Slap on The Wrist?
News Segment About Viewer "Complaint" of a Wristband Warrants Discussion on Consumer Etiquette... But Also Professionalism By Reporter
First off. Let me say it is good to write a Consumer Beast column again. I had this long list of ideas for February, and the first weekend of February, I got food poisoning from a restaurant in Socorro, NM, which is my hometown. Ironically enough, I had just written a column about worker apathy in that town the week before.
It was not pleasant. I am not a vomiter, but I sadly did here. I lost almost 20 pounds in ten days. Nothing tasted good. Even regular old water tasted like castor oil to me. I had oranges. I had the occasional candy, but not much else. It was the most pain I have ever been in, the sickest I ever felt, and frankly, I never want to feel that way ever again.
I sweated and tossed and turned in my guest bedroom listening to every relevant podcast under the sun. No TV. I found out Toby Keith died through a sick scroll of Twitter. It was not fun,
My sincerest apologies. I have been writing NM State columns, but unfortunately my capacity was not what it was until now. But now I am back!
When I last left you, I promised you a deep dive into a local El Paso TV station’s “Mental Health” segments, called “Be Mindful,” and how I thought while it is great to have stories that matter to many on the news like this, I do feel their approach is ham handed, and frankly a little contrived.
I want them to be better and feel more local, not just tell us random stories about California putting barriers to prevent jumpers off the Golden Gate Bridge. It is not local, and not relevant to their commitment they promised last year.
I know this is a touchy subject, and I know the wrong person reading this will be like, “Fuck James, he’s such a hater!”
It’s not like that at all. I am merely critiquing what I am seeing and hope that my discussions lead to more discussions to make it better.
Part 2 was going to be a compilation of some of the sillier clips I have seen since the launch of “Be Mindful.”
Like I said, a lot of the coverage is meaningful coverage, but at times it is just formulaic and reaching for straws… silly straws at that.
“How (insert today’s holiday here) impacts your mental health.”
“Celebrity person has news story tangibly related to mental health”
Their heart is in the right place, for sure, and I think a lot of this is important stuff, but it feels like filler at times in lieu of actual news. It’s just ripping from the headlines of other places most days, and then putting your mental health spin on it.
But something happened this past weekend, that kind of proves my point of the lack of direction with “Be Mindful” at times, where the impact of news stories, or in the case I am going to discuss here, a segment based on a viewer complain can blur the lines of news, customer experience and engagement, and frankly exploitation of a person possibly in the throes of a mental illness episode.
And it all has to do with a goddamn bracelet.
So before I continue some backstory.
Customers can be harsh at times. When I was at Bank of America, some middle-aged Hispanic dude, not unlike your crazy uncle you see at bbqs and birthdays, who was one of my customers, once told me on a Friday the 3rd (the busiest of days at the bank) when I went up to him to see what he needed.
“Damn, man. You got FUCKING fat!!!”
In front of maybe 50 people, including my coworkers, bosses, some customer I had a crush on, and a bunch of other customers.
What happened? People laughed. It was cringe and it hurt my feelings.
Truth? I did get FUCKING fat during that time. What people didn’t know was I was going through a quasi mid-life crisis where I was seeking happiness.
I was newly married and trying to navigate that amazing part of my life with the distractions of working with 90% women and getting belittled at work, sexually harassed in a toxic environment, which led to me not being my best as a human myself, and I had thoughts of ending it all almost every day, because it was all so heavy on me, pun intended. I went from 200lbs to 310 in about 5 years. I hated it. That man really put it out there on the spotlight for me to eat it.
Later that year, another customer went up to one of my coworkers and complimented her on how amazing her breasts looked in her shirt, then five minutes later in my office, the man who I am trying to help change his address, keeps on talking about her breasts in my office which echoes like Carlsbad Caverns and then says, “If she had a better face, I’d hit that every night.”
I mean.. yeah. This dude critiqued her body in both positive and negative ways in a John Madden like breakdown when I am trying to do my job. My boss understood that I was an unwilling participant in that conversation, but it is still awkward.
Even the “uncensored” me at the time knew that was bad.
