… but no one actually said they were sorry.

Thanks for the follow up Heather.

Upon review, the mention of Elizabeth Smart was used a punch line. A feeble, and tasteless attempt at a joke. It wasn’t mean to be mean spirited, but still–it was over the line

I regularly meet with the morning show, and all the on air staff here. It is their job to entertain in the “Ticket style” and sometimes in those attempts to be funny, they cross the line. When they do, it is my job to point out when they do cross the line, why, and how.  I discussed this with the guys, and they had received email about it too. And they also told me when the segment was over, they immediately felt they could’ve gone to far and felt bad about it.

Generally speaking, some topics (rape being one of them) just aren’t funny–no matter what.

Jeff

I haven’t heard an apology on air, and there wasn’t one in that letter. I don’t know about you, but to me, that’s not quite good enough.

Jeff,

Will they be making an on-air apology?

Heather

And we wait.

No they won’t.

Here is why, in part. Having done this for the past 18 years or so, its been my experience that an on air apology only causes further attention to a mistake that is already out there–and shouldn’t be revisited. I don’t want them to explain the joke, then the mystery created when they don’t explain it, causes a stir among the audience and makes it a greater issue due to runaway imaginations.

They made a mistake. I pointed it out to them, they already felt bad about it. It was addressed in a meeting and now they have to be allowed to correct it moving forward.

This is not unlike dealing with kids in many ways!

Jeff

I think I’m going to outsource all of my apologizing from now on. Who wants the job?

While not unexpected, I find your answer — particularly the last statement — to be so intriguing. One, I probably wouldn’t let kids run my radio station, but that’s beside the point. And two, from my 18 or so years of experience *being* a kid, I can tell you that were I in the wrong, I’d have been marched right over to whomever I wronged and been made to apologize (there’s this whole stealing gum incident that’s etched pretty clearly in my memory). My parents certainly didn’t do the apologizing for me, either. A “they felt bad” is not nearly the same thing as the culpable person saying, “I’m sorry.” Obviously this must be the industry standard, protecting the talent, but it seems very… unmanly.

But like you said, Kids.

So, while acknowledging it directly is clearly out of the question, I’m sure we all (your advertisers included) can look forward to the Musers’ eventual Public Service Announcement. Perhaps it can be a Limbaugh/Ticket joint production.

Have a good one, Jeff.

Well, this was not a boat I intended on rocking.

And honestly, I don’t look forward to the conversation in which I tell the Dork Lord that I’ve been boat-rockin’ his favorite radio station (I think he gets a wee bit weary of my ‘the world should be a better place’ on an endless loop). After reading some of your comments, however, I decided that it might be more effective to take my complaint to the source (and perhaps change something) than let it loose in the ethers to bounce around aimlessly.

Here’s my email to the program director:

Good afternoon Jeff,

I’ve debated with myself about sending this – whether or not there’s a point; what kind of outcome it could have. But I think it’s important, if only to say that I spoke up.

Here is what I know:

Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped when she was 14 years old. Taken as a “wife” by an insane man, she was raped and abused in ways that most would consider torture. Nine months later, she was found. Elizabeth Smart grew up, went to college and became a victims’ advocate for child abductions.

Smart married over the weekend.

Yesterday morning, I was listening as someone on your show referred to the event as her “second marriage.”

I was stunned. One, at the reference to her teenage ordeal as a “marriage,” and two, that no one on the show stopped to say, “Hey, man, that’s not cool.”

The comment doesn’t just show a lack of taste, but a disturbing lack of humanity and compassion for the victim of a brutal crime. Look, I get that it’s a bit. My husband reminds me about that almost every morning when I wrinkle my nose at some eye-roll inducing comment by Gordo, et al.  But this isn’t Kim Kardashian we’re having a big old laugh about. It’s a child rape victim. And whatever lines a person should or should not cross on the airwaves, I think mocking a child rape victim is one of them.

Morality is such a fuzzy thing, especially in the entertainment business. What’s right, what’s wrong, what makes a buck, what doesn’t. Believe me, I know. I think, though, that in this instance, it’s pretty clear that what was said wasn’t just wrong, it was gross.

Further, the segment went on to touch on “Lizzie Smart” and the emotional “baggage” she must have brought to that marriage. I will venture to guess that your hosts are unaware that statistically speaking, one in four women will have survived a rape or attempted rape by the time they are 14 years old. Your hosts are likely the husbands, brothers, uncles or fathers of a sexual assault victim. And yet.

Showing sensitivity to subjects like rape might not be entertaining, but it’s the right thing to do. It also makes marketing sense. Why?

