‘Used by the CBC’： Wendy Mesley after the ‘n-word’ incident
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Summary
For many years, broadcaster Wendy Mesley was a fixture on the televisions of Canadian households, bringing families the news as a host of popular shows Undercurrents, Marketplace, and The National, all on the CBC, where she worked for 38 years until her departure last year. Now, she is the host with Maureen Holloway of the podcast Women of Ill Repute, which is described as being about people who don t give a damn about the old rules.
Transcript
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Hello, I'm Anthony Fury. Thanks for joining us for the latest episode of Full Comet. If you haven't
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done so already, please consider subscribing. For many years, broadcaster Wendy Mesley was a fixture
00:02:01.900
on the televisions of Canadian households, bringing families the news as a host of popular shows
00:02:06.500
Undercurrents, Marketplace, and The National, all on the CBC, where she worked for 38 years until her
00:02:12.280
departure from that network last year. A remarkable career during a time that saw incredible changes
00:02:17.020
in the media landscape. Now, Wendy Mesley is the host with Maureen Holloway of a new show,
00:02:21.960
the podcast Women of Ill Repute, which is described as being about people who don't give a damn
00:02:28.340
about the old rules. Wendy joins us today to talk about her career, her new show, the state of media
00:02:34.120
today in Canada, including the future of the CBC, and so much more. Wendy Mesley, welcome to the
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program. Thank you so much for joining us today. Oh, you're very, very welcome. Lovely to be here,
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Anthony. How are you? I am doing well, and how are you? Good. I'm so happy to hear you mention
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Undercurrents, because that was my favorite show. I love doing that show. I had been a political
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reporter forever, and I thought that there weren't really people who were investigating media or
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marketing or advertising or all of that stuff, and I thought, woohoo! And of course, I soon learned
00:03:06.000
why no other network was doing that was because I was attacking my colleagues and attacking
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advertisers and so on, but it was great while it lasted, and CBC, God bless them for that.
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They let me do that show, so thank you for mentioning that. That was my favorite.
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And you know, it's funny, because I guess sometimes the things that people consider their own career
00:03:26.620
highlights, you know, people they've interviewed or places they've gone to are not necessarily what
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the public would think. Like you say, oh, this was the prime minister or what have you. Well, no,
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it was actually this or that. What sort of anecdotes or interviews do you chalk as your
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favorites that perhaps we wouldn't first think of? You know what? I think that's everybody's
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or so many people's first question, and definitely a favorite question. And I'm terrible. I used to
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think it was a guy thing, but I don't think it is. I think it's just a person. I don't know. I mean,
00:03:57.620
there's certain interviews that I remember. Like, I remember asking Jean Chrétien why his face was
00:04:03.340
half frozen, that nobody, everybody talked about, but nobody ever asked him. And he gave me an honest
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answer. Like, I remember, he said, yeah, I had this disease when I was a kid. And now, you know,
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I talked to this other ear, and I hear better through that. And, and, and on we go. So I thought
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that was, like, I remember weird little moments, as opposed to, like, I always wanted to interview
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Dolly Parton. And I, at one point at CBC, they said, who of all the people in the world,
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we're doing something to fill time in the summer, when no one's spending any money. But who of all
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the people in the world, would you like to interview? And I said, Dolly Parton, this is
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like 10 years ago. And she wouldn't do it, wouldn't do it, wouldn't do it. And then finally said, I won't
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come up and do it, or I won't meet you and do it. But you can come to, what's it called?
00:04:47.920
Dollywood. Yeah. And it was when I had booked to go away on holidays, and I couldn't go. And it was
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awful. So that was my big, my big chance. So yeah, I guess I probably would have remembered every word
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of that interview, but it never happened. She does strike me as a genuinely just decent human being,
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Dolly Parton. I know. Yeah. And she's such, you know, I mean, the fake boobs and all which, you know,
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as women were 50 years ago, raised to think, you know, anything you do to enhance your, you should
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never do any of that. But she did it. She was open about it. Her music is great. She can write
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a song in five minutes. And she's, she's just such an inspiration. I'm not a big music person,
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which Maureen Holloway, my co host on the new podcast that we're doing points out to me all
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the time that I am really a mutant when it comes to pop culture. But to me, Dolly is such a,
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such a great character. She's just she's she's used she's she's brilliant. And she's a brilliant
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business person. And she's used her life to make life better for other people. So kind of a cool
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person. You know, Wendy asking, How are you doing now? I'm sure there's a lot of people who who
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approach you and probably ask you that question, just because they're so used to you being in the
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background of their lives with television on seeing you every day. They haven't seen you for for well
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over a year. And they're probably coming up to you on the streets and saying, How you doing,
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Wendy? Well, it's weird, like people, most of the people who come up to me are over 40,
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because it seems that mainstream media now is only watched by people over 40, or maybe even older.
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So yeah, no, I'm doing fine. I it was, it was a heartbreaking thing that I went through it at CBC.
