“I told no one and lived with the shame and guilt thinking all along that I, a 9-year-old child, was somehow responsible for the actions of a grown man.”
America Ferrera has joined the growing list of women sharing their sexual assault and harassment stories online as part of the #MeToo movement.
Both famous and everyday women have used the hashtag to speak out, following the sexual assault allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. The “me too” movement first started gaining traction when Alyssa Milano tweeted about it on Sunday.
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On Monday evening, Ferrera posted “me too” on her Instagram and Twitter accounts, revealing that she was sexually assaulted for the first time at the age of 9.
“I told no one and lived with the shame and guilt thinking all along that I, a 9-year-old child, was somehow responsible for the actions of a grown man,” wrote the now 33-year-old actor, who noted that her assaulter was a man she knew and saw often.
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Ferrera went on to encourage women to break their silence about sexual harassment and assault, “so that the next generation of girls won’t have to live with this bullshit.”
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This is far from the first time the Superstore actor has used her platform to speak out about women’s rights. She had a leading role at the Women’s March in Washington D.C. in January and campaigned for Hillary Clinton during the presidential election.
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In Nov. 2015, Ferrera talked to BuzzFeed News about the importance of “standing up for women and girls.” “It’s just seizing the opportunity when the opportunity is there to say the thing that needs to be said,” she said at the time.
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