Why does sally kohn work for fox

It went like that. How do you think your work has evolved in the last three years? Have you seen a progression of how you think and how you communicate on TV? They have real concerns. They have legitimate fears. And I have a lot of the same ones too. You seem really cool, you seem fun, you seem nice. But are we really? On the flip side, you can be emotionally correct but politically incorrect. Of course, we need to be careful about what we say. Instead, we have implicit bias and structural racism baked into our whole society.

To me, emotional correctness is about how to preserve political correctness while also scratching a layer deeper and trying to find real compassion and connection with each other. The insults getting hurled back and forth from both sides of the political aisle are insane, and it boils down to an incredibly divided country.

How has working with people who have such politically different viewpoints from you changed the way you think? They have real, genuine, authentic, understandable concerns and someone else connected with them first in explaining why those problems are the way they are.

We do it on both sides. As an example, you talk about how a friend suggested to you that some people of color receive scholarships or college admissions based on their race rather than their abilities. How do you handle these charged conversations and maintain the relationship? Sally Kohn: One of the most useful things I learned about neuroscience is when people perceive an argument, the thinking and reasoning parts of their brain shut down and the fight-or-flight part kicks in.

People pick a side. The more we can do to keep things conversational the better. In that instance, what I came to realize is the best response is the question: Do you think of all the scholarships that went to white guys, was that because they were men, or white, or white men?

We made a big deal about Barack Obama getting elected because of his race, but the first 43 presidents in this country were elected because of their race, too. And also because of their gender! The first step and the antidote to all of it is making the unconscious, conscious.

This also goes to how we treat the same points differently depending on whom they come from. I had that conversation with Scottie Nell Hughes , a friend on the right, and bristled at her implying that a woman of color had gotten the scholarship solely because of her race.

SK: Oh my god [ Laughs ], how much time do you have? I try to not be the excuse for someone to be their worst self. Instead, I try to be the inspiration for someone to be the kindest they can be.

MJ: As you were thinking about how to be kind and inspirational in your career and personal life, did it affect your relationship with your nine-year-old daughter?

SK: Oh yeah. I wanted to be a role model for her in lots of other ways, but not like that. And I now do, intensely. I hate him! You can hate what he believes in, what he stands for. We do not hate people. And going beyond just saying it, I had to also do it. It really made me want to do better by her. What a difference if more of her generation can go on and think that! SK: The greatest eye-opener had to be going to Rwanda. I had to be the weirdo to notice how normal everyone else really was.

And not just normal, but nice. Since I blended in much better among the wider mix of liberal, moderate, and gay folks there, I expected Chris Hayes and Don Lemon to be nice to me, and they were. You can judge me for having those biased expectations about everyone at Fox, and you probably should.

The whole thing was a wake-up moment for me—to such an extent I wrote a book about coming to terms with my own hate, and what we can all do about the hate in our minds and in the world around us. But that experience was only possible because I had a unique vantage point in the organization that pushed me to challenge my own ideas and assumptions. That said, you should also judge Fox News for its lack of diversity on and off the airwaves.

My experience is the silver lining coming out of what remains a very narrow—and often narrow-minded—network. Here, too, there are multitudes. On the other hand, we now know the same man horrifically harassed and assaulted many of the women he worked with and created a hostile work environment for women employees in general. Looking back, this was definitely one of the advantages to being an out lesbian at Fox News. The worst I was subjected to was Ailes telling me that I had pretty eyes.

I had no real power at Fox News, but it would have been a much different place had more women, let alone gay women like me, held positions of authority.