With CBS chief Les Moonves leaving, women are left to pick up the pieces

On Monday’s CBS This Morning, anchor Norah O’Donnell offered the first public comment from the network on the forced resignation of her now former boss, Leslie Moonves. Moonves stepped down as chairman, president and CEO of CBS Sunday night, after the New Yorker revealed that a total of 12 women had come forward with sexual misconduct allegations. The New Yorker published its first bombshell expose on Moonves in late July, after an investigation by journalist Ronan Farrow alleged that Moonves had subjected several female colleagues to unwanted kissing and touching, and that their careers suffered when they rebuffed his advances.

“Women cannot achieve equality in the workplace or society until there is a reckoning and a taking of responsibility,” O’Donnell said during the broadcast.

This is the second time in less than a year that O’Donnell has had to address sexual misconduct allegations made against a male colleague at CBS; in November, she and co-host Gayle King discussed similar allegations against Charlie Rose, who was also ousted by the network. It appears to have become a trend in network news to give female anchors the responsibility of announcing the departures of male colleagues accused of sexual assault, harassment and other misconduct. In November, Today’s Savannah Guthrie announced that her longtime co-anchor, Matt Lauer, had been fired by NBC, just minutes after learning the news herself. And in April 2017, Fox News anchor Dana Perino stepped in to host Bill O’Reilly’s show and addressed his sudden departure from the network after it was revealed he had been accused of sexual misconduct by several women.

To O’Donnell’s point, while the #MeToo movement has been a reckoning for men who abuse their power to subjugate women, most — including Rose, Lauer and O’Reilly — have refused to take responsibility and have instead denied any wrongdoing. Moonves is no different. Hours after agreeing to resign from CBS, Moonves responded to the latest round of allegations by the New Yorker with his own denial.

“Untrue allegations from decades ago are now being made against me that are not consistent with who I am,” Moonves said in a statement, noting his resignation is effective immediately. “I am deeply saddened to be leaving the company.”

Farrow’s follow-up article, published Sunday night, reveals that six more accusers came forward, including one woman who allegedly filed a criminal complaint with the Los Angeles Police Department in 2017, accusing Moonves of “physically restraining her and forcing her to perform oral sex on him, and of exposing himself to her and violently throwing her against a wall in later incidents.”

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/once-again-women-are-left-to-clean-up-the-mess-of-metoo-721931/