YPTR has discovered George Saunders Land. No amount of money or persuasion, however, will get the Walt Disney Corporation to add this onto Disneyland. Which is a pity, because Disneyland could always use a Saunders short short.
Year / 2005
The Drunk
“I can’t breathe, motherfucker! I can’t breathe!”
The drunk had only his voice left, but he was determined to fight. A neighbor and I called from the window. We begged the police not to harm the man, to give him oxygen, and the fuzz knew they were being watched. So they didn’t beat him. The drunk had only blurred stamina and a voice that alerted every adjacent domicile that there was a skirmish in the premises. His limbs were pinned down by seven of San Francisco’s finest in the alley adjacent to my apartment. I had to wonder just what the hell it was he did exactly. Had he spurned chase? Had he assaulted an officer? Was he simply belligerent? There was a savage determination in the man’s voice to beat the odds. It took seven police officers to hold him down. Seven.
The liquor had fueled him. It had told him that he was immortal, whatever his problems, whatever his affliction. It had worked the same way that PCP might in another: the abject faith that he was above the law, that he would win in the end, that vengeance of an altogether irrational sort would be his. But the addiction, apparently, was too much for him to operate in society. Tonight, anyway.
Of the seven cops, one was a woman. The drunk, singular in his rebellion, had bitten her hand while they pinioned his limbs down. He called her a dyke. he egged them on. Aside from a feral “fucker” from the lady (an understandable impulse from anyone who had blood drawn from their hand), the SFPD did their job containing him without beating the man down. This was no Fajitagate. They only wanted to get him into the wagon. And the wagon arrived, backing into the alley and colliding into a few trash cans. There was a mesh grille behind the double doors, and I wondered if anyone else was there.
The drunk had been in the Marines at one point. He had been stationed on Treasure Island. So he said. You meet a lot of homeless people in this city, many of them claiming some military stint, some pledge unfulfilled. And he was determined to “fuck your fascist shit up,” thank you very much.
Me? I felt like one of Kitty Genovese’s watchers. Who the hell was I to cast judgment? But if the police clubbed this guy to death, I was determined to run into the alley and stop the violence. Fortunately, they didn’t.
But I sympathized with him. I wondered if he had been left behind at some point. I wondered about his military experience. I wondered what had caused him to become so blotto and so enraged. Had he been abandoned? Had he served in the Gulf War? Or was his life a grand lie?
One police officer for every limb. They threw him into the van and laughed a bit afterward. But I pondered the man’s fate. What would our current local services do to help him? What would our social programs do to reach him? Would he be released to the streets, only to unleash violence again? Or would he somehow find himself? Was this a drunk left to drink himself to death? Another high-maintenance person abandoned to the fateful gods of the streets?
Coffee-Deprived Roundup
- Good Reports has unveiled its second end-of-the-year panel, with Robert “Not a Jejune Fan” Birnbaum, Jessa Crispin, Alex “Johnny B.” Good, Maud “Will Most Certainly Finish Her Novel” Newton and Michael “Coolest Initials in the World” Orthofer.
- Scott Esposito has stumbled upon what may be the TBR photo to end all photos. The metadata reminds me of the moment in Fight Club where Edward Norton’s apartment turns into IKEA catalog items.
- Was Lincoln bisexual? Leave it to Gore Vidal to explore the theory. (via Moby)
- Sara Nelson files her last column at The Post, pointing out the lavish promotion funding thrown at Linda Fairstein. Too bad Fairstein’s net sales don’t seem to match the $1 million per book price tag. But apparently, an appearance on The Today Show has worked this time around. Her latest is one of the top 100 books on Amazon.
- Stephen King’s pimping Ron McLarty, who’s getting published after 32 years of effort.
Whitbread Winners
The Whitbreads go to:
Novel Award: Andrea Levy, Small Island (She also won the Orange Prize.)
First Novel Award: Susan Fletcher, Eve Green
Biography: John Guy, My Heart is My Own: The Life of Mary Queen of the Scots
Poetry: Michael Symmons Roberts, Corpus
Children’s Book: Geraldine McCaughrean, Not the End of the World
Star & Buc Wild: Racist on the Radio
Moorish Girl posts to this item from Turbanhead. Apparently, the wakeup crew at Philadelphia’s Power 99 radio think that it’s absolutely hilarious to call a customer service line outsourced to India and berate an employee with sexist and racist banter.
The MP3 has been removed from the Power 99 site, but, in the event that Turbanhead‘s servers get overloaded on this, I’ve mirrored the file here and I urge anyone who cares to host the file too. For those who can’t play audio at work, here’s a transcript:
NARRATOR INTRO: Wakeup with Star and Buc Wild in the mornings of Power 99 FM.
STAR: I’m going to play this call from earlier before we get out of here. This is the, uh, call that I made to — I thought it was a company here locally. Not that I was surprised.
(laughter)
STAR: I saw this infomercial about, uh, what are these things called again? Oh, the, uh…
FEMALE VOICE: Bead? Oh shoot.
STAR: Anyway, let — let’s just play the call. I was surprised when I got somebody on the line in East India. These little beads that I saw. Little white kids, uh, a little machine that puts them in their hair.
FEMALE VOICE: Mm’hm.
STAR: Play it.
(tape begins)
STEENA: This is Steena. How may I help you?
STAR: Hi, Stain-a, you say?
STEENA: Yes.
