She Helped Popularize The #MeToo Movement
Tarana Burke first created the #MeToo movement back in 2006, and it had become a movement amongst the women of color on Myspace before hashtags were popular. However, Alyssa Milano is given credit for assisting in picking the movement back up after the sexual harassment and assault allegations against Harvey Weinstein in October 2017. She tweeted a photo of a screencap that said, "If all women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote 'me too' as a status, we might give the world a sense of the magnitude of the problem."
She captioned her screencap "If you've been sexually harassed or assaulted write 'me too' as a reply to this tweet." The next day, Milano realized that she had up to 55,000 replies and #MeToo had made it as the No. 1 trending topic on Twitter, along with 85 million Facebook posts with the phrase "It was the perfect storm to happen and I feel really blessed I was the vessel, the messenger. It's very special, probably the greatest thing I've ever felt. I think the fact that it turned into a true movement was surprising. That was never my intention."
She'd Rather Be An Activist Than An Actress
Milano is currently starring on Netflix's negatively reviewed Insatiable after years of flying under the radar after Charmed. She told People Mag that she wouldn't even mind retiring from her acting career altogether to focus exclusively on activism, especially when it comes to raising her son and daughter to be productive and dedicated citizens. She said, "I just really believe that if my integrity stays intact and I stay true to who I am and what I believe in...if it means I'm not going to work in this industry, I'm not going to work in this industry.
But at least I can go to bed knowing that I fought the good fight." She adds that she has been an activist since she was just 15 years old, so if she quit raising awareness and funds for causes that she believes in it would be considered 'disingenuous.' She said, "we are in such a time right now that there is so much chaos and turmoil, and it's really hard to shelter them from that, so we have very deep conversations about what's happening."