Oh Hey There

THE lie detector radio stunt on 2Day FM involving a 14-year-old girl who revealed she had been raped at 12, was a gross violation of her human rights. The girl was strapped to a lie detector test, to be interrogated about school, drugs and her sexual experience by Austereo’s Kyle Sandilands and Jackie O and the girl’s mother. Her protests that she was scared and that it wasn’t fair were ignored. It is the height of irresponsibility to hook any child up to a lie detector test. This is compounded when the intention is to expose a girl to a live outing of her sexual experience.

Regardless of any excuses about lack of advance knowledge that the girl had been raped, there is little doubt the aim was to publicly shame the child.

Dragging a child onto the media stage to be interrogated about her sexuality is a horrific invasion of her rights.

There is a well-founded legal assumption of vulnerability and a need for protection of children at this age, which the station has ignored. This form of public outing and humiliation is abhorrent and must be condemned. There needs to be a penalty. What took place was child abuse and should be acknowledged as such. Increasing desensitisation to the needs of children must stop. This program should be axed. We call for a national strategy for the prevention of child abuse and exploitation, including in the media.