The WZBH Critic's Page is a blog to track the sexist, racist, Islamaphobic, and homophobic commentary often heard on WZBH, The Beach at 93.5 FM airing out of Georgetown, DE. While the station does play some decent rock music, commentary by the nine, thirty-something or younger, White male DJs often targets women and minority groups for ridicule. Women are consistently referred to as "chicks", Muslims are hellbent on destroying America, Black people are mocked, and real men act a certain way.
This blog is born out of frustration from a Matt and Crank show on August 18, 2010, where both DJs labeled homosexuals as perverts and mentally ill. About a month later, they included a segment on why women shouldn't be high school football coaches, which amounted to nothing more than twenty minutes of sexist rantings.
While the abuses are prominent on the Morning Show, the other DJs help carry the negative tone through their shows. Chris Steele regularly refers to women as "chicks". JJ worried about anyone who knew one day in November was National Coming Out Day. On another segment, he wanted callers to reassure him that when some friends came over to watch football and drink a few beers, a couple of his friends weren't gay because they cooked up a five-course meal during the show.
WZBH's programming does not reflect the diversity that makes up Delmarva. A look at the profile of all nine DJs is testament to that fact. WZBH needs to reign in the young, White, Christian, heterosexual males running the show.
The first step would be bringing in a more diverse DJ staff. Women and minorities like rock music, too.
The second step would be to delete links to personal FaceBook pages. Currently, the one linked to the Matt & Crank Show is not a FaceBook page for fans to interact with the DJs as an extension to the official WZBH web page. It is Matt's personal page where he berates fans who don't agree with him and promotes his own (presumably not the station's) personal moral , religious, and political views. If fans are not allowed to interact freely on the linked pages, then the pages shouldn't be linked from the main WZBH web page as if it were an extension of the official site nor should the page be promoted on air as an invite for fans.
If those two steps are followed, particularly the first step, the third step would follow naturally. The programming tone and overall message being set by WZBH and Great Scott Broadcasting would be more diverse and inclusive of all the listeners and fans on Delmarva.
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