Barr addressed the viral controversy on an episode of her podcast, ‘The Roseanne Barr Show.’ Photo by James Devaney/Getty Images

By Rebecca Salzhauer June 29, 2023

Roseanne Barr addressed her controversial comments about the Holocaust, clarifying that the viral clip was part of a joke taken out of context. She made the explanation Thursday on her podcast, The Roseanne Barr Show.

Barr came under fire earlier this week after a clip of her appearance on This Past Weekend, a podcast hosted by comedian Theo Von, went viral on social media on Tuesday. In the clip, which began near the end of a conversation about censorship and the 2020 election, Barr said that “Nobody died in the Holocaust, either. That’s the truth.” She continued: “It should happen — 6 million Jews should die right now because they cause all the problems in the world, but it never happened.”

Barr, who is Jewish, said on Thursday that it was a joke, and refuted the claim that she had denied the Holocaust. “I was raised in an apartment building with Holocaust survivors, so of course I don’t believe that the Holocaust never happened,” she said. “I actually am a religious Jew, so why don’t you go f–ck yourself.”

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

Barr’s son, Jake Petland, who also produces her podcast, framed Barr’s five-minute public statement in light of the online controversy. “We felt like we should come and address it, so this is my mother addressing it,” he said.

Petland saw the podcast as a platform for the actress and comedian to speak her “mind for the first time,” he said. “They always take the joke out of context and paint you however they want, and then they never let you explain the joke.”

Barr responded: “Well, there’s no freedom of speech in America, and there hasn’t been for a very, very long time.”

She noted her particular concern for free speech in comedy, likening her recent controversy to those of past comedians. “It’s what they did to Lenny Bruce, too,” Barr said. “They canceled and arrested and ruined his life because he was talking about the Catholic Church.”

Barr continued, arguing that on social media, people would twist Henny Youngman’s “Take my wife, please” joke into the comedian’s endorsement of human trafficking.

“We are under such heavy Satanic mind control in this country,” Barr said. “I’m always trying to break through to get a little God in there.”

Barr’s original comments about the Holocaust occurred as part of a two-and-a-half hour interview, in which she also said that Jews run Hollywood like “an organized crime network.”

Many people rushed to Barr’s defense, assuming it was satire. But Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the Anti-Defamation League, wrote on Twitter that argument made for a difference without a distinction: “Sarcasm or not, Roseanne Barr’s comments about Jews and the Holocaust are reprehensible and irresponsible. This isn’t funny.”

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’re in the middle of our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we have a very ambitious goal of $127,000 by April 21.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Make a Passover Gift Today!

$90 $180

$360

Other amount