On politics, sex or race, hardball hosts relish a verbal brawl
They call their guests boobs and liars and taunt callers to "get off the phone, you jerk." They shout, hang up and cut people off in midsentence. They sound off pugnaciously on politics and make brash forays into sex. Among their most frequent targets are homosexuals, women, and ethnic and racial minorities. When challenged, they are apt to say things like, "You come down here, boy, you yellow-bellied, egg-sucking dog, bedwetter, pinko Commie " They are the abrasive breed of radio and television personalities, most of them talk-show hosts, who treat their profession as a verbal adjunct to street fighting. But if their hectoring style wins enemies as well as friends, no matter—the ratings count both.
A new glare of national attention has fallen on these belligerent broadcasters since the murder last month of one of their number, Denver's Alan Berg, who was shot down in the driveway of his condominium. When Denver police assigned 60 officers to investigate Berg's killing, it was an acknowledgment of the hostility his combative style had provoked among his estimated 200,000 listeners. So many officers were needed, said one, partly because Berg's audience provided so many potential suspects. Threats and sometimes violence are indeed an occupational hazard. Ex-Washington Radio Talker Gary D. Gilbert has been assaulted in a restaurant by an angry listener and once had a bomb planted in his car. San Diego radio station KSDO has assigned round-the-clock guards for Dave Dawson, its controversial though less brutal host.
Berg's killing has also added a nasty twist to an ongoing ratings war in Miami, where six news/talk shows crowd the air, four in English, two in Spanish. Soon after Berg's death, Tom Leykis of WNWS told his listeners the real name of a popular, less vitriolic competitor who works at a rival station under the pseudonym Neil Rogers, and urged them to call and harass him. "Rogers," who received death threats in 1980 for his opposition to the arrival of the Cuban boat people, believes that Leykis was enabling listeners to attack him "a la Alan Berg." Leykis' station made an apology on the air.
The insult-artist school of broadcasting traces its roots to Joe Pyne, an ex-Marine who liked to tell his guest victims to "go gargle with razor blades." He perfected his brand of radio ridicule in Los Angeles in the early 1960s, then carried it to syndicated television later in the decade, when hippies and antiwar protesters offered him a steady flow of irresistible targets. A generation of Pyne clones were soon imitating his snarl at other stations around the country, and for a time the style flourished. But Pyne died in 1970, and the popularity of his percussive style declined during the low-key 1970s. The 1980s have witnessed a comeback of sorts, as the decade's mood has become more aggressive and as the air waves, stimulated by MTV and a rejuvenated record industry, have become hotter and more competitive.
The rewards for the hosts can be high, including notoriety and incomes that often range into six figures. Among the most prominent current practitioners: