Montel Williams attacks media, KIRO Radio over his hypocritical position

Montel Williams is angry with the media attention paid to Marysville-Pilchuck in the aftermath of a story this week where the school was evacuated due to a bomb threat.

With a story like that, it’s obvious that the media was there to cover it. We covered it here on KIRO Radio, our news partners did, and every local newspaper did.

But that’s a problem, especially the local TV coverage of the event, according to former TV talk show host Montel Williams.

In The Everett Herald, Montel wrote a guest commentary demanding that local media outlets apologize to the kids of Pilchuck for the coverage. He writes:

I understand that a bomb threat at a school, much less this school needs to be reported. I do not think, however, that the need to inform the public justifies further frightening these kids by flooding the area with live news trucks and flying helicopters over the location where frightened children are being reunited with their families. It’s great that the media constantly professes to care about kids like these, but that is certainly not the message that gets translated to the kids when the media oversteps like this. All that’s needed here is a deep breath and some basic empathy for what these kids have gone through and are going through.

A cursory view of the coverage from some outlets seemed respectful and reasonable. But maybe Montel has a point and I feel he’s being genuine in his disappointment. I’ll leave that up to you to decide. But what initially got me so interested in this perspective, was the person it was coming from.

He writes that what happened with the media coverage was “objectively exploitive.”

That seemed odd to me, because he has made a career of doing that to other people, including kids. Whether it was the show where he interviewed a 16-year old who claimed to have been impregnated by a man her family trusted when she was only 11, or when he featured a racist man who impregnated a black woman, Montel’s entire career and brand was based on exploitation.

There was no meaningful news value to these stories.
So why did he cover them? Why did Montel and his producers spend time finding these stories, potentially paying these presumably lower to middle class folks to tell their story (some talk shows pay the participants), potentially housing them in hotels for the travel they’d need to make to the studios? For ratings. For money. For his brand. That is textbook exploitation.

Montel pointed out on Twitter Friday that he personally “took responsibility for following them [the guests] and their aftercare when they needed it.” If true, good for him, I suppose, but that doesn’t absolve you from your exploitation. He put stories on the air that he thought would get him ratings. And a good portion of these guests were victims. Right now, he’s trying to push a new brand.

If you think for a second this isn’t, even a little bit, about Montel’s career, then you’re naive. Again, I actually get the sense he’s sincere and cares about the issue but even in The Herald, he writes, “Having spent some time with these kids (as I have after nearly every incident like this across the country)…” because he wants some credit.

After hearing my segment on this topic, he reached out to me to further push his own brand, showing the world how he’s doing what he’s doing for right, just, and moral reasons, while the evil naysayers are “attacking” him. In fact, he claims that the criticism I offered is over his support of #MPStrong – yes, he hashtagged it on Facebook so you actually can find his piece when you do a search (it’s all about the his brand, remember). He even gives out my personal Twitter link so his fans can boost his ego by criticizing me.

If KIRO really wants to play the game of attacking me for my support of #MPStrong that's fine. Means they are…http://t.co/EOzeyqXIoW

— Montel Williams (@Montel_Williams) January 16, 2015

Now, of course, I didn’t criticize his message in any meaningful way (I’ve said I think it has some merit and it’s certainly worth discussing), but pointed out the hypocrisy in that message coming from Montel, even if it’s sincere. In turn, he changes the subject in a ploy to help push his own brand.

Even Montel’s publicist (of course, not interested in exploitation – publicists don’t do that) tried to pitch himself as a guest on my show to discuss this, because talk shows just love interviewing publicists of the people we actually want to talk to. He thought he’d bait me into booking him on the show, saying if I didn’t, I lack the courage.

So @jasonrantz @JasonRantzShow intellectually dishonest much? I'll have this debate with you any time. Tonight? Doubt u have the courage

— Jonathan Franks (@LucidJonFranks) January 16, 2015

The hypocrisy and holier than thou attitude bothers me, even if Montel’s message has merit.