Candace Owens on Politics, Censorship & Culture Wars
Our special guest is Candace Owens, political commentator, host of the ‘Candace’ podcast and producer & narrator of the new docuseries, ‘Convicting A Murderer’. 4 years after their last debate, Candace joins Russell to talk about politics, censorship, the significant moment that changed her life, her views on selective reporting in the media and how this led to her pursuing her new docuseries.https://get.dailywire.com/candace/convicting-a-murdererFor a bit more from us join our Awakened Wonders Community here: https://russellbrand.locals.com/See my new LIVE SHOW: https://www.russellbrand.com/live-dates/Tickets for COMMUNITY 2024: https://www.russellbrand.com/community/NEW MERCH! https://bit.ly/Stay-Free-Merch
Thanks for joining me for Stay Free with Russell Brand for a fantastic show.
It's going to be beautiful and fascinating because we have a guest who can be described with both of those words.
It's Candice Owens.
We're also, when we're exclusively on Rumble, going to be discussing the nature of modern censorship with Candice and the obvious need for the protection of free speech and how we bring our personal morality to the complex subject of free speech.
In our item, here's the news.
No, here's the effing news.
We're gonna be talking about Bill Gates and lab-grown food.
It's not just synthetic meat grown in Petri dishes, a disturbing literal monstrosity, but now lab-grown fruit that, to me, I've seen some of it, it looks like boogers, and also lacquered fruit that are covered in some sort of Odd, diaphanous web that I find most disturbing.
But now I'm excited and you will be too if you saw our previous conversation because I'm going to be talking to political commentator, host of the Candice podcast, producer and narrator of the new docuseries, Convicting a Murderer on The Daily Wire, the very great, always intriguing, limitlessly confrontational Candice Owens.
Candice, how lovely to see you again.
It's so wonderful to be back.
I really just was very excited about doing this podcast because I had such a fun time with you because at the time we were on such opposite sides of the totem pole, but you were just so kind, such great energy.
And I just said to myself, he's going to drift a little away from being a hammer and sickle communist because he's just too happy.
He's just substantially happy.
It's been really great.
And also, Russell, I will never forget you.
You will always be a part of my love story because I met my husband right after I left your podcast that night.
So whenever people ask how we met, I'm like, I was three hours late to dinner with my husband because I was doing Russell Brand's podcast.
So I'll never forget you.
You're my good luck charm.
Some great things could happen for me after this.
I am glad that I have this apotropaic quality in your life, that I bring you love and good fortune, Candice.
There's a word I don't get to say too frequently.
And yet I find that we are already at a point of conflict because I noticed that you thread I did your first announcement, for that's what it was, with the idea that I've somehow been seduced into a political and cultural space that you long knew that I would inertly wander into.
And I tell you now, I always believed in freedom.
I've always been anti-establishment.
I've always been pro the rights of the individuals and the rights of the community.
I've always been opposed to corporate power and to the combination of states and corporations against the people.
And I've always believed that when it comes to cultural issues, We must be allowed to form our own opinions and identities and I don't think I was ever a hammer and sickle communist.
Although I do remember some marvellous moments when you were in our studio, it was the other studio then, and he goes, and what's going to happen?
Is everyone just going to get away?
And I remember you sort of skipping around the studio.
I thought, how can I continue to argue with this person?
She's just too charming.
And then you marched right out of there and got yourself married.
And we're both now, I think, three kids further down the line.
You've got a new human being entering the world, have you?
Yeah, nine more weeks left of this pregnancy.
This will be another boy.
I have a boy, a girl, and this one will be a boy.
So yeah, everything has just been wonderful.
But I do consider this my good luck podcast.
So I'm looking for some good fortune after this.
And yeah, I know I'm being a little hyperbolic.
You weren't fully hammer and sickle.
But I would definitely say that you've As we all have developed over the years, and it was a wonderful interview.
And I think one of the things that you definitely have always been open to is conversation, even with people that you disagree with.
So I totally understand the success and why people are totally obsessed with your podcast now and everything that you're doing, because you're just an interesting person to listen to.
I love watching Russell Bryan clips.
Thank you.
You're really lovely to say that to me.
Now, when I talk about sort of aspects of socialism. I think it's important to understand
that what I'm interested in is compassion and kindness in politics. Actually, beyond
that, love. How do we have systems that are able to convey quite basic spiritual principles, I would
say, that are common in Christianity and Islam and all great and minor faiths when we look beyond
the kind of cultural divisions that can can easily arise from religion.
What it offers us, I think, is the opportunity to infuse our systems of government and control with And emotional and spiritual quality.
I feel that what we're living in now in this sort of semi, it's not right to say nihilistic because there is so much charge when it comes to meaning in our political space.
But what there is a lack of, I believe, is spirit and kindness That everywhere we look, there is kind of deception, there is hatred, there is a lack of real vision.
And I would say that that's prevalent throughout the mainstream, whether it's on the purported left or right.
What kind of advances have you noticed?
What kind of changes have you noticed?
Where do you look optimistically on the intervening years since our conversation?
Where can you say, well, this has improved, this has gotten better?
Well, so I think one of our differences, which we had early on and I think we still hold, is I actually don't look for compassion and emotion in politics.
I think that it actually needs to be extracted from politics.
And I think that part of the reason is that we've moved away from logic and reason and objectiveness and more towards emotion and compassion, which is subjective, and that's why
it's problematic.
