A TV show prank involving the comedy duo The Inspired Unemployed and three high-profile Australian feminists has stirred up controversy, with audience members labeling it “beyond disappointing”.
On Wednesday night, a free event was held in Sydney that was marketed as an evening of “insightful discourse and thought-provoking discussions” from a panel of renowned feminists Antoinette Lattouf, Clementine Ford and Yumi Stynes.
The audience was expecting a “lively conversation on the intricacies of sex, love, relationships and marriage” from the panellists, alongside “a special guest offering his perspective as a young male”.
What attendees didn’t know was that the “young male” was Jack Steele, co-founder of the popular comedy group ‘The Inspired Unemployed’, who boast 2 million followers on Instagram. Steele and his co-founder, Matt Ford are also known for partaking in a show based off putting on skits to embarrass one another.
The format involves placing each other in awkward situations and giving commands via an earpiece, with hidden cameras recording them. And if they don’t obey the command, they get punished– per the Paramount+ show’s rules.
The event in Sydney last week was being recorded for the show, with Lattouf, Ford and Styne all reportedly in on the ‘joke’.
Beforehand, Ford plugged the event on her Instagram, writing “Come see me, @antoinette_lattouf and @yumichild break down love’n’stuff and generally have a good time being smart cookie.”
Lattouf responded, writing: “Looking forward to this @yumichild and @clementine_ford”.
As the three of them engaged in seemingly serious conversation during the panel, Steele was sitting on stage being fed uncomfortable lines to repeat to the unaware 100+ audience members.
According to one attendee, Steele said phrases such as “Yeah, chicks dig consent” and “I really like girl writers” when asked his opinion on gender-based issues. Some witnesses have said his comments drew “audible gasps” from the crowd, with many getting up to leave the venue early.
Some even called the unexpectedly misogynistic comments “triggering” as they’d been expected to watch an “insightful discourse” on feminist issues as the event had been marketed.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Steele was unaware of what the event would be and even apologised to the venue’s audience afterwards, saying “I’m very sorry guys. I look like a f***wit and you all hate me … from the bottom of my heart, I’m sorry.”
One attendee of the event, Maybelline San Juan, posted her frustrations with the night to Instagram, noting that she felt her time had been wasted.
“We, an audience full of feminists– the event was sold out– have to sit through 50 minutes of this guy commenting bullshit answers and really misogynistic answers about consent, about the gender pay gap… it was extremely uncomfortable,” she said on social media.
“This isn’t funny– do you have any commentary on the fact that women are scared to walk home at night,” she added. “That’s what I have to do after a fake feminist panel conversation– walk home at night and digest the fact that I was robbed of 50 minutes.”
Speaking on The Project, journalist Jessie Stephens said she thought the whole story was funny but understands why many feel that their time was wasted by the night.
“I reckon if you got a babysitter, if you went out and you organised your week around this and you felt like you were getting one thing and then you got another– I can understand.”
And yet, another attendee Jai Mitchell has called out The Project‘s analysis of the event as “minimising what happened”. He alleged that network removed his and Maybelline San Juan’s comments on a reel that were critical of the The Project‘s take on the night.
Alongside a video, Mitchell wrote on his Instagram about his own experience of the “cruel prank”, and the distress that himself and many of the other attendees are feeling from the event.
“It’s been two days now and still no word from the panel involved, and I have it on good insider info that the episode is going ahead and is already being rushed through editing before they even respond to the many audience members desperately trying to email every contact they can find to try to legally rescind their consent to be filmed,” writes Mitchell.
“My ADHD justice sensitivity gene is on fire right now, and this isn’t about me, I haven’t even tried to rescind my consent to be filmed, I hope they show me, but I’m ENRAGED for the many vulnerable people in that audience I know are TERRIFIED that the same people commenting jokes about feminists on all of those articles I mentioned above are going to come for them when this show is released, and they will be made fun of, doxxed, meme’d, or worse.