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Why Emily Ratajkowski Initially Didn't Want to Write About Her "Blurred Lines" Experience

By Allison Crist Nov 09, 2021 7:07 PMTags

A tough decision. 

Emily Ratajkowski's new book My Body is a raw exploration of themes like sexuality, power and feminism. The model draws from her personal experiences in each essay, one of which addresses the controversial music video for Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams' 2013 song "Blurred Lines."

As one of three women who danced around Thicke in the video—which many deemed misogynistic— Ratajkowski became inextricably linked to the controversy. At the time, she defended the video, explaining that she had a good time filming it and felt safe on set in the company of other women. 

However, as she reveals in My Body, Thicke had allegedly groped Ratajkowski during the shoot.

The details of the incident were first made public when The Sunday Times published an excerpt of My Body last month, but as Ratajkowski explained during an exclusive conversation on E! News' Daily Pop on Tuesday, Nov. 9, she initially never wanted to write about what happened in the first place. 

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"That essay, I didn't really want to write because I did not want to 'cancel' anyone or have sort of a 'gotcha' moment," Ratajkowski told E! News' Morgan Stewart.

Thicke has yet to publicly address the alleged incident and did not return requests for comment when this anecdote from the book made news before its release.

Hagop Kalaidjian/BFA/REX/Shutterstock

Ratajkowski, meanwhile, said she's faced plenty of "backlash" ever since her essay excerpt made headlines. 

"It was a brutal couple of days on Twitter for me," Ratajkowski recalled. "But you know, I felt like it was really important because for so long I talked about one side of my experience, which was me having so much fun, being on the set with a bunch of women—which is also true and I guess that's sort of what the book is about."

She continued, "These are the parts you can't see on Instagram, you can't see when you Google something or watch a video, but this is the reality of what it means to be a model and be a commodity in that way."

Ratajkowski tackles this cultural commodification of women throughout My Body, reflecting on her childhood, career and eventually, the birth of her son Sly. She and her producer husband Sebastian Bear-McClard welcomed him in March, and as Ratajkowski revealed in a recent interview with ELLE, she was initially relived to have a son instead of a daughter. 

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On Daily Pop, Morgan asked why that was. 

"I mean, I said it sort of in a conversation where we were talking about what it would bring up for me to have a little girl and kind of how I would teach her about being a woman and how to operate in the world," Ratajkowski explained. "And I just think I had that moment of yeah, it's a little bit of a relief I don't have to deal with this."

Her outlook has changed, though. Added the author, "I hope I have a little girl eventually too."

My Body is now available wherever books are sold.