Family Guy Down Syndrome Actress: No Regrets for Mocking Palin and Son

On Friday, we learned that Andrea Fay Friedman, the 39-year-old voice actress in a recent episode of "Family Guy" criticized by Sarah Palin, actually has Down's Syndrome - the same condition as Palin's 2-year-old son Trig. Friedman's character, a young woman named Ellen on a date with one of the show's male characters, made an indirect reference to Trig in the episode with the words, "and my mother is the former Governor of Alaska."

It's another bulletpoint on a long list of pop culture jabs at Sarah Palin's children, who did not run for vice president - but now, more disturbingly, we learn that it's also the clear exploitation of an individual with Down's Syndrome. Earlier this week, Palin said that the scene "really isn't funny" and was the work of "cruel, cold-hearted people." Daughter Bristol, no stranger to media mockery herself, called the writers out on Facebook, describing them as "heartless jerks."

Friedman is not staying silent on the matter. In an e-mail to The New York Times published Thursday, she wrote, "In my family we think laughing is good. My parents raised me to have a sense of humor and to live a normal life. My mother did not carry me around under her arm like a loaf of French bread the way former Governor Palin carries her son Trig around looking for sympathy and votes." The message also stated, "I thought the line...was very funny. I think the word is sarcasm."

In an interview with NYT Arts Beat blog the same day, Freidman elaborated, "I'm not Trig. This is my life. I was making fun of Sarah Palin, but not her son." She also made reference to Palin lacking "a sense of humor."

I'll steer clear of pointing to the sad reality that "Family Guy" creator Seth McFarlane and the show's casting crew clearly exploited an individual with Down's Syndrome. Other outlets are doing that nicely.

So, here's the opinion portion: What Friedman fails to realize (besides the fact that some people, including Sarah Palin, believe in including their children in their work for the children's benefit, and not their own; in fact, nearly all Palin critics fail to realize this) is that Palin never gained sympathy from supporters - rather, her supporters in the special needs community gained what they considered to be an approachable public advocate.

It's nice that Friedman and her parents don't feel she needs a public advocate (or at least one whose politics they disagree with, which I suspect is the more accurate picture here). But for her and her parents (who are expressing public support for her today) to willfully disregard the feelings of thousands of Americans they know are offended by this episode, chalking it up to "sarcasm" and "making fun of Sarah Palin, not her son" is an example of enormous insensitivity.

I find it more than a little disturbing that her parents back her up in her assertion that a "sense of humor" should include making unflattering light of her own challenging condition. I wonder how they would have handled mockery aimed at their own family when their daughter was barely 2 years old.

So, now, my sympathy is not with Sarah Palin, but with Ms. Friedman. Her defense of these actions demonstrates that her parents raised her to become an adult who displays indifference toward minor children with Down's Syndrome, who do not yet possess her clearly sophisticated sense of irony. Compassion for others who have not yet acquired your level of strength in dealing with any given reality, by way of their own youthful innocence, is an admirable trait for anyone who wishes to "live a normal life."