Why would anybody visit Epstein Island?

Three minutes after ten is the time. Um it's uh y well, that we're gonna wade straight into it. This this this tidal wave of horror.

that washed over the uh the world at the weekend as as millions more documents from the so called Epstein files finally saw the light of day, although some containing absolutely hideous allegations against Donald Trump disappeared almost as quickly as they appeared. Make of that what you will. Where do you begin?

on a morning like this. Uh, do you begin with the news that a man who was the de facto pro or the husband of a man who was the de facto Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, was accepting tens of thousands of pounds from a character who at at the time um ha had already been convicted of sex trafficking. And and this is the point that I think gets overlooked, is is that the original conviction mae'n rhaid wedi'u llawer o'r pethau sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n.

Yn newspaper, if you take one, will also, or your internet news service, will also feature quite a lot of pictures of Peter Mandelson in his pants. Whose life is ever likely to be enriched by images of Peter Mandelson in his pants? And also, to make very brief light of what is a deadly serious subject, who still wears wife? Don't at me. That is not a fa Yeah, go on then. Who still wears white fronts? O three four four four four four five six oh six zero nine seven three.

That was a joke. Please don't ring in to tell me that you st I'll put you straight onto Keith if you're ringing in to tell me that you still wear wife. You're not getting on the radio.

Um so the depu de facto deputy prime minister uh uh under Gordon Brown, um I don't know and and we may never know, but it seems to me possible. that Peter Mandelson uh was unaware of the extent of his husband's financial dealings with Geoffrey Epstein, but he wasn't aware of his own dealings and his own social dealings, all sorts of allegations um sw s swimming around. And then you have Andrew Windsor, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, as he chooses to call himself.

Facing a an a new legal threat, the Daily Mail reports, after a second woman alleged that Epstein flew her to Britain for sex. Um this is in addition to the Epstein revelations which feature him lying on top of a of a of an apparently rather young woman on on the floor of what appears to be Jeffrey Epstein's New York apartment. And then you have revelations, um or accusations, allegations about Bill Gates, about um oh you name them there in it. That the the rich and the powerful. And men.

Always men. If, like me, and it's been a desperately unfashionable position to pursue in the UK media in recent years, but if you find yourself equally disgusted by sex abusers.

um uh irrespective of their ethnicity or religion, if you are as disgusted by the behaviour of Geoffrey Epstein and his mates as you are by the grooming gangs that have a a a large makeup in many cases of of people, men with Pakistani heritage, then you'll be waiting to see what all of the people who've used Pakistani, or as they prefer to call them often, Muslim, grooming gangs, and indeed attacking the United Kingdom.

It'd be very interesting to see how high the horse is that they climb up onto today. Imagine inviting Elon Musk, who's all over the Epstein fast, despite claiming that he had

nothing to do with the man. Um uh uh inviting himself to parties and expressing a deep desire to um get involved in some serious socializing. Imagine inviting him to comment at your rally um ostensibly to protect British women and girls when these people were consorting with a man whose own conviction for sex trafficking was was well established.

And I feel quite naive on mornings like this. D do you know what I mean by that? I I think it's probably male privilege, actually. I was talking about this with some friends last night and um we've all got daughters and and dads don't really know. Until me too came along, dads didn't really know what it was like to be a woman. I saw something online the other day.

And it was it was supposed to be a joke. Like so what would you do if you were a man for a day? And like you're supposed to make a joke about s sort of, you know, sexy things or I don't know, football or something. And this amazing woman, I wish I could remember who it was. You'll probably find it. She just said I'd go out at night.

I'd go out on my own at night. What would you do if you were a man for the day? I'd go out on my own at night. We were talking about this last night and uh all of the of the the the the women round the table were. Right, yeah, absolutely. And the men were a little bit um Rick Oh yeah, of course. That it took a while. Always men. Yn yw, yw, yw, yw, yw, yw. Yw, yw, yw, yw, yw, yw.

yn ymwneud â phobl, ac yn ymwneud â phobl, ac yn ymwneud â phobl ac ymwneud â phobl ac ymwneud â phobl ac ymwneud â phobl ac ymwneud â phobl ac ymwneud â phobl ymwneud â'r enghraifft sydd wedi'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'

ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud. Uh we've been covering this since Andrew Norfolk first started writing about it in the Times in uh in two thousand and eleven. And one of the earliest questions I asked Must sound very I've got naive, what's the correct word to use? Um one of the earliest questions I asked was about

the group dynamic of it. Because you know, or I know, I've always understood that individuals do terrible things. But if if somebody invited you to join in I'm gonna sound pathetic now. I I used to think you'd call the police.

It's su it's we did it a bit possibly looking back unfairly, focusing upon whether or not there was something in the in the geographical diaspora from particularly poor parts of the subcontinent that explained why if your mate was grooming a fifteen year old girl and invited you to join in, you wouldn't phone the police, you'd actually contemplate joining in.

But now we learn that you can be an extremely rich and powerful man who is grooming young girls. And when you invite your mates to join in, they don't phone the police. They hop on a plane and come to join you. Who didn't know, honestly, what Epstein was like? Do you think there's a sort of human hierarchy here that these people actually think of themselves as just better, whether because they're rich and powerful or or because they're men or because

Whatever the reason may be, they just think they're better. Therefore these children, these young women are are are just not they don't have agency. They have What do they have? They d they just have uh they're there to serve. Don't laugh, please. So I don't mean it in a light hearted way, but I was thinking about Henry the Eighth again.

last night. I just I I'm not fascinated by the way that we were taught it's not so much the same today, but we were taught that this guy was like a cross between John Bull and Julius Caesar, the British equivalent. And he was a syphilitic psychopath who killed his wives when they didn't do his bidding. Uh you think of religion as a yoke, a straitjacket that's used to keep the population in its place.

It's what Karl Marx was talking about when he talked about religion being the opiate of the people, the promise of heaven means that we'll put up with penury and poverty, deprivation and exploitation in this world. 'Cause we get our rewards in the next world. What was Henry VIII's attitude to religion when he wasn't getting his own way? Just abolished it.

Just literally um cut off all links with the Catholic Church and started his own like a sort of mad cult lead. Oh, I'll be the head of the church now. Never mind God or the Pope or whatever it may be. And and th these people bring a kind of sociopathic sense of superiority to to the world that we still don't properly'cause either you feel it or you don't. Are they all narcissistic? Are they all paedophilic? Are they all psychopathic? Are they all I don't know.

But I just never understood the bit. where they tell you what look at uh Giselle Pellico, that hideous story in France. I mean even that is easier to understand in some ways because they met on websites that were dedicated to perversion. Jeffrey Epson is knocking about with bankers and and and and and you know you know who's photographed in these files with what appear to be very young women? sitting on their knees, one on Epstein's knee. The bloke who has directed the Melania Trump film.

that nobody has seen yet, except journalists, as far as I can tell. He's literally there. He was a big feature in the Me Too movement. They're looking around for someone to direct a movie about Melania Trump, and they happen upon this guy who's all over the Epstein file. But do you see what I mean about the size and the scale of it being too big to process? Find me one celebrity who's committed one crime and I'll find you uh an uninterrupted array of front pages all dedicated to it.

They've gone today m mostly for the Andrew Windsor angle, the mail in the mirror, the right and the left, the yin and the yang if you like, of the popular press in this country, both going in on the new um uh woman coming forward to accuse Uh Andrew, and it's it's Epstein adjacent, of course. Epstein is the man accused of arranging this visit, but it's not um Epstein Files the story. Is it Mandelson? Mandel the Mandelson story.

Absolutely extraordinary that that a senior politician of any hue, but in this case a Labour politician who perhaps again naively you think might be a little less Um likely to subscribe to the notion of human hierarchy. They're supposed to believe in equality. Like Liney said years ago about being supremely comfortable.

with extremely rich people or whatever it was, takes on a slightly different hue now. How naive do I sound when I say to you, Do you know, I'm not sure I realise that being rich and powerful provided you with so much impunity? Yeah, I remember when that woman in America talked about the taxes being for the little people just before she got sent to jail. I think her name was Leonora Hemsley Helmsley. And I I remember thinking, but surely every surely the Lord I've such a child.

Such a sweet summer child thinking but the law applies equally to everybody. Let's look at cases in this country. You line up incredibly expensive lawyers on your defence side, and you are much more likely not to be convicted than you are if you're relying on legal aid, or if you have, um you know, the the the the local high street solicitor punching way above their weight. It's obvious. The richer you are, the uh

The wealthier you are, the more powerful you are, the less you seem to think that normal rules, both moral and legal, should apply to you. Even like motoring offences, if you've got the money to hire a I d anyway. Um I don't know how much of it you've seen, I don't know how much of it you've followed, I d I don't know how much of it you can bear. It's I mean it is it is I j inexplicably hideous, all of it.

the photographs, the allegations, that the police reports that were not followed up, that the incredible absence of concern for these young women, which again has parallels with the scandals that we've had in this country, because there's a sort of subtext of consent, isn't there? There's a subtext of well, they they didn't mind, they went along with it. They w which is what the police often said in the cases of um uh th the grooming gang scandals that we've seen in this country. So

I I I and and Fergie, as she still calls herself, Sarah Ferguson. Emails appear to show Epstein wanted her to release a statement saying he was not a pedo, again in March of two thousand and eleven. It's not a shock to me. that rich and powerful people have a a vocabulary of their own. And it's not rich and powerful, is it? It's rich or powerful'cause

Andrew Mountbatten Windsor doesn't bring wealth to the table. He brings influence and status. Epstein deals in both. He deals in money, he deals in humans, he deals in influence, and he deals in wealth and status. He's like a kind of Ah i like a sort of Tolkien style spider at the centre of a web that extends into almost every corner of Western society.

Uh or or at least into the almost every corner of the upper echelons of our shared societies. And I don't know what to do today, except ask you what you have been most Taken by, shocked by, disgusted by? What have you well hey, here's the question. Takes me a while to get there sometimes.

What have you learned? O three four four four four four five six oh six oh nine seven three. Whether you're looking at Mandelson, whether you're looking at Andrew Windsor, whether you're looking at Virginia Dufre, bless her memory, whether you're looking at the um allegations being made about Donald Trump, which he subsequently claimed somehow absolve him, that appeared and then disappeared in in moments, had to triple check I hadn't been dreaming.

Um, the knowledge that the Department of Justice has said essentially that they're not gonna release what's left, which is about the same amount as what has been released. Why not? Why can't we see everything? That's second question. And I'll take serious I don't want conspiracy theories. But why can't we see everything? If they can redact people as they have done, uh who are vulnerable or who are victims, why can't we see everything?

Why can't we see every single mention of Donald Trump, for example, in the Epstein Files? How can somebody who appears in them hundreds and hundreds of times essentially be overseeing the process of what gets released and what doesn't? I am not, as you know, a conspiracy theorist. But um it it does seem an extraordinary coincidence that so many members of his high command were supremely comfortable in Epstein's company.

So question number one, what have you learned? O three four four four four four five six zero six oh nine seven three. Question number two, what what is the um The sort of biggest lesson in a way. It's the same question as what have you learned, but the the idea that this goes on. That's the bit I'll never understand, is that if Jeffrey Epstein said to me, Oh, we're having a big party, you should come to my island, there'll be some s teenage girls there who will do whatever you want.

I would run in the opposite direction at ten million miles an hour and I I would have done when I was twenty five, let alone fifty four. It the confidence is it? The knowledge that these men are going to behave in exactly the same way that he does?

You might not have learned anything, of course. If you're a woman, you're you're more likely less likely to be shocked by any of this than than most men are. But what have you learned? Hit the numbers now, O three four four four four four five six zero six oh nine seven three. And I think I think the question I'm going to ask is is whether or not it's not a good idea.

the the scale of it, the sheer scale of this means that justice is is slipping out of reach for everybody. There's just so much of it that how on earth do you pursue or prosecute? Do you understand what I mean? That might be a bit niche. So we'll begin with what what what what have you learned from this hideous saga? O three four four four four four five six zero six zero nine seven three. It's twenty past ten.

It's twenty two minutes after ten and you're listening to James O'Brien on LBC. Well I d I mean does anyone respond to this stuff wi with with a sort of yep? I knew it I knew this was going on. The extent of Epstein's network, the tentacles that reach into so many areas of of of the highest levels of of American and British society, the royal family, the de facto deputy prime minister.

I can't there's something here that I cannot make sense of, and I don't know what it is. Do you? What is it that is the sense? So baffling about this story. It's not the right word, is it? It's it's like this this impenetrability. This sense of shock that you have at something that is not just going on under your own nose, but is going on above your head, is going on, as I keep saying, in the highest echelons of

of our society. I it doesn't matter what your previous opinions were about any of these people. You didn't have them pegged as characters who would be comfortable with or go along with this kind of thing. Epstein's first conviction was in two thousand and eight. in Florida, where he pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution and soliciting a prostitute.

I only did thirteen months in a county jail. He started a sort of PR rehabilitation process uh almost before we'd got out of the door, but that is the point for me at which everything begins to fail to make sense. I'm going to stay friends with him. I'm gonna go on holiday with him again. I'm going to keep in contact with him. He's sending money to some people, but some of these people are so rich they will never ever need money from him. They they I mean they literally make him look poor.

Elon Musk sending in messages. Hi, Jeff. I was thinking of flying down for an epic vacation. Redacted name told me you were planning a party. Girls. I cleared my calendar. What are the details? Thank you, good sir. That's from Elon Musk. Um he replies, I d I d I d well, I mean it's it's it's all there.

