How MFW helped topple Kyle and Jackie O
Since we published this deep dive into Mad F****** Witches (MFW) in 2025, the group's campaign, combined with Kyle Sandilands' on-air behaviour, has seen Australia's most highly paid radio duo split. Jackie O Henderson has left the show, and her $100 million contract terminated. The sustained campaign from MFW has added to KIIS's ratings woes by driving advertiser pullback, with ARN reporting a 16% drop in metro revenue.
Every week, more than 1.5 million listeners tune in to the Kyle & Jackie O commercial breakfast radio show on KIIS FM, to hear a variety of chat, music and, of course, the all-important, revenue-building advertising.
The listeners hear the duo joke about - and graphically describe - a range of crude and, at times, harmful topics.
Among these listeners is a group who call themselves Mad F***** Witches (MFW).
Who are the Mad F***** Witches?
This group is not listening for enjoyment, they are taking note of sexist, misogynist, racist and homophobic content. Most, importantly they are noting companies that advertise on the show.
The activist group's followers then email these companies to bring their attention to the objectionable content and lobby them to stop spending their advertising budget on the show.
MFW calls it the #VileKyle campaign. It's an example of a new type of group that is forgoing boycotts to trigger change; instead they employ the power of finance.
The idea being that if enough advertisers pull their spots from the Kyle & Jackie O show, it will reduce network owner ARN Media's radio advertising revenue to the point where they are left with no choice but to take 54-year-old Kyle Sandilands off air.
"Kyle is degrading to women and people in minority groups; he speaks in a degrading, bullying manner to pretty much anyone who's not a straight white male," says Jennie Hill, the founder of MFW.
"I don't have any idea whether he's a physically violent man, and would obviously never accuse him of that, but what he does is verbally violent and it validates the violence that men who are prone to physical violence will commit."
Warning: objectionable content
There are numerous examples of the sort of content MFW objects to. While chatting to Jackie 'O' Henderson, Sandilands makes regular references to sexual violence towards women, incest, fat-shaming, homophobic slurs and more.
Money is reproducing one example here so readers can understand the context of the #VileKyle campaign: reacting to criticism about his since-cancelled TV show from journalist Alison Stephenson, Sandilands called her "a fat slag", commented on the size of her breasts and threatened to hunt her down.
Some of the content is simply puerile: Sandilands talks about eating a Magnum ice-cream while on the toilet and "holding it in" (this content is promoted on the KIIS YouTube channel).
Hill says MFW doesn't object to puerile content in general, it's the harmful content it is targeting. It's worth nothing that more than 200,000 children and teenagers listen to the show in Sydney alone.
The uncomfortable truth is, however, that it is Sandilands' and Henderson's crudeness that attracts listeners. And that large number of listeners in turn attracts advertisers.
"Kyle and Jackie O have been like they've been for well over a decade and they've been wildly successful. They haven't needed to change," says Chris Walton, managing director of Nunn Media, which buys advertising space on behalf of companies.
Any change to the content or the line-up will be driven by commercial imperatives, not a lobbying campaign, he says. If the MFW campaign ever got to the point that it began to impact commercials, then it would be taken into consideration.
Radio ratings going south
Last year the show started broadcasting on KISS 101.1 in Melbourne, in what was to be the first step in a push to syndicate the show around the country.
Ratings were disappointing, which commentators said was because the sort of crude content that attracts Sydney audiences turned off the more refined Melburnians.
But the latest radio ratings survey suggested that the show might have turned the corner in the southern capital, with ratings starting to improve, dashing hopes among detractors that the pair would have to retreat from Melbourne or tone down their content.
In fact, ARN is making a virtue of the crude content and in May launched an advertising blitz for the hosts in Melbourne with the theme 'Radio Gone Rogue!'.
Power of the advertising dollar
At stake are many hundreds of millions in advertising revenue.
ARN Media earned more than $300 million from radio advertising in 2024, and would earn significantly more should the national syndication plan succeed.
Much of this comes down to Sandilands and Henderson, and their pay reflects it. They are on a 10-year contract said to be worth $200 million.
At the same time, ARN Media is implementing what it calls a businesses transformation program to reduce its costs by $40 million a year.
The cost cutting has done little to help ARN Media's share price, which has slid from $2.20 at the end of 2021 to 51 cents at the end of May this year.
Name of the game
Hill points to the cost-cutting program in her estimate that MFW has cost ARN Media $30 million to $40 million in lost advertising revenue.
MFW publishes a list with the names of several hundred businesses that it says no longer advertise on the Kyle & Jackie O show.
However, Hill acknowledges that the list may contain errors and that companies might have stopped advertising on the show for reasons other than the MFW campaign.
This is MFW's claimed list of new and returning advertisers, released recently:
Advertisers reluctant to comment
Most of Australia's big businesses don't want their name associated with MFW in any way.
Of more than a dozen enquiries sent to major corporates, only a couple supplied an 'on the record' comment - that is, a statement they are happy to put their name to.
Among the major banks, only NAB responded, saying: "The placement of our advertising campaigns is dynamic and constantly changing as we seek to meet our customers' needs. We continually work with our agency and media buying partners to ensure the integrity of our brand and to position our advertising where are customers consume their media."