And emotion can yield to some really bad things. We've seen this over the years when people are
being so invested in their emotions that they're not thinking clearly. And actually, the people
that tend to seize control when people are emotional is the government. So I am very much
like how I feel doesn't actually matter.
We have to remain objective about these things.
And I was just having a conversation this morning with my in-laws about that.
They're overseas at the moment and talking about women and women in politics and why I don't know that it necessarily works all the time.
And I was talking about this.
I've been talking about this on my show for four years.
You know, women are we are naturally more emotional than men.
I hate to say Pretend that there are biological differences between men and women, but there are, and that emotion is a wonderful thing when it comes to caretaking and nurturing and raising children.
But I think in the political realm, we often have our emotions hijacked, and when they are hijacked, it can yield great evil.
And I think we're in a circumstance where there's a lot of emotion being hijacked and yielding great evil.
I agree with you that logic and rationalism are necessary for logistics, operations and organisation.
You can't organise a society based on, I feel very jealous, or I feel very joyful, or I feel very sad.
But when creating a vision, there has to be an emotional component.
There has to be an acknowledgement that That humanity has some value.
That we are not just material blobs fighting for individual survival and making necessary pacts with one another whether that's on a global scale or a communal scale or just the interrelationship between two people for our shared and mutual survival.
I don't think that emotion is a basis for government, but it is the place from where
we need to derive our vision. I don't think that it's in any way ridiculous to suggest that kindness
ought to be a part of politics. I also have to say, because I recognise what you're disputing
and contesting there, I think many of the people that purport to be advocating for kindness and
compassion and for example, rights of previously or currently maligned groups, are actually not
doing that at all. They're using those ideas to mask the same kind of corporatism, authoritarianism,
ability to censor, ability to surveil, ability to shut down, that has always characterised
authoritarianism, whether it's from the right or the left, or these new emergent terms like
centralist and peripheral. There's no question that, call them a leftist government if you will,
although it doesn't fit with my terminology, the current American administration are an
authoritarian administration. They're about the imposition of power and control, even the way
that the war is discussed, the conversation around the pandemic, the shaming of people that won't
align with their perspective on culturally.
I definitely agree with you.
I just think that I can arrive at the conclusion of our humanity logically.
I don't need emotions to do that.
I can logically deduce that we are human beings and that of course we shouldn't be doing things.
We shouldn't be imparting evil on individuals.
I don't It's not because of an emotional aspect, but I don't think that we should be imparting evil.
But yes, you're exactly right.
What we're seeing right now is this authoritarian government across the world that are pretending to care about people, compassion, you know, wear a mask, save lives.
Well, how could you not want to save lives?
If you don't want to wear a mask, then you're a horrible person and you're trying to kill everybody.
And that's why I really think it's important to steel yourself against that sort of a manipulation.
And when you speak about that, though, They kind of frame you as a harsher person, which is something that I've definitely suffered in the media, is that this hardening of Candace Owens doesn't have a heart.
It's not that I don't have a heart.
I just also have a brain.
And I'm very fearful of government encroaching into our personal lives.
And I had done everything to insulate my family from that.
And the best way to do that is to tether people to their brains and, you know, not saying more than their hearts, but just to remember that you do have a brain and you should use it.
I don't find you to be a hard person.
I think that you're actually a good deal of fun and that you're very bright and sparky and a joy to be around actually.
But I do think that you are a sort of deliberately iconoclastic.
I think you are Great provocateur.
I think you enjoy saying controversial things.
That's sort of my assessment of you but I believe that all of those things are possible within joy and good humour and of course within the parameters of accepting that you have had a completely different life to me.
You're completely entitled to entirely different political perspective and in any kind of democracy worthy of the name you would accept and embrace those differences.
Now last time we were talking We spoke a lot about populism in the most sort of common and broad terms.
Brexit regarded to be a sort of an emergence of a nationalist populism in my country.
Trump commonly regarded as a sort of an outlier in a new type of populism.
But in a sense, these markers don't hold up to scrutiny because across Europe prior to Brexit, there were numerous populist movements in response to the 2008 financial crash.
in your country, protest movements like Occupy, which I grant you was a truly global movement,
as that financial crash was also global. Would you argue now that populism and those populist
events - Trump, Brexit - were not anomalies, but in fact the new normal? That what we're witnessing
is a kind of an end of at least a strong appetite for a different type of politics?
Just one conversational example. I think that Ron DeSantis, who's been a guest on our show,
I'm sure you've spoken to him and found him to be a delightful man.
I understand his suffering in the polls because he is too much like a regular politician in a media landscape where what people want now are Accessible, personable, identifiably and the establishment figures like Donald Trump and let's take for the sake of this conversation the emergent forces of Vivek Ramaswamy who I know you're very fond of and RFK whose populism and popularity at least is another marker of change.
Yeah, you know, I think for me personally, the reason why I said from the very beginning it didn't matter how much money that Ron DeSantis had, that his campaign was going to be a flop and that prognostication has proven true, it's not necessarily because he seems too much like a politician.
It's because there's something about him that feels like he kind of checks which way the wind is going, and maybe checks with his
donors before he says something.
And it really comes really down to your gut instinct about an individual, and I think it matters.
I actually think it matters.
There's something that feels less trustworthy with him.
And that's not to say that you need to be extremely personable and a great speaker.
I mean, I actually find RFK interesting because of the work that he's done,
and I'm obviously not a Democrat, and I wouldn't vote for him,
but I think that the work that he has done regarding vaccines and sort of standing up
to the medical establishment his entire life is something that's noteworthy.
