Not Breaking – Roger Ailes is a disgusting creep
His disgusting politics are well known, but the many other ways he is disgusting have always been a matter of speculation. Until now.
So Who Wants To Read About Roger Ailes’ Testicles?
Last week, Gretchen Carlson sued Fox News CEO Roger Ailes for sexual harassment after she was fired last month for allegedly rebuffing his sexual advances. Since then, six more women have come forward to New York Magazine with their own claims of harassment by Ailes and his gross, meat-like ball sac that I can’t stop picturing and so now must you. Via Death and Taxes:
A third woman talks about yet another incident from when Ailes was at “The Mike Douglas Show” in 1967, when she was 16 years old. Ailes brought her into his office at the end of the day when there were very few people around, she said, and he locked the door. Ailes then proceeded to sit down, she alleges, and “very gingerly pull[ed] out his genitals and said, ‘Kiss them.’” She describes his package as being “red like raw hamburger.” After being turned down, Ailes allegedly told the woman to keep quiet about the incident and informed her the entire thing had been recorded on a reel-to-reel tape recorder he had hidden in his desk.
Men (not all) have Been using sex as a source Of control for hundreds Of Years. Disgusting!
Ailes wasn’t using sex for control; he was using money.
Strange, women have always been able to control me through sex
#NOTALLMEN!!! RIGHT BROS? you guys are pathetic.
This kind of thing happens so much with men that I sometimes wonder if there is something wrong with me. I can’t even imagine how the aversion to do something patently wrong like sexual harassment isn’t a stronger motivating force than acting on sexual desire.
They dont see it as doing something wrong. It is, and they are pigs and should be gelded…. but a rich white man like Ailes… he isnt told “no”. Trump is the same way…. and should-be-eunuchs like Brock Turner are made every day.
I’ve never heard of six women accusing a POOR man of sexual harassment.
NO, they usually just jump right to the false rape accusations if he’s an icky poor person, right? And he was being SO NICE TO THEM.
Puck, are you in the habit of hearing much of what the poor do? I’m not.
#RichPowerfulWhitePenisesMatter
It’s about power, and it’s not only money that equals power. So yes, there are plenty of POOR men sexually harassing women.
Sexual harassment a tacit omission from a man that he has no ability to attract a woman
When you first heard about the lawsuit, who among us didn’t flash on this?
http://www.mtv.com/news/2800237/jabba-the-hutt-toby-philpott/
It’s not about attracting women or not attracting women. This isn’t about unrequited love, rejection, loneliness, etc.. It’s about power (and fear) – and plenty of “attractive” men and poor men take part in this behavior.
But I thought you all loved Bill Clinton, and here you are bashing some guy who is a piker compared to Bill Clinton and his discretions….and this time he will have more spare time to get his jollies all over White House.
Talk about selective indignation….jeez.
@fbh “here you are bashing some guy who is a piker compared to Bill Clinton and his discretions”
Huh?? What Ailes did is far far worse.
Bill just wanted to play. Ailes was basically turning his women into prostitutes.
@fbh: Some of us found Bill’s behavior just as disgusting. What of it? The outrage isn’t selective for some of us.
Men of all classes harass women. You have heard of street harassment, right?
Gretchen Carlson has a very plausible-sounding case if she can come up with some corroboration from this decade. I hope she does.
“Bill just wanted to play. Ailes was basically turning his women into prostitutes.”
Being a liberal you should know that there is no such thing as consensual sex in the work place between a nineteen year old subordinate like Monica Lewinsky , and the President of the United States….Not to mention the rape accusations from numerous women…..You have lost your mind
Also Bill Clinton was a frequent traveler on pedophile Jeffrey Epstein’s “Lolita Express” private plane…….you guys remind me of those hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil, cute little monkey statues.
Im sure Bill Clinton is the one case where every accuser is a liar and they are out for his money or something. *eye roll……. FBH has a point…. and I just booked a ski trip to Hell
“just wanted to play”…… that’s disgusting. That young woman’s life was ruined by so-called liberals and Conservatives alike who slut-shamed her to the point of severe depression.
