For the past few months, Fox News has been hyping up the dangers of transgender people using the public restrooms of the gender that they identify with.
Bill O'Reilly has ranted that letting transgender people use the bathrooms of their choice is part of a sinister "progressive agenda to wipe out gender." Tucker Carlson, meanwhile, called transgender bathrooms part of a "war on biology" and Fox & Friends co-host Eric Bolling has called trans bathrooms a "very scary, slippery slope."
And of course, Fox has continuously promoted bogus stories that falsely depict transgender people as perverts and rapists.
So it comes as something of a surprise to learn, as Media Matters informs us, that Fox News has had unisex bathrooms for years.
Yes, really: During a debate with Fox News host Stuart Varney about transgender rights, Fox correspondent Elizabeth MacDonald noted that gender-neutral bathrooms are "already in place here at Fox."
Well, isn't that amazing! And it's particularly interesting because several women have alleged that Fox News had its own serial sexual harasser stalking its corridors, and he wasn't transgender by any stretch of the imagination.
Yes, I'm referring to former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes, who stepped down this week amid a flurry of sexual harassment allegations dropped by multiple women, including former Fox & Friends co-host Gretchen Carlson.
One major argument against letting transgender people use the bathrooms of their choice has traditionally been that it would allow men to pretend to be transgender women so they could more easily grope or assault women in public restrooms.
This is something that never happens, and it's particularly curious that Fox News would make such a big deal out of it when Roger Ailes had the ability to go into gender-neutral bathrooms in the building and harass any woman he pleased.
It would be asking too much to expect intellectual consistency from Fox, but the next time they try to smear transgender people, they might want to take a long look in the mirror first.
