Antoinette Lattouf makes a three-word slur about ABC viewers that is so offensive it had to be DELETED: ‘Odd and cruel’
Antoinette Lattouf has caused a new media storm, using a now-deleted slur to describe ABC viewers.
The ex-ABC Radio presenter wrote an opinion piece for Nine newspapers in which she half-jokingly put herself forward as Paul Barry’s replacement as presenter of Media Watch.
However, a reference to ABC’s older audience as the “colostomy bag crowd” immediately drew criticism.
Cartoonist Kaz Cooke labeled the term on X as “strange and cruel.”
Journalist Lucie Morris-Marr denounced it as ‘one of the most horrible, insulting and annoying statements I have ever heard as a young bowel cancer patient who suffered from it for a year due to emergency surgery’.
The words were later cut from the online version of the Sydney Morning Herald column, although it was too late for the printed product.
Antoinette Lattouf described ABC viewers as the ‘colostomy bag crowd’ and was criticized
Lucie Morris-Marr, a bowel cancer survivor, denounced the joke about
“The national broadcaster needs younger viewers to survive,” Lattouf had written in an earlier version of the piece. ‘
“You can’t cater to the ostomy bag crowd forever.”
Guardian Australia’s Weekly Beast column quoted SMH Opinion Editor Chris Harrison as saying the reference was removed due to the risk of “upsetting others.”
Ms Cooke implored Lattouf to “reconsider referring to the elderly” in this way.
Another reader noted a recent health trend of colon cancer and other bowel diseases in young people – and that it should not be assumed that only older people have colostomy bags.
A woman in her 20s with Crohn’s disease wrote, “I don’t have a colostomy bag, but many people of all ages with Crohn’s disease and other conditions do!
“It’s already such a stigmatized medical device and shouldn’t be thrown around as an insult…disgusting.”
Readers also took to the Herald’s own Letters page to criticize the use of the term.
“Antoinette Lattouf’s description of ABC viewers as ‘the ostomy bag crowd’ is insensitive, one reader wrote.
‘With rates of bowel cancer rising among young people, this is not even an accurate study of an older target group. Perhaps Paul Barry can address the comment next week.”
Daily Mail Australia has asked Lattouf to respond to criticism of the comment.
Lattouf has half-jokingly introduced herself as the new host of Media Watch, despite being embroiled in an unfair dismissal battle with the ABC
Current presenter Paul Barry is stepping down after eleven years in charge of the media criticism programme
In her column, Lattouf, 40, revealed she had conducted a private online poll about who should be Barry’s replacement – and was crowned favourite.
Lattouf is involved in a wrongful dismissal case against the national broadcaster.
Lattouf was taken off air three days after her week-long stint as a fill-in on ABC Radio last December after she reposted a Human Rights Watch video of starvation being used as a tool of war in Gaza.
Lattouf subsequently launched a Fair Work claim, claiming she was dismissed because of her political views and her Lebanese heritage.
The ABC claimed she breached the organisation’s social media policy around impartiality and was not actually dismissed because she was paid for the full week.
But Lattouf scored a major victory in her case earlier this month when the Fair Work Commission ruled that she had indeed been dismissed by the national broadcaster.
The bitter and protracted legal battle could still end up in the Federal Court if planned mediation talks between Lattouf and the ABC fail next week.