Oprah Winfrey has removed the former Def Jam executive from her book The Wisdom of Sundays, a spiritual advice page-turner that includes interviews with Iyanla Vanzant and Elie Wiesel from her popular OWN show Super Soul Sundays.
The New York Times asked the publisher, Flatiron Books, about Russell being in the current editions of the book. And in response to that question, the publisher said that those pages would be removed.
In the book, Russell described the impact meditation had on his life, something that he said contributed to the betterment of his soul and what he has accumulated in life. Although Oprah has made no official statement regarding this, we can all guess why the 64-year-old decided to pull the plug.
Russell has been facing numerous rape, sexual assault and harassment allegations since last year. And a new allegation of rape from Jennifer Jarosik, a California woman, emerged last week, where she has filed a $5 million lawsuit against the 60-year-old, claiming that he raped her on two different occasions, one time in Los Angeles and another time in New York, the former alleged incident being in 2016.
With Oprah being an ambassador to the strong and fluid new #TimesUp Movement, it doesn’t take a genius to understand why her book could not contain someone who has been accused of assaulting women. She herself is someone who has been sexually assaulted, so what sense does it make for her to ask people to listen to “wisdom” from a man being accused of making less than wise decisions?
Interestingly enough, Russell was also removed from another mogul’s book. Daymond John, one of the judges on Shark Tank, edited out Russell’s comments in his book Rise and Grind, but he’s no Oprah. When Oprah deletes you from anything, you might as well think of it as a Color Purple hex.