‘Girls’ Star Lena Dunham Apologizes for Defending Show’s Writer
Lena Dunham is on damage control duty after her most recent controversial statement.Actress Aurora Perrineau came forward Friday announcing that Girls writer Murray Miller had sexually assaulted her when she was 17. Los Angeles Police Department has confirmed as well that the actress did file a report with them, and they would be handling an investigation of the claims made.
Both Girls co-creators, Jenni Konner and Dunham released a statement later the same day, essentially stating that Perrineau’s claims were false. “While our first instinct is to listen to every woman’s story, our insider knowledge of Murray’s situation makes us confident that sadly this accusation is one of the 3% of assault cases that are misreported every year. It is a true shame to add to that number, as outside of Hollywood women still struggle to be believed. We stand by Murray and this is all we’ll be saying about this issue.”
However, Dunham did have more to say on the issue as the backlash against the statement emerged on social media.
I avoid talking about Lena Dunham because life is too short. However, to deny an alleged sexual assault PUBLICLY, regardless of what “insider info” you have, is careless & selfish. If your friend is innocent, that will be proven. Your public statement hurts survivors.
— Hari Kondabolu (@harikondabolu) November 18, 2017
Aurora Perrineau is a woman of color. Many females of color who come forward with allegations are often met with criticism or doubt. Many stated that Dunham’s type of feminism is racist, as it doesn’t include the issues facing women of color. We saw a similar issue when Lupita accused Weinstein and he came out of hiding from all of his allegations to dispute Lupita’s claims. Lupita, as we know, is the only woman of color to come forward against Weinstein.
Not even 24 hours later, Dunham was retracting her previous statement.
— Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) November 19, 2017
“Every person and every feminist should be required to hear her. Under patriarchy, ‘I believe you’ is essential. Until we are all believed, none of us will be believed. We apologize to any woman who have been disappointed,” is how Dunham closed out the lengthy apology.
To her dismay, many women are still fuming over her initial statement and see the apology as nothing more than saving face.
She can add it to this list of tonedeaf apologies pic.twitter.com/kX2pgkNyAB
— Leslie Lefkowitz (@hotmesslie) November 19, 2017
If we had to guess, it is gonna take one serious shovel to dig Lena out of this hole.
