Saying Goodbye to WXDE 105.9

Estimated reading time: 10 minutes

Dear Ms. Monday:

I started writing a letter to you Thursday night.  I got this far:

I'm having trouble fitting into the New World Order as defined by Trump and the Trumplings, his devoted followers.  I noticed your station has changed from a local talk radio that doesn't take political sides to the unofficial propaganda machine for everything Trump.  I really want to fit into the New World Order and hope you can help me.  I want to become a card carrying member of the Trump Liturgical Cult.  I'm having trouble reaching my goal of earning my red hat, so maybe you could help me with the following tenets I can't figure out:

Friday morning, I listened to your show while thinking about how I would arrange the five or six points I had in mind to continue the letter, a letter that was supposed to be humorous and thought provoking.  That's when I heard an advertisement announcing The Ben Shapiro Show was coming to your station.

I checked the WXDE website to verify I heard correctly.  I did.  I turned off the radio and will not be listening to your radio station until Ben Shapiro is gone.  If you care to know why, please read on.

When I first stumbled onto WXDE 105.9 Talk Radio some five or six years ago, the station's claim that they weren't like any other talk radio station caught my ear.  I don't remember verbatim the ad, but in effect the station claimed that, unlike other talk radio stations that tackle national news in a partisan and divisive manner, 105.9 tackled the local issues and occasionally national issues without the partisan biases and divisive rhetoric.  I liked what I heard.

Dan Gaffney has always been the anchor bigot on the station.  He is very adept at labeling a box, shoving anyone who fit the label into the box, then proceed to verbally shred the box.  Massage parlors weren't running a prostitution ring out of their businesses.  The Asian parlors were.  Religious people didn't break the law by not following established protocols to request use of the Rehoboth Beach pavilion.  The atheists and Godless left wanted to deprive religious people of their rights.  When he dragged the name of a 30-year public servant about to retire through the mud over the issue because the religious people didn't follow proper procedure to request use of the pavilion, I stopped listening to Dan Gaffney. 

The rest of 105.9's programming was as advertised - unbiased (I doubt there's anything as truly unbiased programming) and focused more on local news than national news. 

When the station let Jared Morris go, the station's new philosophy began to emerge.  It took a couple of years, but now two bigot clowns follow your show and, of course, Dan Gaffney is still the bigot anchor to the weekday programming.

Did I say bigot?

Yes.  Whenever one sticks a label on a box, starts stuffing people into the box, and then debates as if the box is one person, you either have an intellectually lazy idiot or a bigot talking.  Yes, I listened to both Tyll and Sussman at various times.  Sussman fascinated me because he sounded like Jared Morris, but after sampling his show for a couple of weeks, I had enough of his intellectual laziness.  Tyll I could stomach for about twenty minutes and had to shut him off.  I haven't listened to him since. 

I'm sure if Tyll were to read this, he'd get on his soap box and rant about how the station so graciously offers us a platform to be heard and how dare I ridicule what the station is doing.  At least that's the gist of his argument to a caller who disagreed with his viewpoints.  Someone should tell Tyll that public airwaves are the public's, not the radio station's.  He should also be told the public affords him the platform to be heard and the station and hosts should be gracious for the ad dollars the public draws in for the station (and the hosts' salaries).

Anyway, I could handle all these changes in the station lineup and philosophy, Ms. Monday, because at least your show mostly stayed true to form of the old philosophy - local first, and no partisan vitriol.  Ok, you changed a little bit, probably to fit in with the new philosophy of the station, but you are the last shining light in 105.9's program lineup.

Are my observations off?  I don't know.  Have you noticed your station doesn't advertise "shop local" any more?  WXDE was never a local station, being owned by people out of Pennsylvania, but at least the station strove to keep a "local feeling" and the talk hosts strove to "keep it local."  Local has been erased from the station's vernacular.  Maybe the shift is because divisive, bigoted programming drives ad revenue, not local ambiance.

How can you say a cute face with dimples is racist?

Now racist Shapiro comes along. 

What?  We went from nice local  to bigots and now racists?

Yup.

I know most of Ben Shapiro fans point out that he's Jewish so how could he be racist? 

Ahh, the thinking of a bigot.  The very people who argue that a Jewish person can't be racist are the same people who ask why the racism of Black people isn't reported on and criticized.

Racism is color blind and no one is immune from it.

Shapiro is a racist, period.  He has a whole body of work out there to prove it.  Take a look at his blog, The Daily Wire.  Yes, The Daily Wire is a blog not much different than Five Drunk Rednecks.  The only difference is the rich kid from California has the money and connections to make his blog "more news like" and generate enough money to hire other writers to contribute posts.  Five Drunk Rednecks can barely afford the time to write consistently every week much less hire a team of writers.

