A storm was definitely brewing in the Twitterverse after meteorologist Liberté Chan was asked to cover up on-air right in the middle of her morning weather forecast on Saturday (May 14).
Chan was handed a grey sweater while doing the weather report on KTLA after the TV station received e-mails from several viewers complaining that the sparkling black dress she was wearing was inappropriate for the Saturday morning forecast.
Initially, she had planned to wear another dress - one that had white and black patterns - but was told to wear something different as the patterns conflicted with the graphics of the green screen.
But her new outfit seemed to have failed to make the cut too, with viewers e-mailing harsh comments such as "Liberté Chan's dress is totally inappropriate, looks like she didn't make it home from her cocktail party", and "Weather girl looks like she never went home from last night's stripper gig", according to The Daily Mail Online.
A grey sweater dangled from a hand at the side of the screen halfway during her weekend report.
"You want me to put this on," Chan asked while slipping into the sweater.
"Why? Because it's cold?"
"We're getting a lot of e-mails," TV anchor Chris Burrous replied.
"What?" Chan said, clearly taken aback. "Really? Okay."
"I look like a librarian now," she then said.
"That works," Burrous joked. "It's a librarian going to a cocktail party."
The Twitterverse responded by raining down criticism on KTLA and Burrous, using the hashtag #SweaterGate to voice their outrage.
Some online users defended her, saying she looked fine, while others chided the TV station and Burrous for what they deemed as sexism.
Viewers also noted the double standards, citing a KTLA weather report in 2012 that featured a male meteorologist bringing out two female models wearing Frederick's of Hollywood lingerie to help with the forecast.
The New York Post Online said Burrous apologised on Twitter, saying he offered up the sweater "in jest but I see how it seemed. I am sorry. I hope you will give me another chance".
Chan addressed this incident on Sunday during a Facebook Live chat with fans, during which she said: "I really wasn't offended. People are kind of spinning it and saying it was sexist. I thought it was just funny."
