The hypocrisy of Lena Dunham
PERSPECTIVE | An ally when it’s convenient
Lena Dunham angered followers over the weekend by defending her friend who was accused of sexual assault.
The background: On Friday, The Hollywood Reporter wrote that “Girls” writer Murray Miller was accused of sexual assault by actress Aurora Perrineau.
Dunham, who has cultivated a powerful brand as a millennial feminist, responded to the news by saying that her “insider knowledge” led her to believe the claim was false.
Just a few month ago she said this:
The irony of this statement coming from someone who has branded herself as a feminist was not lost on the Internet:
By Sunday, Dunham took back her initial statement.
Too little, too late.
You can’t pick and choose whether to believe survivors based on whether or not the person being accused is your friend.
Dunham has made it clear who she is and what she believes through her actions. No amount of backpedaling can change what she did.
I watched the first few seasons of “Girls” before peacing out. I couldn’t relate to the clique on that show. They all seemed rather aimless and entitled and intentionally un-diverse both economically and racially. Even the actresses came from privileged backgrounds that helped them gain access to starring roles on an HBO show.
Dunham has defended these kinds of criticisms of her show over the years. The core of her defense is that she didn’t write about people of different backgrounds because she could not relate to them, thereby admitting that she isn’t friends with people outside the privileged children of the New York arts scene and doesn’t know how to write from a perspective outside of her friend group.
With this narrow world view, it isn’t surprising that Dunham would be unable to empathize with an actress who she sees as an outsider. She chose to side with her friend.
Dunham’s “Girls” may be over, but she continues to influence through newsletters, books and social media. With her support of a man accused of sexual assault, she has revealed herself as a hypocrite. So why should we listen to her?
