In August, BBC radio personality, Alex Dyke, took on breastfeeding as a topic for his show, and it didn’t end well. It started because a mother nursed her hungry baby, next to him, on a bus. It ended when he was suspended after his rant, which included comments about how “unnatural” breastfeeding was; about “earth mothers…the ones with moustaches” who breastfeed in public. He even included a warning to women that men don’t like to see breastfeeding and the ones who support public nursing are “wimps who are scared of their wives”.
Photo Credit to Telegraph UK
He served a one week suspension and then returned to his daily show with an apology. The BBC now says he recieved sensitivity training during that weekToday, the BBC released it’s findings in the investigation against Alex. I am not quite sure what took 3 months to investigate since all they had to do was listen to his show but they are finally saying the comments he made, in his August 12 broadcast, were misogynistic and never should have been broadcast. They state that the comments included:
repeated derogatory stereotypical comments about the appearance of the kind of women who might breastfeed. [Alex] stepped significantly beyond what would have been deemed acceptable by listeners
Ofcom, a watchdog group who worked with BBC on the investigation also made a statement, one that could stir up as much outrage as the original comments. They stated that Alex’s comments
stereotyped women who breastfed…, were likely to be perceived as misogynistic…and had the potential to cause considerable offence
The statements were looking so good until Ofcom added their two cents, even if they concluded in the end that he was in breach of their standards.