STAR: (in fake Indian accent) Yeah, I called and I just got hung up on. I’m calling from America about the quick beads for my daughter’s, uh, hair. Quick beads.
STEEA: Okay. May I have your ZIP code please?
STAR: 10274.
STEENA: 10274?
STAR: Yes. Get it right. Now are you in India? Because I just spoke to someone in India who hung up on me.
STEENA: Thank you. I am from India, ma’am.
STAR: Okay. So my call is being outsourced to India.
STEENA: That’s right.
STAR: In… in regards to my six year old, white American daughter who wants to get the quick beads like Serena and Venus Williams.
STEENA: Now. I’ll definitely place an order for that. See…
STAR: What’s that?
STEENA: …in the ad, she called to place a quick bead of counier. To ensure proper handling…
STAR: Ma’am, I don’t know what the hell you’re saying. Hang on a second. Let me try and get something straight here. The quick beads, like Venus and Serena Williams, that to advertise to — to the white kids on television. This call has been outsourced to India?
STEENA: That’s right.
STAR: Well, ma’am, what the eff would you know about an American white girl’s — uh, uh — hair? And quick beads.
STEENA: Just to inform you, ma’am, we’re a national chain services company. And we’re just taking calls on the opposite…
STAR: Listen, bitch! Don’t get slick with the mouth! Don’t you get slick with me, bitch!
STEENA: Now if you continue to speak this language, I will disconnect the call.
STAR: Listen to me, you dirty rat eater. I’ll come out there and choke the eff out of you.
(laughter)
STAR: You’re a filthy rat eater. I’m calling about my American six year old white girl. How dare you outsource my call? Get off the line, bitch!
(laughter; end of tape)
STAR: Pull it up.
(laughter)
STAR: Heard they listen well out there.
The call letters of Power 99 are WUSL. It shouldn’t be too much of a surprise to learn that the station is owned by Clear Channel. In light of the station’s Stop the Violence and Increase the Peace campaign, it might be worth addressing this verbal violence to the WUSL manager and to Clear Channel Corporate. Letters written on actual paper or faxes are the best way to deal with this. Emails can be overlooked, but paper is a physical presence. You can find addresses and fax numbers right here:
Power99 WUSL-FM
440 Domino Lane
Philadelphia, PA 19128
General Business Line: 215-483-8900
Fax: 215-483-5930
Director of Urban Programming/Program Director: Thea Mitchem
Operations Manager: Todd Shannon
General Manager: Dave Allan
Clear Channel Communications
200 Basse Road
San Antonio, TX 78209
Phone: 210-822-2828
Ron has pointed out that DJs Star and Buc Wild have been added to WWPR-FM (Power 105.1) in New York (also a Clear Channel radio station). Clear Channel has apparently invested $17 million to sign Star and Buc Wild to the morning lineup. In addition to WUSL, Star can currently be found on Hartford’s WPHH station.
Star apparently has a history of savage radio behavior. In fact, he prides himself on being “the Hater” and his website notes that “he has the audacity to be unconstrained by neo-conservative intellectual influence.” The exclusive Star interview further notes, “Hate is one of the truest natures of mankind. We’ll always have Hate, even when we branch into outer space and set up new civilizations. To eradicate hate would mean becoming desensitized or emotionless” and then qualifies this statement with a followup, “Does a fat bitch love cheeseburgers? Absolutely.”
When he worked at WQHT, he played plane-crash sound effects when Aaliyah died, complete with a woman screaming, causing his former co-host Miss Jones to walk out. Star has promised to “bury his old station” when he gets to New York (the first show is set for January 17, 2005.
Of course, listeners aren’t really the people who matter in corporate radio. Advertisers do. It might be fruitful for watchdogs in Philadelphia and New York to keep a list of loca and national advertisers that air commercials during Star’s broadcasts on Hartford’s WPHH and Philadelphia’s WUSL. And when Star moves to New York on January 17, maintain the list of advertisers on WWPR.
If we hope to win the war against hate radio, then the time has come to mobilize with diligence and action. And that means paying attention to who pays the bill.
(UPDATE: It’s also worth noting that Star’s real name is Troi Torain. He’s also made anti-Semitic comments. Funny how he’s sensitive when J-Lo uses similar language. Apparently, Torain’s former New York employer Emmis has been trying to block his WWPR gig. Torain was suspended after the Aaliyah incident. The clause in his Emmis contract has kept him off New York radio until this year. That didn’t stop him from ripping about 20 award plagues from WQHT and storming off the office. And there’s more, even a book deal.]
[FURTHER UPDATE: The outcry has resulted in Star & Buc Wild being suspended for a day. Thanks in part to your efforts, Power 99 FM received more email and phone calls in the entire station’s history.
But this is only the beginning of the fight. Since the two DJs have been repeatedly hateful and since the one day suspension amounts to a consolation prize (Star & Buc Wild were moving out of Philly anyway), the DJs will quite possibly settle into the new routine at 105.1 FM in New York. If there are any able listeners in New York willing to keep track of advertisers, now would be the time to mobilize for a future campaign. Because in light of their history of abusive radio, these two will try again. ]
[THIRD UPDATE: Because of the abusive comments (despite my repeated requests), I have closed the comments. I’m appalled by the behavior from some people here. Hate is not the way to respond with hate. I can understand anger, but by drawing generalizations about Africans or Americans, you are giving into the same spiteful tone voiced by Star. And I don’t enjoy my mailbox being pummeled with hatred.]