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I mean, I can talk about that I can, I wouldn't mind actually telling you what happened. Because
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for a year, I didn't, didn't stand up for myself and didn't say anything and sort of hope that things
00:06:36.500
would get better. And, and I think I was used by CBC to basically say, we have a racism problem,
00:06:44.100
and it's her. So let's all hate her. So yeah, basically, what happened was I was on a phone
00:06:50.180
call, preparing a show. George Floyd had been murdered by the cops. A week earlier, we were
00:06:57.240
doing something on racism in Canadian media. And we had three black people who were going to come on to
00:07:03.700
the journalists who were going to come on and talk about what it was like in journalism. And
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anyway, so we were I was talking with other producers on the phone, because it was COVID time,
00:07:11.560
the beginning of COVID time. And anyway, I was outraged that this woman who was going to be on
00:07:17.120
our panel, this journalist had said that she was called that all the time. And anyway, I was outraged
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by this and kept going on. She was called the N word all the time.
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She was called the N word all she said she was called this all the time. So I wanted that to be part
00:07:30.680
of our panel discussion. And I think I used the N word in the first reference. And then I used the
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whole word and because I got caught up in the moment, and I shouldn't have used it. And I realized
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immediately that I'd hurt people. And I apologized for using the word because I should have known
00:07:48.540
better. But it turned into like the next year, I was basically portrayed by my employer of almost 40
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years as, as being a racist, and they never stood up for me. And so I and I never fought for myself.
00:08:02.160
So I think I it kind of broke my heart, actually, it was extremely, extremely difficult. So that took
00:08:09.520
a year to resolve that. And during that, I got sick, and my mom died, and a whole bunch of other
00:08:13.520
shitty stuff happened. And then finally, we parted ways, shall we say, and, and now I'm doing this
00:08:21.780
podcast. So I'm sort of a broadcaster, but I'm more of a podcaster, not making any money. But
00:08:26.820
if you want to sign up, please do. We're looking for sponsors, we're looking for like big bags of
00:08:33.420
money to fall from the sky. So I'm, I'm fine now. But it was, it was a rather rough thing to go through
00:08:38.780
when you look back on that period. And you kind of say, you know, I didn't say it on the air. I, I
00:08:44.520
apologize, because I had hurt people and should have known better. And I deserve to be punished. But I
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didn't deserve the punishment that I got, which was basically losing all credibility and my reputation
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and my job and my show and everything else at CBC. So, wow. And losing your mother as well. I'm
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sorry to hear about that very difficult. Yeah, well, it's funny, I wrote, I think you want to ask me
00:09:06.640
about the piece that I wrote for the Globe, more than a year ago, but I wrote another piece that got
00:09:13.080
published on Mother's Day. So recently. And it was about my mother as being the original woman of ill
00:09:20.600
repute. Because she basically raised me, she left my dad, who I revealed in that piece was gay. Back in
00:09:27.980
those days, it was illegal to be gay. He was going to go through psychotherapy or whatever, and see a
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psychiatrist and learn how not to be gay as if that's a thing. Anyway, so obviously, their marriage
00:09:39.700
did not work out. But somehow I happened. And so I wrote about how she basically went on and
00:09:46.780
formed a life for herself and for me, after leaving him and how she was the original woman of ill repute
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and that, you know, she wasn't, it took her seven years to get custody of me and to get a divorce. And
00:10:01.200
by the time she could date, she was in her 30s. And in those days, if you weren't married by 30,
00:10:07.160
you're a spinster. So anyway, she never remarried. And she raised me to fight for myself and to think
00:10:14.300
a little bit differently than a lot of women were raised to think in those days. And yeah, so I,
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I, yeah, it was, it was difficult losing her, but she had dementia. So she was sort of slipping away
00:10:28.360
gradually. It was not, not a shock. When she died.
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There's so much to unpack about what you discussed there about your departure from CBC. One thing I
00:10:40.660
found interesting, you mentioned, and a year later, so there was the incident, the meeting,
00:10:44.840
which you promptly apologized for, realized you'd misspoken. And then a year later, you feel like
00:10:51.940
you're sort of the fall guy, the fall gal for this racism at the CBC issue. How is that something that
00:10:58.340
No, it didn't take a year. I, yeah, no, I felt that pretty immediately when it turned into,
00:11:03.300
like, two or three days in when I realized that it was going to be an HR and a union thing,
00:11:10.300
and that they were going to basically allow everybody who wanted to portray me as a racist
00:11:15.400
to portray me as a racist. That, like, I was mad from, or I was upset, mad at myself,
00:11:22.880
but also mad at CBC very early on. But when you work for CBC, you can either, and something happens,
00:11:31.720
you can either go with the process and try and figure it out and hope that, that, you know,
00:11:37.320
after 40 years, and, and it had its own problems with systemic racism, of which it was accused
00:11:44.040
publicly at the CRTC and other places by CBC employees, you would hope that I had hoped that
00:11:51.240
things could be worked out and that I could actually return. And it took, it took a year,
00:11:55.500
but you can't fight, you can't say anything, you can't fight for yourself, you can't say anything
00:11:59.380
publicly. So it took a year for me to say, okay, this is not going to work. We, neither of us sees
00:12:05.300
the future here. So I'm going to leave. So it took a year for me to say, I'm going to leave and to have
00:12:11.000
the freedom to be able to say, I think the treatment of me was inappropriate. And, uh, I'm,
00:12:17.560
uh, I'm a free person and, uh, I didn't agree to a gag order for whatever money might've been
00:12:23.360
involved. And, uh, I'm free, obviously, or I wouldn't be speaking to you. Um, uh, that took a
00:12:30.200
year. It didn't take me a year to figure out that, uh, CBC and I, uh, were not in good terms.