And and that's the bit I don't and maybe nobody does. Maybe maybe I'm just gonna sit here for an hour spluttering incomprehensibly about what is going on. Because who can tell me how this works? How do you sound somebody out? For this kind of behaviour. It's just a question I asked when it was taxi drivers in Rotherham. How do you know that your mate is going to be, forgive my French, up for it? When I thought all decent people would

A run a mile and B call the police. How do you sound someone out? Do you make jokes about grabbing women by their genitals and then see how people respond? And if they respond in a certain way, I don't know, if they say oh it's locker room talk, then you think aye. There's somebody I might be able to do disgusting business with. How how do you even begin?

To establish who may or may not be sufficiently repulsed by what you're doing, and then at the other extreme people who won't be able to wait to come to one of your parties.

Um I cleared my calendar. And and of course this is happening after he'd been jailed for procuring a child for prostitution. November twenty twenty twelve. Elon Musk who caused Spoke to a crowd in London that was supposedly dedicated to protecting women and children from predators. In twenty twelve, Elon Musk wrote to a man who'd been jailed for procuring a child for prostitution to ask what day night will be the wildest party on your island.

I don't know. I don't even know what question to ask you today. What's going on? What have you learned? Gareth is in Birmingham. Gareth, you can have a go answering a question I've barely asked. Good morning, James. How are you doing? I'm all right, but I am I d I I'm I'm uncomfortable and confused. But I mean beyond disgusted, obviously, horrified, all of that. But these these you know, Musk essentially put his own man in the White House.

last year. And yet after Jeffrey Epstein was jailed, he's asking about parties. And anyway, what have you learned? What have you learned? I I suppose I've learned a couple of things. One is that um power, if that's your need and for acquisition is power, it becomes very boring. In the same way that um you can get into a particular job and after a while the job is boring and you want more. I think for powerful people like Elon Musk, for Trump

um they attain the power they want and then it's a steady, they've got it, it's boring, there's nothing to acquire anymore. So you go a level further. And for Trump, you know, he started that in his first presidency, but he had people around him to kind of keep him on the guardrails, but then he got rid of them and in the second term, now I can do whatever I want with impunity.

And I think similarly your your worry about, you know, how do people find out that somebody will be up for coming to the island? People fish, corrupt people fish, and by that what I mean is conversationally, they'll bring up something that's a bit inappropriate. Do you react?

Do you say anything? Do you say you're uh abored by what they're saying? If you don't say anything, they'll say something a bit darker. Do you react? If you don't, that you're telling them that you're okay with what they're talking about. That's how they start to fish.'Cause I would say it's the same with recreational drug use. Even if it's just smoking, you know, marijuana, someone will fish and maybe ask to find you're similarly minded, you know? And and

Yeah, okay. Like uh like sounding out the sort of Just just waiting to see what reaction you get. Racism maybe as well? You'd sort of say something a bit low level, waiting to see. Yeah. Misogyny, racism, all the all the usual things. Rakist joke, anti Semitic joke, does any w does everyone laugh? Does anyone feel a bit uncomfortable? No one feels uncomfortable. How much further can I take this? What can I say next?

Can I shock'em or are they part of my gang? I like this analysis. I I mean like is an odd word to use, but you know what I mean. Uh w what about this thing I can't get past? The the the the two thousand and eight conviction. Um I and and this, you know, it's after that conviction that people like Mandelson and Andrew Windsor and and and almost all the rest of them

Are are still consortium. How did that here's a question. I don't know if anyone can answer this, but you can go first. How how did that conviction not shut him down forever? I think because power and money. that that could outweigh everything. That was enough to get him off you know, get the sentence turned into a more lenient sentence, make arrangements with Howard Lutnick, get deals here and there.

There are other people who want favours who you might be helpful to in the future. I think that's what it's all about. And the stuff that we and and and you know, uh the stuff that was not um that hasn't been released, i y y you can't really blame anybody for speculating. Uh uh uh almost unimaginable things must be in there.'Cause what they've released is incredible. The stuff they've decided not to release. So you mentioned Howard Lutnick planning a visit to to to the island.

Years after he claimed to have cut ties with the convicted paedophile, he's the Commerce Department Secretary. He's the sycophant in chief. at Trump's cabinet meetings. He's the guy who sits there saying on a scale of one to ten, Mr President, would you agree that you deserve a twelve for your good looks and intelligence? And he's there. He's he's up to his elbows. He's up to his ears.

In in Epstein um associations. Years after he claimed to have cut. I don't know. Do we sound naive? You I mean, do I sound naive? Are you sitting there thinking, Oh, bless him? But does he not realise this is this is why he keeps thinking about Henry VIII? Because men have been behaving in this way throughout the ages. And to think that guardrails or laws or or authorities or conscience or morals will ever put any sort of break on these people is

It's just naive and idealistic. I don't know. It's half past ten. Thank you, Gareth. The phone lines are open. O three four five six zero six zero nine seven three is the number that you need. I I'm not on um particularly perspicacious form this morning because I don't I d I I don't know how you talk about this.

Uh you can pick the ones you don't like. Like I'm an anti royalist, so I'll go in on Andrew. I'm anti Labour, so I'll go in on Mandelson. I'm anti Trump, so I'll go in on Trump. But that that's that really detracts from the universality of his associates. That that all they have in common is wealth status and perversion, it would seem, to me. And I don't understand how that can go so Unremarked at such a high level. Hopefully you can explain it to me after the headlines with Dominic Ellis.

Ten thirty four is the time. Um we are, if you're just joining us, talking about the Epstein Files. It's not a program that lends itself to easy analysis'cause th there's not really a central question running through our ponderings. I I'm asking what you've learned, but that feels inadequate. And the reason it feels inadequate is because I don't have the vocabulary to address what we are discussing and what we are discovering.

I I genuinely don't know how to do this. It's too big. We've almost every time we talk about Donald Trump, we talk about the impossibility of holding on to anything. Because the minute you get a grip on something that matters Something else happens. He'll invade Iran in order to distract people's attention from the Epstein files. Or or he'll um kidnap the president of um uh a a a foreign sovereign country uh in order to distract attention from uh problems at home or or or or border force.

Officers murdering people on the streets of Minneapolis in cold blood and and I feel a bit like that as I look at the latest. tranche of files, which Donald Trump has inevitably claim absolve him of wrongdoing, even as the rest of us process the fact that some absolutely hideous allegations were contained in the first round of releases this weekend that then were mysteriously redacted, mysteriously removed, almost as if there were people involved in the process.

who were um not very impressed by what they were required to do. So they did something they weren't supposed to do and then as soon as it was noticed it got undone. Listen to this. This is an interview with Epstein that nobody seems to know the provenance of or understand the reason for. But it's it's really interesting. Just ask a question. Is your money dirty money? No, it's not.

So in fact Why is it not dirty money? Because I I earned it my uh heart that you you earned it I earned it we went back to this before, you earned it you earned it w b uh uh advising the worst people in the world. Right? That do enormous bad things uh and just to make more money. You're a mathematician. We walked into that clinic where they're giving that money out to these people that are in di the the most dire straits of poverty and and and and sickness.

And told'em that the money was coming from a what are you, class three sexual predator? Tier one. Tier one's the highest and worst? No, it's a lowest. You're the lowest. Okay, tier one, you're the lowest. Um but a criminal. Yes. That the money came from. What pr what percentage of people do you estimate? I understand you don't like probabilities, do you estimate would say, I don't care, I want the money for my children?

I would say m everyone said, I want the money for my children. Did they know where the money came from? If if I think if you told them the devil hundred percent the devil himself. The devil himself said, I'm gonna exchange some dollars for you to your child's life. Do you think you're the devil himself? N no, but I I do have a good mirror. It's a serious question. Do you do you think you're the devil himself? I and no why would you say that?

Because you have all the attributes. You're you're incredibly smart. You remember the devil is somebody knows what? The d the devil's brilliant. You read Milton's you read Milton's Paradise Lost. No, the devil scares me. Weird. Nobody knows why it was done. Nobody knows where it comes from. Is it is it posthumous? Has he recorded it for posterity? Is it some sort of weird I genuinely don't know. Um but there it is. There's a sort of knowledge of what he is and what he does, and I I

I can't get past the conviction in two thousand and eight for procuring a child for prostitution. A deal. So normally when deals are done that there is or there are worse accusations, um that go by the bye and Everybody carried on being friends with him. That's the bit. Can you explain that to me? I'm conscious that we haven't heard a female voice yet. That's often the way on radio phoning programmes. Happily not so much this one.

But I really want to hear a a a woman's answer to the or or female answers to the question of What have you learned from this? What are you taking away from the knowledge that the most many of the most powerful men in the world were supremely comfortable in the company of a paedophile? was supremely comfortable in the company of a man who had pleaded guilty for procuring a child for prostitution. And an awful lot of these people, the sort of worst of them,

have been at great pains recently to to to portray the United Kingdom as some sort of paradise for perverts and paedophiles. What is it I mean, is it as simple as saying that if if you don't want to get into trouble in elements of British society and the British media for being a paedophile. Just make sure you're rich and white.

And not not not Brown. Is I mean, is that it? Where's where's little Tommy Ten names at the moment? What what's he gotta say about Elon Musk wanting to go partying with a bloke who had been convicted, who had pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution? Can't get past these things. O three four five six zero six O nine seven three is the number that you need. Peter Mandelson.

Bill Gates is in there. All of the names. So many members of Trump's administration. And yet I just the sense that it doesn't matter enough, and I don't understand why. Neil's in Nottingham, Neil, what would you like to say? Why uh James. Uh I I think in terms of my main comment I'd separate it out from the uh if you like, the web of let's say rich men and influential men because I I I can on one level understand

Epstein's desire, if you like, to cast his net as widely as possible and and uh uh incorporate people into it. The thing it says to me though is it just underlines uh i i in treble, if not quadruple, just how low American democracy has democracy has now sunk to. Wha wh why do you say that? Because of because of everything that's going on around these revelations. Bec be because it's it's it's almost'cause th this stuff has been going on since I mean as long as humanity's been around.

Wha which is why I said from the point of view of somebody if you're like wanting to cultivate a network of rich and powerful and influential people It's Steve Bannon conducting that it's Steve Bannon is conducting that interview. I d I I should have mentioned that, but nobody knows why is is the is the point that I'm making. And Steve Bannon, of course, this is long after the conviction for soliciting a child for prostitution was was being fated all over the place.

And um and and propelling Donald Trump into the White House. You can't it's too big, isn't it? Nail, it's too it's too big to get a proper bead on or to get a handle on. That it just shows how absolutely low and how perverted American democracy now is. If you cash your mind back to twenty sixteen in this country, when that original tape came to uh to uh to public about, you know, the grabbing and all the rest of it.

Everyone in this country, I think, at that stage took a sharp intake of breath and thought, That's it, it's over but it wasn't and it's continued in a similar vein. It's it's it's just got worse and worse and worse on every single level that our whole frame of reference has shifted to the extent now that we can now have a situation where an American president implicated in this never mind um i if you like which bits he may or may not have done and all the rest of it.

the the thought that an American president would still be in power in this situation is now normalised. I mean in the UK, if you like, bad as we are and much as we can criticise elements, the fact of the matter is Prince Andrew is no longer Prince Andrew and Peter Mandelson has had to resign yet again. But that but that compared to America, if you like, is nothing. That's i i in the UK Boris had to resign well for lots of reasons, but let's say

COVID parties were the same. They're all very quiet, aren't they? The Donald Trump cheerleaders in the UK meaning. They're not even first tier. Um first tier. Well you sat you sat I mean we don't know that. And and what if what if I mean, God forbid Andrew had actually been king? Would would the same um ma machines of operated with the same uh process of of of being gone through, you know, it's a it's an accident of birth that that made him

second in line to the throne for for his entire child well until Prince William was born. But the that you know, do do you know what I mean? Is i he is disposable. Whereas had he been one notch higher up the ladder he wouldn't have been and the the the the Ah what am I talking about? The engines of the establishment might have moved to protect him in the way that they move to protect people in the United States.

I still remain convinced at the moment though that our rule of law does at least still stand for something. In America it stands for nothing. The only reason these files have been released in the first place is because there was an act of uh uh of law passed in America. Then the act wasn't met, it's still not being met, and Trump is in the position probably where he can and will say to Pam Bondy, supposedly his independent attorney general.

Uh I don't want any more released than anything that is released. I want it to be taken down within twenty four hours and redacted in the following way. Which is which is unbelievable. I mean I can understand why British newspapers are going after Mandelson and uh

Andrew Windsor, but the uh you know, I read one newspaper that that essentially just repeated Donald Trump's claims that he'd been absolved of all wrongdoing without referencing the um uh the allegations that involved an awful lot of alleged Wrongdoing. And fifty percent of the Epstein files have still to be released, which means they're simply not complying with the law. The Robert Garcia is a Democratic ranking member on the House Oversight Committee.

