Two years ago, we declared ‘Good news: TV is dead’. It turns out we were perhaps premature in that assessment.

In less than three weeks The Spinoff TV will hit all of your screens at once, arriving at 9.45pm into Three’s hallowed Friday night lineup, straight after 7 Days. We’ll do our best to approximate what we’ve done online, just on the television – gonzo reporting, scorching hot takes, ruthless media analysis, the best of our podcast lineup and more.

We’ve put together a dream team which is made up of both our people and our favourite outside collaborators to create a current affairs show in The Spinoff style. What that means is that we’ll attack the week as it comes at us, making video and releasing it on The Spinoff, Newshub and our social channels as it’s ready. Then we’ll pick the best of it, along with some exclusive content we’ve saved up, and head into Three’s studios on a Friday morning to package it up with our hosts.

A few hours later it will be on the television, thanks to our production partners at Great Southern Television, the team at Three and NZ on Air. (We can’t believe it either.) What follows is a list of the key on air talent, so you can start to get your head around what will be coming at you in a few weeks.

The Hosts

The first thing you see every Friday will be your hosts, The Spinoff’s very own Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden. Alex was the very first person employed at The Spinoff, and her furiously funny writing style is what built our audience and still defines us to this day. Leonie has been with us a year, after exiting her role as editor of Mana magazine to found The Spinoff Ātea, a dedicated Māori perspective at the heart of the site. The pair have honed their chemistry through their cult podcast On the Rag alongside Michele A’Court, and together will help make the show its own weird, unruly animal.

The Talent

We put together a wish-list of people inside and out of The Spinoff who we wanted to make the show, and we got almost all of them. Let’s meet them:

Ra Pomare

The funniest man on Instagram lovingly satirises New Zealand while also shooting and editing killer field reports.

Angella Dravid

The 2017 Billy T winning comedian will report and write for The Spinoff TV, bringing her truly unique sensibility to our little show.

José Barbosa

The show’s director and beating heart, José will shoot, edit, write and when we’re lucky, appear on screen. This is his beautiful bouncing baby and you all must pat it on the head.

Madeleine Chapman

KFC fan and former New Zealand javelin champion Madeleine Chapman will write and review for the show, bringing to the show the kind of piercing insights that produced her smash hit analysis ‘NZ Politicians sitting down’.

Tom Sainsbury

Brings his universally beloved (even by Paula Bennett) series ‘Kiwis of Snapchat’ to the bigger screen.

Frickin Dangerous Bro

Jamaine Ross, James Roque and Pax Assadi are Frickin Dangerous Bro, and will be providing a helpful guide to white culture.

Rebecca Stevenson

Our news reporter, Rebecca Stevenson comes to us from running multiple papers in West Auckland, and will be busting down doors and bringing in scoops. If you see her coming, you probably have a problem.

Toby Manhire

Toby Manhire is the editor of The Spinoff and the host of the Gone By Lunchtime podcast. He used to edit the opinion pages of the Guardian in London, and write columns for the NZ Herald but has now used up all his opinions. Most recently he has been trying to do a good meme.

James Mustapic

The savage YouTuber and comedian brings a second season of Repressed Memories, his deep, distressing dives back into New Zealand’s pop cultural past.

Lucy Knox

Coming via Sydney, with a stint at MTV and a smash short film under her belt, Lucy’s work is fresh and striking and she is far too good for us.

Adrian Stevanon

Adrian Stevanon is the producer of The Spinoff TV. Of Samoan/Swiss descent, Adrian’s job is to keep our talented band of content makers in line, and make sure that no bits of black go to air.

Carmen Leonard

Carmen is our executive producer. With 30 years of telly making experience, she – alongside Duncan – is the boss.

Duncan Greive

Co-executive producer and The Spinoff’s managing editor, Duncan will also occasionally disgrace the screen as part of The Real Pod alongside Alex Casey and Jane Yee.

The Spinoff TV will air on Friday 22nd June, 9.45pm on Three

These are cruel days for white old men who feel silenced. We scour the country to find the last remaining safe spaces for these struggling titans. 

It’s hard out here for a pimp. But it’s even harder out here for those who don’t know what song or movie that’s referencing. In other words, it’s hard out here for old white men with columns on the largest news site in the country.

“Ageing white males are considered fair game because we’re seen as having enjoyed privilege for too long. Now the tables have turned and we’re expected to pay the penalty by keeping our supposedly rancid opinions to ourselves,” said Karl du Fresne in a rancid opinion column that will be read by thousands of New Zealanders.

Consider, too, the plight of Martin Van Beynen. “I should be boss. I should be on boards, committees, management groups and at the centre of power networks. Instead I’m a mug with a column,” said Van Beynen in his national column on NZ’s biggest media site, and for which he gets paid real money.

It’s a growing concern, this marginalisation of white men who’ve been gainfully employed for decades and given a wide platform from which to dispense their many, many opinions. It’s a growing concern and one that we as a nation must address. After all, who will speak up for those who are given the most prominent platforms in the country from which to speak?

Perhaps while we’ve been trying to bring up those groups that have been historically marginalised and silenced we forgot to notice that the group at the top of ladder hadn’t managed to advance further. And now, here we are, within shouting distance, and they’re ready to share their stories.

So if these columns have struck a chord in your old, white, male heart, and you’re worried your voice is being silenced because there are possibly some other voices around, move quickly. Get to one of the following safe spaces.

A boardroom

A boardroom, any boardroom, will offer you solace. With 85% of board members in New Zealand being male, you’ll at least not be a minority in that department. And if a quick google search of random boards around New Zealand is anything to go by, white people should be there in droves. For example, here’s the board for the Auckland Blues, a team of predominantly brown players. Don’t worry about Kate Daly, she won’t ruin the vibe.

A workplace

The senior management teams in New Zealand workplaces are still your happy place, with only 18% of positions filled by women. And across the board, men earn more than women, while Europeans earn more than any other ethnicity in New Zealand. Two really great stats for old white men.

A private school reunion

People who earn more can afford to pay more for their children’s schooling, which is why private schools are made up of a vast majority of white people. Head along to a reunion for, say, King’s College and you’ll find a home among the brick, glass, and privilege.

The church

The safest place for an old white man is in the Catholic Church. The Pope is old and white. All six bishops in New Zealand are old and white and male. Women can’t even be priests so there’s no way they can yell at you and your opinions in a monastery.

Your own column

If these two self-proclaimed losers can get columns then what’s stopping you? Send an email to your local media outlet and say you’ve got some Thoughts™ that you’d like to share with the nation. The majority of columnists are already old white guys but if we could get a few more, it would be an even safer place to air any bad thoughts you might have.

So despite being wrong about most things in his columns, Martin Van Beynen was right about one. He should be on boards, committees and management groups. That’s where old white men will always find safety in numbers.

An earlier version of this post included an Amnesty International logo in the background of the image. This has been removed as Amnesty International has no current campaigns to give greater voice to the loud white male columnists of New Zealand. We apologise unreservedly.

The Bulletin is The Spinoff’s acclaimed, free daily curated digest of all the most important stories from around New Zealand delivered directly to your inbox each morning.