00:12:35.320
So basically you were being spoken about by people for a whole year and, and I guess perhaps
00:12:40.140
misrepresented or smeared or called names for about a year on social media or the rumor mill
00:12:44.660
in the industry. And you're someone who's used to telling stories, telling people's stories for,
00:12:49.400
for many years. And you couldn't tell your own story at that point while other people
00:12:53.460
were, were speaking about you and speaking for you.
00:12:56.540
Well, I mean, this is a much broader discussion. I don't want to talk about smears or whatever,
00:13:00.820
but, um, uh, it is, it is a broader discussion of what's happening in social media is that,
00:13:06.420
you know, like my, so many normal people, like everyday people who are not in the media,
00:13:12.380
uh, they had no idea what happened cause they're, they're not on, on Twitter or Insta or other
00:13:18.060
places that I was being denounced or even watching the national, which sort of denounced me on air a
00:13:23.020
few times. Um, yeah. Um, but I think that it's generally what's happening in media,
00:13:30.680
is that people just read what their friends believe and, uh, and we're basically being
00:13:37.760
taught to hate each other. But during that whole period, yeah. I mean, people were saying all kinds
00:13:41.980
of ridiculous things about me that, and, and, and even other journalists believe that I had actually
00:13:47.700
called somebody the N word. Like I would never, I never have my long life. I have never called
00:13:54.500
anybody that. And I, I thought I had a reputation for fighting for underdogs and, uh, for not being
00:14:01.160
someone that would ever call somebody, uh, uh, a name. Um, I used the word, uh, and I thought I was
00:14:08.340
being supportive and outraged that somebody had actually been called that word, but, uh, but I
00:14:13.480
shouldn't have used it and I apologized. And I think, yeah. So I kept quiet for a year thinking that
00:14:17.980
CBC and I would, would work things out, but, uh, but we didn't. So it took me a year to rant.
00:14:23.820
And it's crazy to think that there's stories about your departure, but all the facts aren't
00:14:27.640
filled in, or there's a segment about you on the national. Uh, and again, the facts aren't filled
00:14:31.860
in. So people are left going, well, what did she do? Yeah. Well, somebody said to me, a friend of
00:14:36.440
mine said, well, because you didn't speak out because you didn't fight for yourself, uh, people think
00:14:42.120
that, uh, the absolute worst must've happened, that it must've been way worse than what actually
00:14:46.640
happened. Um, and it's true. I mean, I think that is my biggest regret is that I, my mom taught me to,
00:14:52.960
to fight for myself. Um, and I didn't, I didn't, I didn't fight for myself, but if I, if I had,
00:14:58.460
I would have had to have left the CBC grieved the, the, the, uh, punishment that was given me. I would
00:15:05.240
have had to have, uh, sued them. And I just, that was, I don't, or, you know, I could have gone the
00:15:11.380
other way and attacked the people who didn't know what had happened and who had made all
00:15:16.540
kinds of assumptions and were using me to fight a cause. Um, and we're making assumptions about me
00:15:22.040
based on stuff that they didn't know, but I didn't want to attack them either. I didn't really want to
00:15:25.800
attack either the place I had worked for 40 years or for the people who were fighting for issues that
00:15:31.140
actually mattered a lot to me. So, uh, so I, yeah, I felt like the best thing I can do is, uh, try and,
00:15:38.420
and work this out. And then I realized that was not going to happen.
00:15:41.480
It seems definitely very bureaucratic, antiseptic, ungenerous to not discuss the
00:15:47.300
nuances of your situation. Um, that appear, it seems that that's what happened in the HR
00:15:53.740
scenario there, where I know there's debates over, is it acceptable to say this word as an
00:15:58.420
example of a word one shouldn't say, you know, people talk about different nuances. Well, it's
00:16:02.740
said in lyrics to songs all the time, kind of thing. You're just using it as example of a word
00:16:07.160
you disapprove of and so forth. And it's like, to your point, this word was not said in hostility.
00:16:12.020
You weren't aiming it towards anyone. You were speaking about it disapprovingly and you've
00:16:17.120
acknowledged, you feel you shouldn't have said it, you've apologized for it. And yet you still need
00:16:21.340
to lose everything. It's kind of like, where was the nuance in all of that?
00:16:27.480
Yeah. Well, I, I, I don't think that there's any excuse for, for saying the word and I should
00:16:33.640
have known better. And that's why I apologize. And I, and I think that people do need to be
00:16:38.500
careful when they're hurting other people, you know, like my, I, uh, I take particular offense
00:16:43.640
to what's called the C word, which everybody knows, uh, as well as they know the N word. Um,
00:16:48.240
I would take particular offense to that. And my husband, you know, he's, uh, Irish and thinks
00:16:55.280
that that's, I think that that's a word that you call everybody that you think is being a dick
00:16:59.740
in a certain moment. Um, and he doesn't see it as offensive. So everybody sees things in
00:17:04.920
different ways and they can express themselves in different ways. I should have known better.