He's done something different.
He's done something brave.
And to hear him continue to do that is something that makes me
want to gravitate towards him.
I don't think any of us would say RFK Jr.
is one of the great orators of our time, necessarily.
And so, yeah, people are responding to looking at an
individual.
I think they're taking what they're saying and what they're
doing and wondering if this person will have enough courage
because it takes a lot of courage when you get into
position of power to stand up to the authoritarian, whether it's
the CDC or any of the other bodies that they've created.
And I just don't know that I feel that way about Ron
DeSantis.
Vivek Ramaswamy is doing a lot of different things.
I didn't really think anything of him until I had him on my
show, and I just had a very good I felt like, OK, I kind of understand who this person is.
He's a true academic.
He's extremely ambitious.
But it felt more authentic.
So, yeah, I guess you could say that that could be something that has to do with the populist movement and people are naturally distrusting.
But I think it's something else.
I think it's gut instinct.
And I think that people want to measure you against, you know, Did you stand up to this?
Did you stand up to that?
What is your actual record?
And Ron Sanders is a great governor.
I have nothing bad to say about him.
If I was living in Florida, I'd try to vote for him 10 times if I could, but I never thought that he was going to be able to have the same success nationally.
Well, it wouldn't be possible to vote 10 times because, as you know, there are no problems with voting in Florida.
Or anywhere else.
It's one vote per living human being has been well established for a long time now.
I think it's not just about like oratory, but just authenticity more is what people appear to be craving now, Candice, that people are sort of starting to sense that our sanitized, empty, hollow political rhetoric isn't leading anywhere. Another thing, because you sort of,
I guess it's fair to say that your position is generally a conservative, how do you feel when
issues such as free speech and a broad and general anti-war stance appear to now have become
conservative issues?
There's been this extraordinary flip where the liberal, peacenik, cultural revolution, let it all hang out, let's smoke a doobie man party has become the party of have a war, don't question a war, don't talk about potential peaceful or diplomatic solutions.
And obviously when it comes to censorship, the liberal democratic left It appears more sensorial based on the relationships that have been demonstrated between them and the social media sites, for example, and their use of various deep state agencies to control narratives.
And in fact, excuse me, just the continuum of censorship across successive administrations, Snowden onwards, you know.
So, when values like free speech and anti-war can become untethered from one side of the political aisle, what does that do to your position?
And do you think it's a fair assessment to just acknowledge that these changes have taken place?
Yeah, these changes are taking place.
What I would say is the right is still very much pro-war, as well.
I mean, I think we saw this in the Republican debate stage, where how many people were saying you had Pence, you had Nikki Haley.
And this is why we talk about the military-industrial complex, because it encompasses the left and the right.
But speaking outside of the political players and just to the individuals, yeah.
I think what's happened, because I've tried to actually assess it, is People that are left-leaning have actually always been emotional.
And so what's happened, though, is the emotional arguments are now being transpired to make them support things that they've never supported in the past, right?
So it still works, you know, if you're saying, you know, end the war in Vietnam.
There's emotions.
Let's let's end the war.
Hippies.
OK, we want this to be over.
And now you're saying, well, no, no, no.
Go to war.
Because think about the Ukrainian children.
Think about how awful Putin is.
It's still a hijacking of emotions, but the end result, I think, is actually different.
So they haven't necessarily changed.
They've perhaps grown more emotional.
I would say the media has grown just increasingly so focused on emotions all the time that they're not even thinking.
It's just, how could you not feel bad for the Ukrainian children?
How could you be so awful that you don't want to send billions?
Who cares if there's no accounting and it's kind of going into a black hole and we're giving less to the people that are in Maui?
You know, it's your job to constantly care about something.
Here is the current thing that you need to care about.
That's really interesting because it makes you wonder if there's any actual principles present at all.
My position on being anti-war is surely at this point in evolution we must be able to come to peaceful solutions.
Surely this is our duty and I would say that whether it's the Iraq War, Afghanistan War, Vietnam War, Korean War, current war between Russia and Ukraine.
And in all of those wars, the death of civilians and children of all creeds and nationalities is appalling.
When it comes to the subject of free speech, when we were talking in the 1960s or whatever about civil rights movement, pro-women, gay, different ethnic minorities or cultural groups, when it was them spearheading that cultural movement, their free speech was important.
And now I think free speech is... I mean, what the point of principles is, is they transcend an immediate agenda.
Isn't it?
It's like your principle doesn't just sort of shift depending on what your objective is.
Oh, I don't like war.
Actually, I do like war.
And it seems that what's happened is that war has become packaged in quite unique ways.
And I agree with your analysis that it's emotionally packaged, but what it appears, the genuine power behind it appears to be an ulterior or transcendent power, depending on your perspective, and specifically the military-industrial complex, are able to Make sure that the American project remains a military one for economic rather than ideological reasons.
And I reckon, I suppose, that that's a rational discourse and a rational analysis.
But for me, it comes from an emotional place because I think it isn't right to kill people and use violence as a way to resolve disputes.
So it's sort of a fusion of both emotion And rationale, because rationale can lead to genocide, brutality, and so can emotion.
So, yeah, I wonder what you thought about that little moral snake's nest I flung your way.
No, I actually, I totally agree with you, and this is why I was staunchly against, even from the very beginning, day one, it's like we just pulled out of Afghanistan, now you're telling us that we need to all focus on Ukraine, and the American mindset is kind of being set to believe that we constantly have to be worrying about everybody else's problems, right?
that if you say, "Okay, we have plenty of problems here "on our own, why don't we focus on those,"
that you're somehow rotten and you're somehow backwards.
