Fox News Host Insists That Sexually Assaulting a Child Is Okay

Despite their best attempts to convince viewers that “woke culture” and “trans agendas” are the biggest threats to the country’s children, Fox News once again proves that the real danger is their own programming.

Greg Gutfeld—the host of the right-wing network’s atrocious late-night “comedy” show—recently used his platform to discuss the merits of teacher/student sexual relationships. In a segment on Tracy Vanderhulst, a high school math teacher recently arrested and charged with the statutory rape of a 16-year-old boy, Gutfeld applauded Vanderhulst’s “heroic” actions. He compared the alleged assault to the Van Halen song “Hot For Teacher,” saying that he “would have died” for the opportunity to have sex with a teacher when he was the victim’s age.

Here is the vile exchange, via Media Matters:

GREG GUTFELD: OK, this 38-year-old math teacher in California, was once named teacher of the year (and I support that), was arrested and booked into jail for allegedly having sex with a 16-year-old male student. She posted bail but this is what bothers me. 

KATHERINE TIMPF: The fact that she had sex with a student? 

GUTFELD: No, that she went to jail for it! I’m sorry! Come on! 16 years old — I would have died for that! 

TIMPF: Again, I am vehemently against banging kids. 

GUTFELD: Can we live in the real world? 

TIMPF: I can’t believe how many times I’ve had to say that just sitting in this chair.

GUTFELD: Let’s live in the real world, Kat.

TIMPF: I’ve never had to say it any other time

GREG: A 16-year-old boy! 16-year-old boy with like a hot teacher. You’re, I mean — what was the Van Halen song? Hot for teacher? That was written about this! It wasn’t about, hey, let’s have a responsible relationship with someone close to my age. Peter, you’re a professor. You deal with, you’ve dealt with topics in a way like this. Am I right to say it’s an unfair comparison to do the female-to-male teacher? Like a male teacher, 38-year-old, creepy. Female, heroic. 

While despicable, this kind of talk is commonplace at Fox News. Longtime host Tucker Carlson has had a history of making comments that glorify the sexualization of children, and once gleefully debated the idea of his underage daughter “experimenting” with other girls at her boarding school while appearing on the talk show Bubba The Love Sponge. The network’s rampant misogyny recently boiled over into a lawsuit, with plaintiffs arguing that Carlson and other high-ranking Fox News employees had created a culture of sexism in the workplace.

It’s sad to see a victim of an alleged crime turned into the butt of a joke, and is a perfect example of the moral rot that passes for the “culture” of the network. Gutfeld is maliciously ignorant of the fact that he is discussing the “positive side” of the rape of a child. Anything to appeal to the dry, dead souls of his fans, I suppose.

(featured image: Omar Vega/Getty Images)