And he said, Donald Trump and his Department of Justice have now made it clear that they intend to withhold roughly fifty percent of the Epstein files. while claiming to have fully complied with the law. This is outrageous and incredibly concerning. The Oversight Committee subpoena directs Pambondi to release all the files to the committee while provect while protecting

survivors and and nobody is even pretending that they've done that. This is, I think, what you're speaking to when you say the the the decline, the measurable, the visible decline. of what we would once have described as American democracy. I guess the next question then is, well, so if you like so what? What's gonna happen? It's a breach of the law, so what? Who's gonna who's gonna enforce it and how? The answer is nobody is because he's going to ignore it and he is

uh government departments which hitherto are supposedly independent operating on behalf of the country are all gonna tow the line and do whatever he says. That's that's where American democracy now is. He can achie he can choose to disobey any law that he that he wants to and even the ones that finally probably end up in the Supreme Court we can see that there's a large uh likelihood that they're gonna go gonna go his way. He's he's corrupted.

American democracy to such an extent that it can't handle this crisis. Yes. I mean that there there's a there's a paragraph. I I d uh in the article I was reading that that does mention the thing I was just alluding to. This is in the Daily Telegraph, some documents detailing graphic allegations against Mr Trump. And if you haven't seen these allegations, I'd almost urge you not to look them up because it's it's I mean, it's unbelievably hideous. They were released before being briefly removed

from the DOJ website later on Friday. Um I yeah, I d I d thank you, Neil. Rising to the challenge there of just trying to say something substantive about something that seems to me to be I uh how can something so enormous be so hard to pin down?

Uh you know, I am not ordinarily a either lost for words or struggling to find a strong opinion on something. I've I've had a message off a pal of mine. I won't um I won't tell you who it is'cause he hasn't said whether or not this is this is for air or not, but but you you y he's he's in this industry, you know him. Mate, I feel utterly confused and lost by the events of the last few days. The Trump excerpts that I've read made me sick to the pit of my stomach.

Forget that I'm the father of a daughter. As a human being it makes my blood not just run cold, but hit freezing point. Yet I feel like I'm living in a parallel universe where the British media has rightly gone in very hard on Andrew and Mandelson. Yet I see precious little coverage of the leader of the free world who is up to his ears in appalling allegations that should make any man or woman with a shred of decency running through their veins beyond appalled, and yet so many appear unmoved.

I spoke to a Trump supporting friend yesterday about the files, and rather being appalled, his only response was well nothing has been proved yet. Um the world is beyond lost, and I fear for my daughter, because a lot of the world she is growing up in is being run by rich, powerful men, who would see her as a piece of disposable meat, while their enablers would continue to look the other way.

Do you know, I I that's why I mentioned dinner last night when we were talking about that woman who said in an interview if she could be a man for a day, she'd just go out on her own at night. That's why perhaps I'm getting more calls from men than I am from women because women are just going, Oh, yeah. This is the world we live in. It's the world we've tried to tell you about. What the hashtag me too backlash.

You know, not all men managed to turn a a a rare moment of accountability for sexual harassment, sexual abuse, rape. Turn that rare moment into a thing about men, or those people with the hashtag Not All Men? You remember that? Women just sitting there listening to this programme going, Yeah, James, this is the world that we've always lived in. Welcome.

Welcome to your brief little window on on what the reality is. I dunno, I don't know, you tell me. O three four five six zero six zero nine seven three. It is ten fifty one and I I think I may have finally happened upon the source of my feelings this morning, as as as we continue to work our way through the um so called Epstein files. Th there's part of me that wonders how anybody anywhere could be talking about anything else.

I get that quite a lot, oddly, at the moment. I I mean it it just seems to me uh to the last caller's point about the collapse of US democracy and of course the ripples of that on this side of the Atlantic will and already are potentially absolutely enormous. But how can we be talking about anything else? A couple of weeks ago joined the Greenland stuff.

You know, we did thirteen hours out of fifteen on uh on Trump and Greenland, forty five minutes on the Beckhams, and then Mystery Hour of course,'cause everybody meets Mystery Hour. And and and then fifty per well, uh forty eight percent of me was thinking, Are we are we going mad? Or is everybody else? And fifty two percent of me was thinking, but how can you possibly talk about anything else?

Boris Johnson's column on Saturday, Boris Johnson, massive Donald Trump cheerleader, was about the um the bus driver who beat up a thief. and lost his job and then had the decision to to be fired upheld by a tribunal. Boris Johnson, paid by the Daily Mail as a statesman, an international statesman, a former prime minister, massive Donald Trump fan.

Choosing to write about a sacked bus driver on sack Richard Little John in the same newspaper on Friday, another massive Donald Trump fan. Choosing to write about fly tipping. The w I mean we are, aren't we? I'm not going mad. They are. We are in the midst of something absolutely hideous.

The the President of the United States of America claiming to be absolved while the rest of the world is literally reading allegations that are beyond disgusting about him. So many of his close associates, his wife His wife. is in there. Not just as a passing, but sending messages to Ghilaine Maxwell, currently serving a print prison sentence for her role in trafficking underage girls. Um she calls Melania Trump sweet pea in a variety of exchanges.

I remember fly this is a a an email that Jeffrey Epstein sent in November of twenty sixteen. I remember flying back with Donald on his plane. The first weekend I went to visit you in Florida. It was the weekend he met Melania and he kept on coming out of the bedroom saying, Wow, what a hot piece of And a word I'm not gonna say on the radio. And then the wife, Mrs. Trump, is sending emails to Ghilaine Maxwell.

the director of the new film, the Amazon Flop, um I i that is Provoking a lot of laughter and mockery at the moment, but they got paid so much money for it, I don't imagine they care about the laughter and mockery. The director of that film who was essentially cancelled by Hollywood after a a whole bunch of sexual misconduct allegations were made against him back in twenty seventeen. The director of that film appears in multiple pictures with Jeffrey Epstein in the latest release of Files.

And they're looking after each other. Fifty-six year old director seen with his arms around one of the women, holding her arm on his leg. Pictured with with other women hugging Jean Luc Brunel, a French model scout and longtime associate of Epstein, who also died by apparent suicide in his jail cell while facing charges of

Of raping a minor. Who are we gonna get to direct the film, darling? Well well let's get that guy who got cancelled for sexual misconduct allegations and was frequently partying with Jeffrey Epstein. Oh no, we can't go near him. Jeffrey Epstein is But he isn't. That's the bit I don't get. So here's the question at ten fifty four. We may carry this on into the second hour, but only if your appetite for examining and discussing this matches mine. Why has the world not stopped?

W why has the world not stopped? Why do these revelations not constitute A a a much, much bigger moment. Think about that, because maybe you can answer it. Because the people involved are just too powerful? Why did the world not stop when Henry VIII beheaded Amberlynn? Why has the world not stopped? How how can it be that you know, everybody who sits in the Oval Office buttering up Donald Trump with ludicrous sycophancy and the death of traditional journalism are are also old mates of

a convicted paedophile. And they stayed friends after he was jailed for procuring a child for prostitution. I'm not going mad, am I? The world should have stopped. All of the things we consider to be true. Whether we're discussing grooming gangs in the in the north of England or whether we're discussing historic allegations or whether we're discussing the Catholic Church or public schools.

All of the things that we consider to be true should by rights have contributed to a process that sees this as the biggest story of our age. I mean, it would have been big enough if Donald Trump and his mates hadn't ended up in the White House, if Elon Musk hadn't ended up as as the sort of right hand of the president.

and bought a social media platform in order to shut down honesty and critiques and truth to power and replace it instead with racism and white supremacy. Because you can't separate the two. Um I haunted by Mike in Greenwich's call a couple of weeks ago, Mike, a former US diplomat, just explaining it's all about the racism, the misogyny and the climate change denial. Everything that Trump stands for and represents is racism, misogyny and climate change.

The misogyny may may be too mild a word to describe what we're discussing today. But uh but it's there, isn't it? You can only really eng engage in behaviour like this if you hate women. Yn ymwneud â'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio'ch chi'n gweithio? Hello, how are you? I'm very well. Well, I mean, you know, relatively speaking.

Um so what I was calling to say is um I wanted to zoom in um on something that you said um a few minutes earlier, um when you brought up Henry the Eighth and you said uh you said that

No, maybe is this are women surprised by this? Is this in on some level what men are like? And that That sort of that made my hair stand on because that is the sentiment that I've heard again and again over years of researching this, talking to hundreds and hundreds of men about this and that I think that suspicion which is very, very natural, it runs sort of some subcutaneous under under all these assumptions, that idea that maybe maybe this is just s there's something in men that does this.

That is the point. The point is to create a sort of complicity to make men of whatever social standing feel that they have more in common With the monsters who are doing this. than they do with the victims. And actually, most men in the world have more in common with the victims of Epstein and Musk and Donald Trump. the Navy. Tr Trump is the focus of allegations and Musk is not accused of anything other than um wanting to party

Uh w with Jeffrey Epstein on on on his island. So I I d understand what you're saying, but I d we do need to be careful. Um but yeah this um what I'm saying is the um I understand what you're saying. First of all, taking the Mickey out of men who signed up for the not all men thing. And then as soon as you started down this conversation down this point, I I I found myself thinking, but I know I'm not like that.

But this is what you were addressing. It's why for once it's a good job I stayed quiet and let you let you make your point. Is it deliberate? I mean i is it part of the process of almost gaslighting populations to make men think that this is how Men behave when it isn't. I think complicity is an incredibly powerful political tool. And you saw that with me too. You saw that around um Harvey Weinstein. Yes. Um

You and you see that with this I think complicity. The idea that you give people something in common, something to something to defend, an idea and it's shame. It's complicity and it's shame. And what's um But you also brought up the um that awful quote just before the twenty sixteen election, you know, uh w grab them by whatever you like. But actually the bit And the bit of that quote that people miss out now, the bit that shocked everyone was when you're a star, they let you do it.

And that's the and I think the world at that point divided into people who thought well yeah, people who thought that um well there's no way he could possibly get elected now. And people who voted for him, not despite it, but because of it. People who heard that and thought, Well well that's the kind of guy we want. That's the kind of guy I'd like to have something in common with. That's what power is.

You can do whatever you want and you'll never be held accountable. I think that's what it's about. Why do women vote for him? There have always been women who have uh sided with patriarchy and voted for power and uh picked power above solidarity with other women. Sometimes, you know, that's the safe thing to do. Sometimes

that's sometimes uh it that's what seems sensible. And and there are right wing women right now, there are there have been women involved in every, you know, far right movement in history. That doesn't mean that um doesn't mean that it's not And a tool of patriarchy. You see what I mean? And um briefly, because I'm gonna be late for the news uh and I don't think I'm gonna apologize for this question, but it might be a little bit glib. Why has the world not stopped?

I think the world has not stopped'cause we're still deciding whether or not this is a moral event horizon. there is an idea out there that some men are simply too big to fail. And we um I think culture is deciding again, like whether or not a bank is too big to fail. Can we take the hit? Wow. That's brilliant. Um where where where can people read more of your work? Um on substat.

Okay, no that's all right. Do you want to push people in that direction? Uh uh no thank you, sorry. No, that's the one I I'd like to. Will you stay on the line and tell Johnny so that I can read more of it as well?

I d I don't know that any man has ever turned down the opportunity to have a uh a a a free boost of their thoughts and works on on this programme. Make of that what you will, Laurie. I d and and I hope you don't mind me pointing it out, but you're you're obviously brilliant. I mean that was an insight of

extraordinary power, just that we're waiting to see whether or not it's an event horizon. W a and if it isn't, what do we do? We we just it's why that point, unfair though it is on on on King Charles, of course, if if Andrew had not been The spare, if he'd been the heir, would this have happened? Would the machinery of of of of the establishment have permitted I mean d you know, the abdication of the Duke of Windsor notwithstanding, would would it

Actually I don't I we'll never know. It's eleven oh two. Six minutes after eleven is the time. If you were just tuning in, and of course you might be, um and I said to you, the questions that I'm asking are Why has the world not stopped? And what what is the one thing you can't get past? Would you know immediately what subject we were talking about, what subject we were addressing? I I think you probably would. Wha why has the world not stopped? yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r

are not as bad as the stuff that has not been released. You just have to presume that, right? If Donald Trump's administration is making the call on what gets released and what doesn't get released, then you can see that Andrew and and Mandelson are being thrown under a bus. They deserve it all, of course, but y y you know that there's more in that. Rydyn ni'n ei wneud. Rydyn ni'n ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud.

Um victims being treated with with contempt, survivors being treated with contempt. Once again, um in a joint statement, Epstein's victims wrote Survivors are having their names and identifying information exposed while the men who abused us remain hidden and protected. The Justice Department cannot claim it is finished releasing files until every legally required document is released and every abuser and enabler is fully exposed.

Um And then this line here, this is in many ways and and listen, uh allegations are not evidence uh uh of truth, but they are things that need to be examined. Some documents detailing graphic allegations against mister Trump were released before being briefly removed from the DOJ website later on Friday. And he is claiming that this all absolves him. Um it is

I I uh a a a story of unimaginable proportions, but you don't have to imagine them. What you Also don't have to imagine is the the the reaction and I don't know whether I'm calling it strange or inadequate or as Laurie I'll call it a moment ago so brilliantly expressed, waiting to see. There's a ti has anyone got a sense of bystander effect? Who would lead this? The Democratic Party in the United States of America is

I mean, pretty much denuded. The media, of course, has been filleted since Donald Trump became President of the United States of America. Even Twitter, which you might naively imagine could lead some sort of grassroots revolution, um, in the public discourse space has been completely corrupted by Elon Musk, who was desperate to go to Jeffrey Epstein's island for some parties. Um

W is this gonna make me sound even stupider than usual? When when Elon Musk writes to Jeffrey Epstein, I was thinking of flying down for an epic vic vacation vacation. Redacted name told me you were planning a party. Why is that name redacted? Embarrassed. Who does that protect? Someone told Elon Musk that Jeffrey Epstein was having an amazing party and he should get himself down there. And then in brackets, Musk writes Girls FTW

Wh am I gonna sound really stupid if I say what does FTW stand for? Do you know? Is it f for the win, is it? I I knew my younger colleagues might come galloping to my aid on this occasion Girls for the win. Elon Musk writing that four years after Jeffrey Epstein was

Jailed for procuring a child for prostitu. I mean, who on earth writes to a man who's been jailed for procuring a child for prostitution, to ask if I can come to a party, Girls for the Win if indeed that is what F T D F T W stands for, and I can't um I can't think of anything else. I cleared my calendar, he writes, to the man who had previously been jailed for procuring a child for prostitution.