But what am I getting at? Unsolicited critiques of you in workplaces can get harsh. In the news business, a lot of it always falls on news reporters. Now, let’s be blunt, most of the news reporters are attractive. Television is a visual medium. It’s perfectly ok to say, “This reporter is hot” in your head or in private, but when you manifest that into comments towards the station or the person directly, it’s weird.
What happens a lot of times though are that reporters will get a lot of hate about their appearance from both men and women, and it has become a Tweet du Jour to defend yourself from the comment and a bunch of other newsies retweet it and share your crappy comment about your opinion of her appearance to the Twitter world so you can get reamed pretty nicely.
Ethically, I am not ok with people sicing the dogs on a person so publicly like that. There’s a higher standard that must be presented
Now sometimes, they will share emails on Twitter with the name scratched out. I am ok with that. I actually had an interaction with a local weather girl named Roxy Van Ruiten last year about it.
She had posted an email from a viewer criticizing her sleeveless look during newscasts, saying she looks like she’s going to a garden party or something stupid.
I mean, this email is so damn stupid… Now, I worked at a bank that harped on women’s attire all the time, including seeing bosses belittle women for showing too much cleavage, which to be frank, some of the girls are large chested and everything is going to have cleavage (or boobage as me and my wife would likely say). These women would be brought to tears. One woman left the bank after repeated critiques of her attire.
I never got talked to like that about clothes but my friends did, so I chimed in on Roxy’s post, trying to add a little humor and levity to the discussion.
I wasn’t trying to be a hero for women, have Roxy follow witty James on Twitter or trying to go viral. I was reminded of some of the worst parts of my work experience, as I mentioned above. She shared it, it did go viral and 12,000 views later, it was a popular tweet.
Ironically enough, Roxy Van Ruiten would “resign” from KTSM months later because of a toxic work environment that saw her and other females get harassed by a known sex offender working in their newsroom, and a lot of their complaints went ignored. This was ironically during the time, KTSM was covering NM State athletics and harping on sexual harassment that reportedly went ignored as well. It was a hypocrisy like no other.
As I mentioned, Roxy left and you can check the roster of KTSM, so many other women left in the last several months as well. Toxic environment..
But Roxy won one against a crazy viewer for the critique. And all things being equal, Sleeveless dresses/blouses were allowed in banking for women, so to me it WAS professional.
But so many women go through this shit, and it sucks for them. I feel for them. I do.
Brady Brewster, a former weather personality on KDBC-4 in El Paso has posted several times about comments from people about her appearance. When you post about it, it is simple: It bothers you, and I can understand her being bothered by it.
She called out a viewer named Kathy for calling her a “tramp” in that dress, which is the total opposite of “trampy”. It’s professional.
But last year, right around the same time as Roxy’s post, Brady posted this
She posted a picture of her in a nice dress for a charity event. I have done events for United Way with my time at Bank of America, and they are meaningful events. Plus, nice dress, she looks good. Very attractive (I will leave it at that, because compliments are a slippery slope today)
One old timer from El Paso, where she no longer worked (she had since moved to Colorado) had a comment, and it was frankly too much.
This old man named Jim Kell basically said “You don’t have the tits for the dress.” Pardon my salty vernacular but someone who comments what he did this would say the “t” word.
Jesus Christ.
She wasn’t having any of it…
It’s hard to know what she was feeling, but obviously it was anger. She’s right though. If her breasts were oozing out of the dress, someone would say something too. It’s a no-win situation for her. At 26 years old, she is an adult, and as an adult, you don’t have to take these comments. In this scenario, I am ok with her calling him out, because Jim Kell decided to use Jim Kell to talk about her breasts.
For the record, this is who he is… 28 years at Chevron, which likely meant 28 years of working with mostly guys and getting into the netty gritty of vulgar conversations. I will volunteer, convos with female coworkers at the bank were excessive on their part too…
But, Brady was fine with calling it out, because his comment messes up a public post with good intentions (charity)
To me, the social media callouts is a grey area. Not for me, per se, but knowing what a corporate environment is likely, and taking trainings about social media policies in a big company, and actually getting dinged on it once for a comment I once made on Facebook, I understand in a sense that you are representing the news station you are working for in those posts, so if you talk shit or do something that is quasi-vigilante justice, there is that tie to your company. I hope Roxy and Brady didn’t get into trouble for that, but I understand completely. Women have it rough.
