maximum, that you will get, if not better results, at least fair and judicious results. They won't save them from a killer virus. Well, as it turns out, there wasn't one. Well, of course there was.

51:30OK. I would say, this is what I would do. Our best evidence suggests currently that this virus is pretty significant. And some people believe... I don't know why people personally who died from it. Yeah, well, check out the statistics around people dying from vaccines, Piers, because that's much, much, much more important and significant, not least because the people that died from the vaccines were doing what the government told them to do.

51:51Piers Morgan:Can you think of any vaccine in history where people haven't died from side effects? Look, here's... Do you know any? I'm curious now. I'm not saying there weren't legitimate questions... I'm curious about... ..about people having side effects. Myocarditis, other things happened, no question. But I'm also aware that in every vaccine in history, you have had side effects that have killed people. For some reason, the COVID vaccine has inspired this incredible anti-vaxxer movement. And that's why I asked you the question, do you believe in the efficacy of any vaccines? Because RFK, who I really like and I've interviewed him many times, who has a reputation as an anti-vaxxer, made it crystal clear in his testimony this week that actually he's not anti-vaccine, that he's been driving the measles vaccine here, he thinks very successfully.

52:43Piers Morgan:And so my question for you is, is there any vaccine that you think is a good thing? I'm a little frustrated. Or are you anti-vaccine? I'm a little frustrated because what I sense is is that I don't think you do it on purpose, but I think there are moments where you're doing your job where you get kind of caught up in the way that the material will be received. And in a way, that's responsible journalism because you have to be effective and you have to be successful. But my position is, obviously, people should go to their own nominated authorities when it comes to dealing with medical matters or legal matters or any matters where expertise is available.

53:18But I think, Piers, if we get mired in a conversation about my personal understanding of vaccines, we'll miss the opportunity to sketch out together the problem. The problem is new technology means a true potential for decentralised power. Information has been decentralised. It led to Napster. It led to Occupy. It led to the Arab Spring. It will lead to more and more freedom unless it's radically overhauled by authoritarianism. We're in the process of seeing that happening. They can't just, and by they I mean empire interests. Most people know what people mean by they these days. Of course, there's the possibility of just yielding to the ongoing centralization of authority, of just accepting what seems to be coming down the pipe, a dreadful AI future, low horizons for everyone.

54:07But there is also the possibility that people could have a version of democracy now, where the way that currency has changed because of decentralization and blockchain, the way that information has changed because of independent media, in which you are now a participant, so you should understand more than anybody, politics itself could change. So for me, when you ask me a question, what would you do if you're prime minister or what vaccines? In a way, who knows who cares? What I believe in is that the systems themselves, if not radically re-evaluated, urgently, immediately, to be in alignment with some true values, and I mean the values of God, however you understand God and you know how I do.

54:40If that doesn't take place pretty soon, we're going to be living in hell or something akin to it and many people already are. The creeping shores of hell are all around us everywhere. So why would you spend this time sort of pressing me on how much I know about vaccines or this vaccine or that? Only because you've talked about it so much

54:56Piers Morgan:and it's a simple question. You're either someone who believes in vaccines as a concept or you don't. It's not a difficult question. You've just chosen to take 20 minutes to avoid answering it. Let's take five-star credit vote. I've not chosen to. I've pointed out that by focusing on it, it reveals a sort of modality of not trying to detect what someone's actually attempting to say. And with a vaccine or an illness, the simple answer is I would look at the risks versus benefits and get the best advice I could and make a decision based on that and would suggest everyone does that. And I don't think medical matters should be an enforced global legal issue when one is.

55:39Out of interest.

55:39Piers Morgan:You don't have to answer this question if you think it's too personal. I know that no one has to answer any questions. You've got three young children. Have they been vaccinated at all? I feel like you're just sort of sniffing around for headlines. And I just don't think that's worth it. I'm really not. I'm really not. So what do you want to know? You took me on over vaccines. Fair enough. And I've had to admit I was wrong about a key part of the vaccine programme. But what's interesting about... But I'm only asking you simple questions. Like, do you, would you, have you vaccinated your own kids?

56:04Do you think that in the situation I'm in with my wife and my family, that I want to generate any more unnecessary contention when I could be here with you? A man who in some way must be brilliant, and you are, and have a conversation about what's taking place in our culture with regard to power and media in the last 20 or 30 years. And by the way, you say a lot of things I agree with, right? So why don't we, I'm not saying don't push back, because a bit of conflict is good and it's good television. what you do in media. I actually think it's a really interesting conversation. So do I. But like it's not interesting I think to get mired in something where my contributions are not of sufficient value to warrant this attention when I believe when it comes to the matter of the ideological crisis.

56:45Can I put a

56:45Piers Morgan:spanner in the works with your argument? No. I'm not interested. You have to let me. No Piers we're in a serious ideological crisis. Alright but let me just put one push back on what you just said. Which is this. Which is you are a very eloquent individual. Yes. Right? You told me many years ago that you used to study dictionaries to learn long words. Yes, I did do that. Okay. So you're very eloquent and you have a lot of good linguistic skills and you're a very good debater and a very good arguer. But some viewers might watch this. Fans of yours won't. They'll think, go get him, Russell. But some people will be watching this and going, you're very, very, very good at avoiding answering questions that you've, in your head, thought, he just wants that for clickbait.

57:28Piers Morgan:And I don't want that for clickbait. I am actually just asking questions I've wanted to ask you for a while. I'd love to talk to that hypothetical but very real audience member right now. We're on Piers Morgan's show. Piers is a really talented man in lots of ways. He's been inside the system. This is a person that knows Rupert Murdoch, that's been in rooms with some of the most powerful people in the world, including Donald Trump. He won the Celebrity Apprentice. He's seen things, he knows things that are powerful and profound and probably dark and probably heavy to carry in some ways. He's been in a system that many of us think is on the precipice of implosion or terrifying and mad expansion.

58:06It seems to be doing that primarily by increasing cultural fear, increasing division and dread, and then providing us with solutions. But always at a cost, you will yield a little bit more of your personal power. You'll find yourself hating people you don't know, caring about some abstract faraway issue. and look at your own life, your London, your town, your world, your city, your family, your dog. Isn't it all deteriorating just a little bit? And what are we doing for you, the media, the independent media? Are we participating in serious conversations that are going to empower you to live your life, to confront real power where it matters, to focus and to sort of manage the complexity of a migration crisis, but knowing that migrations by definition don't have any power?

