Lena Dunham casts herself as the only person with foresight on Harvey Weinstein

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I’m going to cover the New York Times’ latest Harvey Weinstein article in a few different posts. The NYT’s latest is “Harvey Weinstein’s Complicity Machine,” which details the different people in the media and in Hollywood who knew parts of what Weinstein was doing, or they knew all of what he was doing. The NYT says at least eight agents at CAA knew full well that Weinstein was harassing, threatening and/or assaulting their female clients and CAA continued to send their clients to him. You can read the full article here:

Within the piece, the NYT discusses how Weinstein was close the Hillary and Bill Clinton. During Bill Clinton’s presidency (and Obama’s presidency too), Weinstein was a frequent visitor to the White House, screening his films and participating in various arts/entertainment related events. Weinstein was a huge Democratic Party donor, and likely considered himself a personal friend of Hillary Clinton (whose campaigns he always supported). Lena Dunham was also a big Hillary Clinton supporter, and Lena even got an ill-advised primetime speaking slot at the Democratic convention in 2016. Lena told the New York Times that she “warned” Clinton staffers about Harvey Weinstein.

In a new interview, Lena Dunham says she warned Hillary Clinton’s campaign about Harvey Weinstein being a “rapist.”

“I just want you to let you know that Harvey’s a rapist and this is going to come out at some point,” Dunham says she told Kristina Schake, the campaign’s deputy communications director. “I think it’s a really bad idea for him to host fund-raisers and be involved because it’s an open secret in Hollywood that he has a problem with sexual assault.” (Weinstein has denied all allegations of non-consensual sex.)

According to Dunham, who doesn’t believe Clinton was ever notified, Schake was surprised by the information and vowed to relay the message to campaign manager Robby Mook. The actress also says she warned Adrienne Elrod, a Clinton spokeswoman in charge of working with celebrity campaigners. Elrod and Schake have both denied Dunham made any mention of rape, while Mook tells the Times he was never told of any such warning.

“We were shocked when we learned what he’d done,” Nick Merrill, Clinton’s communications director, said in a statement. “It’s despicable behavior, and the women that have come forward have shown enormous courage. As to claims about a warning, that’s something staff wouldn’t forget.” The statement added of Dunham specifically, “Only she can answer why she would tell them instead of those who could stop him.”

Clinton previously condemned Weinstein, who denied all allegations of non-consensual sex, in an October statement after the first accusations were reported: “I was shocked and appalled by the revelations about Harvey Weinstein. The behavior described by women coming forward cannot be tolerated. Their courage and the support of others is critical in helping to stop this kind of behavior.”

[From Entertainment Weekly]

Kristina Schake and Adrienne Elrod told the New York Times through a spokesperson that Lena never used the word “rape.” Which I believe, that Lena didn’t say “Harvey Weinstein is a rapist.” Because we didn’t talk about him that way in 2016. We talked about him and the “casting couch,” we talked about him being a pervert, we talked about the power he wielded and we implied complicity with his victims when we called them “Harvey’s Girls.” My point? We didn’t know. We didn’t know the extent of it. A year ago, we thought everything was consensual – creepy, gross and consensual.

So no, I don’t believe that Lena “PAY ATTENTION TO ME” Dunham was somehow the only brave and intelligent soul with the foresight to go to the Clinton campaign and tell them that “Weinstein is a rapist.” I think she’s a narcissist and as a–hole and she’s looking to cast herself as a hero in the Weinstein saga. Especially given that Lena is still completely canceled for the assholic way she dealt with Girls writer Murray Miller being accused of rape. She has zero credibility. In fact, I still wonder why the Clinton campaign allowed Lena to participate in so many campaign events, given what we already knew about Lena last year.

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92 Responses to “Lena Dunham casts herself as the only person with foresight on Harvey Weinstein”

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  1. DazLondon says:

    Always has to inject herself

  2. Surely Wolfbeak says:

    I wish Lena Dunham would cast herself into a quiet life of contemplation.

    • Sixer says:

      Seconded.

    • Wren33 says:

      Ha!

    • magnoliarose says:

      Tell her the very before the trend thing is doing” Thoreau”, and transcendental everything is all the rage. The Walden Pond Festival is peak feminist hipster chic important. Like REALLY important deep people show up and stuff. It is VERY exclusive and impossible to score an invite to the event.
      But to be real and authentic you gotta go full transcendent and live alone on a mountain for several months to years.

