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Florence Pugh is not ashamed of her body, and she’s calling out the haters who think she should be. The English actress attended the Valentino show Friday in a stunning pink sheer dress, and was, unfortunately, but not surprisingly, hit with an onslaught of strangers delivering hateful messages. On Sunday, she shared a gallery of photos with a long message denouncing the body-shaming she received from men. “I was excited to wear it, not a wink of me was nervous. I wasn’t before, during, or even now after,” she wrote.
Pugh explained she was never nervous to wear the dress and knew there would be commentary, but said it was interesting to, “watch and witness” how easy it is for men to “totally destroy a woman’s body, publicly, proudly, for everyone to see.”
The 26-year-old explained she has come to terms with the “intricacies” of her body and is “happy” with all of the “‘flaws’” she “couldn’t bear to look at when” when she was 14. “Many of you wanted to aggressively let me know how disappointed you were by my ‘tiny tits’, or how I should be embarrassed by being so ‘flat-chested,’” she continued. “I’ve lived in my body for a long time. I’m fully aware of my breast size and am not scared of it.”
The Black Widow actress continued her powering statement, asking, “Why are you so scared of breasts? Small? Large? Left? Right? Only one? Maybe none?” “I’m very grateful that I grew up in a household with very strong, powerful, curvy women. We were raised to find power in the creases of our body. To be loud about being comfortable,” she added. Pugh concluded her post by offering advice, “Grow up. Respect people. Respect bodies. Respect all women. Respect humans. Life will get a whole lot easier, I promise.”
Pugh has opened in the past about having her body under a microscope in the industry, and explained how she overcame issues with her body. She told Glamour in 2020, that she did a job at the start of her career where it was made “very apparent” she needed to lose weight. “When it was over, I was very aware I didn’t want to do that kind of work,” she said. “Because I was faced with that, I realized what I wanted to represent, and had that not happened, I may not have overcome my issues with my body at such an early age. I’m happy about that, but a lot of women aren’t that lucky.”
She opened up about social media in the same interview, saying she’s always seen it “as a bit of a joke.” “But I have a sister who’s seven years younger than me and it’s made me acutely aware of the negatives of social media. The impact it has on her life at every stage of the day is unbelievable,” the Little Women star said. “Seeing that has made me more conscious of everyone’s constant impulse to have whatever is on their phone so I try not to add to that as much as I can.”