58:48Where is the real power? Who is controlling this? These are complex, nebulous matters. And I believe that with you, Piers Morgan, I could have a conversation that spans tabloid journalism into centrally owned media. Your kind of refugee escape out of it and into all that talk TV things not working. I'm going to run this thing myself. The programmatic ads earn you how much I'd have this much independence. I could be hosting these debates, having people entering their spleens on these tragic genocides and awful situations. and me just i'm just another fellow occupant of this mad giddy sometimes disgusting culture that's

59:23Piers Morgan:right now in a kind of comparable position you tell yourself no one wants your college era band tees but on depop people are searching for exactly what you've got you once paid a small fortune for them at merch stands now a teenager who calls them vintage will offer that same small fortune back sell them easily on depop just snap a few photos and we'll take care of the rest who knew your questionable music taste will be a money-making machine your style can make you cash start selling on depop where taste recognizes taste addition to you but i believe with one important well i don't know if there's an important difference what i want from you and what i expect from you and what i'd like to demand from you is that and from all of us actually is that when we're in this position, when we have these platforms, that we don't take our hearts and our minds away from the people that could be positively impacted.

1:00:15And I don't think that, oh, Russell Brand vaccines or doesn't vaccinate is not a value.

1:00:20Piers Morgan:You know what I'm asking. The only reason I asked was there's been a rising anti-vax sentiment, particularly in America. It's cynicism. Well, hang on. Scepticism. It's not anti-vax. It's we don't trust anyone. The reason they don't trust anyone is because no one's telling them the truth anymore. Let me finish my point. So to the extent that even MMR, which is one that is recommended by almost every legitimate scientist in the world, a lot of people are beginning to resist giving that to their children because they bought into the notion that all vaccines are dangerous. I think that's an incredibly dangerous development out of the COVID pandemic.

1:00:51Piers Morgan:If we cease to believe in vaccines which have been for many decades established as stopping measles epidemics and mumps and so on... I get it. I hear it. I know all this bit. Yeah, but that's a legitimate concern, isn't it? When you lie, I'm not talking about you personally, But when you as a representative and conduit of truth, i.e. media, the interstitial material between the people that have power or information and the people that receive it, when those people lie, people stop trusting them. And then you have to yourself kind of madly aggregate. Would I be better off to take a position where if I'm told something by the media, I just flat out don't believe it because it's probably a lie.

1:01:30I've seen it so many times. Weapons of mass destruction. that geyser gets shot in the woods, take this thing, take that thing, eat this food, drive this car. And so many times it's turned out to be a lie. And also, even more important than that, even more important than that, if such a thing were possible, people in power being honest to the people they govern, is the technology now exists for it to become irrelevant, that there's no need for constant conflict.

1:01:52Piers Morgan:Okay, look, here's my problem with this. Yes, good, give me an actual... You cited two people where you think the pendulum is swinging the right way, Alex Jones and David Icke. Alex Jones had a billion dollar... Hang on. One second. Hang on. No, but you're already misrepresenting my view. I'm just telling you what I think about Alex. Once again, you're doing it live. What I'm saying is Alex Jones, I'm using them deliberately to demonstrate the idea of an extreme. And over time, the tendency of more people having access to information is we're moving closer to that. I'm not saying, even though, you know, dear old David Icke would back this up to his death, that the Queen's actually a lizard or whatever, but he was sure right about them paedophiles.

1:02:28Of course it's wrong that Alex Jones said that thing about Sandy Hook. That's terrible, and those parents must have grieved all the harder for the terrible insensitivity. But let's not forget that he somehow knew that them Twin Towers were going down. Let's pay attention to where he's correct. And in fact, why don't we do...

1:02:43Piers Morgan:He knew the Twin Towers were going down. Oh my God, there's video footage of him in 1997. There's a guy, he's going to blow up the Twin Towers. Everyone's seen it, the relevant audience know. Now, where you are, and we're looting through... This is complete nonsense. No, it's not. Osama bin Laden tried to blow up the World Trade Centre. Yeah, but the genesis of that whole story is that whatever he said, he had no intimate knowledge of any Al-Qaeda plot to take down the Twin Towers. What had happened is that several years before bin Laden had attacked the World Choice Centre. You are right now, right in this moment, advocating for the worst impulses in humanity.

1:03:14No, you are. No. You're trying to make me think that Alex

1:03:17Piers Morgan:Jones knew that the 9-11 was going to happen. He knew it as a fact. He had been given information that meant Al-Qaeda were going to take it down. Bullshit. Are you not aware? He did know. Why didn't he go and tell the President? Why won't you... Well, do you not recall the president's gratitude? Citing Alex Jones having prior knowledge of the Twin Towers attack. Come on, Russell. It sounds ridiculous. What I'm saying to you is that many, many times, people that were marginalised and condemned and criticised and called wackos and crack jobs, as we get more and more access to information that is not filtered, even though I recognise we get a lot of untrue and unhelpful information, I'm really trying my best not to contribute to that, even by being boring.

1:03:58the needle of public opinion and I think in this instance correctly is becoming deeply skeptical and cynical about what we're told by the BBC what we're told by the New York Times what we're being told even by prominent influencers like you and in some cases which is driven a lot by social media I think indeed of course it is and and the very interests that are able to control mainstream media then migrate to social media and attempt to control that and what I am proposing is instead of using this time and these resources to create endless conflict, whether that's between me and you or everyone in our beloved country.

1:04:31I don't see this as conflict. I know that. So do I. I'm just playing along. It's a conversation. I like debate.

1:04:36Piers Morgan:So do I. Even with people, if you say things I don't agree with, fine. All right. Well, then if it's a democracy, all right, let's have a debate. But if we are going to have a debate, can we do something where I would really benefit from your skillset? Let's do that. But let me just finish this point. The technology exists now for this constant babble of conflict to be resolved because people could have more control over their own communities just with the following of a few basic principles that food should be grown as locally as possible to where it will be consumed. People in a community should have the maximum control possible over decisions that affect them, whether that's migration or whether or not there's a hostel in Epping.

1:05:10And when it comes to the major decisions, they're a referenda continually to technology exists. The reason we're not having this discussion, the reason Daryl Piers is shuffling his papers is because politics should be boring. It should just be about the management of resources. It shouldn't be about mad ideologues misusing us and controlling us for their own curious ends. Now, where I would benefit from your tenacity and ability to push back... Yes. ..is in the event... I'm trying to find a specific thing while I'm talking to you, but go on. Well, how can you possibly pay attention while ruffling through your eyelids?

1:05:40Piers Morgan:I can hear everything. Look at that. You're all possessive about that. But that's my notes. Truth. Uncensored. Nothing to be scared of. Hello, these are my interview notes. Have the book. Promote the book. And if you're not going to promote that one, promote this one in the holy name. I'm going to talk about your book. There might be hope for all of us. What is the... Here we are. So this is... No, yes. No, no. No, yes. Tried my best. Do you accept you've been a bit of a chameleon when it comes to your position? From Piers Morgan? Yeah. From Israel-Palestine, Piers Morgan? From COVID, Piers Morgan?

1:06:12No, I've been trying it, like you actually, because I want to love you. And like, actually, I don't even... You don't have to love me. Actually, I don't even find that difficult because I'll tell you something that's sincere. When I look in your eyes and you tell me about that hip and the tibia, I can feel... I feel sadness in you. I know you're brash and I know you're strong. I'm not sad about it. I'm bored. Bored with hobbling. What do you think bored means, really? Let me ask you.

1:06:35Piers Morgan:When people say, all right, see, my theory about you is you have an addictive personality. There's no doubt. But hold on. I'm going to stop you even there because addict... Oh, yeah, Bear Grylls told me to be slow and calm. Right, so be slow and calm. But addictive doesn't... Let me ask you then. So take vegetarianism, right? You became a vegetarian at age 14 after you were influenced by the Smiths' album Meat is Murder. Man, this is government water. Can I have some non-government water, please, out of a bottle? Because you know, I don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist, not on Piers Morgan, where everything's underlined with absolute truth.

1:07:07Like the efficacy of those vaccines. Could I get butter water that's not directly from them? Not to be difficult. someone um you know you know eat meat right yes so what happened there what happened there was like my veganism was really motivated by not wanting to see animals um i really don't like the idea of animal suffering and i think when everything changed in my life with my boy and the allegations of rape and stuff here get a bottle with me mate i think oh someone getting one love it i said Thank you. Thank you. When my boy was ill and the allegations happened, everything sort of changed very, very quickly.

1:07:49And I was confronted with something, you know, because it was in the news. It was very sort of confrontational. The significant thing is that I was brought to Christ in an involuntary instant. Coming to Christ was not... It was not a process of inner philosophical debate. It was like being sort of smashed. My wife's always eaten meat, you know. My wife, she's an unbelievable, stable, beautiful, incredible person. She was going to come. She wanted to say hello to you. What she had in a way because it would have anchored us. And instead, we was filming. And you got HS ticky-tocky trauma out of it, didn't you?

1:08:22But we're not like filming. I'm not trying to gotcha no one. I don't need anything. I've got everything I need. Anyway, so when I come to the Lord, the Lord came to me, a recognition in an instant that instead of all these sort of diffuse and sometimes contradictory and difficult to hold ideas, some of which I still, you know, as you can tell, deal with and deal in, that the Christian story that God came to earth in human form that died somehow taking our sin upon himself and was resurrected was true. And I felt it not rationally or logically. I felt it in my belly. And then from that minute, I was reading about it.

1:08:58Now, I suppose what happened after that is I didn't feel the need to have a self-selected arbitrary system of righteousness or morality like wokeism or veganism, which has a good intention, as does wokeness, I think. Compassion, kindness. These are really lovely, lovely ideas. But it just didn't anymore. My wife's eating a lamb chop, and I remember the smell of lamb in my nans in Dagenham. I remember just the smell of it. And I ate it, and I felt like, hmm. One of my friends, who's always been a meat eater, said, it's them or you, Russell. It's them or you. You've got to start eating meat to survive out there.

1:09:30Piers Morgan:OK, so then this brings me to your political evolution. In 2014, you said Fox News was a fanatical terrorist propagandist organisation. By 2023, you're popping up on Fox News quite happily. What happened there? Well, I certainly wouldn't describe it as anything other than, what do I think about Fox News? What do I think about Fox News when I went on there with Tucker or Hannah Eam? The point I said, say when I was on Bill Maher that time, and they were like oh msnbc like fox is evil but msnbc is great this is what it was this is what it was but get ready to listen like if you come from a normal working class background and you sort of encounter the normal kind of tropes then you get involved in the entertainment industry there's a sort of eliding into champagne socialism like that somehow your views of equality and fairness can fit in the opulence of hollywood everyone does it they're all doing it every day.

1:10:25That's the norm, isn't it? Right. And as I sort of started to experience the difference between not being, being poor and not being poor, I like, I started to have a slightly different perspective. And as I looked at an institution like Fox, it was easy to vilify and make content out of because you had Bill O 'Reilly, you had obviously sort of deliberate and misleading reporting. So it was very easy to make jokes about it. But as the world got more complex, as the left sort of went a bit kind of crazy, I think, Piers, because I was online and reading this stuff, I understood that there was a different way of operating in those worlds.

1:10:59I still recognize who owns Fox and what Fox's primary intentions are and where Fox's funding comes from. But I feel like most people that with that ultimate epitomizing object of cultural controversy, Trump, it was kind of, oh, wow, this guy is going to somehow detonate. You were friends with him. You were a person that was affiliated with him. Yeah. I remember when I I had some spat with him years ago and he said some rude stuff about me. Then I had the view that people from that cultural group had of Trump. Oh, I don't like this guy. Then I sort of saw his ability to kind of be searingly honest and funny and authentic.

1:11:33And now what I think about him is he's a person that's incapable of masking himself. So I generally speaking lost the comfort of categories of like left good, right bad, liberal good, libertarian bad. Climate change? Don't just shout. Is this what we're reduced to? What's happened? Have you disengaged? No, no.

1:11:54Piers Morgan:Just in your book, 2014 book, Revolution, you called for a revolution in big corporations, existing political and economic systems. You collaborated with Naomi Klein saying, ditch capitalism and save the planet, or ditch the planet and save capitalism. And you wanted people to take down massive corporations like Exxon to save the planet. But since 2023, you've shifted, it appears, to be more towards climate change being a lot of nonsense. What do you feel? I no longer believe that the state in any form is capable of meaningfully and in good grace representing the will of the people. So any edict that comes out of there, be very sceptical and, in fact, always investigate what the conclusions they draw are.

1:12:46For example, climate change is the example you've selected. Just interrogate what their proposals are, look at the proposals coldly, and then consider, do you think this is because of climate change or is it because they want to introduce these ideas? Actually, similar to vaccines, I'm not trying to sit on the fence here, I would say, I don't know because I don't think it's possible to know, I've heard that there are intergalactic influences on, what's that brilliant man's name, Randall Carlson, says like even sort of there can be influence in our environment that goes way beyond human causes.

1:13:26But in a way, what's important here is you can negate that entirely by saying we should love and revere the planet. It was Earth Day here in New York and I participated. They obviously, they may have recognized me, but they certainly didn't recognize where I am now because they had me participate in this Earth Day stuff because I just happened to be walking through Times Square. And I got no problem saying we should revere and respect the earth. And if the way that our ecological policies is determined is to maximise profit for powerful organisations, that's plainly wrong. All of us on an individual level should be doing everything we can to respect and revere the earth, and certainly at a global and corporate level.

