Millie Bobby Brown has opened up about the ‘gross’ sexualization she experienced after rising to fame while she was still a child.
Brown was just 12 years old when she stepped into the spotlight in the role of Eleven in the first season of Stranger Things – and though it might be hard to believe, a whole eight years has passed since then.
The actor is now a fully-fledged adult, at 20 years old and engaged to partner Jake Bongiovi, but she’s spoken in the past about how she found herself dealing with adult topics long before she should have.
Brown made the comments in an episode of The Guilty Feminist podcast in 2022, shortly after she turned 18.
In the interview, she spoke about dealing with sexualization and explained she had ‘definitely been dealing with that more in the last couple weeks of turning 18’.
“[I’m] definitely seeing a difference between the way people act and the way the press and social media react to me coming of age. It’s gross,” she said.
Millie Bobby Brown was 12 in the first season of Stranger Things. (Instagram/@milliebobbybrown)
However, while Brown had noticed a difference in the types of comments she was receiving since she turned 18, she noted that she has been dealing with sexualization ‘forever’.
“[It’s] a good representation of what’s going on in the world and how young girls are sexualized,” she continued. “I have been dealing with that – but I have also been dealing with that forever.”
She pointed to one particular occasion in which she received backlash for wearing a low-cut dress to an awards ceremony when she was a younger teenager, saying she was ‘crucified’ over her outfit.
The star described the public attention as ‘gross’. (Instagram/@milliebobbybrown)
“I thought, is this really what we should be talking about? We should be talking about the incredible people that were there at the awards show, the talent that was there, the people we are representing,” she noted.
On top of the public attention, Brown pointed out that she also had to deal with all the regular struggles that teenagers face every day.
“I deal with the same things any 18-year-old is dealing with,” she said. “Navigating being an adult and having relationships and friendships, and it’s all of those things.
“Being liked and trying to fit in, it’s all a lot, and you’re trying to [know] yourself while doing that. The only difference is obviously I’m doing that in the public eye. It can be really overwhelming.”
Brown even went as far as to brand social media as ‘the worst place of all time’, saying at the time she would not be ‘posting anything personal anymore’.