“I’m not surprised by anything anymore,” says a female on-air personality who’s toiled in television news for the past three decades, and has frequently observed the power/sex dynamic between male authority figures and ambitious young women.
In one case more than 20 years ago, she recalls, a prominent network executive producer would arrange “booty calls” with one of her friends—having her picked up in a Town Car and delivered for a quickie, and then, dispensing with post-coital niceties, promptly driven home.
“If you’re a woman, there’s this idea of going along if you want the job, and if you don’t go along, you’re not going to get the job,” says the anchor, who asked not to be identified. “They’re told, ‘If you want to be on this or that show, here’s what you need to do.’…This business is full of a lot of really icky people, and Roger had more power than most. He had unbridled power.”
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