Posted: Monday 19 April 2010
Radio DJ Steve Penk has been reprimanded by the media regulator Ofcom for his broadcast in January about a woman's suicide attempt.
The DJ insensitively played the Van Halen song Jump after travel news reports came in that a woman was considering taking her own life by jumping from a road bridge onto the M60. He made jokes about the incident throughout the two hour programme showing more sympathy for the inconvenienced motorists than the distressed woman who thankfully did survive the incident.
Mind was appalled by Steve Penk's behaviour and complained to ofcom. We blogged and tweeted about this and our website visitors and Facebook followers were equally dismayed (link to blog responses) and 57 of you took the time to complain.
The regulator concluded that Mr Penk had broken the broadcasting code relating to generally accepted standards. The report says:
The potential suicide attempt was discussed in a light-hearted manner even though it was an on-going and live incident at the time. While some listeners may have been frustrated to be caught in traffic (and contacted the station) most would have been aware that, in real time as the programme was being aired, there was a woman considering suicide. Under such circumstances, and given this context, Ofcom does not consider that the broadcaster applied generally accepted standards.
It just goes to show the difference that we can make by coming together to make a stand against discrimination.