Kathy Griffin on Louis C.K.: 'The Boys Club Closes Ranks and Protects Its Own'

Kathy Griffin is speaking out about Louis C.K.’s comeback and how female comedians get pushed out of the industry.

On Wednesday, the comedian wrote a 26-point thread on Twitter that began with an anecdote about an unnamed “famous woman comedian” who’s been working for “over 15 years.” The anonymous comedian told Griffin that she’s sick of “the boys club” and having to constantly prove herself despite all that she’s accomplished. This unnamed woman said that she’s thinking of leaving the industry, which Griffin, understandably, found very disheartening.

“[M]ale comics don’t ever have these thoughts. They don’t feel beaten down by the business. You’ll never hear a successful male comic say that dealing with women in the business is just exhausting and that they have reached their limit. Or that they’re tired of years of having to beg to be treated the same as women or that they’ve had enough of the emotional abuse,” said Griffin. “[W]hat I’m discussing in this thread can be applied to any industry.”

Griffin then talks about Louis C.K., the bonkers double standard that allows a man to masturbate in front of non-consenting women and still find work while a woman who calls out such toxic behavior risks being shunned, and why so many male comedians are so invested in Louis’ ability to come back.

“You know how many women I know who have had their careers effectively ended because they asked for the same amount of money as a man or who dared to make script suggestions on a show they were working on? How quickly they were labeled as ‘difficult’ and thus un-hirable? Louis [C.K.] can go jerk off in front of women [without] their permission [and] then his management destroys their careers and he just gets to waltz back in without any accounting for his behavior and what he’s done to fix it?” tweeted Griffin.

“[T]he boys club closes ranks and protects its own. And many men in the business [w]ant to see Louis come back because deep down inside they know they’ve also done fucked up shit to women,” she said. “[T]hey want to know that it’s not going to hurt them on a permanent basis. Louis is their test case.”