Alyssa Milano Takes on Sexual Harassment and Donald Trump in Powerful New Essay
In a detailed essay for Rolling Stone, Alyssa Milano said she’s dealt with gender inequality and harassment throughout her acting career and urged the public to hold Donald Trump accountable for his lewd comments about women.
The essay, published today, outlined why Milano is supporting Time’s Up, a Hollywood initiative designed to fight sexual harassment and assault. Milano became an integral part of the #MeToo movement when she encouraged women to share their experiences with sexual misconduct on Twitter, boosting a hashtag created by civil rights activist Tarana Burke. While she’s championed other women’s stories, Milano hasn’t revealed too much about her personal experiences with harassment in the entertainment industry.
“I have not told my #MeToo stories, but I will say I dealt with one assault case in the industry and one not in the industry. And I don’t know a week that has gone by in my 35-year career that I haven’t dealt with harassment and gender inequality in some capacity,” she writes.
She listed legislation, lobbying and education about gender inequality as ways through which the Time’s Up initiative can keep the #MeToo momentum going. Already, 30 Hollywood women, including Reese Witherspoon and Eva Longoria, have backed Time’s Up. Milano also encouraged men to become part of the solution—and called out Donald Trump for bragging about grabbing women by the pussy and trying to rollback women’s rights in his first year as president.
“We must hold Trump accountable. If we’re asking senators to resign because of sexual misconduct, what message does it send that we are allowing a man who has had 19 women come forward and accuse him of misconduct, to be our president?” she writes. “This is behavior that I think has stolen generations of women from reaching their potential, and that to me is truly heartbreaking.”
Milano described how supporting the #MeToo movement has impacted her. She explained that she didn’t just want represent voices in her own industry, but those of every woman that has been a victim of such “such a sadly common phenomenon.”
“Every fiber of who I am on a cellular level has been changed since I sent that tweet. It would be impossible not to be affected or impacted by the stories that people have shared with me,” she writes.