Kit Harington is rethinking the remarks he made last year about male “sexism” in the entertainment industry.
In a past interview with the Sunday Times, the “Game of Thrones” star said he liked to think of himself “as more than a head of hair or a set of looks.”
“It’s demeaning,” Harington said. “Yes, in some ways you could argue I’ve been employed for a look I have. But there’s a sexism that happens towards men ... there’s definitely a sexism in our industry that happens towards women, and there is towards men, as well.”
At the time, some pointed out that “objectification” would have been a better term for Harington to use. Now, it seems the actor would agree.
“I was wrong there, though,” he told the Guardian in a new interview. “Sexism against men is not something I should have really said. I think what I meant was, being objectified. At that time, I did feel objectified, and now I’ve learned how to control that.”
“Look, I do think men can get objectified,” he continued. “I do feel I have been objectified in the past, sexually, as well, in pieces that have been written about me. Has that made me feel uncomfortable in the past? Yes. Do I think my position is the same as a woman’s in society? No. They’re very different things, and I should have separated them. I was wrong.”
Harington has lamented being called a “hunk” in the past. He later clarified those remarks, too, saying he was trying to raise the issue of unnecessary sexualization of young men in Hollywood.
“I was making a point to sort of say, ‘It just needs to be highlighted,’” he told Out magazine in 2015. “With every photo shoot I ever go to, I’m told to take off my shirt, and I don’t.”
