Alyssa Milano might not have coined the phrase “Me Too,” but the former Charmed actress played a major role in the hashtag going viral. The two-year anniversary of the Me Too movement going viral is Monday, and Milano plans to share details of her own sexual abuse story on her podcast. Milano previously said she was sexually assaulted at a concert when she was 19 years old.
“The 2 year anniversary of #MeToo going viral is Oct. 15th,” Milano wrote on Twitter Sunday. “In solidarity with the millions of women throughout the world who have told their stories, I’ll share my—never been told before— sexual abuse in Hollywood story on my podcast, [Sorry Not Sorry]. Episode drops tomorrow.”
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Back on Oct. 15, 2017, following the first published reports of producer Harvey Weinstein’s predatory behavior, Milano encouraged women to reply “me too,” as suggested by a friend. Since she posted the tweet, it has been retweeted more than 22,900 times. One of the hundreds of replies came from Milano herself, who simply wrote, “Me too.”
“It was the perfect storm to happen and I feel really blessed I was the vessel, the messenger,” Milano said in a 2017 interview with The Guardian. “It’s very special, probably the greatest thing I’ve felt. I think the fact that it turned into a true movement was surprising. That was never my intention.”
Milano’s activism has gone far beyond just her Twitter page. She was among the celebrities speaking out against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who faced multiple sexual misconduct allegations during his confirmation hearings. During one protest in Washington, D.C., Milano said she was sexually assaulted at a concert as a teenager.
“When I was 19 years old, I was at a concert of a very famous pop star, who told the crowd to get closer to her. This resulted in a stampede,” Milano began. “People were smashed against each other, I couldn’t breathe. I thought I was gonna die. From behind me, I felt a hand up my skirt, and I was punched repeatedly in the vagina. I couldn’t turn around. I looked to the stage, and I looked to the security guards, and I said, ‘Please, help me.’ They couldn’t help me.”
Milano said she did not report the assault at the time because she did not know who the person was who assaulted her in the crowd.
“It’s not a fixed movement, it’s something that will adapt to the women, the territory and the generation,” Milano told The Guardian in 2017. “I do think the most important thing is that it will continue. We are not going to stand for it any more.”
Milano started her Sorry Not Sorry podcast earlier this year. In one August episode, she revealed she had two abortions in 1993. She said she got pregnant despite using birth control, and knew she was not ready to be a parent.
“I refuse to let anyone else’s bulls– morality force me into a life of premarital celibacy. I refuse to live in the narrative that sexual pleasure is for men and that women exist to deliver that pleasure,” Milano told her listeners. “Nobody will say that he was at fault for enjoying sex with me, but you can be damned sure that the men enacting these laws think less of me for deriving the same pleasure from him.”
Milano later explained, “Fifteen years after that first love had fizzled, my life would be completely lacking all its great joys… I would never had been free to be myself — and that’s what this fight is all about: freedom.”
Milano is best known for playing Phoebe Halliwell on Charmed and now stars in Netflix’s Insatiable. Last week, she guest-starred on Grey’s Anatomy.
Photo credit: Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Lifetime
