Morning talk radio has a real reputation for being over the top. But one Philadelphia station took the wacky, zany, sound-effects filled world of radio to an entirely new—and ridiculously offensive—level.
For months, an individual calling himself “Dwyane From Swedesboro” had been dialing into radio host Mike Missanelli’s show. Describing himself as a black man who was often “horny for white women,” Dwayne faced frequent paternity test problems, according to Deadspin.
A snippet of one call, transcribed by CrossingBroad, reads:
“Look man, I ain’t gonna lie to ya, the paternity test was a big relief. It’s like I didn’t think that kid was my kid, but then its that little bit of fear like, oh snap, Dwayne could be paying for this for 18 years.” … “I don’t have that many minutes man, I have a set number. I can’t be using it to wait 45 minutes. Look man, I ain’t got the baller budget that you radio people got so I gotta get the limited minute plan.”
Dwyane would have been one of the show’s most avid fans and callers—except for the fact that he never actually existed in the first place. As CrossingBroad and Philly.com report, Dwyane was actually a character made and up and perpetuated over the last two years by the show’s own white male producer, Pat Egan.
Egan’s lie went so deep that he stole a man’s photo from the internet and used it across multiple social media accounts, including Amazon, where he often reviewed products, and Twitter, where he wrote frequently offensive tweets under his pen name.
Egan’s lie was apparently known to several staffers at the station, according to CrossingBroad, except for the show’s very host, Missanelli. During the opener for his show on Tuesday Missanelli said:
“I didn’t know that ‘Dwayne from Swedesboro’ was not a real person. I would not have authorized a racially charged caller like that… If I had known it was a fake, I would have shut down this immediately because I was sensitive to the racial undertones involved.”
For his part, Egan copped to the lie on Twitter without apology, simply stating he picked a persona who was the “exact opposite” of himself.
According to Missanelli, Egan has not and will not be punished. Egan has called Kyle Scott, the reporter for CrossingBroad who broke the story, an “ambulance chaser.”
Several other radio hosts across the nation have chimed in on the very low brow bit, saying they may do or something offensive once in awhile, but faking callers is not one of them.
However, at least one host, former Fanatic host Sean Brace, noted in his podcast, “I feel like people are like, ‘I can’t believe there’s fake callers.’ Once in a while you’ve got to punch up somebody to rile your host up. … It’s about entertainment. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
Check out Scott’s entire investigation here.