Oh I know….. as a man, poor Billy was powerless against her feminine wilds? Is he a victim because he’s a helpless sex addict and she was a succubus trying to bring him down? Why, exactly is it ok for Bill Clinton to “play”?
Do you realize you can still by a liberal without being a hypocrite?
1967…seems totally legit
@B “That young woman’s life was ruined by so-called liberals and Conservatives alike who slut-shamed her to the point of severe depression.”
No.. It was actually ruined by just one conservative whom she confided in.
It would have been better if Monica had just enjoyed it and then kept quiet.
The problem wasn’t the sex, it was the publicity.
“It would have been better if Monica had just enjoyed it and then kept quiet.”
Trying to be president of Sanford? disgusting.
@fbh “Being a liberal you should know that there is no such thing as consensual sex in the work place between a nineteen year old subordinate like Monica Lewinsky , and the President of the United States”
Sorry… I just don’t have a problem with that. Not unless there was some sort of quid pro quo or some sort of serious coercion. Nineteen year old women own their own bodies.
@b “Trying to be president of Sanford? disgusting.”
Huh? She has always said it was consensual and that she enjoyed it. I believe that.
First, Lewinsky was 22, not 19. That doesn’t mean I think what Bill Clinton did was okay, just that I’d like to keep the facts straight. At this rate, FBH will have her age 15 in a few short months.
It also matters that Lewinsky says the sex was consensual. No on gets to tell her that she is wrong and place a label on her that she rejects. Yes, the power structure/age difference makes me cringe, but I’m not Monica. I have no right to label her experience, especially when she has labeled it herself. See how that works?
Bill Clinton was wrong. Really, really, wrong. Made my stomach twist wrong. I have never excused his behavior, but I find it amazing how Republicans and FBH are only concerned about sexual assault, etc. when it comes to Bill Clinton. That’s why FBH’s concerns are so easy to dismiss. He’s not sincere. He could care less about Monica Lewinsky. He uses her the same way he accuses Bill Clinton and others – for his own agenda.
I stand corrected about Lewinsky’s age, but not about the fact that a subordinate cannot engage in consensual sex with a superior in the work place.
“but not about the fact that a subordinate cannot engage in consensual sex with a superior in the work place.”
Cannot? Lol. You do like to overstate your case, don’t you? Of course they CAN. It happens all the time. What SHOULD NOT happen is a superior either propositioning a subordinate or accepting a proposition from a subordinate and in both cases acting on it. Can and should are two different words.
He has no case, Dana. Office romances/hook ups happen all the time – many leading to marriage. The person in a higher position needs to be careful that their advances are welcome. In many cases they are. If they aren’t welcome then there’s a problem.
But let’s be real, FBH hasn’t addressed Ailes’ behavior in this entire thread. That tells you all you need to know about his “outrage”.
If Carlson can’t substantiate that her firing was the result of her refusing Ailes’s alleged “advances,” then Ailes’s behavior in any decade is moot. The point of presenting the other women’s long-ago stories was to paint Ailes as the kind of guy who MIGHT have fired Carlson over sex. All Ailes needs to do is come up with some kind of plausible reason for firing her other than sex (like ratings), and Carlson will not win, unless the judge just gets disgusted with the whole business and decides to make an example of Ailes anyway. Now if she had quit, then she could claim she quit because of a hostile environment, and then all the other women’s stories would be relevant (if they weren’t disallowed for being so long ago.) At least that’s how I understand the law; I could be wrong.
@p “…then Ailes’s behavior in any decade is moot.”
The whole point of the lawsuit was to punish Ailes.
She’s already done that, and rather successfully.
Kudos to her.
Ailes is now a stain on Fox News and his days are numbered.
It’s amusing you think that, LE. the phrase “oh, bless your heart” comes to mind.
This is Fox News we’re talking about. A Stain? You sweet summer child, that network is already a crap-soaked fire blanket of misogyny and racism. O’Reiley is still on the air and look at HIS history. This will pass as coverage at the network shifts to deporting Muslims and propping up Trump.
@ben
There are still a whole bunch of Republicans who have morals, and this doesn’t sit well with them, especially Republican women.
It not all a sham. They’re not all misogynistic racist assholes.