Now the wristband situation that got me to write this long thing.
ABC-7 (KVIA) is the unquestioned leader when it comes to news in El Paso. It was the only news source I watched from 2008-2015 when I first moved here, and then slowly incorporated KTSM and KFOX into my diet for various reasons.
I just always like ABC news stations, and they were the most polished in the market with stalwart anchors and interesting storytelling that kept me around for more.
Ever since I can remember, they hosted a segment called ABC-7 Listens, where viewers can send in their comments, concerns, or complaints, and occasionally they will be read on the air, typically on a weekend newscast in its own segment. The segment is meant to imply that the news station is SO local that it wants you to feel free to put your two cents in and help shape coverage or get questions answered.
It’s a good idea in theory, but no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the public. The segments will have some of the dumbest emails at times.
This one rants about Daylight Saving Time…
There was one (I have the video but haven’t uploaded it onto Youtube) where a man is going to stop watching the station because the station gives top billing to Las Cruces in the intro.
“From the Mesilla Valley in Las Cruces, to El Paso and the Borderland, this is ABC-7 at 10”
He threatened to stop watching because of that. Jesus, it was so dumb
There was a two minute segment which included a statement from the main boss at channel 7 why he has to include Las Cruces in the intro. It’s literally a total waste of time.
There are times where it is cool, and frankly behind the curtain, like the sudden, unexplained departure of ABC 7 main anchor Erik Elken in Summer 2023. So many complained demanded an explanation, and they finally addressed it in an ABC-7 listens.
It was nice… but Stephanie Valle and others in the company spent the better part of the month addressing Elken’s departure on their business Facebook pages, which to me was unfair to them, and unprofessional of the station to allow the conversation. Current workers should NOT comment on departed coworkers, especially when the situation was clandestine and murky.
This tool can be used for good, no doubt, but honestly, the infrequentness of the segment tells me it is more strategic when it is aired and not a true open hotline to the station, and that they cherry pick what they want to talk about. Again, that’s fine. It used to be every single week with previous anchors, but presumably, the well was dry every week with decent questions or comments, so I get why it became a once in a while thing…
But last Sunday, I saw an ABC-7 listens that threw it to Adrian Ochoa for a voicemail that was left (didn’t say where the voicemail was sent to… a main phone line or Ochoa’s direct line) where an elderly lady commented on how disgusted she was by his green wristband.
Here’s the comment she said if you don’t want to watch the whole video.
Ugh. It’s so stupid of the lady…. But hear me out a second...
I HAVE noticed the green wristband on Adrian’s wrist since he has been at the news station, especially since he shifted to sports anchor. I am fine with it. I didn’t know if it had significance, and now that I know it did, I am happy that he can honor his family in that way.
Here is is last March
However…
Despite how mean, bitchy, and (wait for me to expand on this) crazy this old lady might sound in criticizing Adrian’s wristband, here are some bulletpoint questions I have.
Why was publicly addressing this lady’s shitty comment necessary? The news station could have easily done a segment and just BS and say, “We have had some questions about why Adrian wears a bracelet. It has a special meaning… Adrian, tell us why.”
If done that way, it freezes out the lady, she will get the answer to the question as to why it is being worn, and Channel 7 looks like a hero for shining a light on donating organs instead of a miniscule peek at neon green when Adrian gestures his hands. His wristband that is largely incognito in newscasts is more for him than to promote awareness, because except for the story mentioning he started in 2019, there is no actual awareness going on. It’s simply a fashion statement at that point. Here’s what the wristband looks likeWe all do things to memorialize our dead loved ones. I know people who got tattoos for their loved ones or sometimes put decals on their car.
To have a segment called, “ABC-7 Listens” and you listen to crazy lady’s complaint and basically in a nerdy way tell her to go fuck herself by saying “No, I will not change” and then showing a ziploc bag full of wristbands, how is that appropriate to dunk on a viewer… a viewer who watches commercials in your newscast and buys those products, which means more ads, which means more money to pay your salary. It’s not her right to talk shit about her clothing, but why is thumbing your nose at an obviously elderly and crazy sounding lady ok? What do they tell you about bullies? Just ignore them.
