Howard Stern

Howard Stern is an American satellite radio personality, notable for his crude and vulgar humor.

Overview

Known for his use of scatological and sexist humor, the self-proclaimed "King of All Media" has been dubbed a "shock jock" for his use of shocking or unorthodox content as a promotional draw as well as his highly controversial comments that have included bigoted and misogynistic remarks about various religious and ethnic groups and women.

He is best-known for his national radio show, which for many years was syndicated on FM radio stations (and a few AM stations) throughout the United States until his last broadcast via terrestrial radio on December 16, 2005. After a brief hiatus, he began broadcasting via the subscription-based Sirius satellite radio service in January of 2006. Although Stern had a weekly audience of more than 10 million when on terrestrial radio, on satellite Stern's audience is in the 3 million range.

Stern's show often has such guests as strippers, "little people" (midgets), pornographic actors, regular actors, musicians and comedians. Some of the more unorthodox topics of the Stern show include details of homosexual practices, and talking or trying to talk female guests into disrobing, and of course constant flatulence jokes.

Biography

Stern received his Bachelor's degree in 1976 from Boston University, where he had worked as a volunteer at the college radio station.

After graduation, he worked as a disc jockey for WRNW in Westchester County, New York playing rock music. He discovered a talent for Lenny Bruce-type comedy, and developed a wide-ranging confrontational style. He migrated to FM radio stations in Detroit, Michigan and Washington, D.C., and returned to New York in 1982 to work at NBC's flagship AM radio station WNBC-AM. Also working at NBC was David Letterman, who became a fan of Stern's radio show. Stern's guest appearance on Late Night with David Letterman on June 19, 1984, launched Stern into the national spotlight and gave his radio show unprecedented exposure. Stern has appeared on Letterman's show many times thereafter.

Stern and his crew were fired from NBC in 1985 in response to a particularly outrageous sketch — "Bestiality Dial-A-Date" — and returned to the FM band by joining local rival station WXRK, premiering on November 18, 1985 and returning permanently to morning drive in February 1986. Stern's show was syndicated nationwide in the 1990s by Infinity Broadcasting.

Although both his parents are Jewish, Stern claims on his show to be "a half-Jew". His paternal grandparents, Froim and Anna (Gallar) Stern, and maternal grandparents, Sol and Esther (Reich) Schiffman, were Jews from Austria-Hungary who emigrated to America at about the same time.

On June 4, 1978, Stern married his college girlfriend, Alison Berns, at Temple Ohabei Shalom in Brookline, Massachusetts; they have three daughters. Stern played up his fidelity to his wife in the face of his sexuality explicit antics with female guests on the air. In October of 1999, Stern announced that Alison had left him. Kathy Lee Gifford sent Stern a private letter of support, even though Stern had earlier tried to humiliate her as much as possible when her husband was caught in adultery. Alison remarried in 2001 to David Lobosco. Since early 2000 Stern has been dating model Beth Ostrosky, who is 19 years younger than him. Ostrosky has appeared in the men's magazine FHM several times, and in early June of 2005, the editor-at-large of the magazine, Jake Bronstein, was fired after he commented that Ostrosky is only famous because she dates Stern. Many sources have said that Stern pressured FHM to fire him.

In one typical example of his radio show, he persuaded a female caller to have phone sex with him on the air. He made deep buzzing noises into his microphone, and had her sit on a speaker with the volume turned up until she reached an on-the-air climax. Another notable episode was on WWDC-FM (DC101 Radio) in Washington D.C. in which Stern called Air Florida Airlines and asked what the fare was for a one-way ticket from Washington National Airport to the 14th Street Bridge (on the Potomac River less than 1 mile from the airport). He was making fun of the crash of Air Florida Flight 90 one day earlier, on January 13, 1982, which had killed 78 persons (both onboard the airplane and in vehicles stopped in traffic on the bridge). That June 29, Stern was fired from DC-101 radio after being suspended for criticizing his station management and two other radio stations.

Stern refers to himself as the "King Of All Media," a parody of Michael Jackson's claiming of the title "King of Pop." Stern contends that over time people will forget the source, and only remember the phrase as it applies to him. Stern believes he represents the future of America, where public moral standards will continue to loosen. His show is frequently the subject of complaints by millions listeners who find his deliveries offensive - something he deliberately encourages.

In March of 1995, one day before the funeral of slain Tejano singer Selena Quintanilla, Stern played the sounds of gunshots in the background over some of her music. He also made several racist comments, such as "Alvin and the Chipmunks have more soul", and "Spanish people have the worst taste in music...they have no depth." After pressure from his radio station, Stern gave an on-air apology a week later in Spanish.

