Common Reveals A Family Friend Molested Him During A Sleepover

Photo by Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Images for Common’s Book Tour In New York

If Tarana Burke‘s #MeToo movement has a silver lining of any kind, it’s the unbelievable bravery put forth by the women like Ashanti and others have faced. But now more than ever we’re hearing more from men with the same experiences. From Terry Crews to R. Kelly, more men have come forward, revealing their own battles with being sexually assaulted, raped or molested. Common is the latest to join that group of men.

In his new book, Let Love Have The Last Word, the Oscar award-winning rapper revealed he was a victim of molestation by a family friend he refers to as “Brandon”.

Photo by Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Images for Common’s Book Tour In New York

He recalls the moment while preparing for his 2018 role in HBO’s The Tale. “And one day, while talking through the script with Laura [Dern], old memories surprisingly flashed in my mind. I said to Laura, ‘I think I was abused.’ Right there, it all came back to my mind as if someone had suddenly inserted deleted scenes into that little movie in my head, scenes that I hadn’t remembered or thought about before, scenes I could’ve even remember remembering.”

“[Brandon] kept saying, ‘It’s okay, it’s okay’ as he pulled down my shorts and molested me,” Common wrote. “Thinking back, I should’ve gotten up from the bed and ran out of the room; but I felt a deep and sudden shame for what happened, and for what he kept trying to make happen as I had brought it all on myself,” he wrote.

In an interview with TMZ, he says, “It’s really I’m telling what I feel and the experiences that I’ve had and ways that I dealt with it and I want people to know that it’s a safe place to be able to talk about things you go through. It’s something I know a lot of people experience, especially Black young men and women have experienced it…and a lot of people are afraid to talk about it. And the only way we stop the cycle is to talk about it so that’s why I chose to say something about it.”