And to defend Joss for a moment, I'm not sure how fair it is that the popular story these days is that Joss just turned around and fired Charisma out of sheer spite for getting pregnant. The story I heard back in the day was that the WB had cut the budget quite drastically for season 5, at the same time as ordering Joss to bring Spike on to the show to attract former Buffy viewers, so I guess that it seemed like the obvious solution was to not renew Charisma's contract, Joss did talk about not knowing where she would fit in the revamped version of the show at W&H after everything with Jasmine. They made a big deal at the time of assuring fans that Spike wasn't the reason that Cordelia was being let go, but let's face it, if James wasn't getting the second largest paycheck next to David then it would have been going to Charisma. Not James's fault at all, but that money had to come from somewhere, it was more likely than not a business decision and the WB prioritising getting more Buffy viewers over bringing back an actress that had been part of a very unpopular arc

I mean yeah a part of it was probably frustration at having accommodate Charisma's pregnancy, it sounds like Joss handled things very crappily in not contacting Charisma personally to tell her that they wouldn't be renewing her contract, but I do have serious doubts that it was as clear-cut as Charisma being fired for daring to fall pregnant. Nor as Charisma ever claimed that to be the case, she's talked about the tension on set with Joss that her pregnancy caused with the rewrites to the season, and then it seems like fans who already had issues with Joss's work not living up to his feminist credentials have taken that narrative and ran with it as = Joss fired an actress over her pregnancy