1.26.2007

Are you sensitive?

Well SCREW YOU! SCREW YOU RIGHT TO THE GODDAMNED WALL!
Now, when you're done crying, come back and I'll give you an extra set of balls, or a spine, FREE!

Seriously, I co-host a music basedradio show with a couple of maniacs. Generally we play really good music, played by musicians who do not care what the "top sellers" are doing, how "the hits" are made or anything like that. We also generally tend towards music that deals with topical or challenging subjects. Sometimes humor, in the form of satire, is involved. It is clearly for adults, and we do what we can to have the most adult content that the FCC will allow us. So there's the set up.

Last night we played a song at the end of our show called by a group called Evening Service called "The Bible Says", off an album called Love Gods Way. As of this writing, I am still unsure if these fellows seriously believe that "God...Haaates...Faags" , or because of such lines as "get down on your knees before jesus" if they are very clever satirists. Either way, it's a hilariously awful song (which confirms the fact that all acoustic guitars and pianos should be thrown on my heap of burning saxaphones), and when paired with our commentary was a wonderfully enlightening musical experience for most of our listeners. Unfortunatly, when the cohost who is employed by the station came in this morning, she saw a message in the station log from a listener who had called in (almost 12 hours later) to complain that she and a gay friend had heard the song and it reduced him "to tears".

Here is my response, which has been added to the station log:

"I don't want to be the a-hole, but really...in tears? from a song? a song that was clearly discussed for it's satirical properties for several minutes before we aired it? Did they turn it on and then off again in the middle, or what?
While it is up to the on-air people at WORT to fit their content into the community standard, it is also up to listeners to realize that while using to any sort of media, they may indeed come across view points that they may find objectionable or troublesome. I do not think we did anything wrong, nor do I feel that we needed to do more in terms of discussing or pairing "objectionable" content with more obvious, or palatable, content (when time is available, we generally pair up challenging content with more obvious content anyway). Like you said, anyone can turn on the radio at any time. No matter what we did, they very well could have turned it on and off during the "god hates fags" chorus and had the same issue. We made it perfectly clear the reasons why we were playing the song, and what we felt about it. Just like I do not believe that content should be monitored "for the children", I also do not believe that content should be monitored for the "extra sensitive" or "less humored". Playing to the lowest common denominator is what has made a majority of media the vast wasteland of willful ignorance it is today
I have taken to "self censorship" as a result of past audience response. I no longer play "Jewish Princess" by Zappa due to the fact that the last time I played it while subbing (7 years ago or more) I did receive 3 calls during the show from women who didn't like the stereotypical basis of the song. They each provided well thought out arguments as to why they felt the song was not, lets say "WORT worthy", and allowed me a chance to explain why I thought it was. However, upon further thought, I did make the decision to never play that song again and try to avoid outright mockery of large groups of people through the use of stereotypes. Speaking as a person who works with a wide variety of gay men on a daily basis, I'd just say that most of my coworkers, gay and straight, were exposed to the song when Father Angus first sent out the link a couple days ago without any sort of introduction beyond "check these guys out", and managed to somehow not end up in tears. "

Seriously, if a song drives you to tears, call the dammned station A.S.A.P. to discuss it with the people who aired it! Don't call the station almost a half a day later to "tattle" on the "naughty night dj's". Also, if you are so sensitive that a smarmy-ass song with the chorus of "god hates fags" drives you to tears, then for godsakes, why the hell are you listening to a fucking ADULT radio show?! Please continue to listen to things that won't make you cry, OR THINK, like Wobbles, Yanni or growing grass.