What are the details? Thank you, good sir. This Anyway, here he is, uh Tommy Ten names is rally explaining why this country has a real problem with paedophiles and abuse of young women and girls. Hello? You see what I mean, right? I every thread I tug Whole suits fall to pieces.

And it's not even the the the the the top story or the or the leading story in some American newspapers. The most prominent or the most prestigious of which is owned by Wait For It, the bloke who owns Amazon, who've just made the film about Melania Trump that was directed by A bloke photographed in these files with young women um about his person and Geoffrey Epstein sitting next to him. Lori's right, isn't she? The world probably doesn't know how to cope with this.

We are waiting to see whether or not we've reached an event horizon.

a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a

A decision is taken to flush out the orgyan stables of everything Jeffrey Epstein represents, up to and including the current president of the United States of America. It's not gonna happen, is it? It's not going to happen. So why has the world not stopped? And what's the bit of it you can't get past? I can't get past that conviction. I can't get past the fact that it doesn't appear to have

held him back in any way, shape, or form. Um Sarah Ferguson still writing to him, people still taking money from him. after the first conviction, where he pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution and soliciting a prostitute. The plea deal at the time was controversial, but they were still queuing up to pay homage at his court. Natalie's in Taunton, Natalie Twitter.

Sorry, I went off on one there. What would you like to say? Hello. A couple of things. First of all, I've been listening since this whole thing started at ten and you've been talking about you've got daughters and you've talked to other men who've got daughters. I'd like to point out that you're also a brother. You're also a son I mean no I d I do know that. I was just r relaying a conversation literally that we had last night about but I haven't done that today.

No, but I'm just saying all we're all you know anyway, that that that to one side. I think one of the reasons why you haven't what I said originally to the uh producer was the reason you haven't had many women calling is that none of us are surprised. Rydyn ni'n newydd. Rydyn ni'n newydd. Rydyn ni'n newydd. Rydyn ni'n newydd. Rydyn ni'n newydd. Rydyn ni'n newydd.

The um I spoke to you about that and it's about finding your tribe and it's so easy to find your tribe and and online or within the corridors of power and people don't realise it. I think maybe back then sydd wedi'u gweld ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud ei wneud wherever they are and they're getting cleverer and cleverer to hide their tracks.

But there's also somebody else more clever who can find them. Um and I think within that little pocket They find their own little gang and they just encourage each other. The the I I mean, possibly there are two things here, but possibly it it will be male privilege speaking when I when I wonder about this. So I can understand you not being surprised by what men do. Okay. But are you not shocked by

The reaction or the absence of reaction. I t I'll give you a little of an anecdote. My my daughter is uh is currently visiting London. She went out with her couple of lady friends yesterday and she got kicked in the street by a complete stranger. And so why you know, it's not a obviously. I'm I mean I I said I'm not s not surprised by what men do, but surprised by the fact that much smaller um offences by different people, including men, would have received

Very, very different, much more severe and serious treatment than this is receiving. That's the bit I can't quite compute is the way the story feels. Yeah, yeah. I mean I think because interestingly enough I was listening to um uh the rest is politics podcast this morning talking to a chap who used to work in Russia, I can't remember his name, and it's about the power, the power of having that position, the power of having that status and of that having that income.

people are so intimidated by it and also in awe of it and because of the society we live in respect it. A kind of condoned. He's got a private plane, he's got a private island. I mean this is everything yeah, this is everything we aspire to. These are all the trappings of success in our society. Um I I I and therefore but then you've got this two thousand and eight.

conviction. That's the thing. Maybe I'm missing something. Maybe there's something I don't know. But after that, why are people still emailing him? Why is Elon Musk still asking if he can come to his party with, quote, girls for the wind? I mean, what would you do if someone you knew

Natalie, talking about um wives and daughters and sisters and nieces, uh what what what about your brothers and your sons and your husbands and your boyfriends and your partners? What would you do if one of them wrote to a guy who'd been jailed for soliciting a child for prostitution, and said, Oh, can I come to your next party, Girls for the Win? Well yeah, there you go.

ydych chi'n ei wneud? Ydych chi'n ei wneud? Ydych chi'n ei wneud? Ydych chi'n ei wneud? Ydych chi'n ei wneud? Ydych chi'n ei wneud? Ydych chi'n ei wneud? What would you do? How would you feel? And they were all doing it. It's quarter past eleven. Eleven seventeen is the time. Well very thought provoking, very clever, I think, from Alan. In a in a sexually dimorphic species, extreme male power plus secrecy and weak constraint reliably generate sexual exploitation unless actively countered.

And that explains why allegations of impunity are not intrinsically surprising. I flatter myself this may be importantly relevant. Flatter yourself away, Alan, who who sent me that message via Blue Sky. Um it it is I mean it's so Trumpish for me, this conversation, because if it had landed in in if it had gone off like a bomb in the middle of our lives

Would the reaction have been different? Would the world have stopped? Would you be looking at evidence that the most wealthy, powerful, high status men on the planet were so many of them were part of a paedophile's web?

And and you think about the Catholic Church, you think about schools, you think about various organisations over the years. You think I met um Alexis J. the other night, Baroness Alexis J and her um child sexual abuse inquiry, um uh th the the the the majority of which is recommendations are yet to be enacted, although I gather the current government is um

behaving rather more responsibly than the last one. You think of the people queuing up to express horror and outrage at hideous crimes committed by brown men who've said absolutely nothing about These hideous crimes, um, in some cases actually and in some cases allegedly can c committed by very rich white men, very powerful white men. And and you know that racism and misogyny go hand in hand because We never tire of pointing it out, but you can have all of the intellectual

um weaponry available and still not feel adequate to the task, as a man, feel adequate to the task of of working out what's going on here. And that's the question I can't get past. Why has the world not stopped? It's not how men behave that shocks, although it is gonna shock women considerably less than it shocks men, some men.

It's it's the absence of reaction. It's the it's the looking the other way. It's the oh well Let's write a column about a bus driver who got sacked for beating up a thief or or let's write a column about, I dunno, fly tipping, which the two best paid columnists on the Daily Mail both did at the end of last week.

I I suppose in their defence, um that that this stuff emerged subsequently. But the idea that you wouldn't be writing about Donald Trump at this point in the historical cycle is absolutely extraordinary. Absolutely extraordinary. Do you know what else is interesting? And I don't think you can separate the two.

Uh it was the Brexit anniversary this weekend. Uh did do you see any celebrations anywhere? I'm pretty sure that when it actually happened on on january the thirty first of uh was it twenty twenty? Um, I'm pretty sure that everyone was telling me it was gonna be it was gonna be a big celebration, it was gonna be an annual party.

Uh the Daily Express would be handing out bunting, everybody would be going along for a massive part would but it's gonna be Liberation Day. Does someone remember did I dream that? Did I dream Libera it's Liberation Day? Um, Nigel Farage probably doing a I don't know, doing the hokey kokey down the mall or whatever it would be. It was gonna be a massive celebration. That was only six years ago.

Six years ago, it was gonna be huge, gonna be massive. Same people. Same people who were telling you Donald Trump was gonna be incredible are now writing about fly tipping and sack bus drivers. Um and the same people that told you Brexit was going to be brilliant are marking the anniversary of Brexit Day, Liberation Day by writing about Yeah, you guessed it. Fly tipping and sack bus drivers. Why is it not not there?

Not there. Um eleven twenty one is the time. Ellie is in Kilburn. Ellie, what would you like to say? Oh hi James. Um firstly I'd like to thank you for carrying this over the hour'cause I think Um you've obviously heard a lot of uh the other women who've phoned in have really important and um articulate things to say. But I think I I know I tend to wait to hear what has been said by others before I decide what to contribute. So

I think it's really important that you give extra space to this issue. Good. I'm glad. Yes. I uh well I'm not gonna say thank you'cause it's it's it's uh only works if people like you pop up to to to to contribute, but it seemed to make sense to me anyway. Um the thing I wanted to address really was this idea that okay, he was convicted in two thousand and eight and then people continue to be his friends.

So um there is um a very interesting documentary about Epstein and it does highlight that this behaviour is alleged to have happened for decades prior to the two thousand and eight um police intervention. I mean he was um given it. Extremely uh low grade um incarceration. He was allowed to go home every evening um um or oh sorry, during the day and go back in the evening or something like that. I mean it was it was extremely low grade.

And he he um agreed to it on the condition that everything else that whatever came his way in terms of accusation would be dismissed. So uh this was a way for him to minimize his behaviour, even though all of the people who knew him knew that was this was his behaviour. and that he was targeting extremely vulnerable young girls who were um poor poorly educated, broken homes, already in trouble with the law, very much like the um situation we have with the rape gangs in this country.

And he also ran this kind of Ponzi scheme. He paid the young girls to come to his house to do massage. Which started off genuinely as massage. And Ghlaine Maxwell's role in this was as a Support a comforter. There's a woman here in the same room, but nothing bad's going to happen.

And this was the beginning of the process of the um grooming that escalated and escalated and escalated. And the reason the people that are his friends now were his friends until his death continued his friendship was because this um very shady deal that was struck between men, police officers and Epstein and lawyers. Prosecutors. Prosecutors, whatever.

Um i i because he could m he could point to that and say, Look how careful how gently they've treated me. It was she was only a little bit underage. It was a misunderstanding. She's a bit of a crazy girl, but I've agreed to it because of this. And and on top of that, the guys who know h knew him, knew his behaviour, Elon Musk for example, seems to have known his behaviour, the parties and the girls and whatnot.

They wanted to continue the behaviour themselves and Epstein was their doorway into that world. So there's a double whammy here. It's not very it's not really serious. They're all d a bit damaged girls anyway. We're giving them some money. And on top of that the undercurrent of we want this behaviour, this guy's legitimising our behaviour, procuring girls, allowing this behaviour to continue. And it's a little bit of a boys' club, frankly. You know, we all know who the others are.

That thing was unbelievably um I I've I have no idea why he kept such records, why he kept so much information other than that he was perhaps a black I mean he's dead now so I can't slander him but He c was he blackmailing people? Did he? I mean uh we we we m we may never know, but it is extraordinary that half of the files

are still yet to be released. But the but the leverage is is is is huge. He was obviously a a a a a a frequent photographer, there's lots of No, who n we don't know what age she is, but we do know that another young woman has come forward this weekend to allege that she was flown to this country for for for f for sex by by Epstein and and

It it's funny, I d the more we talk about it, the the less discombobulated I feel, but I'm still not close to any solidifying of a position because I can't quite go to that place where We just say, Yes, of course this happens. I because I'm like, Well, of course it shouldn't and that's pathetic, but that's where I am at the moment.

I mean I understand that, James, and I you know, I I salute you for it and by you know, of course it's not all men, of course it's not all men. But unfortunately scratch the surface of very nice polite people and you'll find some really dark You know, I I'm looking at the that that that sort of hat trick.

to explain everything, that the the racism, the misogyny and then somewhat oddly, but the more you think about it the more it makes sense that the climate change denial. And when you look at the misogyny, you go back to those comments about grabbing women. And as I think it was Laurie that reminded us to saying, um, when you're a star you can do ev anything you want and and and then I'm think and that being a a fork in the road and then I'm thinking to the

There are good people on both sides comment. Mm-hmm. Which which sign w that that was the racism being let out of the bag. There are good people on both sides, when one side was Nazis and the other side was people being killed by Nazis and Donald Trump came out and said there were good people on both sides. So those two things Almost like I don't know what they are, but th those are the the codes.

that leave people with a choice between staying on board or or getting off. And of course what they're trying to work out is how many people will stay on board. So the line about shooting someone on Fifth Avenue and not losing a single vote, that's almost a red herring. That's almost a distraction. The key moments were

Good people on both sides and grabbing women by the genitals. I mean it makes me think of the Brexit thing and how that's unleashed an absolute torrent of um racist views that perhaps people would not have expressed. had they not been encouraged and been given that space. And also I'm a survivor of sex abuse. Um, my father, who's now dead, so I can speak about him freely, was a man who absolutely was adored in his community. He was a pillar of the community.

no one would have believed what went on behind closed doors to this day. And this is the sort of thing that people who are not experienced in this world Do not understand. The vulnerability of a woman who who lives with a history of sex abuse or violence or some other adverse childhood experience is very different from the lived experience of a woman who grows up in a family where she felt loved, supported in her own space and strong in her own being.