00:17:09.140
I never mean like, if I mean to hurt somebody, like when I was in marketplace and chasing crooked
00:17:14.640
contractors, I meant to hurt them, but I did not mean to hurt anybody by using that word. And I should
00:17:21.120
have known better. And I think, but I do think the context matters. There's a big difference between,
00:17:26.320
uh, fighting against somebody being called that and saying the word and calling somebody that,
00:17:31.280
which I would never have done in a million years. All right. And I guess I just mean that there was
00:17:36.480
no sense of that nuance in public discussion or reporting of you, or perhaps in the HR process,
00:17:41.800
it seemed to just be, okay, Wendy has to lose everything now. I, yeah, I don't want to speak for
00:17:46.940
them. I can speak for myself, but yeah. And I think I've explained sort of where I've come from.
00:17:54.440
So when you talk about the punishment you received, what, what was that punishment?
00:17:58.720
Uh, well, there are some points that, um, in my, uh, there are some points that I'm not sure that I
00:18:06.460
can speak about, but, uh, it, it was probably the largest punishment, uh, given out, uh, to anyone who
00:18:14.080
was not fired. Uh, and then I ended up losing my job and my show and whatever. Anyway, they, they,
00:18:19.180
uh, the, the, the punishment, uh, at CBC can be, um, uh, not being paid for a period of time. So I was
00:18:30.360
not paid for a period of time and I had to go to sensitivity training. Um, and my show was taken
00:18:36.480
away from me and I was ultimately offered another job, which was to go back and basically, you know,
00:18:43.360
do a job that I did when I was 20 years old, which is, you know, read somebody else's copy.
00:18:49.700
I want to get your thoughts on a story up at cbc.ca right now. Prominent Radio Canada
00:18:53.940
personalities urge broadcaster to fight CRTC N word decision. Basically there were a few occasions,
00:19:01.000
a number of occasions where a French Canadian employees of, of Radio Canada, part of CBC,
00:19:06.480
uh, had used the N word, I guess in a similar way that, that, that you had in terms of not
00:19:13.380
using it, uh, rudely to a person, but just as an example word, uh, they said this on the air.
00:19:19.600
I know it was established. You said it in a meeting and there was a complaint filed against them
00:19:25.060
and they're saying they want CBC to fight for them. These broadcasters and a lot of, uh, prominent
00:19:31.280
French broadcasters are standing up and saying, yes, you must fight for us, uh, to not receive
00:19:35.760
great punishments for this. I know they often do things differently in Quebec in a number of ways
00:19:40.020
than we do here in English Canada. What do you make of this story? Um, I don't want to make a
00:19:45.440
pronouncement about what Radio Canada or CBC should do, but I have two comments. One is that, uh, nearly
00:19:52.960
all of the people who are saying, how dare the CRTC get involved in this, uh, free speech, uh, debate
00:20:00.020
and tell Reggie Canada what to say. Um, all of those people are 50 and older and there's a lot of
00:20:07.780
people and white, um, maybe not all of them, but I, but pretty much so. And I happen to know a lot of
00:20:15.620
people under 50 and a few people under 50 who are not white, who work at Reggie Canada and are not
00:20:22.000
supportive and think that, that nuance does matter. And there was no nuance, um, expressed in that show,
00:20:27.600
acknowledging that saying the word, um, could have, um, harmful or hurtful effects on people.
00:20:35.540
So there's that. And I would also like to point out that, uh, there was a complaint, uh, made, uh,
00:20:42.800
at CBC during this whole inward thing at CBC, as opposed to Reggie Canada back in the day when I
00:20:48.260
said the word on the telephone, uh, to staff members, um, not accusing anyone of being that,
00:20:55.460
but being upset that somebody was called that. Uh, so the ombudsman at CBC looked into it and wrote
00:21:00.320
a report and nobody noticed that because there was a lot of blah, blah, blah, as there always is
00:21:06.300
in ombuds people's reports, wherever, wherever the institution is. Um, but they also said that, uh,
00:21:14.160
that the CBC broke its own ethical guidelines for, uh, uh, how they, how they covered what happened
00:21:20.800
to me. So, uh, yeah, there, there is, there is a difference. CBC decided to make an example out of
00:21:27.580
me, even though if you look at all of the senior management, or if you look at all the things that
00:21:31.960
were said about, uh, CBC at the time and its own problems with, uh, with racism, um, there,
00:21:38.600
they decided to, uh, um, you know, take advantage of, of, uh, of my using the word and, and my
00:21:47.140
celebrity, I guess, Canadian style celebrity for whatever it's worth. Um, and, uh, there was a
00:21:53.700
very different approach at, uh, at Radio Canada. We'll be back with more full comment in just a
00:21:59.860
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00:22:59.280
What are the new technologies that will change aviation? Well, hydrogen would be one for sure if,
00:23:05.220
if we got there. I mean, hydrogen is not just a, uh, alternative fuel. I mean, hydrogen would change,
00:23:10.440
would change it significantly if we ever managed to break the back of that.
00:23:13.980
Today, I'm speaking with Kalen Rovinescu, the former president of Air Canada and a trailblazer
00:23:21.380
in global aviation. Join me, Chris Hadfield, on the On Energy podcast.
00:23:30.800
Wendy, you mentioned CBC's problems with racism. CBC is a large organization,
00:23:35.440
many employees. Are the problems that CBC has faced, uh, particularly greater than at other
00:23:42.400
institutions? What, what is unique or specific to CBC's challenges as opposed to the challenges that,
00:23:49.380
that other organizations might face with racism?