And I’ll bet that even Megan Kelly was forced a dozen years ago… When does she talk???
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-megyn-kelly-ailes-20160714-snap-story.html
Maybe she is … to quote you…. keeping quiet and enjoying it. It is roughly the same age difference between Monica and Bill… and that’s your favorite star-crossed love story.
To take a job working for Fox News (other than building support staff obviously), knowing what they are, you HAVE to be at least sympathetic to racist misogynists. I cannot think of one on-air personality who hasnt engaged in their war on facts. Shep Smith is the only one who comes close to sanity and even he carries the water. In a month, this will all be forgotten.
Republicans nominated Trump. Sure… they arent ALL the worst, but most of them are. In the Primaries, the more awful Trump got, the more popular he became. Every single on of them watches Fox News….. who will now try to capture every single Trump voter as a loyal viewer.
It’s not all men at his rallies chanting and sieg-heiling either. You make the mistake of thinking all women care about how other women are treated. Poor people keep voting for republicans because they care more about hating “them” than they do about helping their own situation, or their children. Plenty of people who happen to be female voters don’t care how other women are treated, as long as we “Kick Isis Ass!!!!”.
Please wake up
@LE “Ailes is now a stain on Fox News and his days are numbered.”
@Ben “This is Fox News we’re talking about. A Stain? … This will pass…”
Looks like it comes down as I called it!
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/07/murdochs-have-decided-to-remove-roger-ailes.html
(and someone else looks like a fool)
Bye bye Roger Ailes. You will NOT be missed!
p.s. I think that the stain on Fox news will linger even when the bastard is gone.
Oh LE, what a smart oracle you are!
@LE “And I’ll bet that even Megan Kelly was forced a dozen years ago…”
It looks like that guess was also correct…
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/07/sources-kelly-said-ailes-sexually-harassed-her.html
This likely explains why Ailes is getting dumped so quickly.
You rooted for a woman being harassed and now you are bragging about having called it.
Oh.. yea… Like I’ve been urging Roger to roger all the women he hires.
I’m rooting for the takedown of Fox News. I want everyone to know exactly what that nasty place is, and of all the nasty people there.
As for Megan Kelly, it’s hard to feel sorry for her despite the fact that
a) She had to put out for him, and
b) She was steamed that she had to do so
If Megan wants to earn my respect, she needs to take responsibility for what she did and screw over Roger Ailes in a proper manner. If she was really clever, she could take his job as well.
It’s her fault she was harassed. got it.
No. But she own her response to the harassment.
A good woman would run away.
Im sure your respect is the thin Megan Kelly has been yearning…. nay, DESPERATE for all this time. What if she thought that dealing with sexual harassment (which she clearly had coming) was the way to earn your respect? Does that make it your fault?
What, exactly, does she need to take responsibility for? I thought your position on this thing was “she should just enjoy it and keep quiet” …. or is that only for Democratic women/predatory bosses?
“A good woman would run away.”
mansplaining for ‘her fault’ I guess it was the cloths she was wearing, huh?
You can’t equate this with Monica and Bill. Monica was a willing participant, and even the aggressor in their relationship.
Megan Kelly is a clear victim. You cannot equate.
As for taking responsibility? Megan is in a position to help future women avoid her fate. How many more women were forced into “prostitution” by her silence?
I give Gretchen a lot of respect for her brave action. This may sound a bit misogynistic, but I see it as a kind of redemption.
@B “mansplaining for ‘her fault’ I guess it was the cloths she was wearing, huh?”
In the history our our country, I expect that millions of women have been asked to have sex in exchange for a paying job. It happens.
Many have said ‘yes’, and many have said ‘no’.
I would want my daughters to say ‘no’. I see it as a test of character. A good woman would indeed say ‘no’… (according to the values of my heritage).
You are such a creep.
The values of your heritage are crap if they base a woman (or any human’s) value on how they respond to an unreasonably stressful and traumatizing situation.
“This may sound a bit misogynistic, but….’
The sexist pig’s version of “im not racist, but”….
Yes. It sounds misogynistic because you are clearly a misogynist. Calling yourself a “liberal” on a blog handle doesn’t absolve you of being a creep.