Um and and people like Epstein and the people who were his friends and and continue to profit from his behaviour are absolutely targeting, laser targeting on women who like me. were harmed uh in fundamental ways in early life So that their ideas of of how to be safe and what's correct and are you loved and what is happening.

how do I say no? All of these things get incredibly muddled and confused. And and when you're talking about fourteen and fifteen year old girls, which is pretty much his target Yes. You know, th uh h who knows their own mind at that age and and again it was this money, power, beautiful house in Miami.

A private island, the private jet, the whole the whole shebang. I mean that you know, the the and and you your head would be turned by that and the more I don't know what word to use, I I don't want to use an unkind word, but but the more The bigger the hole inside you that needs filling, the more susceptible you will be to the to the trinkets and the baubles and the and the pretense of concern or the pretense of love, or the pretense of Interest.

Yeah, and and this Ponzi scheme that he set up amongst these young women where he would say, Oh, well, if you don't want to do this anymore, uh you bring me two or three other girls and I'll pay you for bringing them in and they'll get paid as well and so everyone's a winner. So he's building a pyramid of of young, vulnerable girls.

all of whom knew they knew if they went to the police they wouldn't be believed because they were f coming from the wrong side of the tracks or their parents were in trouble with the law anyway or They had drag drug and alcohol problems. Again, exactly what happened in in the north of England and the rape gangs all around the country actually, but you know, let's focus on the north.

Women know this stuff. Even if you haven't experienced women live with this stuff because that's the extreme end. And the less extreme end is this poor woman whose daughter came to London and she was kicked in the street. It you know, w m women are not valu women are women are seen as something other by an enormous number of men.

And sometimes it's conscious and sometimes it's unconscious. In the same way as racial biophone which is why it's one of the isn't, right? Racism, sexism, Yeah, and and it's why that that that that combination of the two is once you finally grasp it is so hideously

yn effeithio yn ymwneud â'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn o'r hyn I mean, amazing calls. And it's not over yet. Dominicalis has your headlines. It is eleven thirty five. It might seem a little bit inappropriate, but we we have a a really interesting idiot's corner for you. Um

It's from Matthew, although he uses different names sometimes when he contacts LBC, which is always interesting. He writes, Oh my God, how has Epstein got anything to do with Brexit? in the context of how very powerful men get away with things, racism and and and misogyny being absolutely intrinsic to Donald Trump's success and and um racism of course being a massive part of of Brexit. But if you really don't know, mate, then

Steve Bannon is all over the Epstein Files. In fact that little clip that we played earlier of um uh Jeffrey Epstein been interviewed, the interviewer was Steve Bannon, who you will know Nigel Farage thanked for all his hard work and support. on the Brexit project, although that footage mysteriously disappeared for a while as well. There's also um uh a a a record in june twenty sixteen of of Epstein emailing somebody and describing Brexit as being just the beginning.

of a process of freedom. So I mean you ask the question thinking that you're being clever, whereas actually you just give me an opportunity to remind myself of all of the evidence that these things are actually intrinsically or or or at least um uh closely associated. But let's let's have a look at your history to find out why you've got this bee in your bonnet about racism.

And indeed Brexit. Um what let's see who we uh who we like. So here you go. This is that strange James. You can't remember but our adamant that Nigel Farage Can remember forty years. Oh, so you're a you're a you're a Brexit fan and a big Nigel Farage fan, and you signed yourself on that occasion, Matt Marty B.

Mr Trump is so right, writes Marty B, or Matthew, or whatever you're calling yourself this week. Mr Trump is so right on why Khan is being elected each time. Why will you not address the new democratic of London? Um Well, partly'cause that doesn't make any sense. Uh i it is so sad for a news outlet to only go down the left sided rabbit hole.

Um and you're from Bexley this week, not not not Welling, although they're not a million miles away from each other. And I I mention this partly because you're an idiot and you deserve to be humiliated on the radio, but also partly because it's interesting to see how fans of Donald Trump's racism, in this case his racist abuse of Sadiq Khan, will process the fact that him and his close associates are are up to their ears in associations with a convicted paedophile.

Um, what kind of excuses will you make or or how on earth will you Um uh uh what will you reach for in order to pretend that you haven't actually signed up to a project that is greenlighting all this kind of behaviour. Here but here's another one. Are you completely blinkered? London is dirty, full of crime, drug peddling sweet shops. The demographics have changed so much in a short peri So you're buying the far right propaganda about your own capital city.

On such an extraordinary scale that you're now s reduced to defending the people who were partying with a convicted paedophile long after he'd actually Served a sentence, Matt, or Marty, or Muppet, as I prefer to call you. Eleven thirty eight is the time. Rebecca is in Glasgow. Rebecca, what made you pick up the phone? Um I it started on Saturday really. Um one of your colleagues had a call in about whether we should applaud um the the the the very rich for paying their taxes.

And I kinda called out to the radio in saying, um, yeah, well that's why trumpet, I'll get away with what they they do. And it's about reverence. And I think that, you know, we s we like to think that we're modern and we've we've come a long way in life, but we really haven't. because we are still living with centuries old conditioning. Why why do you think I keep wanging on about Henry the Eighth? This is you know, even back to Henry the Eighth's time, our our betters

can do whatever they like in life and that's just the way it is. We had all these rich, powerful folk who raped, impregnated their slaves, their maids and had their own children live in abject poverty. So why would it be a problem for them to do it to somebody else's children? And that I mean, wh why would we why should we revere the the the the people who make money, whether it's old money, whether it's new money?

We don't why should we revere them? Are we frightened of them leaving the country and putting people into unemployment? They're only in that position because people have put them in that position through their hard work. So yes, I believe we should take this hit. There are only a few people in America like Jamie Raskin who are actually shouting about this.

They need the entire democratic movement to be doing something about this. A b big big fan of Jamie Ranch. Something might happen. Yes. And and of course, um back to our our our our friend with the multiple names and the racism. Uh Nigel Farage in Brexit was very much in J Jamie Braskin's sights when Farage went to Congress to give evidence and got abs got handed his

backside in a plastic bag by the by the politician you referred to. But but why'cause I I mean, there's two things going on here, and it may be that I'm indulging myself a bit by

distinguishing between the two and you see them as being inextricable and and indistinguishable. But on the one hand there's the conduct you describe and I and I think that the The behaviour of the I'm thinking increasingly of the men who were sitting behind Donald Trump at his inauguration, these new um, earls, if you like, these new lords, the sort of equivalents of the of the Woolseys and the Cromwells in Henry the Eighth's court, who who are possessed of epic wealth, but are

powerful only insofar as they keep bending the knee to Donald Trump and, you know, commissioning films about his wife or uh all of these people and some of the people that weren't there, of course, but who were um very heavily involved in uh the project, the the behaviors, but then the absence of response and the absence of reaction. I wonder where the line is between complicity

And cowardice. Wha why is it a Jamie Raskin and v and precious few else? Where where are the U U S journalists working for big organisations? Rolling Stone is doing great work, but I thought this kind of thing would stop the whole world and it doesn't. It hasn't. And and and I don't know how

Whether that makes people who aren't shouting it from the rooftops complicit or a bit cowardly or just not concerned enough. So the three Cs complicity, cowardice and concern. How how do we work out Which is the biggest driver of behavior? I think it's concern. Um but the thing is if you think about it, the the the church came in finally came into the uh into the the the limelight. But it didn't stop the barrels.

i it the church didn't lose any money out of bringing people down, but they had gone for centuries of hiding everything. So I think, you know, there are eight billion of us on this planet. We can take the hit. And I think that we have to actually just h not just highlight it. What's happened is they've thrown a couple of people under the bus. Deservedly. Yes of course we've got we've got Andrew Windsor being thrown under the bus.

who can't remember receiving the money, if he'd not received that money he'd have been out there saying, Nope, never got that. Nope, never got that. Who who here hasn't mislaid seventy five grand down the back of the sofa and forgotten it was there or indeed where it came from? But the other ones have been protected.

And and half of the and half of the files have still not been still not been released. So, you know, i f all and and of course what they do, these men, is they respond only to what is in the public eye. So Elon Musk insisting for years that he had absolutely nothing to do with Epstein. Now we've got him essentially you know, looking forward to a party after the um child prostitution um conviction. After that conviction, you've got Musk writing to him

Wanting to go to a party with girls for the win exclamation mark. I cleared my calendar, what are the details? And now he'll try and accommodate that, b possibly knowing that there's A lot more that hasn't come out. So all we're gonna do is legislate for what has come out while denying constantly that there is anything else. Of which the mothership becomes Trump who is accused in these documents of unbelievably hideous behaviour.

claiming that he has been completely absolved. I mean that is the apotheosis of Trumpism, fake news, allegations of hideous conduct, and the subject of the allegations claiming that he's been completely absolved. I don't know how you navigate these these territories. I don't know how you make sense of These events that are happening in in real time under our very noses and are being undertaken by the most powerful men on the planet.

So you would hope that you know, for those of us who've been covering the the grooming gangs since two thousand and eleven when Andrew Norfolk of the Times first started drawing attention to it and who have been clear throughout that sex abuse, rape, exploitation should not your reaction to it should not be in any way determined or defined by the background or the ethnicity.

or or or the social status or the geographical origins of the perpetrator. You can't find rape more disgusting when a brown man does it than you do when a white man does it. And you can't find rape more disgusting when a white man does it than a brown man does it. So happily, you know uh many of us happily is an old word to use, but

Many of us have been clear about that from the from the get go, even as it leads racists to accuse you of not caring about the stuff they care about much more. So what what are they going to do today? Because they're part of the reason why these men are going to get away with this kind of behaviour.

You've got Elon Musk having the audacity to address a rally supposedly dedicated to protecting women and girls when he's writing fan mail to Geoffrey Epstein after Jeffrey Epstein has been um convicted. of procuring a child for prostitution and this man, the richest man in the world, is writing fan mail to him, begging for an invitation to his parties and a and addressing him as my good sir. Thank you, good sir.

And then he has the audacity to address Tommy Tenname's ridiculous rally, pretending to protect women, while he is begging to go to a party organised by a bloke who'd already done time for procuring a child for prostitution. So where will they be now? The men and the and the women, the people marching outside hotels, the ones who really, really care about women and girls. How are they going to express their unhappiness with the men who were until I dunno midday Saturday their actual heroes?

Eleven forty nine is the time. Um I I just looking at the Elon Musk stuff that is here and and remember he upset the king, didn't he? Elon Musk, albeit he appears to have tried to get back into Trump's favours. But but Elon Musk posted something about Yn ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl, ymwneud â phobl.

Um would be full of people who were and and I quote, no one over twenty five and all very cute. He's now claiming that he didn't realise when he wrote um so and so told me you were planning a party girls for the win, he didn't realise that girls would be involved. That's what Elon Musk is claiming.

You think you can exaggerate the uh what would you call it, the moral corruption of these people, but he thinks he can get away with it now. And part of the reason why they think they can get away with it is they keep buying all the things where you might actually be able to point out that they shouldn't get away with it. What would Twitter have looked like today if it wasn't owned by Elon Musk? It would have looked very different.

from how it actually looks. Um y y you literally start buying the things that could I mean the reason why you do it is to make sure that there's no criticism of the king. In this case Donald Trump. But of course, when the machinery has been co opted by the administration, by the regime, then you can protect yourself as well. So

Where would you go to find out the details on this? If they were now trying to shut down corners of the internet where free speech was um at least being practiced. And simultaneously, just as they lie about uh uh th th th the dangers faced by women and children in this country from a certain type of man, or they massively exaggerate those dangers. while cosying up to a rich white man with identical perversions and appetites.

And and they pretend that London is the problem or or that we have issues, so they do the same with free speech, claiming that free speech is under threat when in fact they're the ones that are shutting down free speech, they're the ones that are shutting down the ability to speak truth to power. Trump even threatening to sue a comedian for telling jokes about him at the at the um

Oh the Grammys. Catherine is in Manchester. Catherine, sorry to keep you. What would you like to say? No, you're fine. Thank you for having me. First time calling so I'm a bit nervous. It's only me. Earlier you were talking about, you know, how would you feel if someone that you knew was writing to Epstein after what all he's done, right? And I just wanted to point out that we're not talking about people like me, people like you. We're talking about the elite.

So his first plea deal, right, was framed as a resolved issue. And then he served a minimal time. He kept his wealth access. social standing and for the elite that signals that the system has decided he's still safe to associate with. And punishment often works like purification. So if you think about that and you think about the relationships that they have, they're all transactional. They're not moral.

So he gets out, he's got all this information on everyone. And if you think about, okay, well, if someone has something on me, are you gonna then go and be nice to that person and keep that relationship even at a distance or are you gonna go and slander them? So I feel like a lot of these emails that were sent, a lot of the messages after the fact were more to save face with Epstein so you didn't think they were talking to authorities. Okay.

No, I mean that's very much the Sarah Ferguson experience as well, in that she was saying things publicly and then sending him private messages saying she didn't really mean it, but she had to do that and I quote, to quote protect her brand. Yeah. And you you had also asked, um, like why the world didn't stop. And I think Well why it isn't stopping today, why it hasn't stopped this weekend. Yeah. And I mean the truth of that is, is what you're running into, it isn't

uh moral failure at the individual level. It's a collision on how modern power actually, you know, metabolizes harm. So we live in an i in an era where exposure is constant. You know? So we're we're just all like you said, trying to figure out which headline to follow. And that's why it feels so trumpy, re regardless of his actual involvement in this story and his presence in the files. It's the it's the equivalent of of him just flooding the zone, which again, Bannon, big friend of Epstein's.

use that very phrase, you flood the zone with excrement and then nobody can ever really operate normally. No one can ever really respond rationally to the moral corruption because the zone is so flooded with excrement that by the time you've got a handle on that story you're overwhelmed by that one over there. And that's what's happened here.

