Feministisches Statement entpuppt sich als schlechter Witz

Die in den USA populäre Komikerin Sarah Silverman ist stark auf dem feministischen Trip. Um ihre Ideologie zu untermauern, erzählte sie vor kurzem eine Anekdote aus ihrem Leben:

In a gender "wage gap" public service announcement for Levo League, comedian Sarah Silverman recalled the time she was paid $10 for a 15-minute spot at the New York Comedy Club when her friend and fellow comic Todd Barry was paid $60. Silverman said she went back inside the club to confront the owner, Al Martin, who seemed to be caught off guard. "It was symbolic, I didn’t need $60. But it’s, um, you know, it’s pretty s****y," Silverman said in the PSA.

Nun entpuppt sich diese unter "Gehaltsdiskriminierung ist nicht komisch" verkaufte Anekdote sozusagen als ein schlechter Witz – weil sich der damalige Besitzer des fraglichen Clubs auf Facebook zu Wort meldete:

Are you kidding ? You come in to my club 15 years ago and ask me for a guest spot , I did not ask you to perform and you were not booked, and Then you ask me for pay ? You asked to work out some material .. Then you make this a gender pay thing ? Sarah great cause I am with it, but I did not pay you less cause of gender …..I paid you less because Todd Barry was booked and you weren’t…It was a GUEST SPOT, so I gave you some car fare, which actually is more than almost any club would have given for a GUEST Spot…Funny how in your attempt to become a super hero with a noble cause, you forgot that little fact…GUEST SPOT ….GUEST SPOT

Die Reaktion Silvermans:

Well, after Martin spoke up, Silverman eventually apologized for mentioning the club owner by name and admitted her story was not a good example of the "wage gap."

"This is also HARDLY an example of the wage gap and can only do that very true reality a terrible disservice if I were trying to make it one. To Al, I truly am sorry to bring you into this as you employ women and pay them the same as the men I’m sure. To the maniacs who want to use this as a chit against women’s issues, I ask that you please don’t," she wrote in a statement to Salon.

Das nennt man Chuzpe: Sich zwar halbherzig dafür entschuldigen, der Öffentlichkeit Mist erzählt zu haben, aber seine Kritiker im selben Atemzug als "maniacs", also Wahnsinnige, anzufeinden.

Katherine Timpf kommentiert:

Notice that the only thing she explicitly said she regrets is not trying harder to not get caught. In fact, she didn’t even acknowledge that she did a "disservice" to the movement by telling a false story — only that it would be a disservice "if [she] were trying" to make the story an example of the wage gap when it wasn’t one. (For the record, specifically citing something as an example of the wage gap seems like a pretty clear instance of trying to make it an example of the wage gap.)

Silverman ended her statement by saying that people who might see an advocate having lied about a movement as a reason to question that movement’s message — something I’d consider a normal response — were "maniacs."

Vielleicht ist der Feminismus auch deshalb so erfolgreich, weil er jegliche Widerlegung seiner Behauptungen höchstens eben kurz zur Kenntnis nimmt, danach aber schlicht ignoriert und seine Kritiker völlig unbeeindruckt weiter als realitätsfremde Irre beschimpft.