Somewhere way past shameful
The scandal that is Kyle and Jackie O has got a lot of attention. As it should. In a nutshell (though you can get the disgusting details via ABC’s mediawatch) they apparently have a regular segment where they apply a lie detector test to someone and ask invasive questions. The subject last week was a 14 year old girl, there with her mother. While there are quite reasonable questions to ask about the mother, the issue was what was asked. The girl plainly did not want to be there. She protested. She was asked about her sexual experiences. She said, protesting, that she had been raped when 12. Now, that should have been the end, wouldn’t you think? Hit the dump button, spin some music, get some help for the child. No. Kyle Sandilands took this as an opportunity to ask the follow up question “Right. And is that the only experience you’ve had?”. Now, it is one thing to do stunts that appeal to not so much the lowest common denominator but more the deliberate victimisation of people, but that follow up question demonstrates quite plainly what sort of person Sandilands is. There is absolutely no excuse available for such a question.
It is appalling and offensive that not only do they think it OK to do this to a child, but that once she admits to having been raped that the obvious trauma of the event and the radio show are nothing to the desire to push for more. The lack of regard for the individual, her trauma, her rights, the lack of respect for simple and reasonable decency, the disregard and lack of absolutely any empathy are an index of how degraded populist commercial radio has become. To compound all of this Sandilands has at no point acknowledged the offensiveness of his actions. He has defended the segment on the basis of it being ‘real life with real questions’ or words to that effect, he has said they did not know that she had been raped or that she would say that. Even if they were reasonable defences, neither provides an excuse or justification for his follow up question. That’s the one that unravels everything else.
I live in Melbourne, so I don’t have to choose not to listen to this crap. But 2DAYFM2d is owned by Austereo, who own FOX in Melbourne. So I sent them a letter pointing out that how appalling the segment was, and that while I could not boycott the show or station my children enjoyed FOX but that it would no longer be heard in our household. My kids (a son 10 and a daughter 14) actually supported this and didn’t have a problem with it, my daughter in particular not wanting anything to do with anything Kyle Sandilands – which could have meant no Idol for her this year but I see that they’ve now also dropped Sandilands. I also see that QANTAS pulled advertising, so I sent them an email congratulating them, and ditto to Optus.
Their radio show is currently ‘in recess’ (weasel word nonsense), he’s been dropped as a judge on Australian Idol, I’m quite libertarian about most things but here I really do hope that after various sponsors have pulled their advertising and he’s lost his Idol gig that he finds himself an unemployed dickhead. I don’t actually think he’ll get why, but frankly such stupidity has to be its own reward.