00:23:51.980
It is a, um, excuse me, it is a, uh, unique situation, um, because I, I don't think that the
00:24:00.640
issue of diversity or bigotry or racism or whatever is any different or any worse, uh, it might actually
00:24:07.460
be better at CBC than a lot of places, but the, the difference is that, um, well, I guess there's
00:24:14.760
two differences. Um, the main difference is that because it's, um, uh, a crown corporation and because
00:24:24.100
it's subsidized by taxpayers, it has a responsibility to, uh, uh, when it does something bad to take
00:24:31.520
responsibility and try and make that better and to be accountable for that. Where, as if you're in,
00:24:37.200
uh, private media, you can make different decisions that don't have anything to do with,
00:24:44.280
uh, that have to do with your own morality as opposed to how others may, may see you. So there's
00:24:49.400
that difference. And there is also a very strong union at CBC, which means that all the old people,
00:24:53.900
like me, uh, had jobs that were protected forever and you would have had to have basically murdered
00:24:59.900
your boss on video, which existed in those days, um, uh, for you not to be supported. So,
00:25:08.000
and meanwhile, the, the government grants and the, and the audience were declining. And so people,
00:25:17.320
all of the old white people were supported and all of the young people who wanted to have jobs,
00:25:22.740
including people who were of color or some kind of diversity, uh, were, were trying to get in and
00:25:29.840
all there, there just weren't a lot of positions in a, in a shrinking mainstream media world. And so
00:25:35.260
like everybody, everybody is struggling and CBC tried extra hard, but they did,
00:25:40.680
they had racism problems. And part of what happened to me was there was a, um, diversity inclusion,
00:25:46.520
um, group that had been made all kinds of promises about how there was going to be changes in terms of
00:25:53.780
there would not just be old white people in terms of, uh, uh, senior management and that there would
00:25:59.320
be different rules in terms of what was considered a bias or a whole bunch of promises made. And this
00:26:05.780
group didn't feel like they were being delivered upon, especially after changes in management. And,
00:26:10.420
um, uh, so when I happened, when the thing with me happened, it was just like enough already and
00:26:17.380
George Floyd and COVID and everything else enough already enough, enough, enough. And so, um, it
00:26:23.280
became, it became very much an issue and there'd been a change in management and, uh, and, and a big
00:26:29.240
focus on, on, on trying to change things quickly. And I got swept up in all of that.
00:26:34.540
Um, speaking about CBC being a crown corporation, people having views about it, people have opinions
00:26:41.540
and passions about CBC that they just don't have about the other major networks. I guess the other
00:26:46.640
networks, they either, they either watch or they don't. And that's that CBC, there's friends of CBC
00:26:51.820
and organization. There are people who put, uh, little signs on their yard saying I'm a CBC supporter
00:26:57.100
on the other side, there are people who just love to criticize CBC and you can win an entire
00:27:01.280
conservative leadership race, just promising to trim the budget or even shut down the whole
00:27:05.020
operation. So strong are the passions felt on both sides. Do you think that's, that's fair? And how,
00:27:13.240
how did journalists in CBC respond to that atmosphere? Well, I think that, uh, a lot of people
00:27:23.120
have wanted to work for CBC, uh, because it has been such, especially as, as, as journalists,
00:27:30.780
um, and there is this, I mean, it used to be that, uh, there would be, I'm exaggerating, but there
00:27:38.640
would be like three crews showing up for, uh, CTVs, one crew and people would go, this is ridiculous.
00:27:43.880
Um, those were the good old days. Those, those days haven't existed for a long time. Uh, so now CBC,
00:27:51.800
while, uh, struggling like everybody else and while supported by the government, unlike everybody else,
00:27:59.100
it's, it's still struggling and its audience is shrinking and the dollars are shrinking, the demands,
00:28:03.680
the, the, uh, the, uh, demands to be, uh, in time zones across the country in different languages and
00:28:10.440
all of that. It's, uh, it, it's really difficult. Like I, I'm, I'm doing a podcast now because I,
00:28:16.900
I think that the mainstream media, uh, world is shrinking and changing. And some of that is natural
00:28:24.260
and some of that is good, but some of it is also because people, it used to be, you know,
00:28:29.360
like when I was a kid where there would be like three TV stations to watch. That was great. It
00:28:34.000
used to be in Quebec, there'd be three TV stations to watch and everybody watched the same thing. And,
00:28:37.780
and the culture was so cohesive. And now you've got YouTube and Instagram and Twitter and everything
00:28:43.120
else, TikTok, um, and, and culture is, is changing. And I think CBC feels very much that it's changing
00:28:51.360
and that it needs to get ad revenue. And that's creating problems with journalists who are saying,
00:28:55.060
why are you selling our journalism as, uh, as, uh, disguised as advertising, even if it's not that
00:29:01.540
clear, but it's, it's a changing world and everybody is struggling. Right. There's a new
00:29:07.260
announcement that there'll be a streaming service that is ad supported, uh, out of CBC. And I know
00:29:12.600
management feels passionate about this as an opportunity for new revenues, but there are a lot
00:29:16.240
of criticisms and concerns about whether a public broadcaster should be doing this. And I guess
00:29:20.780
questions about, should CBC be like BBC in the UK, this large empire, or should it be sort of
00:29:26.100
constrained more to be like an NPR type operation? Where do you see the future of CBC?
