KEZY Says Contest Is ‘Just a Fun Thing’

Officials of radio station KEZY-FM (95.9) on Wednesday defended a controversial contest denounced as racist as “just a fun thing,” but added they have yet to reach a decision on whether to continue airing the game.

Station Manager Peri Corso said the controversy surrounding “Foreign or Domestic”--a call-in contest conducted by morning disc jockey Chris Little in which callers are asked to guess if randomly selected convenience store clerks are immigrants--has been the result of a complaint by one irate listener. However, Corso said there has been no general public outcry about the program.

“There have been no responses from clients or listeners or anything,” Corso said. “Other than just the media, no one has tried to contact us. . . . We’ve only had one person who’s taken it the wrong way.”

But Don Simmons, the listener who first complained about the segment, argued that the station has not been deluged with calls only because few immigrants are KEZY listeners, and those who are would be unlikely to complain.

“Maybe the intention is just for fun, but I know that the people who this impacts aren’t the type of people who are going to pick up the phone and file a protest,” said Simmons, a member of the board of directors of the Volunteer Center of Greater Orange County. “There needs to be someone who has a voice for these people. (The contest) implies racism, it implies that these people are second-class citizens.”

Mary Ann Gaido, a human relations specialist at the Orange County Human Relations Commission, said only Simmons has registered a complaint with the commission about the game. While Gaido was previously quoted as saying that the show “sounds extremely divisive,” on Wednesday she said that the commission still has not heard the contest and has no formal reaction to it.

“Our office doesn’t have a tape of the program, so we’re at a loss to comment,” she said.

In the call-in segment, Little tells contestants he is about to phone a convenience store and asks them to guess if the clerk who answers the phone will be an immigrant. Little then phones a convenience store at random, and the contestant tries to determine if the clerk was born in the United States. Contestants who make correct guesses are awarded prizes.

Little has argued that the segment is meant to poke fun at convenience stores and is not meant to denounce immigrants. He could not be reached for comment Wednesday, but he took a few minutes during his morning show to defend the contest.

“This is not a racist radio station,” Little told his listeners.

Corso, who said the contest has been airing on-and-off for about six weeks but has not been included in Little’s show for about a week, also defended it as “just a fun thing.”

“What we try to do is just entertain,” Corso said. “It’s not meant to hurt anyone’s feelings or make fun of anyone’s background.”

She added that KEZY management has not “made any decision” on whether to continue airing the contest--one of several call-in contests on the station. Corso previously said that the game may be dropped as part of an overall format change.

Simmons, who said he has contacted several of the program’s advertisers to complain about the segment, said he is also considering registering a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission.