Megan Fox has spoken candidly about her complicated relationship with feminism, with the actor claiming she was no longer “celebrated” as a feminist after she called her fiancé Machine Gun Kelly “daddy”.
The 35-year-old actor discussed her identity as a feminist during a recent interview with Glamour UK. However, she said that she still feels like she’s been rejected from the “feminist community” because of her “provocative” personality.
“I’ve never felt completely included in the feminist community and I do still think that it’s tricky in an awful way,” the Jennifer’s Body star said. “Whatever I provoke in them is not something that they can digest very well. And so that comes back on me, as they reject me for those reasons. And I just don’t think that I was a very sympathetic victim.”
More specifically, Fox said that her ability to embrace her image as a sex symbol and be so outspoken about it isn’t always well-recieved.
“Me just being free and having fun with how I am and my personality is very provocative for people,” she continued. “I trigger the people who I trigger. That is something that I, as a famous person, do. That is my purpose in a lot of ways.”
Regarding her experiences in the feminist community, the model said that she’s been “judged for” and feels like an “outcast” because of her relationship with Kelly.
“[It seems] I have to meet a certain requirement or follow all of these rules,” she explained. “It’s very bizarre to get judged for, like, ‘What if I am in a BDSM relationship? And I’m like, yes – is that OK with you? Because that’s what I want.’ So, I shouldn’t be outcast from the feminist community, because that is something that I prefer for myself. I feel sexual power in that way, by experiencing it that way.”
According to Fox, many people were “upset” when she publicly called Kelly “Daddy” on the MTV VMA’s red carpet in September. However, she said that she still believes that being able to call her partner whatever she wants is essentially a form of “feminism”.
“I was being celebrated as being a feminist until I had the nerve to call my boyfriend, ‘Daddy,’” she said. “And a lot of people got upset about that, which I think is a funny conversation to actually have, because that goes into allowing women to be… women. Allowing us to experience what we want in life, what we like. That is feminism.”
Despite any rejection that she has faced, Fox said she takes pride in being outspoken and detailed how she’s previously called the media out after enduring some “genuinely harrowing experiences in a ruthlessly misogynistic industry”. With that in mind, she said that she felt like she was “ahead of the MeToo Movement,” a social movement that supports survivors of sexual harrassment and assualt, as she constantly discussed “patriacial things” happening in Hollywood during the early 2000s.
“I was always speaking out against some of the abusive, misogynistic, patriarchal things that were going on in Hollywood back in 2008 and 2009, way before people were ready to embrace that or tolerate it,” she told the outlet. “And I actually got ridiculed for doing it. I think people just have had time to review that, in retrospect.”
The Transformers star has previously opened up about being sexualised in the media. While attending the Met Gala last year, she acknowledged that, although she’s been considered a sex symbol in Hollywood, she’s learned to “embrace it”.
“I’m not afraid to be sexy,” Fox told host Keke Palmer on the red carpet, according to USAToday. “A woman who is intelligent and also knows how to weaponise her beauty… there’s nothing more dangerous than that. There’s nothing more powerful than that.”
“Instead of rejecting it, I’m happy to embrace it and go for the sexy,” she added.
