Fox News anchor Jenna Lee on Wednesday called out late night host Conan O'Brien for a Tuesday night skit in which he compared her and other female Fox hosts to porn stars.
On Monday's episode of
"Conan" on TBS, O'Brien did a comedy bit called "Coffee Table Books that Didn't Sell."
One of those fake books was titled "Fox News Anchor or Porn Star?" and featured a photo of Lee sipping from straw and leaning against a tree. The back of the book had photos of Fox News anchor Sandra Smith and two porn actresses.
"Very hard. You have to figure it out. Very hard to know, actually," O'Brien said.
"I don't know," sidekick Andy Richter chimed in.
"This book's a keeper, right here," O'Brien added, tucking the book into his suit jacket.
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While Smith has not commented on the skit, Lee took to
Facebook on Wednesday to condemn the comparison.
Lee said the picture was from a photo shoot she did in 2011 for an interview with a food blog shortly before she got married. She said she has ignored sexualized comments about her in the past, but felt the need to speak out this time.
"I think to myself...'I signed up for this business, didn't I?'" she wrote. "But as a wife, and a new mom, this trashy comment is not only inappropriate, it's clearly ridiculous. And not even funny! I'm also someone's daughter - and it's for the benefit of young girls, like Conan's daughter Neve, who are growing up in a world where porn references to successful, educated women are somehow considered 'funny' and appropriate, even when made by fathers, that I think we need to discuss this..."
O'Brien brings up the "sad truth" that some women feel the need to dress and look like porn stars to make it on television, she said. The more provocatively they dress, the more social media followers they get, she said.
"[I]t makes me extremely sad to see so many talented women tarted-up because they feel like that's what they need to do to be successful," Lee wrote, adding that she has made a conscious, strategic decision to dress more conservatively.
"My theory is my body should never be more important than my body of work - and I'm not done building the latter," she wrote.
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