Matthew McConaughey opens up about being blackmailed into sex at the age of 15

Charlie Herbert

‘I’m not gonna let it beat me’

Matthew McConaughey has opened up about his experience of being blackmailed into having sex at the age of just 15.

McConaughey had previously discussed the traumatic experience in his 2020 memoir Greenlights.

Now, he has bravely discussed the incident further in a recent appearance on a podcast.

Speaking on Amanda de Cadenet’s The Conversation: About the Men, the Interstellar star said that his “first experience was blackmail.”

He told de Cadenet: “I’m not gonna be afraid of relationships because my first experience was blackmail. Uh-uh. That’s an aberration.

“And I’m not gonna let it beat me … I’m not gonna let that beat my sense of trust in people and say, ’No, I can have a healthy relationship.’ Non-negotiable. No.”

Going into more detail about the incident, the 52-year-old said he refused to let it affect any future sexual relationships he had as a teenager.

He said: “I was very clear, again, that was not right, that was not cool, that was not the way it is.

“After that, I got to have some healthy sexual relations and have girls that I liked and liked me, and we slowly got intimate and it was beautiful and clumsy, and all those things, but it wasn’t ugly like that was.

“I don’t have a rocket science answer [about how to cope], it wasn’t an option. I love life too much and believe in life, believe in people. I still go trust-first. I have my spider senses and my sirens.”

The actor was also abused as a teenager as well. When he was 18, he was molested by a man in the back of a van after being knocked unconscious.

McConaughey discusses this in Greenlights as well, and told de Cadenet that he simply had no choice but to move past the trauma he experienced.

He explained: “Am I gonna carry that? I chose, non-negotiably, I’m not going to carry that, bring that baggage into the life I’m going to lead, and how I treat people and how I trust people, and how I look at circumstances and the risk I may take.”

And he revealed the main lesson his father taught him as a youngster regarding the importance of consent.

“He said, ‘Son, as a male in the situation,’ – speaking to me about a heterosexual relationship – ‘if you ever feel the girl, the female, hesitate, stop. You may even feel them hesitate, and then after you stop, they may go, “oh, no, come on”. Don’t. Wait till next time,'” McConaughey said.

“He said, ‘Trust you’ll have another day, if it is to be.'”

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