In September, three judges of Ecuador’s Got Talent humiliated and scolded contestant Carolina Peña for being an atheist.
Intolerant judges María Fernanda Ríos, Paola Farías and Wendy Vera, received a strong backlash from atheists all around the world.
This week we learned that Ríos was withdrawn from the show:
The channel will dispense with the camera performance of María Fernanda Ríos “due to her stance shown in different spaces of social interaction after the event that happened in the first phase of ETT4” reported the broadcaster in a statement. The behavior of the actress in social media is “contrary to the guidelines of the channel”, added the media outlet.
Ríos will keep her contractual relationship until the end of the season, on 13th December, although she won’t be featuring on screen. The actress exchanged vitriolic comments with her followers in the social network Twitter after, along with Vera and Farías, they were questioned for their comments to a participant, who identified herself as an atheist, in the show that aired on September 20, 2015. The controversy caused one of the reality-show’s advertisers to announce on the very same platform the withdrawal of their advertising.
In general, I believe that bigots should not see their jobs at risk just for being bigots. However, Ríos, Farías and Vera are the media outlet’s image and, therefore, whatever they say can mean economic losses, as it happened with the withdrawal of advertisers after the atheist-bashing showdown. As a rule of thumb, it is not wise to have an intolerant person as poster child… unless you’re the GOP.
I guess Ríos crossed the line on Twitter and that is why they ended her contract — was it otherwise, it wouldn’t explain why Ecuavisa went to great lenghts to have the all the clips of the attacks against Carolina Peña taken down, nor that Farías and Vera were kept in the show.
It would be very naive to think Ecuavisa fired Ríos out of moral principle or because they dislike discrimination. If so, the decision would have been against the three judges and it would have occurred in the morning after the incident. That was not the case — it’s just business.
(via Gustavo Mota | image: Wikipedia)
