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On 10 Apr 2023, Lou Bricano <
lou.bricano@gmail.com> posted some news:
1c7398ad-27b1-43a3-a7f3-4cd6d7f0dc22n@googlegroups.com:
She said Rudy is a midget, sucks dicks and wears dresses.
When Don Lemon revealed to the world in 2011 that he was gay, he admitted
he was terrified that exposing his true identity would ruin his
illustrious career.
'I'm scared,' the CNN anchor said in an interview. 'I'm talking about
something that people might shun me for, ostracize me for. It's about the
worst thing you can be in black culture. I guess this makes me a double minority now.'
As it turned out, Lemon had nothing to fear. If anything, the revelation
of his sexuality bolstered his success, as he was embraced at CNN as the poster-boy of the liberal establishment and the network's authority on
race as liberal America fell into Trump Derangement Syndrome and demanded collective atonement for any and all past sins.
Instead, it has been Lemon's more recent public outing as an alleged power-hungry misogynist with a history of openly cruel behavior towards
women that now threatens to ruin his career. And ironically, according to
a CNN insider, it may be that identity – which he once so feared revealing
- that is the very thing keeping him in a job.
'Without a doubt, a white straight male would have been fired by now,' a
source at the network told DailyMail.com. 'He's a minority in his race and sexuality… Don seems to be in a protected class, and he continues to get
away with behavior that others wouldn't.'
As of late, Lemon, 56, appears to have been making more headlines than he
is covering.
The trouble seems to have all started at the end last year, when new CNN Chairman Chris Licht moved to steer the struggling left-wing network away
from stale, partisan political commentary.
As a result, Lemon lost his primetime hosting gig and was moved instead to
join journalists Poppy Harlow and Kaitlin Collins on a new show, 'CNN This Morning'.
Negative reports began to emerge almost immediately.
First, in December, we heard that Collins, 30, was rumored to have fled
the set in tears after Lemon berated her for interrupting him during a
segment.
Then in February, things bubbled over further, as Lemon found himself
embroiled in an ugly on-screen row, which critics said betrayed blatant misogyny.
Live on air, he became indignant over Republican Presidential candidate
Nikki Haley's call for competency tests for politicians over 75 years of
age.
'I think it's the wrong road to go down,' Lemon insisted. 'She says
people, you know, politicians or something are not in their prime.'
'Nikki Haley isn't in her prime, sorry,' he went on. 'A woman is
considered to be in their prime in 20s and 30s and maybe 40s.'
Harlow, 41, appeared shocked by what she was hearing: 'What are you
talking about, wait … prime for what?'
Following an increasingly uncomfortable back and forth, Harlow reportedly
left the set 'with Collins following her to try to talk to her.'
And then came last week's a searing expose in Variety depicted Lemon as a jealous and viciously competitive colleague dating back to his early days
at CNN Atlanta in 2006.
Just two years after joining the network, Lemon began co-anchoring a
weekday show with veteran journalist Kyra Phillips. And in a potential foreshadowing of tensions now looming over Lemon, the pair's relationship quickly deteriorated.
The rivalry turned downright bizarre after Lemon reportedly launched a
secret intimidation campaign against Phillips after she was selected for a
plum job to be embedded with US forces in Iraq.
Lemon would 'tear up pictures and notes on top of and inside Phillips'
desk' in a cubicle they shared, Variety claimed.
When Phillips returned from Iraq, sources who spoke to Variety claim she received text messages from an unknown number that read, 'Now you've
crossed the line, and you're going to pay for it.'
The texts were reportedly traced to Lemon.
For his part, Lemon has denied the claims – and, publicly at least, CNN
has backed him. In a statement the network said the Variety article was 'riddled with patently false anecdotes' and 'based on unsourced, unsubstantiated, 15-year-old anonymous gossip.'
But inside sources speaking exclusively to DailyMail.com paint a very
different picture, and say the network's response has been incredibly misleading. They claim Lemon's on-going misogynistic abuse is well-known
and CNN big wigs let it slide.
'The galling part of all of this is the suggestion that the allegations in
the Variety piece are old,' said a CNN source. 'There is new stuff. This
year and last year women have complained to CNN management. But CNN is pretending that these are old allegations that they can't confirm. That is ludicrous.'
'There have been complaints about on-air comments but also things that
he's said off-camera that are degrading, and completely inappropriate in
the workplace.'
CNN declined to comment on these fresh allegations, but certainly it is testimony that chimes with other details in Variety's searing report.
In addition to apparently appalling treatment of Phillips, Lemon allegedly called a producer 'fat' to her face and deemed fellow journalist Soledad O'Brien – whose mother is of Afro-Cuban descent - 'not black' after she
was chosen to host CNN's 'Black in America' docuseries.
And so, the big question now hanging over the network is: why does Don
still have a job?
People familiar with the situation claim Lemon is protected in an
organization that values empty virtue signaling over its own female
staffers.
'CNN is beholden to the cancel-culture lobby,' an insider said. 'If they
were to let Don go the minority representation lobby would go after them'.
'CNN is under new leadership but it is the same subservient attitude
towards cancel culture. Since the Nikki Haley incident women inside and
outside the network are saying this is not acceptable.'
After Lemon's remarks about Haley in February sparked widespread
criticism, the network hastily announced that he would spend three days off-air. But after the short absence, a 'frank and meaningful
conversation' with Licht, and an agreement to participate in a single day
of 'formal training', he was back.
Inside the walls of CNN, such a limp response was seen an yet another
insult to the women who worked there.
'It's certainly an embarrassing look for the network and you would imagine
top talent being rude and misogynist to women is not something you'd take lightly,' a source said. 'A day of training is a f****** joke.
I know that there are multiple women who feel ignored and unsupported.'
In fact, things are said to now be so bad that some women reportedly
refuse to even appear on TV alongside him.
And yet, CNN has dismissed talent before for much lesser alleged offences.
The network notably parted ways with former Pennsylvania Senator Rick
Santorum after he claimed, 'there isn't much Native American culture in American culture,' during a conservative conference in 2021.
Despite apologizing, saying he 'misspoke' and explained that he 'was not
trying to dismiss Native Americans', Santorum was shown the door.
The same went for top-rated anchor Chris Cuomo after he secretly aided his brother, then governor of New York Andrew Cuomo, in an ongoing sexual harassment case against him.
As of now, it doesn't appear that Lemon is going anywhere. And, as CNN's ratings continue to reach new lows, our insiders say the only way they see Lemon getting the boot is if he becomes a significant drag on profits.
'Unless his ratings continue to stay so low and it's a net financial loss
– I truly feel like he'll continue to stay in his spot,' one source said. 'They'll make a decision based on the bottom line – and there is a cost to crossing cancel culture that they're not willing to pay right now.'
Or perhaps, our insider predicted, Lemon's allegedly decades-long reign of misogyny at the network will end with litigation.
'My question is when is enough - enough. Because at some point there might
be some legal responsibilities,' said the insider. 'I don't know if this
is going anywhere but certainly Don feels like he's being protected at the expense of many other people who apparently aren't as important -- and
that includes his co-hosts.'
<
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11957597/Female-CNN-insiders- ballistic-untouchable-Don-Lemons-alleged-decades-long-reign-misogyny.html>
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