When the #MeToo Movement struck, it struck hard; several high-profile people fell, including Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, and many others. But today, we must put actor Justin Long, the actor from such films as Live Free Or Die Hard, Dodgeball, Zack and Miri Make a Porno and Drag Me To Hell. If those movies don’t ring a bell, he’s also Kate Bosworth’s husband.
In any case, the #MeToo wave struck Justin Long as well, sparking a controversy that we intend to explain here. Apparently, Justin Long is involved in some inappropriate behavior and interactions with a minor who, at the time, was a big fan of him. Now, how does that unfold? What are the details? Let’s try to find out.
But before we find out, we must state a few things, this post contains topics that some might find triggering, and it is also fair to say that Justin Long is innocent until proven guilty in front of a jury. We are not in the position to put Mr. Long on trial, that is up to the justice system. Still, we must take a look at what is going on here, so without any further ado, let’s begin.
Justin Long Controversy Explained
To put things in context, we must jump into Marty McFly’s and Doc Brown’s DeLorean and jump back in time to the 2000s when Ashton Kutcher had that prank show on MTV called Punk’d.
Back then, in 2005, Ashton ran a prank on Justin Long by staging a dinner with two underage girls, 17 and 18 years old. At the time, the alleged teens were actresses; one of them was Ashley Greene (you might remember from her role in “Twilight”).
The prank unfolded something like this: Justin Long goes out with this duo, a waitress comes in, serves them both alcoholic beverages, and then another actor, playing the restaurant’s owner and manager, steps in, recognizes that Justin Long is having some drinks with his underage daughter at his own restaurant and calls him out for drinking with minors.
Long plays it cool and says that he and the girls can leave. And things seemed to go along with the Punk’d episode.
Jump forward a few years later, and you’ll find that these skits are from a time when we didn’t take those sorts of things that seriously. And now, a woman by the name of Alexa Nikolas claims that she attended parties at Justin Long’s house when she was sixteen and was served alcohol, and after seeing that episode of Punk’d, she found that to be quite triggering.
Triggering Memories
Alexa Nikolas claims that Justin Long and his buddy actor Jonah Hill made passes at her when she was a minor during one of those parties. Then, in July 2019, a 15-year-ol fan wrote to Justin Long on Instagram, sending them a few video messages that he took quite a few days to respond to. Then he asks her to delete a few messages while in character from a Disney show.
The conversation progresses into inappropriate terms, where the 15-year-old calls him “daddy,” and Justin Long plays along. The girl took snapshots of the conversation, and they made their way to the public.
#MeToo Echoes
Justin Long needs to be aware of the implications of the #MeToo movement, and how important it is being aware of the consequences of engaging in conversations with people who are below the age of consent. Also, Long’s wife is Kate Bosworth. That’s a hottie; he shouldn’t be looking elsewhere.
In any case, Justin Long should’ve known better, and he should be careful with his social media interactions because those screenshots could hold up in court against him. Still, Justin Long is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. But nowadays, things of these sorts are handled with much more care because people are way more aware of the implications of illegal interactions with people below the age of consent.
There’s a whole movement raising awareness for this, and in the case of Justin Long, he’s now a target because he has a past with that Punk’d episode, those parties with Jonah Hill, and the whole “bro” culture from the 2000s that is now considered toxic.
