Home

Erin Molan denies peddling ‘ugly racial stereotypes’ on Continuous Call Team show

Lane SaintyNCA NewsWire
Erin Molan co-hosted the Continuous Call Team between 2015 and 2020. Justin Lloyd
Camera IconErin Molan co-hosted the Continuous Call Team between 2015 and 2020. Justin Lloyd Credit: News Corp Australia

As Erin Molan defended herself against allegations of racism and making fun of Pacific Islander names in court on Tuesday, she was met with a surprise interruption.

The Nine sports broadcaster, who is suing the Daily Mail for defamation, was asked by the media outlet’s barrister Bruce McClintock if she had been laughing at the “mockery or the comic mispronunciation” of a Polynesian name in a past episode of 2GB rugby league show Continuous Call Team.

“Not at all,” Ms Molan said. Almost immediately, an anonymous onlooker in the virtual courtroom said “Ha!”

An awkward silence followed for about five full seconds before Mr McClintock said: “I hope that wasn’t someone who should have their sound muted”.

Get in front of tomorrow's news for FREE

Journalism for the curious Australian across politics, business, culture and opinion.

READ NOW

The interjection came hours into a tense cross-examination in which Ms Molan repeatedly rejected claims she peddled “ugly racial stereotypes” and mocked people for their accents in a “classic example of casual racism” across her five years on Continuous Call Team.

Several excerpts from the show’s archive were played in court as the 39-year-old rugby league personality was confronted with her past words.

Among them was a recording from an April 2017 show in which Ms Molan says “I love you very long time, very handsome man” in a Chinese accent.

Erin Molan
Camera IconErin Molan co-hosted the Continuous Call Team between 2015 and 2020. Justin Lloyd Credit: News Corp Australia

She rejected Mr McClintock’s suggestion she was imitating a “Chinese prostitute”, saying she was quoting a movie — later named as the 1987 Stanley Kubrick film Full Metal Jacket in which a Vietnamese sex worker says a similar line — and the joke was that her accent “was so bad”.

“What you were doing was peddling a really ugly racial stereotype about Chinese women for laughs, weren’t you?” Mr McClintock said.

“Not at all,” Ms Molan answered.

“It was in fact a quite horrifyingly racist thing you did on that day?” Mr McClintock continued.

“No,” Ms Molan replied.

Ms Molan alleges the Daily Mail falsely painted her as a racist and “arrogant white woman of privilege” who mocked Polynesian names on air in a June 5, 2020, story about her saying “hooka looka mooka hooka fooka” on radio.

She maintains the comment was a reference to a past story told on Continuous Call Team about father-son commentator duo Ray and Chris Warren practising how to pronounce player names.

The Warrens, not Pacific Islander names, were the butt of the joke, she said.

Ms Molan also said the story had morphed into one involving a “made up name”, not the player originally referred to, Manly forward Haumole Olakau’atu, who is of Tongan descent.

The Daily Mail is defending the case and has filed a lengthy truth defence based on hours of Continuous Call Team audio.

Ms Molan listened intently, staring at the computer screen and not visibly reacting, as the recordings were played aloud in the virtual court on Tuesday.

She said accents were a running joke on the show and no one had ever complained before the Daily Mail article.

In fact, she said, people from various backgrounds had called in, finding the accents “hilarious” and offering to coach co-host Darryl Brohman on his appalling efforts.

“If any Chinese person approaches me and says they were hurt or offended by anything I have ever said or done I will be the first to apologise to them and to anyone else,” Ms Molan said.

In another excerpt played in court Ms Molan says “You like raw fish?” in a Japanese accent, adding “Sorry, was that racist?”

Accused of “mocking” sushi by Mr McClintock, Ms Molan said: “It’s one of my favourites, I have it for lunch most days. To mock is do something in a cruel way. That reference was not cruel on any level.”

Ms Molan said she saw it as one of her “roles on the show” to question if the banter had crossed the line into being offensive.

In another recording, where Mr Brohman put on a Chinese accent while pretending to haggle over the price of a bowl, the only butt of the joke was Mr Brohman himself, Ms Molan said.

“No one in 2020 or 2021 can put on an Asian accent of a person trying to gyp a customer without it being a racially offensive slur,” Mr McClintock said incredulously.

“Well sir, I’ll have you look at the dates,” Ms Molan replied. “The majority of these clips are before that.”

“If times have changed, and suddenly accents are not considered to be an understandable or acceptable part of humour, I’m happy to have that discussion.”

She pointed to white actor Hank Azaria’s apology earlier this year for voicing the Indian character of Apu on The Simpsons as an example of how rapidly standards could change.

Ms Molan was also presented with an email chain between Nine executives in which director of sport Brent Williams described her comment as “inappropriate”.

She said not a single senior person at Nine had ever said as much to her at the time, adding: “There is no way I could possibly lie about this and they would not come out and correct the record.”

She said Greg Byrnes, the head of content at Nine Radio, had wanted her to apologise as he thought it would “take a lot of the heat out of a massive firestorm”.

Under questioning from her own barrister, Ms Molan said she was “almost incapable of functioning” and had received multiple death threats after the Daily Mail’s story.

“I was worried about my ability to mother my daughter at that stage because I was sick and I was … I was struggling to cope,” she said haltingly.

“I’m different. I won’t recover until this is over.

“And even then I’m not sure I’ll ever really recover.”

On the first day of the trial, the court was told an editor at the Daily Mail emailed a reporter saying “Let’s rip into this sheila” before the article at the centre of the case was published.

The hearing continues.

Originally published as Erin Molan denies peddling ‘ugly racial stereotypes’ on Continuous Call Team show

Get the latest news from thewest.com.au in your inbox.

Sign up for our emails