{"id":624057,"date":"2026-04-23T20:39:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T20:39:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/624057\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T20:39:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T20:39:11","slug":"russell-brand-admits-to-having-sex-with-16-year-old-being-an-exploiter-of-women-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/624057\/","title":{"rendered":"Russell Brand admits to having sex with 16-year-old, being an \u2018exploiter of women\u2019 – National"},"content":{"rendered":"

British actor and comedian Russell Brand<\/a> said in a recent podcast interview that he had \u201cexploitative\u201d consensual sex with a 16-year-old girl when he was 30.<\/p>\n

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Brand\u2019s comments on U.S. media personality Megyn Kelly\u2019s podcast<\/a> come as he awaits trial in the U.K. over rape and sexual assault allegations<\/a> brought by six women who have accused him of various offences between 1999 and 2009.<\/p>\n

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During the podcast, the 50-year-old described his past self as \u201cselfish\u201d and an \u201cexploiter of women.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI did sleep with a 16-year-old when I was 30. When I was 30, I was a very different person. I was a lot younger, and I was an immature 30-year-old,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

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Brand \u2014 who says he has since become a devout Christian and appeared on Kelly\u2019s podcast to promote his new book, How to Become a Christian in 7 Days \u2014 added that his access to drugs and women at the height of his fame provided him with an opportunity for \u201cendless consent that\u201d led him to be a \u201chedonist\u201d and a \u201cfool.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking on the current sexual assault allegations against him and his pending trial, the Forgetting Sarah Marshall actor said, \u201cWhat I\u2019m obviously not only querying but violently, aggressively, assertively opposing is the idea that this [having sex with an abundance of women] is a judicial criminal matter where consent was overridden \u2026 actually, what happened was consent was directed,\u201d Brand said.<\/p>\n

\u201cConsensual sex with a lot of people, when there is a strong power differential, as there is when you are a famous man who has the ability to attract women that I had at that time, I think, involves exploitation. I think it is exploitative,\u201d he added, later estimating that he had sexual contact with \u201cthousands\u201d of women between the mid-1990s and 2015.<\/p>\n

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The age of consent in the U.K., where Brand is from and will go on trial in October, is 16, but there are additional protections in place to safeguard children under 18, including against people in positions of trust or power, according to the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children<\/a> (NSPCC).<\/p>\n

Brand, who is facing three charges of rape, three allegations of sexual assault and one charge of indecent assault, has pleaded not guilty on all counts.<\/p>\n

When the first batch of charges was announced in April, he said that he welcomed the opportunity to prove his innocence.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was a fool before I lived in the light of the Lord,\u201d he said in a social media video. \u201cI was a drug addict, a sex addict and an imbecile. But what I never was, was a rapist. I\u2019ve never engaged in non-consensual activity. I pray that you can see that by looking in my eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Get Him to the Greek actor has dropped out of the mainstream media in recent years, and built a large alt-following online with videos that mix wellness, conspiracy theories and religion.<\/p>\n

His trial is scheduled to begin at Southwark Crown Court in central London on Oct. 12, during which his six accusers will have the opportunity to speak to their claims.<\/p>\n

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A court heard earlier that Brand faced allegations including raping a woman in a hotel room during a Labour Party conference in southern England, groping a television worker and later forcing her into a men\u2019s bathroom where he sexually assaulted her, and kissing and groping a radio employee after pinning her against a wall.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"British actor and comedian Russell Brand said in a recent podcast interview that he had \u201cexploitative\u201d consensual sex…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":624058,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75,233517,519],"class_list":["post-624057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-russell-brand","tag-trending"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/624057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=624057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/624057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/624058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=624057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=624057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=624057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}