I get they have to check their Voicemail because it is the news station, but a mean voicemail…to get it, hear it, export it, and then pitch it as a ABC-7 listens where you, a 40-year old man, is equating a green wristband with the plights of the women I mentioned above.. I can’t get with that. Ignoring the voicemail was the first step, but then asking to promote donor awareness was the next step, because if he got the green light to air the VM, he likely could have gotten the same green light being the face of an issue not just a, “That’s messed up. This is how I honor my cousin!”Thirdly, even though again, I 100% agree with Adrian refusing to take off the wristband, and me thinking the lady is crazy, My bank manager brain has me thinking: What if she was an old bank manager or something? I can tell you that I would NOT be allowed to wear his bracelet at Bank of America, nor could any female. I had 3 different sit down meetings about my black wedding ring in the 4 years I was there as a married man, because they thought I was some emo kid rocking black jewelry, not wearing the ring given to me by my Sweetness. It is unlikely, but she could have been part of a professional environment, and it just bugs her. Here’s my wedding ring I had to “explain” several times to regional managers at work
.
I watch the news every single day. I DVR it, and I remember most stories. A story from 5 years ago means a minimum of 1,500 newscasts in that time slot alone and thousands more that aired in other time slots.
What I am getting at was even me, the biggest news junkie in the world, did NOT know the backstory!
Two days from now, everyone will forget the cause, because it won’t be spoken of again, and maybe a year from now, we get the same segment, because someone new to the game will see it for the first time and reach out. You can’t expect everyone to get where you are coming from, and will you care to explain again should it come up again next year? What charity is it from? Website? Instructions on how to sign up to donate?
Dunking on the crazy lady to me is unethical in the sense that you are kicking out a customer and possibly her friends and family forever by how you treated that moment, but say that I do allow it, because her comments are asinine and Adrian doesn’t deserve it, why didn’t you take the opportunity to help so many more people by giving them information on how they can help.That instead of a soliloquy that was basically, “I ain’t going to stop wearing it.. and check this shit out.. I got 100 more. I will outlast you.”
That’s why I have a big problem with it. You had a 3 minute platform and you used it to score points on an old lady.You know what I would have REALLY appreciated? A “Be Mindful” segment. Roll out Avery Martinez and his smooth voice and do a story about “How harassment about your appearance,” or “Harassment at your place of work by a viewer/customer impacts your mental health?”
You could have had an expert on explaining why people feel compelled to belittle people they see on TV, what you can do to combat people harassing you, and to some people who words hurt them (me for instance), through out the 988 hotline number then. In a world where 12 year olds talk shit to other 12 year olds about their ass size, their facial appearance, their crooked teeth, etc, we have this, and it is so silly.
Understanding the psyche of someone who trolls on Adrian, or the two women above would be enlightening, and possibly have opened up a lot of eyes with people who do that.
My wife and I comment on clothes and diction and all that with the newscasts, but it is a private a-b conversation, and I never feel compelled to tell these public figures my opinions, because it’s not my place. But human nature says we still do it privately anyway.One of the ABC 7 listens segments I found on Youtube was about a story one of the reporters did on Glamour Shots…remember glamour shots from the 80s and 90s?
Well they did a whole ABC 7 listens on the submissions of viewer glamour shots photos, with basically an invitation to talk shit and laugh at the photos by going to their website at KVIA.com
Don’t believe me? Here’s the video:I find it funny that these Youtube Vids only have a couple hundred views. They upload everything and almost no one sees them. Sad.
Adrian being a 40 year old man and the two women above who are in their late 20s are not the same type of situation. Women have a lot more they have to deal with in society. The sexualized nature of well…all of us will judge someone by what they are wearing, their chest, their face, their butt, and the way they carry themselves.
Couple that with women who have to deal with other women hating, other men objectifying, and having to maintain professionalism when it seems like every single person wants to tear you down in a world where newsies don’t get paid nearly enough, work bullshit long hours and in this corporate news world, they are expendable when they get a little more experience meaning more money is deserved. It sucks.