And again, there's no accounting for it.
As you think about, you've got IRS agents that can, God forbid you send $200 on PayPal,
you know, you can be fined by the IRS.
I can log into my bank account and I can see every single charge,
but we have no idea where billions of dollars are going into a black hole.
And it's very obvious that there are kickbacks and this is why the politicians
want to keep these wars going.
I mean, that to me is just a rational, logical conclusion that most people don't see when the current thing arrives
because there's this full media effort because part of the military industrial complex
is also the media.
The media is reinforcing these ideals, reinforcing these principles that we constantly have to be the moral police in the world.
Quite frankly, I'd like to mind our own business.
I don't know why we insist that the way that we want to live has to be the exact way that every single person in the world wants to live.
I live in America.
I like American values.
I like American principles.
I don't necessarily think that people in Iran and Iraq have to enjoy the way that I live or the way that I dress or the freedom that I want to express.
And so they use this moral policing argument, and you saw this on the debate stage.
It's one of the reasons that I would never vote for Nikki Haley, why Mike Pence I would not vote for, is because they say, no, it is our job, and they use these Cold War arguments, and this is why we must do this, and, you know, Russia could become the Soviet Union again, when, in fact, it's us that has military boots all across the world.
It's us that's actually encroaching into other people's territory, and people are completely delusional about that fact.
And when you say it, You know, you're public enemy number one, but I've been public enemy number one and two and three for a while now, so it's okay.
You've been a lot of public enemies.
Now if you're watching this on YouTube, one of our glorious 6.5 million awakening wonders,
tuning in doubtless to see a fiery spat between Candice Owens and Russell Brand.
Candice because of her ferocity and libertarianism and me because of my alleged,
I think you said sickle waving socialist or hippie dippy, airy fairy sparkle covered
woo woo new age guru clap trap.
Well, it hasn't happened yet, but next we're gonna talk about YouTube censorship
and how it has pertained to both of us, how both of us have been affected by legacy
in mainstream media censorship and attacks.
And we'll be talking about that exclusively on the Home of Free Speech Rumble.
Click the link in the description.
Join us over there right now to see us talk about that subject.
If you're watching us on Rumble, give us a like.
The Rumble button, that don't mean nothing no more.
Give us a like.
Like us, like mama used to make.
And we'll talk now.
Are we safe?
Are we just on Rumble?
Can we, Candice and I, speak freely?
Candice, so what do you think about the role of YouTube in regulating and censoring content?
Do you think they've just become another arm of the mainstream?
And also, I still want to take issue about saying that my children are surprisingly beautiful, rather than predictably beautiful, on the basis of a beautiful, two beautiful parents.
Your children are shockingly beautiful.
I know there's no pictures of them in the public sphere, but I did run into you in the UK and at some hotel,
and they are shockingly beautiful children.
Like, they're just really stunningly beautiful.
You're kind of like, you see them, and it just kind of blows you away.
I'm not saying that you're not a shockingly beautiful man, but I am saying that any person that saw your children
would be like, "Wow, these kids are positively stunning."
They should be on, I don't know, the cover of magazines.
They're just, they look like glass dolls is the only way that I can describe it to people.
I'm like, have you ever seen Russell Brand's children?
They're shockingly beautiful.
I always say it.
I want to be honest with you.
I don't want to say it behind your back.
I always say your children are shockingly beautiful behind your back.
Now on, I'd like you, when you're passing on that anecdote, to say, have you ever seen Russell Brand's children?
As you might imagine, based on his physical appearance, they are extremely beautiful children.
But then again, why wouldn't they be?
Just to reiterate my main point, isn't Russell Brand handsome?
And then, you know, carry on with whatever crazy, ethno-nationalist, right-wing, rallying cry you are on.
So wait, what do you think about YouTube censorship then, Candice?
I absolutely hate it.
I'm on a ban right now.
I'm always in trouble with YouTube.
And what's really surprising in your earlier question about whether or not they're pushing mainstream talking points, I think it's much more nefarious than that.
It's really scary.
The groups that they allege are protected.
I think all of my strikes I've ever gotten on YouTube are all pertaining to the topic of pedophilia.
And they try to say, well, you can't talk about pedophiles if they're gay or if they're trans,
even though we're reporting on actual news stories and talking about what's actually happening.
And for me, it's not a battle that I'm willing to give up.
So I continue to talk about it.
And I endure these strikes and these periods because I'm a parent now.
So this is one category that I'm not going to say, well, just find me on a different platform,
and we'll talk about it.
It is something that needs to be talked about.
There's obviously been an explosion of pedophilia light as I like to call it, what's happening in the school
systems in America.
I'm not sure if it's as prominent in the UK school systems, and you can let me know.
But this agenda, operating under the guise of LGBTQIA, by the way, tacking on extra letters,
and this is what happens.
These social justice movements never end, right?
It's the NAACP.
OK, now you have the same rights as white Americans.
Oh, but now we have another battle to endure.
It's against the police officers.
Glad.
All we want is gay marriage.
Love is love.
Second you get gay marriage, suddenly you're like, well, what about trans bathroom signs?
Oh, okay, now we've got the trans bathroom signs.
Well, we need to make sure that children are allowed to pick their gender in the classroom.
It's never ending.