1:14:02How are those solutions going to be brought about? By an alliance between the very interests that got us in this mess in the first place? I wouldn't have thought so.

1:14:08Piers Morgan:But I can see, I can find a lot you say about corporate power and political power and media power, I can find myself nodding along thinking, yeah, you're making good points. It's inarguable that there has been abuse and corruption and unfair influence and bias in all of those things. But here's my problem, if I may put it to you, where I think you sit. You talked about sitting on the fence. It's a little bit... I mean, some would describe it as a grift. It's like, come on, Russell. You change your mind about stuff on a sixpence, right? No, that's what they say about you, actually. Well, sure, but I'm interviewing you.

1:14:45Right? So my point is... So you think that you can command the old channel? I'm not saying I believe this.

1:14:50Piers Morgan:I'm saying you know there are people who think you're basically just a massive grifter, that you're very smart, you're very eloquent, you can be very persuasive with the power of your words, but that actually when it comes to any of these issues, you don't really have a personal principle view. I do, I do. Your view is that all people in power are terrible. But when I ask you, when I've challenged you to say, well, what would you actually do? You've got a 20-minute eloquent spiel, which doesn't answer the question. Oh, my God, it actually does answer the question. Let me try and do it again. Firstly, find faith and integrity in yourself.

1:15:23Do whatever you can. Pray. Find God. Secondly, we cannot have systems that prioritise the centralisation of power, whether that's representative democracy or this global commercialism. What would you do? Use the technology that we currently have. alright, good, this is the bit I wanted to get to. Can I have a glass of water? I mean, it's an associated press.

1:15:42Piers Morgan:Well, they're not under any obligation to give us bottles of water. Oh, I see. Well, actually, this guy, my mate Jake, though, he does work here. We are trying to find yourself, but they're not our servants. No, absolutely. Hold on a minute. I'm not declaring these people. They don't all work for us. We're just hiring their studios. No, I know that. And I think I've established quite good rapport. We should be cognizant they're not working for us. But no, with my mate Jake, though, who's over there, who actually is working for me. Well, Jake can get you on. Who I'm directing it to. And also there was one or two other people.

1:16:06So it's not just to be clear. I'm not sort of like going, get me some water, man. You did direct to the AP that they should get you a nice bottle of water. Well, I just thought that the facility itself might have amidst its many benefits, water. Thank you so much. That's so kind. What's the obligation? Crossing camera, crossing the floor. Thank you very much. I really do appreciate that glass of water. Would you like some? Don't be proud. I'm good, man. I like the tap water. You like the government water? Love it. No problem. Even if it kills me. I can't keep drinking the government water, Piers.

1:16:37I can't keep taking the government water.

1:16:38Piers Morgan:Actually, the water is some of the cleanest in the world, but you know that. Look, you're a very argumentative and obstreperous individual. Not at all. You've even argued with that. I like to challenge people. Go on. So, go on. We were talking about... Oh, yeah. This is what I wanted to say. You say that I'm a grifter. And actually, to tell you the truth... Other people have said that it's all a grift. And they would actually include... And I, you know, this is for you to, actually in the end, only you know. But you've got this new book, How to Become a Christian in Seven Days. People say, look, you only became a Christian seven months after the allegations were made public.

1:17:17Piers Morgan:And that this is part of your thing, that you've worked out that this could give you some kind of cover. You're a born again Christian, that this is, you know, you've heard people say this. But what do you think? A lot of other people take you very sincerely and believe absolutely in your commitment to this. I know, I hear you, mate. I was with a mutual friend of yours, bumped into Bear Grylls the other day, he was a great guy, who was there at your baptism. We famously saw the video and so on. He absolutely believes that it's sincere and genuine. And I completely respect that. I don't know, right?

1:17:47Piers Morgan:In the same way that I don't know where the truth lies about the allegations you face. Or COVID, or Israel, or Palestine. And this neutrality is terrifying for people. Sure, but I can only proffer an opinion. I'm not afraid to change my opinion. Good. Right. My question for you is, do you have genuinely principled opinions, do you think? Yeah, because I think if you don't have. Yeah, I do. And but obviously I ask myself the same question. Why go to the aggravation of going on Piers Morgan? Like, because I tell you, like with everything that's been shown to me, with everything I've learned, the idea of maybe selling some books is it's a professional obligation in some ways.

1:18:30but it sort of doesn't weigh that heavily on me in the scheme of things, just because everything else is so sort of varied, luminous, brilliant, beautiful, awful trial, magnificent trial, best of times, worst of times, revelation of real truth, exposure to the fallibility and facetiousness of fame. Like, in a sense, Piers, like you, I don't have the kind of thick skin you have, because I sometimes think you genuinely don't care that if people think you're a grifter. I don't think that. I think you are a creature of our time. In a way, I think that's what is always brought forth.

1:19:03Piers Morgan:I think in the end, only I know and only you know, right? Maybe not even. Maybe not even, because why would you make yourself the highest authority? You can sort of understand your intentions, but there is a thing in psychology called the unconscious. There is a thing in Christianity called the spirit. And both of these things indicate that your personhood is not absolute authority. And in your sort of continued stance, which is somewhat legitimate as a journalist of neutrality, what's kind of masked in that is that Christianity demands of you that you make a choice. I'm not neutral. You kept saying I've got like, you know, I'm proffering an opinion, but I don't care about COVID.

1:19:38I don't know. I could be wrong.

1:19:39Piers Morgan:I get people on from all sides to debate. I personally have a lot of opinions, a lot of strong opinions. I'm more afraid to express them. If you ask me about do I believe in vaccines? Absolutely is my answer. Your answer was a long spiel of not answering. It's like I'd be really careful about it. I'd be right careful. I'd read Gavin DeBecker's book, Facing the Facts. That's what I'd read on that. And I'd read The Real Antony Fauci by Robert Kennedy and then make a decision. And also tell me what books are good to demonstrate the alternative. Tell me this, what kind of Christian are you? I'm like a kind of Christian that has to hang by a thin thread of faith, knowing that I am broken, that you are broken.

1:20:21Piers Morgan:Do you have a denomination or not? Why? I'm just asking. No, I'm very... It's not an allegation. I just treat everything as another allegation. I know you do. If you don't mind me saying... Was everything okay in that interview we did in 2006? Yes. But you are slightly hypersensitive to that kind of thing. I think because you don't really do many interviews. If I'm honest, you don't do... This is the first interview you've done with any Brit, for example, since the allegations. Yeah. I'm grateful to you for doing it. But you are slightly hypersensitive to anyone challenging you because most of the media you do, you don't really get challenged.