And I mean the whole thing i it's just elite crisis management. So if you think about how that goes, first you isolate the villain, right? So you frame the harm as the work of one uniquely bad individual. Absolutely. Because monsters don't have networks, right? Then you moralize instead of explaining. So you use language like we were talking about earlier, evil, the devil, they're sick. So it's it's not the norm. There's something else. That was Bannon doing that?

Yep. And that was his exact like this was his exact playbook, right? So then you shift the focus to identity, not impact. And you debate who the person is, how they see themselves or how they're portrayed instead of what they did and who enabled it. And then you normalize proximity to power. So you keep the accused visible, calm, controv conversational, and then you signal that continuity and access is not rupture.

And then you delay. So they delayed the release, right? You delay relentlessly and you stall until attention fragments, memory is dull and the public is exhausted. And then you let the fatigue replace justice. So we count on the audience moving on long before any consequence arrives. These things take ages.

You know. And being from America I'm from America but live in the UK. Sure. I kinda understand kind of what's going on there. And and like you said, it's just a pure flood and the upsteam files are no different. I I I yeah. I this is extraordinary. I presume you work in this field of crisis management or something because you you're but y you you sound like a university professor giving me a quick pep talk before my exam on on crisis management.

Definitely not a professor, but yeah, mainly in cybersecurity, but also uh majored in behavioral science. Right. In a university. So Well practice in the UK'cause UK culture is far different from US culture. s perfectly qualified to explain what's been going on in the in the United States. I mean r right down to the timetabling as well, which is not a coincidence and and the continuing absence of roughly half of the

files that um that full disclosure would demand that we could see or that somebody could see. It and and it's a pessimistic analysis yours, right, Catherine? I mean i it it you you're not offering much hope that

I I think that's basically the direction we're heading to in general with a lot of what Trump is doing. And trust me, I can't stand Trump. The one of the main reasons I left America was to get out of there before he was reelected. Um But honestly, and it's gonna sound terrible, I I can't believe I'm saying it, I really don't think that he's done anything insanely wrong.

But in the Epstein files. And I could I could be wrong. Sure. But I don't feel like he would have camp campaigned on that promise if he had. He didn't really say well that this is this is an interesting point. He didn't really campaign on that promise. An awful lot of the people around him did, and he he gave them just enough to think he was because I used that phrase, he campaigned on the promise, and I got picked up on it.

And and so I double checked, I looked into it and I looked at some of the references, about probably a dozen texters were saying he didn't actually campaign. That's a strong phrase. It's almost as if That's that's certainly his supporters thought they were gonna get it. But if you look at the history, it wasn't one of the things he routed. He didn't hit it anywhere near as hard or as often, for example, as he

as he hit deporting foreigners or or or or or or or the racism. So it's there but it was almost put there by others rather than something that he chose to dance on himself. Yeah, and I highly doubt he wanted to release them, whether he was in them or not. And it'd also be very easy for his administration to omit anything that he was part of, right?

Well and well he's claiming he's absolved by disclosures that include absolutely unbelievably unpleasant allegations. So you know, we're back to the Fifth Avenue line again now, aren't we? Where he he probably could. release it all and claim that it was not true or it was fake news or they were alternative fact. I um I'm very glad you rang in last.

On this subject,'cause you have unpacked and unpicked an awful lot of what I have enjoyed talking about for for for two hours. But Rydw i wedi'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i'i

Yeah, I appreciate it. Well, I appreciate you. Thank you very much. And and also a quick word on why sometimes but not often I point out y mae angen i mewn gwirionedd o'r ddysgu'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r I uh I stick my oar in. That's my phrase, not hers. Rydyn ni'n gwybod. Rydyn ni'n gwybod. Rydyn ni'n gwybod. Rydyn ni'n gwybod. Rydyn ni'n gwybod.

elevated the conversation in ways that that that that the first hour didn't. The first hour went to different places. But I'm very glad that we did that in the way that we did it. And if if I hadn't been then Catherine coming in at the end there would absolutely every decision we've made. That's it on this subject. We move on next. I'm gonna do something completely different. Alright, I goodness knows that we almost need a little bit of a mind wash after some of these conversations.

Video game addiction is in the news. And I think I might have it. Three minutes after twelve is the time and you are, lest there be any confusion, listening to James O'Brien on LBC. Felly, mae'n ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn ddim yn

as paying considerably more than every other country in the G seven in in disability and sickness benefits. But the more you dig into the story, the the more you realise that it's Efectively, propaganda. You're talking about shifting percentages, relatively small figures, but if it gives right-wing client journalists an opportunity to...

attack the government then it's mission accomplished, isn't it? So th these n the numbers here are not huge. I wanna make that clear. Um the number of kids referred for gaming addiction Treatment on the NHS has increased by five hundred percent in just six years. This is actually journalism one oh one. This is a g an interesting lesson in how tabloid media works. It's done what, James? It's gone up by five hundred percent in just six years. So what is your thought now?

If I said to you the number of children being referred for gaming addiction treatment on the NHS has gone up by five hundred percent. In six years, take a rough gas. In fact, text it to me, eight four eight five O um or or WhatsApp me on O three four five six oh six oh nine seven three. It's gone up by five hundred percent. What do you think the figure is now? J no honestly, don't play the game. Don't try and second guess or or work out why I'm doing it in the way that I'm doing it.

If I tell you something's gone up by five hundred percent, give me the minimum ballpark figure that you think now would be the total number of children being referred for gaming addiction treatment on the NHS because it's gone up by Five hundred percent in just six years. In fact, the Sun newspaper reports that a staggering blank blank blank blank blank children were sent to a dedicated unit for video game obsessed teens. A staggering number.

A staggering number. So how many children do you think will be um in treatment currently for uh um video game addiction? So I read that and I thought probably twenty, thirty, forty thousand kids. Getting ch I mean,'cause all the kids play games. Some of them are going to be addicted. How many people who like a drink are alcoholics? How many people who um use recreational drugs or drug addicts? You've got a five hundred percent increase. It's gotta be up to it's gotta be thirty or forty thousand.

Um Yes, thank you to Jane who suggested five people. I I see what I've done now. I d I shouldn't have made a big fuss about it because now you're obviously recognising the fact that the number's going to be very, very low. Uh most of you are suggesting numbers that are even lower than the actual number. It was five, it's gone up to thirty. So you've got the right idea. The staggering number is one hundred and twenty one, children.

And there's only one clinic. But that's not really that's the springboard. That is the trampoline upon which we will bounce into the story, but it's not the the the basis of the story itself. Because with all conversations about addiction, I I have the same question. And it's a brilliant question because it it gets completely different answers. There there'll be a theme that runs through some of them.

There won't be a a a kind of unanimity. I do it a little bit. I'd like these questions. I I like questions uh do it a little bit oddly. Well, with all areas of mental health. Because There is a temptation, and I think we saw some evidence of that this morning, by the way, as immigration figures continue to come down, as I told you they were going to do.

And people who um uh uh depend upon hatred for their pay packets, they will be turning more and more attention to to people with disabilities and people who are sick. And they won't bother distinguishing. They'll just talk about fraud and everyone's swinging the lead and everyone's taking the Mickey and every everyone claiming this invisible conditions.

that that will now take up some of the space that has been previously occupied by racism and anti immigrant hatred. Because th th they're not going to change the hatred. They're not going to change the business model. George Orwell of course called it the two minute hate. They're just going to shift because there are fewer and fewer people coming here from other countries.

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Um, I wish it wasn't true and I don't want to add to the trauma and the difficulties that you already endure, but you're on the list. If you're in receipt of a disability benefit, if you have mental health problems uh you heard it a little bit, you've got a little flavour of what's to come with the conversations about motorbility cars. I I I don't know how close you were to that topic, but the kind of people who dedicate their careers and their lives to demonizing and denigrating otherness.

Um the kind of people who would have been writing. uh for for the Sun newspaper thirty or forty years ago about AIDS and and gay people, then moved on to immigrants and and foreign people and because there's not going to be much of an immigration issue left by the end of this parliament you um just be very careful.

if you are disabled or if you are in receipt of a disability benefit because they are gonna come for you with exactly the same weapons that they went for uh people who are or look a bit foreign. And the question I always like to ask when I'm discussing mental health is

The difference, the distinction. So much effort is put into poo-pooing or undermining the truth or the reality. You see it with neurodiversity as well. What's the difference between someone who's just a bit bad at reading and someone who's dyslexic? What's the difference between Somebody who is clinically or medically depressed. And somebody who is just a bit down.

that has crept into public discourse in recent years, particularly in a phone-in context. And happily we we we don't do it on this programme, that you will take a call from somebody who says that depression doesn't exist because I have been sad. It's a bit like taking a call from someone who would say that th that there's no such thing as a common cold, because I've never had one. Therefore everybody else must be lying. I've never had a cold. I've never been clinically depressed.

But I have been a bit sad. Therefore clinical depression is just a lie that's told by people who are actually just a bit sad and they're exaggerating it for money and they probably get a BMW from Keir Starmer, personally deli I mean you you you've heard the calls, you've heard the

kind of quotes, journalism end quotes that I'm talking about. And depression is another one. There's no such thing. Or invisible conditions, um which is a pejorative used by people who want to deny the existence of hideous, crippling conditions that reduce people to um uh uh living lives that are in entirely unenviable, but the tabloid model depends on making you envy them. Which, somewhat surprisingly perhaps, brings us to video games. Because I don't know what the difference is.

Between playing too much because you should be doing your homework or working on your next book or doing your chores or digging the garden or I don't know, just doing nice normal things. And actually being addicted. It's a it's a fascinating thing, isn't it, addiction? We talk about it a lot and it applies to so many areas of life, but who can actually in the context of video games, who can actually describe the difference between?

playing a little bit too much, or even a lot too much, and having a a condition that needs treating. And that's what I want you to tell me. I want you to describe the difference to me between Playing games a bit too much on how'cause I know I'm not addicted. That was a very irresponsible hook and tease that I did just before the news. But something a bit weird happened this morning that hasn't happened to me since I was a teenager.

Don't worry, it's uh per perfectly clean. I found myself as I prepared to come to work and talk to you, which ordinarily puts a huge spring in my step, I actually found myself wistfully Imagining that I could spend the whole day today playing a game that I have got into in the last week. I I go I went for years not playing video games. I used to play them all the time. I've told you this before.

Very few people believe it, but it's true, you can check. I I was the video games ed if I told you I was the video games editor of a national newspaper. And you didn't know which one it was. What would be the very last newspaper you imagined I was the national I was the video games editor of a national newspaper? Yep, you're right. It's that one. I mean it's extraordinary really, the uh that um

It's extraordinary how far they've fallen since I left. That's why that's what I think is the problem. So I was the video games editor of the Daily Mail newspaper. Um and that was one of the cushiest little numbers I have ever had in a life full of cushy numbers, both little and large.

I would be sent almost every game released. Well, in fact, if I wanted it and I hadn't been sent it, all I had to do was make a phone call or drop an email and I'd get it. I got sent consoles, I got sent games, I got sent what I have subsequently discovered is called Merc. I got sent collectibles.

I remember sticking one on eBay after it had been sent to me. It was like a limited edition Street Fighter joystick and some lad got on the train from Northampton to come and buy it off me at the train. So I met him at the station after work. I mean the the the extraordinary. Um freebies. And I remember I have had a career of freebies since I became a showbiz journalist. I've got sent every C D on, but the game stuff.

And then madly, it coincided with me becoming a parent. So a lifetime of playing video games. When I started on daytime television, I went from being showbiz editor of the Daily Express to being An hour a day pundit for more money than the on daytime television. And it meant that I finished at eleven AM. Whereas in my previous job, which I was doing the week before, I hadn't finished at eleven PM. If my phone would ring at midnight, almost every night, it would be the night editor saying,

Why on earth haven't you got this story that your rival has got? And it would be the same conversation every night. And I'd either have to try and pretend it wasn't true Or I'd have to just apologize and promise, All right, I'll write you five hundred words for for the second edition. So I went from being ludicrously overworked. and quite well paid, to being ludicrously underworked and even better paid. And it meant I was free at eleven o'clock. So I used to spend

I I could comfortably put in twelve hours playing a video game. I mean with breaks, I'd eat and go to the loo and stuff. I wasn't like one of those South Korean games players I read about a few years ago who wear nappies when they're in the uh internet cafe. True story, check it out. And and then unfortunately, when I should have really been in my pomp as a video games player, I I became a father. And

I couldn't justify it. I kept it up for about six months, maybe, maybe a bit longer, but you just could not justify getting paid for reviewing games if you couldn't put the hours in to play them. And thank God I didn't try. I you know, I'd much rather have spent time with my new baby than with Grand Theft Auto. But uh i it it was an a very unfortunate Juxtaposition of timing. If if it had happened ten years earlier, I may never have done anything else.

If it had happened ten years earlier I could have become a a video games person. That would have been like my career. But it didn't. It happened at roughly the time, a couple of years before I became a parent. So not long after becoming a parent, I knocked it on the head. And I have barely played a game since. Until about a year ago, when I came across a game called Indiana Jones and the the Grand Circle, or Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.