And I don't understand what two gay men wanting to be in a relationship has anything to do with my children being enrolled in a school and needing to learn about, you know, 26,000 genders that don't exist.
What do you imagine is the agenda of those you oppose?
Hill to die on. So, you know, the YouTube censorship surrounding that topic makes me
very uncomfortable.
What do you imagine is the agenda of those you oppose? What do you genuinely think is
the reason? Because, you know, I know the kind of stories you cover.
I know how it would be reported in some portions of the media.
People would say, like, misgendering and things like that.
And you know me, right?
That's not the sort of thing that I would ever do.
If someone wants me to say something, you know, the same way as I call someone mister or doctor or whatever, if they ask me to, someone says, call me like whatever I'm like, it's for me.
Just because of that principle of kindness that I've previously mentioned.
With regard to this issue, are you saying that you believe that paedophilia, obviously I think we've both agreed that paedophilia is distinct and separate from other forms of, it's a matter of abuse because it's a matter of consent, children can't offer consent, they're too young, it's just plain and simple abuse.
So What do you think is culturally happening?
Do you think pedophilia is being normalized, and to what end?
Yeah, it absolutely is being normalized.
They've already come up with another term for it.
You're seeing college professors say that it's this push that it should be called minor attracted people, that the word pedophilia is not something that should be used.
That's scary.
You're softening pedophilia.
And when you see things of this nature, and then you take a look at the books
and why they're trying to introduce this to kids that are quite literally in kindergarten, first grade,
I mean, you're talking about kids that are five, six, and seven years old.
Why else would you wanna talk to them about their private parts and their gender?
It doesn't make sense.
Teach my children arithmetic, teach them hard academics, you know?
And it's not about being accepting because you have children.
Could you imagine if every single thing that they said you wanted to affirm?
I literally yesterday woke up and my son said he wanted to drive the big car.
Yeah, it's important to tell my child, no, he can't drive a car.
And so by trying to assign to say to kids, you actually are smart enough and you do have the autonomy separate from your parents to make decisions.
What are we setting them up for?
You know, we're setting up the idea that you can can you're an adult, you're a little adult and don't listen
to your parents and your parents are backwards, which of course is the pedophilia
thing is just going to be right behind it. And I've got my eyes on that. I really do
believe that that's what's happening right now. My children happen to be quite good drivers and
I have no problem with them driving either the big or little. They can do what they
want in that vehicle. I mean, as you've said, they're so unnaturally and peculiarly and
inexplicably good looking.
You've got to let them do whatever they want. I was also, what do I want to say there? What
I feel is reasonable when educating, firstly, I would say this.
The parents of children should be in charge of the way that those children are educated, and whether that's traditional or progressive should be a matter for the parent to determine.
Again, that's a principle.
So the principle isn't, I've got a preference and I'm going to use this argument to leverage my preference.
I don't care, not care, but mind how other people raise their children.
I wouldn't mind other people telling me how to raise my children.
So like, you know, and, but what I would say possibly, aside from paedophilia, which seems to me pretty
plainly wrong, that when it comes to offering different ways that a human being might express
themselves or be, isn't the assumption that we live in a culture that doesn't allow
room for debate or conversation, or at least hasn't historically, and a lot of assumptions
around identity, around gender have been made, that sort of began with something you
touched on earlier, that women ought to be able to work in all roles and have jobs in whatever
sector, and even when you said a bit earlier, women are more emotional, I thought, God, I
bet I'm more emotional than you, and I'm a man, you're a woman, I bet you're more
logical and rational than me.
I'm emotional.
That's how I run, you know what I mean?
Anyway, so I guess, look, a conversation about norms and the various ways that people might express themselves, I think, is healthy.
But having said that, I don't think that anyone else should take precedence over the parents when it comes to imposing ideals or ideas.
Yeah, we need to be a society, of course, when you're governing for the whole.
You need to be a society that governs based on the rule, not the exception, right?
So yes, there are exceptions.
Are there some men that are more emotional than women?
Absolutely.
But as a rule, women are more emotional than men.
And we should be able to say that.
We should be able to acknowledge that.
And that's always been the circumstance.
Women are drawn to certain categories.
that men are not drawn to, the way that men bond is different than the way that women bond.
These are, again, rules. Of course, there are exceptions.
I'm sure there are some women that are absolutely crazy about sports and absolutely love sports.
But to then say that because we have these exceptions and we're going to now pretend
that all of society needs to pretend that everything is anomalous, that's when things get crazy.
I mean, you think it's an act of compassion to if somebody comes to you and says, you know, I'm this to affirm them or to not to maybe not affirm them, but you're saying out of respect to, you know, play pretend in a certain way.
And for me, that's offensive to me because what you're saying is I don't mind how you live, but when you tell me that how you live Now has to influence how I live and I have to pretend that reality doesn't exist.
I find that to be very problematic.
It's sort of like, you know, if you meet a person who's suffering from, I don't know, bipolarism or suffering from grand delusions and they come to you and, you know, they say something that is so obviously not true.
But then they demand that you say that it is true.
You're demanding that I lie, right?
So if you want to go out and pretend that you're a woman And in, say, I'm, you know, I don't know what a Russell name would be, whatever it is, that's absolutely fine, but I don't have to pretend that you're a woman.
I get to exist in the realm of reality, and so I find that to be weird when we're encroaching on people that are seeing things straight and as they are, and pretending that it's not kind if they don't want to play pretend.
I'll play pretend with toddlers, I will, you know, but not with adults.
