Gethin Jones had a "scary" stalker when he hosted 'Blue Peter'.
Gethin Jones had a stalker
The 47-year-old presenter - who fronted the long-running children's show from 2005 to 2008 - thinks the worst of the obsessive fan's "weird" behaviour was concealed from him because BBC bosses were so concerned, they had security guards to protect him.
Asked if he'd had a stalker, he told the 'Rig Biz' podcast: "I did, back in 'Blue Peter'. It was weird to the point where I had some security, which I thought was a lot, but they felt... you know, obviously they knew stuff that I didn’t.”
Gethin admitted it was a "terrifying" time.
He said: “Yeah, of course. You know, you go and do your job every day thinking that’s it and then for whatever reason...
“I think it’s interesting on telly, the medium of TV is really powerful and people think they know you really well and there’s occasions where you maybe don’t get back to someone because you just don’t, because don’t know them and they find that offensive."
The 'Morning Live' host is "really careful" when it comes to fan mail and online messages, and has intervened to help people get support if he thinks there are wider issues going on.
He added: "There are people who’ve got sort of issues as well, so you’ve got to be really careful.
“I had one woman who was messaging me and I sort of looked at it and thought, ‘Ah, this is not funny’ and I passed it on to the relevant people just to make sure she was OK, because she obviously had some mental issues.
“Which again, bigger conversation with social media, it just blows my mind that it is not regulated better for that reason, it’s so scary.”
Gethin also admitted he receives a lot of unwanted graphic photos from male admirers.
He said: "I get a lot of d*** pics. Honestly, you get all kinds on there and you don’t know until you sort of... I tend not to go on it too much but then you do open it sometimes.
“Or ‘view photo’ and you think, ‘Do I want to view this photo or not?’ And sometimes it’s really nice and it’s like a charity thing and you want to help and then you’re like, ‘Ugh, that’s not what I was expecting.’
“And then, I don’t know, it’s stuff like, ‘What’s your favourite cheese?’ ‘Can I have your socks?’ ‘What watch are you wearing?’”
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