00:29:31.540
That's not for me to say, especially now. Um, but I, uh, I, I am very grateful for the
00:29:37.680
opportunities that CBC gave me. My first job actually was with CTV. Um, but at CBC, I was able to do,
00:29:44.640
I was able to do shows that, uh, basically spoke for the underdog and I was able to do,
00:29:50.780
I was able to, uh, have support in time to like when I first, like I was the first woman to cover
00:29:56.460
a prime minister for the CBC bureau, uh, on parliament hill. Um, that is an opportunity that
00:30:03.340
I am eternally grateful for. Um, so, you know, while things didn't end well for me and I'm mad at
00:30:10.700
CBC for the certain ways that they handled me in the end, I, I still think it's, I still think it's
00:30:16.860
necessary. And while there's so much positive stuff happening with social media and all of the
00:30:21.620
other, uh, changes that we've seen in the last 10, 20 years, um, I, I, I think there's a lot of good
00:30:30.520
and bad in both mainstream media and in, and in social media. And this is the world that we live in.
00:30:36.500
I love the title of the new podcast, women of ill repute. So far, your guests have been Mary Walsh,
00:30:43.700
Jody Wilson-Raybould, Jan Arden, your co-host Maureen Holloway. Are you all women of ill repute?
00:30:49.840
Yeah, well, that's one of the reasons I've always seen myself as a woman of ill repute,
00:30:54.220
which is meant to be a compliment, by the way, it has, it has nothing to do with, uh, my having,
00:30:59.840
uh, said the N word. And I thought defensive of, of black people and then realizing that I stupidly
00:31:06.600
realizing that I had, you know, hurt people and done the opposite. Um, but yeah, women of ill repute,
00:31:13.120
it has nothing to do with that. It has to do with, with fighting for things that you believe in and
00:31:18.400
not, uh, following perhaps the, the, you know, the roles or the rules that, that were set out for you.
00:31:25.080
So yeah, I mean, um, Maureen, what are those rules? What were the rules that you were supposed
00:31:30.120
to follow? Well, I don't want to anymore. I'm old now, so I'm hoping that the rules are changing,
00:31:35.520
but I, I, I have a, a daughter who's in her twenties and I have a lot of female friends who
00:31:40.600
are in their thirties and forties and fifties. And there are a lot of things that don't change.
00:31:44.120
And, and for Maureen, like she, she's a comedian. She did a, um, a morning show. She was on Q107
00:31:49.700
and on CHFI in Toronto, big, big, uh, morning shows in Toronto. And, but before that she was
00:31:55.140
a comedian and like, she was told, yeah, well, you're really funny and everything, but you know,
00:32:00.180
people don't really want to see funny women. They want to see funny men. Um, I was raised by
00:32:05.060
a woman who, you know, did not tell me to wear clean underwear and, uh, keep my bangs out of my
00:32:11.780
face and, uh, and smile and, and just be nice to everybody. I wasn't, I wasn't, my mother didn't teach me
00:32:18.820
that. And she taught me different things. Uh, she taught me how to fight for myself. She taught me
00:32:23.780
how to believe in things. She taught me to tell the truth, which, uh, I think there's a limit to,
00:32:28.900
like she actually told somebody that they've married a dork. I don't, I don't think, I don't
00:32:33.700
think that's necessary. So she probably went too far, but it's, uh, yeah, the old rules about how women
00:32:39.960
can't be funny. Women can't be ambitious women. Um, they have to be married. They can't get divorced,
00:32:46.260
all of those things. Um, they should always be smiling. Um, I think those things are getting
00:32:52.600
better for, uh, for women and, and for people in general. I think people just need to, um,
00:32:59.140
I think people need to fight for things that they believe in, even if they're not the standard rules.
00:33:03.780
And that's, you know, obviously what's happening in the States is different than what's happening
00:33:07.600
in Canada, but, uh, but that's what I, I don't, I don't reject all rules. I think some rules are,
00:33:13.240
are important and the rules are always changing. And I believe in challenging the status quo.
00:33:17.760
And I think I've done that in my career and I believe in, I believe in change. Like when I was
00:33:21.960
a kid, you know, people used to do jokes about gay people. Um, you don't do that anymore. You used
00:33:28.160
to do jokes about, uh, black people don't do that in Toronto anymore. It would bother me when I moved
00:33:34.080
to Quebec that people were still telling jokes about black people. I just, I think I've, I've fought
00:33:40.200
against that all my life. So when I talk about, uh, rules, those, those are the rules that I mean,
00:33:46.440
but I, I believe in, you know, trying to be kind and trying to be good and trying to listen to each
00:33:52.520
other. And, and I, I've, I've always tried to do that, but I'm human and I've made mistakes like
00:33:59.760
Who are some other voices we're going to hear from on this show? Cause I already see in the guests
00:34:04.120
you've had so far that, uh, one gets a sense of the, well, yeah, that, that these are people who
00:34:11.840
Uh, yeah, well the next person up, she's coming out on, uh, Tuesday. So it's funny because we,
00:34:18.900
I guess women of ill repute is meant to be, it's meant to be a compliment, but it's also
00:34:23.300
like, we're not going to, uh, interview women who have not challenged the status quo in some way.
