Conservative radio host disowned his daughter on-air.
Brandi Burgess, whose father is Rick Burgess from the radio show Rick & Bubba, has hit out at her father and said she is praying for him after he shamed her for coming out.
The radio presenter, based in Birmingham, Alabama hosts a popular show rooted in an evangelical Christian faith and conservative ideology.
Taking to the airwaves to respond to her remarks, he said that she’s his daughter, and he will always love her.
“But I love you enough to tell you the truth. I’m not going to come up with some version of love that isn’t really love at all, that pats you on the back to justify you all the way to hell.”
Brandi wrote a piece on Al.com about the struggle of being in a “constant barrage of shame.”
“The story my father tells is one of a lost lamb, covered in shame,” Brandi stated.
“In his public musings, he speaks of my sin. Without my consent, he uses me as a cautionary tale.”
Brandi said the pressure to speak out grew because I can no longer avoid my own eyes in the mirror.
“I let my father’s message of shame define me,” she added. “I hated my body, sabotaged relationships, believed I was unworthy of love.”
She has been left understandably upset, and more aware than ever of her father’s impact on listeners in her home state.
“Perhaps you have heard my father on the radio and it makes you want to go to sleep and never wake up,” she says of her father’s show. “At the root of all this hate speech is fear. This is not your fear to carry. Release it.”