Well, I suppose I see it as that around language there is an arbitrariness anyway when it comes to some of the terminology that's used.
Language is convenience for identification and if Language has a different meaning to somebody because of the way that they feel, and I can make them feel better just by saying that.
Like, for me, that's easy, and not that different from if someone had some sort of cultural tag that they would like me to apply, like, seigneur, monsieur, or, like, whatever.
If someone says, like, for me, that identifies, you know, female or any form of identification, it just doesn't trouble me in that way.
I'm sort of open to the type of analysis you apply to that, but I don't know what troubles you.
Because calling me a birthing person, you're basically saying that I have to cease to exist so that men that have mental disorders can exist, right?
That's very wrong.
It's very wrong to pretend that I'm not different from you.
You've been pregnant before, Russell.
Do you think calling me a birthing person, you've seen your wife be pregnant, you see what women go through.
So the idea that I'm going to stop existing so that somebody can feel good in their head, it's just not who I am.
I think it's very important to acknowledge the actual struggles that real biological women go through in the same way and the hurdles that they have to go through.
And as we start diminishing language, which obviously is what's happening now, they're starting to say, you're a birthing person.
Men can breastfeed.
No, they can't.
Women breastfeed, women go through that.
It's a very hectic experience.
And so I very much draw the line at that.
And I'm very happy to be considered not compassionate or not emotional enough.
And I think that the reason that movement has gotten so far and now you actually have men invading into women's spaces is because it started with one person saying, I'm just going to pretend to make you feel good.
You just, reality has to remain reality.
And I am very objective when it comes to those things.
Okay, what I feel is like you said earlier about the norm should rule or the majority should rule and I started to feel that under scrutiny and analysis there are so many different taxonomies that are not really acknowledged.
An obvious emergent one are the sort of subjects around gender identity that we've been discussing but it appears that there are just so many ways of being American, being a human being, And it appears to me that really what the ulterior force,
the burgeoning force beneath this, which is not being addressed,
is that there is nothing permanent or necessarily rational or logical
about the idea of a nation state, about having communities of 300 million people
or 60 million people under one government, that this in itself is an idea,
and plainly it's an idea because there is no actual literal thing called France.
It's conceptual, it's abstract.
Same for any nation or community.
And indeed, for hundreds of thousands of years, we evolved in smaller communities.
Now, I'm not anti-progress or anti-technology or medicine or any of those great advances, but what I've started to suspect is that centralism, centralisation, authoritarianism, gargantuanism, whether that's in the corporate world or in the state, are ways that you can create elite strata
and control huge populations.
What I believe in is maximum democracy that would, in my view, immediately diffuse
the kind of conversations we're having.
Like in, so if I was living in a community of a hundred or a thousand people and we vote.
Do you agree that we, if people want to be called a pronoun, we'll do it?
And we go, yeah, yeah, cool.
And then you're one.
People go, no, no, we're not doing it.
There you go.
Democracy.
And we all accept and marvel and enjoy the many different ways, like you said earlier, that people might, you know, you're happy if you go to Iran or Australia or Finland and find cultural distinctions, which I think is glorious.
And in fact, a different kind of diversity.
What I believe we're on some level protesting against is the homogenization of
everything and this homogenization is happening for commerce, for commodity, for authoritarianism.
It's not benefiting ordinary people. It's advancing elite interests and it's undemocratic and it's destroying the
world.
And people are sort of positioning it in extraordinary ways in order to facilitate it.
So where do you think that democracy and the simple idea of people being able to run their own lives and run their own
communities, as distinct from a kind of libertarianism that becomes
ultimately, I don't know, sort of financial and a communal anti-community?
How do you, what do you think about those type of ideas, dear Candice?
Yeah, I actually totally agree with you, and that's actually what makes America quite unique, is that we have state rights, and so you can kind of choose your tribe.
You know, I made—I decided to leave Washington, D.C., and leave—I was also living in Philadelphia for a while, because I realized that I don't identify with these people, I don't identify with the way that things are run, and I moved south.
And it feels like I'm in a completely different country, just living here in Nashville, Tennessee, right?
Completely different values.
And it's all about finding your tribe.
And you are correct that I think that we function better on a community level.
And now my life is totally different, and it doesn't even reflect what you're seeing on the mainstream media, because they have no interest in the way that people are living in the South whatsoever, actually, if we're ever being talked about.
It's in a negative way.
So you're absolutely right.
And this is why I think that I spend so much time and conservatives in general spend so much time talking about families, right?
Because that's that's your original tribe.
Your original tribe is a husband, a wife, the children.
You get to assess how you want to live, what you want to allow into your household, who you want to allow into your household.
And that is the number one answer that I get to people when they ask me what they're they're so frantic about the way of the world.
and I'm talking specifically about Americans because our government is run different,
obviously, than yours.
What can I do? What can I do?
Rather than focus on the big picture, this idea of what the nation
and what our responsibility is as a nation, what can you actually do in your own house?
When COVID happened, for me, I never worried a single day.
My children were never going to be masked.
I was never going to mask.
When we had a baby nurse come one night and she was wearing a mask,
I said, "You don't have to wear that."
She said, "I want to."
And I said, "Actually, we don't allow that in this house."
And we showed her right out because this is our house.
We get to a side.
We're actually the bosses.
I'm the dictator.
Me and my husband are the dictators.
We're the evil rulers of this house.
So, and that returns power back to the individual.
Which is wonderful.
Your style, man, you're hilarious.