      We may be able to get a few months peace from her. We just have to make sure she doesn’t figure out how to send written statements by ravens.

      • Sophia's Side eye says:

        Lena needs to become a yak herder on top of a mountain in the Himalayas. It’s the only way for her to reach true enlightenment. Ten years should do it.

      • magnoliarose says:

        LOL. A good decade. I am game.

    • vespernite says:

      Lena can never be enlightened, she has affluenza! She needs to cast herself into a black hole. So tired of this privileged, child molester.

  3. Alissa says:

    she’s infuriating no matter what she does at this point.

  4. littlemissnaughty says:

    If these people needed Lena Dunham to inform them about this problem, they were unqualified for the job. This is something you need to know. Or you need people working for you who find out. It’s not even about Lena Dunham (when is it ever, really?), it’s about the fact that they claim to not have known. Then you sucked at your job. Either way, they don’t look competent.

    And CAA sounds less like an agency, more like they’re in the business of human trafficking.

    • magnoliarose says:

      They are scumbags. It started long ago with the uber-agents and it never got better. One of the founders Michael Ovitz was pushed out by what he deemed as the “gay mafia” that included Eisner, Geffen, Huvane, Bryan Lourde and Barry Diller.
      CAA is trying to clean up its act.

    • Wren says:

      If it was really such an open secret, you think they’d know. I actually don’t doubt that Lena said *something*, since it’s been revealed that women have been covertly warning each other about Harvey for years. But she was hardly the heroic banner of righteousness who “called him out” or anything like that. I imagine it was more a few offhand “hey watch out for that guy, don’t let him get you alone” type comments to whoever she was directly working with at the time, like several of us have probably experienced.

      • emma33 says:

        Yes, this is what I think too. She probably said something but not ‘ he is a rapist’. As usual, she can’t just tell a story in the way it actually happened, she always has to be so extra.

  5. lightpurple says:

    This isn’t about you, Lena. This is about those he hurt and those who enabled him to do so. Go find some actual work of some sort.

  6. Surely Wolfbeak says:

    Also, I wish Lena had warned herself about Terry Richardson before working with him.

    • Pedro45 says:

      Ha! Nicely done.

    • Lucytunes says:

      TRUTH! ^^^^^^^^^

      If you knew he was a rapist, go to the police. If you knew he was a rapist, keep trying to tell them. You got photos with hillary, did you tell her directly? Did you keep telling, Lena?

      She is just cancelled. Done. No more need to even discuss her.

    • QueenB says:

      Even worse her white feminist friend Audrey Gelman.

    • BlueSky says:

      Or warned herself about the alleged rapists she hangs out with on the regular

    • Sophia's Side eye says:

      Or the writer/rapist in her show who she worked with for “more than half a decade”?

  7. Here or There says:

    Just looking at her makes me grind my teeth.

  8. Laur says:

    Can’t she just go away?

  9. Talie says:

    She really needs to sit all the way down.

  10. grabbyhands says:

    She’s like crap you have stuck on your shoes that just won’t come off no matter what you do.

    What a coup for Lena – getting herself injected into the story without even having to make some whiny post on Twitter pushing it.

    Sorry though – you’re still a bad person and an apologist for rapists as long you like them.

  11. Pedro45 says:

    She is the wooooooorst.

  12. Sarah says:

    Actually it was courtney Love who called weinstein out on video long before Dunham.

    • Sky says:

      Thete were a number of people calling out Harvey people were either not listening or their voices for being silent buy Harvey and his team.

  13. Neelyo says:

    She’s like a ghost who doesn’t know she’s dead. Can’t wait for her to make the realization. Though I do feel for her therapists.

  14. third ginger says:

    She’s awful, of course. What I can’t help thinking about are the critics who pushed Dunham into the spotlight by labeling her the “voice of a generation.” That is ,in great part, why we still have this grotesque nonsense.

  15. Wisca says:

    Somehow the New York BUT THE EMAILS Times has found a way to spin this into an attack on, or at least innuendo about the Clinton campaign, and by extension–Clinton herself. Unbelievable. And narcissist Lena Dunham is only too happy to serve as a useful idiot in the Times’ neverending smear.

    The stuff on Paltrow was interesting though. W pretended that he had sex with her as a lure for other women in search of fame and/or work.

  16. HK9 says:

    Aw god girl…just stop.