Adrian has been at ABC-7 a long time. He is one of the main people there. He is universally well-liked by his peers, and while the local sportscast has shrunk to a almost invisible 2 minutes a day, he does his job well. The professionalism standard for the news business for me is generally a jacket and tie. In this modern local news world, pants are now required as well.
LOL, not that they were naked before, but when you are behind a big-ass desk, you could get away with shorts underneath that blazer and tie.So, to me…as a former professional, I couldn’t get with the shorts thing. You are paid to wear professional clothes. Just because they can’t see you doesn’t mean you don’t have to wear certain things.
For Adrian, I am certain he has the support of his bosses for wearing that. But let’s say he didn’t after this aired, because it never came up, what would happen then? When do your desires to wear something clash with the rules of the place and is it ok to fight them?One more time about the lady. I do think she’s crazy, and likely really old. In this sensitive world of mental health, it’s not PC to say “crazy” anymore, but you are talking to a man with 3 suicide attempts, a nervous breakdown, and low self-confidence. I am mental health awareness… I can say it and be fine with it. SHE’S FREAKING CRAZY!!!!
Exploiting Crazy Lady and her rambling calls (who even calls the station if you are normal) for a segment when you literally promised to raise awareness on mental health to help people is contradictory at best, hypocritical at worst. As mentioned, if you would have called this a mental health segment and not ABC 7 Listens, I would feel differently.
Plus when you call yourself ABC 7 LISTENS, it kind of implies that you are willing to accept the criticisms and address some things. If you are going to use it as a one-way pulpit to shit on someone for making a comment using a method the average person would have never heard until YOU YOURSELF aired it (voicemail), will that not discourage others with real questions from reaching out to you, because of how you adeptly talked shit about a single green wristband?
I know you can’t please everyone, but why would you say you listen when you so easily dismiss one lady’s POV so readily and go out of your way to dunk on her instead of promoting how to help with donor awareness?Finally, and this is why I decided to write this. The Adrian Ochoa video made it to Instagram Account FitFamEP, which is basically a TMZ-style account of the happenings in the Sun City, complete with shit-talking commenters. I love that page, and frankly, they are the best, most interactive news source in the city because they have an army of willing and able followers who will help them Aggregate news stories!
They posted the video, and then it became viewed thousands of times, and tons of comments were left on the post. Here are some:And then the last one…
”The bracelet is hardly noticeable”
Well, that’s the problem then right?… If it is to raise awareness, and even the supporters say you can’t really see it, is it to raise awareness or is it just for you? Again, I am fine with it being just for you, but this whole segment was so manufactured, that it has an unintended consequence.
Yes, the lady who said it was stupid, but the fact that you tweeted it out, ABC 7 and it gets aggregated to FitFam El Paso with its 100k+ followers, who then commented on the video hateful, bullying words about the lady, including insinuating she should die for her comments is FOMENTING BULLYING to the Nth degree. You share a video like that to garner support, not realizing that people who support you will always do so, but it will make them worse than the person who said something bad when they go for her heart simply by commenting the way you told her and your viewers they could do so they can be closer to your station.
Basically you invited her to comment her thoughts, you didn’t like it, so you aired it and shared it, not hundreds of thousands of people want to punch an old lady out.
Fomenting Bullying? Doing segments about mental illness? Not computing.
You can’t say it was meant to be serious when weekend anchors Brianna Perez and Jason McNabb were chuckling at the end of the segment.
This is why I think it was wrong. You did that to hurt her feelings. You didn’t give her name out, but might as well. If she sees instagram, she would have thousands of people basically telling her to piss off… How does that help her mental health?
Look, I don’t want to be one to lose sight of what this is about. Donor awareness is an important thing, and the guy with the platform chose to talk shit to an old lady viewer who is in fact a customer of his newscast. It’s short sighted. It could have been so much more.
I will find a donor charity and give all my monthly earnings on this column to it as a show of solidarity to the cause, because at the end of the day, I have problems with how it was handled.
Nothing will ever replace losing a family member, but all these years and wearing the bracelet later, it took an angry old lady to actually speak of it again. Raising awareness is one thing, but actually taking action and doing something about it is another.
Here’s some donor awareness charities: