The Fall of Bill O’Reilly: New at Reason

Bill O’Reilly is finally getting his comeuppance. The cable titan, it seems, is on his way out from Fox News, thanks to multiple accusations of sexual harassment by women he had on the O’Reilly Factor as guests and his co-workers. His audience did not care about the allegations and therefore neither did Fox News that renewed his contract ahead of schedule. But advertisers – under pressure from feminists – did and once they started pulling out, it was game over for O’Reilly. This shows that markets with their multiple pressure points are better at enforcing basic norms of civilized behavior than the political world. But these kinds of pressure tactics are not entirely unproblematic, notes Reason Foundation Senior Analyst Shikha Dalmia.

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