SameSame.com.au ~ Inside Out Australia

The Big Scandals Of 2008

Feature, By Christian Taylor, 12th January, 2009

2008 was a big year, and not without its share of scandalous moments! Let’s take a look back at the stories that caused headlines last year.

Without a doubt Todd McKenney’s drink spiking G overdose was one of 2008’s more scandalous moments. The radio host and judge on TV’s Dancing With The Stars was found unconscious on Friday April 25 in Rushcutters Bay Park and was resuscitated by ambulance officers who arrived on the scene.

“I had a vodka and tonic and I started to feel progressively sick,” McKenney told media later. “I have no idea where I ended up. My drink was obviously spiked.”

Despite many being unconvinced of his innocence, McKenney continued to vehemently deny any wrong doing until the charges were eventually dropped by police in November.

2008 was the year of the porn scandal, with three instantly coming to mind. First there was Sam Brodie, a Queensland sheet metal worker who appeared not only as a contestant on Channel Seven’s Gladiators, but also on the gay porn website Seduced Straight Guys. He told the site that “he’s into keeping fit, he’s sexually minded, he’s a bit of a ladies man and one of his aspirations is to sleep with a girl from every country in the world”.

Short statured belly dancer Rima hadn’t been in the Big Brother house for very long last year before naked photos of her began to do the rounds on email. The shots came from a website devoted to empowering women. Rima’s husband later spoke on radio defending his wife’s shoot, saying, “She wasn’t naïve going into the house, we had the expectation they would probably surface… She’s no shrinking violet. She’s a belly dancer, she’s part of the burlesque scene, one of her previous jobs was a vibrator sales woman.”

And now a porn scandal of a different kind. At the end of last year an Australian Supreme Court judge ruled that an internet cartoon depicting sex between characters from The Simpsons was child pornography. The images showed Bart, Lisa and Maggie having sex and were found on the computer of NSW man Alan John McEwan, who was charged with possession of child pornography and usage of a carriage service to access child pornography material.

The Justice said the purpose of the legislation is to stop real sexual abuse and exploitation of children, however he believed that images like the cartoon “fuel demand for material that does involve the abuse of children.”

There were plenty of scandals attached to China’s 2008 Olympic Games. The drama plagued world tour of the Olympic torch and the angry reception it received in many countries around the world shed light on some important censorship and human rights issues. The fact that the torch had to eventually be hidden and heavily guarded said it all really.

Several gay establishments in China were also shut down before the Games – two Oasis bathhouses, one in Beijing and another near the Dongsishitiao Bridge. Those who were in the Oasis venue at the time were arrested – the clients were released hours later but staff members were detained. The police also temporarily shut down popular queer night club Destination for capacity violations.

News that Anthony Morley, the winner of the first Mr. Gay UK competition, had killed and then tried to cook and eat a man he’d gone to bed with lit up the tabloids around the world. When police arrived they found chunks of the victim’s legs had been cut off and cooked on a saucepan on the stove. Tests proved the flesh was human, and that Morley had eaten some of it. He was eventually sentenced to 30 years in prison in October.

The arrest of Australian journalist Peter Lloyd in Singapore was a big scandal of 2008. The 41 year old Aussie journalist, who came out as gay just six months prior, was looking at 15 strikes with the cane and 20 years in prison, after being arrested for supplying, possessing and trafficking ice. The trafficking charge was later dropped and in December he was sentenced to ten months in a Singapore prison.

Senator Larry Craig’s toilet block tomfoolery at Minneapolis-St Paul International Airport was another scandalous moment of 2008. In fact it began in 2007 when the married father of three and notoriously homophobic Senator was found soliciting gay sex by an undercover police officer. He pleaded guilty to the charge but then at every opportunity tried to take it all back.

“I am not gay. I never have been gay… [Earlier] I over-reacted and made a poor decision. I chose to plead guilty to a lesser charge in hopes of making it go away,” said Craig. “Please let me apologise to my family, friends and staff and fellow Idahoans for the cloud placed over Idaho. I did nothing wrong at the Minneapolis airport. I did nothing wrong, and I regret the decision to plead guilty and the sadness that decision has brought on my wife, on my family, friends, staff and fellow Idahoans.”

This was the story that wouldn’t go away throughout 2008. He did TV specials, he’s written a book, he spoke publicly about his innocence – methink the lady doth protest too much.

Other stories in the 2008 series:
The Big Let Downs Of 2008.
Love And Hate In 2008.