Featured Image Credit: Tim P. Whitby/Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images
Topics: TV And Film, Celebrity, Louis Walsh, Music, Cheryl
Rhiannon Ingle
Topics: TV And Film, Celebrity, Louis Walsh, Music, Cheryl
For many Brits and TV lovers across the globe, sitting down for The X Factor with your family every week was a non-negotiable.
The hit British reality television music competition, which is also part of the global X Factor franchise created by Simon Cowell, featured an ever-rotating line-up of celebrity judges including Louis Walsh and Sharon Osbourne as the most iconic members.
Other prominent judges from across the decades included Cheryl, Dannii Minogue, Nicole Scherzinger, Gary Barlow, Tulisa, Mel B, and Rita Ora. The final series in 2018, 14 years after it first hit our screens in 2004, featured Simon, Robbie Williams, Ayda Field and Louis Tomlinson.
The programme has given us a bunch of memorable moments, including one particularly controversial clip which saw Louis grope fellow judge Mel B back in December 2014.
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The video has since resurfaced on social media, leaving many fans seriously shocked at what went down on live TV. Take a look:
It shows Mel B, 50, sitting at a table with Louis, Simon and Cheryl discussing performances they had just watched earlier that evening.
During the chat, Louis' hand can be seen move across the top of the sofa behind the Spice Girls alumni towards her bottom.
The 73-year-old hovers for a bit before grabbing her backside, all while continuing the conversation the four of the judges were having.
Fortunately, Mel B was quick to call out his behaviour, asking: "Hold on a second, why are you grabbing my butt?"
Louis then removed his hand as The Xtra Factor Sarah-Jane Crawford presenter, Sarah-Jane Crawford, says: "Louis! Hands where we can see them, please!”
And then Simon chips in: "Honestly, you’re safe."
Louis can be seen laughing off the interaction as Mel B, whose body language completely changed as she shifted away from her colleague, emphasised twice that such conduct was totally 'inappropriate'.
After catching light of the clip, which is over a decade old now, people rushed to share their astonished reactions as one user commented under the resurfaced video: "Sexual assault normalised on national tv and everyone ignores it."
"I'm glad she called it out," praised a second as a third echoed: "Love that she called him out!"
A fourth chimed in: "On air is crazy, women go through alot ffs."
"Don’t touch people without their permission. How is that so f*cking hard to understand?" slammed a fifth.
Another lamented: "Its everyone ignoring it thats really p*ssing me off and you could see she was baffled as well."
And a final Instagram user added: "What annoyed me the most is that she made it very clearly, verbally and physically that this was not ok and no one person said or done anything about it."
PEOPLE reports that the incident was edited out of subsequent airings of the ITV show.
Louis addressed the matter back in 2024, telling Today FM‘s Mario Rosenstock: "We’d be sitting there all day on the couch doing TV, and I just grabbed her ass as a joke.
"She was very funny and you could say anything or do anything to her and I loved her, so I would just grab her for a laugh but it’s not PC anymore."