We can do better than Kyle and his slurs

WRITING about KIIS star Kyle Sandilands is a tough assignment – and not because I’m afraid to call out the man behind the golden microphone. It’s because I’m all too aware that while this piece may get lots of attention, none of that will translate to consequences beyond a possible brief suspension and slap on the wrist.

If it were, I wouldn’t need to write this because Sandilands has a laundry list of reasons why he should no longer be given a national platform.

And yet, here we are. If, like me, you normally avoid engaging with his toxic vitriol dressed pathetically in the costumes of “comedy” and “entertaining outrageous rants”, let me bring you up to speed.

Sandilands recently took issue with the fact that not only had Ben Fordham again beaten him and Jackie O in the breakfast ratings, but he was also deeply enraged by what he viewed as the failings of the station’s publicity team.

In an eight-minute-plus rant packed with venom, Sandilands lashed out with ableist language: “We have to do everything ourselves, even rewrite live reads because the spazzes down there can’t write live reads.”

It got worse, with Sandilands characterising Ben Fordham’s audience as “just dead in a wheelchair, they just sit there like dumb fibreglass-looking fake people … half of them are probably dead”.

Obviously he, Jackie O and their entire team missed the global conversations I led twice a few months ago about the importance of awareness around ableist language. It’s honestly kind of worrying for a show that prides itself on how well they cover and understand pop culture.

This is not the first time Sandilands has demeaned and devalued others using language or experiences connected to disability.

Last year I complained to KIIS’s parent company after Sandilands degraded and belittled Paralympians.

I was told it wasn’t a problem because the network “employs people across the disability sector” as though that cancels one of its loudest voices being so discriminatory.

And he continues to do so because after years of bigotry, those with power have shown that they silently agree.

By rendering Sandilands’ contract essentially bulletproof, they are complicit.

That’s true for every producer, for every advertiser and sponsor, and for every listener.

So tomorrow, when you turn on your radio, you have a choice. Is Kyle Sandilands really the voice you want in 2022? Come on.

You can do better than that.