12 hours v. 20 minutes: Fox’s uneven sex harassment coverage
NEW YORK — Bill O’reilly and Harvey Weinstein are the celebrity faces of sexual harassment in 2017. But on Fox News Channel, O’reilly’s former home, the Hollywood mogul’s fall has gotten far more coverage.
Fox has devoted more than 12 1/2 hours of airtime to Weinstein since Oct. 5, when The New York Times broke the story about his misconduct, according to the liberal media watchdog Media Matters for America.
By contrast, Fox has spent 20 minutes, 46 seconds, on the accusations against O’reilly since the Times revealed many of them in April, the group said.
A news organization’s instinct to downplay a story that reflects poorly on itself isn’t unusual. But in this case, some are attributing the disparity to politics. Weinstein has long been a supporter of liberal causes, while O’reilly is a hero to many on the right, for whom Fox is the network of choice.
“Does liberal Hollywood have a problem with sexual predators?” Trevor Noah, host of Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show,” asked this week. “Yes. Does conservative Fox News have the same problem? Yes. That’s my issue with this. It’s not supposed to be partisan.”
Indira Lakshmanan, a Boston Globe columnist and expert in journalism ethics at the Poynter Institute, a media think tank, said the Weinstein allegations are clearly a big story.
“But to devote hours of airtime to crowing about Weinstein’s welldeserved downfall because of his liberal politics, while ignoring the massive, decades-long pattern of harassment by powerful men at Fox, is both hypocritical and sad,” Lakshmanan said.
She said a news organization’s ability to report on itself speaks to the integrity of its journalism and leadership.
Fox lawyers, wary of investigations into the network’s conduct, may well have urged it to minimize its discussion of O’reilly. The network would not discuss its coverage decisions.
The Times story on Weinstein set off a weekslong wave of other assault and harassment allegations against the studio boss, leading to Weinstein’s firing from the film company that bears his name.
As for O’reilly, he was ousted in April after two decades as cable TV’S top personality. He was back in the news earlier this month, when the Times reported that he had reached a $32 million settlement with a former Fox analyst before signing a new contract early this year.
Following that story, O’reilly’s one-time colleague Megyn Kelly talked publicly about how she once complained to her bosses about him — a spectacle that went unremarked upon on Fox.
More than 16 minutes of the time that Fox has devoted to the O’reilly scandal was on “Media Buzz,” Howard Kurtz’s weekend industry show, according to Media Matters.
Kurtz, on “Media Buzz” Sunday, called news of the $32 million settlement a significant setback for Fox, whose founder, Roger Ailes, lost his job last year over harassment accusations.