1:20:53I don't mind being challenged and I want to be challenged, actually. And I like being challenged. And I didn't go, what, Piers Morgan? Right. This is what he's like. Yeah.

1:21:02Piers Morgan:He's going to be stroking my thigh for out the interview. I think this is a good conversation we've had. People will watch it. They'll take a view. They'll agree with you or me about this, that, whatever. I think what you're interpreting... But this should be how conversations are had. I don't think it is, actually. But what you're interpreting as sensitivity, it might be sensitivity. It's a form of intelligence or a form of awareness. So maybe that's the right word. But it's also a kind of frustration. And the frustration is the sort of feeling that we could that we're supposed to be saying something that could be valuable and we're not quite getting to it.

1:21:34And I think the reason we're not quite getting to it is because you're like you're so sort of expertly schooled in a particular type of discovery. And I felt that when I made an incorrect assessment of Trump on the one time I met him in 2006 or something like that. I'm like, oh, he's a person that has a sort of a genius, but in a very narrow line. I said to myself, it's almost as if being good at the game Hungry Hippos is the most important thing in the world. And this person is a master of it. And he's become elevated with a very unique skill. The same could be said of LeBron or of Beckham or of anyone.

1:22:04Like a skill that is prized in a particular culture at a particular time. And what I'm thinking with you is you're so good at sort of generating sort of conflict and sort of a kind of a needling energy. And I am easily needled because I think that there's purpose and meaning in life. And I believe in new systems of leadership and new systems of government. And I believe in real change. In fact, even the very idea of government could become a position of service. I believe there are people of valor that are just waiting. But even in the fraughtness that one might get if you talk one minute to Tommy Robinson and the next minute to George Galloway and you're aware of Jeremy Corbyn and you're aware of Yanis Varoufakis, you think, well, there actually are sort of great minds that could participate in a way of actually improving people's lives.

1:22:50And in Christ, there is the potential that you yourself can live with the odd paradox of your brokenness and the sort of failings of your life and the mistakes you've made and the errors, but also becoming whole in that, whole in that. For there even to be justice or innocence, these concepts and words we're bandying about, there has to be a God or you can't have those concepts.

1:23:11Piers Morgan:You took probably this Bible, actually, but I think it was this one you took into court, wasn't it? Sometimes I also think you're not listening. Like, that's what I was saying. You're literally talking about. But what I mean by that is, is that this might sound a bit, I don't know, woo-woo or hippie, that the sort of the energy is a kind of like, you talk this Bible into court and I feel like I already know where that thread's going. Where's it going? It's going to go, what are you holding in there? What did you think that was going to be achieved by that? And it's not like, isn't it? No, that wasn't my question at all.

1:23:36It's cynicism. That's what it is. It's cynicism. Why are you pre-empting my question? I think you're cynical. About what? I'm not pre-empting your question. I'm pre-empting your essence. I think you're cynical about human beings. I think you're cynical about yourself. Not at all. I think you're cynical about yourself. I'm one of the most positive people you'll ever meet. I don't think you believe that you're capable of greatness. I don't think you're... I've already achieved greatness. Oh, God, darling. I don't think you think you're capable of participating in meaningful change or even meaningful conversations.

1:24:01I think you think the best that Piers Morgan can do for himself is to host hideous spectacles of conflict about real serious, awful, dreadful stuff. Why are you here, then? Well, I'm here, actually, because I don't mind trying to learn a little bit from you.

1:24:16Piers Morgan:You're prepared to come on something you categorise as a hideous spectacle. No, I think it's a hideous spectacle. Say, for example, the stuff where there's multi-panels and people are really screeching at each other, maybe about trans issues or whatever. And I don't know, maybe there's something cathartic in it. Maybe. But I don't... And also, I don't want to lay all that on your shoulders. I'm just saying I don't think that's the right way for us to be stewarding the culture. And I think we could do better. And I suppose, to really go into it, what I think is, this is a person I could probably learn from and benefit from, but there'd have to be trust.

1:24:48And it's hard to trust because I sometimes think you're too caught in the world that you used to be in. Can I go back to asking a question about your Bible?

1:24:56Piers Morgan:Yes, if you want to. Thank you. Was that the one you took into court? The very one. OK. What was your thinking of taking it into court? And you were seeing looking at some passages. What were the relevant passages for you? All right. Thank you for asking me. Thank you. That didn't hurt, did it? A little bit.

1:25:17It was this from Isaiah. You're right, but I did say, you know, be chilled. Sometimes I lose the chill, man.

1:25:29It's pretty...

1:25:33It's this.

1:25:40They don't like that, do they, in the old gallery, but remember you just said it's a hired spot. This is from Isaiah.

1:25:56Excuse me.

1:26:05Man, I'm not in a market before.

1:26:16It says here...

1:26:31The verse that I was looking at that day was not this. I can't actually find the verse that I had that day. But this is good enough. This is from Isaiah 12. I will praise you, Lord. Although you were angry with me, your anger has turned away and you have comforted me. Surely God is my salvation. I will trust and not be afraid. The Lord, the Lord himself is my strength and my defense. What I was looking at before is that there's a bit where he says, See, I'm doing a new thing, Isaiah says, like springs in the desert, like in the desert of your life, when your life becomes barren and difficult, that a new resource with God will appear.

1:27:19And in a situation that obviously feels quite pressurized and condensed, and in all those preliminary appearings that I've attended, there's the presence of something very beautiful. Grace, it would be called. in one of the moments, I think it was the first hearing, although I've had several, the people that patted me down for Secura Corps went, all right, Russell, geezer, just 50 years old, just some normal geezer, patted me down on that for weapons or, I don't know, sharps. And I'm going to have to touch your hair now. You're not going to like this. And he went, the whole country's behind you, mate.

1:27:56The whole country's behind you. And I felt very, very encouraged. I felt very encouraged that these institutions with their emblems, unicorns and lions, are not all there is to our country. And the reason I take it here is to sort of remember, that's the point I think of becoming a Christian, is to remember to put back together again who you are. That we're not, you're not and I'm not our identity in the world, like the identity of I have to do this to get money or get whatever it is that we think we're getting. and it actually is real into so much as to say Christ is real that even in the transition from my and you know you've had the perspicacity and the insight to diagnose it even in my agitation of being in an unfamiliar situation even with someone I've known interstitially as you correctly assessed at the beginning you know I'm my whole life's a trial and and it's not culminating because there will be a life after it, whether it's in jail or not.

1:28:58But in that trial, in the hardest times, I've found him. And it's not like a sort of a palliative. And I suppose the reason I feel difficult around you is because I feel like there's a cynicism that if I talk about something that is very beautiful and certainly robust enough to withstand any of us.

