Lena Dunham Goes Topless, Says Social Media Leads ‘To Girls Feeling Ostracized, Alone, Slut-Shamed’
Lena Dunham is looking forward to her 30th birthday next year, in spite of having accomplished so much in her 20s, much more than most people, male or female, have the opportunity to achieve so early in life. Fate seemed to be smiling down on Lena from the very beginning with her starring debut in 2010’s Tiny Furniture, which Ms. Dunham immediately followed up with her own HBO series, Girls, which has run for four seasons. Not to be limited to acting, Ms. Dunham also wrote an autobiographical memoir, Not That Kind of Girl. Lena’s writing can also be seen in The New Yorker, as she pens several essays a month.
Lena reflects on both her literary and acting accomplishments with wonder, revealing an eagerness to do as much as can, before her 15 minutes of fame are up, even though there’s no sign that her star is likely to burn out anytime soon.
“That was my 20s. I was like ‘This may never strike again. I’m a kind of weird-looking girl, with a very specific voice, and the fact that I get to have a job is insane.'”
Lena Dunham: The Voice Of A Generation
Harper’s Bazaar credits Lena Dunham with becoming the voice of a new generation of teen girls, crediting the writer and actress with speaking for the majority of girls that struggle with self-doubt, body image, and growing pains. For Lena, however, becoming such a widely respected role model has never been an easy thing to achieve or to live up to on a regular basis.
“I know I’m not most moms’ idea of a role model, but I try to use the attention that comes with that wisely and not foolishly.”
Ms. Dunham says that not everything she writes about should be taken to heart, because she thinks humor and levity is just as important as political activism and feminism.
“Yes, I will tweet about my issues with underpants, but I also want to say things that matter,” Ms. Dunham said. “I don’t want to be out on the town spreading messages I can’t get behind. Which is good because I never leave my house.”
Lena Dunham And The Creation Of Lenny
https://instagram.com/p/8ySE4Fi1Hm/?taken-by=lenadunham
Fresh off of a book tour for Not That Kind of Girl, Lena Dunham tackled her next big dream by launching the Lenny website, which Ms. Dunham hopes will provide a need that’s not being met for the majority of growing girls. Dunham says that there should be a single site that provides girls with a space to explore everything from fashion tips — she uses the topic of coloring one’s hair pink as one example — to current events and political hot topics that affect their lives. Lena hopes Lenny will become a haven for girls to express themselves in fun and funny ways without the snarkiness found elsewhere on the internet.
“Celebrities can complain all they want about how cruel Twitter is, but we signed up for it. Who didn’t sign up for it are the teenage girls who bully each other to suicide using Twitter,” Ms. Dunham says, according to USA Today. “There’s no shortage of stories of how Twitter and Instagram and Facebook, these incredible tools for self-expression, have also led to girls feeling ostracized, alone, slut-shamed. We just want to restore some semblance to safety.”
Dunham admits that Lenny does limit the voices of those girls she hopes to benefit in one way: there will be no comments section. Lena says this was a conscious decision to keep negativity away from the site, because her hope is to enforce unity and support. As most people have by now realized, the comments sections of any website often evolve into a great heap of conflict.
As Lenny takes off and her writing continues, Lena Dunham admits she misses acting and hopes to return to making movies, which Lena sees as the origins of her prolific career. Ms. Dunham says there’s so much to do and that includes finding time to enjoy life and have a great time, all of which Lena will tackle within the next decade of her life.
[Featured image: Lena Dunham courtesy of Randy Shropshire/Getty Images for Planned Parenthood Los Angeles]
