Every now and then, the viewing public witnesses a future “Where Are They Now?” story unfolding in real time.
One can hardly mistake the signs: a thirst for attention, an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and a persecution complex.
In the most recent episode of Bill Maher’s “Club Random Podcast,” openly gay former CNN host Don Lemon sounded like a man standing on the precipice of irrelevance with one foot on a banana peel as he related two strange stories of women who allegedly sexually harassed him during his time at the establishment network.
Lemon began by describing an incident in the CNN cafeteria long ago.
“This woman — young lady — tweaked my nipples and said ‘Oh, it’s cold in here,’” Lemon said in a viral clip posted to the social media platform X.
“And I said, ‘OK, you realize [that] if I did that they’d be walking me out the door right now? But I didn’t care to go to HR. I didn’t say anything because it’s like, it’s a double standard,” he added.
At that point, Maher clearly recognized small potatoes when fed them.
“Good for you, because who giv — ” the host began to say before Lemon interrupted him.
Then, the former CNN host told a cryptic-sounding story about a divorced female co-worker who allegedly harassed him. But he did not say how.
“And she knew I was gay,” Lemon added.
Of course, Maher sounded confused at the lack of detail.
“What constituted this harassment?” the host asked.
Again, Lemon provided no details. Having mentioned the incident, he apparently preferred to remain vague.
Don Lemon opened up on Bill Maher about his experience of being harassed by a woman while at CNN. He shared that he chose not to report it to HR because he feared he wouldn’t be believed. pic.twitter.com/hTLYujmpSY
— Anthony Tilghman (@AnthonyTilghman) March 17, 2025
In April 2023, amid controversies and record-low ratings for Lemon’s show, CNN parted ways with the longtime anchor.
Then, Lemon tried to restart his career with a show on X, sponsored by the platform. In March 2024, however, X owner Elon Musk, not yet an ally of President Donald Trump, announced that X would not, in fact, sponsor Lemon’s show, for it reeked of CNN-style propaganda.
Meanwhile, Lemon has shown signs of increasingly bizarre behavior. Late last month, for instance, a clip he posted to TikTok showed him interacting strangely with random subway riders.
Even Maher more than once has mocked or rebuked Lemon for playing the race card. It happened again during this most recent podcast.
In other words, Lemon does not look or sound like someone who has his life on the right trajectory. Already an unserious person, he appears determined to try to cling to relevance by doubling down on the very things that have brought him to the precipice of irrelevance.
As for his specific — if one can call them that — accusations of sexual harassment, two possible conclusions leap to mind.
First, Lemon loves attention and thinks himself important. Thus, the first incident he described — the nipple tweak — undoubtedly has percolated in his mind as a grievance ever since.
Of course, one should use caution before attempting to analyze a woman who goes around tweaking men’s nipples. But it hardly requires Jungian analysis to suggest that the woman who allegedly tweaked Lemon’s nipples might have done so not because of inexplicable sexual aggression toward a gay man but for precisely the opposite reason: she deemed him harmless.
One might venture other explanations, but the scant evidence Lemon provided hardly allows for more plausible ones.
Second, and far more important, Lemon’s claims of sexual harassment, which neither Maher nor any reasonable viewer would characterize as such based on the details Lemon provided, illustrate the core modern liberal principle that victimhood, even if merely alleged, confers status, virtue, and moral authority.
Lemon and other woke liberals trade in stories of victimization as if they amounted to currency.
Maher knew it. Like most smug liberals he hates Trump. Unlike most smug liberals, however, he also despises far-left wokeness. Hence his underwhelmed response to the sexual harassment accusations.
Thus, Lemon’s claims might have sounded serious and important to him. To the rest of us, however, they sounded like one more bit of proof that the former CNN host, already teetering on the precipice of irrelevance, continues to embrace the woke ideology of perpetual victimization that put his career on a downward trajectory in the first place.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
