The sun was up and blazing. It was 2:30pm in April. Meaning everyone on the equator – men, women and children – would be up and about. It was nowhere close to adults-only hours under moonlight, when the children are all tucked away and radio talking heads can get away with murder.
And bang in the middle of such daylight hours on this April 6th day, Milele FM afternoon crew was holding forth on a hot debate about sex: How many times people should have sex in a day!
Three times? One presenter asked on air. A lady called in, said, nah. She wasn’t taking anything less than five. Sex, five times a day.
And she wasn’t done. She added, just for good measure, that any day her guy managed only three times, he would owe her two. And that accrued balances got carried forward.
She was currently collecting IOUs, she alluded. Sex IOUs.
“Right now he’s running behind 150,” the lady hollered on air. “Look, I didn’t come here – she meant this marriage – ku kula ugali!”
And that set off a firestorm.
Suddenly, callers were climbing all over each other to be heard. One man, clearly off the ledge, let off a stream of curses. “Kubafu! Mama Yako…. “ All on air. At 2:30 pm.
Eventually, somebody at the controls scrambled to cut off Mr foul mouth.
And we ask: How does anyone not see a train wreck coming in this kind of show? And what is their value – should we add, at 2:30 pm?
You’ve heard about taste, decency, obscenity being cardinal ethical issues in broadcasting? That afternoon Milelle FM producers trashed all of that. Inappropriate arguments are also unethical practices in mass media.
“The mass media shall not publish or broadcast anything which is obscene, vulgar or offensive to public good taste,” says Kenya’s Code of Conduct for Journalists and Mass Media.
The Code further qualifies things: “Good taste shall be determined by the prevailing social norms, and the test shall be based on the standard whether the material is so vulgar that it is likely to deprave; or it is likely to be regarded as ‘filthy’, ‘dirty’ or ‘lewd.’”
Well, perhaps Milele FM was broadcasting from Pluto, no?