  17. Miles says:

    She needs to go away. Literally everyone has said they knew Harvey was a dog but they didn’t know he was out there raping people and black mailing actresses if they dared to tell him no or to come out against him.

  18. Wren33 says:

    Okay, she is awful. But clearly she did say something. They are only denying that she used the specific word “rapist” right, not denying that she warned them that he was really sketchy sexual harrasser. I wouldn’t say campaign managers have a lot of credibility either.

    • Marlene says:

      Exactly. And the NYT piece specifically mentions that both Dunham and another person warned the managers.

      ” – even though Tina Brown, the magazine editor, and Lena Dunham, the writer and actress, each say they had cautioned Mrs. Clinton’s aides about his treatment of women.”

    • Wren says:

      Yeah, that’s my thought. She said *something*, sure, but I don’t think she actually called him a rapist (because THAT would have been news at the time) and she likely didn’t pursue the issue all that strongly. Because, again, THAT would have been news. She’s a little late to the party now with her “I totally knew he was a rapist and I’ve been telling people that for ages!” statement. I would even believe that she merely warned a few women personally, just tipping them off that Harvey was a perv and not to allow themselves to be alone with him type of thing.

    • PPP says:

      That being said, there was a segment where someone commented something like, “If she did say this, it is known only to herself why she would inform a Clinton aide and not anyone who could put a stop to the behavior.” Which, fair enough. What was her purpose– to save Clinton from the association, or to do some real good? If the latter, she should have gone to the NYT.

  19. Neelyo says:

    Didn’t Clinton have a chapter in her book expressing regret for ignoring Dunham and how it cost her the election?

    • magnoliarose says:

      The one saying she was planning to head up Lena’s 2020 bid for the White House and lend her full support and guidance? I think that was that very long chapter 8 in the book.

  20. Mabs A'Mabbin says:

    I blame her then. She wants attention for knowing then give some for knowing and not doing anything.

  21. Sequinedheart says:

    Gosh, she’s just too much. Please Lena, disappear – you are not relevant to everything. (Or anything for that matter)

  22. Yawn says:

    Can we just PLEASE stop mentioning this a—hole? Stop giving her the attention she craves and let her fade away into the obscurity she deserves!

  23. Electric Tuba says:

    Shes a sentient dumpster fire isn’t she.

  24. poop says:

    Internet: *hates Lena Dunham*
    Internet: *Clicks on every article about Lena Dunham*

  25. Patricia says:

    Wow she’s well and truly done. Her insta is a hate fest to the point where I actually worry because as horrible as she is she’s still human. Like every comment is about how she is cancelled and way to many comments entail “kill your self” type sentiments.
    I’m not defending her but I do hope she has someone by her side becuase damn, people are taking it to the extreme.

    I for one have been completely disgusted with her behavior for years. So I get telling her that much. She turned out to be a deplorable. A deplorable who is extremely narcissistic and attention seeking

    • Rose says:

      I see nothing wrong with people calling her out, but telling her to kill herself is beyond overboard. The best thing to do with narcissistic like Lena is to ignore them. They should just not comment at all and unfollow her that would drive her crazy. Right know they are giving her the attention she wants, to turn it into a poor me story of how it’s her against the world.

  26. Otaku Fairy says:

    “We talked about him and the “casting couch,” we talked about him being a pervert, we talked about the power he wielded and we implied complicity with his victims when we called them “Harvey’s Girls.” My point? We didn’t know. We didn’t know the extent of it. A year ago, we thought everything was consensual – creepy, gross and consensual.”

    Exactly. These rumors are passed around quite promiscuously and usually with malice or a Lena Dunham-esque “Every thought I have must be put out there for public consumption, even if it’s damaging for women and helpful for abusers and bigots, cuz I’m real. Sorry stans” smugness. What many don’t want to face is that that misogynistic aspect of the celebrity gossip we all particpate in blurs lines in a dangerous way. It makes it harder to see the difference between when there’s actually a consensual exchange going on, when someone is abusing women (or men), when a creep or his enablers are slandering a woman as punishment for her not giving into certain demands or getting a little too ‘talky’, and when none of those things are happening and people are just slut-shaming successful women they don’t respect by spreading rumors. All of those things are harmful parts of a patriarchal society. When it comes to rape culture, misogyny is complicity. few days ago somebody here wrote an excellent comment about not wanting to be a part of this problem anymore.

  27. lucy2 says:

    Girl, stop.