1:29:13Piers Morgan:I'm not questioning your faith. I'm not saying that you are. I'm not saying that you are. But it's, I think it's so important, not because of me obviously because who are any one of us he has no favorites but i feel like you know yeah hopefully this isn't a grift hopefully all of our lives aren't just some stupid attempt to garner material things in this temporary place to create the appearance of permanence as we just pass through time to death in this horror of this time where the worst things that could be said about a man was said about me. And while my son was, you know, having surgery, as you already know, because you've heard me say it elsewhere, the most graceful and beautiful things happened in my life.

1:29:57I felt whole and I felt loved and I felt everything's going to be all right. And also what's been surprising about it is all the things that I kind of knew just as a kid and going through life as a counter-cultural person. I mean, not trusting authority is what I mean by that. It's all been underwritten by scripture. It is explained and foretold. You're fallen, Piers. I'm fallen. We will participate in this world in a fallen way. And I reckon the reason me and you both love Bear Grylls, in spite of our sort of, I don't know, whatever this chemistry is, is because he is sincere and he demonstrates Christ.

1:30:35And I do have a tendency to, as a raconteur and as an entertainer or whatever, try to present stuff. and I do have a tendency, I think as a person that's felt even prior to all this happening, I feel like I'm being under attack my whole life anyway. And that if I wasn't famous and if I wasn't sleeping with loads of women, that I wasn't worth knowing or even worth anything or even worth being alive. And even though, of course, it's the worst thing that's ever happened in my life to be accused of these things, but God provided because that was happening with my boy, Herbie, who's doing real well, it sort of showed me, it was all bullshit, man.

1:31:12You know who you are. You know what you've done. You know what you've not done. You know your behaviour.

1:31:15Piers Morgan:How has Laura, your wife, dealt with this? She's like, um... Ah, she's... Well, like, I'm in a real marriage, mate. And I suppose you are, are you? Mm-hmm. So what it's like being in a real marriage is like it's someone who actually knows me and who's known me for a very long time. and knows, like, see when even in the introduction, some people he's a silver-tongued devil, and other people he's an arsehole. Yeah, yes and. Yeah, silver-tongued devil, arsehole. But she knows me, and she loves the reality of who I am. And she's like a cradle Catholic, but she, like you, I figure, sort of, you know, it's hard to live your life like Christ is real because the world is telling you in a million different ways that he is not, that God isn't real.

1:32:05Piers Morgan:Is she a believer as well? as she is committed as you? She and I, me and my wife Laura, her beliefs are very different from mine, in a way. Like I suppose it would be, because it's hitting a very different prism in her. But we've certainly got a real alliance. And neither of us have got any... I suppose why I got rankled even at the asking about the denomination is because it's so beautiful in its purity and its formlessness. But most Christians have no problem saying what denomination they have. It's not like I've got a problem with it. I've got this challenge. And I'm a Catholic, I've got no problem telling you.

1:32:35I know, but you're very different. You're very different. But why? Why is it so difficult to answer? It's not difficult to answer. I'm really interested in Catholicism. Really interested in that kind of love it. You then were a Buddhist. See, that's antagonistic. No, it's not.

1:32:49Piers Morgan:It's factual. You were an atheist. I wonder what I'm going to be next. You were a... Well, yes. That's what some people... A Jew? A Scientologist? That's what some people think. Hitler? What do you think about Hitler? That's what some people think. Was he OK? That's what some people think. Should we get the jab? Russell. Have you vaccinated your own children? Take Bear's advice and come. No, you take Bear's advice and be a good man. I am a good man. Be a good man. And no, it costs you to be a good man. It might cost you everything. You might not like... It might cost you everything to become one, but you can do it.

1:33:16You can do it, Beers.

1:33:17Piers Morgan:Russell, these are basic facts. You were an atheist. You then became a Buddhist. No, they're not... Now you're a Christian. Good. They're not basic facts. They're information being tailored and collated. Is it not true? Yeah. You are creating, attempting to create, using a collage of language. But you're the one who told us these things. You told us that. You were. You told us you were an atheist. Israel's got the right to protect itself. Yeah. This is a genocide. Don't take that COVID shot. Take the COVID shot. Listen. But I'm happy to talk about that. You're not. I'm happy to talk about anything, but I would prefer to talk about...

1:33:48But I only know you're an atheist because you told me. But I'd prefer to talk about something, Piers. Fine. Something. We're talking about your profound belief in God. And as a Christian... No, we're not talking about my profound belief in God. We're talking about the actuality of God. And we're talking about the fact that you have been doing water carrying for Satan. That's what we're talking about, Piers. Who's Satan? Water carrying. The fallenness in this world. The fallenness. I've been carrying water for Satan. Satan is the epitomising object of the realness of evil. The evil is not some abstract moral idea.

1:34:19Who's the Satan I've been carrying water for? I suppose it's... And I'm trying not... I don't mean to be mean. The Satan...

1:34:26Piers Morgan:What is he like? I don't care. It's the institutions of media power and how they interact and operate with government. I suppose one could argue your initial position in COVID. One could argue what went on with the mirror stuff. One could argue what went on, say, with this contentiousness around the terrifying and awful conflicts in the Middle East. But more importantly, more importantly, right now, right now, that there's a chance for us to, even when I sort of take my own advice and more importantly Bear Grylls' advice and think, right, just sit and chill, that you sort of revert to a kind of, he was a Buddhist, and I can't see that as a good faith inquiry.

1:35:05I see it as an attempt to generate an outcome and to create a sort of a kind of hysteria, whether that's in this room with me, or sort of more broadly among people. Like Piers Morgan uncensored could be an opportunity to house, frame, and present in a kind of graceful way important opinions. And I'm not suggesting that I've got any of them, but I happen to be in a sort of a really weird situation in a way that's deeply similar and comparable to your own. You've sort of gone down the weird gushing chute of fame in a million different ways, been close to actual dark, nasty power, come out the other side.

1:35:41And what I suppose I'm saying is, look, you know, it's because nothing means anything to you. It's like, that's what it feels like a bit. Like, what means something to you? Like, you love your wife, you love your kids, you're willing to die for your country. The UK is about to march teenagers into war. The United States is about to do it. And me and you, like, you know, me as well, maybe we are a couple of grifters, a couple of worthless, lousy grifters that will say whatever we have to say to stay on the internet and make a few quid and flog a book and, oh, Meghan Markle, she's a bitch. Is that all right?

1:36:06Is that a bitch? Israel, yeah, fuck it. Maybe that's all we are. But through him, not through you or me, we can be something great. And when I sit here with answering questions about whether or not I vaccinate my kids, I think, ah, no, not this. This isn't it. This isn't it. And this hair there has been bothering me for a long time. Thankfully, it wasn't attached. Otherwise, that would have been grooming. And what would that be in the ape world? What I want to say to you is that I want to be better. I want to be better. And for me, the cost of that, who knows what that's going to be? You've alluded to it already.

