Henry Winkler Receives Massive Backlash After Controversial Tweet

Henry Winkler sent out a very odd tweet over the weekend that was met with considerable backlash from fans and detractors alike.

By Doug Norrie | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

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In terms of stirring up controversy, Henry Winkler is about the last guy you’d ever think of when it comes to polarizing or unpopular opinions. But that changed a bit over the weekend when he sent out a fairly controversial, and kind of just weird, tweet that called for unity in our country albeit in the weirdest way possible. Winkler is now catching some flak for how he worded the message and what he might have been implying. It definitely caught some folks off guard. 

The original tweet by Henry Winkler, sent out on July 3rd presumably in preparation for the July 4th Independence Day holiday, lamented that Americans live in a divided country. As Winkler saw it, there was a split among the American people, and a definitive lack of unity in the current state of affairs and possibly political climate as well. Ok, this might be true and unlikely something anyone would vehemently disagree with. It was the next part of Winkler’s message that raised an eyebrow or two. Check out what he said on Twitter. 

Now, I’m not a Tweet-ologist, but it sure sounds like Henry Winkler is calling for something tragic and terrible to happen in America to *help* bring us back together as a country. He uses the word “cataclysmic” to describe what would need to happen in order for Americans to see eye-to-eye again, to rally together as a single unit. Apparently, from this original message, he’s saying that only a tragedy would make the country whole again. 

To be clear, it doesn’t seem like Henry Winkler is actually calling or hoping for this to happen but rather thinking that this is the only thing that would shift the rhetoric and tide in our country. Of course, it was met with considerable derision from folks who 

The list goes on in the replies to the Henry Winkler tweet. This was actual cannon fodder for the online warriors who took umbrage with the wording which was, admittedly, pretty obtuse. Even if you get the general gestalt about what Winkler is getting at here, lamenting the lack of unity, saying that a tragedy is the only thing that would bring people together does miss the forest for the trees. And Winkler seemed to quickly understand this after more than 4K comments to his original message. He posted this as a follow-up. 

This didn’t stop people from hopping into the mentions of this Henry Winkler tweet and going scorched Earth again, but at least he gave it a try. It was an ill-timed and poorly worded tweet, to begin with, though it’s hard to imagine the dude meant anything truly bad by it. This is the Fonz we are talking about here. 

The 76-year-old Henry Winkler is still working plenty these days, mostly with bit parts and cameos over the last few years. He’ll be voicing Fritz in the Monsters at Work Disney+ series which is a follow-up to Monsters, Inc. That is set to release on the platform this week which makes the timing on this tweet that much worse.