He lives up to the “elite” part tho.
@B “Yes. It sounds misogynistic because you are clearly a misogynist.”
Hmmm. What makes you the arbitrator of what is and isn’t misogynistic?
Frankly, I’d give more credence to pandora’s views.
And it works equally well with the other sex. A good man also doesn’t sell his body for sex. So how can that basic view be seen as purely misogynistic?
…just because women are propositioned more often?
“The values of your heritage are crap…”
Hmmm. And I’ve been rather proud of my ancestors and my moral heritage.
“…how they respond to an unreasonably stressful and traumatizing situation.”
Isn’t that perhaps the only time a person’s true character can be measured?
Im not an arbiter of anything. Im just calling out a misogynist for saying shit like “she should have just enjoyed it and kept quiet” or “a good woman would have…..”
(flashback, didnt the GOP say a good woman wold have left her cheating spouse?)
Pandora, LE wants to know if
1 passing moral judgment on sex workers, (that’s a new one for LE…. considering many sex workers are underage slaves…. but i guess if they were REALLY good people, they would have run… or exposed their tormentor… or kept quiet… not sure which one)
2 blaming women for being harassed and
3) proclaiming that “a good woman…” (followed by almost anything) is misogynist.
Because, I assume, you are a woman and therefor responsible for expressing the views of all women everywhere. “You people” obviously think with one brain.
You dont get to tell people how to respond to victimization.
You dont get to set moral rules about “character”.
I’m saying Megan Kelly (or anyone else, for that matter) can handle her own harassment however she damn well pleases. The fact that she is a conservative shill who has used her position to harm the country means absolutely nothing when it comes to Ailes actions.
She doesn’t owe you anything, she doesn’t owe “her kind” anything.
Well… this went off the rails quickly. I’m actually debating wading into this.
*deep breath*
I’m not seeing where LE was rooting for a woman to be harassed. It comes across more as, “What would you expect from FOX news – an organization that’s blatantly misogynistic to its core.” It’s like if I said, “I bet Rudy Giuliani says something racist on Friday.” I’m not rooting for him to say something racist, I’m just predicting (given past behavior) that he will.
The “good” woman comment strikes me as out of character for LE. I’m really trying to make sense of it. It’s just not like him.
That said… not everyone has the privilege to walk away from a job; not everyone has a safety net. I don’t know these women’s situations, but I hesitate to tell someone to walk away from employment. I’m also hesitant in instructing people on how to act after they’ve suffered a trauma (sexual harassment, assault, a death of a loved one, etc.). To me there isn’t one way to handle these situations.
When I first heard this story about Roger Ailes’ behavior my initial response was… duh. After all, the entire network is saturated in bad social behavior. They don’t value women or minorities – even women and minorities who work for them don’t value women and minorities. So Ailes’ behavior wasn’t surprising. It made sense.
Roger Ailes is the only one responsible for his actions. No. One. Else.
@p “The “good” woman comment strikes me as out of character for LE. I’m really trying to make sense of it. It’s just not like him.”
Consider the two classes of women. Those who worked at Fox News after submitting to Ailes’ harassment, and those who never worked there because they refused to submit (several such stories have been recently reported).
Is it wrong for me to respect the latter class and not respect the former?
Is it wrong for me to give respect those women of the former class who tried to do something about after the fact (e.g. Gretchen), and not those who remain silent (e.g. Megan)?
I hope that helps you make sense of it.
LE, I don’t know about the situations. Were they told they wouldn’t be hired unless they put out? Did the harassment start after they got the job, with comments (the kind that people can defend – “I didn’t mean it that way” sort of thing) and build?
That said, I’m uncomfortable with good girl/bad girl labeling. It detracts from Ailes’ actions and makes his victims (partly) accountable for what happened. See what I’m saying?
@p “Were they told they wouldn’t be hired unless they put out?”
From the account’s I’ve read, it was mostly pure quid pro quo prior to employment or promotion. Put out = get job/promotion.
“It detracts from Ailes’ actions and makes his victims (partly) accountable for what happened.”
But aren’t they? If none said yes, wouldn’t that shut it down?
Aren’t both the buyer and the seller both at fault?
