The media are always on the prowl for something to latch onto an nail and the current flavour of the week is Kyle Sandilands and Jackie O.
Kyle & Jackie O are known for pushing the boundaries of what is allowed on the radio and they are normally just labelled as stunts to get even more publicity. As a by product of their previous behaviour, while intentionally pushing the limits – it would seem as though their latest stunt which involved hooking up a 14 year old girl to a lie detector and asking her questions about her sex life went horribly wrong.
The media around the country are calling for their scalps after the 14 year old devulged that amongst other sexual activity that she’d been involved with – that she had been raped. The media are suggesting it should have been pulled immediately from air, however Kyle and Jackie O are saying that they don’t have that facility in their studio. I find that hard to believe, given that everyone else commenting on it suggests thats a common facility for a radio studio.
Whichever way it happened, their stunt involved hooking up the 14 year old the the lie detector, with her legal gardians permission to sort out once and for all whether she had been having sex. As it turned out, the mother not only confirmed that she’d been having sex but that she’d allegedly been raped as well – which supposedly wasn’t part of the expected outcome.
While it was poor judgement from the two and their radio station to allow a 14 year old to be hooked up to a lie detector, it wasn’t done in an interrogation style like you’d normally see in the movies. On top of that, it was done with the concent of the mother – who I believe suggested the idea in the first place.
I think that the media should be directing the majority of their anger at the mother and less at Kyle and Jackie O for their poor judgement. Should Kyle and Jackie O be repremanded, I think so as it was a gross error in judgement and in poor taste. Should they lose their jobs over it and their radio show, no I don’t think so. Should Austereo take a hit, absolutely as I’m quite sure they approved directly or indirectly that the stunt was okay for air and ultimately they are responsible.
Who do you think should be in the firing line and to what do you think their punishment should be?