And I just really like the look of it. It must have popped up on my internet, on my feed, social media feed. And I love Indiana Jones and I love those Tomb Raider type games. They're the ones I used to love playing most. And I didn't have an Xbox and it wasn't coming out and I've got a PlayStation. It wasn't coming out on the Playstation for about nine months. But I was looking at my Samsung television. I told you this, didn't I, at the time? You may not even know this.

I I would I was looking at my Samsung television, I was uh do you think that televisions have become a bit like computers? You know you've got a computer, right, and all you use it for is is a bit of internet surfing and emails. But it can actually you could make a film on it or an album. It's got the s the software that is loaded into it, the software that is on board.

You could do you could probably run a space shuttle mission to Mars and back with your laptop, but you don't use any of the stuff that's on it. All you use it for is emails and and and internet surfing. I think my telly's like that. I was looking at my telly and and some of the stuff on it. I thought what's that then? Why is there an Xbox icon on my telly? I've got one of those frames, you know, the Samsung frame. So it it's a box.

And a really thin screen and you hide the box around the back of the piano or whatever and and the no one can see that so it's like a magic telly. And I'm messing around with the remote control and there's an Xbox icon pops up on the uh On the screen. I think what's that then? So I click on it. It turns out my television's got a built-in Xbox. Anyway, that's how I got back into games. And I went from Indiana Jones.

to the Harry Potter one. Um well it's not Harry Potter, it's Hogwarts, Hogwarts Legacy, which I got absolutely into. And then I bought a mafia game and then I bought a game called Ghost of Tsushima. So you're looking at about two to three months on each game. And I have now hit absolute pay dirt with the sequel to Ghost of Tsushima, which is called Ghost of Yote.

And this morning, for the first time in thirty years I actually found myself thinking, Oh, I wish I could take the day off and just spend the entire day playing my new video game my brilliant video game.

That I really broke the back of this weekend, worked out the the the techniques that I was doing wrong, got the hang of things. It's not entirely irrelevant to the conversation we had in the last two hours, actually, but that sounds quite weird, so I'll explain more in a moment. But I know I'm not an addict. For example, I didn't take the day off. Spoiler alert, I'm here. I didn't take the day off to play my video game.

I absolutely accept that anything that involves dopamine Mae'r hyn sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n. It is absolutely right that this should be an official condition and and it is, but it needs greater recognition and and uh although recognition is increasing. it it can only get bigger. So what I want you to tell me is this. What's the difference? Between playing too much

Playing too much video game and having or worrying that you've got an addiction. And and and remember, there's no age on this. You might have an eleven year old who you think is addicted. You take the game away and they can't cope. Cold turkey. Think about cold turkey. Rational analysis.

Those aren't the only games I've ever played, by the way, thank you for your recommendations, but I I'm probably across it these days. It's been quite the year. But I don't know what addiction looks like, and I want you to tell me. So well there you go, that's the question. In the context of video games

What does addiction look like? And how do you know if you've got it? All right, hit the numbers now, you will get through. O three four four four four four five six zero six oh nine seven three. And think about the difference, the distinction between Perhaps playing an unhealthy amount but not being addicted. And actually having a medical condition. Where is the line between excess

and medical condition?'Cause I I honestly don't know, but I think between us we should be able to work it out. Hit the numbers now, you will get through. O three four four four four four five six oh six oh nine seven three. When does video game enjoyment Become video game addiction.

Twenty two minutes after twelve is the time. It's it's an interesting question, isn't it?'Cause you might think you know the answer. Uh uh w when does an enthusiasm become an addiction? In this case video games, but actually you don't. I would today if I could

Spend twelve hours playing Ghost of Yote. Uh you know, I'd I'd I'd stop off for Jaffa cakes and toilet breaks and things like that, but I would enjoy nothing more today than sitting down and playing twelve hours of this game that I am absolutely enthralled by at the minute. Um obviously if if if it was getting on Mrs. O'Brien's nerves or if there was something that she wanted to do, I w I would uh happily go and do it.

And I probably wouldn't do twelve hours on the on the game if she was in the house'cause I would in many ways rather spend time with her. But there is a space, there is a universe in which uh she'd be out at work all day and I would be on the on the PlayStation for twelve hours straight. And I'd go to bed and close my eyes and I'd see the game unfolding in front of me. And a bit like Tetris is always bad for that. So if I have that feeling.

were I to indulge it for what, a month? W would I be addicted at the end? How would I know I was addicted? If I was still loving it? That's something that um H this text is signed Hamlet, and I have no reason to doubt the uh veracity of that name, although it's not a name you come across very often in Kidderminster. Uh the biggest difference is enjoyment, James, says Hamlet. To enjoy or not to enjoy, he didn't write. That is the question.

Especially when you're self medicating even if you're not aware of it. If you're enjoying the game, you're probably safe. My addiction was at its worst when I was playing even when I wasn't enjoying myself. Yeah, I can't quite imagine that.

Actually, I genuinely can't quite imagine that. And as Becky says, if you can't cope without it or your partner tells you they are lonely despite you being there, then you need to back off a bit and put the controllers down. You see, you wouldn't say that to someone reading books.

Would you? You wouldn't say to someone, I wish you'd put that book down and pay more attention to me. There's something about video games that lend themselves to well, I don't know. Anyway, let's get some calls on. Jace is in uh Meesham in Leicestershire. Jace, what made you pick up the phone?

Hi James. Um good to speak to you. I um come from a background of playing games for a long time. So I'm forty eight. I've been playing since I was seven years old and I got my first Spectrum. Um Um I've got to be a few years. What was your favourite Spectrum game? Oh, Spectrum. It must have been uh I think Black Hawk was one of my first ones. That was uh like a Harrier game. Um so from there, um now I'm the parent of teenage children. Um

So obviously I've seen gaming come from where we started and to where it is now. Um and on my journey I've gone through gambling addiction and Or close to gaming addiction myself, um, at various points. So I c I can identify where it is. Where is it? Um I think the So just to be clear, with with gambling you crossed the line into addiction, but with video games you haven't. So you've got a clearer well you've got a clearer idea than me of where the line actually is.

Rydyn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd With games being made particularly to keep them um imprawled and to then push onto the microtransactions, which is what the the model is.

Um it's the the games are built in such a way that they feed that addiction with those continuous dopamine hits and games like Fortnite and Roblox do that very, very well. And the way that I identify that now within my teenage son is the level o of reaction when you take them away um from that so to the point where

Um there's a funny day out. We're going out swimming, for example. Um he'd rather stay at home and play the games. Um But that doesn't I'm gonna be quite strict this hour. Well it's only forty five minutes. Simon Marks is joining us at quarter two. I'm gonna be quite strict because I I I you know Swimming can be a bit rubbish.

I'd rather play my video game. That's not a sign of addiction. Unless they loved swimming last month, last year, and it was the best day out of the best day of the week, and now they can't Do you see do you see what I mean? It's a bit like saying why don't kids play outside anymore, to which I used to respond by saying,'Have you seen?'

The latest video games. I mean, are you mad? Of course they're not gonna play outside. They can go to the moon and back. In in like real time, virtual reality. So uh that's not quite enough. Just I don't wanna go out, Dad. I wanna carry on playing my game. But I think it's how that reaction manifests in terms of anger and of the need to as soon as they get back. from being taken out, the first thing they do is go on and jump straight back on that game. I think

Um, you know, I enjoy games every single day. Um, but it's that very fine line I think with with those reactions. And I think when things do affect outside of where you are, that's when it becomes that addiction. Now, I've been in the position where I played a mobile game um at a very high level and I was staying up till very late at night or stopping my work to play these things on certain timed events.

Um so it is there, there is a line and addiction to caves is an actual thing to do. A couple of sentences. What what is the difference between the new games, like like your uh Fortnite? I know it's not new new but it's new in context, and a traditional game like Call of Duty. Is Fortnite's more addictive because it's got these financial Mechanisms in it. I think as well as the financial, I think it's the fact that

Does that always online thing? So you and I we we know the the benefit of playing a single player game and having that experience yourself. Yeah. But it's very much about that shared experience they have now. Um and the the thing where they've got the constant feedback with their friends and that constant shared experience.

But always active, I think. Um it's exacerbates the addictive elements to it and that sense of it's going on when you're not there. Can you get addicted to the kind of games that we play, that I play? I don't think so James. Because you finished them. Because you finished them. There's an end thing isn't there? There's not that constant next game, next game because you've got an end point to reach.

And that yeah, I mean that's the comforting thing. Maybe so there's something else that is gonna be partly dependent on age or or on on on generation of the kind of games that you are playing. Um there's always one. There's there's uh th I I'll just Um uh read this to you in a moment,'cause you d you mean I d I sometimes think that you don't listen to a word I say. I literally predict what the lazy tabloid position on a topic will be.

And then ten minutes later someone will literally send in the lazy tabloid position on on the given topic. Not Jace, I'm talking about this texture, which I will read you after the half past twelve headlines. Um if you want to join this conversation, have another crack. at where that line is. I saw a really

um clear line. Jace has nudged us towards it, but we're not mapping it yet, on on how you know that that is an addiction as opposed to, for example, an unhealthy level of enthusiasm, or a perfectly reasonable stroke rational. um preference for playing games to doing almost anything else. You can't overestimate how I know this sounds a bit like sort of saying you know, g well you can't underestimate how amazing heroin is.

Um not that I'd know, but you can't overestimate how amazing games are. Everything addictive delivers enormous pleasure, doesn't it, in in in the first, second and third instance. But how do you know when you've landed in the fourth instance? Um it's just coming out to half past twelve. You're listening to James O'Brien on LBC. Um Matt Hewitt has your headlines.

Twelve thirty three is the time. So lazy tabloid analysis or lazy tabloid opinion, which of course is not confined to tabloids, but also to the people whose brains have been melted by generations of encouragement not to think about anything. This is their contribution to a conversation about video game addiction. There is no such thing as video game addiction. This is a new clinical term made up to make irresponsible and lazy parents feel better about their poor parenting. Um idiot.

Uh James in Maidenhead is the opposite of an idiot. I like Gable Marseille's definition of addiction, James. He describes it as any behaviour, substance based or behavioural. that provides temporary relief, pleasure, and craving, yet results in long term negative consequences and an inability to abstain. It's the second bit that really defines it as an addiction for me. Is it causing negative consequences? And if it is, are you able to abstain from it, which is why I'm supremely confident that

Much as I am enjoying um Ghost of Yote on the PlayStation five, I am not addicted. Um not least'cause I can finish it, and then the joy will be complete. Mark's in Wigan. Mark, what made you pick up the phone?

Hello. Hi talk. This is uh not the easiest thing for me to talk about'cause it's not something I'm proud of. Okay. Uh but for a long time, no like ten years easy. Yeah. Uh most of my days have been uh waking up, turning on my computer, putting on my headphones, you know looking at a screen, playing a game I've uh played to death, not really getting much enjoyment out of it anymore. Um and that's as a really it's as a way to kind of escape responsibility.

Um uh day to day uh living kind of thing, podding things off. What sort of things? I can see from looking about now, my house is pretty messy, so that would be the first thing to avoid. Just looking at the mess and dealing with it. I'm getting better at keeping things tidier now, but... Yeah. Um Yeah, I don't have to. I got some money from our family. I'd be able to, you know, just co-spy and get by. But I started working and...

uh in a care residence uh last December. How's that going? And it's it's pretty good. The the people I work with, the the good people to work with and I think that makes all the difference. Um I'm studying to be a nurse as well. Oh wow. Well maybe you've been a bit hard on yourself. I've I've got a I have started to turn my life around quite a bit in the last few years, but um there is still

quite a bit of work to do, um, mostly at home. Um the bit outside of the house that's fine. But when I get back home that's when Um I kinda just kinda like get sucked into um staring at a screen and keeping myself kinda placated, if you want. Yeah, go keep keeping yourself occupied and engaged. Do you do you not like being alone with your thoughts?

Well, um that's I I I think I I have to be used uh to that and I've no issue with that because I've I've always been kinda living on my own and on my own, so I wouldn't say that's a problem. Well what is it that you what wha wha I mean Rydyn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd Yeah.

Um I've I've got some longstanding issues with depression and I was diagnosed with autism as well not too long ago, about six years ago or so. Okay. Uh six or eight years. And I know that that will tie into like a repetitive behaviour or like when it comes to you know, like I said, uh first thing I do is spend how many hours then would you w what would be a normal day, roughly?

Uh most of the time that I'd be uh awake and at home. So but but what would be a normal day in terms of the amount of hours you'll spend on a screen, on on the computer playing a game? I'd I'd say twelve would be a the decent average. It could even be more than that. Every time. Um

N not every day, but days when I'd when I'd be at home, yeah. If you're not out, if you've not got work or something else to do then you will only play Is here's the thing. I think it's great you've made this call. Um But I I also hear a man who is doing lots of other things and who who recognises the

The need to introduce a little bit more variety into your life, whether it whether it's professional or social. So you're you know, you're training to be a nurse, you're working at the at the co home. But the bit that you've said that I think we both know is the problem here, is that you're not enjoying it when you're doing it. That's it. Yeah, and I think that's what makes it uh the difference between um you know, just someone who played a lot of games and someone who might have

Real. That's where I think that's where the problems are. Yeah, Ris where you you keep using that word as well. I mean it it it it's putting off chores, putting off boring things, but not 'Cause you must b there must be a bit of not wanting to be'cause I get this a bit as well, or I used to before I had therapy. In that I'd I'd I'd need to do something. I don't just want to sort of sit there and um stew. as it were. But you don't think that's going on with you at all?

