After enduring more than three days of around-the-clock protests in front of its offices, Toro Talk Radio announced today that it has suspended talk show host Yannis Tavros “for an indefinite period of time.”
In a statement released this morning, the radio station said that after a review of Tavros’s remarks about Hieronymous Hedgehog the owners felt it would be best to remove the broadcaster from the airwaves for a length of time.
“Toro Talk Radio was saddened to hear the remarks that Yannis Tavros made during the essay portion of his talk show on Tuesday, February 12. These remarks in no way reflect the beliefs or opinions of this radio station or of any Animal employed here. In light of the nature of those remarks, however, and of the pain that they have caused many Park residents, we feel it would be best for all concerned if Tavros spent some time away from the airwaves. We have, therefore, suspended Yannis Tavros from his duties here at Toro Talk Radio for an indefinite period of time,” the statement said.
The station went on to assure its listeners that Toro Talk Radio “takes tremendous pride in drawing its listeners from a wide variety of species” and that it “values and respects The Park’s hibernating communities.”
One of the most contentious remarks that Tavros made concerned Hieronymous Hedgehog’s late uncle, Hamlin Jarvis Lambert Hedgehog, who served as Archon in 1998. Ten years later, the Hedgehog died of premature awakening from hibernation, a circumstance that Tavros blamed on the lack of intelligence that he believes afflicts the former Archon’s entire family.
Experts in the field, however, say that premature awakening, which is on the rise in The Park, has nothing at all to do with intelligence.
“For whatever reason, he is spreading a falsehood and a dangerous one at that,” says Dr. Jagger Zebu, Professor of Mammalian Medicine at the University of West Terrier and one of the authors of a recent report on premature awakening in The Park.
“There are a number of factors involved in premature awakening but none is related to intelligence,” he said.
Meanwhile, members of a group that calls itself Les Amis de Hieronymous (The Friends of Hieronymous) are calling for a formal on-air apology from Tavros.
“We will not be satisfied until he apologizes publicly for his treatment of Hieronymous,” said a spokesAnimal for LAdeH.