00:34:30.200
Um, but we're also interviewing women who we find to be admirable in some way. So, uh, I'm not going
00:34:36.680
to give you the whole list of, of people, but we're, we're talking to, uh, Marie Hennon, the lawyer.
00:34:42.420
So she's, uh, she defended, uh, Jean Gomeschi and, uh, he used to work at CBC of course, and, uh,
00:34:50.700
she defended him and he was found to be not guilty. Uh, and a lot of people say that the way that she
00:34:56.260
fought for him, uh, did a disservice to victims of sexual assault. So there, there's, but also
00:35:04.220
like murderers deserve to, to have a good defense that doesn't make their lawyer a murderer. Um,
00:35:14.500
Well, you've teed me up some, I can't now ask you brought Gomeschi up. I didn't bring him up. Now
00:35:18.940
I have to ask you, what did you think about the Jean Gomeschi thing being a, at least a broader
00:35:24.600
colleague? Yeah, I never really knew him. So, uh, I had heard stories, but I never knew anything to
00:35:31.600
be real. So, uh, yeah, I'm hardly, hardly an expert on, on that situation. So sorry.
00:35:39.300
Well, and what did you think of that, that discussion? And I know you're just getting
00:35:42.600
into this before I interrupted you that Marie Hennon, like, would it have been different if a
00:35:47.440
male lawyer had said, well, I'm defending him because everybody deserves a defense. So I'm going to
00:35:50.880
defend him. But Marie Hennon, as, as a woman, somehow that wasn't acceptable.
00:35:56.960
Yeah. Uh, well, I found it very interesting that, that she was able,
00:36:04.840
she acknowledges in the interview and I, I, I, Maureen is going to kill me for giving too much
00:36:10.340
away here, but in the interview, she basically acknowledges that, that the system doesn't always
00:36:16.300
work for sexual assault victims. Um, and we know that most, not all women tell the truth, but
00:36:23.540
that the women who have actually been sexually assaulted, which often means rape, even though
00:36:29.180
that is not the word in law anymore, um, that they, uh, do not get a fair trial or they do not get a,
00:36:37.460
they do not get justice in the, in the system that very rarely, uh, do they come forward. And if they
00:36:43.060
do, I mean, I know lots of lawyers and judges who've said that, you know, if my daughter was
00:36:46.840
ever raped, I would not go through the process with her because she won't win. She'll just be
00:36:51.880
destroyed. So we, we talk about that. Um, and, and how, uh, it was, it was different for her as,
00:36:59.480
as a female lawyer who sees herself as a, as a feminist, even though she doesn't use that word,
00:37:04.860
um, to defend, uh, somebody like Gian Gomeschi. So, um, yeah, she was attacked as a woman and
00:37:14.080
also she was attacked as a woman for doing, uh, sexy photos of her, of her stuff. Like, really?
00:37:20.540
Like, it's just, I don't know, lawyers are, are supposed to all wear buttoned down suits. I don't
00:37:25.580
think so. So yeah, we talk about that sort of thing. Wendy, you've referenced social media a few
00:37:30.160
times here, and I do want to talk to you about just the nuts and bolts of news gathering,
00:37:34.320
reporting, how journalism has changed because increasingly I find, and while this has been
00:37:39.260
going on for maybe 10 years now, so many news stories now are just what's trending on social
00:37:43.220
media. Who said this on social media? Pretend everything, pretend life is 140 characters long.
00:37:48.700
You talked about the, the sort of viciousness that I guess we can sometimes be exposed to on there.
00:37:53.860
How has social media changed the general news media landscape and where is it headed?
00:37:59.840
Well, I remember back on my show undercurrents, which was like at least 20 years ago, um, boy,
00:38:09.140
20 odd years ago. And we did stories on the sort of the birth of, of social media and people's
00:38:15.200
fixations with celebrities. And, uh, I didn't realize that it would only explode from, from then.
00:38:21.940
And we sort of thought that, Oh, wow, look at this. Like everybody is, is obsessed now with what
00:38:27.280
celebrities are saying. Um, and now, you know, it's, it's the, Kim Kardashian's is the way too obvious
00:38:33.560
example, but it, it does seem that, uh, we're now being driven into these silos of which we've all
00:38:41.100
heard about the, um, uh, where we all hate each other. Um, as, uh, Roxanne Gay, who made a career
00:38:48.800
for herself on social media, uh, wrote a book recently saying, you know, it's, it's like everybody
00:38:54.220
is a hammer in search of a nail and that's, that's how it feels. Like I, I know that, uh, people don't
00:39:00.300
believe in objectivity anymore, but I still argue for that because I tried to be objective and people
00:39:06.080
would think that I, and obviously I do have personal opinions about things, but I always tried
00:39:10.320
to be fair to present two sides of an argument so that people could make, make up their own decision
00:39:17.300
about things. Um, and to me that was being objective and people would say, Oh no, no, no,
00:39:23.140
that doesn't make any sense. Just let everyone know what you think. And then they can figure out
00:39:27.880
whether they want to believe you or they want to believe somebody else. But that just basically
00:39:31.100
drives us into this polarized world that we're living in right now, where nobody even tries to tell
00:39:35.840
you, uh, what's actually happening. Instead, you just, you know, you read all your pals on whatever
00:39:40.960
social media posts you're on, or you read your, your favorite newspaper that supports what you want
00:39:45.440
to believe in. And, uh, and very few people make an effort to tell both sides of a story anymore. And,
00:39:51.760
uh, anyway, so it ends up that instead of talking to each other and trying to understand each other
00:39:56.740
and trying to learn from each other, uh, that we all hate each other, that we all say I'm right and
00:40:01.240
you're wrong, which is not very helpful. And it has led to the world that we're,
00:40:05.840
living in right now. On the other hand, you know, I remember being 12 years old and being so
00:40:12.560
bored. And if I had a question, I had to go to the library or look up on microfiche.
