Joss Whedon Apologizes for — Now Deleted — Tweet Mocking Cancer Survivors

Avengers director Joss Whedon somehow thought it was a good idea on Thursday to use a picture of House Speaker Paul Ryan meeting with teenage survivors of childhood cancer as a setup to snark at President Donald Trump on Twitter (see screengrab above, as well as the embedded Tweet from Speaker Ryan below).

Advocacy is not limited to adults. These Wisconsin teens shared some powerful stories with me about their fight against childhood cancer. pic.twitter.com/VJ0eQDXu7U

— Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) April 27, 2017

As you might have expected, conservatives on social media erupted against Whedon’s use of the cancer survivors.

Jackwagon calls cancer survivors ugly. Wow. https://t.co/emzXS126Xl

— Ellen L. Carmichael (@ellencarmichael) April 27, 2017

@joss What a sorry piece of humanity you are.

— Andrea Ruth (@AndreaNRuth) April 27, 2017

Those are kids, you freak. https://t.co/xpkPxJDnqm

— Cuffy (@CuffyMeh) April 27, 2017

.@joss As young cancer survivors they look a hell of a lot better than your Nicole Kidman/Ginger Baker mashup. pic.twitter.com/yeQvWuXL3Z

— Jay Caruso (@JayCaruso) April 27, 2017

@joss You can say these things when you’re incredibly hot like Joss Whedon. pic.twitter.com/MoYa2ua5nd

— Philip Terzian (@PhilipTerzian) April 27, 2017

However, there were also left-of-center critics of Whedon’s Tweet. Andi Zeisler of the feminist site Bitch Media replied to the director, who also calls himself a feminist.

@joss This is…not a good tweet, man pic.twitter.com/8GFpxTNAsb

— Andi Zeisler (@andizeisler) April 27, 2017

Whedon’s post comes three weeks after he hinted in an earlier Tweet that President Trump might emulate the government of Chechnya and start detaining and executing homosexuals.

(Update, Friday, 9:00 am Eastern: Whedon deleted the offending Tweet and posted an update.)

So I tweeted something that inadvertently offended everyone except the people I was trying to offend. I’m sorry. I’ll be quiet for a bit.

— Joss Whedon (@joss) April 28, 2017

[image via screengrab]