The last few years has seen Emma Watson become quite outspoken on a number of feminism-related topics, such as marriage, gender roles, and boyfriends and relationship labels (which gave birth to her widely-covered “self-partnered” comment).
It’s actually great to see someone like Emma Watson talk about those issues so openly, which is why her chat with author Valerie Hudson about those very topics – on top of some new ones, like her interest in kink culture – is so damn good.
Speaking of being self-partnered like Emma Watson, the GOAT team talk about how to handle being in iso RN on ‘It’s Been A Big Day For…’ below:
The pair had initially gotten chatting about Valerie’s book, Sex And World Peace, and soon their convo covered a fascinating plethoria of topics. While there’s simply too much to cover here (head over to Teen Vogue for the whole convo, it’s brilliant), there were two very interesting things that were brought up: the fallout over Emma Watson’s “self-partnered” comment and her new-found love of kink culture.
Talking about the infamous Vogue interview where she talked about the anxiety of getting a boyfriend, being married and having kids as she turned 30, which led to her “self-partnered” line, Emma says it came about because she “needed to create a definition for something [she] didn’t feel there was a language for.”
As for the fallout from coining the “self-partnered” term, Emma says it “really riled some people up” but stands by it as it was “less for [her] about the word but more about what it meant — just this idea that we need to reclaim language and space in order to express ourselves, because sometimes it’s really not there.”
The other interesting topic that was brought up in this Emma Watson/Valerie Hudson chat was communication and consent in relationships. Noting how the healthiest relationships she’s seen have been between same-sex couples, Emma says she’s “become slightly fascinated by kink culture” as a result.
Now this isn’t because Emma’s into bondage and gags (which is what most people incorrectly associate kink culture with) but more because she loves how the culture has some of the “best communicators ever” and people “know all about consent.”
“They [smash] that stuff because they really have to get it — but we could all use those models; they’re actually really helpful [relationship] models.”
There’s a lot more happening in this Emma Watson/Valerie Hudson chat than just marriage, boyfriends, kink culture and being self-partnered, so check out the entire thing over here.
If there was anything missing from this awesome chat between Emma Watson and Valerie Hudson, it’s the lack of focus on Little Women (which was brilliant).
I want an Emma Watson deep dive into who left their hydro flask in the background of one of Little Women‘s scenes damn it.
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