1:36:36I want you to do it as well. I know you can do it. I want you to be a meaningful participant. I feel that there's some reason that you're in this world. And it's not to generate conflict. And it's not to generate, it's to participate in the creation of truth. That was always your destiny. And I want you to do it. Is your book going to generate profit? Actually, I've already decided. and believe me, I don't want to do this, but no. But if it does make any money and the chances are that slim in this crazy world that I will find a way. In fact, me and you, if you will. I want to give it to something that means something.

1:37:10I've seen it all. I've not seen it all, but I've seen enough. I've seen a lot of... It's Tucker Carlson's company doing it, right? TuckerCarlsonBooks.com? TuckerCarlsonBooks is an imprint of the company Skyhorse, which are a company that will publish stuff of cancel people.

1:37:23Piers Morgan:Yeah. How to Become a Christian in Seven Days is on sale. It's huckercarsandbooks.com. I don't think it's good to be all sort of passive like that. You know, like sort of like in sort of say neutrality. Yeah, I'm just, it's my job to be a journalist. It's good in a way. I've never claimed to be neutral. I don't know what you're talking about. Where have you got that from? I'm probably the least neutral person on the airwaves in the world. Well, I suppose by... Literally, my whole reputation is of being highly opinionated. Where have you got this idea that I want to be neutral? I reckon it's from like...

1:37:48Piers Morgan:That's totally bizarre misreading. Lack of conviction. Really? That's what I feel, yeah. You don't think I have any convictions? That's what I'm feeling. I feel like you're a beautiful person and I want to be in a position where, look, man, think of the wonders of this I've done. I've done Paxman. I've done that other little one with a earring. I've been around all these people, mate. And all I want is to feel like in the midst of some terrible madness in my own life, which definitely needs to be resolved, and I pray to God that there is a resolution of this that we can look at and go, oh, my God, that's miraculous that that happened.

1:38:19Piers Morgan:What if you get convicted and you go to prison? and it's not very nice. No, not that. I'm talking rats. You'll have to choose a gang. Not that. They'll be the white supremacists, the Muslims. Not that. What will you do? Join the white supremacists on one day and then grift for cigarettes with the Muslims on the next day. How will you deal with the fact that in that moment, God has felt that's the right thing to happen to you? Then, like, you know, drink the cup, man. Drink the cup. That's the deal we've got. That's the deal we've got, Piers. And how will you feel on your judgment day? how will you feel on your judgement day because it's outside of time it's here now and it's forever meaning that all of us have a calling to be wonderful and it's bigger than even important serious things where evidently people have been hurt and big trials and big consequences have you been surprised I've been through a few ups and downs as you pointed out it's also like also it's a bit like there's kind of a dementia like you know have you ever spoken to someone with Alzheimer's and they'll just suddenly sort of the way that they talk is kind of like I've been through some ups and downs There's a reason I'm asking the question.

1:39:22Piers Morgan:When people go through ups and downs, in my experiences, surprising people reach out to support you. What's that body language? And other people that you would have expected to don't. Have you had that? Oh, man, yeah. It's unbelievable. It's sort of an unbelievable kind of churn and change of your life that's sort of... Well, it's a bit like you saying, if you're convicted and you're going to jail, knowing in your heart of hearts that you're not a rapist, How will you deal with that God wanted that for you? And it's like, wow, this is reality. I'm not scared of the truth. I love it. It's all that's real by definition.

1:40:00So what is it like when, you know, you lose touch with that person, that person steps up? It's like, oh, that was always true. Who's disappointed you the most? Give us the top fives. Top fives. Who's been most disappointing to you? No one disappoints me. Come on. I'm not doing your mad little game of reducing everything to trivia and tittle-tattle. Because some things, believe it or not, are not trivia and tittle-tattle. In fact, there's an argument for the direct contrary that none of it is trivia and tittle-tattle. That you're continually, in the moment, interfacing with a really beautiful reality that has a veil laying across it.

1:40:35And all of us are sort of tangled and interacting with the veil. Oh, man, I just sort of thought Terry Wogan and David Icke 1987 vibes. I don't want to do that stuff. I don't think that I'm especially important, although I have any unique or novel insights. I've just had a really unusual life and I've written this book. And the key thing about this book is becoming Christian is a consolidation of all the mad musings of a mind that was embedded in and wedded to the culture. I thought, wouldn't it be great to be famous? Wouldn't it be great to marry a pop star? Wouldn't it be great if you could sleep with endless women whenever you wanted to?

1:41:09Consensually, one might say, given the nature of this current appearance. But at the end of it all, even though, obviously, you have to find God to get any of you that are clean and sober from drugs and alcohol, and you have to get clean, you have to find God, some kind of God, to even cope with life without your former God that was drugs and alcohol. Coming to Christ is like you're exposed to a deep reality that is beautiful and available. And so it's not, like, always good, because sometimes still, like, this morning, I was worried about coming on Piers Morgan. I'm even a bit worried now. I'm doing this on Piers Morgan.

1:41:36Will they use it? It's uncensored, so I suppose by definition.

1:41:38Piers Morgan:Every word we've said will appear. Even the sort of long pause on Isaiah. That will all appear without... I've clipped that up. No, no. Everything will appear exactly... That's my promise to you now. There will not be a single second cut out of this. What do you think your duty is here? Not with me as a guest. Me, just to ask you questions. No, not with me as a guest. That's sort of largely irrelevant. I mean, you as Piers Morgan. I think I have a platform that is now pretty big, pretty global, and my job is to take complex issues, get people with strong opinions and hopefully some brain power who have strong opinions that don't agree with each other to debate these things.

1:42:12Piers Morgan:or to have one-on-one interviews with people like you, where I try and just be... I said to you before we came in here, you asked me, you know, what do you want to get out of this? I said, I just want to be fair to you, right? I don't think I've been unfair. No, I don't think that either. What I've been struck by is that you've... I think, underneath the calm exterior, you've tried to exude, quite understandably, I think, inside you, there's a lot of tension, a lot of stress. You know how big this moment is coming in October. I've known you 20 years. Like I said, we're not like friends, but I've known you.

1:42:43Piers Morgan:And I've always got on well with you. I'm not one of these people that suddenly pretends I always knew you and always hated you. I don't know, right? I don't know. I don't look at you and think you are this or you are that. I would prefer to let a jury work that out based on the evidence and you to be judged fairly by the evidence. That is what should happen to anyone. That's irrelevant. I absolutely believe in that. Of course. Of course. I know that you do. I don't think you're... I'm really not trying to trap you at all. I don't feel that. I don't feel like you're trying to trap me. I promise you, when people watch this, I doubt anyone thinking, God, Morgan's trying to trap him.