Because like me, I'm like, listen, I don't really see that these mask things are working.
But I guess maybe I'm just not strong enough.
But if someone in my house was wearing a mask, oh man!
I feel embarrassed asking people to take their shoes off.
But you'd be like, get that mask off!
Yeah.
And what did they say?
That's what I did the entire time.
She left.
It was, you know, it was no hard feelings.
I just said, we actually don't allow that in our home.
And I think she was quite surprised by that.
But the concept of my child waking up in the middle of the night, baby, and you've got a person that looks like Bane from Batman looking over their crib, it's just not allowed in my house.
You know what I mean?
This is a baby.
If you're afraid of a baby, I don't need you here.
That's my Bane impression.
you.
"Hello, let me check this baby is doing well.
What a delightful child."
That's my baby impression.
I hope you're pleased that I've done that.
That's what it would look like.
I was like, he's going to wake up and my poor little baby is going to see like, oh, this
is very scary.
And so we just didn't allow it in our households at all.
Didn't require any of our employees to wear it.
We didn't stop anything.
We didn't care about don't see your family for Thanksgiving.
I hosted a huge Thanksgiving.
You know, that's the beauty of small communities.
That's the beauty of family.
You get to establish your own rules.
in the nonsense of the mainstream media. So you're absolutely correct.
In a way, it starts to expose, I think, a conversation like this one, that there is
no need for ongoing cultural conflict. There is simply a need for mutual acceptance and
respect, whether it's a subject like masking, where it appears we agree, except I'm too
scared to impose my own beliefs in the same way that you are.
Or subjects like gender identity, where we disagree, but it's sort of like, yeah, let's be who we are, man.
Like, what's the issue?
Now, I want to talk to you a moment, Candice, that because you are such a troublemaker, because you can't even accept That Netflix have made a successful documentary about causing some bloody problem about it, making a murderer, which we all liked.
We all had a lot of fun.
We all sat around thinking, oh, the police are corrupt, aren't they?
The way they've jailed this poor fella.
It was a lot of joy.
Now you've made a new docu-series trying to ruin that for everyone else, haven't you?
Trying to even unmask that, like that was a problem.
Tell us about your new docuseries, Convicting a Murderer, and why you've done this, and why you're such a troublemaker.
I have to say, one of the things that I'm fascinated about is just the psychology of propaganda, and we've all fell victim to it at one point in our lives.
I mean, there are so many things that I believed when I was in high school, and now I know that those things simply aren't true, but I adamantly believed them in my soul.
And so in my political career, or in my cultural career, however you want to spin that, I like the idea of a mass brainwashing that takes place because the media was able to present a piece.
And so I obviously did the Black Lives Matter doc last year, and now Black Lives Matter is filed for Chapter 11, and people are starting to realize that I got really emotional and fired up about that.
But, you know, before BLM and George Floyd, there was this Making a Murderer series, and for whatever reason, we trust documentaries more.
Like, we just set our preset to, like, okay, the media might be lying, the news might be lying to me, but the documentary, they're documenting this, so this absolutely must be the truth.
And the Stephen Avery case was absolutely fascinating.
You know, it was a global sensation.
It put Netflix on the map.
And you see this same dynamic that keeps playing out over and over again, where we are now interested in turning villains into heroes.
And you see this on a fantastical stage, like, you know, the movie Maleficent.
Like, they're, oh, Oh, actually, here's the real story.
Wicked Broadway play.
Oh, actually, I know she was the bad guy, but let me tell you why she has a soul.
Joker, you know, actually, let's really tell the story of the villain, feel bad for the villain.
But then when that happens in real life, like with the Stephen Avery case and making a murderer, when you are taking someone who, you know, threw a cat into the fire, abused animals, abused dogs, abused cats, abused women throughout his lifetime, and then kills a woman, And you say, as a documentary maker, how can we turn him into a sympathetic character?
We're talking about something that has very serious implications.
We're talking about a family that had to not just bury their daughter, Theresa Hallback, who was 22 years old and had her entire life ahead of her.
And was fearful of this man, Stephen Avery, and who expressed her fear regarding this man, Stephen Avery.
She was brutally raped twice.
She was shot.
She was stabbed.
She was burned.
She was chopped into a million pieces.
And then she was killed in the afterlife because two lesbian documentary makers from New York was like, this could be an interesting person to turn into a hero.
And what happened was the celebrities seized this, all the usual characters.
Alec Baldwin said, you know, the brother wasn't crying enough at the funeral.
and created this monstrosity of this family getting harassed with conspiracy theories,
some that the daughter wasn't even dead, that she was gone with the cows and in Mexico.
It created a cult, you know, a fan base and people sending letters to Stephen Avery wanting to marry him in prison.
It's very dangerous.
This aspect of the media being able to turn villains into heroes when it comes to real life is very, very dangerous.
And I'm very interested and I always want to expose it because the only way we conquer it is if we all realize that we're getting duped, you know, that we're playing a part in all of this.
That's a fascinating perspective and take.
What do you think it is?
Because I've always thought that, in a sense, a story that tells the Joker from a sort of semi-naturalistic and anti-hero perspective is an interesting are
It's interesting.
You're like, oh, yeah, this could be another take.
This could be interesting.
We're going to explore this.
But I think in terms of the media, there's always been something more nefarious at play.
I don't think it's a coincidence that all the late-night talk hosts made these documentary-maker stars, gave them Emmys, you know, and told them, yeah, absolutely, this could potentially be true, and decided not to look over the facts.
