One month after facing criticism for celebrating “the extinction of white men,” Lena Dunham has found herself in hot water again — this time for apparently expressing regret about not having had an abortion.
In a segment titled “Choice” during Dunham’s “Women of the Hour” podcast on Tuesday, the Girls star related a story about visiting a Texas Planned Parenthood clinic and expressed her support for those who had chosen to terminate their pregnancies. It was a comment that came just after that, however, that critics say Dunham overstepped.
“Now I can say that I still haven’t had an abortion, but I wish I had,” said Dunham.
Writing for The Daily Beast, Erin Gloria Ryan took Dunham to task for suggesting that an abortion was an experience to wish upon oneself.
“Treating abortion like a leisurely activity that Lena Dunham can personally help normalize represents a cartoonish version of clueless urban liberalism we’d be well-served to rid ourselves of,” Ryan wrote. “Dunham’s comments are free red meat for the sort of troll who believes pro-choice feminists spend their days praying … they’ll get accidentally impregnated so they can have one of those abortions the gals at the nail salon can’t stop gabbing about. It’s not compassionate; it’s bizarre, a more obnoxious version of telling a person who has had their appendix removed that you, too, wish you could have your appendix taken out.”
Following the backlash, Dunham apologized for her remarks over social media, referring to her comments as a “distasteful joke … spoken from a sort of ‘delusional girl’ persona I often inhabit, a girl who careens between wisdom and ignorance.” Dunham added that she would “never, ever intentionally trivialize the emotional and physical challenges of terminating a pregnancy.” Read her full apology below.
Read the full story at The Huffington Post and The Daily Beast.
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