Oh no. Uh in my life at the moment. It's it is that that putting things off and you know, just being quite stationary, if you will, a lot of the time. Yeah. And you live on your own. Yeah, yeah, I've I've c I've called you before. I think the the first call um that I made a few years ago I called about um uh cat I think so. Yeah, those go. If I mean th if you were really, really addicted, you'd pr probably be putting great effort into denying that you had a problem at all.

Well th no I have to agree with something that the uh the the the lazy tabloid guy who texted it I I have to agree a bit. Uh but this is just from my perspective. Yes of course. Because uh I don't agree with him wholeheartedly by any means. But the the way that it's being uh labelled clinically, as they say it's a video game addiction. Now to me I I don't really think it so much of video game addiction, it's just um the behaviour that uh th that I'm adopting to uh to um manage the um

Like the the symptoms of depression, if you will. A lot like Well you're self medicated. Yeah, but just like the other guy that you um that you that you're commenting on just after where um you know short term relief, long term uh I can't remember how you phrase it, long term. It's not me, it's it's Gable Marty who's like a an an extraordinary um uh writer and I d I always forget precisely how he describes himself but but um he he's very, very strong on

um, therapeutic treatment and um childhood trauma and o o all of the things that propel us into doing things that aren't very healthy or very good for us because we think that they'll fill a hole inside that can only really be filled with love and self care. But he says that any behaviour, whether it's substance based or behavioural, that provides temporary relief.

But results in long term negative consequences and and an inability to abstain. So you can't knock it on the head is veering into addictive territory, becomes addictive. No, I I did find that a an interesting um But that's what you've described. Yeah, yeah. That's I mean he's describing you.

Sure. Um the you've heard of Sigmund Freud? Yes, of course. Um do you know i have you heard of his daughter Anna? I have, yes. She founded a a a big clinic in this country and uh continues to do amazing work. Right, I didn't know that. But she did a lot of work on um defence mechanisms. Yeah. And what people do uh when you know, just psychologically where we put things off. in the short term to protect ourselves and in the long term.

um it can cause a problem, you know, if it goes on for too long. I just found it interesting,'cause I do think addiction is an interesting thing. And uh there's there seems to be quite a lot of correlation there between um those two uh quotes there. Yes. As well. But maybe. I I mean the the relationship between trauma and addiction is probably m better explored than than than other motivations. But be be be kind to yourself, mate. I don't I'm not gonna patronise you but

Rydyn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd

There are times in my life where my schedule allowed it, I have absolutely no regrets for the amount of time that I played v spent playing video games. But when you say that you're not enjoying it, that is for you and for me when the alarm bells go off, isn't it?'Cause that's it's what could you be doing instead? Stay safe, Mark, seriously. Um twelve forty two is the time. Oliver is in Putney. Oliver, what would you like to say?

Hi James, I hope you're well. So mine might be a little bit different. So I went to university when COVID started. Oh yeah. And so I was doing all my coursework from home. So I was on the console a lot and I got addicted to FIFA points. Uh which then led to me. spending more time on my Xbox. So I was spending about seven ninety nine a day, maybe. Which over the course of eighteen months added up to about

5,000 pounds of my university loan. Yes. How do you know it was an addiction? I mean clearly it was because you wish that you hadn't been doing it, I think. So I knew it was an addiction when I would look at my bank balance and I might be on maybe you know, thirty seven pounds or something and I'd go, Oh, you know what, another twelve pounds won't hurt or something when I knew I shouldn't be doing it and that led to me because I was financially invested, I continued playing more hours.

and I just had to go cold turkey when that sound n my now fiance and then I had to stop completely because of your phone games I was I was still Well s forgive me for not knowing this. I used to play a lot of FIFA but I don't anymore'cause my mate moved. But um what what a fee for points? How does that work?

So it like allows you to like open packs to get better players. So because I wasn't great I was always having to catch up. Oh I was always See that for me that that that is that's evil, isn't it? When you can actually pay money to substitute skills. or or improvement. So you play and play and play and play and get better and better and better and better. And then someone else can come along and and pay money to to get the same

Exactly. And when you've spent that much it almost forces you to play more because now you've got that financial link to it where well I can't just stop playing now I've spent this amount of money on it. How easy was it when you went to use your phrase cold turkey? How how how what was that like? I don't think I'd have been able to do it with my without my fiance because she basically made me like stop everything. She made me like

physically like do hours of the uni look uni work instead'cause my grades were were lacking. And then I basically just started doing like, you know, secret comedy clubs and all that kind of stuff. So I just traded my fifteen pounds a day for activities on the weekend with my partner so and now I've got a house and a mortgage so it's a worth an hour but That's a lovely story. I don't Crikey. I yeah there is something there that's hard to nail but when you hear it, you know it's been nailed.

On the wrong side of the line and then on the right side of it, but still hard to pinpoint precisely where that line is. I'm spending too much money, I'm spending too much time. I'm not enjoying it. And why are you doing it? I can't not do it. That's an addiction. Isn't it? I can't, I'm not enjoying it. I c I used to enjoy it, but I'm not enjoying it. Well stop then. I can't stop. I can't stop.

It is twelve forty eight, Simon Marks is here. Before that, very quickly, I'm gonna knit together everything that we've talked about today, which you might find an impossible task given that we've veered from Epstein to Trump to video games. But

The video game I'm currently playing, Ghost of Yote, is a sequel to a video game called Ghost of Tsushima and I was really bad at it. I was brilliant at the first game by the time I finished it. I couldn't understand why I was playing so badly on the second game. And then I realised I'm playing as a woman.

And everything is different. The mechanics are different. The relationship between strength and threat and physicality is different. And and as soon as I realised I was playing as a woman, um the game changed completely, which is kind of relevant to what we were talking about. in the first couple of hours of the programme. And um staying with that, Nigel Farage has um been bemoaning

the failure of the United Arab Emirates to buy the Daily Telegraph, um, which is extraordinary. He's accused Britain, his country of course, of being not very straight with the UAE, which is An interesting development, given that not that long ago he said he would be deeply uncomfortable if that deal went ahead. Whether or not this has anything to do with the fact that Nigel Farage has been visiting Dubai a lot,

Um I think he attended a a Grand Prix perhaps as a guest of the UAE government and his and his position has changed. And it is to the UAE that I will turn Simon Marx's attention first this afternoon because We talk often about how hard it is to keep up and how flooding the zone with um uh uh uh uh questionable or or or or b possibly corrupt behaviour has become so

commonplace that you can be forgiven for missing events. But this five hundred million dollar deal that Donald Trump struck with an Abu Dhabi Sheikh shortly before his presidential inauguration deserves a little more coverage, Simon. It it certainly does, James, and the coverage of course has been sparked by investigative reporting done by the Wall Street Journal, uh that was published within the last few days. Again, an example of the journal, a Murdoch owned publication.

uh uh uh really uh going for it as far as Donald Trump is concerned. We've seen uh similar actions in the last few days from the journal accusing the White House of lying over the killing uh of Alex Pretti. uh in Minneapolis. But what the Wall Street Journal revealed is that four days before Donald Trump's inauguration in January of last year, uh a five hundred million dollar stake was purchased uh in World Liberty Financial. That's his big crypto business.

uh and the purchase was made uh by uh an uh a a UAE Sheikh, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, who is uh the national security advisor to the government of the UAA. It was two of his aid. That made the purchase and joined the board of World Liberty Financial. Now, this was never disclosed to the American public. And remember that when Donald Trump was first president, back in January of twenty seventeen.

We went through all of this kabuki because people were concerned uh that there were gonna be conflicts of interest between business and statecraft. And so Donald Trump at one point showed up surrounded by, you know stacks of documents and uh he signed a piece of paper claiming that he was uh putting his businesses into the control of his family and he would have nothing further uh to do with them when reporters in the room asked to see the papers.

They were told they couldn't possibly uh look at them because they were confidential documents. The suspicion has long been that many of those binders were filled with blank pieces of paper. This time round, we haven't even gone through the kabuki. So here is a president of the United States. whose crypto venture

is now forty nine percent owned uh by uh the national security adviser and and senior figures within the Emirati government. We know that Trump Family crypto investments have inflated his net worth by one billion dollars on paper since he became president. And the conflict of interest question arises in a couple of different areas. I mean, first of all, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times reporting that the Emirates secured an agreement.

for the from the Trump administration, for the United States to uh sell hundreds of thousands of advanced AI computer chips. To the Emirates, even though national security figures within the Trump administration said that they were concerned that those AI chips. via the Emirates could end up in the hands of China and be used to develop Chinese weapon systems. And then there's the not insignificant issue, James, of the genocide that is taking place in Sudan.

Uh the United Arab Emirates is widely accused, it denies it, but it is widely accused, of being the principal supplier of weapons to the rapid support forces, the group that is trying to unseat the Sudanese government. Uh and it is absolutely clear that uh the Trump administration is under continuing pressure To do more to make representations to the UAE about those arms supplies to the RSF. Indeed, in a paper that was published last week.

Before we knew about this acquisition of World Liberty Financial, uh this 49% stake in it by the Emiratis, the Atlantic Council published a paper saying, given Trump's close ties to Abu Dhabi's leadership, There is reason to doubt whether the White House would press the UAE to curtail its support. For the rapid support force. And that was before we knew that 49% of his crypto venture had been sold to the Emirates. I should say that the White House insists.

And this is a quote from White House Counsel David Warrington that President Trump performs his constitutional duties. in an ethically sound manner and to suggest otherwise is ill informed or malicious. So that's the official White House position. We've come a long way from Jimmy Carter's peanut farm, haven't we? Just a quick word on Steve Whitcoff. He's thirty well he's sorry Mae'n yw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n ymw'n.

Yeah, a and and the the polluting aspects of money from the region are everywhere within Donald Trump's inner circle. The Saudis. made a significant investment in Jared Kushner's uh private uh company. Uh before Donald Trump uh came back into power. Uh so through uh across the board there are questions that can be raised. uh about conflict of interest. But the extraordinary thing is that

Uh the checks and balances here have completely disappeared. There's been no massive amounts of pressure for any kind of public inquiry into all of this stuff. I mean I saw that Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts was saying over the weekend, Congress needs to do its job, it needs to grow a spine. Well, I mean you could you you know, you could utter that like a mantra on a daily basis over uh the last year. Congress has largely disappeared.

from the lives of the American people, as this president uh puts his uh pedal to the metal and tries to see exactly how much he can get away with in terms of expanding executive power. Uh accruing a an ever increasing amounts of wealth for him, his associates and his family And doing so at a time when Americans across the board are saying in poll after poll after poll that they are concerned about the rising costs of groceries at the supermarket every weekend.

Uh far more than they are impressed by the growth of the earth. uh of their four oh one K retirement accounts under Donald Trump stewardship over the last year. And uh and our very own Timu Trump, Nigel Farage, has changed his views on the UAE's

um uh attempt to buy the Daily Telegraph. By complete coincidence, shortly after he enjoyed a ten grand jolly to Aberdabi to attend a Formula One Grand Prix. How the world turns. Um we're short of time. I've taken up too much on this. What else do you need to tell us about?

Well, um uh first of all we should talk very briefly about Donald Trump suing his own government because that hasn't attracted enough attention. A ten billion dollar lawsuit that he's filed over the leaking of his tax uh records uh to the press by uh an a former IRS employee, the equivalent of HMRC, uh who was sent to jail for that leak.

Uh Donald Trump said over the weekend he might settle it. He's thinking of settling the lawsuit. And it'll be okay because he won't keep the money. No, he won't keep the money. He's gonna give the money to charities, unnamed charities. But remember it's gonna fall to His own Treasury Secretary Scott Bissent, his own Attorney General, Pam Bondy.

uh to play a role in determining the size of any settlement of that lawsuit. And then there is the absolutely stunning news last night that he's gonna close the the what he calls the Trump Kennedy Centre now. for two years for a complete refurbishment and reconstruction. Uh and uh of course the reason why he's really doing it.

is because an array of leading artists and performers have all said that they will not perform at the Trump Kennedy Centre and are appalled by his decision to name what is supposed to be a living memorial to uh slain former President John F. Kennedy to name that after himself. So his uh decision now is closing it for two years from July.

for complete refurbishment, the refurbishment of a building that was only renovated at a cost of two hundred and fifty million dollars in a project that ended in twenty twenty four. That's extraordinary. Um so this is the presidential equivalent of taking your ball home? I think. uh all dressed up as a desire to uh endow the city with the greatest performing arts centre in the world when Yes.

To our post, the greatest performing arts centre in the world. Simon, we'll talk again this week. I am absolutely certain of it. In the meantime, do look after yourself and stay safe. That's it for me for today. If you missed any of the show, you can listen back on Global Player, which is free. Or the L B C app where you can also stay up to date with all the latest news, videos and opinions. I just had to look at the global player at the weekend. I was looking for something.

Um the Mystery Hour podcast. It is like self contained, incredibly popular actually, and uh in keeps extraordinary company on the Global Player. But that our little mystery hour, oh they're punching its way up with all the big names. Uh download the official LBC app for free from your app store now. Coming up at four on LBC, it's Tom Swabright but now it's time to go.