Fox News has been a controversial cable station for over a decade now. Broadcast and cable news stations in the past were highly concerned about providing fair and unbiased coverage of stories. Every effort was made to bring in experts on all sides of an issue to present a clear picture of what was happening in the world. Fox News changed all of that. It became clear from the start that the goal of Fox News was to push forward a Conservative agenda. The network regularly propped up Republican ideas, candidates and legislation. The network would also attack Democrats and Liberal ideas.
Fox News did not seem concerned about the controversial status or perceptions of others. The network has a long history of providing opinion over facts in order to support an idea. There were numerous documented instances of the network presenting false or misleading information in order to attack Democratic opponents or legislation. There were even times when the network would show blatantly incorrect or false statistics and charts. This is just one of the reasons why so many people were disgusted when the network came out with the “fair and balanced” slogan.
The chief executive officer of Fox News has been a veteran of the television industry named Roger Ailes. Many people have stated that Ailes was directly responsible for some of the most controversial decisions at Fox News. Some have claimed that Ailes enacted a policy where female anchors and reporters were banned from wearing anything but short skirts on the air. Those same claims state that Ailes intentionally chose camera angles and set pieces that would clearly showcase the bare legs of female anchors during shows. This is why few people were surprised when sexual harassment charges were brought against Ailes by one of the most well-known anchors on the network.
Gretchen Carlson has been a fixture at Fox News for many years. She was wildly popular with audiences especially when hosting a live morning show called Fox and Friends with two men named Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade. Carlson was recently fired from Fox News. She filed a lawsuit claiming wrongful termination and sexual harassment by Ailes. She specifically states that she was fired for refusing the sexual advances of Ailes behind the scenes. Bloomberg Politics, however, went back through her live broadcasts to show that there was a pattern of sexual harassment at the network.
Bloomberg Politics assembled a video that shows just what Carlson was forced to endure during live television broadcasts. The two-minute video shows repeated incidents where various Fox News anchors and co-hosts were talking about Carlson’s appearance and her clothes. There were many sexual innuendos made during the segments. Carlson was called a “skirt” and a “broad” at various points. Brian Kilmeade suggested that Carlson should ride a mechanical bull in a skirt. The men in the video clips even made sexist and harassing remarks to other women on the set such as Conservative commentator Laura Ingraham.
It was very clear in the video that Carlson was uncomfortable with the treatment. She even joked about Kilmeade having to read the sexual harassment policy of the company again. Carlson is specifically targeting Roger Ailes and the environment he created that allowed the harassment and demeaning comments to occur. The video also shows that the co-hosts of the show clearly believed that Carlson’s appearance was more important than her abilities as a journalist and anchor. There has been no comment from Fox News about the video at this time. It is unclear what the outcome of the lawsuit will be. Roger Ailes did recently step down from his position and no longer works for Fox News.