  28. Tess says:

    Oh I’m soooo sure she called a powerful man above her a rapist when she can’t even call a colleague equal to her that she worked with for years an aggressor.

  29. Ruyana says:

    I’m so very tired of Lena. Tired of listening to her, reading her statements and seeing her picture. Just. Tired.

  30. Beckysuz says:

    Ugh. She’s just exhausting. She needs to stop talking

  31. holly hobby says:

    Again why is she a thing? Who made her famous? I don’t find her interesting.

  32. HoustonGrl says:

    Wow, this really takes the cake.

  33. Mia says:

    I guess it takes a pervert to know a pervert. Why she has a platform after happily sharing about molesting her little sister is beyond me. She is disgusting and I really think she should just go away now

  34. Megan says:

    The DM is reporting that they’ve confirmed the email and it did use the word “rapist.”

    • GreenTurtle says:

      Prepare to have a bunch of people now say how horrible and non-credible the DM is.

      • Sky says:

        Im not saying its not true, but people have been calling the DM out for years and are as credible as Life & Style Enquirer Star Magazine Okay magazine…. which is not credible. People have also been calling the Daily Mail office that’s why it’s nickname to Daily- fail.

      • Jussie says:

        The DM is awful, and should be completely ignored anytime they speculate or hint or report on other reports or offer up anything that could be construed as opinion and not fact.

        But when they straight up say they personally have something or have confirmed something, they mean it. If they’re saying they’ve actually seen the email and she calls him a rapist, then that’s what happened.

  35. Valiantly Varnished says:

    Well Lena is the center of the universe you know? She warned the dinosaurs about the coming meteorite, she warned King George about the colonies rebelling. She warned the Kennedy administration about Dallas… she is all knowing and all seeing. And yet somehow STILL can’t find a way to pull her head out of her ass. Go figure.

  36. Miss Melissa says:

    Will this &itch ever shut up?

    How does every conversation about every topic always end up being about her?

  37. GreenTurtle says:

    The fact is- she warned them. And the rumors were rampant, and everyone knew he was a sleezy creep, but the DNC continued to take his money despite the brewing PR nightmare. We can’t conveniently explain around this just because we hate Lena.

    • Electric Tuba says:

      Nah, I think she’s a lier telling lies.

    • magnoliarose says:

      I think the missing point is that Harvey is the one we know. Unfortunately, in both parties, they have accepted money from lechers. Arnold Schwartzenegger was awful and Sylvester Stallone and on and on. It is a serious problem and if parties want to make sure this doesn’t happen campaign finance reform is the only answer. Otherwise, poor behavior from the past will keep haunting politics.
      The election process is a farce and a waste of resources.

  38. Sarah says:

    GIANT EYE ROLL.

  39. ALF-M says:

    Lena needs to do go on a media hiatus for a long time!

  40. LittlefishMom says:

    Does this girl have to make EVERYTHING about her? Please please she needs to go away.

  41. BKittyB says:

    Lena and Clinton actually have some similarities that disturb me. But they are subtle, such as willingness to say anything in the heat of the moment and subscription to a white feminist theory that is a decidedly white supremacist -based one. That’s where they similarities end, and why there’s a slight energy that is offputting sometimes with Clinton with me. That being said, she certainly would’ve made a better president than the one in the office now (when he’s not playing golf). But Lena….Lena is awful. I cannot stand her. She’s a liar. A molester. A racist. A self-entitled snowflake.

  42. sunshine gold says:

    Telling the Clinton campaign does NOT make you a hero….what is her point in bringing this up?Maybe if she told someone who had the power/reason to stop it, I could appreciate her weighing in at this point.

  43. Rebecca says:

    I’m not a fan of Lena Dunham. She is not “the face of feminism” that she believes she is. I think when she opens her mouth she does more damage to feminism than good.

    However, in this case. I believe her. I think Hillary’s people lied. Can you imagine what it would do to Hillary’s reputation if her people admit she was warned about Weinstein being a rapist and she still took his money? Remember all those stories about how she ignored or threatened Bill Clinton’s victims?

    Given the amount of women who came forward about Weinstein, Hilary was probably warned by others also.

  44. Shelllley says:

    “…zero credibility…” YUP.
    I see “Lena Dunham said” and I move on because .. yeah . . . zero credibility.

  45. Sarah B says:

    I think she is a detriment to the democratic party. She gives ire, fuel, and fire to the conservatives for good reason and it cheapens our voices.