Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke is finished defending her nude scenes.
The actress explains why she’s sick of talking about her bits in an op-ed written for Huffington Post UK’s month-long All Women Everywhere campaign.
The month-long campaign, which aligns with the celebration of International Women’s Day Wednesday, March 8, also provides a platform to “reflect on the diverse mix of female experience and voices,” something that’s not lost on the actress.
On Wednesday, Clarke posted a link to her piece: “Women’s day?! HELLS TO THE YEAH. I had the honour of guest editing the Huffington post Women’s Day edition, and here it is…”
“If you’ve watched ‘Game of Thrones’ then, spoiler, you will have seen me in the nude,” she writes.
Adding, “there are plenty of ways in which people want me to respond to questions about this fact and plenty of reasons why I do not feel the need to justify myself.”
Preparing for the highly anticipated seventh season of the HBO series, where she plays arguably one of the strongest female characters on television today, Clarke explains how roles like Daenerys Targaryen brought strength to her everyday life.
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“The roles I’ve played have given me an insight into what it feels like to be a woman who stands up to inequality and hate, and stands out as a feminist,” she writes. “It has forced me to stand by my actions and be OK with the consequences.”
“Do I get treated equally at work?,” Clarke writes. “Not always. Does every woman? No, and the statistics back that up.”
“Do I get asked questions at press junkets by men and women alike, specifically because they will get headline grabbing responses from a young woman? Yes.”
Growing up, Clarke credits her family with instilling feminist values at an early age, writing, “my life has been shaped by a true sense of equality,” she said. “It was simply etched into every action, choice, and behaviour of my family.”
“It was a recognized matter of fact that I, as a woman, was no different to my brother,” she continued. “Just as my mum was no different from my father in their careers, therefore I was raised in an equal earning, equally managed household that showed me anything a man could do, a woman could and should do too. So I grew up with a voice, but it was not a shared voice of a generation, and it was only much later I realized what an incredible, feminist, start to life I had been given.”
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Although she might have grown up to understand feminism, Clarke reveals she still refers to herself as a “guilty feminist,” offering advice for other women who want to show that kindness is the new sexy.
“I believe we all have the opportunity to stand up as women in our ordinary everyday lives,” she continued. “I believe that we all have the power to replace hate with justice, open-heartedness and kindness.”
“One act of kindness can take your day from bearable to enjoyable in a heartbeat,” she writes. “Because being kind is showing someone that they are seen and heard, and that they do indeed matter. And that’s sexy.”
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