Women are listening to your show. I’m listening to your show and I’m a pretty fair representation of the fastest growing demographic of sports fan. I’m a 30-something-year-old female sports fan, in charge of the household finances (and on top of it, a blogger with decent following). I’m one of three women in my department alone who stream the Ticket at work. Or women who did. After yesterday, I am not certain I will continue to listen. It seems like while sexism is simply an unfortunate part of the sports radio bit, yesterday crossed a line that made me realize I had a decision to make. Stand up or shut up.

I have chosen to stand up.

Thank you for your time, Jeff. I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Heather Hunter

Here is his response:

Thanks Heather- I saw your blog. I have not had a chance to go back and review the segment and the comments myself. I did not hear them live yesterday.

Before I respond to your email, or address this with the guys, I need to hear it.

I appreciate where you are coming from–
thanks for the note
Jeff Catlin

What’s next, I suppose, is that he listens to the show and decides for himself whether the comment merits any discussion. Look, I’m not asking for heads on platters; I just want some respect for those who deserve it and for someone to acknowledge that rape is not ‘bit’ material.

I don’t know who these people are, but this is their wedding video and it is amazing.

Myra and Kenneth from Romantic Wedding Videos on Vimeo.

In the morning, while we’re getting ready for work, my and I husband listen to The Ticket – a sports radio station here in Dallas. The morning show, Dunham and Miller, ranges from sports chitchat to celebrity birthdays to news tidbits.

In general, I like sports radio. In general. But every so often, this show in particular crosses a line that gets my hackles up.  The ever-so-patronizing Women Say the Darndest Things About Sports segment, for instance, or more recently, the post-Grammy reference to Adele’s lineage as possible “chimney sweeps” because of her accent. But today. Today was not sexist or narrow-minded or crass. It was soulless.

It was beyond the pale, as Kimberly said.

Elizabeth Smart (who you remember was kidnapped at 14, raped and abused by a man who had taken her as his ‘wife’ before she was miraculously discovered wandering the streets nine months later and who went on to become a victims’ advocate) married over the weekend. Mazel tov!

The show’s host congratulated Smart on her “second marriage.”

I was stunned. In part, because the banter kept going without anyone pausing to say, “Whoa, man, that’s wrong,” like was done moments later when another voice piped in to question what kind of “baggage” a girl like “Lizzie Smart” must bring to a marriage. Frankly, I was stunned that someone could muster the bile to say that in the first place.

A million angry bubbles formed in my chest. Second marriage. Just like that. Like it’s Kim Kardashian we’re talking about and not a survivor of rape and systematic torture. The glibness of his comment, made from where he sits, behind a microphone, safe in the statistical unlikelihood that something bad (actually really bad – not like a scare at the dermatologist’s office) will ever happen to him, well, it makes me shake my head.

Because it’s disgusting. Arrogant and ignorant.

And just in case it needs to be said in regard to “Lizzie Smart” and her “baggage,” the statistics currently go a little something like this:

One in Four college women report surviving rape (15 percent) or attempted rape (12 percent) since their fourteenth birthday. And the lack of respectful dialogue about victims means that many, many more go unreported. You know what that says? It says Elizabeth Smart is not the only one bringing something heavy with her to a marriage. She may be in company with, say, the wife, daughter, niece or sister of a clueless sports radio personality.

Well, jeepers.

You guys. I’m sorry to be so absent, but I just don’t have anything to say. I’m not even interesting to myself right now and for the first time in a long time, don’t actually have a single story to tell. Everything in the last year was so full of turmoil or stress of one kind or another, my current day-to-day, in comparison, is so spectacularly dull. I mean, getting my very first ticket ever was this big nothing. I got pulled over. I got my ticket. I went on with life and because it wasn’t say, getting robbed or trying to save someone you love from starving themselves to death, the blemishing of my perfect record wasn’t quite the crisis situation I’d have imagined it to be.

My days go a little something like this: I go to work at a job I tragically, really like, so you know, there’s no drama to dig up there. I come home to  a husband I also really like. Sometimes we talk about his Chemistry homework. Sometimes we bake things. Most times we pile on the couch with our fur children and stay there real cozy like until bedtime. Lather, rinse, repeat.

See? Spectacularly dull.

You know Picasso’s Blue Period? Clearly this is Heather’s Lazy Period. And without the gift of retrospect, I have no idea how long it’s going to last. I do know that for someone who is (probably unhealthily) innervated by crisis, all this peace and quiet has been a bit disquieting. Naturally, I tell myself to enjoy it while it lasts but come on. Enjoy what? Seriously, give me a limping kitten to save or a dilapidated shack to renovate because, oh my god, I need something to do.

And then, surely, I’d have something to say.

