Twilight: Eclipse star Robert Pattinson is usually polite and reserved, but he came out with guns blazing to defend his co-star/girlfriend Kristen Stewart.
Stewart, 20, was recently criticized when she compared her encounters with intrusive paparazzi as akin to “being raped.”
Almost immediately, bloggers and tabloids launched a vicious attack on Kristen, saying her casual use of the word “rape” was insensitive to real rape victims. After groups like RAINN (Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network) slammed her, Stewart she issued an apology.
But Pattinson, 24, is peeved that people made such a fuss over Kristen’s harmless comment.
“None of those associations came out and gave a statement [criticizing Kristen] without being called upon by the media first,” he told EW. “That whole system of Internet journalists, where no one is called to account, is almost entirely about hate. All these people get away with doing it because they have no responsibility to anyone.”
‘Nerds Hiding Behind Computers’
Robert went a step further and slammed anonymous bloggers as cowards who feel free to bash celebrities while hiding behind their laptops.
“There are so many little nerds behind their computers, on their little blogs,” he says.
Meanwhile, Kristen says Pattinson can get away with making nasty comments more than she can because Internet critics are harder on her.
“See, if I said that? Crucifixion,” Stewart said of Rob’s rant. “You can say so much more than me. It’s insane…you could say, ‘I just took a s***on the Queen’s face,’ and people would be like, ‘Oh, I love him! I love him!’”
Still, Stewart concedes that her use of the term “rape” to describe her encounters with photographers was wrong. “I’m so sensitive about stuff like that,” she says. “I used the wrong word. I should have said ‘violated’.”
She adds: “I probably shouldn’t say this, but I just feel like people got so excited once they saw that it was me. It was like, ‘Sweet! Let’s get her!’ For the people to exploit it under the guise of being morally upstanding is disgusting — and it embarrassed me because I was a part of it.”
Eclipse, which co-stars Ashley Greene, Kellan Lutz and Taylor Lautner, comes out June 30.
Samantha Chang is the executive editor of TheImproper and a celebrity editor at Examiner.
