Entertainment

Lena Fires Back At Haters Using Lil Kim Lyrics

by Maitri Suhas

When a female celebrity supports a female political candidate, it's obviously the blind leading the blind, right? Lena Dunham supports Hillary Clinton and is tired of all the absurd hate she's getting for it. The actress visited Clinton's campaign headquarters in Brooklyn on Friday and posted an Instagram of herself with a Hillary bumper sticker in her mouth. As innocuous as it sounds and as excited as Dunham was to show her support, she got immediately attacked for supporting Clinton just because she's a woman.

The Girls creator and star, who has obviously dealt with her fair share of hate in the media, wasn't having it, and posted a follow-up Instagram that took an interesting angle but made her point nonetheless: a photo of Lil Kim's album cover for La Bella Mafia with a caption slamming the nonsensical sexism.

Dunham laid it out pretty plainly:

Hey, just a head's up: accusing women of supporting Hillary just because she's female is misogynistic BS- women are smart enough to make decisions based on a number of factors: policy, track record, campaign strategy. Yes I think it's time for a female president but I'm not part of a witch's cabal that senses ovaries and suddenly MUST VOTE. Plus if I was gonna vote for someone just because she was female it would be this chick, written in on all my ballots always.

Pretty dope. She followed up with some lyrics from Lil Kim:

As Kim would say "I'm valedictorian y'all in the audience/And I've got nine hundred and ninety-nine votes, You got nine hundred and ninety-nine notes/You know bitch I'm worldwide." New Hillary campaign slogan? TGIF!

Even if she were just voting for Clinton because she's a woman, that's her prerogative. It is time for a woman president, and attacking celebrities who endorse Clinton this way is not only horribly sexist, but futile.

Obviously, the politician has her fair share of famous friends and fans, Dunham among them. (There's also Amy Poehler, Katy Perry, and Jennifer Lopez, to name a few.) But that's not the anomaly anymore, it's the norm. Barack Obama, both in 2008 and 2012, was criticized for being a "celebrity" president, riding on his youthful image and popularity with A-listers rather than his diplomatic skills, policy-making, and general Commander-in-Chiefing.

Plus, Clinton has long been a celebrity in her own right. There have been more than a few women who have played her on Saturday Night Live, most recently and probably most scathingly Kate McKinnon. At this point, it's impossible to separate the celebrity factor from politicians.

Much of the criticism against Dunham, though, as she notes, is just lazy and rampant sexism. Her critics apparently think she and any other celebrity woman (or just woman, probably) are sheeple, following Clinton for the myopic reason: She's a girl. Not that they support her policies or think she's the best person for the office or that the amount of experience facing and overcoming adversity throughout her long, brutal career would lend her an upper hand in the Oval Office. None of that.

No matter, though. Dunham's response was pretty great. No better way to make a sexist hater mad then with a fire NSFW pic of Lil Kim. But it's that same tenacity and ability to recognize the absurd and what battles to pick that Dunham exhibited that also makes Hillary a great candidate. The woman knows how to turn jokes against her around — haven't you seen her pantsuit shirt?