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    Lena Dunham Defends ‘Girls’ Producer After He’s Accused Of Raping 17-Year-Old

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    Lena Dunham Girls

    For those of you who haven’t ever seen Girls, you might not know who Lena Dunham is. She’s an actress, writer and self-proclaimed voice of our generation, and is very popular on Twitter – sometimes for occasionally trying to get a reaction out of some of her divisive tweets.

    The one that is making the headlines today, however, is this one:

    Well, it now turns out that her tweet only refers to people who aren’t in good standing with Dunham. Actress Aurora Perrineau has accused Girls producer Murray Miller of raping her back in 2012, when she was 17 – according to The Wrap:

    “He was flirting with me. I told him repeatedly that I was 17 years old,” Perrineau said in the statement.

    The actress was with two friends, she said, and Miller asked one of them for a ride home “because he was drunk,” and the group agreed. Miller was 35 at the time.

    She said everyone got out of the car at Miller’s home, and she did not want to, but “felt like I had to go along with everyone else.

    “At some point, I woke up in Murray’s bed naked. He was on top of me having sexual intercourse with me. At no time did I consent to any sexual contact with Murray,” she said in the statement.

    The report adds:

    After being contacted several weeks ago by lawyers who–on Ms. Perrineau’s behalf–sought substantial monetary damages from him, Mr. Miller’s legal team gathered overwhelming evidence directly contradicting these false and offensive claims. Only after her demands for money were rebuffed did Ms. Perrineau go to the police. Mr. Miller looks forward to sharing all evidence and information with any and all authorities seeking the truth in this matter.

    So naturally, given Dunham’s tweet, she’d side with Perrineau, right? Nope. In a statement to THR, Dunham and Jenni Konner (co-creator of Girls) said:

    During the windfall of deeply necessary accusations over the last few months in Hollywood, we have been thrilled to see so many women’s voices heard and dark experiences in this industry justified. It’s a hugely important time of change and, like every feminist in Hollywood and beyond, we celebrate. But during every time of change there are also incidences of the culture, in its enthusiasm and zeal, taking down the wrong targets. We believe, having worked closely with him for more than half a decade, that this is the case with Murray Miller. 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 percent 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.

    Naturally, backlash ensued, prompting Dunham to send this tweet out:

    The backlash didn’t end, however:

    Writing this story has reminded me why I tend to stay away from Twitter in general, unless I want to be miserable.

    It’s important to note that this isn’t the first time Dunham has been criticized. She was criticized back in 2014 for these passages in her book:

    To which she said was just a right-wing conspiracy:

    To which Twitter responded:

    One article detailed passages of the 2014 book we mentioned:

    Dunham writes of casually masturbating while in bed next to her younger sister, of bribing her with “three pieces of candy if I could kiss her on the lips for five seconds . . . anything a sexual predator might do to woo a small suburban girl I was trying.” At one point, when her sister is a toddler, Lena Dunham pries open her vagina — “my curiosity got the best of me,” she offers, as though that were an explanation.

    Hollywood doesn’t seem to be slowing down any time soon after the Harvey Weinstein scandal seemingly opened up a monster most of us weren’t prepared for – featuring the likes of Kevin Spacey, Louis C.K. and producer Brett Ratner.

    We’ll be sure to keep you updated on all the latest news out of Hollywood as we get it.