Emily Jashinsky, culture editor for The Federalist, criticized the anti-sexual harassment group Time’s Up, saying it protects the interests of the wealthy and powerful.
During an interview on Hill.TV’s “Rising,” Jashinsky drew comparisons between Time’s Up and actress Rose McGowan’s recent criticism calling Oprah “as fake as they come” with her support of the #MeToo movement.
On Sunday, McGowan tweeted a photograph from 2014 of Oprah kissing convicted rapist and former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein on the cheek along with a scathing caption.
“I am glad more are seeing the ugly truth of @Oprah. I wish she were real, but she isn’t. From being pals with Weinstein to abandoning & destroying Russell Simmon’s victims, she is about supporting a sick power structure for personal gain, she is as fake as they come,” McGowan wrote.
Time’s Up was founded in 2018 in response to the #MeToo movement and public condemnation of Weinstein. On Aug. 26, its CEO Tina TChen announced her resignation following backlash over reports that organization leaders advised former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) as he faced sexual harassment allegations earlier this year.
Jashinsky said that both Oprah and Time’s Up have intertwined themselves with the same powerful institutions they claim to try to challenge.
“I think what Rose McGowan is getting at is the way we are conditioned by the entertainment news media to see celebrities as paragons of morality when in fact they are part of a power structure that can in fact be very abusive,” she said in the interview.
She further pointed to how Oprah has “taken on a journalistic capacity” but without asking “the tough questions they actually deserve” while interviewing high-profile guests like Meghan Markle and Prince Harry.
“When you run in these circles, you start to become protective of them,” Jashinsky said, referring to Oprah’s billionaire status and reputation as one of the world’s most influential women.
With Time’s Up, Jashinsky said the organization’s political relationships present a conflict of interest.
“The people who do have the capacity and the power and the resources and the credibility to head up an organization like this, they are enmeshed in the apparatus of Democratic politics,” she said. “Some of them are going to be enmeshed in the political establishment, period, whether it’s Democrats or Republicans.”
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