Happy Women’s History Month to Everyone Except Amy Schumer
By Shannon Kane
Amy Schumer: Put some disrespect on her name! They say, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say it at all,” but I simply cannot remain silent on this matter any longer. It is time for the world to face my wrath. Amy Schumer is the capital-W Worst.
Ms. Schumer’s most recent offense occurred on Sunday night during the 94th Academy Awards Ceremony, which she hosted alongside Wanda Sykes and Regina Hall. Amid a slew of mildly entertaining jokes, she referred to Kirsten Dunst as a “seat filler” and complimented her husband’s work in Power of the Dog. Although Schumer later claimed that Dunst was in on the joke, it did not sit well with me. Don’t EVER disrespect Lux Lisbon like that!
Schumer also allegedly stole her bit about Leonardo DiCaprio and his 22-year old girlfriend from a December tweet that read, “Leonardo DiCaprio is so passionate about climate change because he wants to leave a better world for his girlfriends.” Stealing jokes is nothing new to her, though! Our silly friend has a thing for thievery, apparently. A quick Google search will reveal many such instances. On the rare occasion that she does write her own jokes, they are terribly, painfully, gut-wrenchingly unfunny. We don’t want to hear about how gross you think you or your genitalia are, Amy!
On a more serious note, Amy Schumer frequently targets people of color in her “comedy.” She has made a number of racist jokes over the course of her career, which she attempts to justify by accusing her critics of hating women. She infamously addressed backlash against her comedy by saying, “You can call it a ‘blind spot for racism’ or ‘lazy’ but you are wrong. It is a joke, and it is funny. I know that because people laugh at it” (@amyschumer via Twitter). She also admitted to having sex with someone who was too drunk to consent, an act for which she has faced no consequences.
Amy Schumer is one of the most egregious white feminists of her generation; she consumes black art (and steals jokes from comedians of color), yet she has no intention of educating herself on the actual experiences of people of color. She is painfully ignorant and tone-deaf. For example, Schumer felt the need to parody the genius that is Beyonce’s Formation music video with her own, flopulous version. She whitewashed a video intended to liberate Black women from respectability politics, and rather than apologize when confronted, she claimed she was celebrating female empowerment. Literally nobody asked for a white woman’s take on police brutality. By touting female empowerment when called out for racism, Schumer asserts that white women’s issues are more important than issues of race. Amy has clearly never had an intersectional thought in her life.
Basically, I don’t care about a single thing Amy Schumer has to say. I would rather eat a pair of jeans than spend an hour in the same room as her. In the nicest way possible, I wish Amy Schumer the worst of luck in all of her future endeavors. I hope you burn your tongue on your coffee tomorrow, Amy. :)