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The past month has been a lot for actress Amber Tamblyn. Just a few weeks before reports detailing decades of alleged harassment and assault from Harvey Weinstein were made public, Tamblyn wrote a New York Times op-ed alleging that actor James Woods had hit on her when she was 16, pointing out that he called her a liar when she made the claim on Twitter decades later, and discussing the larger issue of women not being believed when they come forward with allegations. Then earlier this month, actress and comedian Charlene Yi accused Tamblyn’s husband, actor and comedian David Cross, of making racist comments (he has since apologized) and Tamblyn was inevitably washed up in the controversy. In the midst of it all, she took a short but much-needed break from Twitter.

Just before the first day of the Women's Convention — a weekend-long conference in Detroit from the organizers of the Women's March — she ended her Twitter hiatus, and joined the convention to speak on panels about fighting sexual assault, and being a woman in the male-dominant film industry. Tamblyn spoke with Cosmopolitan.com about Weinstein, the silver lining of the Trump presidency, and how women are overwhelmingly held accountable for the actions of their husbands.

You've been vocal your own experience with men and with harassment in the industry, and we're seeing a lot of those stories from women in the past few weeks especially in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein allegations. What have the past few weeks been like in terms of conversations among women in the industry? Are there whisper networks? What's changed?

I feel like the whisper networks have kind of always been there – they've just never really been taken seriously. I have mixed feelings about them because I think that they can do good, but they can also do bad at the same time, depending on who gets outed in any given situation. The Harvey Weinstein thing is a great example of a serial predator getting proverbially kicked out of our industry for good, but at the same time, I've seen some lists with some questionable people attached to that, [and I'm thinking], Really, guys, because he winked at you at a lunch?

Everything is important right now, I think every woman's voice is important, every woman's story is important. We have never in the history of this country had an opportunity in the way that we have right now to share our stories so publicly and be believed. If I could put that AND in all caps, I would. Because we can share them, but normally, a person like a Rose McGowan would just get blown off as being an emotional crazy person, and now people are looking at her like, Oh my god, that's right. And not only is she right, and not only do we believe that, but we also have our own versions of that story, and we're sharing them. I think that the more women talk and come together and share these conversations, the better it is for everybody.

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This month has taken its toll.

Let me tell you. Taken and taken and taken. — Amber Tamblyn (@ambertamblyn) October 19, 2017

What do you think it is, are we hitting critical mass and that's why people are being believed?

Honestly, I trace everything back to the election of Donald Trump. I think that without him being elected, if it had been Hillary Clinton, this would've never happened to Harvey Weinstein. I feel like the election of Donald Trump was a singular pointed message at women telling us that our lives don't matter, and that our safety doesn't matter, and that our physical health doesn't matter, our reproductive rights don't matter, that our gender just doesn't matter, and that we are somehow owned by the country. I think within that one move, it was a giant gesture, and Donald Trump symbolizes, for most women – not all of them – he symbolizes and epitomizes everything that is deeply wrong with masculinity and with the objectification of women. And so within that single vote, it sort of was like a switch was flipped on and every woman just went, I'm done. It's as simple as that: I'm done.

Now we're seeing men scramble with what they're supposed to do now. One man in the industry who's said something is, of course, Quentin Tarantino, when he said he could've done more to stop behavior like Weinstein's. I feel like most men could say that same thing.

It's interesting you bring that up because I single-handedly put Quentin in touch with Jodi Kantor at the New York Times. I had a dinner with him and we had a long conversation about it and he was really processing it. It's really hard, when everyone says, "Oh, these guys knew." All that we ever know is like, don't go in a hotel room with that guy, don't have a meeting there, don't be alone with that guy, is usually the term that you hear. To that end, it was so important to me to stress to Quentin, that everything he was telling me privately, he needed to say publicly. Because it's not just about women standing together and supporting other women, we need male allies, we need men in the business who also speak out for the injustices that have been happening. Not just in Hollywood, but just in general. And Quentin is arguably, not only one of the biggest names in film, but he's also did every single film he's ever done with Harvey. So I really encouraged him and said, "Women need this, they need to hear this from you, they need to know that you know — even if you didn't know it was happening — they need to know the level at which you were complicit." So he accepted that, and when that article came out, I definitely was pointing at that to say like, more men need to follow suit in this direction.

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All healing begins with ownership and the truth. Men; forget your crafted statements and follow suit. https://t.co/DwfK1wrF4c — Amber Tamblyn (@ambertamblyn) October 19, 2017

I've seen people in my own social timelines who definitely would not call themselves feminists but have been sharing #metoo stories, and they've never been active in this way, but that doesn't mean they don't have their own experiences. To women who are feminists and are able to fight, how do we take care of women who aren't ready, and may never be ready?

That's a really good question. It's just hard. We're at the beginning of a real change. I believe that. A lot of the interviews that I've given and people I've talked to have said, do you think it's really going to change? Do you think it's really going to stick? And I do, I do actually. I just think it's going to take time and patience, and a lot of love and compassion and understanding between us, meaning women, all women. Because this is hard and it's hard not to look at each other and accuse each other of being part of the problem. It's what we've systemically been taught to do, is to not look at men as the problem but look at other women as the problem. It's primarily the reason why most white women didn't vote for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. I think that it's important for those who are not ready to share their stories to not feel pressured to do so, and I think it's very important that those that can, like me or like a Rose McGowan or Lupita Nyong o, like anybody who's stepped forward to tell a story should carry that for now. But to have patience with each other, and a lot of love, and to know that we're going to make it an environment in which it's OK to speak. Because that hasn't really existed for us before. And so that's what we're all working toward, an environment where, not only is it OK to speak, but that it's just the behavior's not tolerated any longer. I feel like there's a long way to go, but now we're on the move at least.

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I will say this for the last time. Do not hold women accountable for the actions, decisions or words of their partners. Don’t. Do it. — Amber Tamblyn (@ambertamblyn) October 20, 2017

In the midst of all this, you've been wrapped up in a controversy involving alleged racist comments made by your husband, David Cross, to comedian and actress Charlene Yi. You tweeted that you believe her, but then shortly after took a hiatus from Twitter. What has this been like to deal with at home? Do you feel like people have been coming after you for things your husband said?

You get it on either side. I'm a bad woman because I didn't stand by my husband, and then I'm also a bad woman because I'm married to him in the first place. You can't win on either side. And I frankly don't give a shit what anybody says about it. I know what's true. I've been with him for ten years. He's not a racist, he's not even remotely a racist. He is the, for the most part, one of the biggest advocates in everything he does — in stand-up, in stopping police brutality against people of color. But that does not mean that he is not capable of a racist act. That's a real hard thing for white people to understand about themselves – you can be capable of being racially insensitive, or having a racist thought or experience or moment, and not be a racist. And that's OK. And the more that we start owning those things, which is a conversation that he and I had to have privately about a joke you might make, even if you're doing a character, which is what he was doing — he does this like, racist, redneck character, which is, ironically, his way of mocking the racist South that he grew up in – but now the context in which he did it is racist.

More of getting off Twitter for me is about a break. It had been building and there had been so much, and from the James Woods [op-ed I wrote] up to that point. And I have an 8-month-old daughter, so I'm like, I don't owe Twitter anything. This is a great place for me to express views, but at the same time, I'm not willing to lose sleep and sanity and watch a world be cruel to itself in order to just prove a point.

Follow Hannah on Twitter.



Hannah Smothers Hannah writes about health, sex, and relationships for Cosmopolitan, and you can follow her on Twitter and Instagram

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