And aren’t the sellers partly responsible for the inability of the “good” women from being able to a good media job.
I fail to see the innocence that you want to see.
This was one of the reported stories (or something like it):
Let say six women applied for an intern job. And that 3 put out and 3 didn’t. All three who did got intern jobs, and those who didn’t were rejected.
Who victimized those who were rejected?
“Aren’t both the buyer and the seller both at fault?”
In this case, no. It isnt like someone is buying a used car under a bridge from a person dressed as a space pirate. This is sexual assault.
This is sexual assault.
This is sexual assault!
The saddest part of this conversation is that you cant see that you are victim-blaming. Maybe it’s your hatred of Fox news and how Carlson and Kelley have genuinely done things to harm humanity. That, you can blame them for. Suffering that pile of shit in order to have a career in an industry where I bet this kind of thing is in no way limited to Newscorp….. not their fault, and you’re wrong for assigning any blame to them whatsoever.
To top it all off, Ailes is getting something like a 40 million dollar buy-out. So an old white man, already close to retirement age, who probably has tons of money squirreled away off shore… and is likely incapable of feeling anything close to shame, gets to spend a career harassing women and coercing some into his bed, gets a big ol’ payout at the end. HAPPY ENDING!
“Who victimized those who were rejected?”
Ailes. By forcing them to make the decision. The instant he insinuated, or overtly stated that being fucked by him was a condition of employment, he committed sexual assault. ..
I dont know what your threshold for sexual harassment is, but the instant a boss so much as gives a pervy look to an employee, they have crossed a line. The greater the gap in hierarchy, the worse it is.
How do you not see that? Are we now saying that women were throwing them selves at Jabba unbidden and whoever stuck got a promotion?
Ailes is a dinosaur and he’s gone. His exposure and fall will serve as a warning to future employers and employees, even if he negotiates a golden parachute.
Only if he has to deal with a few years of court battles, depositions and accounts of his actions, and hopefully, humiliation and financial ruin.
Otherwise every wanna-be Brock Turner is taking career notes.
No, the risk for future executives is that they will be exposed mid-career well before they turn 79. Boards are now aware of the risk to the organization.
One troubling thing though is that if Ailes had focused his attentions on the mailroom instead of the on-air talent, the situation might never have come to light. FOX broadcasters are well-paid and personally assertive, and have other career options, so they are well prepared to lawyer up and push back on harassment.
Complaints of sexual harassment should not require a high profile lawsuit to resolve.
Ailes may be an older man, but the idea that he’s the last of his kind, that this breed (based on age) is dying out simply isn’t true. I’m not sure why people think sexual harassment/assault, sexism, etc. is a thing of the past, that once these guys over 60 die all will be well – that younger men, in positions of power, don’t behave this way? (And before we go there, let me always say: #notallmen)
If FOX wanted to keep Ailes they would have. They wrote the playbook. My bet is his leaving isn’t driven by the sexual harassment charges. That’s just the excuse they’re using to do what they already planned on doing.
“Otherwise every wanna-be Brock Turner is taking career notes.”
True. And they have a lot of notes to take on various bad behaviors. 40 million for sexual harassment. 6 months (most likely 3) for sexual assault and attempted rape (altho, inserting items into a vagina is rape, not attempted rape). Ailes may be gone, but this dinosaur laid eggs.
Everyone knows I’m a cynic — and I think that this entire episode is the Murdoch sons using this to oust Ailes. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy, really, but the sons had tried to dislodge Ailes for awhile. Sexual harrassment charges (which I don’t doubt are true) seemed like a tailor-made opportunity to show Ailes to the exits.
Yep, yep, yep.
The core of workplace sexual harassment is an individual supervisor’s ability to arbitrarily fire employees with no accountability. We can rail about men all we like, but actual reform must be based on reform of the at-will employment doctrine. Reform of at-will employment will cure many workplace injustices including but not limited to sexual harassment.
Cases where an employee is demoted, reassigned, or simply is not promoted because of sexual harassment will always be difficult if not impossible to prove. But actual termination can and should be reformed.
