Channel 4 has apologised after a seven-letter gay slur was broadcast on Countdown.
The contestants, fans and rival quiz hosts and the contestants were left wondering why bosses didn’t edit out the word “p*****r” as one of the answers, in the words round.
Pointless host Richard Osman was surprised the offensive word wasn’t cut from Monday’s show, the Mirror reports.
Osman said: “The contestant was embarrassed to be saying it, but in that situation the easy solution is to all agree he scored 7 points and to retake with a different answer. We’ve done that a couple of times with ‘correct’ answers.”
He added: “A very easy fix, and not an uncommon one.”
Journalist Scott Bryan said: “As someone who was called a “p*****r” by homophobes on a daily basis why on earth is Countdown allowing it to be said cheerfully as an answer on daytime television?Yes, I know it is in the dictionary.
“But having been at the receiving end of that word as abuse for years (along with f*****), then hearing it casually as an answer on a quizshow.”
He added: “The amount of people saying 'it is only a word,' I’m pretty sure it was only a word back in the classrooms back then too. Yet it feels the same.”
The contestant who said the word even agreed.
Matt Gould, from Whitley Bay, said: “I apologise for my part in this. I thought it might be edited differently.
"At the time I said ‘I have an inappropriate 7 that I know is in the dictionary or a riskier 7 that I’m less sure about’.
"I thought that bit would be reshot with a non offensive 7 letter word.”
C4 have now apologised. They said: “The airing of the word was an error of judgement. It does not align with our values and we apologise for any offence caused.”
The row comes after Anne Robinson has previously come under fire for using gay innuendo to belittle some contestants on The Weakest Link.
Questions were asked at the time if Robinson was a suitable host for Countdown in light of such comments.
Her tenure of the teatime quiz is already ruffling feathers with her barbed comments and put-downs.
The Mirror told last month how the 76-year-old upset some viewers by taking a pop at people from Norfolk, Rochdale and Isle of Wight, to name a few.
Fury erupted in 2011 over Anne’s remarks about Welsh people on Room 101 that they were “irritating and annoying”.
TV watchdogs warned her comments “came close to the boundaries of acceptability” but ruled they fell short of racism.
Speaking about landing the Countdown role, Anne said: “Some [viewers] will loathe me because they’ll feel I’ve ruined their show.”
Asked if she would be mean to the C4 quizzers, she added: “You have to judge how far you can go. Don’t want the contestants to have to have Kleenex next to them.”
Radio star later Vanessa Feltz claimed Anne made a racist jibe to her on The Weakest Link in 2006. Anne denied it.
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