There was one UK host, actually, who, from the very beginning, called those women out and said, you're not telling everything about the case, but his name, I can't think of right now.
But I think for them, there was always an agenda, because in 2015, when this docuseries premiered, Making a Murderer, there was this sort of anti-police sentiment that was brewing, and they wanted to believe that the police, who are generally the good guys, were the bad guys.
And we've seen how that's played up and how that's scaled over the years.
And you see that when they were sitting down with Trevor Noah and these hosts on late-night talks.
did his thing, and he's sort of said, "Oh, well, this is the one case where now white
people can see how we've been, you know, how maybe potentially the criminal system is wrong
and rotten and locking them up because of Stephen Avery,"
and did his whole bit.
And so it was also a way to racialize everything, which is bizarre, because Stephen Avery was
a white guy, but to kind of drum up this narrative.
So I think that there is always a nefarious political agenda and they seized upon this series to further divide people.
And yeah, we're kind of seeing the consequences of that.
But this is something that I'm just fascinated by.
I just, I love to examine people's psychology and how easily we are routinely duped by the power of the mainstream media.
What do you think is the significance of the success of a film like Sound of Freedom or the Emergence of Our Man, Oliver Antony, like these sort of, I won't use the phrase anti-hero after what we've just been discussing, but like new cultural voices that are not coming through the typical machinery, the media machinery, which of course have incumbent economic models and Certainly, you strongly believe a set of ideals that they are conveying through their cultural products.
What do you think about the Sound of Freedom phenomena?
Let's start there.
It's amazing.
It's amazing to see something that is truly anti-establishment have so much success.
And I think we're seeing this, like you said, with Richmond, north of Richmond, that people, we're understanding how people are feeling.
And I think that there is a moment, there is a shift that is happening culturally.
I think people are no longer believing They're what they're reading and what they're seeing in the mainstream media.
And that's in large part not just because of people like them, but people like you, podcast hosts that are getting millions and millions of views and subscribers stepping outside of the traditional model.
And I think that infuriates the establishment.
And it's why they've grown angrier and why they are encroaching even more on censorship and things of those nature, because they think if we can just stop these people from speaking, then we'll be able to regain control.
But they're wrong.
The train has already left the station.
Oh, please God, please God.
Hey, I've got a few questions from, like, people.
Thomas Beard, I was just, like, watching these guys in the locals' chat.
Some of them, they're such conspiracy theorists, they think that this ain't even live.
It's live.
Thomas Beard goes, do you think that the Will Smith Chris Rock slap was staged?
I don't.
No, I think Will Smith is a broken man, and I think when I watched his wife put him on Red Table Talk and talk about how she cheated on him with her son's friend, and he sat there like a puppy, I was watching a man.
It was very sad, like a tail between the legs, something that you should never see happen for a man, and I think he was broken.
He had a moment.
He wanted to show Jada that he was the strong, masculine man that she's looking for, and he did something stupid.
That's good analysis.
Fair enough.
Thanks.
Michael L. Roscoe, do you ever plan to run for president because him and his family want you to?
That's very sweet.
Thank you so much.
You know, at the moment, I'm running behind toddlers.
The family stuff is way more important to me.
And I actually think that I have more influence outside of politics.
I think the realm of culture is way more influential.
And I'm just happy with where I am right now.
You won't do it!
Oh wow, gosh.
Rich2054, what is your personal view of the Lahaina fires, the local federal government response, and what's your perspective on big stars doing campaigns to raise money for that?
Obviously, the federal response has been abysmal, and when you weigh it against our response to Ukraine and the United effort to make us send money overseas, it should really shine a light on how corrupt the United States has become.
I don't have any conspiracy theories to offer.
None of it makes any sense.
It's very worrisome, and it's kind of hard to sift through it all at the moment.
But yeah, absolutely a corrupt response is what I would say.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's a weird one that.
I tell you, it's interesting talking to you.
Maybe I have changed.
Maybe I have, you know, I still disagree with you with loads of things, but I agree with the, I agree with the concept of you.
I agree with the essence of you.
I agree with the right for you to be you.
And if you came on here one day and said that you wanted a different pronoun, I wouldn't, I wouldn't even remark on it.
I just go, yeah, right.
I don't care.
I'm like, I'm happy.
Love is love.
Love is love.
So, hey, listen, Candice, thank you very much for joining me.
I hope you've enjoyed this conversation.
Now, get out there in that world and have some fantastic luck.
Last time you left a conversation with me, you went out and got a husband.
Why not leap straight into polygamy?
Go out there, get another one!
Or a wife!
Why not that?
You've heard it here first.
I'm off to get me another husband because that's just my luck after I do the Russell Brand Show.
Thank you so much for having me.
It's always been so fun.
Let's not make it too long next time.
I'm always in the UK, by the way.
We could do this in person.
I married an Englishman, you know?
I know.
I know you did.
Don't think I don't think about that.
Come and sit here.
Come and be on the show.
I'd love that.
I'd love that.
Yeah, exactly.
Thanks, Candice.
I love it.
Stop saying that my children are... I like beautiful, but not unnaturally beautiful.
Not like... Well, they're just... They're, like, beautiful creatures.
Like, they're, like, perfect specimens.
Because they would... Guys, I'm telling you, it's bizarre.
Obviously, because they would be.
Candice's new docu-series, Convicting a Murderer, which is seemingly made just to annoy people, is available on The Daily Wire, of course, and you can watch episode one on YouTube.