Carlson’s case is an outlier in that regard because the terms of her employment weren’t at-will; she had a contract. And she wasn’t fired; her contract simply expired and was not renewed (I think). So it is really more a case of contract law. I’m not sure to what extent she was entitled to a renewal of her contract.
@B “Are we now saying that women were throwing them selves at Jabba unbidden and whoever stuck got a promotion?”
No, but some women walked away, and other women chose the dick.
I agree that both groups are victims. And I agree that it’s all sexual harassment/assault.
And I agree that it’s a shame that any of them had to endure any of that.
But I’m sorry. I respect the former group, but I just can’t respect the later.
I’m a strong believer in a true merit based system, and these “willing” women really do help to destroy that.
The crackup of the GOP as we know it isn’t confined to Cleveland. The fall of Ailes is a bigger blow to the dying “conservative” project than the nomination of Trump.
As the speeches by GOP electeds last night showed, they plan on regrouping after Trump loses and everything goes back to what they consider normal. (I didn’t watch, but I understand McConnell actually bragged about his do-nothing Congress.)
But now the propaganda arm is going dead. Roger Ailes cannot be replaced. Fox News sprang from his mind, at least the lizard part of it, and won’t be duplicated competently with him gone. Look at what happened to CNN once Ted Turner sold it — it’s a laughable mockery of its glory days.
I expect the same will happen here. Ailes programmed the channel not based on any kind of research but his own gut. Nobody who is promoted into the job will dare do the same — they will act like normal TV execs and do lots of market research; eventually they will water down the brand.
The fun part will be the civil war that starts, oh, right about now. The employees are split into two camps. I expect the Ailes loyalists will be purged, probably as their contracts expire. Then the tell-alls will start and the whole project will unravel.
No, wait. The fun part will be when Ryan and McConnell and the rest of the antediluvians get back to Washington and slowly find out that the world they knew has disintegrated.
That’s a sunny and optimistic outlook. An alternative vision is one in which they do find someone who has been brought up in the new system in which TV New (particularly Fox) is the propaganda arm of the GOP by design. Someone, in short, who doesn’t give a fuck about anything but advancing conservatism.
Facts don’t matter. Objectivity doesn’t matter. Only what’s good for Fox News’ ratings and by extension, good for the GOP matters.
LE, I’m done trying. You’ve exposed yourself as a chauvinist and as a judgmental prick.
“I agree that both groups are victims. And I agree that it’s all sexual harassment/assault. And I agree that it’s a shame that any of them had to endure any of that.”
… you SAY that, but everything else you say blames the victims and slut-shames. It uses the “dirty girl” argument… which is just creepy. It’s real easy to tell someone to walk away from income if you aren’t ever going to be asked to make the same decision. check. your. privilege. bru.
@jason: In case you haven’t noticed, the conservative propaganda isn’t what the viewers are coming there for. They’re coming for the impotent railing at cultural change. They couldn’t care less what size government is as long as it benefits them.
My point is that whoever succeeds him, nobody can duplicate him, because whoever gets the job will not have Ailes’ tyrannical ego. GOP elected officials no longer will have to kiss Ailes’ ring to succeed. The new boss might even stop using RNC’s daily talking points as programming guides.
It took several years for CNN to lose its cultural influence, and several more for it to become a laughingstock. It won’t happen all at once, but it will happen soon enough. Remember Lindsay Graham’s admonition: The GOP can’t create resentful white men fast enough to stay relevant this way for long.
@B “It’s real easy to tell someone to walk away from income.”
Quite frankly… If your wife or your daughter came to you and said that had to make such a choice, how would you advise them?
And is that choice really about privilege? Or does it reflect a more fundamental moral value and a respect of self worth?
Sorry, I said I was done with you.
I’m going to go with it reflects privilege since not everyone has a supporting husband or family to turn to in these situations. So… a safety net (and in many cases a financial safety net) is a privilege. I’m not going to comment on anyone’s moral values or their self worth. That’s not my place.
If your wife or your daughter came to you and said that had to make such a choice, how would you advise them?
One of the reasons why these choices get made is that women feel isolated by sexual demands in the workplace. A wife or daughter who comes to you to discuss this choice has already made her decision, I’m thinking. All that is left is a discussion on how to deal with the consequences.