In a guest column for The Hollywood Reporter, NBC News host Megyn Kelly, who experienced sexual harassment from Roger Ailes, says that she sees opportunity for a lasting impact in the avalanche of horror stories.
00:00We are in the middle of a sea change in this country, an empowerment revolution.
00:05In a guest column for The Hollywood Reporter, NBC News host Megyn Kelly, who experienced sexual harassment from Roger Ailes,
00:10says that she sees opportunity for a lasting impact in the avalanche of horror stories.
00:15Kelly opens her column by offering,
00:17Recently an audience member asked me what we can teach in schools about dealing with sexual harassment.
00:22My first reaction was, let's understand how bad the disease is before we prescribe the treatment.
00:27Just a couple of weeks later, we know the disease is advanced, severe, far more aggressive than we feared.
00:33The treatment, she writes, must be equally aggressive.
00:36Reflecting on the sexual harassment she suffered at the hands of former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes,
00:41Kelly says that she knew no one was likely to help her.
00:43Despite that, she writes,
00:57Kelly notes that there is power in numbers when it comes to victims of sexual harassment and assault, musing,
01:03Harvey might have been able to dismiss Rose McGowan alone. Rose plus 90? No way.
01:07While Kelly acknowledges the great strides women have made over the past 40 years, she also stresses that there is still a ways to go.
01:14There are still too few of us in positions of power in the most influential industries.
01:18And when we do ascend to positions of authority, we can face enormous backlash, she writes.
01:23Of course, Kelly herself has been the recipient of that type of backlash, as she recounts in her guest column.
01:27When I was working my way up the ranks at Fox and in a submissive posture, I got along fine with the channel's most powerful men, she says.
01:34When I launched a successful primetime show and stopped seeding the inevitable power struggles that came with it,
01:39things changed dramatically with some of them, and it was painful.
01:42The fact that it is still a world of men, and women must learn to navigate that, is lost on no female as she enters the workforce.
01:49Kelly praises the evolved men, who she says are equally disappointed in these facts as women,
01:54but asserts that the truth remains that men who see women as creatures designed for their pleasure to be subjugated are far too great in number.
02:02Addressing that is going to require honest conversations about much more than sexual harassment.
02:07The continued implosion of powerful men is also causing many to re-examine retro notions about the anchor configuration of morning TV.
02:14Kelly's friend and ex-today co-anchor Matt Lauer and former CBS This Morning co-host Charlie Rose are two of the most recent high-profile figures
02:21to face the consequences of sexual harassment allegations.
02:25It was left to Lauer's former co-host Savannah Guthrie, who was joined by Hoda Kotb, to break the news of his dismissal to viewers.
02:31Sources say Gayle King and Norah O'Donnell advocated to CBS management to host CBS This Morning without a third fill-in anchor the day after the Rose news broke.
02:40I think this is an opportunity to think a little bit differently, says Soledad O'Brien, a former anchor of today's Weekend Edition and CNN.
02:47There's this mythology that it has to be a boy-girl team, and the boy should be about 15 years older than the woman.
02:53To read Megyn Kelly's full guest column for The Hollywood Reporter, head to THR.com.
02:57For The Hollywood Reporter News, I'm Lyndsey Rodrigues.
03:03This episode of The Hollywood Reporter News was brought to you by American Airlines, Hollywood's favorite airline.
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