And there is something very wrong here.
But what's wrong might come as a surprise to you.
London (CNN) -- As radio pranks go, it was irreverent on-air fare: Two DJs, impersonating Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles, trick a nurse to get details about the hospitalization of Prince William's pregnant wife.
A nurse who was a victim of the stunt, Jacintha Saldanha, apparently committed suicide Friday, King Edward VII Hospital said in a statement
The fallout from Saldanha's death has stretched around the globe, from Britain to Australia -- with questions being raised about how far is too far in the effort to find out details about the Duchess of Cambridge's pregnancy.
"Pranksters Face World Fury," screams the front-page headline of the UK's Daily Mirror, while Daily Telegraph columnist Bryony Gordon said it was "not so funny to hear two grown adults call up a hospital ward full of sick people to try to scam information about one of them."
The two Australian DJs, Mel Greig and Michael Christian, behind the practical joke are under fire, with some using the phrase "blood on your hands" to condemn their actions on the Sydney-based radio station 2DayFM.
The DJs have since apologized, and "mutually decided" to go off the air for an undetermined period, Rhys Holleran, CEO of the Southern Cross Austereo media group, said Saturday during a news conference.
Holleran said he was "very confident that we haven't done anything illegal."
"This is a tragic event that could not have been reasonably foreseen and we are deeply saddened by it," he said.
A spokesman for David Cameron said the prime minister "thinks this is a very sad case and his thoughts are with her family and colleagues."
News of Saldanha's death broke Friday, with the hospital saying she "was recently the victim of a hoax call."
London's Metropolitan Police said they were notified Friday morning that a woman was found unconscious. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
Police are treating the death as "unexplained," they said.
Audio of the call posted online suggests a woman spoke briefly to the DJs before she put the call through early Tuesday morning to the ward where Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge, was being treated for acute morning sickness.
Throughout the controversy surrounding the hoax, authorities did not identify the nurse. Her identity was released after her death.
"They were the world's worst accents ever. We were sure 100 people at least before us would've tried the same thing. ... We were expecting to be hung up on -- we didn't even know what to say when we got through," Greig told listeners Thursday.
Off the air, Greig and Christian tweeted about the practical joke on Thursday and earlier Friday, promising "more on the #royalprank." The pair's Twitter accounts were taken down late Friday.
Some listeners applauded the prank, like one who identified himself as Guido on the station's Facebook page and wrote, "It is only a joke people! it was great i love it!!!"
Others were outraged, with such negative comments outnumbering positive ones on 2DayFM's Facebook page before the nurse's death.
"Your stunt was done at a time in this country where there is paranoia about the intrusion of the media into people's lives," Gary Slenders wrote. "I know you will say it is harmless fun, the management of 2DayFM will say that it won't happen again, but this exactly where the phone hacking scandal started."
The outcry grew exponentially after the hospital confirmed Saldanha's death, leading the Coles supermarket chain to remove all its advertising from 2DayFM.
"This death is on your conscience," reads one Facebook post. Several accused the two of having "blood on your hands."
Saldanha's family released a statement asking for privacy and directing questions to police. She is survived by her husband and two children.
"We as a family are deeply saddened by the loss of our beloved Jacintha," said the statement, released by police.
Saldanha, 46, worked at the King Edward VII Hospital for more than four years, and she was described as an "excellent nurse," well-respected by co-workers, the hospital statement said.
The hospital "had been supporting her throughout this difficult time," it said.
A St. James's Palace spokesman said: "The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are deeply saddened to learn of the death.
"Their Royal Highnesses were looked after so wonderfully well at all times by everybody at King Edward VII Hospital, and their thoughts and prayers are with Jacintha Saldanha's family, friends and colleagues at this very sad time."
Separately, a palace spokesman told CNN: "At no point did the palace complain to the hospital about the incident. On the contrary, we offered our full and heartfelt support to the nurses involved and hospital staff at all times."
The Royal College of Nursing, which represents nurses nationally, also expressed sorrow over Saldanha's death.
"It is deeply saddening that a simple human error due to a cruel hoax could lead to the death of a dedicated and caring member of the nursing profession," said Dr Peter Carter, its chief executive.
The hospital said Wednesday that it deeply regretted the call had been put through.
