Viewers tuning in across the African continent to the music channel, run by M-Net, and this year's ceremony taking place in Soweto on Saturday night, would have seen Channel O showing women on stage shaking their asses and demeaning themselves - apparently in the name of performance art.
Since Channel O has no qualms about "showcasing" women in such a way, one has to assume that Channel O is okay with, and endorses, this chauvinistic, terrible view of women. Women who are almost not even their faces, but mere sex objects and body parts employed to "enhance" a musical performance.
Trash like this belongs in a seedy Nigerian strip club. Not on a TV channel which is supposed to show the best of Africa.
As a TV critic I believe that M-Net, Channel O and MultiChoice with it's continent-wide DStv service have a corporate and a social responsibility to uplift women - not to show them with their faces down to the ground and their asses in the air.
There is no respect and dignity in showing women in the way they were shown by Channel O on Saturday night.
At the Channel O 2013 Africa Music Video Awards Dineo Mokoetsi's words sounded ironic and hollow when she said that the entire point behind these music awards is to "showcase the best of our continent on one night, for everybody to see".
If these visuals of women everybody got to see are the "best" of Africa, then I have a major problem with Channel O.
During Zimbabwe's Buffalo Souljah performance for instance at the 2013 Africa Music Video Awards, viewers saw women bent over and shaking their asses.
Viewers saw women then go down on all fours shaking their asses in the air and pumping their behinds right into the camera. Then Channel O "treated" Africa's viewers to the women laying down on the floor with their legs open and in the air, and then even showing them upside down on their backs, their bottoms once again in the air.
So why is Channel O sexist? Strangely, ironically, the 2013 Africa Music Video Awards on Channel O on Saturday night featured no men bending over and shaking their asses, no men going down on all fours shaking their asses in the air, no men laying down on the floor with their legs open, and no men on their backs on the stage with their asses jutted into the air.
Only African women were sexualised and demeaned in what any sociologist will tell you is subservient, sexually submissive trash on television.
It's unbecoming and frankly a disgusting "reflection" back to the majority of the African continent's women of who television wants to show them that they are.
Africa's women on average have to walk 13km per day just to get access to clear drinking water for their families. They work for their children, they work for the homes and they try to build better lives. In my view Channel O's depiction does nothing but tear women down.
It's unbecoming and frankly a disgusting "reflection" back to the majority of the African continent's women of who television wants to show them that they are.
Africa's women on average have to walk 13km per day just to get access to clear drinking water for their families. They work for their children, they work for the homes and they try to build better lives. In my view Channel O's depiction does nothing but tear women down.
Did people like Yolisa Phahle, M-Net's director of local interest channels who oversees Channel O, Leslie Kasumba, Channel O Africa manager, and other executives at M-Net and Channel O watch the cringe-inducing sexism and demeaning female objectification included in the 2013 Africa Music Video Awards before stuff like this gets broadcast?
If they saw it during rehearsals or are informed about the content beforehand, are they okay with this?
If it were TV executives' own daughters who were gyrating on, and dry-hump a man's loins on a stage as happened at Channel O, would they be fine with that? I would guess not. Why then must viewers be subjected to this trash?
If it were TV executives' own daughters who were gyrating on, and dry-hump a man's loins on a stage as happened at Channel O, would they be fine with that? I would guess not. Why then must viewers be subjected to this trash?
Television as a powerful medium - and Channel O - has a responsibility to help promote women and to promote them by not showing them in this way on, and to, a continent still suffering and struggling hugely with equality for women and with sexism.
It's sad and terrible that Channel O continues to aid and abet such terrible stereotypes about women. And if it has to happen, why only to one gender?
It's sad and terrible that Channel O continues to aid and abet such terrible stereotypes about women. And if it has to happen, why only to one gender?
Why does Channel O feel that its okay for a women to be on her back with her behind and her legs in the air? An African man certainly won't ever be "allowed" to be shown like this. But for Channel O and the Africa Music Video Awards 2013 it's clearly "okay" to have women be portrayed in this way for the sake of superficial entertainment.
African television, Channel O and award shows like the Africa Music Video Awards, show that it still has a lot of growing up to do. They need to start taking responsibility for every minute, and for every act, and for every event during which they reflect Africa's women and young females back to the continent itself. It's 2013.
Besides the bad stuff there were the other usual bad stuff at the Channel O Africa Music Video Awards 2013.
Viewers had sound problems throughout - a production and broadcasting problem which is especially painful when it happens during a music show.
As usual the show ran long over. DStv viewers who've set their PVR will discover they're missing the most important awards which will be cut off - the show which was supposed to be 2 hours long according to the EPG and was supposed to end at 22:00 only ended at 22:22.
Besides the bad stuff there were the other usual bad stuff at the Channel O Africa Music Video Awards 2013.
Viewers had sound problems throughout - a production and broadcasting problem which is especially painful when it happens during a music show.
As usual the show ran long over. DStv viewers who've set their PVR will discover they're missing the most important awards which will be cut off - the show which was supposed to be 2 hours long according to the EPG and was supposed to end at 22:00 only ended at 22:22.