This week, I flew halfway across the country to participate in an intervention for someone I love desperately. The intervention failed. We failed. I’m pretty sure that goes down in the books as the worst day of my life.

There’s a lot of brain energy – soul energy – that goes into an intervention. Weeks and months of worry and planning, so much heaviness hanging from such spindly threads of hope and then, in the aftermath, you’re left with so much nothingness. Food you don’t really taste and sleep that can’t leave you rested. And then there’s the anger, because everyone needs someone else to blame. Oddly, it feels like the dress rehearsal for mourning.

When the neurologist recommended an MRI, I knew it was going to be costly. My options were: 1) forgo the tests and just assume that my increasingly freaky migraines were not related to a brain tumor or 2) know they were not. I wanted to know. So did my husband. And we were vaguely aware that knowing was going to dent the ole pocketbook.

What we didn’t quite grasp was that it would dent it to the tune of $1,500. After insurance.

I’ve been staring at the online claim summary, trying to do one of those Magic Eye things where if I stare hard enough the real number would magically appear, floating over the backdrop, gloriously containing one fewer zero. And it doesn’t. Though, frankly, that shouldn’t surprise me since I have heretofore been unsuccessful at discerning any Magic Eye poster ever.

Fifteen hundred dollars for the brain doctor to say, “Well, things look good.” He found some (for lack of a more technical term) scarring consistent with migraines, then turned me loose and told me to come back in six months. If in six months he wants another test, we’re gonna have words. About bills. And how fancy brain doctors are probably way better suited to paying these fancy bills than very unfancy marketing and computer programmer folks.

One mortgage payment + one half of a mortgage payment = 30 minutes in a really loud tube under a blanket of insufficient thickness.

The hell. If I were less than fine, I wouldn’t resent it, I’m sure. I’d have lots of other medical bills to resent along with it, so you know, drop in the bucket. But as it is, I’m fine and wondering if these people have payment plans. Surely. I mean, what can do they do if (ha ha. read: when) I can’t cough it up? Repo the MRI? Telepathically cast lesions onto my brain?

That would be a skill, now wouldn’t it? Like Vader crushing that one dude’s throat with his mind.

Here’s where I talk about healthcare reform but, like so many other things that are messed up with this country, it’s sorta a big, fat duh.

In other, much less whiny news, I have worn lipstick all day long today, just like a real grown up. It’s not even flavored! How’s that for leaf turning? It’s like I won’t even need any New Years resolutions – I’m the model of self improvement a full month early. Bam!

This spring, I’m going to be an auntie again (must. contain. the exclamation. points)! This time, though, it will be a driving distance baby. A baby I can snuggle after 3 hours of Glee playlists and one potty break at a rest stop of questionable cleanliness. Our own brood is still a couple of years off (the Dork Lord will be transferring to SMU in the fall and I probably don’t have to tell you that an infant + husband working/in school full time = one of those poor crazy ladies that end up on the news) so this is just the kind of squeeee! I live for.  If only I could be more patient about it. Every day I email my sister and ask if the baby is ready. Every day she tells me, “Not yet.” Is there no fast-track program for kid making? If anyone is eligible, she is, so let’s get on with it!

Anyway, for a bit I was able to focus some of my energies on making her baby announcement, which as distracting for about ten minutes. (See? This is why I need so many orphaned kittens!)

Oh, you guys, I don’t even have an excuse for all this non-blogging I’ve been doing. This is probably the sixth or seventh post I’ve started in the last couple weeks – I just can’t get interested in it. But boy howdy, enough is enough and I’m gonna give it a solid try. Like, posting every single day. So. Here we go.

The Dork Lord and I are on week three of a three week cleanse. Which means… well, it means many things, but primarily it means that it’s been over two weeks since I’ve had a cup of coffee. No sugar? No big deal. No alcohol, bread or dairy? Eh, okay. But coffee? Even on a normal, non-restrictive day, I could shamelessly open-mouth kiss a cup of really good coffee in front of a crowd of impressionable school children, so you can imagine how lusty I feel right about now. Two weeks ago, I was feeling a little more murderous than lusty, but thankfully, my desire to stab people has decreased exponentially with each passing caffeine free day.

I know, I know. What kind of weirdos go on a cleanse during the holidays? These weirdos. The ones who were breaking zippers and on the verge of investing in wardrobes based solely on elastic waistbands. The ones who packed on 20lbs since they got married a short six months ago. And right after we wrap up the cleanse and our innards are free of toxins, we hop right into a 30 day fitness program and hopefully, be wearing our elastic-free jeans by New Years having celebrated every major winter holiday on lean protein and lots and lots of organic vegetables.

Meanwhile, I lick your empty coffee cup when you step away from your desk.

No, I don’t. But I think about it.