If one reads enough of Shapiro's work, a theme in his writings emerges.  White, European influence good, anything else bad.  One of his most controversial postings (that wasn't authored by him) was a video depicting Native Americans as cannibalistic savages that Europeans came over to save.  He apologized for the posting long after it made its impact by saying he was on vacation when the video was posted.  After reviewing it, he thought it was good satire so he let it stand, but a few days and lots of backlash later, he decided maybe it was in bad taste after all.

And therein lies the problem.  If one reads what Shapiro actually writes himself, it's wish-washy gibberish that uses a lot of ten dollar words when words off of Walmart's clearance rack would work just as well.  Despite the ten dollar words and the "sitting on the fence" literal interpretation of his work, the underlying tone is, at minimum, bigoted, if not racist. That's why Shapiro inspired one of my characters in my recently developed satire, "Conservative Cacophony."  If you're not sure what that is, look to your right for the label, "Conservative Cacophony" (complete with a disclaimer) or look at the top of the page for the tab, "Conservative Cacophony." 

Shapiro's other problem is his blog, The Daily Wire.  Shapiro doesn't author every post, but he is responsible for the content. 

Ok, let's back up here.

Many media outlets air a disclaimer  along the lines that the views and opinions expressed are not those of the station (or whatever outlet airing or publishing the views), but are solely the opinions of the hosts and guests.  I can't find such a disclaimer on The Daily Wire and even if such a disclaimer exists, does it absolve Shapiro, the owner and chief editor, of responsibility for the site's content?  Honestly, I don't know if that question has ever been answered in court so I don't know.  As far as the casual reader is concerned, though, no, the disclaimer is merely a liability protection and an excuse to make money at any cost. 

For most people, the content of a site is a reflection of the owner and chief editor.  The Daily Wire, if read as blogs are meant to be read (as a book in its entirety) is a racist blog.  Shapiro hires the writers, publishes and shares their work, and let's it stand as chief editor.  Either he's a racist because he agrees with the content of his blog or he's greedy and wants all the ad revenue the blog generates regardless of the content he's promoting to make his monthly paycheck.

I'm sure, Ms. Monday, you remember a character named Matt Walsh, originally a local morning show host on WZBH, The Beach at 93.5 on the FM dial.  He was fired from that station; ended up on WGMD at 92.7 on the FM dial for a year before being let go; ended up on an AM talk radio station in Kentucky and was fired before his year contract was up.  That character (who made it clear that Blacks were crack addicted freeloaders living off of welfare and food stamps, gays were mentally ill perverts, and women could work as long as they were home to make their husband dinner - all paraphrased from his one particularly offensive three hour show on August 19, 2010) writes for The Daily Wire today.

So here's the tricky question.  Is Shapiro a racist trying to spread White supremacy messages or is he an astute businessman who knows extreme rhetoric sells and he can maintain his wealthy lifestyle selling extreme rhetoric?  He doesn't write the stuff Matt Walsh writes, but he does promote it.

The answer doesn't matter to me.  Delmarva has enough of its own bigots and racists.  We don't need a rich kid racist from California polluting our airwaves whether he's writing the words or his flunkie writer wannabes are writing the words for him.

So sad to see WXDE 105.9 adopting the divisive bigoted and racist rhetoric to drive ad revenue and up their profits.  If I were rich, I'd buy the station and kick those foreigners from Pennsylvania who own the station to the curb.  But I'm not rich so the most I can do is keep the station silent on my radio.  Somewhere a long time ago, I read that ratings companies set up listening devices along major highways to "hear" what stations are being listened to as the cars pass and the information gathered is combined with other data sources to estimate how many listeners a station has.  If there are monitoring stations along the roadways, I don't want my listening to you to be counted as a plus for the station as a whole.  I feel that strongly about your station purchasing a racist's show from California as if bigots and racists make for quality talk radio.

Anyway, thank you for a few years of quality talk radio programming.You inspired quite a few articles on Five Drunk Rednecks and, yes, you remain an honorary drunk redneck. If you ever leave WXDE, please let me know so I can tune into your new home. If you remain put, please let me know the moment Shapiro is dropped from the station's lineup. I'll start listening to you again.


TL;DR folks:

WXDE 105.9 hired a racist as a talk show host.  Ok, they subscribed to a racist's program to air to you.  They did it for money, I'm sure, but it's time to kick the foreign owned station (the owners live in Pennsylvania) to the curb...or at least into the old coal mines where they grow mushrooms now.  Talk show hosts are dime a dozen.  Find another station to listen to.  I'm so serious about what I wrote, notice I didn't link to the racist websites - The Daily Wire nor WXDE. 


For your listening pleasure:


Posted by A Drunk Redneck