Rowan Blanchard Pens Powerful Essay & Isn't Going to be Saying 'Sorry' Anytime Soon

Rowan Blanchard just keeps being our favorite in everything — especially when it comes to women’s rights and speaking out for things that she believes in.

In a new essay with Rookie mag, the 14-year-old actress and activist writes about how she was apologizing for everything and how she’s not going to be ‘sorry’ anymore.

“My first memory of rejecting my emotions to improve another person’s outlook on me was in the third grade, although I’m sure it happened unconsciously even before that. We often read books in which dogs died so, naturally, I would cry before, during, and after class. When I realized that crying = boys making fun of you, instead of delivering a lecture about the layers and power in of female emotion and the history of its being used to undermine women (eight-year-old me didn’t really know about that yet), I apologized,” she writes.

Rowan continues, “And when on the first day of middle school, an eager/nervous/anxious/EXCITED TO HAVE A LOCKER!!! me was greeted by teachers who warned me of suspension because of the length of my skirt, I apologized. That same year, when I was just becoming aware of my body, a boy I had formerly considered a friend told me my arms were “so hairy they could be Godzilla’s,” so I told him I was sorry. On that same day, I snuck a razor out of my mom’s bathroom and shaved my legs for the first time, praying that the boy hadn’t seen how Godzilla THEY were. That was also the week I snuck concealer out of my mom’s bathroom and applied it at 6:30 AM because that same boy had told me my under eyes were dishearteningly dark. I’d apologized about that, too.”

Read Rowan‘s entire essay RIGHT NOW!