It did not dispute MFW's claim that it doesn't advertise on the Kyle & Jackie O show.
Westpac, Commonwealth Bank and ANZ didn't respond.
However, in an email to an MFW supporter who had asked the bank to reconsider its advertising expenditure given its 'inappropriate content', ANZ wrote that the Kyle & Jackie O show is on its brand exclusion list.
The bank explained that some of its 'bonus' slots - where the radio network plays their ads for free - weren't filtered to ensure that they didn't appear on the show. ANZ said it had contacted ARN about the issue.
It's not just the big banks that don't want to comment on MFW.
Qantas and Virgin didn't respond to enquiries, nor did Optus.
Telstra supplied a statement: "We stopped advertising on the program in August 2024 as the content didn't align with our brand."
Woolworths and Coles also didn't respond, although Coles has emailed an MFW supporter to say it will not advertise during the Kyle & Jackie O show.
Business as usual
Steve Allen is a media analyst at Pearman, a media agency that buys advertising space on behalf of companies.
The suggestion that MFW has cost ARN up to $40 million is fanciful, he says, and questions whether they have cost ARN any revenue at all.
There is, Allen says, no doubt that some companies are concerned when contacted by MFW. They then tell ARN they don't want their advertisements to appear when Sandilands is on air or ask their media agency to tell ARN.
But the advertising spots taken out of the breakfast timeslot are usually placed elsewhere in the KIIS FM or other stations' schedules.
"When they get the call from us, the last thing they're going to do is let go of dollars," Allen says of ARN Media.
"They're sympathetic to the plight that advertisers find themselves in and the simplest and easiest commercial way is to reschedule."
And while MFW's campaign is generating headlines and making advertisers take note, Allen also doubts that it will result in the pair toning down their content because, ultimately, it's the ratings that count.
MFW's Hill argues, however, that if organisations are taking their advertisements out of the four-hour prime time KIIS breakfast spot, there is only so much other prime-time broadcasting they can go into instead, and that many organisations have pulled their advertisements from the network altogether.
ARN Media did not provide an executive to interview and instead responded in writing to questions.
The company didn't directly address questions on the effect the #VileKyle campaign has had on its revenue, instead saying it has a strong and stable advertiser base, "with partners continuing to achieve great results across our platforms".
The broadcaster acknowledged that the Kyle & Jackie O show "may not be for everyone", but said its enduring success lies in its ability to resonate with a large portion of everyday Australia.
"Radio is subject to robust regulations. The same can't be said for social media, and some of the personal attacks and radical views held within these activism groups are deeply concerning," ARN Media said.
On activist groups in general, the broadcaster said they "pick fights" with radio personalities to increase their own relevance.
"These groups are prone to overstating their impact, and they don't dictate our strategy or programming. We are focused on the millions of loyal fans who enjoy our content and the advertisers that get quality results," ARN said.
Accidental activist
MFW came about in 2016, after then Minister for Immigration and Border Protection Peter Dutton referred to political journalist Samantha Maiden as a 'mad f#$$!!$ witch' in a text message and mistakenly sent the message to Maiden herself.
The name resonated with Hill and she started what she describes as a "silly little Facebook page". It now has 90,000 followers on Facebook and tens of thousands on other social media sites.
Some followers contribute $5 to $10 per month to MFW's $120,000 revenue, which it uses to pay five part-time workers around $25,000 each, including Hill, who refers to herself as an accidental activist.
She says she is embarrassed by the swearing in her group's name and still cringes when she hears it, but says it also carries an important message because it has not traditionally been acceptable for women to swear, and that by swearing without apology women are taking back their power.
Three years after she formed MFW, she heard an interview with then Prime Minister Scott Morrison, during which bombastic Sydney radio host Alan Jones said Morrison should "shove a sock down [New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern's] throat". He followed it by saying the PM should give her "a few backhanders".
"[MFW] didn't really want to start a campaign, but the pressure from our followers was intense," says Hill.
"I was working in a successful career at that time, had run my own business for 30 years, so I wasn't looking for anything like that."
Inspired by campaigns overseas, Hill and her supporters drew up a roster to listen to the Alan Jones Breakfast Show and make a note of the advertisers. The supporters then emailed the advertisers to say they were unhappy with the content, urging them to pull their ads.
In May 2020, Jones announced his retirement from his role at 2GB and the following year Sky News Australia announced it would not be renewing Jones' contract.
MFW was widely credited for ending Jones' media career.
Hill made herself available to Money for two interviews to answer any questions, including claims from companies whose advertising MFW targets (who asked that their names not be used).
These included claims that MFW is an extremist group.
"We're only extremists because we're women," she says, adding that pro-nuclear, tax cuts and policies seeking to control women's bodies are more extreme.
MFW has been accused of bullying individuals, such as receptionists or customer service people who work for the advertisers.
However, sending them examples of the offensive content is an important part of MFW's campaign strategy.
Hill says MFW is sorry for upsetting these people, but considers it hypocritical that MFW is being criticised when these companies are supporting offensive content.
Commenting on the #VileKyle campaign, she says: "What I work for now is just trying to make the world a bit better for other women," she says.
Get stories like this in our newsletters.
Reply