00:40:17.920
So, you know, it's way better that now I have an answer to, uh, Martha Mitchell. I remember her.
00:40:24.080
I just watched this series on gas lit on TV and Martha, John Mitchell and the whole Watergate thing.
00:40:28.820
Cause I'm a Watergate kid. It was happening when I was like 12, uh, and go back and read about that.
00:40:33.820
It's all on Google. I can watch stuff on YouTube. I can, if I'm on holidays, the first place I'll go
00:40:38.720
is Twitter because everything is there and I can put in a keyword and I can find stuff,
00:40:43.120
but I'm only being sent stuff that the algorithm says that I want to hear from. So, uh, I try and
00:40:49.960
keep my mind open and read people of all, you know, different opinions who I respect in different ways,
00:40:54.760
uh, to keep my brain full. Uh, so it's kind of wonderful. It's like, like I remember when video
00:41:00.060
games came along, that was going to kill it. You know, everybody was going to be a serial killer
00:41:03.580
because they were watching a video game. Or if you're old enough, you remember the debates about
00:41:08.120
how TV was going to ruin everyone's life and we're all going to become worse people. And, and maybe we
00:41:13.460
are, but TV, video games, and now social media for the last 20 years, um, they're kind of here to
00:41:20.300
stay. So I think we just have to, uh, try and find a way of still talking to each other and not
00:41:25.760
just talking to people that we agree with. Yeah. The whole, we're all hating each other thing.
00:41:30.100
I get the sense that traditional media is, is probably amplifying it or worsening it rather
00:41:34.620
than healing that. I don't know. Does traditional media even, does anyone even read that anymore?
00:41:41.360
Or listen to that anymore? I have to say yes in hopes that people are still buying the newspaper.
00:41:46.040
Well, I don't have to say anything because I have a podcast,
00:41:48.600
women of ill repute.com go and sign up. I don't have to say anything that I don't want to say
00:41:54.000
anymore, which is quite liberating. Cause that, you know, at, at CBC and certainly as a political
00:41:59.440
reporter, you weren't supposed to have, uh, a sense of humor or any political opinions about anything.
00:42:05.520
Whereas now you're, it seems, uh, even at CBC or, you know, we've, there are people who'd like
00:42:11.680
tweet stuff about going to, uh, following drag Queens. Well, if I'd done that one, not that that was my
00:42:17.460
thing, but if that had been my thing and I tweeted that, it would have created a huge sensation,
00:42:22.860
which I think, and I think it's good. Like, why shouldn't you be able to tweet whatever the,
00:42:29.020
There you go. Tweeting whatever the heck we want. And that's kind of where, where we found
00:42:35.720
ourselves at. Cause that's the state of social media, maybe the state.
00:42:38.860
Yeah, but we still need to talk to each other and listen to each other and learn from each other
00:42:42.540
and try and understand each other and maybe even forgive each other instead of just saying,
00:42:46.980
Oh, somebody said, they said this, so they're a bad person. And now I hate them. I don't think
00:42:51.640
that's very helpful. Have you been forgiven? Uh, I think a lot of people who actually
00:42:56.840
are familiar with my career and know that I devoted much of it to fighting corruption,
00:43:03.780
uh, fighting for the little guy, um, maybe not doing as well, obviously not doing as much as I
00:43:10.000
should have in terms of like, I remember, uh, I think I just left the Hill and Phil Fontaine started
00:43:15.440
talking about residential schools and I didn't, you know, stop and pay attention. Like I should
00:43:21.960
have paid attention to that. I, I, I said the N word without realizing, uh, that in any context,
00:43:28.340
it could hurt people. And that, did I really want to do that? Um, so, um, so yeah, I think we're,
00:43:38.820
Wendy Mesley, it's been a great conversation. I admire your career. I admire your honesty.
00:43:42.720
Wendy, thank you very much. Well, thank you. Thank you, Anthony. That's it. Yeah. So women
00:43:46.960
of ill repute me and Maureen, she's a comedian. I'm a journalist, but we're both trying to be
00:43:51.600
honest. And, uh, that's, that's, that's the difference. So it's been lovely to talk to you.
00:43:55.400
Thank you so much. Likewise. All the best, Wendy. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Bye.
00:44:00.100
Full Comment is a post-media podcast. I'm Anthony Fury. This episode was produced by Andre Pru with
00:44:06.000
theme music by Bryce Hall. Kevin Libin is the executive producer. You can subscribe to Full
00:44:11.060
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