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Lena Dunham has been at the center of numerous controversies since she walked into the spotlight with HBO’s hit series Girls, but her most recent comments made during a podcast yesterday may be unredeemable.
While hosting “Women of the Hour,” the 30-year-old actress recalled a visit to a Texas Planned Parenthood several years ago. While she was there, a girl asked her to share her experience with abortion.
“I sort of jumped. ‘I haven’t had an abortion,’ I told her. I wanted to make it really clear to her that, as much as I was going out and fighting for other women’s options, I myself had never had an abortion,” she said. “And I realized then that even I was carrying within myself stigma around this issue. Even I, the woman who cares as much as anybody about a woman’s right to choose, felt that it was important that people know that I was unblemished in this department.”
She went on to commend her loved ones who have had abortions for their “bravery” and “self-knowledge,” while acknowledging that she needs to put her own stigma about the issues “in the garbage.”
She ended her story with, “Now I can say that I still haven’t had an abortion, but I wish I had.”
Listeners were less than enthused about her closing statements.
Others stood up for her.
She has since come out and apologized in a lengthy Instagram post.
“My latest podcast episode was meant to tell a multifaceted story about reproductive choice in America, to explain the many reasons women do or don’t choose to have children and what bodily autonomy really means,” her post began. “I’m so proud of the medley of voices in the episode. I truly hope a distasteful joke on my [art won’t diminish the amazing work of all the women who participated.”
She continued, “My words were spoken from a sort of ‘delusional girl’ persona I often inhabit, a girl who careens between wisdom and ignorance (that’s what my TV show is too) and it didn’t translate. That’s my fault. I would never, ever intentionally trivialize the emotional and physical challenges of terminating a pregnancy. My only goal is to increase awareness and decrease stigma.”
Check out her full post below:
What do you think about her comments? Was it a tasteless joke she didn’t think about or did she just misspeak? Was her message something to back or is it entirely inappropriate? Sound off below.
