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Speaker 1: This Day in History Class is a production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio, Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class,

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Speaker 1: a show that reveals history one day at a time.

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Speaker 1: I'm Gabe Lousier, and in this episode, we're re examining

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Speaker 1: the time when a Grammy winning musician blew up her

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Speaker 1: own career for the sake of sending a message. The

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Speaker 1: day was Saturday, October three. At the end of her

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Speaker 1: performance on Saturday Night Live, Irish singer songwriter Said O'Connor

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Speaker 1: shocked the audience and viewers at home by tearing up

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Speaker 1: a photo of Pope John Paul the second. She later

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Speaker 1: explained that her actions were motivated by the desire to

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Speaker 1: quote face some very difficult truths. More specifically, the singer

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Speaker 1: wanted to shine a light on the rampant, systemic child

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Speaker 1: abuse that had long been ignored in her native country

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Speaker 1: and abroad. Earlier that week, O'Connor had caught the SNL

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Speaker 1: staff off guard when she decided her second performance of

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Speaker 1: the evening would not be a song from her latest album. Instead,

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Speaker 1: she chose to sing an acapella version of a Bob

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Speaker 1: Marley song called War. Most of the song's lyrics are

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Speaker 1: adapted from a speech delivered to the United Nations by

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Speaker 1: Hailey Selassie, a former emperor of Ethiopia and a sacred

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Speaker 1: figure in Rastafarianism. The speech and the song it inspired

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Speaker 1: call for world peace while also cautioning that there will

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Speaker 1: be war quote until the ignoble and unhappy regimes that

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Speaker 1: hold our brothers in subhuman bondage have been toppled. During

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Speaker 1: dress rehearsal, O'Connor all heard some of the lyrics to

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Speaker 1: directly mention child abuse, which she viewed as an example

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Speaker 1: of the subhuman bondage mentioned in Marley's song. When she

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Speaker 1: sang the final line, we have confidence in the victory

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Speaker 1: of good over evil, she held up a photo of

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Speaker 1: a starving child. This planned protest was approved by Lauren Michaels,

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Speaker 1: the creator and executive producer of SNL. It was even

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Speaker 1: arranged for the camera to zoom in on the photo

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Speaker 1: during the live performance, but when the moment came later

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Speaker 1: that night, O'Connor replaced the photo from rehearsal with a

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Speaker 1: photo of Pope John Paul the Second. She then proceeded

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Speaker 1: to tear the photo to pieces, and as she did so,

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Speaker 1: she said, quote fight the real enemy and then threw

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Speaker 1: the pieces toward the camera. The show's director made the

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Speaker 1: split second decision to leave the applause signs off, which

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Speaker 1: resulted in a complete, at least silent audience as the

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Speaker 1: show went to commercial. But over the next few days

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Speaker 1: the phones at NBC were anything but silent. Nearly a

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Speaker 1: thousand viewers reportedly called in to complain about their performance,

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Speaker 1: and in the end, O'Connor was banned for life, not

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Speaker 1: just from SNL but from the entire NBC network. But

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Speaker 1: SNL couldn't just ignore the incident, so at the next

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Speaker 1: week's show, guest host Joe Pesci confronted the controversy head on.

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Speaker 1: He held up the same photo of the pope, explaining

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Speaker 1: that he had taped it back together. Then he tore

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Speaker 1: up a different photo, one of O'Connor herself. He then

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Speaker 1: went on to say that if she had pulled the

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Speaker 1: stunt while he was hosting, he would have quote gave

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Speaker 1: her such a smack. Lauren Michaels had a more middle

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Speaker 1: of the road response. He described O'Connor's actions as quote

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Speaker 1: on a certain level of betrayal, but also a serious

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Speaker 1: expression of belief. In later years, Michael's would expand on

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Speaker 1: that idea, saying that quote to her, the church symbolized

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Speaker 1: everything that was bad about the way she grew up

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Speaker 1: in Ireland, and so she was making a strong political statement. However,

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Speaker 1: not everyone agreed with the singer's message, or at least

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Speaker 1: not the way she had chosen to express it. A

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Speaker 1: few weeks after the incident, O'Connor was set to perform

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Speaker 1: at a Bob Dylan tribute concert in Madison Square Garden,

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Speaker 1: but she was booed off the stage. For the rest

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Speaker 1: of the year and well into the next, O'Connor was

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Speaker 1: condemned and parodied by everyone from Madonna to the Anti

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Speaker 1: Defamation League. Despite all the outrage and the harm to

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Speaker 1: her career, O'Connor never apologized or expressed regret for her actions,

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Speaker 1: but she did put an end to the speculation years

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Speaker 1: later by giving a full account of the incident. She

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Speaker 1: revealed that the photo of the Pope had been taken

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Speaker 1: during his visit to Ireland in nineteen seventy nine. She

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Speaker 1: had kept it with her for years, waiting for the

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Speaker 1: right moment to destroy what she viewed as a symbol

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Speaker 1: of lies and abuse. Then, just before her appearance on SNL,

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Speaker 1: O'Connor read an account in an Irish newspaper about priests

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Speaker 1: who had abused children but faced no legal repercussions. That's

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Speaker 1: when she knew that the right moment had finally arrived.

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Speaker 1: O'Connor may have waited years to deliver her defiant message,

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Speaker 1: but it would be several years longer before most Americans

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Speaker 1: would understand the true target of her protest. In her youth,

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Speaker 1: O'Connor had spent eighteen months in a Magdalene asylum, a

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Speaker 1: Catholic institution meant to house troubled or promiscuous teenagers. The

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Speaker 1: numerous cases of child abuse that occurred at sites like

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Speaker 1: this were an open secret in Ireland for decades. In fact,

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Speaker 1: just one year after O'Connor's performance on Saturday Night Live,

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Speaker 1: a mass grave was discovered on the grounds of one

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Speaker 1: such asylum. In response, an investigation was launched by a

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Speaker 1: U N Committee for Children's Rights. By the early two thousands,

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Speaker 1: these abuses, and thousands of others like them, were finally

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Speaker 1: laid bare for the people of Ireland, the United States,

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Speaker 1: and the rest of the world to see. I'm Gabe

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Speaker 1: Louzier and hopefully you now know a little more about

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Speaker 1: history today than you did yesterday. If you're so inclined,

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Speaker 1: you can follow the show on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram

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Speaker 1: at t d i HC Show, and if you have

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Speaker 1: any comments or suggestions you'd like to share, you can

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Speaker 1: send them my way at this Day at i heart

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Speaker 1: media dot com. Thanks to Chandler Mays for producing the show,

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Speaker 1: and thank you for listening. I'll see you back here

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Speaker 1: again and tomorrow for another day in History class. For

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Speaker 1: favorite shows.