Comedian Joan Rivers reportedly told Anti-Defamation League officials to ‘shut the f*** up’ after the group expressed disapproval over a remark she made about retail store Costco.
The 79-year old Fashion Police star compared the store to Nazi Germany over its refusal to sell her book, ‘I Hate Everything…Starting With Me!,’ saying it contained profane and inappropriate language.
“Costco banned my book because of one word on the back cover,” she told KTLA News. “People should have the right to have the literature they want. This is the beginning of Nazi Germany.”
The league condemned her choice of words as offensive to all Jews for comparing her book sales to the Holocaust.
“Such comparisons serve to only trivialize the Holocaust,” ADL officials told TMZ, “and are deeply offensive to Jews and other survivors.”
Rivers protested against the ban on Tuesday by handcuffing herself to a shopping cart at one of the store’s California locations.
The rebellion lasted approximately half an hour with Rivers handing out and signing copies of her book to store customers while yelling through a bullhorn that the store’s ban violated her first Amendment rights. Rivers was led away by police along with a camera crew she brought to film the protest.
“She had a whole entourage,” Burbank city spokesman Drew Sugars told the Los Angeles Times. “Sounds like a staged media event.”
Sugars said that no arrests or charges were made.
Rivers, who is also Jewish, defended her statement, saying that it was a reminder of how Holocaust victims had their rights stripped.
“My husband lost his entire family in the Holocaust,” she told KTLA. “My comment reminds people of the Holocaust because half the people now don’t even believe it ever happened.”
Costco officials did not respond to comment, but employees say that the store is a “family-friendly environment that does not sell explicit books or video games or other materials.”
