Gretchen Carlson: Don’t underestimate this girl
Posted by Michelle Moquin on July 10th, 2016
Good Sunday Morning!
From the Huff Po:
Roger Ailes Clearly Underestimated Gretchen Carlson
On “Fox and Friends,” Gretchen Carlson was the archetypal dim blonde on the couch, sitting between two men and struggling to understand the crazy ways of the modern world.
“I just wanted to see how much of an insult it is to be called an ‘ignoramus.’ Since I didn’t know what it meant, I just googled it,” she said in one segment on what The Washington Post has called “TV’s dumbest news show.” At another point, she struggled to do grade-school math.
The dimness of the caricature she played on TV was still bright enough to catch the eye of the “The Daily Show,” which produced this must-watch segment:
Carslon’s act fits squarely within the ethos of a news network that thinks first and foremost about the attractiveness and sex appeal of its on-air female talent. The roving camera high up above Megyn Kelly’s (not coincidentally glass) desk, for instance, is known as a “leg cam.” Fox News Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes once reportedly called a host on air and demanded, “Move that damn laptop, I can’t see her legs!” Carlson has said she wasn’t allowed to wear pants on “Fox and Friends.”
A Fox News employee told The Huffington Post’s Michelle Fields that Ailes often talks about the way he hires on-air talent:
“He always brags to people about how he doesn’t do polling or testing when he chooses his on-air talent. He told me that if he was thinking of hiring a woman, he’d ask himself if he would fuck her, and if he would, then he’d hire her to be on-camera,” the employee said. “He then said if it was a man he’d think about whether he could sit down for a baseball game with him and not get annoyed of him. If he could, then he’d hire him.”
For Ailes, on-air women were nothing but bodies for viewers.
Carlson wasn’t terribly convincing at playing an idiot: She comes off too much like somebody smart trying to figure out how to look dumb. Ask any moron you know, and they’ll be able to tell you what an ignoramus is.
As Jon Stewart discovered, Carlson was valedictorian of her high school class. She graduated with honors from Stanford University and studied at Oxford University. She was a classically trained violinist.
She’s no ignoramus, but she played one on TV.
But she was also crowned Miss America. Did Ailes, the veteran pitchman, start to believe his own pitch ― that Carlson was in real life the dimwit she pretended to be on air?
If so, it may account for Ailes’ epic miscalculation and underestimation of Carlson.
On Wednesday, Carlson filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Ailes, accusing him of long-running pattern of abusive behavior. She alleged Ailes he ogled her in his office; asked her to turn around to view her backside; commented frequently on her physical appearance; and demanded sex, then fired her when she turned him down.
She also accused Steve Doocy, her “Fox and Friends” co-host, of engaging in a “pattern and practice of severe and pervasive sexual harassment” that included “mocking her during commercial breaks, shunning her off air, refusing to engage with her on air, belittling her contributions to the show.”
Last year, Carlson opened up a bit about some of the harassment she’s faced over the years (although she didn’t then disclose the treatment by Ailes):
The first incident came when I was nearing the end of my term as Miss America. I was thrilled to schedule a meeting with a top TV executive in New York who promised to help me gain entrée to the business. He called a bunch of shows and sang my praises, and then he took me out to dinner. Afterward we got into his car and he gave the driver the address of the friend I was staying with. As we sat in the backseat, he suddenly threw himself on top of me and stuck his tongue down my throat. I pulled away from him, horrified. As we reached my friend’s apartment building, I jumped out of the car and fled. When I got upstairs I started crying. I thought I had done something wrong.
Carlson advocated that people stop seeing sexual harassment as a “women’s issue” and stop blaming the victim.
“Even when I was harassed, I always knew that my brains and talent were responsible for my success, not my looks,” she wrote. “Unfortunately, I still have to put up with the constant drumbeat of ‘lookism.’ People think it’s okay to refer to a professional woman as a ‘blonde bimbo.’ We should refuse to tolerate this attitude when it occurs.”
