This morning on our local radio station, Rickey Smiley and Gary with the Tea spoke about how many women choose to be lesbians due to some type of sexual abuse by a man in their past. Well, Queen Latifah spoke with Essence magazine about how she was victime of sexual abuse as a child.

During her interview with Essence, Latifah says a male teenage babysitter preyed upon her, leaving her unable to form relationships as an adult.”He violated me,” said the 39-year-old, born Dana Owens. “I never told anybody. I just buried it as deeply as I could and kept people at an arms length. I never really let a person get too close to me.  I could have been married years ago, but I had a commitment issue.”

She didn’t talk about the abuse until the death of her brother wherein she couldn’t hold the secret any longer. “I had to get it off my chest. My mother felt terrible. She was kind of a country girl, so she wasn’t up on how slick people could be. When I told my dad, he said nothing,” she tells the publication.

Latifah xposes that for many years she blamed herself for the sexual abuse she endured. “I was a kid, and I had no power or control over the situation. I really wish I’d had the strength and the knowledge to say something sooner, because I always wondered, Did he do that to someone else? But I accept that the time for action has come and gone.”

For more on this interesting article on Queen Latifah check out the latest issue of Essence magazine, on newsstands June 12.

http://www.essence.com/

In related news, Latifah will host the official televised BET Awards afterparty, which will air following its live broadcast of the main event on June 28 at 8 p.m.Little Ashes film

Taking Lives release

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