SiriusXM fires Gregg "Opie" Hughes for "inappropriate behavior"

it's officially an end of a era at SiriusXM as they have fired Gregg "Opie" Hughes 3 years after the other half of the controversial radio duo "Opie and Anthony", Anthony Cumia was fired for a series of racist tweets. the reason for Opie's firing, "inappropriate behavior". Opie was fired by SiriusXM after he recorded a co-worker of the show in a state of undress as he was using the restroom.

Opie and Anthony joined XM Satellite Radio in 2004 (before it merged with Sirius Satellite Radio in 2007-2008), 2 years removed from being fired by CBS Radio for the infamous "Sex For Sam" contest stunt where they sent couples to random places all over New York City to have sex in public, in which one couple made the bad decision to have sex at St. Patrick's Cathedral, in which their show broadcast from WNEW in New York City and was syndicated in several markets.

after 10 years on SiriusXM/XM Satellite Radio, Opie and Anthony broke up in the summer of 2014 after Anthony was fired by SiriusXM for racist tweets containing the N word. in the years since, Opie remained with SiriusXM hosing "Opie Radio" along with Jim Norton until they had a falling out late last year and Norton along with Sam Roberts, a former intern with the Opie and Anthony show on SiriusXM, launched a show on SiriusXM Faction Talk (the channel that started out as High Voltage, then rebranded in the Virus in 2006, then again to the Opie & Anthony Channel in 2011, then again in 2014 shortly after Anthony's firing to SiriusXM talk before the station took it's current name late last year) in the mornings in October of last year, while Opie's show moved to afternoons, where it remained until today.

Opie filmed a fellow SiriusXM employee (who he had bad blood with) in the bathroom while he was in the act of using the toilet, which he filmed it without consent of the person on the toilet, which makes it an illegal act of misconduct.

http://variety.com/2017/music/news/siriusxm-fires-opie-anthony-1202488824/#article-comments
https://www.allaccess.com/net-news/archive/story/167357/opie-fired-by-siriusxm

I never had any interest in morning show hosts that talk excessively instead of playing music. Shock or otherwise. Shut up and play music.

rbrucecarter5 said:

I never had any interest in morning show hosts that talk excessively instead of playing music. Shock or otherwise. Shut up and play music.

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When they were on broadcast radio, they did afternoons, so not to compete with Howard Stern. The station they were on was a "hot talk" station, no music.

Recorded someone in the bathroom without consent?

What kind of demented person does something like that?

That's just pathetic--not cutting edge, not justified by "bad blood," not funny--just pathetic.

AbrahamJSimpson said:

Recorded someone in the bathroom without consent?

What kind of demented person does something like that?

That's just pathetic--not cutting edge, not justified by "bad blood," not funny--just pathetic.

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Remember, O&A first came to national attention -- and the attention of New York City radio programmers -- when they were working in Boston and thought it would be really funny to report that the mayor was dead. So they did. Nobody but their lobotomized fans laughed. They were gone soon afterward but, of course, found a warm welcome waiting for them in New York, where radio has rewarded slick, crass self-promoters for decades. From there, it was on to a desperate XM, looking for something, ANYTHING, to soften the blow they'd just suffered from losing out on the King of All Cretins, Howard Stern, to Sirius. I would hope Opie would find no fourth chance in radio, but as we all know, calculated crudeness sells, so he probably gets an even bigger contract out of this.

CTListener said:

Remember, O&A first came to national attention -- and the attention of New York City radio programmers -- when they were working in Boston and thought it would be really funny to report that the mayor was dead. So they did. Nobody but their lobotomized fans laughed. They were gone soon afterward but, of course, found a warm welcome waiting for them in New York, where radio has rewarded slick, crass self-promoters for decades. From there, it was on to a desperate XM, looking for something, ANYTHING, to soften the blow they'd just suffered from losing out on the King of All Cretins, Howard Stern, to Sirius. I would hope Opie would find no fourth chance in radio, but as we all know, calculated crudeness sells, so he probably gets an even bigger contract out of this.

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Sadly true.

I have no interest in the general crudeness, but can generally say to be crude in language when you're not actually harming someone is one thing. And Stern could go back and forth over that line. But fake death reports...not so much. That may not be physical harm, sure, but it's dangerous on so many levels. And to violate someone's privacy in such a vile manner as to record them in the bathroom--I simply can't understand how depraved you have to be to do that.

list of things that got O&A fired for and where they were fired from:

1998, WAAF in Boston: said the (then) mayor of Boston was dead on April Fools day.

2001, NBC/WNBC/XFL: they hosted the pre-game show for the XFL in the NYC TV market on WNBC NBC 4, the east coast flagship station of NBC, the XFL was a football league that was created by WWE (then WWF) and NBC to replace the NFL on NBC (years after NFL left NBC for about 8 years to move to CBS who had regain NFL rights for AFC coverage after losing the rights to the NFC side of the NFL to Fox in 1994, NBC regained NFL rights in 2006 with Sunday Night Football leaving ESPN to NBC) and the XFL pregame show failed and was canceled after 4 weeks, and on top of that, the XFL flopped and was folded after the 2001 season ended.

2002, CBS Radio (then Infinity Broadcasting) Syndication/WNEW: during the "Sex for Sam" contest stunt, they sent a couple to have sex at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City, a catholic church, which angered the Catholic League, on top of that, Infinity/CBS Radio got a ton of FCC fines for O&A violating FCC, this was the straw that broke the camel's back for Infinity Broadcasting in terms of losing money by these two over them violating the FCC rules several times during the period they worked for them.

2009, CBS Radio/WKRK/WFNY (FM Simulcast of the first half of the show on SiriusXM): years after they were rehired by CBS Radio to replaced Van Halen's David Lee Roth (who replaced Howard Stern on what became hot talk Free FM in NYC after Stern left K-Rock and Infintiy Broadcasting/CBS Radio to join Sirius (before the XM merger) in early 2006) to host the show on the mornings on CBS Radio's failed Hot Talk format "Free FM", and a format flip back to K-Rock the previous format at 92.3 FM in NYC that also flopped after the relaunch of K-Rock, they were let go from CBS Radio, this time, it was not cause of something bad, it was cause of low ratings and the fact they were on load from SiriusXM. after CBS ended the deal, the reverted back to SiriusXM exclusive talent.

2014 (Anthony) & 2017 (Opie), SiriusXM: O&A broke up in 2014, with Anthony getting fired first from SiriusXM for a incident with a African American woman that devolved into a racist twitter tirade that contain the one word a white person is not allow to say, the N Word, and then in 2017, Opie is fired for filming a co-worker using the toilet for crap without his consent.