Ailes denied Carlson’s allegations Wednesday, dismissing her (in the statement below) as a disgruntled employee who wanted to get back at the network for not renewing her contract. The response is similar to what other women often face when they accuse a man of sexual harassment: questions about their motivation, their timing and their sincerity. It was a surprisingly unoriginal rejoin from a legendary public-relations knife-fighter.
It turns out there was at least one fool at Fox News ― it just wasn’t Carlson.
*****
Readers: Well? Thoughts? Blog me.
Glowbal Ambassador: Welcome! Thanks for commenting. I can see you are new here. I noticed that you made a comment to two other readers (Betty #42, June #43) who were responding to your first comment. I’m bringing it up here because you responded back on the previous day instead of the most present day. (See Rule #3 Posting Comments in the left hand column of the blog under “Blog Rules of Conduct.”) No problem. I’m sure they’ll see it now. I’m here to help. By commenting on any other day other than the most current day, your comment may not be seen by others. Being that you responded to these sisters, I’m sure you would want them to see and read your recent response!
Newbies: Please see the “Blog Rules of Conduct.“ When posting a comment in regards to any past or archived article, please post your comment on the present day to keep the conversation contemporary, and to ensure that your comments are seen by everyone, especially the ones you are personally responding to. :) Thank you!
Have a wonderful Sunday everyone!
✌🏽&❤️
Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.
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michelle
Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)
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July 10th, 2016 at 12:26 pm
Glowbal Ambassador: please accept my apology I had no right to question your sincerity.
July 10th, 2016 at 12:29 pm
Fox is the biggest hypocrite on the air. Why women support that station is such a mystery to me.
July 10th, 2016 at 12:31 pm
I live and work in Argentina. Working women are treated as if they are sex objects for the convenience of men.
July 10th, 2016 at 12:36 pm
Thank you Michelle for making it possible for me to respond to Glowbal Ambassador.
Glowbal Ambassador I reacted without thinking. I admire your courage in continuing to think positively without animosity towards your offenders.
I wish I could find the peace of mind you have to forgive. I am very interested in where you go inside yourself to find that peace of mind. When I think of the harm done to me by men I become enraged.
July 10th, 2016 at 5:35 pm
The only thing better than having a Dem in the White House, is to also take back control of the Senate.
Get out and vote.
July 10th, 2016 at 6:25 pm
Candy, you’re comment yesterday had me laughing out loud!
Mischa I’m glad you posted Glowbal’s response I missed it, you have an amazing heart, Glowbal Ambassador, spreading love over hate is the only way.
And of course fixing the systemic issues within police departments before more violence breaks out.
After Dallas I hope leaders are going to turn this around, this level of targeted violence is not acceptable.
Luv, Zen Lill
July 11th, 2016 at 6:35 am
Men like Ailes have been getting away with their sexual demeaning and rape of women since women began to interact with them in the employment field.
Men will use any advantage they have to coerce a woman to have sex with them in a work environment. They make rape appear to be merely a cost of doing business with a man, hence the acceptable term of “casting couch.”
That is rape by any other standard but the one controlled by men. Forcing a woman to have sex with you to gain employment or advancement is rape.
But men get to call it a “casting couch.” Let’s be honest, that would be white men. They control every outlet of communication that generates the concept that coercing a woman to have sex with a man in the employment field is not rape but something less called a “casting couch.”
Why is that acceptable?
July 11th, 2016 at 8:04 am
My male cousin called after reading your post Delores#y, he was loudly complaining that Michelle’s blog is following her previous pattern of blaming everything bad in this country on white males.
I reminded him that Michelle simply points out;
That more than 90% of all the governors, local, state, and federal offices and judgeships are held by white men.
Just about 90% of law enforcement on any level is white.
White men started and maintain all the inequities between the privileges white men get over white women and OTWS.
And as someone very astutely pointed on this blog. If the concept of Affirmative Action implies the government uses its police and policy powers to grant benefits to one race or sex over another, then the chief beneficiaries of Affirmative Action has always been and still is the american white male.
I asked him to just refute that with factual stats or statements. He hung up.
I looked at that as CASE CLOSED.