Emily Ratajkowski recently shared how she’ll approach parenting her seven-month-old son. In March, the 30-year-old model welcomed her son Sylvester “Sly” Apollo with her husband, Sebastian Bear McClard.
Ratajkowski is a model, actress, and author that rose to fame in Maroon 5’s “Love Somebody” and Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” music videos in 2013. From there, her career soared, and the model made an incredible name for herself.
The new mom recently sat with Interview to promote her book of essays “My Body” and ended up talking about motherhood and gender with philosopher Amia Srinivasan. She shared a glimpse into her life at home with her son when she detailed how she would ‘protect’ her son from the ‘toxic masculinity culture.’
Ratajkowski Became A Mom In March 2021
After her appearance in “Blurred Lines,” Ratajkowski’s career skyrocketed, and she appeared on the cover of many magazines, including the July 2014 issue of GQ. She also got several movie roles from the publicity and acted alongside big names like Ben Affleck and Zac Efron.
After a failed relationship with musician Jeff Magid, Ratajkowski married actor and producer Sebastian Bear McClard in February 2018. The couple currently lives in the NoHo neighborhood of Manhattan, and in October 2020, the model confirmed her pregnancy. She also shared that she and McClard had decided not to share the gender of the child.
In her Vogue essay, Ratajkowski wrote, “When my husband and I tell friends that I’m pregnant, their first question after ‘Congratulations’ is almost always ‘Do you know what you want?’ We like to respond that we won’t know the gender until our child is 18 and that they’ll let us know then.”
In March 2021, the author shared that she had just given birth to a “beautiful boy” named Sebastian.
Ratajkowski Will Shield Her Son From The ‘Toxic Masculinity Culture’
The model takes her motherhood duties very seriously and plans on raising her child with the most care. In her conversation with Srinivasan, Ratajkowski revealed that she would try her best to teach her son to be compassionate and learn the power dynamics between men and women.
“The best I can do is teach him compassion and about these power dynamics that men don’t have to inspect in the way that women do, and make him aware of them and make him care about them,” Ratajkowski said.
“How’s that going to happen? I’m not entirely sure. I also think that this culture that I’m writing about in the book [My Body] is very bad for men. There are books about how bad it is for men.”
The model added, “I see it in my life, the ways that it limits men, and how depressing their existence and their lives can be when they have to adopt this toxic masculinity. So I also feel incredibly protective of him in the same way I would with a daughter from this culture.”
Ratajkowski On Why She Was Relieved About Her Child’s Gender
In a joint Elle interview with Lisa Taddeo, the author spoke about how she initially wanted a daughter but was “relieved” when she discovered she was having a son. The model revealed that the major reason was that she didn’t want her child sexualized before puberty.
“I wanted a daughter initially, but when I found out I was having a son, I was so relieved,” the “My Body” author said.” I want more children, so it might be something I deal with later—being sexualized way before puberty and being aware of it.”
“I have a memory: I did a sexy move down the wall of my parents’ kitchen. I was probably in first grade, and my parents were like, ‘Where did you learn that?’ I was like, ‘I fricking learned it. That’s what women do.'”
‘My Body’ Was Released In November
“My Body” was released on November 9, 2021, and is now available on stores like Amazon in Kindle and hardcover formats.
One of the popular topics in the book is an incident with Robin Thicke, but the model also shared what she faced in a family and society that were mainly concerned about her looks.
In her New York Post interview, Ratajkowski wrote, “It had never occurred to me that the women who gained their power from beauty were indebted to the men whose desire granted them that power in the first place. Those men were the ones in control, not the women the world fawned over.”
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Amazon described the book as an intensely honest “investigation of what it means to be a woman and a commodity.” It was called a “profoundly personal exploration of feminism, sexuality, and power, of men’s treatment of women and women’s rationalizations for accepting that treatment.”