1:43:17Piers Morgan:I'm not. I'm just asking you basic questions, which often you react like Vesuvius to, which I find weird. The only reason, for example, for example, the only reason I know that you were an atheist and a Buddhist is because you proudly told everybody. No. I want to try and explain it because maybe it will be valuable. I took drugs real young, so I knew that there was a God. I rejected the idea of the Christian church for all the reasons anybody would. Then I got involved in trying to understand because I knew there was something else. And indeed, what's amazing about coming to Christ is finding it's there already.

1:43:54And there's something so analogous to just anyone's personal journey. The thing that you're looking for is already here. He's waiting for you. In fact, he's running towards you. And it's such a sort of an obvious and traditional and well-cited story, the story of the prodigal son, that it feels hacky to say it. And it's not that I feel like you're trying to trap me. I feel that you remain an avatar of something mercurial and untrustworthy in the media space that by making claims like I'm housing debate or challenging or whatever, the tendency and trend is generally towards the interests of sets of power that benefit from having you there in the same way that Rupert Murdoch is not going to advocate for someone that's going to go, hey, these media monopolies should have as much influence.

1:44:42They're messing with the miners' strike or they're putting factory power.

1:44:45Piers Morgan:Oddly, Fox News, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch, regularly has had you on as a guest. I'm not like this. And I would ask you a difficult question. If you feel that way about Rupert Murdoch, who I personally have enormous time and respect for and a lot of gratitude for what he's done for my career, and I think he's a great, great media tycoon, But regardless of that, if you have such strong views about his terrible power and so on, why do you go on his network, Fox News? Well, it's not like I'm always on Fox News. You're helping him get ratings and advertising. Some people would say, Russell, it's hypocrisy that you do that.

1:45:21Piers Morgan:The more principled stance would be, I'm not going to do Fox News. What am I trying to say? What am I trying to say? It's like your MO is to be able to desecrate and denigrate kind of anything. I want to ask you, what do you think is pure? What do you think is beautiful? Who do you think you can rely on? How are we going to resolve this endless, knotted, tangled conflict that's unfolding both geopolitically and domestically almost everywhere? What do you feel your contribution could be? to be at the centre of global debate about it and hopefully get to the truth and hopefully concentrate people's minds on making the right decisions.

1:46:03Piers Morgan:Concentrate their minds on making the right decisions. That's really good. Yeah. Challenging authority. What is the right decision? Challenging authority. For example, I've been friends with Donald Trump 20 years, but I've been very challenging and critical about the Iran war, for example. As an example, I see that as my role as a journalist. Notwithstanding we've been friends a long time, when I see him do things I don't agree with or don't understand, I call him out on it. More journalists should be fair-minded. But I also praise Trump when he does things I agree with. I'm willing to be both things.

1:46:32Piers Morgan:There are very few people out in my world, in the media, who are prepared to be, in my view, intellectually honest. What do you mean by that and why would that be? For example, I don't think anyone who is intellectually honest can say they know what's happening in the Iran war right now with any confidence. People who talk with absolute certainty and confidence about it, they're not being intellectually honest because clearly it's extremely chaotic and unpredictable and no one can speak with any confidence about what's going to happen. That's the intellectually honest position. Got it. All right, got it.

1:47:04Would you apply that to various areas of complexity, even if they're not the apotheosis?

1:47:10Piers Morgan:You keep mentioning Israel guards. Somehow I should be embarrassed about my evolution on that story. But my position was very clear. After the appalling terror attack by Hamas on October 7th, where 1 ,200 Israelis were killed, 7 ,000 more were wounded, absolutely Israel didn't just have a right to defend its people but had a moral duty to do it. And then as it went on, I felt the scale of their response became utterly disproportionate, and I feel that very strongly now. That's my position. By the way, a lot of people agree with me. So I don't think it's an unusual evolution on that story. Yes.

1:47:48Piers Morgan:But if I asked you, for example, are Hamas a terrorist organisation and was what they did that day an act of terrorism, what would you say? This is where we get, I think, to an important point. What would you say? What I would say is, Piers, do you not recognise, perhaps because of your stated aim to be at the heart of global debate, that actually it's a conflict-generating dynamic? We're talking about a conflict, literally, where people are dying. Of course. Naturally. But we're also talking about a more diffuse conflict that's around it. That's also very heated and very, very charged. And I wonder if we as people with a degree of eloquence and access to an audience, instead of being participants in what one would have to call the problem and therefore compounding it, might begin to talk about solutions, whether those are spiritual solutions.

1:48:44Piers Morgan:You have to deal with reality when you see it. What happened on October 7th was an act of grotesque terrorism. But do you agree? I have... Do you know I saw Ben Shapiro do something rather wonderful? Was it an act of terrorism? What Ben Shapiro did that was very smart was he said, I'm an orthodox Jew, I wear a hat and everything, so do I agree with gay marriage as an orthodox Jew or conventional Jew or whatever type of Jew Ben Shapiro is? He said, no, this is my belief. This is my belief, right? So while dear old Russell Brand might be a vegan, one minute and a carnivore the next and a Christian one minute, a West Ambrose.

1:49:20We've got a rap, by the way. Still support the Hammers.

1:49:22Piers Morgan:We're running out of time, but finish your point. My point is that my sense of what is right and wrong is taken from Scripture and my sense of how we should treat one another as individuals is guided by that. And my sense of what should happen on a global stage is completely guided by that. And it's one of submission and surrender and service. I really think of the questions you could ask about that I'm just asking a basic question about what Hamas did that day do you know what we've learned? There are no basic questions anymore there are, that's the problem about being intellectually dishonest is that when you have an act of obvious grotesque terrorism you just say what it is you don't think how's that going to play to my audience or how's that going to spin out on social media you just say when 1200 people are massacred like that then it's a grotesque act of terrorism when babies are kidnapped, when it holocaust victims are kidnapped.

1:50:14Piers Morgan:No, you don't. You look at how it happened, when it happened, the potential alternative narratives, and you try to take responsibility. You've answered it by not answering. No, well, I... You have, haven't you? It's wrong to kill people. Okay. Thou shall not kill. Let's end on that. That's in the Old Testament. Russell Bryan, how to become a Christian in seven days. May take 50 years of sin and serious fuck-ups just to get started. Yeah. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it. Yeah, I do as well. I do as well. Piers Morgan Uncensored is proudly independent. The only boss around here is me. If you enjoy our show, we ask for only one simple thing.

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