The private hospital is known for treating royals. In June, Prince Philip, 91, was admitted to the same hospital with a bladder infection, forcing him to miss part of the queen's Diamond Jubilee celebration.
For those who don't know, I include on my resume', among the other assorted nefarious occupations with which I've amused and/or supported myself in my checkered past and/or present, the listing "radio personality."
Sparing you the lengthy "hooray for me" schpiel, let me just offer, for the sake of my point here, that since the late 1990's, in every radio market that I have worked, my show has been the number one rated program in its timeslot, be that mornings, middays or afternoons.
I point that out only to underscore my next assertion.
When it comes to entertaining radio, I apparently know what I'm doing.
That said, I don't do prank calls.
Partly because I'm a snob.
In my life, that kind of juvenile behavior went out of style when...well, when I aged past the point of offiically being categorized as a juvenile.
Let's say, roughly, when I went from twelve to thirteen.
Don't get me wrong. In my childhood days, pre-radio career, I managed to pull off a few pretty cool practical joke type phone calls.
How about calling the Houston Astrodome during a game, feigning a mature voice, and having the stadium announcer kick open the microphone and let fifty plus thousand people know that there was an emergency phone call waiting for a Doctor Nass, a lady physician whose first name, I had smoothly informed the announcer, was Ima.
"Attention, please, Ima Nass, Doctor Ima Nass, you have a phone c......."
The rest of the announcement was drowned out by the laughter and cheers of fifty plus thousand people.
I got yer phone pranks.
Bazinga.
Meanwhile, back to grown up time.
I don't do phone pranks on the air.
Partly because I think that, along with tit, ass and bodily function jokes, the whole phone prank thing is a sad sign of a very lazy mind.
If you can't be funny, then be dirty. Or stupid.
I realize, though, that I am, and have always been, in the minority when it comes to that kind of thing.
And "radio personalites" who offer up that kind of armpit fart humor are, at the core of it, doing nothing more, or less, than pandering to a large group of listeners who think that kind of thing is funny.
It's the old chicken or the egg concept that reminds us that were there not a big ol lot of doofuses willing to tune in and yuk yuk yuk along with the goofball gags, there would be no market for, and therefore no need for, the goofball gags in the first place.
My personal stick in the butt appearing as a stick in the mud perspective notwithstanding, my first reaction to what happened to this lady as a result of these two armpit fartster's goofball gag came to me in the form of one word.
Overreaction.
The two goofsters managed to get someone to put their call through to another someone who told them a few, at worst, embarrasing things on air.
And because of that, that first someone killed herself?
Did what she do result in the inadvertant passing of information that put hundreds of lives in danger or actually cause serious harm to someone?
Obviously not.
What it did at worst, if you read the comments coming from the "offended parties", they being, of course "their Highnesses", was cause them to let it roll off their royal backs as just one more stupid thing on the long list of stupid things they confront as they go about their very public lives in a culture that thrives on bombarding them with stupidity.
What seems terribly wrong to me is that this apparently very loving, gifted and giving woman felt such a crush of humiliation at being the "victim" of little more than a stupid, childish, goofball gag that she felt the only honorable thing to do was end her own life.
Really?
Hari-kiri to restore honor?
Don't get me wrong.
I still think those two jocks are a couple of no talent hacks who couldn't keep any audience whose members included anyone with an IQ above, say, fifty.
And their whole yuk, yuk, yuk way of "entertaining" in a culture already far too overflowing with the river of shit that passes for entertainment these days is nothing more, or less, than more shit thrown in that river.
But a reason to commit suicide?
Oh, and not for nothing, but let's not overlook what the "suit" who runs the radio operation knee jerkingly offered up in his comments about the whole shitty incident.
Rhys Holleran, CEO of the Southern Cross Austereo media group, said Saturday during a news conference he was "very confident that we haven't done anything illegal.".
Sounds about right.
And there's something very wrong here.
1 comment:
Well worth reading Very sad about the loss of a very precious mommy and wife regardless of the reason and so sorry for the royals that after years of the loss of their own mom that such sadness has now attached itself to the joyous news of their precious little one. Imagine if everyone thought about their actions before doing- we would them demonstrate the higher intelligence that all humans are capable of but often don't utilize.
Candace Newton-Chaput
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