"The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" actress America Ferrera revealed on Instagram a heartbreaking experience from when she was younger. This is amid several other celebrities recounting their own harrowing memories.
The post, which the 33-year-old actress shared on Tuesday, Oct. 17, started off with "Me too," hinting that she also had her fair share of traumatic experiences. Ferrera revealed that she was sexually assaulted when she was 9 years old. I was reportedly done by a person she had to see every day for years after the incident.
Ferrera did not exactly say what the perpetrator did to her in detail. But the "Ugly Betty" star went on narrating that she had to take the horrors of the experience with her, as she had to endure the daily struggle of meeting the suspect who casually waved and smiled at her, acting like nothing happened.
She also added that she kept mum about the attack thinking that she was "somehow responsible for the actions of a grown man." Ferrera also said that the offender told her to keep her mouth shut. At the end of the post, the Los Angeles, California-born actress encouraged women to speak out "so the next generation of girls won't have to live with this bullshit."
The account of Ferrera is a part of the #MeToo campaign, which came about after celebrities like Angelina Jolie, Gwyneth Paltrow, Ashley Judd, and Kate Beckinsale spoke out of their distressing experience with film producer Harvey Weinstein.
The movement was started by the "Deadly Sins" actress Alyssa Milano, and it aims to help those who have experienced sexual assault by helping them come out to raise awareness of the large impact these abuses are creating. Milano, in an interview with Variety, spoke of how the crusade had come at the perfect time. The #MeToo campaign garnered a whopping 10,000 replies in 20 minutes after its launch.