In 1997, Stern's autobiographical book, Private Parts, was adapted to film. The movie did moderately well at box offices and in video release, garnering a total of over $60 million. However, this take was far below expectations. He had also announced plans for a film provisionally titled The Adventures of Fartman based on a character created for his appearance at the 1992 MTV Video/Music Awards. As of 2007, this project has not even begun pre-production.

His April 21, 1999 show drew angry criticism and official "censure" from the Colorado State Legislature for his comment regarding the motives of the two male students who murdered 12 classmates and one teacher in the Columbine High School massacre in Colorado:

"There were some really good-looking girls running out with their hands over their heads. Did those kids try to have sex with any of the good-looking girls? They didn't even do that? At least if you're going to kill yourself and kill all the kids, why wouldn't you have some sex? If I was going to kill some people, I'd take them out with sex."

This incident prompting a Denver radio station to suspend his show.

Stern and his wife divorced in 2000 and in February of 2007 he became engaged to his longtime girlfriend, Beth Ostrosky.

On February 25, 2004, Clear Channel Communications "indefinitely suspended" him from six markets because of indecency involving sexual and racist dialogue during his show. The show in question featured Rick Salomon, whose claims to fame include a publicly released home video showing him having sex with heiress Paris Hilton. During this broadcast Stern held a sexually-provocative and racially insensitive interview with Saloman, asking him graphic questions about back door sex and making light of a caller's use of the word "nigger". Clear Channel president John Hogan said, "Clear Channel drew a line in the sand today with regard to protecting our listeners from indecent content, and Howard Stern's show blew right through it...it was vulgar, offensive and insulting, not just to women and African-Americans but to anyone with a sense of common decency." Because some of Clear Channel's employees have donated money to the Republican Party, Stern claims the company was trying to penalize him for his harsh verbal attacks on President Bush.

On October 6, 2004, Stern announced on his show that he has signed a five year, $500 million deal with the satellite radio service Sirius. This move met with much controversy, as Stern was talking about his move to Sirius on his show, even telling listeners how to purchase Sirius equipment and subscriptions. Stern even held a rally in New York where he gave out coupons for free or discounted Sirius equipment. Stern was later sued after he joined Sirius, but settled out of court.

Stern's last show on conventional AM/FM "terrestrial" radio was on December 16, 2005. The Howard Stern Show debuted on Sirius, on January 9, 2006.

Political and Religious views

Although raised Jewish, Stern is a militant atheist. Stern and his staff often mock religion and the show is widely considered inappropriate for children, due to inappropriate content (both related to religion and not).

Stern's shows have also featured political commentary. Although Stern used to be a self-proclaimed libertarian, in recent years he has abandoned that philosophy and embraced liberal positions that are in direct opposition to libertarian ideology, such as government regulation of corporations, radical environmentalism, gun control, income redistribution through higher taxation, socialized medicine, and government funding for abortion and embryonic stem cell research. He also considers Ralph Nader to be one of his heroes. He is also a supporter of Michael Moore and was very vocal in his endorsement of Moore's film "Fahrenheit 9/11" which was released in June of 2004. Moore was even a guest on Stern's show the week of the film's release and called into the show a day before the 2004 presidential election. Moore appeared on Stern's show again on June 18, 2007 to promote socialized medicine, which Stern also staunchly supports.

Stern was a staunch supporter of Bush after 9/11, and was a supporter of the invasion of Afghanistan.

Stern is now considered by many conservatives, libertarians, and moderates/centrists to represent the far-left of the political spectrum.

During a week vacation in February of 2004 he read comedian Al Franken's anti-Bush book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right. He told his listeners "If you read this book, you will never vote for George W. Bush. I think this guy is a religious fanatic and a Jesus freak, and he is just hell-bent on getting some sort of bizzaro agenda through -- like a country-club agenda -- so that his father will finally be proud of him ... I don't know much about Kerry, but I think I'm one of those 'Anybody but Bush' guys now. I don't think G.W. is going to win. What do you think about that?"

On July 25, 2006 Stern launched into a tirade against Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman. He attacked Lieberman's past support of indecency laws and his current support of the War on Terror . In February of 2007, Stern announced on his radio show that he will most likely vote for Rudy Giuliani for president in 2008, however he is currently supporting Hillary Clinton.

Trivia

• Stern share the same birthday as Rush Limbaugh (January 12).
• Stern is 6 ft 5 in (196 cm) in height.