On the heels of musician Moby claiming he and Natalie Portman had once been in a romantic relationship (which Portman vehemently denies), fellow musician Liz Phair tweeted a poignant commentary on this whole debacle.
“If every guy I let kiss me when I was 18 because I was scared and couldn’t figure out how to get out of the car/ apartment/ party [without] pissing them off thought we were ‘dating,’ then this *awakening* of men to what situations are like for girls is going to take much longer,” wrote Phair on Thursday.
In his new memoir, “Then It Fell Apart,” Moby claims he dated Portman in the late ’90s when she was a 20-year-old Harvard student and he was 33. The “Porcelain” singer alleges they kissed “under the centuries-old oak trees” at Harvard and cuddled in her dorm room bed.
“After she fell asleep I carefully extracted myself from her arms and took a taxi back to my hotel,” he writes in his book.
Portman responded with surprise to these allegations, saying in an interview with Harper’s Bazaar UK published on Tuesday that she remembers what went down with Moby very differently.
“I was surprised to hear that he characterized the very short time that I knew him as dating because my recollection is a much older man being creepy with me when I just had graduated high school,” Portman said.
“He said I was 20; I definitely wasn’t. I was a teenager. I had just turned 18. There was no fact checking from him or his publisher ― it almost feels deliberate.”
Moby has since doubled down on his claims about dating Portman, posting on Instagram on Thursday that even though Portman has denied the “romance,” “she’s publicly discussed our involvement, and there’s ample photographic evidence that we briefly dated and then were friends(some pictures included in this post).”
“It hurts to be lied about, especially as I’ve always respected her, and I thought we were friends. But I’ve been receiving anonymous threats of violence from her fans, and it’s affecting my business and my health. So what should I do? What do you do when people believe lies and accusations and not actual photographs and evidence?” he wrote as a caption to several photographs of himself and Portman.
It’s unclear why Moby believes that photographs of himself alongside Portman are “evidence” of a relationship. Most women have photographs of themselves with men that they have never been in a relationship with.
Phair’s tweet about the entire ordeal between Moby and Portman points to an issue many women have dealt with all their lives. If a man comes on to them, they can be fearful of how that man will react if they reject him. This leads to women having to couch their language or interactions with in a way that makes the man feel comfortable.
The “Why Can’t I?” singer elaborated on this point in another tweet, explaining that navigating the waters of trying to avoid being hurt as a young woman can equate to a game of Escape Room.