Ah, silly me

Kyle Sandilands thinks he was helping the mother of the teenage girl:

“It was unfortunate that lie detector went south, it really was. But the whole reason that mum came on here in the first place was because she was a single mum that was worried sick about her daughter and she had no where else to turn and she didn’t know where else to turn and what to do. She really was at her wits end. And, you know, the reason we took ourselves off air…we weren’t suspended, we weren’t fired, we weren’t anything…we took ourselves off air because we wanted the story to die down because at the end of the day it was a girl, it was a teenage girl, and we didn’t want her to have any more distress than what was already caused. No else gave a shit did they?”

Here I was thinking that he and Jackie O strapped a scared girl to a polygraph machine and asked her about sex for the titillation of their audience.

I wish I’d said that

Rachel Hills has written a great piece for the Dawn Chorus about how the public reactions to Kyle and Jackie O and Matthew Johns says a lot about how we treat people who have been raped. There is still this disgusting public attitude that if a woman isn’t a virgin, then clearly she’s a dirty slut and is only making it up. I work in a newsroom where a story about the rape of a male is considered far more newsworthy than the rape of a female, instead of it being an horrific experience regardless of which hole is violated.

Anyway, this post is “I wish I’d said that” and John Birmingham on his Brisbane Times blog said it perfectly:
In what moral universe does interrogating an underage girl about her sexual history, while she’s hooked up to a polygraph and sitting in front of a live microphone, strike anyone as anything other the basest, most grotesque and abusive form of media exploitation imaginable?

Kyle and Jackie O haven’t been punished

If you didn’t see Media Watch last night, make sure you watch it online. Don’t just read the transcript. I had no idea how revolting the Kyle and Jackie O show is.

But one thing is still bothering me. Their radio show wasn’t suspended by 2Day’s management – it’s off the air because Kyle’s management told 2Day that he was “unable to work” and then 2Day decided they couldn’t have the Kyle and Jackie O show with only Jackie O, so that’s why it’s “in recess”. 2Day hasn’t punished them at all.

And when I read in the SMH today that Kyle earns $3.8 million a year, I vomited a little in my mouth.

Kyle’s a wanker, literally

As Melinda Tankard Reist points out in today’s Online Opinion, the pathetic excuses given by Kyle Sandilands and Jackie O for asking an underage girl about sex and drugs on live radio are hollow:

Jackie O said the team never intended to stage a “sick stunt”.
“There is no way we would want to go down that path or put that girl in that situation …” she said.
But Jackie, you did put her in that situation.

And then Kyle Sandilands went crying “oh poor me, the media is out to get me”. Oh, boo hoo. Take some responsibility, you big baby.

Not being a fan of 2Day FM or Kyle and Jackie O, I wasn’t aware that the polygraph machine had been used before. Tankard Reist says it’s been used to quiz people about STDs, masturbation, anal sex, threesomes, and eating shit during sex. Classy.

But this bit is my favourite:
On May 6 this year, Kyle and his male radio announcer buddies (in a show syndicated around the country) held a competition in the station office to see who could masturbate the fastest and who had the largest sperm count.
With armloads of porn, they were sent to cordoned off toilets. One of the players returned and wiped his “sticky” hand through Jackie’s hair.

Now I’m not surprised they thought asking a minor about sex would be entertaining.

Kyle fail, Jackie O fail, media fail

Reading comments on news sites over the last few days, it’s clear that most people – or most people who post comments on news sites, which may or may not be the same thing – don’t get why Kyle and Jackie O should get their butts kicked for asking a 14-year-old girl about her sex life. They think the problem is that when the girl revealed she had been raped, Kyle asked if that was her only sexual experience. (Thereby calling rape a sexual experience, rather of a violent one.)

But as much as he makes my skin crawl, I have to cut him some slack on this one as we’ve all said something dumb when put on the spot. Because what he said is not the problem.

Kyle, Jackie O and their producer should indeed get an almighty kick up the bum for deciding that strapping an underage girl to a lie detector and getting her mother to ask her about sex would be entertaining. The mother aside, that at least three adults did not think there was anything wrong with this situation is disturbing.

But then the story is reported as “Kyle, teen, rape revelation on air, stupid comment” and so it’s not surprising that readers don’t get it. Rape counsellors are interviewed to comment on Kyle’s stupid comment and no one is asked whether the segment should have been on air in the first place. And what we end up with is a large section of the public who think Kyle and Jackie O have been taken off the air because he said something stupid. Which means as journalists we haven’t done our jobs properly.

It also means that each time there’s a new “scandal” – The Chaser, footballers, take your pick – more people think each story is a media beat up.